Bits Bucket For June 5, 2009
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The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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It’s a good morning to be shameless. Today is the CityBoy’s birthday. The past year has been a truly great one for me. The next year looks to be even better. I hope all the rest of you can say the same.
Raise your glass and let’s toast to a debt-free lifestyle.
Thank you Ben for what you do. A check will be on its way this weekend. It shouldn’t bounce.
Happy Birthday, NYCBoy. And many happy returns of the day.
Haaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaappy
Birthdaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaay!!!
~~confetti and clink of Jack and coke~~
Leigh
Happy Birthday!
Happy birthday, you cranky bastard.
X = age
X + 27 = liver age
HahaHAHAH! That’s funny!
But yeah, NYCity, you oughtta have a separate, special party for your liver, with a cake and little perky hats and everything.
Say, I’ll send MY liver to YOUR liver’s party! With a big bottle of Jack wrapped in a pretty bow! Then they can commiserate!
My liver’s so big and robust—I’d be fine with leaving it unsupervised on a cross-country trip, once it promised not to beat up any Marines or ninjas for looking at it funny.
Happy Birthday!
Happy Birthday! Hooray!
*sings loudly and prettily *
“Happyyyyyy Birthdayyyyyy to yoooooooo, Happyyyyy Birthdayyyyyyy to yoooOOOOOOOOOO, Happy Birthday, dear NYCityboyyyyyy, Happyyy Birthdayyyyyy to YOOOoooOOOOooooOOOO….”
I’m sorry you couldn’t hear that, NYCityboy, because I howled the ‘yoooooo’ parts in an exciting and celebratory sort of birthday-ish fashion, in rising crescendos of bellowing majesty, much like a velociraptor. Except for the last ‘yooooo’, where I wavered back and forth, like if I was a singing velociraptor jumping on a trampoline.
(I’m working at home today, so I can howl songs.)
*the ‘prettily’ part was a bald-faced lie.
Glad you’re back, NYCityBoy. We missed your insight and call-it-like-you-see-it-ness.
Oh, and your interesting diet (cheerios et al).
I can go for shameless.
My birthday was yesterday.
Happy birthday to us!
You shoulda told us! I can’t sing a warmed-over Birthday Song. Now I have to save up for next year.
Next year tell us, Mr. Secretive.
HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!
Good morning everyone….
Just eating some chicken nuggets in afghanistan…(at least I think they are nuggets)
lol… positive they are chicken, but not sure which part of the chicken?
If your experience over there is like mine, about half of the meat you’re going to be served will be chicken.
Half the time, or half at any given meal? Like, you get half chicken nuggets and half kitty nuggets?
I was told a story once, by the crew of an airplane owned by one of the major chicken processors.
They said the company was a chicken processor……started with the whole chicken, then dismantled the chicken piece by piece, until the only thing left was the stuff nobody would eat (beaks, feets, bungholes, etc). These were processed into chicken feed, to keep the cycle going.
The step immediately ahead of the “chicken feed” stage was the “Chicken McNuggets” process.
(Now aren’t you glad this blog is so educatiuonal??
)
I’m surprised the nugget’s stage isn’t BEHIND the chicken feed stage. MickyD’s gets what the chickens won’t eat!
Never happen, but keep trying…
Committee seeks greater scrutiny for Fed actions
By Krishna Guha in Washington
Published: June 4 2009 20:37 | Last updated: June 4 2009 20:37
Government auditors would be allowed to examine the Federal Reserve’s response to the financial crisis – a move many believe would threaten the Fed’s independence – under an amendment adopted by the oversight committee of the US House of Representatives.
The amendment, proposed by congressman Dennis Kucinich, is subject to referral to the House financial services committee as well as approval in the Senate, and may never be law.
I love how they are afraid thait this will “threaten the Fed’s independence.” Um, they control our money supply and answer to no one; should we really be concerned about keeping THEM independent vs. keeping US independent of the meddling of out-of-control bankers?! How can anyone not on the bribe list think that it is a good idea to have the money supply controlled by unelected plutocrats who never have to answer questions, face an audit, etc… wow!
The thought is that if elected officials control interest rates they will slash rates prior to every election. There is a difference between being independent and having no oversight. Time to shine some light on this black hole of information and make the results public.
Government auditors would be allowed to examine the Federal Reserve’s response to the financial crisis – a move many believe would threaten the Fed’s independence – under an amendment adopted by the oversight committee of the US House of Representatives.
The amendment, proposed by congressman Dennis Kucinich, is subject to referral to the House financial services committee as well as approval in the Senate, and may never be law.
Eh? Is this not referring to HR 2107 proposed by Ron Paul? That’s the amendment proposing that the Fed but audited - did something change?
White-Collar Fugitives Tripped Up by Bad Planning, Weakness…
June 5 (Bloomberg) — White-collar fugitives such as Sam Israel and Marcus Schrenker often fail to escape the law because of what prosecutors and bounty hunters say is a lack of preparation for the rigors of life on the lam.
Israel, 49, convicted of running a $400 million Ponzi scheme at hedge-fund firm Bayou Group LLC, and Schrenker, 38, accused of fraud as president of Heritage Wealth Management Inc., were captured within a month of fleeing. White-collar fugitives often run out of money or lack the mental sturdiness to elude police, said Duane Chapman, star of the television program “Dog the Bounty Hunter.”
“There are different qualities in white-collar guys than street thugs,” Chapman said. “A criminal’s life has nothing but ups and downs, whereas a white-collar criminal has never seen the dark side, so when he enters that realm, he is lost.”
Schrenker, who faced trial next week on charges related to his flight, including allowing his plane to crash after he jumped out of it, is to plead guilty today in Pensacola, Florida, according to court records. Israel is to be sentenced July 15 for bail-jumping. He is already serving a 20-year sentence for the underlying fraud.
U.S. law-enforcement agencies captured 110,000 fugitives last year, according to David Turner, a spokesman for the U.S. Marshals Service. Some 3,300 warrants are outstanding for white- collar crimes, according to William Sorukas, chief inspector for domestic investigations for the service.
Cash Essential
Once someone has fled, a supply of cash is important to having “a fighting chance” of staying free, said Michael Seigel, a former federal prosecutor who teaches law at the University of Florida in Gainesville. The hunters’ priorities can also determine whether someone is caught, he said.
“A lot of whether they are captured depends on the continued interest of law enforcement,” Seigel said. “If leads dry up, it may be back-burnered.”
Israel, after pleading guilty to perpetrating a massive fraud at his now-bankrupt Stamford, Connecticut-based company, was to report to a federal prison in Massachusetts in June 2008 to begin his sentence.
Instead, the money manager left his car on a bridge over the Hudson River in upstate New York with “suicide is painless” written in dust on the hood, suggesting he may have jumped.
Faking death rarely throws off investigators, who grow suspicious if there’s no body, Chapman said.
I would like to see a list of the ones that they have not caught before determining that white collar criminals don’t know how to evade police.
It may be like the sociologist that measured the IQ of prisoners and determined that criminals have lower IQs than that of the general population. Of course someone pointed out that he had only measured the IQ of criminals that had been caught.
The smart ones become CEO’s or politicians.
I’d PAY to see “Dog, the White-Collar Bounty Hunter”
-Watch Dog and his posse beat some hedge fund cheat into submission.
-See Dog wrestle down and cuff a “renegade” trader, on a Bermuda beach.
-And, in a special moment, see Madoff get Tazed in the gonads.
SWEET!
Years ago when I lived in San Rafael, CA the highway patrol found a man’s car parked along the edge of the freeway with the hood up, and the man had literally disappeared. No crime was evident, his car ran fine, his family bank accounts were untouched, etc., he had simply vanished. I clearly recall an investigator who looked at the man’s life (his job, his bills, his fat wife, his dysfunctional kids, the whole picture), and postulated: the guy’s in Canada; probably hitch-hiked a ride — living a second life.
I had the opportunity to work with the good Mr. Schrenker on financing for his first aircraft back in 2003. Interesting dude. The Dateline special was dead on. He showed up about an hour late to close on his airplane (not the Malibu) and pullled up in his new Harley. (All about the flash, even then) Luckily, we did not finance his Piper in 2005. Mrs. MissedApproachMN (a Mechanical Engineer) and I both had a good laugh over the drag of the open door in reference to fuel burn. Whoops. Bad flight planning, Marcus.
MissedApproachMN,
And I’m really surprised there haven’t been more comments about this guy? Textbook case of fraud/sociopathic behavior. The REIC would have embraced him as their own!
The REIC would have embraced him as their own!
+1 They’d probably have him on the lecture tour.
I don’t know… looking over the long list of various bankers, government officials, and other crooks who are still in power and taking our money (or printing up new money and thus “taking” ours through inflation), white collar criminals seem to do pretty well for themselves. The key is to commit an “acceptable” crime, such as bailing out your buddies at Goldman Sachs, running huge companies into the ground while pocketing all the loot, or bankrupting the nation; if you do this, you’ll be fine, but if you just run a basic Ponzi scheme and forget to pay off the right people, you might get caught.
Argh!
My dad knew a Colorado rancher who just disappeared. His old pickup was found in town with the wallet on the seat, full of the usual stuff wallets have, IOW, no crime.
He just disappeared, no real reason to, no huge debts, etc.
Years later he was seen on the street in Salt Lake City. He just wanted a new life and walked away, hitch-hiked and got a job there, left everything. He was single, an older guy.
I’m thinking about doing that myself…wait, I already did…but nobody even noticed.
My small corner of the planet is chock-full of The Disappeared–full of folks I’ve known and sweated an honest day’s work with for fifteen years–whose last names (and likely their real first,) are totally unknown to me. Safer that way, I think….
SEC Charges Ex-Countrywide CEO With Fraud
The government is charging Angelo Mozilo, the former chief executive of mortgage lender Countrywide Financial Corp., and two other company executives with civil fraud.
The Securities and Exchange Commission’s case also accuses Mozilo of illegal insider trading, an agency spokesman said Thursday.
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=104972529
Yaayyy!!!!!!!!!! I love it!
Roidy
P.S. I think I just saw a pink unicorn walking down my street, and it was crapping candy of all things.
LOL, Yes, that made my day as well.
Heres another great article on it.
http://www.salon.com/tech/htww/2009/06/04/mozilo_sued_by_sec/index.html
The ‘Great Pumpkin’s goin DOWN!
“The ‘Great Pumpkin’s goin DOWN”
lol
I just saw this yesterday on Nightly Business Report, with a bit of file footage of Angelo Mozillo himself….in high-definition.
“Tan Man” doesn’t describe it. He looked like a dead space alien, or something.
Darren Gersh on NBR said that this is a civil case, not criminal. So no jail for Mozillo, but damages could run $400M and up. (On the other hand, if Dept of Justice charged Moz too, that’s ciminal, but the standard of proof is much higher.)
Anyone that invested in that company obviously did not read this blog.
This is all sour grapes. If Mozillo had explained the truth in the 401Q, would anyone have really believed him?
“Anyone that invested in that company obviously did not read this blog.”
I have one problem with your argument and the sentiment that these crimes are victimless crimes. You and I most likely invested in his company. Your neighbor most likely invested in his company. The guy down the street most likely invested in his company. I would guess anybody that has a 401k or a pension invested in this clown’s company. I bet we also invested in Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch, Citigroup, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, etc.
We were all herded into accounts such as 401k accounts. The politicians allowed this to take place. They then allowed a whole network of vultures to prey on our savings that were sitting in those accounts. The vultures included investment banks, hedge funds and other corporate manipulators such as Mozillo.
None of us were forced to put our 401k money into the stock market. But let’s get real. We should have been able to assume that we had some safety and freedom from these parasites and the turkey shoot they had planned for us. But obviously we didn’t. It is now time for the vultures to pay for their crimes. I want to see perp walks for all of them, especially this little goblin.
Don’t worry about me. My 401k is alright. I was out of the stock market in October. I learned something on this site.
With most 401Ks doesn’t one have a reasonably wide range of possibilities for their allocations? In other words, I could have put ALL of my 401K money into a mutual fund that invested in something safe, something that always goes up, like real estate, right?
Let the turkey shoot begin. Ready! Aim! Fire!
Nope.
Many 401k’s are stuck in various shady, “company mutual funds” that have no listed name outside of the company (unlike a known mutual fund, such as Vanguard Wellington, etc.), no detailed analysis on what is in the fund, and no accountability. “Strangely” many of these fake company-provided funds often have worse performance and higher fees than the benchmark funds that they supposedly compete against. Gee, how could that be? Finally, most 401k’s prevent any strategy other than “buy and hold” - and only for stocks and bonds (not shorts, commodities, etc.) and we all know how well that strategy has worked over the past 10 years or so.
Remember, limiting the choices of the sheeple is key to fleecing them.
Permit me to express my gratitude to the HBB. Why? Because of what I read here about the stock market. Thanks to you, I pulled the lion’s share of my retirement money out before last year’s meltdown.
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Yep. 401(k) choices are *very* limited - I hate that. However it’s very hard to beat instant 50% (usually) investment gains on matching funds. Anyone who contributes beyond the matching is a fool, IMO. There are a lot of people who do that. There are much better ways to save for retirement. Beyond the matching funds - a basic IRA has the same benefits as 401k but is way more flexible.
Some of us don’t qualify for IRAs, making 401(k) the only tax advantaged way of saving.
OTOH, are the “tax advantages” worth putting up with?
Sort of like, say, buying a house for the “tax advantages”?
(I’m not so sure, anymore, but that is the beauty of this blog……..)
I’m not convinced either, but we use it as our ’stocks/bonds’ savings right now. We’ve got SOME stuff in the market as a hedge/diversification, so we stick them in whatever Index Vanguard fund is available, some bonds, and some treasuries.
It’s not our only savings. But it is one of our plans.
Never understood the allure of 401Ks. The assumption that your expenses will be less so therefore you will withdraw less so therefore the taxes will be less is like assuming real estate always goes up. I get the employer match concept, but how many match or contribute and how does that balance against the huge losses? There is usually a pathetically low return money market option. I begged a couple of people to just move their money into those early last year and continued through summer to no avail. One lost 1/3 and the other half. Their answer is it will go back up. Double stupid on a stick. I just don’t get it.
Limited choices amongst a set of opaque investment funds is the most obvious downside. But now that things are not so rosy many struggling corps take the matching contribution off the table. And this can trigger an IRS limit that has to do with distribution of the 401k between lower wage earners and higher earners. When the 401k gets imbalanced contributions get capped at an even lower rate than normal. I get the argument that an IRA is a better choice beyond the matching level, but I would rather see folks take a slight rip while they sock 10 - 15% away than watching that money drive by with spinners or get burned up in depreciating consumables.
One positive for those of us getting canned is we can migrate all of that 401k money to IRAs over which we have better control.
Never was $1 of ours infested in Countrywide. I guess it’s because I’m retired and have nothing else to do do other than be well-informed and vigilant!
Oh, how I hope they hang this clown from a tree!
There are plenty of crooks that need to go to prison for what they’ve done to our economy, and we need to start somewhere - The Tan Man is a good start!
Oh, how I hope they hang this clown from a tree!
Hopefully a smallish tree that would yield under his weight, but still sturdy enough to hold him upright and cut-off his air supply.
Well-hung?? -
Folks here were complaining about not enough prosecutions and I pointed out that Google news was full of the small fry getting busted and it would take time to get the bigger fish.
Now we get the bigger fish.
And that’s how it works.
Now you know why your grandparents (or great grandparents) didn’t trust banks, bankers or the stock market.
Damn shame we had to learn it all over again the hard way.
Wow is there really justice?
There might Be a pink unicorn. I sure know that it is 82 degrees in the desert today, so there must be odd things happening everywhere.
Odd indeed, dd. High 50’s here after weeks of 90’s. Dark brooding clouds and lightening strikes all over the high desert communities– with a couple of deaths over the last few days. Remarkably low solar pulse activity.
Maybe Mozillo is calling upon his minions?
GM’s Hummer Sale May Fail to Clear China’s Regulatory Hurdles…
June 5 (Bloomberg) — General Motors Corp., seeking to shed unprofitable units after filing for bankruptcy, may have its agreement to sell the Hummer sport-utility vehicle brand blocked by Chinese regulators, threatening 3,000 U.S. jobs.
Sichuan Tengzhong Heavy Industrial Machinery Co.’s bid for Hummer runs counter to China’s attempts to develop a globally competitive auto industry by focusing on fuel-efficient vehicles, according to analysts. The government also wants to pare the nation’s more than 100 automakers to ease competition.
“A new entrant in the car industry is not something they’re looking to see,” said Chip Chaikin, who helps overseas $800 million as managing director of Shanghai-based Blue Point Capital Partners Asia. “It’s pretty unlikely” the deal will go through.
Tengzhong also needs to persuade at least two Chinese government agencies that it can turn Hummer into a profitable company to get clearance for the deal, said Zhang Xin, an analyst with Guotai Junan Securities in Beijing. Hummer’s U.S. sales are plunging as higher gasoline prices and rising job concerns hammer demand for its gas-guzzling SUVs.
“There was also some passenger security issues with the proposed booster seats that would need to be installed”…
“The government also wants to pare the nation’s more than 100 automakers to ease competition.”
In the United States this is what has come to be known as “capitalism”. I guess the Chinese want to follow our lead. Competition is bad. Monopolies are good. One can only shake his head as the parade of stupidity continues to march blindly down the street.
For having 100 car companies, I have yet to see any good design come out of China.
I went to Shanghai last year. Pretty much every car there was either a Buick or a VW - a couple of other but I don’t remember what. I don’t think I saw a single Chinese car though.
Audi (!?) is the aspirational ride these days.
“For having 100 car companies, I have yet to see any good design come out of China.”
The market should be allowed to sort that out. The bad car companies, such as our GM and Chrysler, should be allowed to fail if they aren’t able to compete. Good companies should be allowed to prosper. The pressure of failure is what should drive these companies to excel. I believe it is what drives individuals to excel.
Unfortunately, outside intervention seems to have screwed the whole thing up. I am so glad that I don’t have to deal with a car or car companies. Life is so much better. I do not look forward to the day when I move and have to deal with that again.
Eh. Maybe it’s like here. In China, everyone wants to drive a foreign car. In America, everyone wants to drive a foreign car.
In that case, Saturns will sell well when we have one world government.
In that case, Saturns will sell well when we have one world government.
Ba-dum-bum - tssshh
You’ll be here all night, I suppose?
But Saturn AND Mercury are on the chopping block….
Uranus isn’t… new GM model perhaps?
But Saturn AND Mercury are on the chopping block….
Saturn is being acquired by Penske Auto Group…
Penske will be selling Saturns and SmartCars…what are they thinking?
WRT the Penske deal: All I can picture is a Saturn sedan with a hydraulic lift gate…
…and an Indycar motor?
Penske is one of those guys who “has his s##t” together.
He’ll find the best people for the job, and get things straightened out a lot faster than you would think possible. Too bad there is no way to get on the ground floor with an IPO.
(Disclaimer: I’ve met him a few times, so I’m somewhat dazzled by what he has accomplished).
Perhaps Hummer is a good buy just for the engineering content. No offer would be made without pre approval from the bosses. Now they will tap dance for a sweeter deal.
There might be some value in their forward contracts for steel. They would have locked those costs in at some point, right?
Besides, isn’t the Hummer, at least the original, a military vehicle? They could return them to their original use. The Chinese have a lot of “extra” young men because of sex selection against girls under their one child policy. Military is a good a way to keep them occupied as any.
And THAT’S a demographic time-bomb that makes Social Security look like happy fun time. If they think that the rural poor are discontented now, wait until the rich citydwellers have wooed away their women.
If they think that the rural poor are discontented now, wait until the rich citydwellers have wooed away their women.
Or maybe not even bothered to ‘woo’ away their women. I was reading an article last month or so about how kidnappings of young Chinese women in, yes, the rural, remote, and poor parts of the country are occurring with increasing frequency. First the kidnapping, then the forced marriage to some richer, old guy…China’s an awfully big place, and if you are unempowered to begin with, and scared, and if your parents have no resources to track you down and get you back…?
One young woman had given birth and had a 3 year old son before her parents found her, and they found her mostly by luck. She rejoiced at being found and was grateful to go home, with her son, but there was another young woman the article quoted who was also eventually found, and she said she was ‘already ruined’ and could therefore not find a decent husband, so she might as well stay with her kidnapper/husband.
WTF…?
I was pretty upset, reading it. I thought, ‘is this for real!?’
I’m going to go search for the article.
“The Chinese have a lot of “extra” young men because of sex selection against girls under their one child policy.”
How dreadful.
“The Chinese have a lot of “extra” young men because of sex selection against girls under their one child policy.”
How dreadful.
The ramifications of this - from a social stability standpoint - should not be underestimated.
maybe some of these guys will be satisfied with just a hummer.
LOL!
maybe some of these guys will be satisfied with just a hummer.
Heh.
At least the guy’s that kidnap have no money in the games vs. the loser idiots who beg from relatives to come up with a big buck dowry for some scammer skank.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124415971813687173.html
The Chinese already have Hummer-type vehicle.
Google “Mengshi” (Warriors) or “Brave Warrior”
Looks a lot like a more modern version of our military HumVee.
Hmmm, maybe my daughter find nice young Dloctoh, eh ?
Silver! Where did THIS come from…?
In New Future, there will be only one car company - Government Motors - per nation. And probably only one of each company in general. Of course, the unemployment rate will be staggering without multiple companies competing and providing jobs, but who cares since we can just print money and we’ll all be rich buying Eco-Yugo’s as provided by GM.
we’ll all be rich buying Eco-Yugo’s as provided by GM.
You might want to check with ecofeco on the naming of your wunderkar.
Be my guest!
“…Tengzhong also needs to persuade at least two Chinese government agencies that it can…”
…Export at least 4,786 lbs per vehicle of toxic domestic materials & poisons to international end users.
“There was also some passenger security issues with the proposed booster seats that would need to be installed”
Hasn’t stop the 4′10″ “domestic workers” in “The O.C.” from picking up & dropping off their masters kids at the local community “private & religious schools”
OK Hwy - I am 4′10″ and I work as a nanny these days and do pick up the little princess at her private school. I drive a hyundai. Precious one is still trying to talk her dad into buying a Range Rover for me to driver her around in. She’s 10!
Well I was thinking what they did to the drywall, they might just try with the “booster seats”…and honestly, when I look in the mirror at who is driving the behemoths, all I see is a big old steering wheel with a touch of hair!
By the wmbz, even though I know you can cite Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
while sitting blindfolded on the toilet chewing your cud, please cite the author when posting a quote, I’m not yet that quick at recognizing the historical pervasiveness of his brilliance, you know like: “Four score & seven years ago…”…thanks in advance!
PS,
Also, why did you exclude this from your quote?
“…But an election was coming and Shrub tried to rig the system. Not only that, but after seven years of ridiculous marauding around like King of the Universe, he was flush with power and arrogance.”
O.K., O.K., I changed his name to Shrub, I admit it.
Posting during a flashback?
J/K
Leigh
There must something in either the coffee or the water?
“There must something in either the coffee or the water?”
Could your favorite coffee cup have the “Made in China” stamp on the bottom and contain the daily recommended FDA supply of LEAD ?
Mikeyyyyyyyyyyy Helllllllllppppppppppppp!
Then:
“Taxation without representation!”
Now:
“Taxation with representation!”
Geez, teaching 5th grade US History has to be one of the most challenging jobs in America.
Actually,
You are correct in having to teach history. I asked my daughter (13yrs old) what type of govt we have. Like most ignorant peoples, she said “Democratic or democracy” because that’s what her liberal schools have been teaching her. I called her history teacher and informed her that we are a representative republic, NOT a democracy. We are only a democracy at the LOCAL (I.E. town council, Housing association) level. Even most in most states the districts send representatives to the state legislature TO REPRESENT THEM, as we do in N.C. She even had to look it up, called me back and admitted her error. Scary to me….
One more thing:
Ever notice how most “democracies are also socialist nations?” I will be looking back thoughout the night here in afghanistan to see the discussion on THIS topic…
hat we are a representative republic, NOT a democracy.
What was it that Bush was so intent on spreading in the Middle East?
Representative Republicanism?
We haven’t had a president that actually cared that we were a Republic for about 100 years. Since then they’ve all pretty much pushed an oligarchical agenda, as formed by the PTB.
That and there just isn’t a good general word to represent the concept - “Republicanism” just flow the way the word “Democracy” does - most people are lazy and just used the latter. I wish there were a better term for representing our form of government.
Though in reality I think it’s really just more a MSM-pushed thing. Most of the MSM isn’t interested in us maintaining a republican system either.
what does PTB stand for?
what does PTB stand for?
Powers That Be.
Can also be written as PBT - Power Behind the Throne.
Though in reality I think it’s really just more a MSM-pushed thing.
Agreed.
My point was that using the word ‘Democracy’ to describe our system of government is not just a “liberal schools” thing when an avowed “conservative” administration uses it incessantly as well.
I guess having kids recite the Pledge of Allegiance every morning isn’t working very well ( “and to the Republic for which it stands”).
That’s because a lot of schools haven’t done that in years.
lavi d,
( From previous ) Thanks so much for the update on Coyote Springs! It would be funny if it wasn’t so painful? The author’s knowledge of the area and the project’s shortfalls were impressive.
Again, when first scripted, I thought it was something I could get behind? But in the end it was nothing more than Just Another Milk The Boomer scheme. Boring!
It’s hard to imagine those of us that appreciate the solitude and natural beauty of the desert wanting to live 12′ apart? And truthfully, just how much golfing can one do?
“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury. From that moment on, the majority always votes for the candidates promising the most benefits from the public treasury with the result that a democracy always collapses over loose fiscal policy, always followed by a dictatorship. The average age of the world’s greatest civilizations has been 200 years.
Great nations rise and fall. The people go from bondage to spiritual truth, to great courage, from courage to liberty, from liberty to abundance, from abundance to selfishness, from selfishness to complacency, from complacency to apathy, from apathy to dependence, from dependence back again to bondage.
”
Author unknown
“Debt is Slavery”
Blue Skye
Debt is slavery…
Ya well then there’s gonna be a whole lot of “Yessa Massah, I’z be cummin,” goin on in this country real quick.
As called here on the HBB…
O’Bama Stimulus nothing more than a cover for $$$$$$ trillions dumped down the welfare-health care entitlement ratholes, and to keep the donut eater boyz in blue and the nose wipers for Johnny Jack-Off the special needs kid on the job.
Oh, and let’s not forget the six figure per year, multi-million triple dipper pensions doled out for all the public employee union parasites and the politically connected by no ballz state and muni management.
Jobs Stimulus for the private sector infrastructure refurbishment?
Pffffffffftttttttttttttttttttttttttttt!
Buried on page six of the Beantown Glob.
http://www.boston.com/news/nation/articles/2009/06/05/in_states_stimulus_aid_favoring_social_programs
“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government.”
There goes Old Abe spouting off again about: “A more perfect union”
” I hold that in contemplation of universal law and of the Constitution the Union of these States is perpetual. Perpetuity is implied, if not expressed, in the fundamental law of all national governments. It is safe to assert that no government proper ever had a provision in its organic law for its own termination. Continue to execute all the express provisions of our National Constitution, and the Union will endure forever, it being impossible to destroy it except by some action not provided for in the instrument itself. 12
Again: If the United States be not a government proper, but an association of States in the nature of contract merely, can it, as a contract, be peaceably unmade by less than all the parties who made it? One party to a contract may violate it—break it, so to speak—but does it not require all to lawfully rescind it? 13
Descending from these general principles, we find the proposition that in legal contemplation the Union is perpetual confirmed by the history of the Union itself. The Union is much older than the Constitution. It was formed, in fact, by the Articles of Association in 1774. It was matured and continued by the Declaration of Independence in 1776. It was further matured, and the faith of all the then thirteen States expressly plighted and engaged that it should be perpetual, by the Articles of Confederation in 1778. And finally, in 1787, one of the declared objects for ordaining and establishing the Constitution was “to form a more perfect Union.”
“Continue to execute all the express provisions of our National Constitution, and the Union will endure forever…”
Umm, does “express provisions” include rescuing poorly run companies and banks? Does it include starting far flung wars and occupations?
Or is that all open to interpretation to suit particular agendas and therefore meaningless?
“A democracy cannot exist as a permanent form of government. It can only exist until the voters discover that they can vote themselves largesse from the public treasury.”
If the citizens, rather than government officials, were truly in charge of public spending and taxation (i.e. periodic referendums to establish tax levels), I think this would be a lot less of a problem.
Which stage are we at now?
I would argue bondage — to the central bank.
Yep.
The word “democracy” was not used in the founders’ documents - and for good reason.
California is one of our most democratic states - voting on a large portion of their legislation. It seems to have not served them well.
It seems to have not served them well ??
It has served us quite well Thank You….We have finally had a recession big enough to squeeze the tax receipts enough that it creates a huge deficit and brings to the forefront the obscene excess that the State, County and muni governments provide…
“…and brings to the forefront the obscene excess that the State, County and muni governments provide…”
What’s that noise in the background scdave? I can barely make it out…sounds like: “we want… our early… retirement offers NOW!”
“we want… our early… retirement offers NOW!”
Big Time Hwy…..They are bailing like crazy…
Hey, speaking of Afghanistan, I heard that news piece about Coleman Barks last night, is it true that they broadcast Rumi everyday on the radio? Because the only thing the MSM broadcasts over here is heroin fields & that Saudi fanatic with the dusty flea ridden beard.
Good point.
We are a Republic indeed. However, a Republic is only as good as the people representing us. Congress has only a 9% approval rating.
Here are a few examples where a Democracy is better: In Arizona the voters overwhelmingly approved a referendum to legalize marijuana. However the Arizona high court threw out that.
Another example: Just two years ago Congress and Shrub were trying to push through amnesty to illegal aliens. However there was such a stink raised by the public that the Congress feared the voters would dump them all on election day, so the amnesty did not pass.
Another example: The people overwhelmingly disapproved of the $750 billion bailout in October and the $850 billion bailout earlier this year - TARP, yet the Congress critters approved the bailout.
Like I said, if there are only idiots representing the people, a Republic is certainly not a good thing to have!
And to that, the CA voters overwhelmingly voted for Insurance rollbacks, that was in the early 90s(94?)and the INS lobby still has it in the courts. I believe it was over 87% voted for INS rebates/rollbacks.
Calif turned into something more like a direct democracy, thanks to a huge number of referenda. And yes, it is something like a socialist nation. Thanks to the US Senate (so far) for not bailing out Calif at the expense of everyone else. The other night I was speaking on the phone with a friend who has been a Calif public employee for a long, long time and who now thinks a layoff is likely. I’m sorry for my friend but positions like hers do seem superfluous.
“Thanks to the US Senate (so far) for not bailing out Calif at the expense of everyone else. ”
You can’t have your green shoots and a California depression, too. Either California gets bailed out, or Uncle Sam and Associate’s green shoots get crushed under the weight of California’s budget shortfall.
In case of no bailout, will CA bring suit against the mavens of Megabank, Inc who perpetrated the mortgage mess?
And what about next years short fall and the year after …
How long Can California keep running to the Fed pleading for another 30b?
I do not have any numbers, but instead of firing teachers and firefighters, I would bet we could do really well by axing 1/2 of the administrative positions in Ca. A friend in local govt tells me they all sit around all day nattering, afraid to make decisions that might jeopardize their looming retirement.
A teacher I met in Irvine complained her district had no money to buy basic supplies. Incredulous given Irvine’s wealth I asked how this was possible. She explained the district had plenty of money, yet head to support the burdeon of more than one administrator per teacher.
Here in San Diego, the person responsible for hiring administrators has to consider three people for any administrative job. That would be her friend who will get the job and two less qualified individuals she also considers.
Our senior officials all take turns at the top positions so each gets the maximum possible retirement, which often is some 140% of base pay apparently.
I see no way out of this outside of bankruptcy for CA, and the sooner the better, so we can get some roads and other infracture repairs completed with all the money we pay in tax here!
Personally I don’t want a Fed bailout for California even though considering the amount of tax revenue California sends to D/C, I consider it a little arrogant that some farmer in Nebraska receiving farm subsidies would complain about loaning California some money…
I’m against a bailout of states who were run in the most foolish manner ever. It’s up to them to get their sh!t straightened out. A start for CA would be to repeal that ridiculous property tax measure which has one person paying $75 a month, and their neighbor paying $1000. They should also stop being the PPO for free Mexican health care. Furthermore, getting serious about rooting out illegal alien labor would go a long way. These scabs don’t pay state or federal income tax, and that’s lost revenue.
California = “Too big to fail”
Or as they used to say: “As California goes…so goes the Nation”
“I’m against a bailout of states who were run in the most foolish manner ever.”
Since our government has set the precedent of bailing out banks that threw money into the mortgage black hole, why shouldn’t California get theirs now?
“Since our government has set the precedent of bailing out banks that threw money into the mortgage black hole, why shouldn’t California get theirs now?”
I’m against bailouts, period. At any rate, while I don’t agree with it, I can see the argument for shoring up the financial industry for the health of the entire country. But to bailout CA? Not so much. So sorry you went all in on real estate, CALPERS, but now it’s time to pay the piper. Why should someone making $7.50 per hour at Walmart in Kansas pay for the six figure retirement of some glorified CA firefighter? Gimme a break…
A start for CA would be to repeal that ridiculous property tax measure ??
Ridiculous my A$$….Tax and spend is all they know how to do…Without prop#13 we would have crossing guards making $250,000. per year and retiring at 50 with 90% of their pay…
“Without prop#13 we would have crossing guards making $250,000. per year and retiring at 50 with 90% of their pay…”
Yeah, sure. That’s an absurd claim.
Furthermore, getting serious about rooting out illegal alien labor would go a long way.
Banteringbear, lets start with the Mega Agri Corps in the Midwest that hire illegals. Not any more of a problem here in CA as it is all over the US. So, lets start out with monopoly Agri Farms/Meat packing corps that are FOB, friends of bush etc.
And where the hell did all that subsidized overage Cheddar cheese go to that the Feds warehoused in the midwest?
I’m all for it, desertdweller. The people and corporations hiring these people are as much or more to blame than the people themselves. But, don’t get carried away there, desertdweller, CA has the WORST illegal immigration problem in the entire country.
Yes. The only answer to California’s problems is a bankruptcy. Too many bloated contracts. It will be painful, but necessary.
It happened to NYC and they survived it.
California unlikely to be told ‘drop dead’
New York’s 1975 plea for loan guarantees got a curt reply from President Ford, but he never said “drop dead.”
New York City’s plea for loan guarantees in 1975 got little sympathy from President Ford. But the Golden State’s financial mess is another matter.
By Robin Abcarian
9:37 PM PDT, May 20, 2009
Whether California will wrest loan guarantees from the federal government is not yet known, but the plea for help is unlikely to inspire the kind of antipathy that met New York when it was on the fiscal ropes in 1975.
“…a friend who has been a Calif public employee for a long, long time and who now thinks a layoff is likely. I’m sorry for my friend but positions like hers do seem superfluous.”
O.K., what are the numbers on her benefits & retirement pension? You might feel less sorry…
And why are Firefighters and Law enforcement so Sacrosanct ??
Ever since 9/11 its as if they are above it all…We have so many dam firefighters I dare you to try to burn something down in my town…Same thing with the police…You look at the daily crime blotter and see that we do not need anything close to the number of officers that we have….Add to that the pay scale that they receive (3rd year 29 year old firefighter $143,000. 2008 earnings) works 11 days a month…My daughter, a teacher with two advanced degrees makes $55,000….Its just disgusting as far as I am concerned…
As a muni government worker, I can tell you that firefighter & cops have an incredible scam. And it is all backed by an intense public relations campaign of fear run by their unions. One of our County Commissioners once ran the numbers and determined that it would cost 10% of the fire dept’s budget to just let every house that caught fire burn to the ground and pay the owner to rebuild.
Here’s the deal with cops. Once you hit about 35 you really don’t want to go busting heads in the ‘hood anymore. Your not as quick as you used to be and you want to be around to watch your kids grow up. Being on the street is for the young guys. So what to do with all the 35 - 55 year olds? Well, you set up dozens of “programs” like SWAT teams & bomb units that need multiple layers of Commanders, Captains, Lieutenants and other military titles to run them. All at a pay commensurate with the status.
In most muni governments, all the money (outside of schools) is in firefighting & cops. Of course, they are always held harmless in budget cutting because they are our “heroes” who put their lives on the line for us every day.
Jon,
Hence my constant ongoing comment and response to all of this?
“If you see me and I’m ON FIRE!? Let-me-burn! ( I can’t afford you! )”
I’ve said this for years. The other day Mrs. D was watching TruTV and they had (1) whacked out poor hispanic dude that flipped out and hit a telephone pole and they had like a DOZEN SWAT guys ( all w/ surgical gloves, wouldn’t want to contract AIDS, got a lot to live for you know? ) and EMT guys ( and they’re all over weight ) and radio communications etc.
All THIS for (1) poor guy? You’re kidding me. You’d have thought they were approaching the world’s most dangerous terrorist! He’s drunk, that’s all. 2 guys tops.
“We have so many dam firefighters I dare you to try to burn something down in my town…Same thing with the police…”
Hey, let’s see what happens in “The O.C.” in the “planned community” of Irvine:
One of my friends was driving around 15 mph in a residential street looking for an address of another friend…kid on a bicycle is riding parallel doing the whooptee do’s off the driveway humps…suddenly, the kid launches up into the air and slams into the side of my friends truck…uh, oh…he stops and gets out to check on the little b@stard…Mothers, with cell phones blazing, explode from the surrounding houses…minutes later…uh,oh…x2 fire trucks with x6 firemen…x1 paramedic vehicle with x2 medics…x3 police cars…x1 ambulance…x18 neighborhood spectators…Mother is screaming, “he hit my kid, he hit my kid” (surely she’s on the phone to the family lawyer, right?) …55 minutes later…they let my friend go on about his business, no charges fortunately (the kid hit HIM!) …oh, and all the vehicles: latest & greatest with all the cool bells & whistles…new, shiny & waxed!
Good to be in a city where all the homes are valued at $650,000+
Had family member in law enforcement. Retired. No where near rich. No union. Not really paid given the risk. Have friends in law enforcement. Don’t get paid well at ALL, I wouldn’t do it. Another family member in law enforcement, he plans to leave as soon as something better comes along. So perhaps these high paychecks and pensions are in specific cities or states, but definitely not all of them. The physical damage done working in that line of work is obvious all the time.
And thats what we are all screaming about V Beach….The unions are completely out of control and WAY, WAY, WAY over staffed…
The physical damage done working in that line of work is obvious all the time.
Out of curiousity, what physical damage is done to your average LEO?
drumminj,
Guy I know put 20 years in as a sheriff deputy here in CA. Never fired his weapon in the line of duty, but……here are some of the things that happened to him.
- Spit on more than once.
- Hit in the face several times
- Wrestle with suspects numerous times
- Carried a heavy belt full of gear (leads to lower back problems)
- Sit in a patrol car all day (also bad for back)
- Running after suspects in the dark, tripping and falling.
- On and on.
robiscrazy - Thanks for the list. I guess I have some snarky comments to give in reply, but ultimately ALL jobs have that issue. I sit all day and type..there are injuries that come with that. That doesn’t entitle me to a huge salary or pension - it’s just life.
Perhaps our LEOs should carry less guns and hardware and walk/bike the beat instead of sitting in a car. I realize that this is not an option in all areas, but I’m really tired of seeing fat/out of shape LEOs. How can they expect to be effective (yes, I’m talking about you, 200lb 5′5″ cop on presumably bike patrol in downtown Seattle. Hopefully the change in detail will help get her back in shape!)
Drum…I do see your point.
Question for economic history buffs:
How did Megabank, Inc manage to rig the politics of the game so that, unlike in 1975, NYC did manage to get a bailout this go round, to the tune of $700bn in TARP money, plus myriad other “off the books” life lines from the Fed?
My hunch: This time, Government Sachs has so deeply infiltrated DC that they got pretty much whatever they wanted out of the Fed’s printing press, below the political (and fiscal) radar screen.
Remember, Ford did not win the ‘76 election.
Politicians took note.
I think that Ford’s 1976 defeat was largely attributable to:
1. The 1974 pardon of his predecessor, Richard Nixon.
2. The Swine Flu vaccine fiasco.
3. His remark about there being no Soviet domination of Eastern Europe.
“Like most ignorant peoples, she said “Democratic or democracy” because that’s what her liberal schools have been teaching her.”
You are right that the United States is a representitive republic. The liberal schools taught that to me in 11th grade, adding that the semantic direct democracy of ancient Greece is not as logistically feasible with larger populations.
However, one could argue that the elections themselves are Democratic, in that we do directly elect our leaders, — electoral college being the exception. This is opposed to leadership selected by heredity (middle-age Britain), leaders elected by other leaders (British Parliament(?)), chosen successors (ancient Rome, modern dictatorships), or straight-up military coup or installation.
Umm, isn’t the US of A considered to be a federal republic?
please define socialism…
“Taxation with representation!” Unless you live in DC.
if you live in the ghetto, it’s representation without taxation.
Hwy: My daughter teaches 6th grade history and says she always remembers when I questioned her teacher at open house. It was a government class and I asked if he taught the way things are supposed to be or the way they really are. Everyone looked at me like I was an alien, but he said he tries to do both.
My son came from school in the fourth grade and said, “I thought John Q. Adams was John Adams’ son. My teacher says that they weren’t related.” I told him that she was an idiot. To which he replied, “So were her parents. They named her for a Roman general. I guess they didn’t know that Roman generals were all men.” That was the end of his respect for teachers just because they are teachers.
Less silly than naming a daughter Bambi, cause Bambi was a stag, not a doe.
How about Thumper? I like Thumper.
BTW, Bambi is a girls name, at least before Disney.
Trickle down economics, Obama style.
Launder money through GM to private equity firms.
Suddenly GM doesn’t need all that taxpayer money??
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124415849847687023.html
WASHINGTON (Reuters) – One in nine Americans are using federal food stamps to help buy groceries as the country’s deep recession forced another 591,000 people onto the federal anti-hunger program at latest count.
Enrollment jumped 2 percent to 33.2 million people in March, the fourth consecutive month that rolls hit a record, said the Agriculture Department. The average monthly benefit was $113.87 per person.
“It’s tough out there for struggling families and will be for many months to come,” Jim Weill, president of the Food Research and Action Center, said.
“It’s very likely that the numbers will continue to grow in the coming months as a turnaround in unemployment and wage declines typically lags behind the recovery of the broader economy,” he said.
In 20 states, as many as one in eight are on the food stamp program, according to the Food Research Center.
The U.S. economy has contracted sharply since last fall, with nearly 6 million jobs disappearing since the beginning of 2008. Further job losses are expected as the recession grinds on.
Congress allocated some $54 billion for food stamps this fiscal year, up sharply from $39 billion last year. In the new fiscal year beginning Oct 1, costs are estimated at $60 billion.
U.S. enrollment in recent months:
March - 33.157 million
February - 32.556 million
January - 32.205 million
December 2008 - 31.784 million
November 2008 - 31.097 million
October 2008 - 31.050 million
Sept 2008 - 31.587 million
Food stamps are TARP money for farmers.
food stamps prevent riots just long enough to allow the bankers to strip the last of the wealth from the country.
Layoffs have slowed but unemployment has climbed to 9.4 percent? Who calculates these silly numbers?
The stock market is ready to soar on the news. But the 10-year bond is just under 3.90% right now. That will kill any hope for the housing “recovery”. Walk-aways will increase. Pending deals are going to get slaughtered like a pack of paralyzed lambs. There is no way that any deal will close that isn’t already locked.
At least oil is up. That should be good. (scratches his head)
It is starting to feel like summer 2008. Nothing is adding up. It sure feels like something big could happen that will slam this whole thing down again. Be careful boys and girls, bad things lurk in the shadows.
“…It is starting to feel like summer 2008.”
So much for the old sage dictum: “Sell in May & go away!”
Time to pick up some more BEARX? But not quite yet?
This slowing decline is being spun like it’s “the turnaround”.
I think we are in for 2-3 more months of the slowing decline being spun as good news. Then it will start to sink in, profits aren’t coming back for a long time.
Yeah and consumption is 60% of GDP. Fast forward 5 months: It ain’t gonna be a pretty Christmas. That is when the next big bout of reality sinks in.
Beer and Cigar Guy,
We’ve been postulating here for a while that Christmas 2010 will… suck.
Got Popcorn?
Neil
Time wasn’t too long ago when consumption was about 50% of GDP. But that was back when our country made things, instead of importing them.
So, 2009 Christmas will be last hurrah?
Layoffs have slowed but unemployment has climbed to 9.4 percent? Who calculates these silly numbers?
I think that means that workers who where previously laid-off, are not finding jobs.
Yes but how did the government numbers come in so different from everybody else’s? That part is fishy. The unemployment number is fishy. I should have been more specific. The whole thing is just a joke.
I think the key is that layoffs slowed. eg - the rate is no longer increasing month over month, however there are still 600k+ new layoffs each month.
Plus, the government always readjusts the number any how the following month.
I think there were 350,000 layoffs in May, which was down from the expected 500,000.
But yes, the key is that layoffs have slowed. It is certainly possible for unemployment to increase while layoffs are being reduced!
We could have 12% nationwide unemployment but the amount of layoffs going down every month for several years!
My comapny did its first layoff at the beginning of 2Q. They are waiting for the green shoots. The next big decision will come at the beginning of 3Q. First layoff was bottom tier. Next one will be middle tier.
No green shoots yet. Lots more pain in the pipeline.
Well I for one just laugh at ANY numbers our government publishes. They are doing all they can to delude the sheep into borrowing more and spending foolishly. This BS will end sometime, the only question is when.
“…delude the sheep into borrowing more and spending foolishly.”
Spot on. But there’s an opportunity here for those that hang back and let the “volunteers” impale themselves upon the ramparts.
Hey aren’t you supposed to disclose if you own Wal-Fart stock?
“There is no way that any deal will close that isn’t already locked.”
Really? Not a single one? Anywhere? In the entire USA?
Way to be so literal. That’s good.
I just spoke to a friend that is working on a deal with his brother in Florida. The mortgage company is trying to kill them in upfront costs. I would guess that the uncertainty is causing much of this. The mortgage industry appears to be quite confused.
Next time I will choose my words a little more closely, for Mr. Literal.
Glad to see you posting again NYC’b -
Best,
Leigh
And I will be in your state on Thursday of next week. We’re having a little reunion / fishing trip.
Dang! I keep missing you -
We’re moving into our new diggs Monday.
Enjoy the reunion/fishing trip!
Leigh
Support/Floor is 8500, Seriously.
Stop, George. I missed NYCityBoy, and your nitpicking might drive him away again!
Yes, because NYCityboy is so dainty of spirit and all, he might very well leap up from the computer and run away with his shoulders heaving with sobs, and then his Birthday Crown might fall off and be trampled! Oh, no!
In the summer of 2008, I was watching a narrowing flag in the gold chart, or whatever you call such things. I love it as a barometer of emotion. It was obvious that tension was building and something was going to go sprong.
Now the chart looks very odd. Never seen a setup like this before. Not like summer 2008 at all. Curiosity builds. It’s one hell of a tug of war.
Its all lipstick on a pig….
“At least oil is up. That should be good.”
And what a great scam it is. Some shill on CNBC was saying that we can expect $79 per barrel oil in the very near term, and that translates to $3.25 per gallon gasoline. Hmmm, an increase of $.50 per gallon for another $9 rise? At that rate of increase, that would mean that at $147 per barrel, gasoline would be priced at more than $7 per gallon. Where the hell are these “experts” calculations coming from? Today, since the dollar is strengthening and can no longer be used as an excuse for the price per barrel increase, oil is up based on “a strengthening economy”. The spin is nauseating.
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-funemployment4-2009jun04,0,7581684.story
No from The Onion, I promise.
Funemployment or unemployment?
I finally have a street view comment:
Went over to HHS to get a pest control pre-demolition permit. You need to bait the property (rat traps poison spraying)before you can get a permit to demolish.
Had a nice chat with the lady, and she said boy is it slow. Showed me her log book in 2007 had over 3000 requests last year 2000…..so far this year 385, last year at this time over 1200 70% decline…..
Not a good sign of things to come.
European stocks are skyrocketing on the U.S. unemployment figures. Just think how high stocks will go if/when our unemployment rate hits 12 percent. That’s certainly a green shoot for the financial mafia to look forward to.
Increasing unemployment will also come with an increase in GDP. Shareholders like it because their companies have a lower unit cost per widget.
What unemployment rate was used for the “adverse scenario” in the, ahem, “stress tests”?
lower unit cost per widget ??
All well and good assuming there is anybody willing to buy the widget…
“All well and good assuming there is anybody willing to buy the widget…”
There’s always someone to buy the widget. Just 72 easy payments and the widget is yours.
Naah, they’ll just buy a Chinese made Woodget. Lasts half as long for 3/4 the price. (of coure the markup is MUCH higher since it costs the seller 1/4 the price)
Don’t forget shipping costs across the world.
This was a big deal for the Chicoms, sounds like some Aussie’s had reservations about connecting up…
Miner Rio Tinto scraps deal with Chinalco, choosing to raise $15.2 billion in share sale
SYDNEY (AP) — Anglo-Australian miner Rio Tinto PLC on Friday scrapped its $19.5 billion deal with China’s Chinalco, choosing instead to raise $15.2 billion in a share sale and setting up a joint production venture with rival BHP Billiton Ltd.
Rio Tinto Chairman Jan du Plessis said in a letter to shareholders the planned deal with Chinalco was now dead and his company would pay it a $195 million break fee, thus ending what would have been China’s biggest overseas investment to date.
The proposed deal with Chinalco had sparked opposition in Australia, amid concerns that a foreign state-backed enterprise would own a strategic stake in the country’s biggest natural resource assets.
The move is a blow to China’s aggressive moves to cement access to resources needed to fuel the country’s rapid growth by taking strategic stakes in major producers.
Cap and trade has been passed.
Hope that you are all ready to pay your new tax as carbon emitting points. (all animals, including those in capitol hill emit CO2 as part of their breathing)
Unless you are dead that is, and then your parasites will have to pay the tax.
Deceiving headlines… Cap and trade made it out of one comittee…
Not the full house and senate. No matter, it is the mother of all bad ideas. It will kill our industry, and lead to a much higher level of unemployment. Thanks a bunch Nancy.
Unless it throws members of Congress out of work it doesn’t really matter to them. Will the unemployed vote for the people that put them out of work?
Will the unemployed vote for the people that put them out of work? Don’t know about the unemployed as a special interest group, but the electorate in general re-elects incumbents en masse.
Cap-n-trade will only wind up hurting “working Americans” and “families” the most, to think otherwise is irresponsibly naive.
Name one instance in world history where the big boys absorbed the costs of their bright ideas. Name one.
American Revolution?
IIRC, Georgie wasn’t all that heartbroken over the loss of the colonies. They were happy with Canada and already turning their attention to India.
Funny that you mention India, as Corporate amerika has been looking over there lately as well… And having the same luck as England did…
Some of my ancestors came from a part of England that was pretty well written off by the Crown in the 19th century. Seems that the Empire found cheaper sources of tin in Malaysia, and that was the end of the mining industry in County Cornwall.
The Cornish cousins (that’s what we call ourselves) headed off to America, Canada, Australia, South Africa, anywhere to find jobs. They had to. According to my aunt, the Cornish economy collapsed and people were starving to death.
And, to this day, Cornwall remains one of the poorest parts of England. But don’t you dare say that you’re in England when visiting Cornwall. Call it Cornwall, or prepare to be corrected.
My dad’s family was from Wales as well (Cornwall is supposed to be in Wales, isn’t it). There are more people with my surname in Australia than in “England”.
I’ve no doubt that Bank of England embezzlement in the 1800s had something to do with it.
Cornwall is near Wales, but not border-touching close. What the Cornish and Welsh have in common is Celtic heritage.
The Cornish cousins (that’s what we call ourselves) headed off to America All I know about the Cornish I read in “Bloodstoppers and Bearwalkers: Folk Traditions of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula”
p. 103 COUSIN JACKS
To the Peninsula people, every Cornishman is a character. In a land that abounds with salty characters, this makes high tribute. The Cousin Jack (a nickname supposed to derive from Jack’s habit of cussin’) differs markedly from the exotic Finn and the explosive Frenchman… Cornishmen began crossing the ocean in the 1850’s to work the Peninsula mines. The world’s best miners, trained over the centuries in the deep tin mines of Cornwall, they fanned out all over the world, to dig gold in South Africa, copper in Spain, iron in Cuba. Inevitably the iron and copper strikes in Michigan demanded and attracted their skill… The big mines are played out now, and the mining wizards from Cornwall have long ceased their transatlantic trek…because their numbers decline, the Cornishmen are cherished as lads with undoubted mettle and a special flavor. This flavor has permeated the north country, whose peoples eat their pasties, listen to their carols, watch their upright wrestling bouts, and remember their callithumpian parades on the Fourth of July.
Cornwall was part of Wales until some war or other I am thinking. Heck, the whole place was the Celts until the Romans (English) pushed into the middle.
The “Bloodstoppers” author has us pegged: We are indeed characters. And fine cussers. A blue streak has nothing on us.
Aye, cheer for Scotland, laddies !
Nemo Me Impune Lacessit - No One Harms me with Impunity - the defiant national motto of Scotland.
Aye, ye Brits and yer very airs !
If people think that the hundreds of billions that would be skimmed off due to cap and trade will be put to good use, they need to read up carefully on the history of Enron. Nothing good environmentally will come out of any of this.
Cap and trade will be the ultimate Bubble.
The Housing Bubble only increased the cost of living for those who bought houses. Cap and Trade will make us all poor (since prices will go up but salaries will not.)
The toxic assets in the Housing Bubble at least physically exist (until they fall apart in a few years), while the magical “carbon credits” that will fuel the Cap and Trade Bubble will be nothing but worthless paper.
This will be the most impressive of all Bubbles if it gets up to speed before events overtake it.
I fear you may be right. At this point though, I’m more inclined to believe that the next wave of economic contraction will render most of todays policially-driven economic policy crusades to be moot for the better part of a decade or so. But, we shall see.
Name one instance in world history where the big boys absorbed the costs of their bright ideas. Name one.
Here’s one: The American Mob’s exploitation of Cuba in the mid-20th century as a safe haven for gambling, graft, and prostitution.
Ultimately, the mafia overdid it — they exploited the country and its people for profit, they ignored Castro’s rebellion until it was too late, and then underestimated the incoming Castro regime, thinking that the new powers-that-be would sign up for the same old graft and corruption that the previous regimes had wallowed in. (While there was (is) probably plenty of graft and corruption in the Castro era, it certainly wasn’t the same ol’ graft and corruption that previously reigned … on the Mob’s terms.)
Ultimately, the Mob (as well as numerous legitimate American corporations) lost most of their profits and assets in Cuba. Chalk it up to their greed, their “bright ideas” about manipulating a country for profit, and their hubris in thinking the swindle could go on forever.
Hmm, that sounds just like current events, doesn’t it?
There are certainly some parallels, but we don’t seem to have revolutionaries at the doorstep, just different coup throwers — the Mob’s influence had persisted through multiple regimes before Castro came to power.
As much as I’d like to believe our major financial/corporate players will experience the same shock, it doesn’t appear to be in the cards.
I was only looking at the financial parallels.
“Ultimately, the
MobFIRE mafia (as well as numerous legitimate American corporations) lost most of their profits and assets inCubaCDOs, etc..Chalk it up to their greed, their “bright ideas” about manipulating a country for profit, and their hubris in thinking the swindle could go on forever.”
I’d say that perfectly sums up the current situation.
This is the goal, of course.
A dead economy with long-term, high unemployment will be full of people out of work who can not afford $5.00 a gallon gas, doubled energy bills, etc. These people will have no choice but to get aid from the government, and will thus do whatever those in charge (bankers, etc.) tell them to do.
Yep, because unions are “bad.”
Extra6/5/2009 12:01 AM ET
Got $2,500? Buy a house
Rock-bottom interest rates and an $8,000 tax credit make a home possible for many first-time buyers — with no trick mortgages or financial gymnastics required.
By Marilyn Lewis
MSN Money
A triple play like this one probably won’t happen again in your lifetime:
Money’s cheaper than dirt.
Home prices have been knocked back to 2003 levels.
The federal government wants to pay you up to $8,000 for buying a house.
With that tax incentive, average credit and less than $2,500 in savings, it’s possible to buy a $150,000 starter home for about $1,000 a month, taxes and insurance included.
“It may be the best time to buy a home that we’ve seen in this generation — for everybody but particularly for first-time homebuyers,” says Brad Blackwell, a national sales manager for Wells Fargo Home Mortgage. The flood of homes for sale is hard on sellers, but it gives buyers an unusually wide selection, he points out.
It’s a memorable moment for responsible buyers who’ve been waiting to own a home. While the new tax credit is just the kicker some buyers have needed, historically low interest rates take some risk out of buying now. Waiting for lower prices might be a false economy if you lose a great rate. The monthly payments on a $200,000 mortgage at 5% and a $180,000 loan at 6% are about the same
Most people who want to buy are stuck with a home to unload first. First-time buyers don’t have that problem. But many don’t have the down payment money either.
The $8,000 federal tax credit solves that. It is literally a gift: All you need to do is buy a first home for $80,000 or more to receive a 10% — to a maximum of $8,000 — rebate from the government, even if you had no taxes withheld.
The government is even letting homebuyers with Federal Housing Administration mortgages borrow against the tax credit right now — it’s called a bridge loan — and then repay it at tax time.
“I just heard a story yesterday about a recent college graduate who bought a single-family residence in the Phoenix area — 2,000 square feet for $70,000, and they got the tax credit,” Blackwell says.
With the tax credit and an FHA loan, you can buy a $150,000 home for as little as $2,250 cash.
Down payment: $5,250 (3.5% of $150,000).
Closing costs: about $5,000.
Total cost: $10,250.
Your upfront cost: $2,250 ($10,250 minus $8,000 tax credit).
Here’s how the FHA loan compares with a conventional loan. Both are 30-year, $150,000 loans at 5%:
The costs: FHA versus conventional loans FHA Conventional
One-time costs
Down payment
$5,250 (3.5%)
$30,000 (20%)
Closing costs
$5,000
$5,000
Taxes & homeowners insurance
$200
$200
Mortgage insurance
$61
None
Principal & interest
$790
$644
Total monthly payment
$1,051
$844
“A price tag is now emerging for what last year’s collapse of investment giant Lehman Brothers could cost the state of Florida: more than $1 billion.”
http://www.tampabay.com/news/politics/article1007445.ece
Good one, Muggy. Time we saw the real fallout from this.
“Bush has said he had nothing to do with those sales.
“As Governor Bush has stated several times in response to your inquiries, his role as a consultant to Lehman Brothers was in no way related to any Florida investments,” said his spokeswoman, Kristy Campbell.
“It is unfortunate the St. Petersburg Times continues to perpetuate this incorrect and baseless conjecture.”
Oh, please, PLEASE, SP Times, do continue with those so-called baseless conjectures.
While it may be true that Jebbo might not have DIRECTLY done anything, a number of political underlings on both the state and Federal level had their tongues firmly wedged in the patootie-cracks of the Brothers Bush. So this was bound to happen.
Who exactly made the buy? There’s yer culprit.
The guy who was in charge of the funds for the state was appointed by JEB. He was also the brother of his campaign strategist.
I truly doubt that JEB had any direct role in this. However, his utter incompetence in hiring staff, blatant nepotism, corruption, and lack of even basic management skills are legendary in Tallahassee.
“…However, his utter incompetence in hiring staff, blatant nepotism, corruption, and lack of even basic management skills are legendary in Tallahassee.”
Hey Jon, your messin’ up the “Lost Wages” odds on the Palin /Jeb Shrub III… 2012 GOP National ticket wagers, knock it off!
hey I heard it was going to be Bush/Cheney 2012 saving money on marketing/memorabilia etc.
Jeb/daughter cheney.
Yikes. OMFG. Give us the lobotomies now.
Hey, I’d rather have a bottle in front of me than frontal lobotomy!
So speak for yourself!
I saw a clip of a recent Palin speech yesterday. SCARY.
Previous post from Loudain Wainright (Jr.)?
I truly doubt that JEB had any direct role in this.
Sure and Neil was innocent too.
I’m not a conspiracy theorist. I think bad things happen because people are just really stupid.
Bad things also happen because other people are psychopaths.
To forget that can be fatal.
And let’s also not forget that people are convicted of conspiracy, racketeering and collusion all the time.
Conspiracy is VERY real. Playing dumb is also a classic diversion.
Greetings fellow HBBr’s
Hope one you banking experts (or armchair quarterbacks) can help me understand a letter I received from my bank (USAA) yesterday.
Here are the relevant portions of the letter:
“Dear Savings Customer: A recent review of your account indicates you have exceeded certain withdrawels limited by federal regulation and not USAA. We realize this may be an oversight so we would like to remind you of which transactions on your savings account are limited and unlimited.
Limited transactions should not exceed six per statement cycle:
Checks or debit card purchases (only three in any combination per cycle)
Preauthorized, automatic transfers
Transfers to third parties or other institutions
Overdraft protection transfers
Payments to other USAA accounts (see exception below)
Unlimited transactions include:
Transfers to another USAA Federal Savings Bank checking or savings account in your name by messenger (e.g., personal bankers), mail, ATM or in person
USAA Federal Savings Bank loan payments
ATM or bank teller withdrawels
Telephone requests for checks (must be payable to you)
Because this is your first occurene and may be a misunderstanding, we waived the fee regularly imposed on excessive “limited” transactions. However, over the next 12 months a fee of $5 will be assessed on every “limited” transaction you conduct over the allowed amount.”
So, my questions are:
What is the deal here? It is my money and none of the Fed’s biz where and when I transfer money between my savings and other accounts (provided I am not hitting the $10k number, which I am not as I only move amounts in the hundreds, or sometimes $1k amount).
Do I ask USAA for clarification and copy of the federal regulation which dictates how many electronic transactions bank customers can make?
Remember, USAA did not partake in the TARP funding frenzy. In fact, the advertise the crap out of that fact (…”hey, we are better than other banks, we don’t need any freshly printed paper…”).
Can anyone provide me some answers to my questions and some guidance?
Very much appreciated here in the land of 10,000 lakes (Minnie-sooh-tah).
I am limited to 3 electronic transfers out of each account per month at my credit union. That’s why I bank in person, and leave the electronic transactions for emergency back up transfers. There are also federal regulations for Money Market and Savings transfers, I believe 3 per month as well. M1,M2,M3 data, I believe, is the reason.
You have run afoul of laws used to prevent drug lords from laundering money.
If you are the Governor of any state, you can assume that your phones are now tapped.
Hey Skip and Awaiting Wipeout;
Thank you for responding. I appreciate the clarification. Hope you both have a decent weekend.
Skip,
Yeah, you’re right. That $10,000 & over(per transfer or deposit) amount that gets reported to the feds really gets my goat.
tgun,
You’re welcome. We have no privacy anymore. I can’t wait to put 100% down on a home, and have to answer to where we got the $. We sold and waited, but we’ll probably be treated like criminals. You know, guilty until proven innocent.
When I bought my house in 07 (six months before finding this blog
) I put down an 80% downpayment. I wasn’t treated like a criminal, but it would have been less of a hastle administratively to finance the whole thing.
guilty until proven innocent
If inflation cranks up like some predict on this blog, then you may soon be breaking that law when you buy lunch.
For how many years has the $100 bill been the largest note available? 45 years?
Can anyone provide me some answers to my questions and some guidance?
Email me your account number, soc sec number, mother’s maiden name and I’ll look into it for ya.
LOL work it lavi d.
Tgun,
I bank with USAA as well. What type of account are you dealing with? Just what they call the type of account, not any specifically identifying information. I think that there are rules about certain accounts that are considered money market accounts, though I couldn’t recite them off the top of my head.
If you don’t have a regular checking account, you could ask them to set one up for you. The interest rate is lower than on savings account, but it is no fee and there are no restrictions on electronic transfers that I have bumped up against and I use their bill pay service from that account. The you can put money into that account from your current account (the restricted one). Plan to do it once a month. If you find your expenses were higher that month in a way that you couldn’t anticipate when you made your regular monthly transfer, you can put some more in. That is just two a month and then you can do whatever you like out of the checking account. Because of this system (and their excellent web access) I can let the amount in the checking account go very low, so most of my money stays in the higher interest bearing account. It does require you to keep an eye on the account electronically or to keep an accurate written check register, especially if you use a debit card a lot.
I rarely ever write a physical check off the savings account. Maybe once a year for my Roth IRA contribution or to transfer money to another bank.
I find this system works very well. Hope it works for you. And please just call the banking number and ask the rep to explain the letter. They are pretty helpful. Ask if the system I outlined will work for you and they can set it up. Total cost shouldn’t be more than $10 for a box of checks on the new account.
Yeah, waaay down in the fine print, there ARE differences between demand(checking) accounts and other kinds. My understanding (and I’m probably confused) is that because you don’t have the same withdrawal rights with other accounts that you do with checking accounts, the bank is required to have less in the way of reserves for those accounts. At some level, that’s WHY they pay higher interest on them. And the government has to regulate this so that the bank can’t simply CALL everything a savings account and get away with even less in the way of reserves. At a macro-econ level they’re also considered different parts of the money supply.
The only two times I had to file a claim with USAA, (over 20 years with the company,) they treated me like a criminal. Had to hire an attorney to get them to pay out legit claims.
Yes, Tgun, it’s true. You’re not allowed to transfer YOUR money out of YOUR savings account into YOUR checking account more than 6x a month. You can have unlimited access and funds flowing from your CHECKING account, but not your stinkin’ savings account. As the young lady at Comerica told me, it’s federal law that was passed during the Bush administration ( not sure which one ), to encourage us to SAVE. I told her I already knew how to SAVE, that’s why I had money in my SAVINGS account. I don’t think she appreciated my comments.
The old bug eyed moonbat kook must really suck to be trailing the evil Cheney!
Cheney and Pelosi Have Poor Ratings in Common
Pelosi’s ratings down, while Cheney’s improved from record low
by Lydia Saad
PRINCETON, NJ — Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and former Vice President Dick Cheney have little in common politically, but they receive almost identical image ratings from the American public. According to a May 29-31 Gallup Poll, 37% of Americans have a favorable view of Cheney and 34% have a favorable view of Pelosi. Both Cheney and Pelosi are viewed unfavorably by at least half of Americans.
“37% of Americans have a favorable view of Cheney and 34% have a favorable view of Pelosi.”
Frightening that they could find that many for either of those people.
I think they took the polls at the respective Cheney and Pelosi family renunions.
I think they took the polls at the respective Cheney and Pelosi family renunions.
+a bunch!
hahaha!
Considering that 49.9% of all people suffer from below average intelligence, and a large percentage try to comply with what the bible, preachers, and others say without question regardless of whether or not it makes sense . . .
Note to self: send free copy of “True Believers” to Natalie…brave girl.
It’s fashionable to slam religion nowdays, but in so doing, the slammers fail to recognize the widespread charity and aid delivered to the needy by religious organizations.
And this assistance is rendered in observance of Christ’s directive:
“Whatsoever you do for the least of these, that you do unto me.”
You should spend some time with the friars at St. John’s Hospice in Philadelphia, or visit elderly being housed at Quaker run nursing homes, take a walk with the Sisters of Charity who minister to homeless women in Norristown, PA and Chester, PA. Maybe your view of those religiously inclined will modify.
Or not.
Those examples are not typical. The most devouted people I know often tend to be the most closed-minded, abuse, deviant and/or hate filled people I know. That is not how I chose to live my life. True many other people have the same traits, but they don’t go around telling others how they are going to heaven and you are going to hell, and some actually try to listen to reason. That is the real rub. Throughout history religion has been used as a form of mind control and slavery. Anyhow, even if some do help others sometimes, if they do so in the belief it will secure them a spot in heaven how can it be viewed as a good deed? I would catagorize it as a selfish act albeit with positive results. I have known many ppl that did not believe they were going to heaven and some born gay etc. that actually believed they were born condemned to go to hell because of the twisted thoughts of the religous right drilled into their heads. When they help people, they do so with no hope of going to heaven and knowing that most ppl think they are worthless and wish they were dead. They are the true good people. By defending the religous, you disgrace the truely good among us. Those that do good deeds simply because they are nice people, not because they believe they will get a treat at the end of the day.
Let us not overlook the fact that a lot of modern political beliefs look suspiciously familiar to age old religious beliefs. The Religious Left doesn’t bask in open-mindedness, either.
+1, p’gal.
Not only that, but the slammers invariably subscribe to their own religion, though they don’t call it that, and it does a lot less good than the mainstream ones.
Anyhow, even if some do help others sometimes, if they do so in the belief it will secure them a spot in heaven how can it be viewed as a good deed?
Catholic Charities is the second largest provider of social services in the United States, second only to the Government. They offer assistance to the needy, regardless of whether the recipient is Catholic, or has any religion at all. So yes, they do “help others sometimes”.
And how do you know for sure what their motivation is?
There are atheists who help out in soup kitchens, etc. What’s their incentive to volunteer?
I don’t mean to sound so bitter, but I have known many relgious ppl that have used religion as part of a pattern of severe abuse of others, while at the same time using it to give justification and/or redemption for their actions. It is very dangerous, and the aspects of religion that try to decouple reason from decision making are truely frightening.
“There are atheists who help out in soup kitchens, etc. What’s their incentive to volunteer?”
That the whole point I was making. If you do so thinking it gets you a spot in heaven, it’s tainted and cannot be viewed as a good deed. If you do it because you really care about others, then it is honorable. The fact that you have to wonder why anyone would do a good deed if there was no incentive is the whole point in a nutshell. There are actually such ppl. I have known many.
And this assistance is rendered in observance of Christ’s directive:
It’s entirely possible to be ethical, moral and generous without believing in invisible superheroes who live in outer space.
I should add that I have friends of many different religions. It is not that I dislike religious people. It’s that I just generally dislike the role that religion has in their lives, especially the role it plays in critical decision making. I don’t even deny there may be something more out there, and I suspect there is. I just have no doubt that nobody on earth has the answers. Rather than trying to pick the right religion, and doing what we are told, in my opinion we are better off just trying to be great ppl and doing what makes sense after careful objective consideration. Leave the hatred, condemnation, and washing away of your sins for others, and treat begin treating people with respect and listen with an open mind. Caring about others should be a trait, not a directive you must follow or be punished. Also, if you screw up, you should bear the consquences without a get out jail free card. We need a little more personal responsibility in this world and understanding of the human condition.
“True many other people have the same traits, but they don’t go around telling others how they are going to heaven and you are going to hell”
If only they would leave it there. My problem is that instead of looking to eternity, they keep insisting on their own versions of a heaven on earth. With little or no sense of recorded history, nor of the limitations of their own finite understanding of human behavior. Too often, the results are Aryanism, Leninism/Stalinism, Maoism, etc.
A lot of us get tired that one side of the argument is always judged by its worst actors (of which there are legion), while the other side is always judged by its best intentions. At least their stated intentions, which many of us question, but then we’re told that we’re not playing nice anymore…
Natalie,
I went to church when I was younger and saw some stuff I didn’t like (not really bad stuff, just disappointing) and I left it behind. When I got older I decided I missed that part of my life and shopped around for new one. I didn’t limit myself to a particular denomination. Found a church where I feel comfortable and consider it a positive part of my life. I guess I’m saying that there are good and bad aspects to religion, but don’t completely reject the good.
That the whole point I was making. If you do so thinking it gets you a spot in heaven, it’s tainted and cannot be viewed as a good deed. If you do it because you really care about others, then it is honorable.
Is this written in the Gospel according to Natalie?
If one follows this argument to its logical conclusion, then all of Martin Luther King’s achievements in the civil rights arena must be discounted because of his profession:
Southern Baptist minister. Likewise Mahatma Gandhi’s contributions to the world.
You are assigning value to an individual’s or organization’s actions based on your own prejudice against people of faith. Your comments support what other posters here have noted, that anti-religionists frequently become devout advocates of their own religion (read: personal belief system), without even knowing it.
Yes. I believe if one of your primary motives for doing good is to get personal reward, than such actions may be properly characterized as selfish although their impact may be positive. The worst among us would do good deeds if we were convinced it would lead to personal gain. To me this is common sense. When you have that, you don’t need gosep, whether yours or someone elses. I would definetely respect someone more that did good deeds out of compassion than personal gain, and would have to examine any individual case on a case by case basis.
gosep = Gospel
I was not talking about the value of the impact of one’s actions, I was talking about the motivation behind one’s actions which is very important in evaluating the true moral character of someone, especially if you may be prone to falling into the trap of looking up to them blindly based on impact alone. The two are very distinct.
“…Or not.”
Hey phillygal,
First, you don’t really know nothing about me…second, I don’t remember advocating that religious charity is an unworthy avocation…third, that little dart you tossed: “And this assistance is rendered in observance of Christ’s directive:”
I’ll just run right over to Rick Warren’s Church in South Orange County or maybe the Crystal Cathedral and bend down a knee if front of the altar and ask the Lord Jesus if the money $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ spent on these behemoths of faith with their 28 foot big screen plasma monitors is what he thinks is needed to spread his most admirable message of: Love one another…
Perhaps you have a similar type church that you attend in your neighborhood, or perhaps you have a direct deposit to Vatican City…
“First, you don’t really know nothing about me…”
Yet you seem to know quite a bit about a lot of us. At the very least, you seem disinterested in distinctions between the varioius cartoonish bogeymen of your own creation, and many of us commenters here. After a while, it gets really old.
lol, my church rents…
Yay ! Religion wars on Friday evening ! Yay ! Go see Angels and Demons. It explains everything ! Or not. My husband went to see it this afternoon and told me I wouldn’t have been pleased with it. No doubt. No doubt about it….
“..against people of faith. ”
There it is. It is often just a social place to hang out and be “like other followers” rather than a true belief/faith.
And as so many who live their lives one way and profess the other. All talk. The human being just wants to belong, to a group. They will transform their thinking just to fit in, not of true belief/faith. Some have it, most do not, just a need to fit into a group.
I was thinking the same but rather than religion it was global warming and other environmental nuts and the neo-marxists we have running the current administration.
Extremism is always bad - the left and right are kissing cousins. Politics isn’t a straight line it’s a circle, just look at Mussolini for example.
Sorry, I don’t mean to upset anyone who depends on the “two party” fantasy to get through life.
Thank you.
Exactly, Brothah Edge.
Speaking of global warming, anyone see the “Earth 2100″ show on ABC a couple of nights ago? I found it interesting. Came away with the idea that the true culprit behind the possible demise of the planet is overpopulation, over-consumption and limited or poor use of resources.
+1. Waiting for another reminder from our esteemed blog host about putting a lid on the political hackery and personal insults stemming therefrom. Seems to have been percolating up again lately…
Brown shoots?
“Earth 2100″
Palmy, I saw that. I thought it was terrible — that lady comparing Earth to Easter Island!? WTF!? Um, Earth is a little more resilient than a teeny patch of land, isolated in one clime. What a turd burglar.
I am also tired, despite my respect for him, of Kunstler yapping about the scale of food production. He, and Alad, never attempted to describe the space between McDonald’s and stabbing for rice.
I dunno: life will go on, until it doesn’t. And then it will start all over again.
I’d like to add that the food scalability issue is already being addressed by the new crop of backyard gardeners.
“Came away with the idea that the true culprit behind the possible demise of the planet is overpopulation, over-consumption and limited or poor use of resources.”
Exactly!
Global warming (which IS happening) is just a symptom of the real problem. Too many people using too many things for pointless stupid and selfish reasons.
I’m no sain’t by any stretch but I do try to always keep in mind my impact on my enviroment on both the micro and the macro scale. Call it karma, call it self awareness, call it whatever you like but people need to realize that they don’t live in a vacuum. The stuff you put out there WILL come back to you. The good, the bad, and all the rest. It’s a prety basic and straight forward philosophy really but I fear that I am very much in the minority.
In the minority? No, you’re one of the vast majority who still believe in an ultimate sense of justice, beyond that which can be comprehended by the finite mind. It just goes by dozens of different names and creeds.
Without a sense of ultimate retributive justice, there are few who will self-restrain their actions that do harm to others. And without self-restraint, there are only police states or anarchy.
Every day on this blog we comment about the total lack of financial self restraint, by actors large and small, that has caused all of this. And most all of us regularly declare how wrong, in an absolute sense, it all is, even though we disagree much about the specific nature of the wrongs committed.
Without a sense of ultimate retributive justice, there are few who will self-restrain their actions that do harm to others
I’m going to call BS on this statement. There’s no way you can know this….and there’s clear evidence that even those who fear “ultimate retributive justice” still commit harm against others. So one must question this statement for multiple reasons.
I’m not attacking anyone of faith..but the idea that without a fear of god society would collapse is a quite unfounded claim. Read ‘The God Delusion’ if you’d like to see a good exploration of this assertion.
‘and there’s clear evidence that even those who fear “ultimate retributive justice” still commit harm against others”
Absolutely. Self-restraint is far from perfect regardless of its origins. OTOH, a lack of any sense of restraints that are based on common understandings of right and wrong is far scarier IMO. BTW, I didn’t mention a supreme being. My point is that we almost all agree about morality far more than we disagree, and we forget or dismiss how much that fact contributes to holding civilized societies together. It doesn’t prove else anything by itself, but there it is.
I didn’t take your comment at all as an attack, but rather as an honest disagreement.
I don’t believe in God one iota. Any god. Yet I don’t go around randomly stabbing people and taking their wallets and purses. There’s somebody else who would show up and put the smack down pretty quickly if I did. Police and community organization to resist scoundrels is what keeps people in line. Religion just makes them feel good about not being a scoundrel themselves.
Just because they are below average, doesn’t mean they aren’t smart enough to spot a phony.
Lol!
Note to Natalie: Retake math classes. You don’t understand what the word ‘average’ means.
Here’s a quick refresher:
3 grades on a test:
100
100
5
Average: 68.3
How many are below average again?
Average can be a reference to median, mean or mode.
You showed mean, she showed median.
I think you need to take an English class and statistics class. Mean, median, and mode are all types of averages (i.e., subsets thereof). Average does not necessarily mean the arithmatic mean, and given the example I gave, such an assumption would have been clearly incorrect.
I hate when people pretend to understand statistics to the point of arrogance, but have no idea what they are talking about. You must have taken the Realtor’s math class at the local community college.
Thanks Al. I had actually posted the same thing earlier but it didn’t show up. Mean, mode and median are all types of “averages” under the English language as you pointed out.
Anyway in large samples mean and median are usually the same (near enough).
Ouch. Natalie with a vicious KO, making The_Overdog look incredibly foolish.
“Anyway in large samples mean and median are usually the same (near enough).”
Assuming a normal distribution. For other distributions they’re generally not the same no matter how large the sample.
“Considering that 49.9% of all people suffer from below average intelligence,”
Time for a review of the definition of “median” vs “average”, Natalie!
You should not assume that below-average intelligence is bounded at 50%… Below-median, yes; below-average, no.
As stated above, i said “average” and stated the 50%/50% split clearly indicating intent. “Median” is not different than “average.” “Median” is different than “Mean” or “Mode.” Each one is a type of average. My use of the term was correct.
But what about the geometric mean?…. Ducks, and runs away.
Hey Jim, did you used to post on an RE blog from Edmonton by chance?
From what I have seen your financial analysis has been dead on. You Sir may pass.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Average
by definition, 50% of the population is below the mean IQ, and one sd is 15 points, 100 being the mean.
Yes, Natalie the Stickler, but you did use the word “devout” incorrectly in your anti-religion essay. There is no such thing as being “devouted”. There is only being “devout”. One can be devout in both the present and in the past. And, hopefully, in the future, if one choses that route.
Silver.. lots of folks have spelling issues. Leave them be.
Unless it happens again, all over again, vuja de.
Why does one that question religions critically get labeled anti-Christian? It’s like saying anyone that questioned Bush was anti-American. My whole earlier post had to do with blind religious faith as a substitute for critical thinking. As opposed to being a stickler, I only target substance. Please advise when I slammed someone for typos. It is not easy proofing and editing on a blackberry. I have never attacked someone for spelling and never will in this type of forum.
…of course, the average IQ is up by about 7 points over the last 50 years… (ducks hastily)
Thank you, Natalie. No. BLESS you.
Must have found them at one of the “Jaywalking” tapings.
“What we are doing is staying on our course and not be distracted from it… I don’t have anything more to say,”
Ok, financial story from the front lines.
In September last year as the financial world seemed to be crumbling, I decided to move most of my bank account over to Chase from WaMu. Had my mortgage through Wamu, but with all the stuff going on figured it was prudent to get out of Dodge and put my money in the bank that seemed to be deepest in cahoots with Uncle Sam.
In retrospect a complete waste of time, but I digress.
Anyhoo, went over to Chase yesterday to see if they could close out my wamu account (the 7 bucks left in there) and link my mortgage to my current chase checking/savings account. As per the usual, the dude wanted to go over all the stuff I should be using, you know, I’ve got the wrong credit card, blah, blah, blah.
At the end, he tells me, “And I’d like you to know that you have been pre-approved for a home equity line of credit. $230,000.”
I looked at him and said, “You have got to be kidding me”
And he said, “No, and it’s a great time to do it now. Perhaps you’d like to renovate your home, or catch up on some other purchases”
I said that I really didn’t need the money right now.
And seriously, the guy keeps doing the hard sell on me to open it.
So, of course, I did and bought a LED panel TV and a porsche yesterday.
It ended up being a waste of time yesterday as they couldn’t link the accounts yet. But interesting that they’re still pushing this stuff. Remember when you had to beg to get something from the bank? And this guy just wants to give me 230K without me asking for it? It reminded me of the Eddie Murphy skit where he colors his skin white and goes to the bank, and the white banker just gives him buckets of money. “Pay it back when you can, or don’t! We don’t care!”
Similar hard sell story:
I do business with over a dozen banks in my local area.
(Irvine, Ca.). Small, large (including Chase and Wamu
as mentioned).
Without exception, everytime I go in for anything I get
the hard sell about opening a checking account, debit
card, etc.
Even if I politely ask rep to please refrain from using the
phrase “checking account” before we start to do business
it still doesn’t stop.
Yesterday at California National I couldn’t get the lady
to shutup. She kept telling me about what a “great deal”
opening a new checking account was, as if it carried
some sort of mythical powers.
I think I would rather be exposed to waterboarding.
But it doesn’t end there. Nope, a “relationship banker”
will later call at home at hound me even more.
Clearly, checking accounts are very profitable to banks.
Why not? free or almost free money from customers,
throw in a few trip wires and fees and viola! instant
profit center.
DDA accounts are gold for banks.
So, of course, I did and bought a LED panel TV and a porsche yesterday -
————
Tooooooooooooooooooooo Funny!
Leigh
I liked the bus when the last black guy got off of it.
Hahahaah! Yeah, and the music comes on and cocktails on trays start getting handing around to the bus-riders…
I also loved in the bank when he introduces himself as ‘Mr. White’.
What type of porsche? The 911 or the little one?
Of course it was the 911, silly. They can’t fit an LED screen in the little one.
didn’t we have a discussion about the evils of the 914 the other day?
In response to an earlier topic:
Comment by Stpn2me
2009-06-05 06:31:15
Actually,
You are correct in having to teach history. I asked my daughter (13yrs old) what type of govt we have. Like most ignorant peoples, she said “Democratic or democracy” because that’s what her liberal schools have been teaching her. I called her history teacher and informed her that we are a representative republic, NOT a democracy. We are only a democracy at the LOCAL (I.E. town council, Housing association) level. Even most in most states the districts send representatives to the state legislature TO REPRESENT THEM, as we do in N.C. She even had to look it up, called me back and admitted her error. Scary to me….
One more thing:
Ever notice how most “democracies are also socialist nations?” I will be looking back thoughout the night here in afghanistan to see the discussion on THIS topic…
Stpn2me
Active duty and active father - your family is truly blessed.
Be safe my brother.
Leigh
Democracies are not very good, republics are a much better form a gov’t. Democracy is nothing but mob rule and now the mob has discovered that they can vote themselves money, game over. Our Founding Fathers understood this very well which is why they set up a republic.
They also wanted the congress/senate critters to serve a couple of years/short time then return to whence they came and not be lifers.
Cherrypicking.
How is that going?
And yet, here we are. Where, instead, the FIRE mob voted themselves the money.
Game over.
WSJ
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. has shut down Silverton Bank, the failed Atlanta “bank of banks,” instead of selling it to private-equity investors, according to a person familiar with the situation.
An FDIC spokesman didn’t immediately return a call and email for comment.
I’m shocked, I tell you, shocked!
Good day all;
Tried to post an excerpt from a letter I received from bank regarding “too many electronic transactions”- said it was a federal regulation. Can anyone help me? mark dot sampica at ge dot com
Money market accounts (at all the banks I use) stipulate that a limit on withdrawals, of whatever kind. None has a limit on deposits, only on withdrawals, 6 per month is the number. Most of them don’t display your status when you check your account online, they just send you a letter or an email after you exceed their limit.
Yes this is true. Presumably your account is a MM account right tgun?
But apparently ATM withdrawals are considered unlimited!!?? I hadn’t heard that - I thought for sure there were considered part of the 6 per month.
MMA limits are 6 per month, 3 of which can be checks. You can do unlimited number of transfers to other accts at same bank, but ACHs and wires fall under the limit of 6.
Penalty for exceeding is usually pretty nominal, but if you continue to do it, you’ll get booted out of that type of acct.
First read of the May Unemployment Report:
The job loss # included add back of 220,000 jobs from the birth/rate model. Without that “help” the job loss would have been -565,000 based on reported job loss. Another report from the Good Folks at BLS.
Rally on dudes!!!
They can make up as much as they want for now, but any under reporting of job loss today is likely to result in “worse than expected” job losses up the road. Perhaps that is part of the plan, as the death of green shoots might perversely support the value of Uncle Buck due to resurgent flight-to-quality demand.
What if we just do not need 100% employment to run our civilization? Does our work ethic model really work? How about adopting a 32 hour work week? Yeah I know…. It is all about how hard we work that makes our lives here so great.
First cutting 8 hours from the typical work week would pretty much 1/2 our tax burdeon, since we are taxed progressively, and there would be more jobs to go around. Think about it.
I stopped working OT a few years back when I calculated my OT was being taxed at just shy of 60%. (37% fed, 7.5% ss, 11% state and a few percent misc. Total waste of time to work an extra 10 hours for harldy any more money in the paycheck anyway.
Are you sure you calculated correctly? Overtime is charged at the same marginal tax rates as regular time, and even if you worked enough to cross into the next tax bracket, you would only be taxed on the amount that crossed the bracket. So if you went from $55 to $61, and there was a higher tax bracket at $60, only $1 ($61 - $60) would be charged at the higher rate.
In any case, judging from those fed tax rates you gave, you were doing pretty well without OT. Which is not typical of the median US family/citizen.
Yes, that amount over 40 hours was taxed at close to 60%. Overall closer to 30%, but not worth wasting my time going over for sure.
Think of jobs being on a continuum of value. If you own land and produce a food that is in high demand and doesn’t grow well in other areas, you have a very high value job. Generally jobs that produce products that fulfill “needs” are high value.
Then there are low value jobs. Nail salons, pet grooming, stuff that goes away quickly when people don’t have money.
So what happens in a society when the productivity of high value jobs is increasing because of automation? When an ever smaller portion of the population produces more of the needs? That means more and more are competing for lower value jobs.
Very hard to estimate employment in new firms / closed firms outside the model. That’s why you get massive revisions when the economy turns, once hard data comes in. But the revisions will eventually go the other way.
Ignore the printed information…Just ask the people around you….I get more reliable information from the dozen or so guys that I meet up with every Friday afternoon
then I do from anything I read locally…
A local pastor of a mega church here went on record last year (when the official local UE was about 5%) with the local paper saying that 10% of his flock was unemployed.
An on-line informal poll of 50,000 people by AOL earlier this year showed 29% UE.
Apparently Sheila Bair is not all that convinced by the grading of the bank stress tests. Why the government’s “confidential ranking” of Citi’s health should differ from the impression created by the recent stress test results is a deep mystery to me.
Wall Street Journal
* MANAGEMENT
* JUNE 5, 2009
FDIC Pushes Purge at Citi
Bair Wants to Shake Up Management, Sought to Cut Rating of Bank’s Health
By DAMIAN PALETTA and DAVID ENRICH
WASHINGTON — The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. is pushing for a shake-up of Citigroup Inc.’s top management, imperiling Chief Executive Vikram Pandit, people familiar with the matter said.
The FDIC, under Chairman Sheila Bair, also recently pressed a fellow regulator to lower the government’s confidential ranking of Citi’s health — a change that would let regulators control the firm more tightly.
The FDIC’s willingness to take an increasingly tough position toward one of the nation’s largest and most troubled financial institutions is setting up a bitter clash between regulators — some of whom disagree with the FDIC’s position — and between the FDIC and Citigroup, whose officials have argued that Ms. Bair is overstepping her authority.
“The FDIC is our tertiary regulator,” behind the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency and the Federal Reserve, said Ned Kelly, Citigroup’s chief financial officer.
Citigroup has taken steps to shrink itself and clean up its financial mess. Just last month, the bank performed better than expected on the Federal Reserve’s “stress test” of top banks’ strength.
Bloomberg: Bogus bank profits mask problems
“Mark-to-fantasy”* is alive and well.
*credit to Warren Buffet
Items like this rarely show up in America’s mainstream news . . .
Netherlands Deputy justice minister Nebahat Albayrak announced Tuesday that eight prisons will be closed, resulting in the loss of 1,200 jobs. Natural redundancy and other measures should prevent any forced lay-offs, the minister said.
The overcapacity is a result of the declining crime rate, which the ministry’s research department expects to continue for some time. (The same phenomenon could occur in the United States if Congress would give up the failed War on Drugs and allow drugs to be sold at venues such as drug stores….fully supervised and taxed.
Not only the crime rate would drop in the US, but also in the drug producing countries.
You will never see it though, as TOO many lawr enforcement agencies depend 100% on drugs being Illegal for them to exist (DEA), and tons of money to the local police departments would vanish, crimping their ability to buy M16 rifles, and battering tanks.
Not Just Law enforcement there are a litany of groups feeding off the drug criminalization trough…
So true - Let’s not forget the rehab industry that gets most of its money from forced rehab.
Legalize everything and the crime rate will drop to zero.
Legalize everything and the crime rate will drop to zero. The death rate might change though. That’s not subject to legislation.
Every time a state like California or Arizona has a referendum on legalizing, the people seem to approve it. And the dictators strike it down, and crime caused by the illegality goes up. There will be a revolution to get rid of those dictators because more people are realizing this prohibition nonsense is the problem, not the drugs.
Same thing for the war against men (natural tendency to go for variety): criminalizing prostitution and hiring prostitutes. This is legal in the Netherlands and almost all developed nations. Prostitution is legal in Canada. In France and Italy, most married men have mistresses. In the U.S. the puritan religious cults still infect the government. It is embarrassing to be part of a society with an Augustine outlook on consensual issues.
My prediction is that within one generation, the U.S. will finally decriminalize the usage of marijuana and prostitution.
The illegality of those activities feeds crime, corruption, overpopulates prisons, costs taxpayers billions of dollars to pay for the welfare of corrections officers as well as prisoners, and so forth.
OK - I believe there are good reasons to legalize things like some drugs and prostitution - however using the Netherlands, France, Italy, etc. as models is certainly not one of them.
The European “it’s better here” thing is pure marketing mantra.
The problem is that most drug laws are Federal, and state legislation legalizing drugs is superceded by said Federal law. It’s a waste of time for people to propose state legislation/state ballot initiatives. We need to go after Congress.
Anyone know why a Constitutional Amendment (#XVII) was deemed necessary for the prohibition of alcohol but that no such amendment appears necessary for the prohibition of dope?
IIRC, Marijuana wasn’t made illegal, you had to buy a “marijuana stamp” from the federal government to produce and sell it. And the Feds never created any stamps for sale. I believe the Supreme Court said that this was perfectly legal. This is all from memory and is surely off somewhat.
Sorry about the late posts guys. Havent yet gotten the hang of this site yet…But I will!!!
I think job losses will accelerate over the next few months, especially in the winter this year. We havent seen the carnage in housing yet!
“When I was younger, I could remember anything, whether it had happened or not; but my faculties are decaying now and soon I shall be so I cannot remember any but the things that never happened.”
~Mark Twain
So out of curiosity - can anyone explain why the dollar skyrocketed - apparently due to the employment report?
Might have something to trillions of the things vanishing into thin air.
to = to do with
What specifically happened today that caused trillions *more* of them to disappear, that wasn’t already happening?
Nothing special today, just the accumulations of past disappearances and more to come.
10-year treasury shooting up today - now at 3.85. It’s now back to the pre-late-2008-meltdown levels.
Flame thrower to the green shoots.
Hello one and all. Just back from a wonderful four days in the eastern Sierras on horseback following the wild mustangs. The thunder, lightening and hail made it all that more special. Will post some pic’s later on Flicker for those interested. No news, no phones, no computer, no radio, no tv, no contact with the outside world; this is my first contact with the internet.
That’s awesome. I’m due for one of those soon. I might hit Ocala National Forest soon and play with gators and diamondbacks.
Did you see a little naked elf dashing about with ingots abound?
Ahhh. Lucky bastard.
For several years now I’ve been meaning to take a week or so off and get lost in the high country between Yosemite and Mammoth but something always gets in the way.
I need to just make it happen and recharge my spiritual batteries.
Awesome!
The thunder, lightening and hail made it all that more special.
Most people don’t realize the wicked thunderstorms the Sierras can get, despite the overall lack of them in California, and the lack of rain in the summer. I hiked Mt. Whitney a few years ago - we got quite the thunderstorm when we were camped at the high base. With zero protection around - no trees just a big bowl of rocks - it was pretty dang scary, but also quite awesome.
The top of Whitney I believe is the most lightning-struck place in the U.S. - maybe on earth. There’s a hut on the top with some *serious* lightning rods and cable system, for protection.
The thunder, lightening and hail made it all that more special.
That is the ONE thing lacking hereabouts. The only one. You’d think with all the lovely clouds, but no. The weather here is such that lightning is rare.
Ahhh… a nice good thunder and lightning storm with zapping and rolling clouds.
*nostalgic sigh *
Not that rare. I was traveling between Centralia and Chehalis, after picking my mother up from the airport last year, and during a wicked thunderstorm, lightning struck a tree right next to the truck as we traveled along at 50 mph. For a brief moment, I thought it struck the vehicle. The deafening sound coupled with the fireball scared my mom half to death. My big oaf of a dog, on the other hand, didn’t even budge.
Checking it out the following day, the fir tree was a total loss. I also noticed a tree downed in Priest Point Park which looked to be due to lightning.
after picking my mother up from the airport last year, and during a wicked thunderstorm, lightning struck a tree right next to the truck as we traveled along at 50 mph.
Well, maybe you had recently done something worthy of celestial zappage.
Come on—claim you didn’t.
“I hiked Mt. Whitney a few years ago - we got quite the thunderstorm when we were camped at the high base. With zero protection around - no trees just a big bowl of rocks…”
Ummm, the LAST thing you want to do in a lightning storm is take shelter under a tree. You want to crouch as low to the ground as possible, as far away from trees as possible, and make as little contact with the ground as possible. Lightning seeks the quickest source to the ground, and trees stand tall in the sky. Should you be standing next to one of these lightning rods, the charge will travel down the tree in the dead spot between the bark and the meat, a poor conductor, and then jump to your little water filled, helpless body in order to get to the ground. You will be burnt toast. Don’t ever do that.
Ummm, the LAST thing you want to do in a lightning storm is take shelter under a tree. You want to crouch as low to the ground as possible, as far away from trees as possible, and make as little contact with the ground as possible. Lightning seeks the quickest source to the ground, and trees stand tall in the sky. Should you be standing next to one of these lightning rods, the charge will travel down the tree in the dead spot between the bark and the meat, a poor conductor, and then jump to your little water filled, helpless body in order to get to the ground. You will be burnt toast. Don’t ever do that.
Well it depends. As long as you’re not right next to the tree, you’re OK. What you don’t want to be is out in the middle of a treeless field - because the shortest path to ground then will be you. Best option is to be in an area of trees, but not right next to one. In our case though there wasn’t a tree within a couple of miles or so.
So, you’re one of those types that likes to sit around a campfire…that’s cool…no mosquitoes uh?
definitely do post. I’d love to hear more about the trip!
People putting their vacant second homes to good use:
From the Chicago Sun-Times today…
For one married Matteson couple, their second house wasn’t a ritzy vacation home on a lake or a piece of property to be rented out for some extra monthly cash.
Instead, their unassuming second home 1 1/2 miles away was left vacant. Except for the nearly 500 pounds of marijuana hidden away in the garage, uncovered after two thieves broke in and stole half the drugs, leading police on a chase.
Evlicia Jackson-Long, 30, and Roy Long, 32, of 21301 Barn Owl Drive, were charged with felony possession of marijuana and distribution of marijuana after investigators turned up the stash, police said.
Police said that although the couple lived at their Barn Owl Drive residence with their three children, they used the second home in the 6200 block of Streamwood Lane to hide their drugs.
edgewaterjohn,
LOL! I think awhile back ( with their having been the “tip of the spear” ) there was the same stuff going on in SAC. IIRC it was a Vietnamese realtor gal. She looked tired in the police photo.
I suppose all those late nights tending to your “little babies”? Potheads, who needs ‘em?
Hey! I resemble that remark! There is nothing wrong with a little herb from time to time.
And the “little babies” ? Each one nets $400-$4000 (if grown outdoors). I know people here that “retired” at 30 and are to this day quite happy. No more “late nights” for them.
The Chicago couple had the decency to keep the stash out away from the kids. The reason they got caught was some thieves ripped off their house. Bummer.
Ben Jones!
The “King of the Surf Guitar” ( Dick Dale himself ) will be playing in Corvallis, OR on June 25th! I know he has some gigs that will be closer for you so check his website. Here’s a guy that’s beaten cancer not once but TWICE! If you’ve never seen him live, you’ve never been to a show.
Here’s to hoping “Friends of Dean Martinez” will open for him!
IIRC wasn’t one of his recordings played on Space Mountain in Disneyland?
Can we get a summary going (pardon if I’m wrong, just wanted to get it started):
Deflation: Ben, FPSS, Combo, Blue
Inflation: VTDan, Packman, Bill LA
Undecided: PB, DinOR, Muggy
Stuffing Pants with Ingots: Alad, OlyGal
Stagflation: scdave
Muggy,
That’s accurate. I tend to agree w/ whomever said: “How can you have inflation when banks refuse to lend and consumers refuse to spend?”
I tend to be on the deflation side. Cars and houses (two biggest expenses) are definitely a helluva lot cheaper. I also understand what combo said about disruptions in supply (price spikes) being mistaken for inflation.
Can someone help me out: don’t both, in our current scenario, end in a lower standard of living, regardless?
At this point, I lean toward deflation — though I think the stagflation camp has a reasonable argument, I find that scenario particularly unappealing and therefore ignore it out of personal bias.
“I find that scenario particularly unappealing and therefore ignore it out of personal bias.”
Me too. I totally understand the mindset of the FB. I am in total denial about the possibility of a bad outcome for me. I refuse to accept it because it will bust my bubblesit. In order words, I will be punished for being rational and exerting financial self-control.
As inflation is to boiling, deflation is to freezing. Take your pick.
We appear to have opted for deflation, which means the fed will need to print some $62 trillion dollars to bail out all the banks and lenders as ever greater numbers of individuals, corporations, state and local govts default on their loans. Endgame - check-mate. I personally recon it would be cheaper and more stable to inflate our way out of this, but this means getting people to work and inflating wages, which is not on either the Bush or Obama agenda right now, so I stand at this point behind the collapse by deflation theory of life the universe and everything.
I think there are a number of folks collecting fixed income allotments who think they will end up OK when all is done, but these folks will be defaulted on too if things keep going.
When Uncle Hussien decides to take care of it for you.
Not that he can piss up Niagra Falls.
Only if we get the terms clear:
inflation = increase in (money supply + credit)
deflation = decrease in (money supply + credit)
Do you honestly think our Congress would understand what you just said?
No, like DUH!!!
What the heck kind of comment is this?
NIAGRA FALLS!!!
Slowly I turned, step by step, inch by inch…
Undecided WT.
But with what Generation Greed has done, we’re screwed either way.
I guess I’d say I’m leaning toward inflation, perhaps only because I grew up in the 1970s. Nixon took the dollar off the gold standard then. China will take itself off the dollar standard now.
Short term Treasuries or equivalent win with inflation or deflation, lose if things are OK. I’m betting against OK.
What about stagflation?
Put me down for “inflation in needs, deflation in wants.”
This cannot happen due to the budget constraint. How many times do we have to explain this?
You need food more than a house. So an increase in food prices causes more familes to default and more loans to get unpaid = deflation.
But that deflation due to loans unpaid is only on the credit side - not the money supply side. Thus there will be deflation in the things people get loans for - i.e. mostly houses and cars, but there can still be inflation in the things that people *have* to buy, and can buy without credit - the essentials. No?
I know people can also use credit for food (credit cards), but if they default on this credit they still will continue to buy food, because they have to. And other essentials like water, electricity, etc. aren’t things that can be bought on credit.
In short - people can choose not to buy houses and cars and boats, and even if they do choose to buy them they can buy them used. They can’t choose not to buy food and electricity and water, and they can’t buy them used.
So I guess what I’m saying is I disagree with your premise.
“can’t choose not to buy food and electricity and water”
Perhaps you have not thought this through carefully. I suggest that the majority of food, electricity and water that you and I buy is in the totally non-essential category.
Perhaps a better way to say it would be “won’t choose not to buy food and electricity and water”, since what really matters in the inflation vs. deflation discussion is what people will and won’t do, not what they can and can’t do.
Certainly as you say - within the “food” realm there are luxury areas that will indeed decrease in price (high-end steaks, wines, etc.), but demand for staples will remain near constant. Same mostly for utilities etc. They will perhaps decrease some as people cut energy and water usage and such - but not nearly as much as is being cut for housing and autos of course.
Deflation will continue as long as the perception of an economic recession/depression persists; because inflation is caused by demand reduction, as driven by this perception. When that’s done, and there’s the perception (correct or not) that we’re in the midst of a recovery - people will ramp up spending again. And lenders will indeed lend - because it’s what they do, and they are enabled by the money flowing in from the backside from the Fed, and by the promise of bailouts if/when it goes bad again.
This is when inflation will rear its ugly head.
“This is when inflation will rear its ugly head.”
But what will these new bubble dollars be spent on? Housing is already my single biggest (but declining) expense.
Like DUH!!!
I’m more of a “buy guns, food and toilet paper and head for the hills” type myself. I guess that puts me in Alad’s camp
I’m more of a “buy guns, food and toilet paper and head for the hills” type myself. I guess that puts me in Alad’s camp
I’m more of a ‘live in the hills to begin with and stuff the pantry with guns, food and t.p when you see them on sale.’
See, because I don’t want to leave my books and pretty shoes behind to go head for the hills. They’d get scared.
Besides, the wilderness has a definite paucity of long hot bubble-baths with pink loofahs and dewberry scented bubbles.
(That was what lured me out of the wilderness in the first place, several years ago. Bubblebaths and beer, and boys.)
* and lots and lots of likker, of course. I don’t wanna be sober for Armageddon, nohow.
Oh. I forgot the booze part. Absolutly! Lots of Absolute
+1e6 on booze.
Who forgets that part, fer’ cryin’ out loud!?
Doesn’t every well prepared living in the hills folk have a trusty still for these essentials?
Doesn’t every well prepared living in the hills folk have a trusty still for these essentials?
Sigh. I can’t get mine put together right. It’s only partly assembled, out in the woodshed. Bigfoot plays with it sometimes until I shout at him to get out of there before he loses the tube bits.
)
I dunno, it seems like a lot of fiddling, especially when I brew beer all year round as well as hard cider in Autumn by simply pouring some warm liquid in a 5 gallon bucket, slapping on the lid, and wandering out of the laundry room.
Besides, beer and/or hard cider by-products don’t make you go blind. (Although that one batch of hard cider last Autumn came close. A wild yeast strain must have sneaked in.
One day, though.
Proper operation of the still takes the blinding stuff out, not adds it.
Do I have to come up there and show you how to?
If so, don’t let bigfoot drink all the beer before I get there.
The easiest thing to do with hard cider, so as to lessen precious space on the shelf, is to freeze it and drain off the applejack. It’s called jacking.
Careful though, my Sunday School teacher told me that jacking can make you go blind by itself!
In my experience, it takes at least 100 years though.
Besides, beer and/or hard cider by-products don’t make you go blind.
Not sure about that, but I have some hard cider (sort of, I added sugar and used wine yeast for ~15% alcohol) that I’m considering donating to the local hospital to use for cleaning wounds.
Either that or I’ll build a go-cart and use it for fuel.
and use it for fuel.
Wasteful!
In my experience, it takes at least 100 years though.
Ahhh…? What, you’ve run the tests?
I’m gonna have to giggle here just for a bit.
You missed my undecided…Been posting to get peoples’ opinions one way or the other for at least 2 years.
Well, I want 14+% on mortgage rates & 11.8% interest on a passbook savings account…what does that make me?…(besides being totally whacked!)
Lucy: “Charlie Brown…here let me hold the football…”
Daffy: “Consequences, Schmonsequences, as long as I’m rich.”
I’m actually in this camp:
Inflation -> Deflation -> Inflation
1. Big-time inflation already happened on the front side of the housing bubble. It wasn’t reflected in CPI of course which doesn’t include actual home prices but rent equivalent. But it was *incredible* inflation of course. During 2007/2008 this inflation shifted to commodities, but then…
2. Deflation is happening now, as an unwinding of that initial inflation. This is being seen across the board - but with the highest amount again in housing prices.
3. Inflation is in our future - the result of the massive stimuli happening in various forms, that will be continuing even as the economy “recovers”. This will be a whip-saw effect - an overreaction to the existing deflation. This inflation will probably be spread across goods and services - certainly it won’t be in housing.
FWIW I’m going to conjecture that the coming inflation will most visible be seen in the stock market. I think there’s a good chance the stock market will be the next big bubble. Everyone seems to (wrongly) think the stock market is low-priced right now. I think that the combination of “recovery” fluff from the government and people going to equities as a form of inflation protection will drive the market up. In fact I think it’s already happening.
Commodities are going up, which I believe is based on inflation worries and recovery talk as well. Check out the TSX and the Cdn$, which are driven by commodities. Since I can’t see any logical reason for these moves, I’m guessing bubble.
Count me in the undecided, leaning deflationist. Though energy goes up longer term, after a few more violent up and down thrashes.
I say “leaning deflationist” because I’m rooting for deflation so much that I must allow for how that may be skewing my judgment. I’m rooting for deflation because I want to see the notion that “the Fed can manage this” laid to utter and humiliating waste, scorn, and outright mockery.
Inflation -> Deflation -> Inflation
I’ve seen this cycle before packman. I think it’s the most likely.
Good one!
+1 vote for undecided, but stuffing my pants with Krugerrand (much more comfortable than an ingot!) and Cash.
Yeah. Besides, I’d look mighty funny carrying an ingot around inside my flower-embroidered Daisy Duke short-shorts.
Is that an ingot in your pocket or are you “just pleased to see me” Olygal!
Deflation
Just too much debt
Muggy, I am in the stagflation camp. I don’t see any reason for wages to go up but I think we will see high inflation. Tea parties will keep a lid on taxes, so government will increase the printing of funny money.
Count me in the inflation camp.
Count me in the inflation camp.
I want to be in the inflation camp too. If it rains when you’re camping and your air mattress is fully inflated then you stand a chance of at least floating somewhere if it floods.
And even a fully inflated air mattress is of little use against a charging stag, so I don’t want to be in that camp, either.
The tight rope is a difficult path to walk between two points.
It’s name is Inflation.
Hmm - combination - Stuffing purse with gold, deflation, then inflation. Cash is also good. Also keep credit cards handy if needed. Also have passports in order. Have food and water stored. Have cars that run. Have some goods to trade. Have to work on more food, water, gold, trade goods. Have person who will get guns if needed. Can go to dog pound to get mean dog if necessary.
Can go to dog pound to get mean dog if necessary.
I’m not sure having a ‘mean’ dog is ideal. A well-trained, loyal dog? perhaps. But you can’t just pick those up at the pound ready to go…that requires work.
The intertemporal decoupling of Wall Street’s massive bonuses to managers of Megabank, Inc and the collapse of the investment banking sector raises a question of interest for evolutionary scientists: Was the crisis a matter of natural evolutionary forces that drive financial markets, or was it a matter of intelligent design?
The only way to explore the latter hypothesis would be some kind of legal investigation into what the managers of Megabank, Inc knew and when they knew it. I take encouragement from the plight of the Tan Man that such investigations may be forthcoming.
At any rate, I note that the consequence of the past decade or so of Wall Street boom times followed by bust was to transfer the contents of many a Main Street household’s pension wealth into the hands of greedy bankers. I would like to applaud the efforts of the leadership at the Fed for making this massive wealth transfer possible and, most likely, legal.
The Tan Man is an easy target. There’s likely to be little collateral damage beyond Senator Dodd, and he’s been judged to be expendable in this case.
I remain pessimistic about serious investigative action, unless and until the pitchforks literally appear in the streets by the millions.
I wouldn’t rule that scenario out.
I wouldn’t either. If my current predictions come true, that the next leg of the downturn will be severe enough that the nakedness of the whole crop of emperors can no longer be denied by anyone (all of them, Bush, Paulson, Greenspan, Bernanke, Geithner, Summers), who knows where we go from there.
Been sharpening my pitchforks for a while now. Just waiting for the word GO.
Pitchforks won’t come out in the US unless
1. Unemployment benefits and food stamps run out, thus my belief that unemployment and food stamps are for the elite not the poor.
2. Massive inflation
I’ve always held the opinion that taxes (and by extension welfare/SS/medicare/etc) are the fees you pay to keep the pitches and torches off your lawn.
I’ve got a whole bunch of pitch forks ready to go that take the following:
5.56 x 45
45 ACP
9 mm
.357
12 ga
You is crazy, rob.
5.56 x 45
45 ACP
9 mm
.357
12 ga…
Once again I ask—tell us more!
I wonder if Barry knows this idiot is out talking while he’s gone…
Biden: White House to `ramp up’ economic recovery; tough jobs report includes signs of hope
Ben Feller, Associated Press WriterOn Friday June 5, 2009, 11:52 am EDT
WASHINGTON (AP) — Vice President Joe Biden said Friday the White House plans to “ramp up” the pace of its economic recovery efforts as the government reported the unemployment rate jumped to it highest level in over a quarter-century.
Addressing reporters, Biden said the latest jobs report reflects how millions of Americans are still hurting, but he also said there were “some signs of hope today.”
The jobless rate in May shot up from 8.9 percent to 9.4 percent and 345,000 more jobs were slashed from company payrolls.
Actually, economists said they had expected even larger jobs cuts, and the smaller numbers offered a sign that the worst recession in decades is starting to give way. Biden quickly tempered his hopeful words by saying that White House is not satisfied with getting a less gloomy report. The mission remains to create jobs, he said.
“Let me be very clear: A lower job-rate loss is not our goal,” Biden said. ” `Less bad’ is not how we’re going to measure success.”
Does anyone else have a feeling of information deficit?
Obfuscation.
From the Agora 5
The U.S. economy shed “only” 345,000 jobs in May, the Labor Department said this morning. We forecast Wednesday that today’s employment gauge would beat expectations, but wow… this number smashed the Street’s guess of 520,000. Last month’s loss is the smallest since it all hit the fan last September.
May’s number establishes a trend for 2009, too. The jobs scene is far from rosy, but at least it doesn’t seem to be getting worse… not yet anyway.
So “Buy, buy, buy!” as they say in Cramerica, right? U.S. index futures jumped on the news and the Dow and S&P 500 opened up 1%. And if you aren’t the type to be bothered by the fine print, we suggest you slam the buy button too.
But the details of today’s jobs report aren’t quite as rosy as the headline number. The unemployment rate rose to 9.4%, notably higher than the expected 9.2%. In other words, the unemployed are not being rehired. While the rate of firings cooled off, the bread line is just getting longer and longer. 9.4% is the highest rate since 1983.
Over 6 million people have lost their job since the recession officially began in December 2007
The “long-term unemployed” — those out of work for six months or more — now exceed a record 4 million. Many of these “discouraged” people are not counted toward the official unemployment rate
9.1 million people are working part time because they can’t find a full-time gig — also not counted as officially unemployed.
I ain’t seen no fat lady yet.
New Rockville, MD commercial development goes to pot. Stores move out and college students move into the attached apartments to party.
Development at Rockville Town Square disappearing
The slogan at Rockville’s Town Square, the town’s revitalized town center, is “It’s hip to be square!”
But some businesses have cleared out of the mix of retail, restaurant and residential buildings.
One shop worker looked out his front window and declared, “In two years, this will be nail salons and dollar stores.”
This will never do, saving instead of spending? Why, we must have the great American consumer get out there and start buying up those ‘green shoots’…
Consumer Credit in U.S. Falls Second-Most on Record (Update1)
By Vincent Del Giudice
June 5 (Bloomberg) — Borrowing by U.S. consumers had the second-biggest drop on record in April as the jobless rate reached its highest in a quarter century and accessing loans remained difficult.
Consumer credit fell $15.7 billion, or 7.4 percent at an annual rate, to $2.52 trillion, according to a Federal Reserve report released today in Washington. Credit decreased by a record $16.6 billion in March, more than previously estimated.
Spending by consumers declined for a second consecutive month in April as the unemployment rate increased to 8.9 percent, a level not seen since 1983. The number of people collecting jobless benefits broke records for 17 weeks before the end of May, causing Americans to put off purchases out of fear they might lose their jobs or take longer to find new ones.
“Consumers have retrenched in the face of rising unemployment and are paying down their debts and increasing their savings,” said Chris Rupkey, chief financial economist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in New York. “Those consumers who do want to spend are having their credit limits cut left and right by banks that are increasing their credit-risk checks.”
Economists had forecast consumer credit would drop $6 billion in April, according to the median of 29 responses in a Bloomberg News survey. Projections ranged from a $9 billion drop to a gain of $1.5 billion. The Fed initially reported that consumer credit decreased by $11.1 billion in March.
Savings Rose
Revolving debt, such as credit cards, decreased by $8.59 billion in April, according to the Fed’s statistics. Non- revolving debt, including auto loans and mobile home loans, decreased by $7.09 billion. The report doesn’t cover borrowing secured by real estate.
The savings rate among Americans rose in April to 5.7 percent, the highest in more than 14 years, the Commerce Department said on June 1. Consumer spending, which accounts for about 70 percent of the economy, was down 0.1 percent for the month after falling 0.3 percent in March.
The nerve of us!
I love how he says that “Those consumers who do want to spend are having their credit limits cut left and right by banks that are increasing their credit-risk checks” as if it were a BAD thing!
Note he never said “Consumers who want to spend and have saved money over the years went right ahead and bought whatever they wanted, so long as they could afford it.”
It’s about time fiscal responsibility came back in fashion.
Don’t let the FIRE mafia hear you say that or you might have to have a little chat with “Tony.”
Of course they have to cut services for the elderly, that way people will get alarmed, and scream for FED bucks…
Alabama County Set to Halt Services, Shut Buildings Over Budget.
By William Selway
June 5 (Bloomberg) — Alabama’s most populous county is preparing to stop road maintenance, close courthouses and shutter services for the elderly after a court struck down taxes that pay for about 35 percent of its budget.
Jefferson County, which includes Birmingham, released a plan to cut $52 million from its budget as it appeals the ruling against its business and occupational taxes to the Alabama Supreme Court. Without that revenue, the county has said it is at risk of running out of money as soon as this month.
The loss of the tax money was another blow to a county that has been struggling to avoid bankruptcy since last year, when Wall Street’s financial crisis caused its interest bills to soar on more than $3 billion of bonds.
The proposed cuts, released today by county Commission President Bettye Fine Collins, would slash deeply into the government’s services and also include closing a nursing home for the indigent, declaring a moratorium on enforcing zoning and littering laws, and scrapping local development contracts.
“Either cuts in spending or increases in taxes will be necessary to stabilize the fiscal situation,” said Ben Bernanke in response to a question posed by a member of Congress. Then, he added…
“The Federal Reserve will not monetize the debt.”
That last sentence has a ring to it. It reminds us of Richard Nixon’s “I am not a crook.” Surely, it is destined to make its way into the history books, alongside Bill Clinton’s “I did not have sex with that woman” and the builder of the Titanic’s “even God himself couldn’t sink this ship.”
Monetizing the debt is precisely what the Fed will do. But it will not do so precisely. Instead, it will act clumsily…reluctantly…incompetently…accidentally…and finally, catastrophically.
That’s our prediction, here at The Daily Reckoning.
The Fed won’t monitize the debt, but the treasury department will.
Are you demented? Do you even understand the phrase “monetizing the debt”?
Gawd, this subject brings out all the loonies!
wikipedia
Debt monetization occurs when a nation’s central bank (for example, the Federal Reserve in the United States) “buys” government bonds. [1] If a government’s expenses exceed its tax revenue, if nothing is done the government will draw resources (capital) out of the private market. Since there is a limited amount of capital available in the market, there will be less available to fund business growth if the government takes out a substantial portion. If the debt is monetized, the capital is thereby returned to the private market.
Excessive debt monetization can be inflationary, which in some eyes can be seen as a flat tax because the ultimate result is that the government acquires additional funds and the currency decreases in value.[citation needed] However, monetization helps the government temporarily to meet its short term commitments at the beginning.[citation needed] On the other hand, some degree of debt monetization is useful for increasing the money supply, to keep up with increased production or economic growth.
Hence it is a primary tool of the Federal Reserve in managing interest rates. Excessive debt monetization has the drawback of increasing the twin deficit. That is, when government financing is increased, along with interest rates and foreign capital, the trade deficit also goes up along with the budget deficit.[citation needed]
Read the m*ron’s comments:
The Fed won’t monitize the debt, but the treasury department will.
Does that give you any confidence that the person making the comment has any freakin’ clue on the subject?
“Excessive debt monetization can be inflationary, which in some eyes can be seen as a flat tax because the ultimate result is that the government acquires additional funds and the currency decreases in value.”
It is a flat tax on dollars. Whatever other assets are denominated in dollars (like oil, US stocks, housing, bonds, etc) will tend to go up in nominal price, even if their real value is unchanged.
Case in point: Oil prices have almost doubled in a couple of months, and I don’t think it has much at all to do with increasing demand, as I keep reading about massive amounts of inventory floating around on ships at sea.
I’m confused by this. Yes, the treasury prints the federal reserve notes and stamps the coins…
how does that translate into monetizing the debt?
A. The Treasury does no such thing - the mint does. They are separate entities.
B. Coins and bills have nothing to do with it. The vast majority of money is 0’s and 1’s.
Monetizing the debt involves the Treasury in that they literally sell bonds to the Federal Reserve, who pays for these bonds with non-existent money - created for that specific purpose. Thus the term.
But the majority of debt monetization isn’t via the Treasury - it’s via things like FNM and FRE selling *their* bonds to the Federal Reserve - $1.25 Trillion worth in fact, compared with $300 Billion that the Treasury is selling. There are other things the Fed buys too; this probably does include indirectly buying treasuries (e.g. a financial entity buys treasury bonds, and then turns around and sells some of its own bonds to the Fed)
A. The Treasury does no such thing - the mint does. They are separate entities.
Yeah. D’oh. My brain is on strike apparently.
So who are you saying is monetizing the debt? I fail to see how the Treasury could be the one monetizing the debt - by issuing more debt. I would think that, if you’re looking at actors, it’s the Fed who’s doing the monetizing, as they are the one creating money (whether it’s by buying FRNs from the *mint* (or do they buy from the treasury? Guess i have a date with wikipedia later tonight) or adding an entry to an electronic register) and using that newly created money to buy debt instruments - gov’t bonds, Fannie and Freddie bonds, whatever.
Assuming I have this right, who would you say is the one doing the monetizing?
No matter what he will actually do, BB clearly cannot announce a plan to monetize, and in fact has to deny it. Any open admission to this effect would make the job of buying down l-t T-bond yields with freshly printed virtual currency all the more difficult to accomplish.
Help! I don’t want to renew my CD for 1.25%. Suggestions please. I have some PM, cash, retire fund in cash & bond fund, play money in Scottrade. I can’t renew for 1.25%–that’s just wrong.
spend it! Do something fun, like….pay for everyone here on the blog to travel to las vegas
Buy a house!
StarMucks…they’re running out of coffee beans!
Put it ALL on the Lions!
The Detroit Lions odds of winning the 2009 Super Bowl were set at +7600 for a payout potential of $7600 on every $100 bet.
I’d say the Lions’ potential for winning the 2009 Super Bowl is exactly zero, given that it’s already happened and they didn’t even participate.
So no - I wouldn’t do that bet.
You`re killin me packman, I was gonna book it.
Try to find a local credit union and see what they offer on their CD’s. I renewed mine last month at 3% when others were offering much less. Good luck!
He has a zillion dollars (and lots of dirt on other business scum bags) and will have the best lawyers in the country working up his defense. Crazy Phil Spector had top defense too, but when you stick a gun in a pretty gals mouth and pull the trigger - even the best suits can’t save your sorry butt. The public is pretty apathetic about non-violent crimes. Smart money says Mr.Suntan cuts a deal and walks.
Most of the Enron clowns got convicted.
It took forever, but convicted they were!
“Smart money says Mr.Suntan cuts a deal and walks.”
Frankly, despite the massive amount of damage to Main Street household wealth due to Mr. Suntan’s operation (possibly including our own OlympiaGal), I would rather see him cut a deal and implicate subprime mortgage lending kingpins on Wall Street than to see the fallout from the greatest ‘bank robbery’ (executed by Wall Street bankers against Main Street victims) in history.
Word is out in the MSM that there are something like 1/2 million homes that banks are holding off the market in the hopes of riding out the recession and selling them later on at a higher price. Did Japanese bankers try that? How many of them lost their shirts on the two-decade-long housing market escalator ride into the basement? With the Fed constantly calling a bottom 12 months out, I suppose bankers have reason to hold out hopes.
Haven’t these bankers all noticed that there was a six-year lag between the onset of the last serious recession (in 1990) and the bottom of housing prices (1996)? If we are on a similar time span this time, then housing will not bottom out until 2008+6 = 2014 or so, and this is the optimistic scenario (the pessimistic one is a repeat of the Japanese experience with a two-decade lag, where housing does not bottom out until after 2008 + 20 = 2028).
The most amazing aspect of this story (and the most convincing evidence that housing is nowhere near a bottom): A huge share of current buyers are knifecatching investors who somehow didn’t hear the inventory avalanche warning and are now playing in the snow directly below the massive, unstable overhang!
Friday, June 5, 2009
Housing numbers don’t tell whole story
A foreclosed townhouse in Virginia
Many of our current economic woes can be blamed on the housing market. And it turns out the worst may not be over in the housing sector. Jeremy Hobson reports.
TESS VIGELAND:So you’ve got US automakers on life support and the nation’s economy shedding hundreds of thousands of jobs a month. It’s the new normal, isn’t it? Shows how far we’ve come from the simple life back in oh, ‘07. Just about everything being done to fix the economy depends, in part, on a real estate rebound. But it turns out the housing numbers we hear every month do not tell the whole story.
Marketplace’s Jeremy Hobson reports from New York.
Jeremy Hobson: Banks are holding hundreds of thousands of foreclosed homes. When house prices rise, the banks will release those cheap houses onto the market and potentially send prices right back down again.
Andrew Jakobovics is a housing expert with the Center for American Progress.
Andrew Jakobovics: There are about half a million properties that have been taken in foreclosure that have not yet made it onto the listings of properties that are available for sale.
The banks are doing this because they think they’ll get a better offer on the houses if they wait. It’s a delicate balance because empty homes don’t do anyone much good.
JAKOBOVICS: The properties sort of sit vacant and abandoned on some level and often the vacancy attracts blight and crime. People will break in, people will start squating. It really impairs the value of the properties.
As much as 10 percent, he says. Lewis Goodkin is a housing consultant in Miami. He says prices are also threatened by the people who are buying the bulk of the houses on the market right now. Half of South Florida’s sales, he says, are going to investors, who are just looking for a quick profit.
I don’t have the link with me (on vacation), but there was a recent article - in the WSJ I think, that stated that the estimated inventory at the banks is 800,000.
Enjoy your vacation, and thanks for taking the time to post (or is it just a matter of HBB obsession — as in my case???)…
Somehow amidst the US MSM stories about green shoots and ever-rising headline stock market index levels and incipient economic recovery, this story about the record rate of decline in housing prices has received little air time.
Finance and economics
Global house prices
Bottom fishing
Jun 4th 2009
From The Economist print edition
Lower prices are tempting bargain-hunters back into the most depressed markets
FEARS of a general deflation may be receding but in the rich world’s housing markets at least, falling prices are still the norm. Property values are slumping in almost all of the 19 countries in our latest global survey (see table). The trend is most persistent in America, where prices in the first quarter were 19.1% lower than a year before, according to the national index published by S&P/Case-Shiller. That is the biggest drop since the series began in 1987.
…
Job losses stand in the way of housing recovery in America too. Deprived of regular income, many homeowners are falling behind with their mortgage payments. A record 9.1% of borrowers had missed at least one payment by the first quarter of this year. A further 3.9% were in foreclosure, the legal process that settles defaults and thereby adds to the glut of homes for sale. At April’s rate of sales, it would take ten months to shift the stock of unsold homes. In 2006, when markets were far perkier, that sales-to-stocks ratio was just 6.5 months.
Considering that all the experts insisted the nonexistent bubble was just a slight bit of froth in overheated coastal markets, it is downright amazing to see US home prices drop 19 percent year-over-year on average across the entire country!
The Fed
Jun 5, 2009, 4:40 p.m. EST
Fed should pop next housing bubble, Yellen says
Higher rates might have slowed appreciation in home prices
By Greg Robb, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) - The Federal Reserve should consider raising interest rates earlier to prevent asset bubbles from getting too big, San Francisco Federal Reserve President Janet Yellen said Friday, in a notable departure from long-term Fed consensus that monetary policy should not be used to prick asset bubbles.
Yellen said that she thinks the Fed should raise rates to lean against the expansion of a bubble in certain circumstances, especially when a credit boom is the driving factor.
“In the current episode, higher short-term interest rates probably would have restrained the demand for housing by raising mortgage interest rates, and this might have slowed the pace of house price increases,” Yellen said in remarks to a central bank conference.
I give 2:1 odds that the entity that is the U.S. Federal Reserve won’t even exist the next time there’s a significant housing bubble.
Is that because you don’t expect any more bubbles in the foreseeable future, or because you believe the Fed-based system will soon give way to some kind of successor US banking system?
Finance and economics
Central banks’ exit strategies
This way out
Jun 4th 2009 | WASHINGTON, DC
From The Economist print edition
The Federal Reserve weighs plans to unwind its unconventional stimulus
Illustration by S. Kambayashi
A FIREFIGHTER’S first rule of survival is “know your way out”. The same can be said of financial firefighting. Though it has no intention of exiting soon, the Federal Reserve is planning its path out from the extraordinary measures it has taken to free credit markets and boost demand.
With other central banks, the Fed is under growing pressure to explain its exit strategy in order to allay fears that its policies will produce inflation. On June 2nd Angela Merkel, the German chancellor, launched an astonishing attack on the Fed, the Bank of England and the European Central Bank (ECB) for their loose monetary policies. Mrs Merkel’s outburst, which trampled on a German political tradition of not commenting on the actions of independent central banks, makes life awkward for the ECB, which was due on June 4th to announce details of a plan to buy €60 billion ($86 billion) of covered bonds. But her most pointed barbs were aimed elsewhere. “I am very sceptical about the extent of the Fed’s actions and the way the Bank of England has carved its own little line in Europe,” she said.
The Fed did most to unsettle Mrs Merkel and its other critics when it said on March 18th that it would buy $300 billion in Treasuries by September, plus $200 billion in bonds issued by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, America’s two housing-finance giants, as well as $1.25 trillion of their mortgage-backed securities by December. The purchases are meant to drive down long-term interest rates, and at first they did. Ten-year Treasury yields fell to 2.5% from 3%. But by June 3rd they were back up to 3.5%.