I just got stopped by a cop....

" It is estimated that the Rothschilds held half the world's wealth in the 19th century."

 bwahaha... what a ludicrous statement..

 They ate half the meat, they drank half the wine.. and enjoyed half the sunsets with half the pretty girls (I say enjoyed.. but they were probably a bit too inebriated and stuffed to pay full attention..)

 Time and energy is your real wealth.. you get about the same amount as a Rothschild.. use it wisely... worrying about whether someone else is getting your share isn't IMHO...

How about this example?  Someone decided they did not want to go through the checkpoint so they U-turned and the cops chased and now an innocent person is dead.  I personally think the police are nearly as at fault for this death as the driver that caused the accident.

Woman dies in collision with car chased by police

Latia Winchester loved children. She worked at a day care center where the kids called her “Miss Tia.” She babied her pet chihuahua, Sugar, and talked about wanting her own children.

But shortly after 10:15 p.m. Saturday, passing through the intersection at North Davidson Street and Parkwood Avenue, Winchester’s maroon Chevrolet Impala was broad-sided by a car being chased by an N.C. Highway Patrol cruiser, authorities said.

Winchester, 25, died immediately. Witnesses said she wasn’t wearing a seat belt and apparently was thrown from her car, which slammed into the side of a house at 1617 North Davidson.

The chase began after a silver Cadillac driven by Eddie Bernard Ellison, 41, had stopped, U-turned and sped away from a routine highway patrol checkpoint at 30th Street and The Plaza, patrol spokesman Sgt. J.E. Brewer said Sunday.

It lasted about 30 seconds, Brewer said.

“It was clear to us that he was trying to avoid a check,” he said. “It’s our experience that when a person stops, turns and leaves a check station, they’re engaged in some type of violation.”

Ellison was driving with a revoked license, he said. Sunday, he and a passenger were in a hospital being treated for injuries. Brewer said the highway patrol is still investigating the incident, and will confer with the Mecklenburg County District Attorney’s office on what charges Ellison will face. Charlotte-Mecklenburg police were called in to reconstruct the incident.

N.C. court records show that Ellison served eight years in prison on a first-degree burglary conviction in 1992. Since his release in 2000, he’s been arrested multiple times, including two counts of shoplifting in 2007. He was fined $330 and banned from Wal-Mart and K-Mart.

That same year, he was convicted of driving with a revoked license and fined $160. Last May, records show he was charged again with driving while his license was revoked, resisting an officer and drug possession. It wasn’t clear Sunday how those cases were resolved. Brewer said Sunday he didn’t know if Ellison had a blood alcohol test after the crash.

It was the second time in two nights that someone had crashed in CMPD’s jurisdiction after being chased by officers from another agency. Late Friday, two men were taken to the hospital with serious injuries after they crashed while being pursued by Cabarrus County Sheriff’s deputies. The deputies were investigating a home invasion and stabbing near Concord when the victim pointed out the suspect’s car and the officers gave chase.

Winchester’s family and friends say the patrol shouldn’t have been chasing a car for avoiding a checkpoint.

“Maybe if he killed someone or robbed a bank, chase him then,” said friend Lakeisha Wilson, who’d just been with Winchester. “Or on the highway. Not in a residential area. Anything could have happened there – a child could have popped out.”

Renae Steele, Winchester’s mother, said she doesn’t know why anyone would flee a checkpoint and risk killing someone. “It doesn’t make sense,” she said. “Oh gosh, I miss her.”

“It just doesn’t seem real to me. I just keep remembering her smile.”

Brewer said it’s the highway patrol’s policy to pursue anyone who blatantly avoids a checkpoint. “You don’t know what he’s got in the vehicle – drugs, guns – or why he’s fleeing,” he said. “We engage that person if he refuses to stop. Unfortunately in this case, he ran a stoplight and killed somebody.

“If anyone’s to blame, it’s the driver of that car. He should have stopped.”

Winchester appeared to have been driving on Parkwood crossing North Davidson with a green light when Ellison ran a red light and struck her car on the passenger side, witnesses said. Ellison’s car smashed into a utility pole on Parkwood. Ellison tried to flee on foot, but was quickly caught, Brewer said.

Ernest Walker, who lives at 1617 North Davidson, said he was asleep in a room just above where Winchester’s car slammed into his house, knocking a hole in the brick foundation.

“I heard a big bang,” Walker said. “I thought a tree had fallen on the house.”

Walker jumped out of bed, and ran onto the porch. He saw the car, but no driver. “I looked over the car, and saw the woman lying on the ground,” he said. “The police said she wasn’t wearing a seat belt. It looked like she was ejected.”

Winchester was from New York, but moved to Charlotte before high school, Wilson said. She graduated from Independence High in 2003. She’d been playing Monopoly at Lakeisha Wilson’s house when she left to meet a friend in north Charlotte. Before leaving, Winchester had put baby shoes on Wilson’s 10-month-old daughter and they hugged goodbye.

Wilson headed out to meet other friends at a south Charlotte restaurant. Winchester said she might meet them there later.

“I gave her a nice, tight hug and said, ‘I’ll see you later,’” Wilson said. “And that was it.”

At 6 a.m. Sunday, she got a text message from Winchester’s boyfriend: “Tia’s dead.”

http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2010/03...

NOTE: Check out the comment section.  It appears as though there were more anti-roadblock comments that were removed by the newspaper.

Surprising that they didn't ticket the family of the deceased for her not wearing a seatbelt <sarcasm>.

You know how they'll solve this next, don't you?  Electronic de-activation of the fleeing car.  It's coming ... all for our safety.  Great Britain had a proposed program a few years back where every vehicle would have a black box with a satellite link.  If the car exceeded the speed limit, a warning would sound.  If the car continued to exceed the limit, the satellite would shut down the engine of the car and dispatch a LEO to the scene to issue the driver a citation.  Thank goodness the Brits didn't let this go through ... yet.

 I'll read it and post here what I think. Tell you what, I won't show a snide disdain for what you believe either. :-) You know, like rote dismissal of stuff. Anyone can claim something's not happening if they a.) aren't looking or refuse to look, and b.) just deny everything and anything out of hand.   Primarily that attitude has no place here or anywhere, secondly, said attitude sets up dangerous "inside the box" cognitive traps, and thirdly and most importantly, I won't pretend to know the information that you know. Fair enough?  

But, is it not possible that power cliques are spontaneously self-organizing? If so, then I'd think that would be significantly more dangerous than any "planned" structures as the former is nearly impossible to characterize where the latter can leave a trail of prima facie evidence that something's amiss. 

Do it for the children. 

Here's the sick part. When the national dialogue shifts from critical thinking to emotive arguments, then the republic is dead. And nothing jerks the heartstrings of a parent more than the visual of little Johnny getting killed in a high speed chase. All reason at that point gets flushed as parents would throw every last neighbor of theirs off a cliff to save their child (it's the parental instinct to protect their offspring as you know). 

Where this emotional argument falls apart is that those that fall into it fail to realize that their so-called "reasonable restraints" can and will result in some other Johnny's parent going to jail for something stupid (thus screwing up his life) or, little Johnny, now adult Big John, being thrown over a cliff by another parent to protect their little Johnny. 

What an awful strawman Plato. This isn't dialogue. Your definition of "wealth" strains the imagination. I guess if I defined it that way then I'd be able to smash the argument too. How much meat and wine do you think JPMC holds on hand? Or, is wealth also defined as land, gold, silver, trade contracts, real estate, ships, ect?

 I disagree Morpheus..  what does it mean to "own" half the earth ... ?  It's a conceit.. especially for a mortal.

 The idea of "ownership" hides a way of viewing the world.. think about the way the word "my" is used:

 My Car.  My poem ?  My wife ?  My children ?  My land ?  Myself ?

 Does the language encourage us to see wives and children as chattel ?   - see: Sapir Whorf hypothesis  - http://www.aber.ac.uk/media/Documents/short/whorf.html

 Anyhoo, I'm off topic.. so I'll quit while I'm behind...  me trying to unplug Morpheus... such chutzpah!  :o)

Nathan Rothschild was able to buy up the entire British guilt market after the Battle of Waterloo. That's just one son in the Rothschild Empire. Quibbling over the percentage of ownership by the Rothschilds is fruitless IMO. Any banking empire with the capacity to completely buy up a nation's debt is still powerful enough to control a nation and hence worth looking into. I'm not interested in whether the Rothschilds at one time owned 29%, 43%, 50% or 80% of the world's wealth. It's splitting hairs and really advances nothing, correct? What I am interested in is that their financial empire is powerful enough to influence history. That would be enough to raise my eyebrow.  Is that something that we can agree on? 

I do believe that nations today are controlled by their bond markets. The borrower is subservient to the lender. 

 "I do believe that nations today are controlled by their bond markets.."

   until they choose to assert sovereignty...

.. or say well done Mr Rothschild, you won that one.. now let's quit playing monopoly and find a more fun game.

Too late, many are already getting this feature courtesy of Government Motors.

Here is another reason I'll never own a car with OnStar.