[Plura-list] Bankruptcy is very, very good
Cory Doctorow
doctorow at craphound.com
Mon Jun 17 11:48:03 EDT 2024
Read today's issue online at: https://pluralistic.net/2024/06/17/lovilee-jubilee/
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On Thursday (June 20), I'll be live onstage in Los Angeles for a recording of the Go Fact Yourself podcast:
https://laist.com/events/go-fact-yourself-live-with-aida-rodriguez
On Friday (June 21), I'm doing an online reading for the Locus Awards at 16hPT.
On Saturday (June 22), I'll be in Oakland, CA for a panel and a keynote at the Locus Awards:
https://locusmag.com/2024-locus-awards-weekend/
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Today's links
* Bankruptcy is very, very good: "A large increase in earned income, employment, assets, real estate, secured debt, home ownership, and wealth that persists for more than 25 years after a court ruling."
* Hey look at this: Delights to delectate.
* This day in history: 2004, 2009, 2014, 2023
* Upcoming appearances: Where to find me.
* Recent appearances: Where I've been.
* Latest books: You keep readin' em, I'll keep writin' 'em.
* Upcoming books: Like I said, I'll keep writin' 'em.
* Colophon: All the rest.
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🥈 Bankruptcy is very, very good
There's a truly comforting sociopathy snuggled inside capitalism ideology: if markets are systems for identifying and rewarding virtue, ability and value, then anyone who's failing in the system is actually *unworthy*, not unlucky; and that means the winners are not just lucky (and certainly not merely selfish), but actually *the best* and they owe nothing to their social inferiors apart from what their own charitable impulses dictate.
It's an economic wrapper around the old theological doctrine of providence, whereby God shows you whom he favors by giving them wealth and station, and marks out the wicked by miring them in poverty. And like the religious believe in providence, the capitalist belief in meritocracy is essential to resolving cognitive dissonance: it lets the fed winners feel morally justified in stepping over the starving losers.
The debate over merit and luck has been with us for millennia, and even th hereditary absolute monarchs of the Bronze Age had to find a way to resolve it. For the rulers of antiquity, the way to square that circle was *jubilee*.
Bronze Age jubilees were periodic celebrations in which all debts were canceled. Different kingdoms had different schedules for jubilees, but imagine some mix of "every x years" and "every time a new ruler takes the throne" and "every time something really portentous happens." To modern sensibilities, the idea that we would simply wipe away all debts every now and again is almost inconceivable. Why would any society practice jubilee? More importantly, *how* could a ruler get the wealthy creditor class to countenance a jubilee, rather than seeking a revolutionary overthrow?
The best answers to this question can be found in the scholarship of historian Michael Hudson, who has written extensively on the subject. Hudson doesn't just write for a scholarly audience, he's also a fantastic communicator with a real commitment to bringing his research to lay audiences:
https://michael-hudson.com/
Hudson's most famous saying is "debts that can't be paid, won't be paid." It's in this dense little nugget that we can find the answer the the riddle of jubilee:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/09/29/jubilance/#debt
Let's start with a simple model of debt and credit in an agricultural society. In agricultural societies, everything exists downstream of farming, which is the core activity of the civilization. If the farmers succeed, everyone can eat, and that means they can do all the other things, all the not-farming work of your society.
To farm successfully, you need credit. Farmers enter the growing season in need of inputs: seed, fertilizer, labor; they need still more labor during the harvest. Without some way to acquire these inputs *before* the farmer has a crop that can pay for them, there can be no crop.
No wonder, then, that the earliest "money" we have a record of is ancient Babylonian credit ledgers that record the debts of farmers who borrow against the next crop to pay for the materials and labor they'll need to grow it. Debt, not barter, is the true origin of money. The fairy tale that coin money arose spontaneously to help bartering marketgoers facilitate trade has no historical evidence, while Babylonian ledgers can be seen in person in museums all over the world.
Farming requires an enormous amount of skill, but even the most skillful farmer is a prisoner of luck. No matter how good you are at farming, no matter how hard you work, no matter how carefully you plan, you can still lose a harvest to blight, drought, storms or vermin.
So over time, every farmer loses a crop. When that happens, the farmer can't pay off their debts and must roll them over and pay them off with future harvests. That means that over time, the share of each harvest the farmer has claim to goes down. Thanks to compounding interest, no bumper crop can erase the debts of the bad harvests.
That means that, over time, "farmer" becomes a synonym for "debtor." Farmers' productive output is increasingly claimed by the rich and powerful. No matter how badly everyone needs food, the whims of the hereditary creditor class come to dictate the country's agricultural priorities. More ornamental flowers for the tables of the wealthy, fewer staple crops for the masses. "Creditor" and "debtor" no longer describe economic relations - they become hereditary castes.
That's where jubilee comes in. Without some way to interrupt this cycle of spiraling debt, society becomes so destabilized that the system collapses:
https://pluralistic.net/2022/07/08/jubilant/#construire-des-passerelles
In other words: debts that can't be paid, won't be paid. Either you wipe away the farmers' debts to the creditor class, or your society collapses, and with it, the political relations that made those debts payable.
Jubilee is long gone, but that doesn't mean that debts that can't be paid will get paid. Modern society has filled the jubilee gap with bankruptcy, a legal process for shriving a debtor of their debts.
Bankruptcy takes many forms. The most important split in bankruptcy types is between elite bankruptcy and the bankruptcy of the common person. The limited liability company was created to allow people with money to pool their funds to back corporations without being responsible for their debts. This "capital formation" is considered "efficient" by economists because it creates the backing for big, ambitious projects, from colonizing and extracting the wealth of distant lands (Hudson's Bay Company) to spinning up global manufacturing supply chains (Apple).
Limited liability means that companies can take on debt without exposing their investors to risks beyond their capital stake. If you buy $1,000 worth of Apple stock, that's all you stand to lose if Apple makes bad decisions. *Apple* may rack up billions in liabilities - say, by abusing its subcontractor workforce - but Apple's *owners* aren't on the hook for it.
Economists like this because it means that you can invest in Apple without having to be privy to its daily management decisions, which means that Apple can accumulate huge pools of capital, "lever them up" by borrowing even more, and then put all that money to work on R&D, product development, marketing, and, of course, "incentives" for key employees and managers.
But limited liability also does a lot of work in the *political* sphere. Once an individual crosses a certain wealth threshold, they become an LLC. Accountants and wealth managers and financial planners insist on this. For freelancers and other sole practitioners, the benefits of forming an LLC are modest - a few more tax write-offs and the ability to get a business credit-card with slightly superior perks.
But for the truly wealthy, transforming yourself into the "natural person" at the center of a vast pool of LLCs is essential because it allows you to accumulate and shed debts. You can secretly own rental properties and abuse your tenants, accumulate vast liabilities as local authorities pile fine upon fine, and then simply dispose of the LLC and its debts. Plan this gambit carefully enough and the debtor LLC will have no assets in its bankruptcy estate apart from the crumbling apartment building, and its most senior secured creditor will be another of your LLCs. This lets the slumlord move an apartment block from one pocket to another, leaving the debt behind.
For the corporate person, shedding debts through bankruptcy is an honorable practice. Far from being a source of shame, the well-timed, well-structured bankruptcy is just evidence of financial acumen. Think of the private equity looters who buy a company by borrowing against it, pay themselves a huge "special dividend," then wipe away the debt by taking the company bankrupt (which also lets them shed obligations to suppliers, workers, and especially, retirees and their pensions). As Trump (a serial bankrupt who has stiffed legions of contractors and creditors) would say, "That makes me smart."
The apotheosis of elite bankruptcy is found in massive corporate bankruptcies, in which a corporation kills and maims huge numbers of people, then maneuvers to get its case heard in one of three US federal courtrooms where specialist judges rubber-stamp "involuntary third-party releases" that wipe out the company's obligations to it victims for pennies on the dollar, while the company gets to keep billions:
https://pluralistic.net/2021/07/29/impunity-corrodes/#morally-bankrupt
This process was so flagrantly abused by companies like Johnson & Johnson (which spent years knowingly advising women to dust their vulvas with asbestos-tainted talc, creating an epidemic of grotesque and lethal genital cancers) that it is finally generating some scrutiny and pushback:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/02/01/j-and-j-jk/#risible-gambit
But the precarious state of elite bankruptcies has more to do with the personal corruption of the small cabal of judges who run the system than public outrage over their rulings; like that one judge in Texas who was secretly fucking the lawyer whose clients he was also handing hundreds of millions of dollars to:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/10/16/texas-two-step/#david-jones
Certainly, we don't hear much about the "moral hazard" of allowing the Sackler opioid family to keep as much as ten billion dollars in the family's offshore accounts while walking away from the victims of their drug-pushing empire, no matter what bizarre tricks they deploy in pulling off the stunt:
https://pluralistic.net/2023/08/11/justice-delayed/#justice-redeemed
But when it comes to canceling the debts of normal people, the "moral hazard" is front and center. If you're a person who borrowed $79k in student loans, paid back $190k and *still owe $236k*, we can't cancel your debt, because of the message that would send to other people who want to (checks notes) get an education:
https://pluralistic.net/2020/12/04/kawaski-trawick/#strike-debt
The anti-jubilee side also wants us to think of the poor creditors: who would loan money to the next generation of students if student debt cancellation was a possibility? Of course, these are federally guaranteed loans, risk-free, free money for people who already have money, a kind of UBI for the people who need it least. The idea that this credit pool would dry up if you were limited to only collecting the debts that can be paid - rather than insisting that debts that *can't* be paid still be paid - elevates the hereditary creditor class to a kind of fragile, easily frightened, endangered species.
But the most powerful arguments against bankruptcy are rooted in the idea of providence. In an efficient market, anyone who goes bankrupt was *necessarily* reckless. They were entrusted with credit they weren't entitled to, because they lacked the intrinsic merit that would let them manage that credit wisely. Letting them walk away from their debts means that they will never learn from their mistakes, and that their fellow born-to-be-poors will learn the *wrong* thing from those debts: that there's an easy life in borrowing, spending, and discharging your debts in bankruptcy.
As it happens, this is an empirically testable proposition. If this view of personal bankruptcy as a personal failure is correct, then people who go bankrupt and live to borrow again should end up bankrupt again, too. On the other hand, if we accept the jubilee view - that debt is the result of accumulated misfortunes, often including the misfortune of birth into poor station - then bankruptcy represents a second chance with an opportunity to dodge misfortune.
In a new study from IZA Institute of Labor Economics's Gustaf Bruze, Alexander Kjær Hilsløv and Jonas Maibom, we get just such and empirical analysis. It's called "The Long-Run Effects of Individual Debt Relief," and it examines the lives of people for a full quarter-century after a bankruptcy:
https://docs.iza.org/dp17047.pdf
The study follows Danish bankruptcies following the introduction of continental Europe's first modern bankruptcy system, which Denmark instituted in 1984. Prior to that, the Danes - like most of Europe - did not allow for a discharge of personal debt through bankruptcy. Instead, a debtor who went bankrupt would be expected to have about 20% of their lifetime wages garnished to pay back their creditors, until the debts were repaid or they died (whichever came first).
After 1984, Denmark bankruptcy system imported features of US/UK/Commonwealth bankruptcy, including the ability to restructure and discharge your debts. Not everyone is eligible for this kind of bankruptcy: there's a bureaucratic system that verifies that people seeking bankruptcy discharge don't have a lot of assets that could go to their creditors.
But for the (un)lucky people who qualify for bankruptcy discharges, there's a fascinating natural experiment in which the fortunes of people who see debt relief can be compared to bankrupt people who couldn't get their debts wiped out.
It turns out that the Bronze Age has a thing or two to teach us. Here's the headline finding: people who discharge their debts in bankruptcy experience "a large increase in earned income, employment, assets, real estate, secured debt, home ownership, and wealth that persists for more than 25 years after a court ruling."
After people are given the benefits of bankruptcy, they are less likely to rely on public benefits. They get better jobs. Their families live better lives. Their creditors get *some* of their money back (which is all they can realistically expect, since "debts that can't be paid, won't be paid").
As Jason Kilborn writes for Credit Slips, "the benefits of debt relief are not only substantial but robust, as debtors learn their lesson (if there was one to learn) about managing their finances, and they capitalize (literally) on their fresh start."
Score one for the luck-based theory of wealth, and minus one for the providential meritocracy hypothesis.
Americans should take note of these findings. After all, Danes are insulated from the leading American cause of bankruptcy: medical debts. In America, breaking a bone or getting cancer or even kidney stone can wipe out a lifetime of hard work, careful planning and prudential spending. The US refuses to seriously grapple with this problem. The best we can come up with is the (welcome, but tiny) step of banning credit bureaux from trashing your credit score because of your medical debt:
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2024/06/11/fact-sheet-vice-president-harris-announces-proposal-to-prohibit-medical-bills-from-being-included-on-credit-reports-and-calls-on-states-and-localities-to-take-further-actions-to-reduce-medical-debt/
Millennia ago, everyone understood that debts that can't be paid, won't be paid, and they created a system for discharging debts and freeing productive people from the tyranny of accumulated liabilities, to the benefit of all. Dismantling that system required us to invent an elaborate theological system and dress it up in economic language.
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🥈 Hey look at this
* Within a month of launch, Namma Yatri fetches Rs 5.4 crore for cab drivers in Bengaluru https://indianexpress.com/article/cities/bangalore/namma-yatri-cab-drivers-9323223/lite/ (h/t Shashwath)
* CZM Book Club: "Party Discipline" by Cory Doctorow, Part Two https://www.iheart.com/podcast/105-it-could-happen-here-30717896/episode/czm-book-club-party-discipline-by-186134922/
* Hertz Nightmare: Customer Fined $436 Before They Even Rented The Car https://viewfromthewing.com/hertz-nightmare-customer-fined-436-before-they-even-rented-the-car/
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🥈 This day in history
#20yrsago Neuromancer jacket-quote https://memex.craphound.com/2004/06/16/neuromancer-jacket-quote/
#20yrsago Vatican reduces Inquisition’s atrocity-count https://web.archive.org/web/20040621234858/http://www.iht.com/articles/525118.html
#20yrsago Orin Hatch to make “counselling infringers” a crime https://web.archive.org/web/20040621210922/https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/archives/001631.php<
#20yrsago Why Microsoft should get out of DRM https://craphound.com/msftdrm.txt
#20yrsago Fark posts 1,000,000th link, Web surrenders https://www.fark.com/comments/1000000/Birds-learn-how-to-open-doors-at-Home-Depot-Finally-they-can-make-that-deck-for-birdhouse-In-other-news-this-is-1000000th-link
#15yrsago Vancouver cops affirm your right to take pictures https://web.archive.org/web/20090618134523/http://www.news1130.com/news/local/more.jsp?content=20090617_112051_8240
#15yrsago UK cop: ‘War on terror means no pictures of police vans in disabled parking spots’ https://shkspr.mobi/blog/2009/06/police-camera-action/
#15yrsago British cops stop and hassle thousands to “balance racial statistics” https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2009/jun/17/stop-search-terror-law-met
#15yrsago Mind Over Ship: David Marusek’s hyperfuturistic, hyperimaginative soap-opera https://memex.craphound.com/2009/06/17/mind-over-ship-david-maruseks-hyperfuturistic-hyperimaginative-soap-opera/
#15yrsago Bozeman, Montana requires job applicants to hand over all social network logins and passwords for background checks https://web.archive.org/web/20090621103931/montanasnewsstation.com/Global/story.asp?S=10551414&nav=menu227_3
#15yrsago Canadian cops want to wiretap the net https://web.archive.org/web/20090618223330/http://www.calgaryherald.com/Technology/Feds+give+cops+Internet+snooping+powers/1706191/story.html
#15yrsago China backs off on mandatory spyware https://www.crn.com/blogs-op-ed/the-channel-wire/217900033/china-caves-says-green-dam-software-is-optional
#15yrsago EFF kills another stupid internet patent https://www.eff.org/press/archives/2009/06/16
#15yrsago Kids lose their summer break due to impenetrable bureaucratic mess https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2009-jun-16-me-summer16-story.html
#10yrsago IRS won’t fix database of nonprofits, so it goes dark https://web.archive.org/web/20140715041700/https://bulk.resource.org/irs.gov/eo/terminate.html
#10yrsago Father’s Day: Groucho sings “Father’s Day” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e0Dt9q8bkqg
#10yrsago Copyright trolls cut and run at suggestion that they’re a front for disgraced firm Guardaley https://www.techdirt.com/2014/06/16/once-again-as-details-questionable-copyright-trolling-practices-come-to-light-troll-desperately-tries-to-run-away/
#10yrsago London police’s secret “domestic extremist” list includes people who sketch protests https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/jun/16/domestic-extremist-metropolitan-police-spying-elected-politician
#10yrsago Riot control drone that fires paintballs, pepper-spray and rubber bullets at protesters https://www.defenceweb.co.za/aerospace/aerospace-aerospace/desert-wolf-unveils-riot-control-drone/
#10yrsago Seattle paid $17.5K to “manage” online rep of public utility CEO https://web.archive.org/web/20140623210450/http://seattletimes.com/html/localnews/2023849447_citylightbrandxml.html
#10yrsago Oligopolistic America: anti-competitive, unequal, and deliberate https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/how-america-became-uncompetitive-and-unequal/2014/06/13/a690ad94-ec00-11e3-b98c-72cef4a00499_story.html?hpid=z3
#5yrsago Structural Separation: antitrust’s tried-and-true weapon for monopolists who bottleneck markets https://memex.craphound.com/2019/06/17/structural-separation-antitrusts-tried-and-true-weapon-for-monopolists-who-bottleneck-markets/
#5yrsago Fox News poll has Trump losing to Sanders, Biden, Warren, Harris, or Buttigieg https://www.commondreams.org/news/2019/06/16/fox-news-poll-bernie-sanders-would-beat-trump-9-points
#5yrsago Traverse City, MI braves the wrath of telcoms lobbyists, pushes ahead with municipal fiber network https://upnorthlive.com/news/local/traverse-city-light-and-power-approves-fiber-optic-internet
#5yrsago After Hong Kong’s leaders delay plan to render dissidents to mainland China, 2,000,000 Hong Kongers march and demand resignations https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-48655634
#5yrsago The UK government gave away cheap money for property purchase deposits, which the wealthy abused, driving up property prices and leaving UK taxpayers exposed https://wolfstreet.com/2019/06/13/uk-government-blew-billions-on-help-to-buy-scheme-that-enriched-home-builders-and-drove-up-home-prices-taxpayers-on-the-hook-when-prices-sink-new-report-warns/
#1yrago Pizzaburgers https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/17/pizzaburgers/
#1yrago Conservatives are fringe outliers – and leftists could learn from them https://pluralistic.net/2023/06/16/that-boy-aint-right/#dinos-rinos-and-dunnos
Upcoming appearances (permalink)
* Go Fact Yourself (Los Angeles), Jun 20
https://laist.com/events/go-fact-yourself-live-with-aida-rodriguez
* Locus Awards reading (virtual), Jun 21
https://locusmag.com/2024-locus-awards-weekend/
* Locus Awards keynote (Oakland), Jun 22
https://locusmag.com/2024-locus-awards-weekend/
* HOPE XV, Jul 14 (Queens, NY)
https://www.hope.net/talks.html
* American Association of Law Libraries keynote (Chicago), Jul 21
https://www.aallnet.org/conference/agenda/keynote-speaker/
* Go Fact Yourself (Los Angeles), Jun 20
https://laist.com/events/go-fact-yourself-live-with-aida-rodriguez
* Locus Awards reading (virtual), Jun 21
https://locusmag.com/2024-locus-awards-weekend/
* Locus Awards keynote (Oakland), Jun 22
https://locusmag.com/2024-locus-awards-weekend/
* HOPE XV, Jul 14 (Queens, NY)
https://www.hope.net/talks.html
* American Association of Law Libraries keynote, (Chicago), Jul 21
https://www.aallnet.org/conference/agenda/keynote-speaker/
Recent appearances (permalink)
* Reimagining the Internet
https://publicinfrastructure.org/podcast/102-cory-doctorow-enshittification/
* Circulating ideas
https://circulatingideas.com/2024/06/11/261-the-bezzle-by-cory-doctorow-summer-reading-spectacular/
* Capitalist Realism vs. Science Fiction
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zz-iHWzqGK0
Latest books (permalink)
* The Bezzle: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about prison-tech and other grifts, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), February 2024 (the-bezzle.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3062/Available_Feb_20th%3A_The_Bezzle_HB.html#/).
* "The Lost Cause:" a solarpunk novel of hope in the climate emergency, Tor Books (US), Head of Zeus (UK), November 2023 (http://lost-cause.org). Signed, personalized copies at Dark Delicacies (https://www.darkdel.com/store/p3007/Pre-Order_Signed_Copies%3A_The_Lost_Cause_HB.html#/)
* "The Internet Con": A nonfiction book about interoperability and Big Tech (Verso) September 2023 (http://seizethemeansofcomputation.org). Signed copies at Book Soup (https://www.booksoup.com/book/9781804291245).
* "Red Team Blues": "A grabby, compulsive thriller that will leave you knowing more about how the world works than you did before." Tor Books http://redteamblues.com. Signed copies at Dark Delicacies (US): and Forbidden Planet (UK): https://forbiddenplanet.com/385004-red-team-blues-signed-edition-hardcover/.
* "Chokepoint Capitalism: How to Beat Big Tech, Tame Big Content, and Get Artists Paid, with Rebecca Giblin", on how to unrig the markets for creative labor, Beacon Press/Scribe 2022 https://chokepointcapitalism.com
* "Attack Surface": The third Little Brother novel, a standalone technothriller for adults. The *Washington Post* called it "a political cyberthriller, vigorous, bold and savvy about the limits of revolution and resistance." Order signed, personalized copies from Dark Delicacies https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1840/Available_Now%3A_Attack_Surface.html
* "How to Destroy Surveillance Capitalism": an anti-monopoly pamphlet analyzing the true harms of surveillance capitalism and proposing a solution. https://onezero.medium.com/how-to-destroy-surveillance-capitalism-8135e6744d59?sk=f6cd10e54e20a07d4c6d0f3ac011af6b) (signed copies: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2024/Available_Now%3A__How_to_Destroy_Surveillance_Capitalism.html)
* "Little Brother/Homeland": A reissue omnibus edition with a new introduction by Edward Snowden: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250774583; personalized/signed copies here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p1750/July%3A__Little_Brother_%26_Homeland.html
* "Poesy the Monster Slayer" a picture book about monsters, bedtime, gender, and kicking ass. Order here: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781626723627. Get a personalized, signed copy here: https://www.darkdel.com/store/p2682/Corey_Doctorow%3A_Poesy_the_Monster_Slayer_HB.html#/.
Upcoming books (permalink)
* Picks and Shovels: a sequel to "Red Team Blues," about the heroic era of the PC, Tor Books, February 2025
* Unauthorized Bread: a middle-grades graphic novel adapted from my novella about refugees, toasters and DRM, FirstSecond, 2025
Colophon (permalink)
Today's top sources: Credit Slips (https://www.creditslips.org/creditslips/).
Currently writing:
* Enshittification: a nonfiction book about platform decay. Friday's progress: 807 words (12142 words total).
* A Little Brother short story about DIY insulin PLANNING
* Picks and Shovels, a Martin Hench noir thriller about the heroic era of the PC. FORTHCOMING TOR BOOKS JAN 2025
* Vigilant, Little Brother short story about remote invigilation. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM
* Spill, a Little Brother short story about pipeline protests. FORTHCOMING ON TOR.COM
Latest podcast: My 2004 Microsoft DRM Talk https://craphound.com/news/2024/06/16/my-2004-microsoft-drm-talk/>
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"When life gives you SARS, you make sarsaparilla" -Joey "Accordion Guy" DeVilla
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