The Housing Bubble

Ayn Rand couldn’t have dreamed that the meeting place would be in cyberspace, but here we are…

Makes a heckova doorstop, when you’re done reading it.

The Fountainhead is wonderful, Enjoy~

You can get it on audiobook and listen while driving…kills two birds with one stone.

I believe this book is helping to support a cinder block by keeping one of the holes dust free in my parents basement. I read everything else in the house, but never managed to yank this one out. Possibly afraid of dropping it on my foot. I don’t know if this storage location indicates a conscious editorial decision, or whether it merely came with the house 40 years ago…

Loved both Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged. Read em in High School. lengthy yes, but well worth the read.

I read them in high school also - we’re showing our age. I can’t imagine these being taught in most high schools today.

It’s been said that one must be exposed to Rand during adolescence in order to get hooked. I didn’t read Rand until my 30s. About 40 pages into The Fountainhead I remember thinking to myself “there is really something psychologically off about this author.” Everything I subsequently learned about her life confirmed this bit of intuition. Murray N. Rothbard nicely summed up Rand and her movement:

“Thus, power - not liberty or reason - was the central thrust of the Randian movement. The major lesson of the history of the movement to libertarians is that It Can Happen Here, that libertarians, despite explicit devotion to reason and individuality, are not exempt from the mystical and totalitarian cultism that pervades other ideological as well as religious movements.”

That’s the difference.

We Read.

while cults are often born of worthy ideas, worthy ideas are never born of cults.

alad….

One of the best gifts I’ve ever received was a video set of “We The Living”…..in Italian ….. starring Rosanno Brazzi. It was filmed in Italy shortly after WW2…. Astonishing rendition….

Saw Rand at Reed College….like almost 50 years ago!! She shredded the hecklers.

MaryLee…

She was a force to be reckoned with~

Only just now again, can hecklers be silenced by using our intellect against them, in a decidedly one way battle…

We The Living,

against

Those that post twice, but think not much.

is there something you want to tell us, joey?

p.s.

Galt, California

pretty much sucks.

Galt Calif. was named after Galt Ontario.. which was named after Galt the writer.

read a couple chapters. if you don’t like it after that, put it away and forget about it. but the book is definitely worth reading. even if you don’t agree with AR on everything, you’ll prob enjoy the book.

What’s to tell? They sell off their only means of production other than housing and then housing tanks. They should be a 101 college course on how to take a diversified successful company and destroy it in a few short years…

“They sell off their only means of production other than housing and then housing tanks.”

Interesting commentary and I wholeheartedly agree. When you hear officials in various state govs talking about how their state’s economy (like Florida) is dependent upon building and real estate, you know we’re in big trouble. For cripes sake, houses are just places to live, raise families, etc. You’ve got to have other means of employment and income. Now, for the Great Lakes states like Michigan, if I were a states’ rights government official, I’d be laying claim to the water up there and telling CA and AZ etc to stick it, or pay up in a big way. Water industry getting big. Could be a huge boon for the Great Lakes states, especially if they could find a way to replenish it.

PHO nice water etf

“Could be a huge boon for the Great Lakes states, especially if they could find a way to replenish it.”

That’s apparently becoming a problem. With Lake Superior down a number of feet in depth, the effect is working it’s way through all the other lakes. It’s affecting shipping in terms of reduced loads, lakefront property values when you can cut the grass around your dock, marinas, etc. And when water levels will head up again is anybody’s guess.

I used to live in Southwood. Overall a very nice, well made St. Joe master planned community. If they had kept pricing where initially intended, they could have built for 40+ years at full speed in Tallahassee. But they (finally) jacked up prices just as the market was peaking and then low and behold, the insatiable demand disappears. Then they sign with Beazer to do all the actual construction. Their plans to build multiple “Seaside” like towns with similar profit margins only made sense in a bubble. Neat business model though, take 1000 acres of $5k acre land, set aside 900 as a nature preserve, sell the remaining 100 at $500K an acre (or something along those lines). Panama City will always be the “Redneck Rivera”. There just isn’t that much real money that wants to go on vacation in the woods and bring in all their own food.

I saw something about that recently, Blano. Weird. One guy was claiming that the water was being covertaly diverted or “stolen” to supply CA, AZ, and other southwestern states. Although it came off as tin foil hat, the other day I saw some proposal to tap the Great Lakes to divert water to the southwest and it made me go “hmm”. Although how something like that could be covered up I have no idea.

But it is not unheard of. Here in West Central Florida, Hillsborough and Pasco Counties made a deal with the devil back in the 1970s to supply Pinellas County. In recent years, the counties have wanted to withdraw from that agreement and Pinellas threatened to sue the peewadden out of them. In 2000, when I was looking for property up in Pasco, one of the realtors showing me around drove me past a few dry lake beds and started muttering under her breath about how Pasco was being “sucked dry” by Pinellas.

The arid Southwest is in for an international fight if they want water from the Great Lakes,see below. The Lakes themselves are already at low levels, and folks who live around the Lakes have no interest in “sharing”. Remember those Texans with their “Freeze a Yankee” bumperstickers?
Expect to see “Let ‘em Die of Thirst” from those up north. Payback is a bitch.

“…signing on December 13, 2005, a historic agreement with Quebec and the eight Great Lakes states (Illinois, Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, New York, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin) that share the basin with Ontario.
The Great Lakes-St. Lawrence River Basin Sustainable Water Resources Agreement establishes:
* A virtual ban on diversions
* A basin-wide environmental standard for water uses
* Better conservation measures
* An increased role for science in decision-making.
The basin-wide environmental standard will significantly increase the control of water uses in the Great Lakes states. There was previously no such standard.
http://www.mnr.gov.on.ca/mnr/water/greatlakes/index.html

In lieu of moving the water, why not just move people to the water?

In lieu of moving the water, why not just move people to the water?

<californians>Flyover states are for exploiting, not for living</californians>

Never happen, It gets cold up north, very cold. Could be the only thing that protects us from Californians.

Mastering the Midwest accent will be a challenge for many a Californian…

“In lieu of moving the water, why not just move people to the water?”

Lots of people don’t like the idea of that liquid becoming a solid for part of the year. As spike mentioned, there may be something to be said for that.

They’ll just have to perish of thirst somewhere else, perish the thought.

have you read “Cadillac Desert” about the water , the west and the big government programs that were created and didn’t know when to quit.

Bad enough with the FIBs, but now Californicators.

First I’ll get my realtors license…. oooh start some lovely condos overlooking Superior..

Yes, well, google could move their operations to the Great Lakes region and that would revive the area. Why not?

> The arid Southwest is in for an international fight if they want water from the Great Lakes,see below.

How would they get that water to Cali? They would have to pump it thousands of miles and over the Rockies.

The Californians are coming the Californians are coming

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0060921/
(my very first drive in movie, that I remember being at)

Never happen, It gets cold up north, very cold. Could be the only thing that protects us from Californians.

I tell people that Chicago winters keep all the pussie$ out. I’m only half-joking.

I’m late to the water rights discussion, but suffice to say that the Great Lakes states are extremely aware of the value of our fresh water (and concerned about the drop in lake levels). It won’t go cheaply so arid states can build golf courses, that’s for sure.

I’m also encouraged that the states and big cities around the lakes are becoming more aggressive about defending the watersheds from pollution and corporate exploitation. A little late to the game, but better late than never.

Yes indeed. I should remind Californians that I wished I had a winter jacket on as I walked to work this morning. It was in the upper 40s… Three days removed from a day in which the Chicago Marathon was stopped early due to heat that was causing runners to drop like flies. 300+, and 1 died (turned out to be a heart condition that was likely aggravated by the heat).

Spike66: The two Canadian provinces and the eight US states like the Great Lakes just the way they are, thank you very much. Besides, the water wants to go downhill! Despite the cold, Americans in the south-west will come north.

Where there’s a will, there’s a way, especially if there’s money in it. Think of the payday! All those jobs, moving the earth, blasting the rock, manufacturing the equipment, moving the equipment, people guarding the pipelines, land to be bought up, the lawyers for the lawsuits that would surely come about, the profit for the utilities, etc., etc., ad nauseum, amen.

Now, that’s how it is done. Why do you think we use oil, gas, hydroelectric, etc. instead of Tesla’s brilliant and inexpensive plan to tap the magnetic field for power (in Colorado, by the way). Imagine how different the US would be. No oil spills. No pipelines. No shipping costs. No Middle East wars. No Exxon, Chevron, et al to hold us hostage. Far less pollution. No worrying about utilities being shut off.

And imagine all the losers if we were to transition to that system right now. No having to live under the threat of nuclear plant meltdowns or sabotage.

But oh, no. We’re in the last hours of ancient sunlight (oil) and now we MUST have nuclear, not the simple, safe, clean, renewable alternative that Tesla came up with so long ago and that Westinghouse (dang his soul forever) put the kibosh on. No, we MUST have something that, if there’s ever an accident or an attack, will make the Exxon Valdez oil spill look like the dog piddled on the floor. But think of the money and the employment!!

Same here, Brian….90 degrees Monday afternoon, 49 degrees this morning. Lots of folks wouldn’t appreciate that.

Reminds me of Sam Kinison:

“See this? It’s sand. Nothing grows in sand. You’re starving because you live in the middle of a ****ing desert! C’mon, we’re putting you on a bus and getting you outta here!”

90 degrees Monday afternoon, 49 degrees this morning ??

Ugh…….I’ll Pass….I am one of those p..see’s that ET talked about…

There’s a veritable s-load of water in the ocean clinging to California…

“move the people to the water…”

Excuse me, but there’s a huge body of water right next to the entire state of California called the Pacific Ocean. The technology exists to turn the salt into fresh water, but for reasons beyond me, it isn’t done. Something about control…

The restriction on water movement out of the Great Lakes is old news and the people in the Midwest, better not count on that saving them. It might just be cheaper for the Southwest to desalinate.

http://tinyurl.com/2×9q4o

Desalination has a host of problems associated with it. 1)Requires a lot of power to run a desalination plant 2) The powering of a plant produces emissions harmful to the already delicate environment 3) The brine left behind cannot be put into the ocean without devistating consequences, so where to put the brine? 4)Water intake, unless done from a beach well also has devistating consequences to ocean life. We are basically screwed.

Late to the discussion, but I’d like to share my community’s water trouble.

Live in Rocky Mount, NC, about 70 miles east of Raleigh. A couple hours drive from the Atlantic Ocean. We’ve had maybe four days of rain this summer, one of which was this morning. The reservoir for the city is so low that grass has been growing on the parched ground and is almost dry. Our city has already been on Stage 1 water restrictions and is now going on Stage 2. The factory I work at is trying to figure out how to cut the plant’s water use by 10%, about 20000 gallons, so for starters they cut off all air conditioning throughout the plant (as a native Southerner that grew up next to a swamp, I can take humidity just fine so it doesn’t bug me, however, Yankees and people that live with AC don’t like it). We have some wells on the plant’s property but we’re previously discouraged from using them cause it would reduce the local groundwater table of all the houses around us that use wells. We don’t have any choice now. A lot of people’s private wells have gone dry and new holes for wells have had to be drilled. My city council signed an agreement with a nextdoor city for them to supply us water short-term. However, til January is a dry season for us so we don’t know what’s coming. We’re really hoping for a tropical storm of some kind.

In Raleigh, a city and area that has had massive population influx in the last couple decades, if things continue as they are, they’ll go dry in January it’s been stated.

RE: We’re really hoping for a tropical storm of some kind.

I think your area needs some more immigrants (snicker).

Campaign Speech in Los Angeles, on Sept 11, 1952

“It might not be too many years, for example, before you people of Los Angeles can get your drinking water from the sea. Already our scientists have made great progress in turning salt water into fresh.”

Adlai E. Stevenson, Jr.

Conscience means literally: with science

Who ratpured you away?

Perhaps there is something a bit more sinister being planned? Seems a bit odd that no one in a leadership position seems at all surprised or concerned about any of this.
Gee, the president of Mexico seems to know something!
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=58052

So, devalue the dollar to intro a new currency?? This is the Bush/Cheney/Paulson plan?? How is this not treason??
Destroy the borders, undermine the Constitution and destroy the currency?? i feel physically ill.
But hooray for Chavez, my new hero.

“(Larry)King, evidently startled by Fox’s revelation of the currency, asked pointedly, “It’s going to be like the euro dollar (sic), you mean?”
“Well, that would be long, long term,” Fox repeated.
Fox noted the FTAA plan had been thwarted by Hugo Chavez, the radical socialist president of Venezuela.
“Everything was running fluently until Hugo Chavez came,” Fox commented. “He decided to combat the idea and destroy the idea.”
Fox explained that he and Bush intended to proceed incrementally, establishing FTAA as an economic agreement first and waiting to create an amero-type currency later – a plan he also suggested was in place for NAFTA itself.
“I think the process to go, first step is trading agreement,” Fox said. “And then further on, a new vision, like we are trying to do with NAFTA.”

ugh. you’re assuming that our beloved president has even half the brain to understand what they agreed upon. not to mention that nothing he does is related to what he says.

Yep. And the FDIC is literally all hat, no cattle. They can’t back up deposits with promises and they don’t have much “equity” to support any meaningful bailouts. In essence, just another Ponzi Confidence Domino in the game.

Crazy, you got very lucky. We call them Daddy houses here in Davis and folks who bought as long ago as 03 are having problems unloading them. I’m watching one that went REO this month and a handful more that will complete the cycle this winter to dumped on the MLS this spring.

Question: if these homes are secondary homes, do they become recourse loans in CA? I seem to remember they do. If are non-recourse loans but were specified at o/o in the loan documents, they go back to recourse - ouch.

for those of you who are relatively new to this blog, the “auger-inn special” is oxide’s euphemism for an “a$$ pounding”, a term first used by auger on this blog.

Yeah. I bet that dog was jettasoning ballast in all directions…

Impressive. I’ve seen a barn owl take a rather fat bunny, but nothing as impressive as a 25 lb dog! That would be worth seeing.

Neil

I lived in Alaska for a short time and remember reading a newspaper story about a older out of state couple that pulled over for gas in their camper trailer outside some small town in AK. While they were gassing up they let their little yapper dog get out and run around to stretch it’s legs. Sure enough, an eagle swooped down, snatched the pooch and flew off while the owners stood there dumbfounded.

Even if the dog were in a coma, how would a 3 pound bird hope to loft a 25 pound lunch pail?

Great Horned Owls are often said to be the most dangerous owl, and it is reportedly the only bird of prey that has been known to kill a human being…

maybe he planned to tear it into tiny pieces first?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Horned_Owl

Seriously, Great Horned Owls like to show people who’s boss.

Here in Santa Clara Valley in the western foothils we have a terrible Skunk problem…Why ?? Only natural preditor is the Horned Owl (Long Gone) and the red tail Hawk (Mostly just in the flat lands now)….

Get a pure breed that is highly trained and it beats haveing kids by a long shot,,,,,

“Get a pure breed that is highly trained and it beats haveing kids by a long shot,,,,,”

I’ll take my english coonhound pound puppy over that purebred chihuahua that piddled on every surface of my house and ME anyday.

Sorry, I apologize for jumping on Joey…I get a little too defensive when I think folks are dissing dogs. In Manhattan, there are entirely too many mothers with these monster strollers who are happy to ram dogs who are walking along the sidewalk on a leash, minding their own business. Of course, I’d be happy to feed these mothers and their spawn to needy coyotes.

I will send it to you Chick…

http://www.bangitout.com/articles/viewarticle.php?a=2003

For anyone else who is interested…

So, is she a bimbo or a coyote or both? Certainly predatory, but predators that are lost and can’t find game, starve….

Man, that was a beaut!
“I know a woman in my yoga class who was married to an investment banker and lives in Tribeca, and she’s not as pretty as I am, nor is she a great genius. So what is she doing right? How do I get to her level?”
HINT: Learn the “pretzel” position and how to suck a golfball through a garden hose.

p.s.:

2 of the 3 cubs are dead by now, statistically

Mother Nature’s a tough taskmaster

The bells are to let the grizzlys know it’s dinner time and the pepper spray is for seasoning.

Wow. You are a FlyWhisperer.

LOL!

Sadly, my Beastmaster skills do not stretch to higher life-forms, such as SUV drivers talking on their cell phones

…..hang on, did I say higher life-forms…

She hosts Bulls & Bears on Fox News on Saturday mornings.

That’s a woman??? You’ve got to be (bleep)ing me.

Thank you!!

Mass Ave is a nightmare, but otherwise it’s not so bad. The bikeway (the old B & M rail line) goes straight to the Alewife T, or you can get commuter rail in Belmont. The west part of it runs by the Great Meadows ( a pretty swamp). Much livelier since they gave up being dry.

There was one winter I worked in Burlington & mostly drove through Arlington. Every morning, there was this angry, shabby, runner with a bent stride who would run right towards oncoming traffic on Route 3….

good times.

“However, imho, it’s best tread very lightly when it comes to getting involved in decision making, planning or deciding anything about mom’s life, present or future.”

Having been through it twice now (both parents are gone) care of parents is a very thorny area. Because unfortunately children are often left with the consequences of their parents’ actions later in life. Try fifteen years of handling a father who is physically active, very strong, but has a mild to moderate case of dementia. It’s a real laugh a minute, especially when you get a call from the NYPD that your parent is wandering around in front of Lincoln Center, when you thought he was safe at home in Connecticut. If you could handle them like a parent handles a child, it would be much easier, but it doesn’t work that way and society and AARP frowns on it.

Thankfully, there are a few good books out there that cover this specific subject. I can’t remember the title of the one I read or i’d recommend it.
Sometimes roles do get reversed and children must take control.. no question about that.

it’s interesting that in many cases, children end up taking care of their parents for as long if not more than their parents took care of them, while also dealing with children of their own and jobs as well. I wish someone would write a book about how to make brains last as long as the bodies.

i bet some kids get to begin taking care of mom at maybe 12 or so.. routinely stop at the store and buy a can of chili on the way home from school, heat it up on the stove before trying to wake mom up to stuff some food down the crack-ho’s throat.

we gotta remember to count our blessings.. often.

“we gotta remember to count our blessings.. often.”

True, but that others are worse off shouldn’t prevent us from dealing with the matters at hand, or make us complacent or grateful, for that matter.

“buy a can of chili on the way home from school, heat it up on the stove before trying to wake mom up to stuff some food down the crack-ho’s throat.”

Sort of reminds me of the “eat your food, remember the children starving in Africa” riff, but I get your drift.

‘…unfortunately children are often left with the consequences of their parents’ actions later in life.’

So true. And not always even later in life. I had to do a lot of the raising of my siblings. 7 of them.
It’s called ‘birth control’, and I think it’s quite a good thing, but Mormons think big families are gooooood. Yeah. Suuure they are. Problem is, what if it turns out you’re not up to the task of raising all your kids you produce? It’s not like you can put them back. Someone has to do the care.
I am grateful however, that the smell of diapers eventually wore off my hands only 5 years or so after I escaped.

Is that a first hand story of confiscation?

I’ve got a little parachute too, only enough to make a fresh start if it comes to that.

What “other plans” might one consider?

Oh, yes! Like those utterly horrible ‘Bratz’ dolls. Sexualized little plastic girls who only like to shop?! I think they are terrifying. And that’s just one example of the freakish things put out there for girls to model themselves after.

I refer to Bratz as Slutz.

“I taught both my daughters that being financially independent was their #1 goal prior to forming any lasting relationships. That way, they could pick who they wanted and dump them if they weren’t acceptable.”

That’s why more and more working females are seeing the positives of “pre-nups.”

DOC

It’s also why so many couples are having “fertility problems.”

I guess you are expecting another speculative blowout to the upside soon? DJIA 39,000, here we come! Buy now or get priced out of the stock market forever!!

I’m skeptical of buying in at these levels….i did some selling last week in all my investments . Of course if there is another rate cut around the bend, it would appear the Fed is stimulating another stock market bubble so people will keep spending. Problem is most Americans don’t draw income from the stock market so consumer spending will still likely fall. The wealth effect has gone from tech stocks, to housing and now back to stocks.

The US stock markets are stagnant.

There is no volume

There is no upward momentum

The famous Dow is only 30 stocks

The US stock market is over 5000 stocks

Good markets do not trend on rumors or unreasonable future expectations

Many investors are waiting to sell for tax reasons - IMHO, a mistake - tax rates have never been this low

Most rumors require outside market activity to bail out the US (e.g. Berkshire Hathaway buying, China buying, OPEC buying etc.)

Many US companies indices are down for the year, (banks -14% , retail -8%, investment banks - 12%) This is American industry

DJIA coming in for a soft landing at 14K. Time to buy the dip.

“All you need is faith and trust
and just a little bit of pixie dust”
Peter Pan

In Los Angeles, The Staples Center is running a television ad campaign for premium seating.
They never had to that before. You can’t blame that on Kobe apathy alone.

I’ll throw in Buffalo…

Aladin’s just mad at Buffalo ’cause our ghetto retreats only cost $50k instead of $300k like CA..

Saw a few $10k estates, when I was there…

You’re a brave man.. Or well armed..

The confusion we live in these days is a deep one, traumatic in its intensity and violence. While chasing debt-soaked dollars down a filthy, rusty drainpipe, it’s hard to differentiate between friends and enemies. From gutter height, everyone looks like an enemy. And that’s exactly how it’s meant to be; welcome to the new class war pitching the dissolving middle class against itself in one long reality TV show. Rich versus poor is a fairy tale. Middle class versus itself is the reality. The confusion is real, and it’s intentional.

on minyanville……..sums me up, at the momment