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In the foreground, a CN train of ore pelletts will shortly commence discharge at 'Dock 5', Duluth, Minnesota. On the far side of Saint Louis Bay, a BNSF train of coal, probably from the Powder River Basin, is discharging at the Midwest Energy coal dock in Superior, Wisconsin. September 9th, 2017.
KSB Chairman Larry Thomas presented Bailey McKay, Hunter McKay, Dakota McKay, Brad McKay and Billy Carter of McKay Farms with the Ky Soybean Contest State Champion Award at the 2022 Crop Production Awards Banquet held at the Sloan Convention Center in Bowling Green, Kentucky.
An eastbound NS coal train rolls east through the upper reaches of the Ohio River Valley on the Fort Wayne Line, passing under classic Pennsy position lights at Haysville, Pennsylvania.
Graffiti (plural; singular graffiti or graffito, the latter rarely used except in archeology) is art that is written, painted or drawn on a wall or other surface, usually without permission and within public view. Graffiti ranges from simple written words to elaborate wall paintings, and has existed since ancient times, with examples dating back to ancient Egypt, ancient Greece, and the Roman Empire (see also mural).
Graffiti is a controversial subject. In most countries, marking or painting property without permission is considered by property owners and civic authorities as defacement and vandalism, which is a punishable crime, citing the use of graffiti by street gangs to mark territory or to serve as an indicator of gang-related activities. Graffiti has become visualized as a growing urban "problem" for many cities in industrialized nations, spreading from the New York City subway system and Philadelphia in the early 1970s to the rest of the United States and Europe and other world regions
"Graffiti" (usually both singular and plural) and the rare singular form "graffito" are from the Italian word graffiato ("scratched"). The term "graffiti" is used in art history for works of art produced by scratching a design into a surface. A related term is "sgraffito", which involves scratching through one layer of pigment to reveal another beneath it. This technique was primarily used by potters who would glaze their wares and then scratch a design into them. In ancient times graffiti were carved on walls with a sharp object, although sometimes chalk or coal were used. The word originates from Greek γράφειν—graphein—meaning "to write".
The term graffiti originally referred to the inscriptions, figure drawings, and such, found on the walls of ancient sepulchres or ruins, as in the Catacombs of Rome or at Pompeii. Historically, these writings were not considered vanadlism, which today is considered part of the definition of graffiti.
The only known source of the Safaitic language, an ancient form of Arabic, is from graffiti: inscriptions scratched on to the surface of rocks and boulders in the predominantly basalt desert of southern Syria, eastern Jordan and northern Saudi Arabia. Safaitic dates from the first century BC to the fourth century AD.
Some of the oldest cave paintings in the world are 40,000 year old ones found in Australia. The oldest written graffiti was found in ancient Rome around 2500 years ago. Most graffiti from the time was boasts about sexual experiences Graffiti in Ancient Rome was a form of communication, and was not considered vandalism.
Ancient tourists visiting the 5th-century citadel at Sigiriya in Sri Lanka write their names and commentary over the "mirror wall", adding up to over 1800 individual graffiti produced there between the 6th and 18th centuries. Most of the graffiti refer to the frescoes of semi-nude females found there. One reads:
Wet with cool dew drops
fragrant with perfume from the flowers
came the gentle breeze
jasmine and water lily
dance in the spring sunshine
side-long glances
of the golden-hued ladies
stab into my thoughts
heaven itself cannot take my mind
as it has been captivated by one lass
among the five hundred I have seen here.
Among the ancient political graffiti examples were Arab satirist poems. Yazid al-Himyari, an Umayyad Arab and Persian poet, was most known for writing his political poetry on the walls between Sajistan and Basra, manifesting a strong hatred towards the Umayyad regime and its walis, and people used to read and circulate them very widely.
Graffiti, known as Tacherons, were frequently scratched on Romanesque Scandinavian church walls. When Renaissance artists such as Pinturicchio, Raphael, Michelangelo, Ghirlandaio, or Filippino Lippi descended into the ruins of Nero's Domus Aurea, they carved or painted their names and returned to initiate the grottesche style of decoration.
There are also examples of graffiti occurring in American history, such as Independence Rock, a national landmark along the Oregon Trail.
Later, French soldiers carved their names on monuments during the Napoleonic campaign of Egypt in the 1790s. Lord Byron's survives on one of the columns of the Temple of Poseidon at Cape Sounion in Attica, Greece.
The oldest known example of graffiti "monikers" found on traincars created by hobos and railworkers since the late 1800s. The Bozo Texino monikers were documented by filmmaker Bill Daniel in his 2005 film, Who is Bozo Texino?.
In World War II, an inscription on a wall at the fortress of Verdun was seen as an illustration of the US response twice in a generation to the wrongs of the Old World:
During World War II and for decades after, the phrase "Kilroy was here" with an accompanying illustration was widespread throughout the world, due to its use by American troops and ultimately filtering into American popular culture. Shortly after the death of Charlie Parker (nicknamed "Yardbird" or "Bird"), graffiti began appearing around New York with the words "Bird Lives".
Modern graffiti art has its origins with young people in 1960s and 70s in New York City and Philadelphia. Tags were the first form of stylised contemporary graffiti. Eventually, throw-ups and pieces evolved with the desire to create larger art. Writers used spray paint and other kind of materials to leave tags or to create images on the sides subway trains. and eventually moved into the city after the NYC metro began to buy new trains and paint over graffiti.
While the art had many advocates and appreciators—including the cultural critic Norman Mailer—others, including New York City mayor Ed Koch, considered it to be defacement of public property, and saw it as a form of public blight. The ‘taggers’ called what they did ‘writing’—though an important 1974 essay by Mailer referred to it using the term ‘graffiti.’
Contemporary graffiti style has been heavily influenced by hip hop culture and the myriad international styles derived from Philadelphia and New York City Subway graffiti; however, there are many other traditions of notable graffiti in the twentieth century. Graffiti have long appeared on building walls, in latrines, railroad boxcars, subways, and bridges.
An early graffito outside of New York or Philadelphia was the inscription in London reading "Clapton is God" in reference to the guitarist Eric Clapton. Creating the cult of the guitar hero, the phrase was spray-painted by an admirer on a wall in an Islington, north London in the autumn of 1967. The graffito was captured in a photograph, in which a dog is urinating on the wall.
Films like Style Wars in the 80s depicting famous writers such as Skeme, Dondi, MinOne, and ZEPHYR reinforced graffiti's role within New York's emerging hip-hop culture. Although many officers of the New York City Police Department found this film to be controversial, Style Wars is still recognized as the most prolific film representation of what was going on within the young hip hop culture of the early 1980s. Fab 5 Freddy and Futura 2000 took hip hop graffiti to Paris and London as part of the New York City Rap Tour in 1983
Commercialization and entrance into mainstream pop culture
Main article: Commercial graffiti
With the popularity and legitimization of graffiti has come a level of commercialization. In 2001, computer giant IBM launched an advertising campaign in Chicago and San Francisco which involved people spray painting on sidewalks a peace symbol, a heart, and a penguin (Linux mascot), to represent "Peace, Love, and Linux." IBM paid Chicago and San Francisco collectively US$120,000 for punitive damages and clean-up costs.
In 2005, a similar ad campaign was launched by Sony and executed by its advertising agency in New York, Chicago, Atlanta, Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Miami, to market its handheld PSP gaming system. In this campaign, taking notice of the legal problems of the IBM campaign, Sony paid building owners for the rights to paint on their buildings "a collection of dizzy-eyed urban kids playing with the PSP as if it were a skateboard, a paddle, or a rocking horse".
Tristan Manco wrote that Brazil "boasts a unique and particularly rich, graffiti scene ... [earning] it an international reputation as the place to go for artistic inspiration". Graffiti "flourishes in every conceivable space in Brazil's cities". Artistic parallels "are often drawn between the energy of São Paulo today and 1970s New York". The "sprawling metropolis", of São Paulo has "become the new shrine to graffiti"; Manco alludes to "poverty and unemployment ... [and] the epic struggles and conditions of the country's marginalised peoples", and to "Brazil's chronic poverty", as the main engines that "have fuelled a vibrant graffiti culture". In world terms, Brazil has "one of the most uneven distributions of income. Laws and taxes change frequently". Such factors, Manco argues, contribute to a very fluid society, riven with those economic divisions and social tensions that underpin and feed the "folkloric vandalism and an urban sport for the disenfranchised", that is South American graffiti art.
Prominent Brazilian writers include Os Gêmeos, Boleta, Nunca, Nina, Speto, Tikka, and T.Freak. Their artistic success and involvement in commercial design ventures has highlighted divisions within the Brazilian graffiti community between adherents of the cruder transgressive form of pichação and the more conventionally artistic values of the practitioners of grafite.
Graffiti in the Middle East has emerged slowly, with taggers operating in Egypt, Lebanon, the Gulf countries like Bahrain or the United Arab Emirates, Israel, and in Iran. The major Iranian newspaper Hamshahri has published two articles on illegal writers in the city with photographic coverage of Iranian artist A1one's works on Tehran walls. Tokyo-based design magazine, PingMag, has interviewed A1one and featured photographs of his work. The Israeli West Bank barrier has become a site for graffiti, reminiscent in this sense of the Berlin Wall. Many writers in Israel come from other places around the globe, such as JUIF from Los Angeles and DEVIONE from London. The religious reference "נ נח נחמ נחמן מאומן" ("Na Nach Nachma Nachman Meuman") is commonly seen in graffiti around Israel.
Graffiti has played an important role within the street art scene in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA), especially following the events of the Arab Spring of 2011 or the Sudanese Revolution of 2018/19. Graffiti is a tool of expression in the context of conflict in the region, allowing people to raise their voices politically and socially. Famous street artist Banksy has had an important effect in the street art scene in the MENA area, especially in Palestine where some of his works are located in the West Bank barrier and Bethlehem.
There are also a large number of graffiti influences in Southeast Asian countries that mostly come from modern Western culture, such as Malaysia, where graffiti have long been a common sight in Malaysia's capital city, Kuala Lumpur. Since 2010, the country has begun hosting a street festival to encourage all generations and people from all walks of life to enjoy and encourage Malaysian street culture.
The modern-day graffitists can be found with an arsenal of various materials that allow for a successful production of a piece. This includes such techniques as scribing. However, spray paint in aerosol cans is the number one medium for graffiti. From this commodity comes different styles, technique, and abilities to form master works of graffiti. Spray paint can be found at hardware and art stores and comes in virtually every color.
Stencil graffiti is created by cutting out shapes and designs in a stiff material (such as cardboard or subject folders) to form an overall design or image. The stencil is then placed on the "canvas" gently and with quick, easy strokes of the aerosol can, the image begins to appear on the intended surface.
Some of the first examples were created in 1981 by artists Blek le Rat in Paris, in 1982 by Jef Aerosol in Tours (France); by 1985 stencils had appeared in other cities including New York City, Sydney, and Melbourne, where they were documented by American photographer Charles Gatewood and Australian photographer Rennie Ellis
Tagging is the practice of someone spray-painting "their name, initial or logo onto a public surface" in a handstyle unique to the writer. Tags were the first form of modern graffiti.
Modern graffiti art often incorporates additional arts and technologies. For example, Graffiti Research Lab has encouraged the use of projected images and magnetic light-emitting diodes (throwies) as new media for graffitists. yarnbombing is another recent form of graffiti. Yarnbombers occasionally target previous graffiti for modification, which had been avoided among the majority of graffitists.
Theories on the use of graffiti by avant-garde artists have a history dating back at least to the Asger Jorn, who in 1962 painting declared in a graffiti-like gesture "the avant-garde won't give up"
Many contemporary analysts and even art critics have begun to see artistic value in some graffiti and to recognize it as a form of public art. According to many art researchers, particularly in the Netherlands and in Los Angeles, that type of public art is, in fact an effective tool of social emancipation or, in the achievement of a political goal
In times of conflict, such murals have offered a means of communication and self-expression for members of these socially, ethnically, or racially divided communities, and have proven themselves as effective tools in establishing dialog and thus, of addressing cleavages in the long run. The Berlin Wall was also extensively covered by graffiti reflecting social pressures relating to the oppressive Soviet rule over the GDR.
Many artists involved with graffiti are also concerned with the similar activity of stenciling. Essentially, this entails stenciling a print of one or more colors using spray-paint. Recognized while exhibiting and publishing several of her coloured stencils and paintings portraying the Sri Lankan Civil War and urban Britain in the early 2000s, graffitists Mathangi Arulpragasam, aka M.I.A., has also become known for integrating her imagery of political violence into her music videos for singles "Galang" and "Bucky Done Gun", and her cover art. Stickers of her artwork also often appear around places such as London in Brick Lane, stuck to lamp posts and street signs, she having become a muse for other graffitists and painters worldwide in cities including Seville.
Graffitist believes that art should be on display for everyone in the public eye or in plain sight, not hidden away in a museum or a gallery. Art should color the streets, not the inside of some building. Graffiti is a form of art that cannot be owned or bought. It does not last forever, it is temporary, yet one of a kind. It is a form of self promotion for the artist that can be displayed anywhere form sidewalks, roofs, subways, building wall, etc. Art to them is for everyone and should be showed to everyone for free.
Graffiti is a way of communicating and a way of expressing what one feels in the moment. It is both art and a functional thing that can warn people of something or inform people of something. However, graffiti is to some people a form of art, but to some a form of vandalism. And many graffitists choose to protect their identities and remain anonymous or to hinder prosecution.
With the commercialization of graffiti (and hip hop in general), in most cases, even with legally painted "graffiti" art, graffitists tend to choose anonymity. This may be attributed to various reasons or a combination of reasons. Graffiti still remains the one of four hip hop elements that is not considered "performance art" despite the image of the "singing and dancing star" that sells hip hop culture to the mainstream. Being a graphic form of art, it might also be said that many graffitists still fall in the category of the introverted archetypal artist.
Banksy is one of the world's most notorious and popular street artists who continues to remain faceless in today's society. He is known for his political, anti-war stencil art mainly in Bristol, England, but his work may be seen anywhere from Los Angeles to Palestine. In the UK, Banksy is the most recognizable icon for this cultural artistic movement and keeps his identity a secret to avoid arrest. Much of Banksy's artwork may be seen around the streets of London and surrounding suburbs, although he has painted pictures throughout the world, including the Middle East, where he has painted on Israel's controversial West Bank barrier with satirical images of life on the other side. One depicted a hole in the wall with an idyllic beach, while another shows a mountain landscape on the other side. A number of exhibitions also have taken place since 2000, and recent works of art have fetched vast sums of money. Banksy's art is a prime example of the classic controversy: vandalism vs. art. Art supporters endorse his work distributed in urban areas as pieces of art and some councils, such as Bristol and Islington, have officially protected them, while officials of other areas have deemed his work to be vandalism and have removed it.
Pixnit is another artist who chooses to keep her identity from the general public. Her work focuses on beauty and design aspects of graffiti as opposed to Banksy's anti-government shock value. Her paintings are often of flower designs above shops and stores in her local urban area of Cambridge, Massachusetts. Some store owners endorse her work and encourage others to do similar work as well. "One of the pieces was left up above Steve's Kitchen, because it looks pretty awesome"- Erin Scott, the manager of New England Comics in Allston, Massachusetts.
Graffiti artists may become offended if photographs of their art are published in a commercial context without their permission. In March 2020, the Finnish graffiti artist Psyke expressed his displeasure at the newspaper Ilta-Sanomat publishing a photograph of a Peugeot 208 in an article about new cars, with his graffiti prominently shown on the background. The artist claims he does not want his art being used in commercial context, not even if he were to receive compensation.
Territorial graffiti marks urban neighborhoods with tags and logos to differentiate certain groups from others. These images are meant to show outsiders a stern look at whose turf is whose. The subject matter of gang-related graffiti consists of cryptic symbols and initials strictly fashioned with unique calligraphies. Gang members use graffiti to designate membership throughout the gang, to differentiate rivals and associates and, most commonly, to mark borders which are both territorial and ideological.
Graffiti has been used as a means of advertising both legally and illegally. Bronx-based TATS CRU has made a name for themselves doing legal advertising campaigns for companies such as Coca-Cola, McDonald's, Toyota, and MTV. In the UK, Covent Garden's Boxfresh used stencil images of a Zapatista revolutionary in the hopes that cross referencing would promote their store.
Smirnoff hired artists to use reverse graffiti (the use of high pressure hoses to clean dirty surfaces to leave a clean image in the surrounding dirt) to increase awareness of their product.
Graffiti often has a reputation as part of a subculture that rebels against authority, although the considerations of the practitioners often diverge and can relate to a wide range of attitudes. It can express a political practice and can form just one tool in an array of resistance techniques. One early example includes the anarcho-punk band Crass, who conducted a campaign of stenciling anti-war, anarchist, feminist, and anti-consumerist messages throughout the London Underground system during the late 1970s and early 1980s. In Amsterdam graffiti was a major part of the punk scene. The city was covered with names such as "De Zoot", "Vendex", and "Dr Rat". To document the graffiti a punk magazine was started that was called Gallery Anus. So when hip hop came to Europe in the early 1980s there was already a vibrant graffiti culture.
The student protests and general strike of May 1968 saw Paris bedecked in revolutionary, anarchistic, and situationist slogans such as L'ennui est contre-révolutionnaire ("Boredom is counterrevolutionary") and Lisez moins, vivez plus ("Read less, live more"). While not exhaustive, the graffiti gave a sense of the 'millenarian' and rebellious spirit, tempered with a good deal of verbal wit, of the strikers.
I think graffiti writing is a way of defining what our generation is like. Excuse the French, we're not a bunch of p---- artists. Traditionally artists have been considered soft and mellow people, a little bit kooky. Maybe we're a little bit more like pirates that way. We defend our territory, whatever space we steal to paint on, we defend it fiercely.
The developments of graffiti art which took place in art galleries and colleges as well as "on the street" or "underground", contributed to the resurfacing in the 1990s of a far more overtly politicized art form in the subvertising, culture jamming, or tactical media movements. These movements or styles tend to classify the artists by their relationship to their social and economic contexts, since, in most countries, graffiti art remains illegal in many forms except when using non-permanent paint. Since the 1990s with the rise of Street Art, a growing number of artists are switching to non-permanent paints and non-traditional forms of painting.
Contemporary practitioners, accordingly, have varied and often conflicting practices. Some individuals, such as Alexander Brener, have used the medium to politicize other art forms, and have used the prison sentences enforced on them as a means of further protest. The practices of anonymous groups and individuals also vary widely, and practitioners by no means always agree with each other's practices. For example, the anti-capitalist art group the Space Hijackers did a piece in 2004 about the contradiction between the capitalistic elements of Banksy and his use of political imagery.
Berlin human rights activist Irmela Mensah-Schramm has received global media attention and numerous awards for her 35-year campaign of effacing neo-Nazi and other right-wing extremist graffiti throughout Germany, often by altering hate speech in humorous ways.
In Serbian capital, Belgrade, the graffiti depicting a uniformed former general of Serb army and war criminal, convicted at ICTY for war crimes and crimes against humanity, including genocide and ethnic cleansing in Bosnian War, Ratko Mladić, appeared in a military salute alongside the words "General, thank to your mother". Aleks Eror, Berlin-based journalist, explains how "veneration of historical and wartime figures" through street art is not a new phenomenon in the region of former Yugoslavia, and that "in most cases is firmly focused on the future, rather than retelling the past". Eror is not only analyst pointing to danger of such an expressions for the region's future. In a long expose on the subject of Bosnian genocide denial, at Balkan Diskurs magazine and multimedia platform website, Kristina Gadže and Taylor Whitsell referred to these experiences as a young generations' "cultural heritage", in which young are being exposed to celebration and affirmation of war-criminals as part of their "formal education" and "inheritance".
There are numerous examples of genocide denial through celebration and affirmation of war criminals throughout the region of Western Balkans inhabited by Serbs using this form of artistic expression. Several more of these graffiti are found in Serbian capital, and many more across Serbia and Bosnian and Herzegovinian administrative entity, Republika Srpska, which is the ethnic Serbian majority enclave. Critics point that Serbia as a state, is willing to defend the mural of convicted war criminal, and have no intention to react on cases of genocide denial, noting that Interior Minister of Serbia, Aleksandar Vulin decision to ban any gathering with an intent to remove the mural, with the deployment of riot police, sends the message of "tacit endorsement". Consequently, on 9 November 2021, Serbian heavy police in riot gear, with graffiti creators and their supporters, blocked the access to the mural to prevent human rights groups and other activists to paint over it and mark the International Day Against Fascism and Antisemitism in that way, and even arrested two civic activist for throwing eggs at the graffiti.
Graffiti may also be used as an offensive expression. This form of graffiti may be difficult to identify, as it is mostly removed by the local authority (as councils which have adopted strategies of criminalization also strive to remove graffiti quickly). Therefore, existing racist graffiti is mostly more subtle and at first sight, not easily recognized as "racist". It can then be understood only if one knows the relevant "local code" (social, historical, political, temporal, and spatial), which is seen as heteroglot and thus a 'unique set of conditions' in a cultural context.
A spatial code for example, could be that there is a certain youth group in an area that is engaging heavily in racist activities. So, for residents (knowing the local code), a graffiti containing only the name or abbreviation of this gang already is a racist expression, reminding the offended people of their gang activities. Also a graffiti is in most cases, the herald of more serious criminal activity to come. A person who does not know these gang activities would not be able to recognize the meaning of this graffiti. Also if a tag of this youth group or gang is placed on a building occupied by asylum seekers, for example, its racist character is even stronger.
By making the graffiti less explicit (as adapted to social and legal constraints), these drawings are less likely to be removed, but do not lose their threatening and offensive character.
Elsewhere, activists in Russia have used painted caricatures of local officials with their mouths as potholes, to show their anger about the poor state of the roads. In Manchester, England, a graffitists painted obscene images around potholes, which often resulted in them being repaired within 48 hours.
In the early 1980s, the first art galleries to show graffitists to the public were Fashion Moda in the Bronx, Now Gallery and Fun Gallery, both in the East Village, Manhattan.
A 2006 exhibition at the Brooklyn Museum displayed graffiti as an art form that began in New York's outer boroughs and reached great heights in the early 1980s with the work of Crash, Lee, Daze, Keith Haring, and Jean-Michel Basquiat. It displayed 22 works by New York graffitists, including Crash, Daze, and Lady Pink. In an article about the exhibition in the magazine Time Out, curator Charlotta Kotik said that she hoped the exhibition would cause viewers to rethink their assumptions about graffiti.
From the 1970s onwards, Burhan Doğançay photographed urban walls all over the world; these he then archived for use as sources of inspiration for his painterly works. The project today known as "Walls of the World" grew beyond even his own expectations and comprises about 30,000 individual images. It spans a period of 40 years across five continents and 114 countries. In 1982, photographs from this project comprised a one-man exhibition titled "Les murs murmurent, ils crient, ils chantent ..." (The walls whisper, shout and sing ...) at the Centre Georges Pompidou in Paris.
In Australia, art historians have judged some local graffiti of sufficient creative merit to rank them firmly within the arts. Oxford University Press's art history text Australian Painting 1788–2000 concludes with a long discussion of graffiti's key place within contemporary visual culture, including the work of several Australian practitioners.
Between March and April 2009, 150 artists exhibited 300 pieces of graffiti at the Grand Palais in Paris.
Spray paint has many negative environmental effects. The paint contains toxic chemicals, and the can uses volatile hydrocarbon gases to spray the paint onto a surface.
Volatile organic compound (VOC) leads to ground level ozone formation and most of graffiti related emissions are VOCs. A 2010 paper estimates 4,862 tons of VOCs were released in the United States in activities related to graffiti.
In China, Mao Zedong in the 1920s used revolutionary slogans and paintings in public places to galvanize the country's communist movement.
Based on different national conditions, many people believe that China's attitude towards Graffiti is fierce, but in fact, according to Lance Crayon in his film Spray Paint Beijing: Graffiti in the Capital of China, Graffiti is generally accepted in Beijing, with artists not seeing much police interference. Political and religiously sensitive graffiti, however, is not allowed.
In Hong Kong, Tsang Tsou Choi was known as the King of Kowloon for his calligraphy graffiti over many years, in which he claimed ownership of the area. Now some of his work is preserved officially.
In Taiwan, the government has made some concessions to graffitists. Since 2005 they have been allowed to freely display their work along some sections of riverside retaining walls in designated "Graffiti Zones". From 2007, Taipei's department of cultural affairs also began permitting graffiti on fences around major public construction sites. Department head Yong-ping Lee (李永萍) stated, "We will promote graffiti starting with the public sector, and then later in the private sector too. It's our goal to beautify the city with graffiti". The government later helped organize a graffiti contest in Ximending, a popular shopping district. graffitists caught working outside of these designated areas still face fines up to NT$6,000 under a department of environmental protection regulation. However, Taiwanese authorities can be relatively lenient, one veteran police officer stating anonymously, "Unless someone complains about vandalism, we won't get involved. We don't go after it proactively."
In 1993, after several expensive cars in Singapore were spray-painted, the police arrested a student from the Singapore American School, Michael P. Fay, questioned him, and subsequently charged him with vandalism. Fay pleaded guilty to vandalizing a car in addition to stealing road signs. Under the 1966 Vandalism Act of Singapore, originally passed to curb the spread of communist graffiti in Singapore, the court sentenced him to four months in jail, a fine of S$3,500 (US$2,233), and a caning. The New York Times ran several editorials and op-eds that condemned the punishment and called on the American public to flood the Singaporean embassy with protests. Although the Singapore government received many calls for clemency, Fay's caning took place in Singapore on 5 May 1994. Fay had originally received a sentence of six strokes of the cane, but the presiding president of Singapore, Ong Teng Cheong, agreed to reduce his caning sentence to four lashes.
In South Korea, Park Jung-soo was fined two million South Korean won by the Seoul Central District Court for spray-painting a rat on posters of the G-20 Summit a few days before the event in November 2011. Park alleged that the initial in "G-20" sounds like the Korean word for "rat", but Korean government prosecutors alleged that Park was making a derogatory statement about the president of South Korea, Lee Myung-bak, the host of the summit. This case led to public outcry and debate on the lack of government tolerance and in support of freedom of expression. The court ruled that the painting, "an ominous creature like a rat" amounts to "an organized criminal activity" and upheld the fine while denying the prosecution's request for imprisonment for Park.
In Europe, community cleaning squads have responded to graffiti, in some cases with reckless abandon, as when in 1992 in France a local Scout group, attempting to remove modern graffiti, damaged two prehistoric paintings of bison in the Cave of Mayrière supérieure near the French village of Bruniquel in Tarn-et-Garonne, earning them the 1992 Ig Nobel Prize in archeology.
In September 2006, the European Parliament directed the European Commission to create urban environment policies to prevent and eliminate dirt, litter, graffiti, animal excrement, and excessive noise from domestic and vehicular music systems in European cities, along with other concerns over urban life.
In Budapest, Hungary, both a city-backed movement called I Love Budapest and a special police division tackle the problem, including the provision of approved areas.
The Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 became Britain's latest anti-graffiti legislation. In August 2004, the Keep Britain Tidy campaign issued a press release calling for zero tolerance of graffiti and supporting proposals such as issuing "on the spot" fines to graffiti offenders and banning the sale of aerosol paint to anyone under the age of 16. The press release also condemned the use of graffiti images in advertising and in music videos, arguing that real-world experience of graffiti stood far removed from its often-portrayed "cool" or "edgy'" image.
To back the campaign, 123 Members of Parliament (MPs) (including then Prime Minister Tony Blair), signed a charter which stated: "Graffiti is not art, it's crime. On behalf of my constituents, I will do all I can to rid our community of this problem."
In the UK, city councils have the power to take action against the owner of any property that has been defaced under the Anti-social Behaviour Act 2003 (as amended by the Clean Neighbourhoods and Environment Act 2005) or, in certain cases, the Highways Act. This is often used against owners of property that are complacent in allowing protective boards to be defaced so long as the property is not damaged.
In July 2008, a conspiracy charge was used to convict graffitists for the first time. After a three-month police surveillance operation, nine members of the DPM crew were convicted of conspiracy to commit criminal damage costing at least £1 million. Five of them received prison sentences, ranging from eighteen months to two years. The unprecedented scale of the investigation and the severity of the sentences rekindled public debate over whether graffiti should be considered art or crime.
Some councils, like those of Stroud and Loerrach, provide approved areas in the town where graffitists can showcase their talents, including underpasses, car parks, and walls that might otherwise prove a target for the "spray and run".
Graffiti Tunnel, University of Sydney at Camperdown (2009)
In an effort to reduce vandalism, many cities in Australia have designated walls or areas exclusively for use by graffitists. One early example is the "Graffiti Tunnel" located at the Camperdown Campus of the University of Sydney, which is available for use by any student at the university to tag, advertise, poster, and paint. Advocates of this idea suggest that this discourages petty vandalism yet encourages artists to take their time and produce great art, without worry of being caught or arrested for vandalism or trespassing.[108][109] Others disagree with this approach, arguing that the presence of legal graffiti walls does not demonstrably reduce illegal graffiti elsewhere. Some local government areas throughout Australia have introduced "anti-graffiti squads", who clean graffiti in the area, and such crews as BCW (Buffers Can't Win) have taken steps to keep one step ahead of local graffiti cleaners.
Many state governments have banned the sale or possession of spray paint to those under the age of 18 (age of majority). However, a number of local governments in Victoria have taken steps to recognize the cultural heritage value of some examples of graffiti, such as prominent political graffiti. Tough new graffiti laws have been introduced in Australia with fines of up to A$26,000 and two years in prison.
Melbourne is a prominent graffiti city of Australia with many of its lanes being tourist attractions, such as Hosier Lane in particular, a popular destination for photographers, wedding photography, and backdrops for corporate print advertising. The Lonely Planet travel guide cites Melbourne's street as a major attraction. All forms of graffiti, including sticker art, poster, stencil art, and wheatpasting, can be found in many places throughout the city. Prominent street art precincts include; Fitzroy, Collingwood, Northcote, Brunswick, St. Kilda, and the CBD, where stencil and sticker art is prominent. As one moves farther away from the city, mostly along suburban train lines, graffiti tags become more prominent. Many international artists such as Banksy have left their work in Melbourne and in early 2008 a perspex screen was installed to prevent a Banksy stencil art piece from being destroyed, it has survived since 2003 through the respect of local street artists avoiding posting over it, although it has recently had paint tipped over it.
In February 2008 Helen Clark, the New Zealand prime minister at that time, announced a government crackdown on tagging and other forms of graffiti vandalism, describing it as a destructive crime representing an invasion of public and private property. New legislation subsequently adopted included a ban on the sale of paint spray cans to persons under 18 and increases in maximum fines for the offence from NZ$200 to NZ$2,000 or extended community service. The issue of tagging become a widely debated one following an incident in Auckland during January 2008 in which a middle-aged property owner stabbed one of two teenage taggers to death and was subsequently convicted of manslaughter.
Graffiti databases have increased in the past decade because they allow vandalism incidents to be fully documented against an offender and help the police and prosecution charge and prosecute offenders for multiple counts of vandalism. They also provide law enforcement the ability to rapidly search for an offender's moniker or tag in a simple, effective, and comprehensive way. These systems can also help track costs of damage to a city to help allocate an anti-graffiti budget. The theory is that when an offender is caught putting up graffiti, they are not just charged with one count of vandalism; they can be held accountable for all the other damage for which they are responsible. This has two main benefits for law enforcement. One, it sends a signal to the offenders that their vandalism is being tracked. Two, a city can seek restitution from offenders for all the damage that they have committed, not merely a single incident. These systems give law enforcement personnel real-time, street-level intelligence that allows them not only to focus on the worst graffiti offenders and their damage, but also to monitor potential gang violence that is associated with the graffiti.
Many restrictions of civil gang injunctions are designed to help address and protect the physical environment and limit graffiti. Provisions of gang injunctions include things such as restricting the possession of marker pens, spray paint cans, or other sharp objects capable of defacing private or public property; spray painting, or marking with marker pens, scratching, applying stickers, or otherwise applying graffiti on any public or private property, including, but not limited to the street, alley, residences, block walls, and fences, vehicles or any other real or personal property. Some injunctions contain wording that restricts damaging or vandalizing both public and private property, including but not limited to any vehicle, light fixture, door, fence, wall, gate, window, building, street sign, utility box, telephone box, tree, or power pole.
To help address many of these issues, many local jurisdictions have set up graffiti abatement hotlines, where citizens can call in and report vandalism and have it removed. San Diego's hotline receives more than 5,000 calls per year, in addition to reporting the graffiti, callers can learn more about prevention. One of the complaints about these hotlines is the response time; there is often a lag time between a property owner calling about the graffiti and its removal. The length of delay should be a consideration for any jurisdiction planning on operating a hotline. Local jurisdictions must convince the callers that their complaint of vandalism will be a priority and cleaned off right away. If the jurisdiction does not have the resources to respond to complaints in a timely manner, the value of the hotline diminishes. Crews must be able to respond to individual service calls made to the graffiti hotline as well as focus on cleanup near schools, parks, and major intersections and transit routes to have the biggest impact. Some cities offer a reward for information leading to the arrest and prosecution of suspects for tagging or graffiti related vandalism. The amount of the reward is based on the information provided, and the action taken.
When police obtain search warrants in connection with a vandalism investigation, they are often seeking judicial approval to look for items such as cans of spray paint and nozzles from other kinds of aerosol sprays; etching tools, or other sharp or pointed objects, which could be used to etch or scratch glass and other hard surfaces; permanent marking pens, markers, or paint sticks; evidence of membership or affiliation with any gang or tagging crew; paraphernalia including any reference to "(tagger's name)"; any drawings, writing, objects, or graffiti depicting taggers' names, initials, logos, monikers, slogans, or any mention of tagging crew membership; and any newspaper clippings relating to graffiti crime.
The weekly market of Yanonge - DRC.
Photo by Axel Fassio/CIFOR
If you use one of our photos, please credit it accordingly and let us know. You can reach us through our Flickr account or at: cifor-mediainfo@cgiar.org and m.edliadi@cgiar.org
In a culture that is continuously accelerating, filters have become a primal commodity. We use them both to open and to close ourselves to or from any kind of possible information. Filters are ubiquitous. However, we only realize their presence when we lack them or when they fail our expectations. On the other hand, modern digital cultures are inseparable from keywords like functionality, s...moothness, order and progress. Interaction designers, programmers and interface developers all work together to understand and execute these mantras. But to really understand these keywords, they have to be defined in relation to what they are not. A successful product designer does not design for the average customer, but instead for the marginal, extreme customer; because when taking the margins as the rule, the middle will take care of itself. ! This is why studying the qualities of disfunction, irregularities, breaks, disorder, damage or even demolition are as important in the development of a new technological product as the researching of its perfect flows and this is also one of the reasons why I think it is important to study failure. The concepts of perfection and failure are a tradeoff of each other. If we want to understand and pursue perfection - we can find this in the pursuit of failure.
The exhibition Filtering Failure investigates (the connections between) the procedural terms ‘filtering’ and ‘failure’ and how in (lo-fi) digital arts these terms are being re-invented and re-used. The exhibition asks how Filtering and Failure co-exist; and how these processes influence each other.
The exhibition includes new and older works from the avant-garde of glitch artists. These works show the filtering of failure as a generative process, but also to unfold a genre that includes many the different envelopes of personal ways of dealing with failure.
Filering Failure is curated by Julian van Aalderen and Rosa Menkman.
Participating artists:
Paul Davis (US/UK)
Benjamin Gaulon (IR/FR)
Gijs Gieskes (NL)
Jodi (NL/BE)
Karl Klomp (NL)
no-carrier (US)
Notendo (US)
Nullsleep (US)
Jon Satrom (US)
Videogramo (ES)
Filtering failure is an initiative of PLANETART and GOGBOT in collaboration with Rosa Menkman and Julian van Aalderen
Powered by gem. Enschede, Blacklabel Records & Eurotrash Brewery.
Opening: 25th of Februari with live visuals by vj the c-men (Enschede): Julian van Aalderen, Sjors Trimbach & Edwin van Aalderen
The exhibition is open from monday to fridays between 14:00-17:00 (28th of Februari to the 1st of April 2011).
The stock market for agricultural products in Vienna, short Commodity Exchange, is a commodity market founded in 1869, without futures. It is located since 1890 in a from 1887 to 1890 purpose-built building in Tabor street in Vienna Leopoldstadt.
During National Socialism in Austria (1938-1945) as well as on the basis of the Market Organisation Act from 1949 to 1994 the stock market did not have any meaning. With Austria's EU accession in 1995 the stock market was reactivated and resumed the function of the target price determination for the Austrian market by the main players. The listings take place weekly.
Moreover, the Vienna Commodity Exchange has an arbitration court which is responsible for all the members and trading partners in case of disputes.
History
Since 1812, the grain trade in Austria is an open market, grain therefore commodity. With the development of trade arose in 1853 the Viennese fruit and flour exchange. This one for the time being was subordinated under the Vienna Magistrate and became only on June 24, 1869 independent. This was the birth of the Vienna Commodity Exchange. Its trade for the time being took place in Café Commodity Exchange in Vienna Leopoldstadt. With increase in trading volume and trading participants, the construction of a separate exchange building was decided. The contract for this was awarded in 1887 to the architect Karl König who built the Stock Exchange building in Tabor street near the cafes in the style of neo-Renaissance. The completion and the start of trading took place on 23 August 1890. In Latin letters the motto of the stock market was bricked into the wall: in usum negotiatorum cuiuscumque nationis ac linguae ( "the merchants of all nations and any language dedicated").
Until the First World War, the stock market was the most important market for agricultural products in the Austro-Hungarian Empire. After its demise, and the years of inflation stock exchange trading experienced a large decline from which it did not recover until the mid-20s.
In 1938, after the annexation of Austria to Germany, the market was closed. During World War II the stock market was hit in air raids on Vienna whereby the trading hall burned. After the end of the war was began with the reconstruction. On November 10, 1948, followed the new constitution of the Exchange Chamber and on Wednesday, July 29, 1949, was held the first trading session in the Tabor street after the war in the reconditioned exchange building. The stock market was now, however, because of the Market Organisation Act, determining the specific price-fixing by the social partnership, largely meaningless. It only served as a weekly meeting of the key market participants. From the 1980s, the great hall was used by the Odeon theater.
With Austria's accession to the EU in 1995, the market organization law had to be repealed. The Commodity Exchange got together once more and adopted its function as a place of indicative pricing by the major market players again.
The Vienna Commodity Exchange was instrumental in the preparation of a unified Italian-Austrian-German model contract for the grain trade.
Die Börse für landwirtschaftliche Produkte in Wien, kurz: Produktenbörse, ist eine 1869 gegründete Warenbörse ohne Termingeschäft. Sie befindet sich seit 1890 in einem 1887–1890 eigens errichteten Gebäude in der Taborstraße in Wien-Leopoldstadt.
Während des Nationalsozialismus in Österreich (1938–1945) sowie aufgrund des Marktordnungsgesetzes von 1949 bis 1994 verfügte die Börse über keine Bedeutung. Mit Österreichs EU-Beitritt 1995 wurde die Börse reaktiviert und die Funktion der Richtpreisfindung für den österreichischen Markt durch die wichtigsten Marktteilnehmer wiederaufgenommen. Die Notierungen erfolgen wöchentlich.
Darüber hinaus verfügt die Wiener Produktenbörse über ein Schiedsgericht, das für alle Mitglieder und Handelspartner im Falle von Streitigkeiten zuständig ist.
Geschichte
Seit 1812 ist der Getreidehandel in Österreich ein freies Geschäft, Getreide also Handelsware. Mit der Entwicklung des Handels entstand 1853 die Wiener Frucht- und Mehlbörse. Diese unterstand vorerst noch dem Wiener Magistrat und wurde erst am 24. Juni 1869 unabhängig. Dies war das Geburtsjahr der Wiener Produktenbörse. Dessen Handel fand vorerst im Café Produktenbörse in der Wiener Leopoldstadt statt. Mit Anstieg des Handelsumfangs und der Handelsteilnehmer wurde der Bau eines eigenen Börsegebäudes beschlossen. Den Auftrag hierzu erhielt 1887 der Architekt Karl König, der in der Taborstraße unweit des Cafés im Stil der Neorenaissance das Börsengebäude errichtete. Die Fertigstellung und der Handelsbeginn erfolgte am 23. August 1890. In lateinischen Lettern wurde der Leitspruch der Börse in die Fassade gemauert: in usum negotiatorum cuiuscumque nationis ac linguae („den Kaufleuten aller Völker und jeder Sprache gewidmet“).
Bis zum Ersten Weltkrieg war die Börse die wichtigste Börse für landwirtschaftliche Produkte der österreichisch-ungarischen Monarchie. Nach deren Untergang und den Jahren der Inflation erlebte der Börsenhandel einen großen Rückgang, von dem sich die Börse erst Mitte der 20er-Jahre wieder erholte.
1938, nach dem Anschluss Österreichs an Deutschland, wurde die Börse geschlossen. Im Zweiten Weltkrieg wurde die Börse bei Luftangriffen auf Wien getroffen, wobei der Handelssaal ausbrannte. Nach Kriegsende wurde mit dem Wiederaufbau begonnen. Am 10. November 1948 erfolgte die Neukonstituierung der Börsekammer und am Mittwoch, dem 29. Juli 1949 wurde die erste Börseversammlung nach Kriegsende im wiederinstandgesetzten Börsegebäude in der Taborstraße abgehalten. Die Börse war nun allerdings aufgrund des Marktordnungsgesetzes, das die Preisfestsetzung durch die Sozialpartnerschaft bestimmte, weitgehend bedeutungslos. Sie diente lediglich als wöchentlicher Treffpunkt der wichtigsten Marktteilnehmer. Ab den 1980er-Jahren wurde der große Saal vom Odeon Theater genutzt.
Mit dem Beitritt Österreichs zur EU 1995 musste das Marktordnungsgesetz aufgehoben werden. Die Produktenbörse setzte sich wieder zusammen und nahm ihre Funktion als Ort der Richtpreisfindung durch die wichtigsten Marktteilnehmer wieder auf.
Die Wiener Produktenbörse war maßgeblich an der Anfertigung eines einheitlichen italienisch-österreichisch-deutschen Musterkontraktes für den Getreidehandel beteiligt.
de.wikipedia.org/wiki/B%C3%B6rse_f%C3%BCr_landwirtschaftl...
Date: November 7, 2008
Contacts: Manilatown Heritage Foundation
Release Until: January 10, 2009
Phone: (415) 399-9580
Email: mhf@manilatown.org
Website: www.manilatown.org
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Chasing Commodities concludes “Globalization: Response & Responsibilty” Series
San Francisco, CA – November 2008 - Photos taken of sisal, cotton, seaweed and coffee farms and factories will be showing in an exhibit entitled “Chasing Commodities” at the I-Hotel Manilatown Center in San Francisco. Documented in Tanzania, India and Mexico the photos tell the stories of communities struggling in the global economy. This will conclude the 2008 series on “Globalization: Response and Responsibilty” presented by the Manilatown Heritage Foundation.
In every corner of the world there is a story about how the local community is suffering from the global economy. Documentary photographer and community organizer, Angela Angel followed just a few of these communities and found hundreds of untold stories: sisal farming growing rapidly for fiber optics in the technology industry, the plight of Indian cotton farmers who have committed suicide by the thousands because of farm monopolies and bio-piracy, seaweed grown in Zanzibar strictly for export and shipped to Asia and finally, the coffee industry that begins in Africa and Central America and is dictated by world market prices.
From 2006 to 2007 Angel set out on a global exposure trip to find answers for the disconnections between the consumer and the producer, from the local to the global: “We always talk about this entity that is ‘larger than ourselves.’ That is what I had set out to see. Really, you don’t have to travel to find the truth but there is much that we are being lied to about—how globalization has come to be for humanity and the earth and how communities are trying to deal. There is much disconnect from the food we consume and how it gets to the table. This is a glimpse into the local realities of the earth that produces these raw materials, of the farmers and the choices they have to make and of the systems that turn them into cash crops for our benefit in this global economy, other wise known as, commodification.”
Opening Reception for the exhibit is on December 12, 2008 from 5pm to 9pm at the I-Hotel Manilatown Center. The reception will also include a program from traveling activists Yoreb Ku Ba and Jean Melesaine of Debug in Brazil on Hip-Hop Semana & Quilombo, Vicente Garcia and Cory Aguilar of H.O.M.E.Y. & HUAXTEC in Guatemala on Los Desaparacidos & HIJOS and Erica Benton of Famoksaiyan in Guahan on the Chamoru Cultural Center.
Chasing Commodities will be showing at the I-Hotel Manilatown Center from December 12, 2008 to January 10, 2009.
What: Exhibit Opening Reception
Who: Manilatown Heritage Foundation and Angela Angel
When: Friday, December 12, 2008 at 5-9 pm
Where: I-Hotel Manilatown Center, 868 Kearny Street, San Francisco, CA 94108
For more information visit: www.manilatown.org
###
About the Manilatown Heritage Foundation:
The mission of Manilatown Heritage Foundation is to promote social and economic justice for Filipinos in America by preserving our history, advocating for equal access, and advancing our arts and culture. We envision an inspired and self-sustaining organization that effectively and creatively enhances the Filipino community’s capacity to shape social, political and economic policies. Our community will be one that has equitable access to resources and opportunities, as well as pride in our culture, history and traditions. Our core values are bridging cultures and generations, maintaining organizational integrity and respect, and encouraging critical conversations within our community. We strive to create community across generations by developing contemporary approaches to issues and by fostering a culture that is both grounded in its historical roots and guided by our love of community.
Coal loads flow west across Sand Creek as a crew continues shuffling materials off a truck onto a barge. September 5, 2023.
Dried fish at the weekly market of Yanonge - DRC.
Photo by Axel Fassio/CIFOR
If you use one of our photos, please credit it accordingly and let us know. You can reach us through our Flickr account or at: cifor-mediainfo@cgiar.org and m.edliadi@cgiar.org
Commodity 1/4
Spoof -- you should read the fine print. This is the first time I've tried HDR, and I found that places like this with extreme dynamic range are still challenging.
Politics of property.
25
I was sick over the Christmas holidays but had no way to be tested for COVID-19. Free rapid test kits were nowhere to be found and the assessment centre was booked for weeks. Although I have been working from home I found out my work had a bunch of kits on hand, so I went in to grab one. This week our government said that if you get a cold or the flu just assume it’s COVID-19. Guess I don’t really need a kit after all.
Garlic, onion and salt at the weekly market of Yanonge - DRC.
Photo by Axel Fassio/CIFOR
If you use one of our photos, please credit it accordingly and let us know. You can reach us through our Flickr account or at: cifor-mediainfo@cgiar.org and m.edliadi@cgiar.org
OCTOBER 16, 2008 Economic Fears Reignite Market Slump
Stocks Post Biggest Drop Since 1987 Crash as Retail Sales Fall, Commodities Sink and Investors Worry About Hedge Funds
By SUDEEP REDDY, JENNIFER SARANOW and ANN
Fears of a deep recession sparked the worst drop in the Dow Jones Industrial Average in 21 years, as retail sales tumbled, demand for commodities sank and bank earnings fell.
Bloomberg News/Landov
SOMBER OUTLOOK: As markets fell Wednesday, Fed chief Ben Bernanke said stabilizing financial markets won't spur a broad economic recovery overnight.
The latest data suggest the U.S. economy is poised to fall into its deepest recession since the early 1980s. That news, coupled with renewed signs of trouble in the all-important markets for credit, reignited the sell-off in stock markets, all but wiping out the huge gains that shares had made in Monday's rally.
The Dow dropped 733.08 points, or 7.9%, to 8577.91 as recession fears and continuing doubts about the world financial system's prospects shook investors. Wednesday's decline marked the Dow's largest percentage drop since October 1987 and the second-biggest point drop ever. The index is down 21% this month and almost 40% from its record close a year ago.
Other indexes plunged, too, including the Standard & Poor's 500 stock index, which fell 9.03%. Overall, investors lost about $1.1 trillion in U.S. stock-market value on Wednesday, the second day in history that they have lost more than $1 trillion in one day.
In another sign of economic weakness, demand for the most important raw materials continued to slide, with oil and copper prices falling sharply.
With the big drop in stocks, many investors fled into safe-haven instruments like the two-year Treasury bond, which rose in price, sending its yield down to 1.6%, while the 10-year bond price rose slightly to yield 4%.
The stock market was unnerved late in the day by new fears of instability in the financial system, this time in the hedge-fund industry. Traders heard talk that hedge fund Citadel Investment Group, whose funds are down between 26% and 30% for the year, was facing margin calls. The rumors fed an already anxious market, where investors have grown worried that some big, highly debt-dependent hedge funds could fail, causing more market declines. Citadel said its financial situation remained strong.
Adding to the somber mood, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke in a speech at the Economic Club of New York warned the economy faced tough prospects despite the government's $700 billion rescue plan aimed at bolstering the U.S. financial system.
"Stabilization of the financial markets is a critical first step, but even if they stabilize as we hope they will, broader economic recovery will not happen right away," Mr. Bernanke said. "Ultimately, the trajectory of economic activity beyond the next few quarters will depend greatly on the extent to which financial and credit markets return to more normal functioning."
Mr. Bernanke noted that the economy had been decelerating even before the September shock to financial markets. He ticked off a broadening list of troubles that now weigh on it: slower exports from a global slowdown, nagging declines in home prices, slower consumer spending and business investment, and the time that it will take for credit markets to unfreeze after the government's dramatic steps this week.
Mr. Bernanke subtly left open the possibility of interest-rate cuts in the weeks or months ahead, noting inflation pressures have receded as a result of falling commodities prices.
But it's far from clear how much effect further rate cuts would have. Investors have been demanding huge premiums -- known on Wall Street as spreads -- over benchmark interest rates to make loans to businesses and households. As long as these spreads remain large, the benefits of rate cuts are diminished. A big priority for now remains calming the fear that has swept through financial markets. That would make financial institutions more willing to lend at narrowed spreads.
Evidence is mounting that the U.S. is likely to experience a far worse downturn than the 2001 or 1990-91 recessions. Job losses started at the beginning of this year but started deepening last month, even before the worst of the credit crisis struck. The degree of the declines is sapping consumer incomes after a decade showing few earnings gains for most Americans.
In Seattle, 25-year-old Web developer Scott Krager is curtailing his spending -- especially on eating out -- and now rarely pays full price for anything. Recently, when he needed to purchase new khaki pants after his older ones were ruined in the dryer, Mr. Krager visited a Kohl's department store for the first time and bought two pairs using a $5-off coupon.
"Overall, you can tell that it's not 2003 or 2004 anymore," said Mr. Krager. "It's the first time my generation has really felt the effect of any kind of pull back."
The Commerce Department said its broad gauge of retail sales dropped 1.2% last month, a much sharper decline than in July and August. The figures followed last week's weak September sales reports by major retailers, and they confirmed that the economy was weakening before this month's market turmoil, suggesting deeper declines in the coming months. Consumer spending, which accounts for more than 70% of the U.S. economy, is likely to record declines in the third and fourth quarters of this year.
Retail sales slipped in almost every sector. Auto sales fell 3.8%, while furniture, electronics, clothing and food stores also declined.
The troubles are weighing heavily on the global economy. Weak prospects around the world are pushing commodity prices sharply lower, a sign that strong demand -- which led to huge price surges earlier this year -- has abated with the economic turmoil. Crude-oil prices tumbled $4.09, or 5.2%, to $74.54 a barrel, its lowest settlement price this year.
Meanwhile, the continuing turmoil in credit markets is likely to hit the banking sector hard in the coming months. J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo & Co., two of the nation's strongest banks, on Wednesday said their consumer operations are likely to worsen for months amid weaker performance of mortgages, credit cards and auto loans. J.P. Morgan, which is one of the nation's largest credit-card issuers, said charge-offs -- reflecting loans considered to be uncollectible -- represented 5% of its card portfolio compared with 3.64% in the third quarter of 2007. That's expected to grow to 6% in the beginning of next year and 7% by the end of 2009, the bank said.
The Federal Reserve's latest "beige book'' report, a summary of regional economic conditions, showed weakness across the nation into early October. Consumer spending declined, manufacturing activity dropped and several regions reported lower capital spending or reductions in capital spending plans "due to the high level of uncertainty about the economic outlook or concerns over the availability of credit." Among the few bright spots were agriculture and other natural resources, though drops in commodity prices since the reports were compiled could hurt those sectors.
Job losses, which started at the beginning of this year, are expected to worsen as businesses feel the credit pinch. The effects of the worsening economy were on display at retail outlets around the country.
After years of conspicuous consumption, many middle- and upper-income Americans are morphing into cautious shoppers. The change in mood could have a dramatic effect on consumer spending on everything from cars and travel to electronics, fashion and jewelry, especially heading toward the holiday season. That's a radical change from the 2001 economic slowdown when many people shopped to feel better.
In Chicago, Fanchon Simons, an avid 60-year-old shopper, says she couldn't bring herself to buy a $360 blouse that she tried on at a designer-clothing boutique last week. Ms. Simons says she hasn't bought much for herself in the past couple weeks -- and not because she can't afford it. Buying "is not that important to me right now because of the climate," she says. "Maybe it's a way to be in sympathy with the rest of the people...or maybe it's that I don't really need anything."
High-end consumers aren't the only ones pinching pennies or turning to window-shopping. Synetha Chambers, a 31-year-old single parent from Cedar Hill, Texas, who makes $25 an hour as a service representative for AT&T, says she has pared her grocery list to the necessities -- milk is a must, but she no longer buys soda and chips. "And I will be honest with you, Christmas is no longer a necessity in my household," Ms. Chambers says.
Besides worrying about the economy, stock-market investors have two other immediate concerns. One is that credit markets may remain dysfunctional for weeks or even months, which would make the recession worse. The struggling credit market in particular is making it more difficult for many companies to raise the cash they need to run their operations.
In addition, investors are watching the earnings season, in particular what companies are saying about their outlook for the rest of the year. One test comes Thursday: Citigroup Inc. is reporting its latest quarterly results, and investors will be closely monitoring the health of its huge portfolios of consumer loans.
—Jon Hilsenrath, Miguel Bustillo and Robin Sidel contributed to this article.Write to Sudeep Reddy at sudeep.reddy@wsj.com, Jennifer Saranow at jennifer.saranow@wsj.com and Ann Zimmerman at ann.zimmerman@wsj.com
1933. Our country was recovering from a depression and was declared bankrupt. Why were the American people never told about this? - Public policy and National Security overruled the public right to know. Read the following Congressional quote:
"My investigation convinced me that during the last quarter of a century the average production of gold has been falling off considerably. The gold mines of the world are practically exhausted. There is only about $11,000,000,000 in gold in the world, with the United States owning a little more than four billions. We have more than $100,000,000,000 in debts payable in gold of the present weight and fineness. . . As a practical proposition these contracts cannot be collected in gold for the obvious reason that the gold supply of the entire world is not sufficient to make payment."
-- Congressional Record, Congressman Dies, March 15, 1933.
Before 1933 all contracts with the government were payable in gold. Now I ask you, who in their right mind would enter into contracts totaling One Hundred billion dollars in gold, when there was only eleven billion in gold in the whole world, and we had about four billion? To keep from being hung by the American public they obeyed the bankers demands and turned over our country to them. They never came out and said we were in bankruptcy but, the fact remains, we are. In 1933 the gold of the whole country had to be turned in to the bankers, and all government contracts in gold were canceled. This is bankruptcy.
"Mr. Speaker, we are here now in chapter 11. Members of Congress are official trustees presiding over the greatest reorganization of any bankrupt entity in world history, the U.S. government. We are setting forth hopefully, a blueprint for our future. There are some who say it is a coroner's report that will lead to our demise."
"It is an established fact that the United States Federal Government has been dissolved by the Emergency Banking Act, March 9, 1933, 48 Stat. 1, Public Law 89-719; declared by President Roosevelt, being bankrupt and insolvent. H.J.R. 192, 73rd Congressional session, June 5, 1933 - Joint Resolution To Suspend the Gold Standard and Abrogate The Gold Clause dissolved the Sovereign Authority of the United States and the official capacities of all United States Governmental Offices, Officers, and Departments and is further evidence that the United States Federal Government exists today in name only."
"The receivers of the United States Bankruptcy are the International Bankers, via the United Nations, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. All United States Offices, Officials, and Departments are now operating within a de facto status in name only under Emergency War Powers. With the Constitutional Republican form of Government now dissolved, the receivers of the Bankruptcy have adopted a new form of government for the United States."
-- Congressman Traficant on the House floor, March 17, 1993 (The Bankruptcy of The United States, United States Congressional Record, March 17, 1993, Vol. 33, page H-1303).
The wealth of the nation including our land was turned over to the bankers. In return, the nations 100 billion dollar debt was forgiven. I have two papers that have circulated the country on this subject. Remember Jesus said "money is the root of all evil" The Congress of 1933 sold every American into slavery to protect their asses. Read the following Congressional quotes:
"I want to show you where the people are being imposed upon by reason of the delegation of this tremendous power. I invite your attention to the fact that section 16 of the Federal Reserve Act provides that whenever the Government of the United States issues and delivers money, Federal Reserve notes, which are based on the credit of the Nation--they represent a mortgage upon your home and my home, and upon all the property of all the people of the Nation--to the Federal Reserve agent, an interest charge shall be collected for the Government."
-- Congressional Record, Congressman Patman, March 13, 1933.
"That is the equity of what we are about to do. Yes; you are going to close us down. Yes; you have already closed us down, and have been doing it long before this year. Our President says that for 3 years we have been on the way to bankruptcy. We have been on the way to bankruptcy longer than 3 years. We have been on the way to bankruptcy ever since we began to allow the financial mastery of this country gradually to get into the hands of a little clique that has held it right up until they would send us to the grave."
-- Congressional Record, Congressman Long, March 11, 1933.
What did Roosevelt do? Sealed our fate and our childrens fate, but worst of all, he declared War on the American People. Remember the War Powers Act, the Trading with the enemy Act? He declared emergency powers with his authority being the War Powers Act, the Trading with the enemy Act. The problem is he redefined who the enemy was, read the following (remembering that the Social Security Number is a license to work):
The declared National Emergency of March 9, 1933 amended the War Powers Act to include the American People as enemies:
"In Title 1, Section 1 it says: The actions, regulations, rules, licenses, orders and proclamations heretofore or hereafter taken, promulgated, made, or issued by the President of the United States or the Secretary of the Treasury since March 4, 1933, pursuant to the authority conferred by subdivision (b) of section 5 of the Act of October 6, 1917, as amended, are hereby approved and confirmed."
"Section 2. Subdivision (b) of section 5 of the Act of October 6, 1917, (40 Stat. L. 411), as amended, is hereby amended to read as follows: emergency declared by the President, the President may, through any agency that he may designate, or otherwise, investigate, regulate, or prohibit, under such rules and regulations as he may prescribe, by means of licenses or otherwise, any transactions in foreign exchange, transfers of credit between or payments by banking institutions as defined by the President, and export, hoarding, melting, or earmarking of gold or silver coin or bullion or currency, BY ANY PERSON WITHIN THE UNITED STATES OR ANY PLACE SUBJECT TO THE JURISDICTION THEREOF."
Here is the legal phrase subject to the jurisdiction thereof, but at law this refers to alien enemy and also applies to Fourteenth Amendment citizens:
"As these words are used in the first section of the Fourteenth Amendment of the Federal Constitution, providing for the citizenship of all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, the purpose would appear to have been to exclude by the fewest words (besides children of members of the Indian tribes, standing in a peculiar relation to the National Government, unknown to the common Law), the two classes of cases, children born of Alien Enemies, in hostile occupation, and children of diplomatic representatives of a foreign state, both of which, by the law of England and by our own law, from the time of the first settlement of the English colonies in America, had been recognized exceptions to the fundamental rule of citizenship by birth within the country."
-- United States v Wong Kim Ark, 169 US 649, 682, 42 L Ed 890, 902, 18 S Ct 456. Ballentine's Law Dictionary.
Congressman Beck had this to say about the War Powers Act:
"I think of all the damnable heresies that have ever been suggested in connection with the Constitution, the doctrine of emergency is the worst. It means that when Congress declares an emergency there is no Constitution. This means its death....But the Constitution of the United States, as a restraining influence in keeping the federal government within the carefully prescribed channels of power, is moribund, if not dead. We are witnessing its death-agonies, for when this bill becomes a law, if unhappily it becomes law, there is no longer any workable Constitution to keep the Congress within the limits of its constitutional powers."
-- Congressman James Beck in Congressional Record 1933.
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[–]moneyprinter[S] 9 points 4 years ago*
The following are excerpts from the Senate Report, 93rd Congress, November 19, 1973, Special Committee On The Termination Of The National Emergency United States Senate. They were going to terminate all emergency powers, but they found out they did not have the power to do this so guess which one stayed in, the Emergency Act of 1933, the Trading with the Enemy Act October 6, 1917 as amended in March 9, 1933.
"Since March 9, 1933, the United States has been in a state of declared national emergency....Under the powers delegated by these statutes, the President may: seize property; organize and control the means of production; seize commodities; assign military forces abroad; institute martial law; seize and control all transportation and communication; regulate the operation of private enterprise; restrict travel; and, in a plethora of particular ways, control the lives of all American citizens."
"A majority of the people of the United States have lived all of their lives under emergency rule. For 40 (now 63) years, freedoms and governmental procedures guaranteed by the Constitution have, in varying degrees, been abridged by laws brought into force by states of national emergency....from, at least, the Civil War in important ways shaped the present phenomenon of a permanent state of national emergency."
-- Senate Report, 93rd Congress, November 19, 1973
You may be asking yourself is this the law, and if so where is it, read the following: In Title 12 U.S.C, in section 95b you'll find the following codification of the Emergency War Powers:
"The actions, regulations, rules, licenses, orders and proclamations heretofore or hereafter taken, promulgated, made, or issued by the President of the United States or the Secretary of the Treasury since March 4, 1933, pursuant to the authority conferred by subsection (b) of section 5 of the Act of October 6, 1917, as amended (12 U.S.C., 95a), are hereby approved and confirmed."
-- (March 9, 1933, c. 1, Title 1, 1, 48 Stat. 1)