Bits Bucket For October 21, 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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Recovery-less recovery continues. Enjoy it while the media makes it last.
Meanwhile the stock market continues to surge!
Oil up almost a dollar fifty. The higher it goes, the more the speculators rush in. Remember, JP Morgan took delivery of heating oil and parked the tanker off the shores of Malta. The pigmen will NOT be denied. They will be sure to make a killing off the backs of those shivering poor in their old drafty houses out in the rural areas of New England.
The nice thing about having only a small cartel of very large banks running the global investment banking business is that it becomes very easy to manipulate markets without worrying about charges of collusion or (for American firms) violations of the Sherman Antitrust Act.
There was a story about oil prices which showed up on yahoo a few days ago. The money quote of the article, which I had copied and pasted with the link when I sent it to a friend via e-mail was:
“”Refiners don’t want to own crude, it’s Wall Street traders who want it and I’d like for someone to explain that to me,” said energy analyst Stephen Schork. “If we’re spending a greater proportion of our incomes on gas right now, that doesn’t bode well. It’s less money we’re spending elsewhere.”"
Interestingly, the story was pulled from yahoo, and the link no longer worked, but linked to an entirely new article about oil, which mentions nothing about speculation. I found the article on a few obscure sites, but it’s disappeared from all of the mainstream ones, and I’m starting to wonder if there’s a lot of hushing of the media going on by the heavy hitting investment houses.
Here’s a link to the article:
http://channels.isp.netscape.com/pf/story.jsp?floc=FF-APO-1310&idq=/ff/story/0001%2F20091019%2F2042140569.htm&sc=1310
That to me indicates that the PTB know we’re in for a rough period of inflation ahead, and are using oil as a hedge.
Any reason to think otherwise?
The Agricultural Adjustment Act (AAA) (Pub.L. 73-10, enacted May 12, 1933) restricted agricultural production in the New Deal era by paying farmers to reduce crop area. Its purpose was to reduce crop surplus so as to effectively raise the value of crops, thereby giving farmers relative stability again. The farmers were paid subsidies by the federal government for letting a portion of their fields lay fallow.
This from Peter Schiff
The dominant school of thought believes that the stubborn refusal of then president Herbert Hoover to intervene after the stock market crash of 1929, and his preference for free market solutions, led directly to the ensuing decade-long catastrophe. Through this lens, our leaders assure us that the most recent raft of government measures will prevent another episode of bread lines, Hoovervilles and pencil salesmen. As usual they have it completely wrong. In my view, the Depression was created precisely because Hoover followed the path that our government is now taking.
When the stock market bubble of the Roaring Twenties (which was created as a result of the loose monetary policy of the newly created Federal Reserve) finally popped, Hoover would not allow market forces to correct the imbalances. His policies were aimed at propping up unsound businesses, artificially supporting prices, particularly wages, and providing Federal funds for public works projects. These moves went well beyond the progressive reforms of Teddy Roosevelt, and established Hoover as the most interventionist president ever up to that point. In fact, much of what eventually became the New Deal had its roots in Hoover’s policies
When Roosevelt took office he continued the same failed policies only on a grander scale.
Seems like we are using the same play book. Prop up prices and labor. This time due to our debt and collapsed manufacturing ability I suspect there is no choice damned if you do and damned if you don’t, but if you don’t you’re damned a bit earlier.
From Wikipedia:
Hoover’s stance on the economy was based largely on volunteerism. From before his entry to the presidency, he was a proponent of the concept that public-private cooperation was the way to achieve high long-term growth. Hoover feared that too much intervention or coercion by the government would destroy individuality and self-reliance, which he considered to be important American values. Both his ideals and the economy were put to the test with the onset of The Great Depression. At the outset of the Depression, Hoover claims in his memoirs that he rejected Treasury Secretary Mellon’s suggested “leave-it-alone” approach.[29] Critics, such as liberal economist Paul Krugman,[30][31] on the other hand, accuse Hoover of sharing Mellon’s laissez-faire viewpoint. President Hoover made attempts to stop “the downward spiral” of the Great Depression by hoping that the private sector would recover largely through its own volition.[32] His policies, however, had little or no effect. As the economy quickly deteriorated in the early years of the Great Depression, Hoover declined to pursue legislative relief, believing that it would make people dependent on the federal government. Instead, he organized a number of voluntary measures with businesses, encouraged state and local government responses, and accelerated federal building projects. Only toward the end of his term did he support a series of legislative solutions.
“meastman” - is that like a hybrid between measton and me? I take offense!
You’re right. Oil should be free for everyone. Damn you pigmen for daring to make a profit from the exploration, refining and transporting of oil.
Problem is, they used TARP money to by the oil and rent the tanker. So the poor get screwed twice.
Dude,
We have a bunch of Fed banks directing zero cost loans and colluding to manipulate oil prices and other non-elastic markets.
Not sure what bizzare universe you live in but this kind of manipulation, sponsored by a quazi-government agency drives us conservatives insane.
It is clear we should force the banks to take delivery on their oil futures.
Then when the get killed by the price drops, no bailouts for em.
Wow. JP Morgan is exploring for, refining and transporting oil. And here I thought they were just a bank.
Damn you pigmen for daring to make a profit from the exploration, refining and transporting of oil.he says sarcastically.
Obviously eddie is also a member of the group
Republicans for RapeDOTorg. too.
One tanker full of heating oil and J.P. has cornered the market. Amazing.
The crime is not that the banks are speculating. The crime is that they our speculating and profiting with OUR MONEY.
Got pitchforks?
Bill
Troll alert.
The crime is not that the banks are speculating. The crime is that they our speculating and profiting with OUR MONEY.
NO
The crime is that they are manipulating the market in a coordinated fashion.
No problem for me I burn very little oil suck it Wall Street, OPEC, Big Oil, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Venezuela, US gov. If everyone did this it would shake these criminals to their core.
According to you all banks, brokerages, health insurers and now oil producers are criminal. Is there any industry - aside from govt of course - that you think is not criminal?
Oil now up almost $2.50.
Who said anything about free, Eddie? Oh, I see, you’re just talking out of your @SS as usual.
Ignore the troll.
It’s an Icarus market.
All this gloomy correction talk is a bullish contrarian signal. Buy stock now, or get priced out forever!
Market Snapshot
Oct. 21, 2009, 12:05 p.m. EDT
As U.S. stock market gains, some predict pullback
orrection a bullish call says one analyst, noting the rapid speed of advance
By Kate Gibson, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — As U.S. stocks gained on Wednesday amid quarterly results that have mostly topped expectations, one analyst said that after a seven-month climb, the equities market is approaching a stage where it’ll sell into any news.
“We’re not quite at this final stage, but by the end of the week or next week at the latest, traders should be looking for a 5% pullback,” Marc Pado, U.S. market strategist at Cantor Fitzgerald, wrote in a research note.
…
FWIW - there were a lot of similar predictions back in April after we went up 10% or so - that the rally couldn’t be sustained and we were due for another leg down. We’re up another 40% since then.
Just sayin’.
Stock market behavior transcended fundamentals years ago - now it seems to generally transcend even investor sentiment.
I’m pretty sure the market’s behavior is now driven by some guy in his basement in Iowa. I have no clue what his address is, so I don’t bother even thinking or conjecturing about it anymore. For that matter I think the guy may have died a couple of years ago, and behavior is now driven by his cat occasionally walking across his keyboard.
guy may have died a couple of years ago, and behavior is now driven by his cat occasionally walking across his keyboard.
Probably. You are right. First time today. J/teasing ya.
The market is always due for “a leg down”, get a chart of the dow back to the 1920’s. Up and down, Up and down, but over the long term, only one direction, up.
And, despite what some people believe, market behavior is much like an earthquate, you know it will happen, but nobody, nobody knows when.
The run up in the market in the past few months is the result of the decline in the dollar and retail investors chasing some kind of yield since there are only negative yields available outside the equity markets. When safe non equity yields begin to return to more normal levels the dollar will begin to recover and retail investors will flee back to safer investments, we will see the next leg down.
It will happen, who knows when, in the iterim, we take the gains the markets give us.
“The market is always due for “a leg down”, get a chart of the dow back to the 1920’s. Up and down, Up and down, but over the long term, only one direction, up.”
Yeah. And “over the long term”, we’re all dead. Time frames DO matter.
Spokane,
I bet that Japan had some kind of thoughts with their market.
Then it dropped and went down for 20 years.
Does that figure into your calculations?
Also note, the market has been flat or so for a decade.
The market going up just means inflation. Boring stuff.
“It’s an Icarus market.”
Kid Icarus was one of my fav nintendo games.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama will announce a package of initiatives on Wednesday to increase credit to small businesses, an administration official said on Tuesday.
“The proposal will increase the caps for existing SBA (Small Business Administration) loans and give small banks better access to TARP funding to encourage more lending to small business,” the official said.
While the credit crunch that threatened the economy earlier this year has been easing, small businesses that typically drive employment growth in the United States are still facing borrowing constraints.
“They’re more dependent on banks. They’re more dependent on credit cards, home equity loans, other types of things that got washed away by this crisis,” U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told CNBC on Friday.
The Obama administration in May temporarily relaxed restrictions on the size of businesses allowed to apply for small business loans.
The move was expected to allow some 70,000 additional firms to apply for Small Business Administration 7(a) loan program through September 30, 2010. The move was expected to particularly aid auto dealerships that have been squeezed by tight credit.
“The move was expected to particulary aid auto dealerships that have been squeezed by tight credit.”
Is it tight credit to auto dealerships that’s the problem or is it the fact that they can’t sell cars?
It seems to me that if they have customers then everything else that is needed will follow. If they don’t have customers then they are hosed no matter how much credit they may have.
I dont know about you guys but I still have access to lots of credit.Credit is not the problem here I think.With cars, prices are way to high imo.If you have decent credit and a job it is no problem getting a home loan.I think it is all about confidence and job creation.
You are correct, if a person has good credit and employment, borrowing is not a problem. Home loans are easy to come by, every broker I have talked to, which amount to 3, say the same thing. Good credit, no problem, with plenty of loan options.
every broker I have talked to, which amount to 3,
You are on a roll…hehehe
Time to start a business w borrowed money and pay myself a fat paycheck until it implodes.
Speaking of credit, Citibank called me and said that someone tried to buy a $900 vacume cleaner online with one of my cards and Citi denied the purchase.
I askes why they denied them. They said it sounded “suspicious” so they didn’t let the transaction go through.
How did they know I hate to clean?
How did they know I hate to clean?
SD renter. That is funny.
Good thing they knew you so well.
Friend just reported her CC # was used to buy those CCs at stores. It was stolen from 1 of 2 places. The atm right next to the hotel or the duty free shop when she bought wine in Madrid.
Luckily she caught it in time. It was refunded to her, but Citi is “right on it”.
Had a card from Citi that hadn’t been used in 10 years. Every few years when the old card expired Citi would send me a new one which I would activate and store in a safe.
Received a call a month ago that someone charge various online purchases to the card. Same thing - suspicious activity. Asked Citi to close the accout.
Very concerning given that the card hadn’t been used recently.
Wow. If it hadn’t been used, doesn’t that mean the problem was in the Citi computer syetem? Yikes. Not a good thing.
I just got hit last week with identity theft. Every one of my credit cards got hammered. Luckily it was caught quickly.
Interestingly, it turns out that if someone knows your social, name & address, they can get a credit report that will show all of your credit cards.
A lot of times, employees of banks will sell CC numbers to crooks (considering the current caliber of employees, it’s easy to see how this happens). When I worked at B of A, there were absolutely no safeguards to prevent such.
Crazy thing is… I am on the other end of that. Had someone use a stolen credit card to buy something from our store. Bank takes the money from me. I had to investigate it on my own with the help of UPS to find the thief, then threaten him with jail if he does not pay with a new card. The idiot had the item delivered to his work and his boss signed. Lucky for me, but what a joke that the bank makes the little guy eat it.
Bank takes the money from me.
Again the banking lobby rips away from small business. Good think congress is behind their local constituents. NOT.
Dang — I was up at 3a this morning, it’s already almost 11p at night, and a sink full of dishes awaits my attention…There must be a silver lining in here somewhere.
* WORK & FAMILY
* OCTOBER 21, 2009
Housework Pays Off Between the Sheets
* By SUE SHELLENBARGER
Housework may seem like the ultimate romance-killer. But guess what?
A new study shows that for husbands and wives alike, the more housework you do, the more often you are likely to have sex with your spouse.
Earlier studies have hinted at this connection for men; the sight of a husband mopping the floor or doing dishes sparks affection in the hearts of many wives. But the more-housework-equals-more-sex link for wives, documented in a study of 6,877 married couples published online recently in the Journal of Family Issues, is a surprise.
Scrubbing the floor is no aphrodisiac, and seeing your spouse doing it usually isn’t either. “My husband loves doing laundry, yet I don’t get any thrill out of his doing it,” says Chicago writer Julie Danis. And “I don’t think he thinks it’s sexy when I go around gathering the detritus of his daily life.”
But for some high achievers who take a “work hard, play hard” approach to life, researchers say, working hard in one domain produces more energy for others. The study also found a correlation between hours spent on paid work and the frequency of sex in marriage.
“Rather than compromise their sex life” because of time demands at work or at home, “this group of go-getters seems to make sex a priority,” says Constance Gager, lead researcher and an assistant professor of family and child studies at Montclair State University, Montclair, N.J. The study doesn’t measure what proportion of spouses fall into this group, but she believes “they are on the leading edge of couples we expect to see more of in the future.”
…
Had someone use a stolen credit card to buy something from our store.
You mean “Let someone use a stolen credit card”, right? I imagine your store to be like nearly every other store that doesn’t even look at the card or ID. I seriously doubt they had nice looking fake ID to go with the card. I’m always tempted to buy a bunch of stuff and sign “F*** YOU!” in those kinds of places.
arizonadude,
Well said. The kindly gentleman that leases the entire floor below me just bought a brand spanking new Jag XK. Beautiful car.., but they’re like $80,000! ( Base price )
Granted not everyone is in “the market” for a luxury car but even “economy” cars are by no means cheap? Btw, the guy downstairs kept to his knitting and manages numerous multi-family properties and refrained form “condo-conversions” and other assorted Tom Foolery. ( Whatever WILL he talk with his peers ‘about’? )
but they’re like $80,000! ( Base price )
Does that come with or without the steering wheel?
Any tires with that?
LOL= base price.
DD,
If I had Todd’s money ( I’d burn ‘mine’ ) so it isn’t a matter of whether or not he can afford it? They steered clear of all the Vegas-like condo/re-partment black holes and if the guy wants to pat himself on the back..?
Their bus. model hasn’t changed much in 25 years. Good for him.
I was just joking.
That kind of money doesn’t always go for the total pkg.
As you said, base price!
The problem is too many had too much access to too much credit for too long. It seems to me that attempting to find ways to make credit more accessable is just pouring a little gasoline on the glowing embers. Remember: 1/2 the households have below average credit scores.
It will be quite a while before a guy with a 650 FICO score and household income of $100K/year will be able to buy the dream home, a Lexis and a boat. Unfortunately, that was what the economy was driven by 2002 to 2007. it was a house of straw.
I was in the Marine Industry during that time, and I kept saying that people can’t be buying the houses they were buying and have the boat and car market hold up too. But it did, the period from 2002 to 2007 were record years for boat sales, fueled, of course by consumer debt and home equity loans. Pleasure boat sales (14 to 32 ft) today are about 40% of what they were in 2007 and showing no sign of recovery. I would imagine that most consumer big ticket consumables are in the same condition.
I think as usual, they missed the boat on this one. All of the small GM/Chrysler dealerships had their franchises revoked and are no longer in business. Only the big, multi-franchise dealerships remain.
I remember them talking of all of those dealership closings, but did they all really end up closing?
Many of them yes. My town lost a few at least.
wmbz,
Stephen Moore of the WSJ has been beating on that concept like a rented mule! I mean for weeks now going on and on about how small business is the growth engine for job creation!
( At least Team O finally got the memo? )
Stephen Moore LOL
I’m sure to pay close attention to good ole Steve.
The Idiot.
Roidy
Steve Moore??? BWHAHAHAHAHA.
What a clueless hatch girl in the same vein as Cocaine Kudlow.
What’s a “hatch girl”? Is that the same thing as a “twink”?
( see below )
Roidy,
I ‘thought’ there was a consesus that “A statement is true, or it’s false. The -who- that makes the statement does not determine it’s veracity”
( krazy bill, below )
Agreed, Stephen can be a twink at times ( Ivory Tower ‘much’ Steve? ) but I happen to think it’s a pretty common sense observation that really doesn’t require any further support. Unless we’re thinkin’ all gov. jobs going forward is the ticket?
We’ve had all kinds of green shoots/small businesses sprouting up locally
-Mexican restaurants (so the undocumented and their extended families will have a place to work).
-Lawn and Garden services (minimal startup costs; just need a truck, trailer, riding mover, push mover, and weed whacker).
-Stores loaded with locally-made, artsy-fartsy bull$hit.
-”Collecter Car” restoration shops. (Too many people watching SpeedTV, think they are going to make a fortune by troweling Bondo).
“-Lawn and Garden services (minimal startup costs; just need a truck, trailer, riding mover, push mover, and weed whacker).”
Where are you located? Don’t you need to be licensed, bonded, and insured? That can tend to be kind of pricey- especially if one isn’t an owner of a house with a 20% equity position and stellar credit. Also, that equipment doesn’t come cheap. Lastly, there’s been a bubble, at least out west, in such businesses with most sporting wealthy white owners utilizing cheap, illegal alien labor.
In Houston, no licensing is required to start a lawn service and you can buy everything you need from the pawn shop or classifieds.
Most start with just a cheap push mower, weed whacker, leaf blower and gas can. Total cost? $200.
Truck? Used Japanese beater.
The biggest problem to staying in business is underpricing and consistently showing up.
You could do what Ed (not so) Smart out in Utah did, and hire some homeless drifter to do some yard work. Not such a wise choice when the guy came back late one night and kidnapped 14-year-old Elizabeth Smart out of her bedroom at knifepoint and kept her as his “wife” for the next nine months.
“Don’t you need to be licensed, bonded, and insured?”
What part of illegal did you not understand? They already operate outside the law, why would they worry about little things like workman’s comp, bonding, etc?
“What part of illegal did you not understand?”
Did you forget to read part of my post? Here, I’ll spell it out for you again:
“…wealthy white owners utilizing cheap, illegal alien labor.”
The business itself, as far as licenses, bonds, ins. is legit. The hiring practices are not. They check licenses and bonds ALL the time. They just don’t check green cards.
DinOR
“I ‘thought’ there was a consesus that “A statement is true, or it’s false. The -who- that makes the statement does not determine it’s veracity””
True. You are entirely correct. Still, my problem with Stephen Moore is the crap he fed anyone who didn’t agree that the US Economy was just beautiful , good, and Golidlocks, in 2006. He also never admitted he was wrong. At least Mr. Magoo did. Aurthur Laffer is in the same category as Moore. Completely wrong and won’t admit it and apologize. Karry Kudlow, while I really don’t think much of him as a “Wall Street Expert” at least apologized and admitted his mistake.
I’m not big fan of Peter Schiff, but he deserved better than Steve Moore gave him.
Roidy
Gbear,
You must not live in the same “out west” that I do.
Obviously not, Dude. I know you are in CA. What county? Are there really that many illegal operations out in the open? It’s obvious the employees are illegal, but the whole shebang? Geez, no wonder there’s a problem with revenue. No license + no bond + no insurance = no tax revenue.
Los Angeles, and yes, the black market for all labor intensive work is huge. All sides of the equation are have incentive to cheat when doing things on the up and up adds 50% or more to the cost of things.
Also, I’m not just pointing at Hispanics, nor just immigrants. It goes across the spectrum, but in the arena of lawn and yard care the Hispanics are the most prevalent if only because of the demographic.
Business
M&I posts loss, to sell $775 million in stock
By Paul Gores of the Journal Sentinel
Posted: Oct. 20, 2009
While reporting its fourth loss in as many quarters, Marshall & Ilsley Corp. said Tuesday it is selling $775 million in common stock - its second initiative to raise capital since June.
In addition to providing a cushion to handle soured loans, money raised from the stock offering should put M&I in a better position to compete for the assets of banks that fail and perhaps even pay back part of the U.S. Treasury’s investment in the Milwaukee-based company, M&I said.
Regulators have been pressing banks to increase their capital, said Thane Bublitz, an analyst who follows M&I for Thrivent Asset Management in Appleton. That’s likely one reason M&I is seeking more capital, even though it raised $552 million with a similar stock sale this summer.
“They should be fine, especially with the excess capital, as long as there is no additional surge in credit quality problems,” Bublitz said of M&I.
…Hit hard by housing
M&I has been hit hard by the housing slump, especially on loans it made in Arizona, and the lingering economic downturn.”
Ben, you’re killing us out there in in AZ
We need jobs but they give us more loans! Better yet, they are running up debt to suck up budget so that we get more loans if we need them or not.
Yeah. I love this plan.
At some point I will embrace the great default and go out and blow some serious money on a house/boat/car and bling. Figure I can get 3 of the four out of the country.
“They’re more dependent on banks. They’re more dependent on credit cards, home equity loans, other types of things that got washed away by this crisis,”
Sounds like Megabank, Inc has the American people right where they want them: Totally dependent on high-cost, uncompetitively-supplied banking services.
Chicago most stressed city in U.S.
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Striving to attain that perfect life, work balance? You’re not alone, but if you live in Chicago you’re more unlikely to find it with residents of the Windy City the most stressed in the United states.
A survey by Harris Interactive found Chicago is the most stressed city in the nation, followed Houston, Boston, Los Angeles and San Diego, while Miami is the least stressed, along with Dallas/Fort Worth, Las Vegas, Cincinnati and Minneapolis.
“It is (due) to a combination of different things. There wasn’t one thing that made Chicago stand out but they were the ones who had the least attainment of life balance,” Harris Interactive spokeswoman Regina Corso told Reuters.
“In other cities, some by leaps and bounds, their residents have managed to attain some level (of life balance).”
Washington DC, despite its concentration of politicians and high-powered wheeler-dealers, came 12th in the poll of 25 cities, ahead of New York at No. 17 but lower than Denver, San Francisco, Tampa or Seattle on the stress scale.
“I expected to see a different order,” admitted Corso. “But maybe people in Chicago are trying to do too much.”
She attributed Miami’s low stress levels to its proximity to the sea, warm weather and laid back attitude.
“Chicago most stressed city in U.S.”
Even worse than LA? That sounds pretty bad to me…
“Even worse than LA? That sounds pretty bad to me…”
There are a lot of great things about Chicago, but there is a very materialistic culture present here. The crappy weather and long winters are probably what keeps it from going over the top.
Perhaps this explains why my past GF’s brother died of a heart attack in Chicago at the age of 30. It was quite a shame, really, in more ways than one. It was devastating to her, and our relationship too.
Oh, Grizzly.
That’s awful.
Death really has a way of f-ing things up, doesn’t it…. I’m so sorry.
It doesn’t have to be that way, my city was at its best when it was affordable.
The funny part is that so many think these prices are justified. But seeing as we are not confined to an island, peninsula, or valley the excuse given is that “everyone wants to live here”.
This city has always been my home, my family and friends are here. That said, I can’t imagine stretching to live here - no way. There are places in this world worth stretching for, but this is not one of them. This was a working man’s town that tried to become a global city.
Oh, and tax bills arrive next week, that ought add to the stress!
Miami’s ‘laid back attitude’? Maybe the Miami of 25 years ago.
* Pershing buys 9.5% of Corrections Corporation of America
“We’re in with two feet,” Ackman said today at the Value Investing Congress in New York. “You’ve got a real estate company, in our opinion, with the government as a tenant. We think this is a business that has very significant growth. It’s going to do well in any economic environment, as long as people commit crimes and as long as we punish them.”
Pershing buys 9.5% of Corrections Corporation of America
And this makes me sick. No one should make a dime on prisons, crime or punishment.
The profit driven aspect of business promotes the pursuit of growth whereas the pursuit of growth does not enter into my concept of the ideal criminal justice system.
Then Legalize the possession of drugs…and make it Illegal to sell even 1 joint.
That would scare the helllllout of lawyers who make tons on money in legal fees…..and don’t exactly have to question the arrested client to find out where did the money come from.
———————————-
No one should make a dime on prisons, crime or punishment.
“ideal criminal justice system”
Agreed, it -has- become an industry ( just ask defense attorneys? ) It pays just ‘fine’ where they’re concerned. How about a “victim justice system”, ever hear of ‘that’ phrase?
“Ideally” people would only commit crimes ‘once’ or not all. Ideally…
Hear hear. Incarcerating someone - taking their liberty away - is inherently something that only government should have the authority to do. It is disgusting to see this “outsourced” to private companies who will then try to make slave-labor bucks off prison industries.
No - prison’s don’t take liberties away - judges and juries do, because they’re the ones that make the decisions, not the prisons.
Are judges and juries outsourced?
Judges don’t need to be outsourced to send CHILDREN to juvenile detention camps. They just need to privatize and then let the profits roll in.
http://tinyurl.com/b59or8
packman,
And that isn’t exactly a “finer point” of the law. My oldest daughter worked where they filmed One Flew Over the Coo-coo’s Nest” ( Oregon Mental Health “Hospital” )
At first it was just the insane, then it was the ‘criminally’ insane ( and towards the end of her tenure, just plain old criminals! ) Their staff was in NO WAY prepared to deal w/ these types of “patients”. It was alarming as she was in Admin. and actually req. to read their files.
Common drug dealers that killed their own mom for $20.
That’s the reverse of what’s been happening in regards to mentally ill being warehoused into jails due to hospitals closing. Now you’re saying that criminals with no mental health history are being routed to hospitals?
This is a disaster for the sick who are there for treatment, and as you point out, no walk in the park for the staff either.
there’s a website: privateci dot org that tracks the abuses and neglect that occur in privately run prisons.
We had one operator close shop when they were sued and had to pay out the wazoo for neglecting to treat a 38 year old woman who was diabetic as well as mentally ill.
She suffered for six weeks or so then died a horrible death alone in her cell. The records for the three days prior to her death mysteriously disappeared. (she was on round the clock watch due to her medical conditions.)
The prison is still open, under new “management”.
The so called “justice” system has nothing to do with justice, especially in civil matters.
It has more to do with who runs out of money for the lawyers first.
Judges don’t need to be outsourced to send CHILDREN to juvenile detention camps. They just need to privatize and then let the profits roll in.
tinyurl dot com/b59or8
Yep - case in point - don’t equate corruption with outsourcing; in this case no outsourcing to private firms required.
(Not sure what you mean by “privatize” being that the judges were public government appointees. Their positions weren’t in fact privatized.)
X-philly,
Congrats on the other night btw! Go team!
I hate to say this, but ‘my’ primary concern was for my daughter. Many of the patients there have reached the end of the line. Family can’t/won’t take care of them any more and they’ve been deemed a hazard to themselves and others.
When the first thing they tell you Day 1 is to never wear a necklace of anything a patient can “get of hold of” you know you’re in for a rough ride. Lots of drugs and alcohol will land you ‘here’.
When the first thing they tell you Day 1 is to never wear a necklace of anything a patient can “get of hold of” you know you’re in for a rough ride.
There was a time when it was dangerous to walk the streets of Philadelphia for the same reason. Any gold jewelry worn on or about the person had to be cleverly concealed, or it would have been ripped off ya ass before you could say: Was that a wolf pack that just stormed by?
I had one crazy friend that used to dangle her gold braceleted arm out the SEPTA window to tempt the thieves. She was crazy, as opposed to mentally ill, which is what we were discussing in the first place.
re: the Phils. My favorite thing about the team is that they are eye candy-licious. It’s a shame that Pat Burrell left.
judges and juries do ??
Nope…95% of all cases are pleaded out…Why ?
Because the potential punishment is so punitive because of the multitude of charges the D.A. files the defendant does not take the risk of a judge or jury…They take the reduced charge at great cost to their liberty and future prospects..
Or they can get off the dope and find real work?
Nope, no turning back! Once they’ve had a taste of easy ( tax free ) money, working is for suckers. ( They’ll take the revolving door thank you )
Its all a money scam from top to bottom under the guise of “Keeping You Safe”…
“You’ve got a real estate company, in our opinion, with the government as a tenant… as long as people commit crimes and as long as we punish them.”
Hey, yeah just think you can make money if they ever bring “crimes against humanity” charges against Cheney-Shrub & their enablers…interesting.
Has housing really bottomed?
http://www.cnbc.com/id/33411724
This statement falls clearly into the “hopelessly naive” brand of corporate boosterism. States have huge amounts of flexibility on how they deal with their prison populations, especially with recent technology advances. Releasing non-violent prisoners to house arrest with electronic monitoring, just plain old early release under parole, not prosecuting minor drug crimes at all (see yesterday’s announcement about feds not prioritizing mj prosecutions when they are under a state medical program that conflicts with federal rules), etc.
It might be a better business than providing lavish snack trays for condo open houses, but I wouldn’t get too excited. Oh, and don’t expect to make money firing half the employees. You could find yourself facing serious whistle blower issues. You know they collect a percentage of what they save the government if they report legitimate fraud, don’t you?
… they need it when they loose their jobs and get blacklisted or to pay for the lawyers to defend themselves against trumped charges by their former employer.
I wouldn’t be too sure that this is the recession proof investment it appears to be. AZ is talking about releasing as many as 1/3 of those detained in the state prisons. CA I believe is also talking about releases. The state coffers are empty and nothing is safe from budget cuts.
The state coffers are empty and nothing is safe from budget cuts ??
Never happen in Ca..They will let children starve first..The legislature is bought and paid for by “Anything” even remotely related to crime..A
Constitutional Convention would be the only way to break their backs…Until then, its more taxes and cutting on the backs of the weakest…
Little known fact: Mandatory sentencing laws became far more prevalent during the rise of corporate prisons in the 1980s.
Coincidence? Ya, sure. You betcha.
Now tell me what kind of country we live in again?
Little know fact, the crime rate in California has plummeted since the “3 strikes” mandatory sentencing was passed by proposition in the 90s and we started putting career criminals out of business.
Link?
http://www.threestrikes.org/fbi_crimerates_pg1.html
I didn’t search real hard, if you look you’ll see it’s pretty obvious. Even now well into the recession the crime rates are fairly low.
I don’t know about the auto dealership and relaxed restrictions parts but this package makes some sense.
Small businesses create jobs and it’s jobs we need.
Customers (those with some money to spend) would also be nice to have.
Do you guys really believe the earnings numbers that are comign out of financials?Wells fargo and us bank came out with smashing results this morning.Are they accounting for all the losses on loans?Something seems really bizarre here.I just dont see how they could have any earnings at this point in the cycle.Must be some of that bush fuzzy math.Maybe they have arthur anderson cooking the books as usual.
“Do you guys really believe the earnings numbers that are coming out of financials?”
My long, elaborated, extended answer is: No.
Fees, fees, fees. On credit cards, mortgages, refis, overdrafts, ATMs, etc. They add up. Plus they’re avoiding real estate writeoffs, as you suggest.
And they’re borrowing from the Fed at zero and lending to the Federal Government at 3 percent.
And they’re borrowing from the Fed at zero and lending to the Federal Government at 3 percent.
Got a link perhaps?
This has come up recently, and I also believe it to be the case, but I’d like something hard to point people to if I can find it. Otherwise all I’ve seen is loose talk / conjecture.
“Got a link perhaps?”
Google-up “boingboing borrow at zero”.
Whoa! I think we’re all keenly aware of what’s gone on at BAC, but USB has seriously kept their nose clean during all of this!
The wife and I applied for a loan from them in ‘06 ( things we just “heatin’ up” for us late-to-the-party Oregonians ) and we were given the 3rd. Degree while applying. I asked if they “razz” ‘everyone’ like this and the ( salaried ) LO quietly explained ( we ‘keep’ all our loans )
Sure, they can be a PITA, but don’t be hatin’ on the Bros. Grundhoffer!
we ‘keep’ all our loans
Heard that from my loan guy when I bought in ‘99. ‘Course then the whole company got sold to Wells Fargo.
Jim A,
Not challenging that. Here’s the difference though, unlike the majority of now busted residential RE loans, these weren’t being fluffed up enough to get them thru the underwriting “process” ( there’s a laugh )
From inception standards were in place to make them of value ‘whomever’ were to acquire them! But I hear ya’ and it’s a pain.
Same here…
Got mortgage on current house back from US Bankd in Spring ‘06, and refi’d 6 months ago with them. The LO were pretty nice people, but I did have a lot of paperwork to give them. And a number of followup calls to verify data and proved supplemental paperwork.
They said they did not sell their mortgages (one major reason I went with them, along with the local servicing at the bank branches all around me), and so far they have not. Could always happen, though.
This was similar to what happened when I bought my first house back in 1999 with a mortgage from HSBC bank. Lots of paperwork and they kept and serviced the loan at the local branch. The (owner-occupied [for real]) duplex I owned inbetween was a whole different story with a mortgage broker.
Follow up calls? V-e-r-i-f-y?
Hmm, why didn’t you go to a MB that could “turn it” in the time it takes to go thru the drive-up at Taco Bell? Oh… they’re all out of business..!?
I think Wells has impaired assets but isn’t facing insolvency.
If the collapse in the financial sector had been allowed to go through, WF would likely have survived.
Basically, WF owes themselves a lot of money so they can play accounting games for a long time to declare gains or losses. So, if congress through up a bunch of taxes on them, they’d shift the money to loss reserves and write down assets, basically wait it out.
This is my understanding of their situation. Not in bad shape like BOA/C or GS (before they received 50B in capital).
Yes, now small businesses like car dealerships can go ahead and loosen lending standards again and we can reinflate the credit bubble. This is great news America.
The barefaced greed of bankers and their bonuses beggars belief.
City pockets are bulging with bonuses. Have the banks no shame? ~ (UK)
You, the taxpayer, pay for the bonuses that buy bankers new yachts and villas.
If you pressed a rifle into the hand of the man in the street and asked him to choose between two targets – an MP or a banker – who do you think would get the bullet? Tricky, eh? It is hard to know which of these two formerly respectable professions has fallen further in public esteem.
Some people might hesitate, like Buridan’s ass, the rifle barrel weaving indecisively between two such luscious hate-objects. Most people would simply call for two bullets.
London estate agents say they cannot believe the wheelbarrows of dosh that are suddenly crashing through their doors. Savills says the number of buyers from the financial services sector has risen by 48 per cent in the third quarter of this year, purely in the expectation of yet another ginormous Christmas bonus.
A knuckle-cracking realtor in Knight Frank’s Kensington office says he has never seen anything like it: email after email from the boys and girls at Goldman Sachs. “We did our first Goldman’s deal in June,” he tells the FT, “and we are now doing five times as many for its employees as for any other bank.”
I confess that I read these words with amazement. Of course, it is good news that cash is going into the London housing market, shoring it up and helping millions of people retain their equity in property whose value might otherwise have collapsed. There again, it doesn’t exactly help make housing more affordable for everyone else; and the real question is, how did these bankers come by these new fortunes?
This was good. Who wrote it?
I say 2 bullets.
Well the GS employees certainly chose the “right” firm to hack for.
As my Border Patrol brother’s shooting instructor said:
“Anything worth shooting, is worth shooting twice”.
Q If you were in a room with Hitler, Stalin, and a lawyer, and your gun only had two rounds, what would you do?
A Shoot the lawyer twice.
…just to be sure.
First line all three of them up in a row, with the lawyer in front and Hitler in back. Then shoot twice — once from the front then once from the back.
“If you pressed a rifle into the hand of the man in the street and asked him to choose between two targets – an MP or a banker – who do you think would get the bullet?”
A man should never be forced to make such difficult choices. I’d just have one stand directly in front of the other, and hope the bullet carries through. I’d lock the two of them in a room for a bit and let them decide who stands in front. That should provide a bit of entertainment.
I’d lock the two of them in a room for a bit and let them decide who stands in front. That should provide a bit of entertainment.
ROFLMAO
Thanks that was pretty darn good idea. Always save 1 bullet.
You are a frugal smart person.
I’ve got about 50 rounds of 1940-vintage, armor-piercing .30-06 for my M-1 stashed somewhere. It’ll work………
BYOB? Bring your own bullets? I’m in.
The telephone # of our local sheriff’s substation is 30.06. Easier to remember than 911….
Ron Bloom, is Obama’s manufacturing czar. Last year, Bloom gave a speech to some union members in New York. He was giving a speech on the union role in bankruptcy and restructuring of the auto industry.
“Generally speaking, we get the joke. We know that the free market is nonsense. We know that the whole point is to game the system … we know that this is largely about power. That this is an adults only, no limit game. We kind of agree with Mao that political power comes largely from the barrel of a gun. And we get it that if you want a friend you should get a dog.”
Everyone should know Mao was a “good guy”, I mean he only killed off what? 40-50 million people? Could have been much worse!
At least Mao didn’t pay billions to crooks who run banks.
He killed off all the bankers.
And all the industrialists.
And all the intellectuals.
And all the artists.
Pretty much anyone considered subversive and un-re-educationable.
Well, one out of 4 ain’t bad
A statement is true, or it is false. The -who- that makes the statement does not determine it’s veracity.
Bill you’re krazy…here comes Cheney & he’s swingin’ his paddle…
Run Bill…RUN!
(…The -who- that makes the statement does not determine it’s veracity.)
Dude, just give it up. Please.
Why? reason?
Shtick fail.
A statement is true, or it is false. The -who- that makes the statement does not determine it’s veracity.
Well put, KB. We need constant reminders of this point here.
Not everything you read on the Internet is true.
Not everything you read on the Internet is true.
So true. So true. Deleting nasty vicious vile emails now.
“oh this one is so true” can’t people look things up? geezelouise.
“Not everything you read on the Internet is true”
Yeah
” Listen, pal, they lie to everyone. They lie to the fish,”
Falling Down (1993)
Honest !
“Ron Bloom, is Obama’s manufacturing czar.”
Lawrence Summers, the enforcer, selects another insider to “guide” Obama.
Go to youtube and watch this guy’s speech, he sounds like an HBB regular. To take his comments as serious is rather McCarthyesque. I guess you can never be ironic or joking anymore, or it will be taken out of context and used against you. I posted a link long ago, but it looks like it ain’t going through.
Sure, Ron Bloom talks a good talk. Bravo!
I’m tired of all these appointments coming from the same flock. Today we are unknowing subjects living with a determined financial and political occupation. We are never going to have affordable housing, health care, energy or access to upper education while these folks are in charge. They freely practice “saber rattling” around the world because their sons and daughters don’t serve in the armed forces. If we’re not fighting their enemies in a foreign land they’ll have us fighting amongst ourselves at home. A number of longtime columnists from both sides of the isle allude this occupation today without saying so directly for fear of being ostracized, but their fear for the economic future of our country is unmistakable; we need a major course correction. I’d like to think that a nonviolent solution to this problem exists, but I’m not sure if it’s possible looking back through history. Fingers crossed.
Have you ever seen a Parasitic Wasp land on a Caterpillar’s back? The awkward creature writhes and twists frantically trying to rid itself of the efficient predator. Eventually the Wasp paralyzes its victim with a well practiced injection. Completely immobilized, the Wasp is free to carefully insert its embryo into the warm Caterpillar where it can grow by devouring its host’s insides. Ruthless.
I have seen the tiger smile…
…and I ate his cereal.
What I thought was very presumptive of this Bloom fellow, is that he obviously thinks that ALL union members consider an open or freer market place to be EVIL.
I think it plainly shows how those on high look down on and have a low opinion of the regular worker. I guarantee a good many in his audience know how the system works, and want people to be able to purchase the product they produce.
Bloom is just another person milking the system for all it’s worth while trying to deceive others that he thinks are beneath him.
“What I thought was very presumptive of this Bloom fellow, is that he obviously thinks that ALL union members consider an open or freer market place to be EVIL.”
How presumptive of you.
Given the fact that I work with the skilled crafts daily, allow me to straighten your crooked distortion of union members.
Tradesmen know the deck is stacked against them, generally speaking. And it’s come glaringly obvious to them that they’ve lost alot of ground over the past 30 years and that they haven’t had a voice in govt that represents their position on issues. Make no mistake; have no doubt in your mind….Mr. Bloom’s language mirrors exactly what the rank file think, loudly and boldy.
“they haven’t had a voice in govt that represents their position on issues”.
I may have gone along with some of what you were saying until this line. That is a pant load, period.
I may live in the south but of plenty of family in the great N.E. and in Chicago &St.Louis. I have known numerous union members/workers in my life, including one grandfather. Generalizations are generally to board spectrum.
It is a fact. If they did have someone in govt that represented their interests, they would have gained, not lost.
He is accurate in that the balance has been tipped to the extreme via lobbyists that are pro corporate, INS, Pharma,OIL etc vs lobbyists for union which has fallen to an all time low.
Just see the outcomes.
I’ve worked my fair share of trades and factory. J6P is getting destroyed. And thus his family. Upward mobility is now a thing of the past for most blue collar workers and their children.
Remember! When they started offshoring blue collar jobs, the white collar folks thought it couldn’t happen to them and were some of the most vocal apologists. The white collar folks are now making the same mistake thinking their workplace protections, pay and “investments” are protected.
I’ve talked to many who have already found out differently… the hard way.
+1000. That’s what I got also wmbz.
What a crock! The guy was clearly being ironic, and if ANY clip of his speech goes past the 1:20 minute mark, I predict that would be revealled. Plus, he was saying something that most everyone here agrees with-ie that the free market is no more. It’s all crony capitalism now. Isn’t that a common theme of most everyone here? He wasn’t trumpeting it like it was a good thing, he was speaking in a jaded, ‘we get it now’, kind of way.
But in the mean time, it’s great fodder for our local Rushies. Pick out a ’shocking’ sound bite, play it without context, then cluck over it like chickens until it’s shown not to be what you claim, then move on to the next red herring. I guess it never gets old for some people.
Well yeah but paraphrasing ‘Mao’ is just plain dumb. No ‘matter’ who your target audience might be? It never occured to him that ‘might’ come back to bite him? Also bringing guns and barrels and then end of them, flirtin’ w/ violence here dude.
Besides the original quote is from Andrew Lewis ( Liar’s Poker ) and it’s “If you want loyalty.., ( buy a puppy ) Some people just aren’t meant to be public speakers.
Yes that was poor taste, really no different from quoting Hitler in an ironic, lighthearted sort of way. Mao was no better, though he may still have more cachet with aging hippies and radicals.
In Montana,
We’ve seen a lot of this in recent years. If you’re not the kind of person where anecdotes “roll off the tongue” leave ‘em the hell alone.
It’s been years since we’ve seen an objective comment here about sales people in general but if you were contemplating a purchase and a SP said something inaccurate or misquoted, the sale dies ‘there’. Apparently though in politics ( it’s the best we can expect? )
Montana,
I know this is odd but most of the hippies are more libertarian leaning. Mainly into self reliance and “communist” only at the community level.
A large portion would be considered arch conservatives around here.
Also not into materialism but that is neither here nor there as far as communism vs consumerism.
been there, was one. not all, of course, but many 60s radicals had a blindspot when it came to communist despots, and their clueless followers even moreso, witness popularity of che.
Get ready to bend over forever.
If you trust that Mao killed 40-50 Million people, you could just as well trust all those bankers are doing good things with bail-out money besides taking bonus. If you are lazy to check facts, at least be suspicious to what being brain-washed upon.
That’s pretty well documented and known. See Wikipedia for instance which references quite a few sources. I could give lots of links, but easier to just go there yourself.
Or are you one of those holocaust-denier types that likes to ignore reams of evidence/proof?
Holy cow! There’s someone here who actually believes Mao was a good guy?!
Or do they just believe that the 40+million number is an exaggeration?
See vicever’s post above.
The 40+ million number is one of those stats, that even if it’s off by 75% it’s still pretty terrible.
I was out and about on the weeked and stumbled across a yard sale, which I’m usually inclined to check out. I noticed a copy of Nial Ferguson’s ‘Ascent of Money’ in a pile of books and decided to pick it up. I saw a TV version of it, and didn’t even realize there was a book.
A guy nearby sees me holding a book with the word ‘money’ on it and asks if I had read ‘The Wealthy Barber’, which I haven’t. He proceeds to tell me about some new info he learned, how paying extra money during the early years of a mortgage can save a lot! I, of course, was suitably awed by his financial sorcery. As our conversation continued, he realized I wasn’t actually so awed when I corrected him about the existence of 40 year amortizations in Canada (CMHC cancelled insuring them last fall, thus the banks aren’t interested), and noted that even with 35 year ams the interest component of the early payments is well over 70%. The guy was well into his 40s.
You could have told the guy that putting down a substantial downpayment or having a shorter loan period saves even more interest, or would the logic have exploded his brain.
Haven’t read Ferguson’s Ascent of Money. However, The Cash Nexus was very good.
Good on ya, Al.
I got a good book titled ‘Innumeracy’ at a yard sale a year or so ago. I picked it up, looked at it, and then asked the lady, ‘Would you take fifty-eleven cents for this?’
It was my own joke.
Turns out I didn’t have fifty-eleven cents on me, so I got it for a quarter. It was a very good book, although I don’t seem to be any better at math than I used to be. Alas.
Polly health update:
Still sick. Temperature is elevated but less than yesterday. Cough is worse, sore throat is worse, but, I no longer feel like I have an elephant sitting on my chest. Breathing is a little tight but not as bad as yesterday. My evaluation is that I’m on the mend but it ain’t going to be a bucket of roses from now on.
Despite the negative test (the ones that get results in less than 15 minutes are notoriously innacurate), I’m guessing I have a mild version of H1N1. All in all, I wish I had had time to get the vaccine instead. This is not enjoyable. However, it was not the worst possible week to have to deal with it. I have more obligations scheduled for other weeks.
And thanks to all the well wishers from yesterday.
Nurse at CVS did listen to my lungs and reported them to be clear, so, no pneumonia.
Oh good. Glad to hear you don’t have pneumonia.
Please take good care of yourself and let us know how you are doing.
Nurse at CVS did listen to my lungs and reported them to be clear, so, no pneumonia.
Oh, goody! So you just feel like crap is all.
Get well soon, and meanwhile drink lots of fluids and stay in bed and call up your friends to grumble about stuff, and while you’re at it, why not make up some really exciting gossip to spread around?
That’ll soon cure you.
Hey Oly,
Hi, Mikey. Hows your Halloween decorations going? I piled a heap of pumpkins on my porch yesterday and then daintily arranged handy banana slugs into handsome facial expressions. I don’t want to cut faces out, because I plan to eat the pumpkins.
Then this morning the slugs were all gone. Stupid slugs. Man, you just can’t get good help nowadays.
Going great !
Leaves are about 1/2 off my oaks and the maples have a way to go. It rained last night but up North they are expecting some snow. My decorations are lights and plastic, just hit a switch. Life is good !
No much more going on. Somebody bought MY farm a couple of weeks ago but I’m still kinda watching a newer Amish built log McMansion on a hill with 10 acres in the middle of Nowhere, WI.
I believe some of Rachael Ann’s distant wealthier progressive kin live there. Nice shack and you’d need the Pony Express with a GPS to bother me and I see him a’coming for miles…Who knows ?
Not sure where and what I want to do today other than grabbing a haircut locating a place with a good Halloween Party.
Not sure where and what I want to do today other than grabbing a haircut locating a place with a good Halloween Party.
That’s a busy schedule. I urge caution—don’t work yourself tooooo hard and strain something.
“No sweat, no strain …just maintain.”
Good luck, and as my dad would say, drink lots of water…
Orange juice! I love that stuff when I’m sick!
I don’t think I could handle orange juice right now. Too heavy and too acidic. Lemon herbal tea with honey goes down. It has rose hips in it, so that has vitmin C, too, right? Just checked the box. Yes, it had C.
What about orange popsicles? Do they count?
Been there and done that. Been so sick I thought I would die, and afraid I wouldn’t. Hang in there and drink all the fluids you can, the worst is usually over in 48 hours.
Godspeed.
Water…Lots & Lots of water…
Nyquil + Robitussin DM + Your choice of booze = No problem.
Made the mistake of taking a little too much of this once. My first out-of-body experience. I actually got stuck on “a” while spelling “cat”
If you think that’s funny, wait until you hear my “Kamikaze and Bear Claw” story………
wait until you hear my “Kamikaze and Bear Claw” story………
and?
The last time I was in the “so sick I thought I would die and afraid I wouldn’t” mode, I had a fever of 102.5. Wasn’t delirious, but was completely nonfunctional. Never got close to that this time. I even managed to make apple sauce last night without cutting off any finger tips. Take that virus.
polly. send knee update to me ellisisland123AT yahoo. Mine isn’t improving as fast as I had hoped.
even managed to make apple sauce last night without cutting off any finger tips.
Why, that’s wonderful news!
*encouraging face *
…Sheesh! You know what, just put down the d*mn knife and tell someone to bring you some applesauce.
If you were to chop off some fingers your posting would suffer, and then we’d all be sad, and it would be your fault, Ms. Polly McStumpy.
“…….and?…….”
Was working second shift back in the early 90s, shift got off at midnight (when we weren’t working O/T, which was about 90% of the time, but I digress…….)
One of my crew chiefs and I decide to go to one of the local “exotic” entertainment establishments. I usually have a beer or two at most. Unfortunately, after my first, my buddy says “Hey, you ever had one of these? They are called Kamikazes……..”
Had one, then two……..then lost track. Developed a bad case of beer goggles. One dancer turned from skank into Miss Universe in about an hour. I think I fell in love. I was feeling no pain. Fortunately, my house was only about a mile from the bar.
(Yeah, I drove home blitzed at 3am. This was back before it became a “crime against humanity” to drive after drinking. Have only had a couple of dozen alcoholic drinks total, since then. So there.)
Got home and walked in the house. I was hungry, so I went to the kitchen to find something to eat. The only thing in the house was a box of fresh, gooey, sticky, triple-sugar-glazed Bear Claws on the counter. Proceeded to devour one.
Helpful hint #1- Citrus flavored alcoholic drinks and pastry don’t mix.
Bear claw hits my stomach……oh boy. Tried to lay down in attempt to sleep it off before I started upchucking. Ever see the scene in the movie “Alien”, when the alien is crawling around under the guys skin before it bursts out? I turned on the light, and looked down at my stomach, and it looked exactly like that. Not good.
Gave up trying to sleep at 5am, went to the can, and heaved my guts out. Felt much better. Passed out on the bathroom floor.
Woke up bright and early at 2pm.
Tx…1 six oz. glass of Ginger Ale w/ one 1.5 oz. shot of Jack Daniels stirred and taken by mouth 4 times a day. (May add 2 ice cubes PRN.)
Caution: Do NOT operate motor vehicles, machinery or seemingly abandoned 747-400’s while taking this medication.
Mikey, XGS—for your viewing pleasure:
‘Drunkest Guy Ever
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-s_40rM_L0s
He’s kind of amazing. Like a drunk Charlie Chaplin.
Haw! Exactly. I love how he just doesn’t give up. He’s gonna wiggle around on the floor until he wins, by gum!
I thought it was funny as hel*l until I realized, ‘Oh, lordy, he probably drove hisself to the 7-11 like that.
…Ooooh! The wind is really picking up. Look at all those leaves swirl. Goody. I love this time of year, with cozy fires and getting out all the sweaters and the quilts and making atole and such.
Thanks Oly,
Sheesh…that’s almost a little sad as well as very funny. That fool is some sort of accident…just looking for a place to happen.
Talk about not knowing when to quit…Wow !
I like autumn too. But I’ve curled up with a (Washington state!) syrah. Saving the atole for breakfast.
mmm, beer goggles. The thing that dreams are made of.
Washington state does it best.
I don’t drink atole for breakfast, because I first had it for breakfast in Mexico and I thought inside my sizzling head, I thought, ‘What sort of crazed gringa drinks a HOT drink on a morning so hot and humid that my ponytail has melted right off my head?’
It put me right off atole for breakfast for forever and ever.
But several years later I discovered that atole is the PERFECT drizzly grey and blue afternoon drink for the Pacific Northwest. It is truly the best drink ever, sipped from a chunky sturdy simple mug, with a sprinkle of chili and a dash of cinnamon floating serenely on top.
mmm, beer goggles. The thing that dreams are made of.
Ahhhh…?
Don’t leave us hanging, Cassy, tell us the story!
Yeah…it’s slow Fall night … story night !
atole is the PERFECT drizzly grey and blue afternoon drink for the Pacific Northwest. It is truly the best drink ever, sipped from a chunky sturdy simple mug, with a sprinkle of chili and a dash of cinnamon floating serenely on top.
But that’s not all: When I sip atole I like to be sniffling lightly, with the top of my head a bit soggy from a light rain, and a frog or two must be hidden cozily about my person in the folds of my thick wooly sweater or raincoat or galoshes or whatever, and then hop out to the startlement and wonder of all, so that then everyone has to catch them and then I must retrace my steps so I can return the prodigal to his mom or girlfriend the next day.
Really, it’s quite a measured ritual. Like the Japanese tea-ceremony, only with more amphibians and shouting.
Yeah…it’s slow Fall night … story night !
It’s even an atole story night! As long as there’s half a bottle of mescal in the atole, that is…
mescal atole beer goggle story! let’s have it…
…where’s the rest of my atole story? It’s all gone.
*starts crying dramatically into mug *
the bell tolls for atole tall tales
the bell tolls for atole tall tales
Well, I’ll be…
Did that just come to you? Magically? Or you need to drink apricot pyramid ale? Because I feel respectful, I suppose.
the muse was upon me- que syrah, syrah…
I liked your ‘frog-in-the-wool’ by the way. Return the prodigal to his girlfriend (or mom! -you cougar, you) the next day, eh?
And rest all you can.
that’s my motto!
Wishin’ you to get well…and hoping “it” isn’t sneaking enough to return.
Hang in there polly and I hope you feel better soon. I’m glad you at least feel clear enough to peck out a few thoughts to your HBB friends.
DH and I are nursing something low level that feels like chest pressure, throat and nose. A teacher friend in New England is also reporting same symptoms. 600 kids were not in a smallish local school district yesterday although reportedly only about 200 were actually sick and the rest the parents kept home as a precaution. We do have a couple of friends in our larger social circle w/kids w/confirmed H1N1, all mild cases. It’s going to be a long winter.
I had it a couple of weeks ago. Hubby has it now.It’s not the least bit of fun. He can’t take flu shots. He tried twice including for the 1976 swine flu. Both times the shot made him much sickerthan the flu does.
Thanks for the update, Polly. Thank goodness you’re a little better. I’ll bet you have the swine flu. My son and his girlfriend had it two weeks ago - very miserable. I didn’t get it even though I spent lots of time with them - maybe I’m protected by the vaccine I got in 1976.
There was a vaccine in ‘76? I was around in ‘76. Why didn’t I get a vaccine in ‘76? Wah….I want to have had a vaccine in ‘76. Wait, what tense was that? Past subjunctive something or other? Where are the latin scholars?
I believe in letting my participles dangle.
Past subjunctive..oy.
pfluperfect ?
(Chicken soup, ginger ale, and pedialite popsicles- the holy trinity of flu care- plus old movies and couchtime.)
OK Polly,lay off the Nyquil now.
I believe in letting my participles dangle.
Pervert!
*modestly covers little green eyes lest I become offended *
Just don’t dangle them in a split infinitive, or you’ll awaken Pedantic Man! (Who Cares?!-they shout)
I believe in letting my participles dangle.
Pervert!
*modestly covers little green eyes lest I become offended *
I didn’t think anyone was going to point them out to me, so I just admitted my short comings. Better to be upfront. Doncha think?
No! NO! Not ‘Pedantic Man’!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAw
(Who Cares?!-they shout)
split infinitives… ya hoooey!
Not sure about the vaccine in 1976. A statement was made last week that anyone alive in 1957 wouldn’t get swine flu now since a variant of it was going around then, and thus they would have antibodies. Not sure how true that is though.
Got a link? I’d be curious, since that would apply to me.
Wasn’t the 1976 vaccine for SARS?
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=113446539
I’ve read online that people born before 1957 are already immune to swine flu. Is this true, and if so, why? — Lisa Radher, Chicago
Yes, pretty much so, says Dr. David Morens of the National Institutes of Health, who has studied the history of flu viruses.
People born before 1957 were exposed to ancestors of the new pandemic virus, which are in a lineage that goes back to the notorious H1N1 virus that touched off the raging pandemic of 1918-19. That’s why people older than 52 are likely to have some protective antibodies that “cross-react” with the new H1N1 flu.
In 1957, for reasons flu experts don’t fully understand, H1N1 viruses disappeared for 20 years.
…link it to continue.
The 1976 vacccine was for the swine flu. I was in the Army at the time and we were given the shot whether we liked it or not.
In 1957, for reasons flu experts don’t fully understand,
I don’t fully understand either, but finally-sighhhhhhh- I finally got something right!
I hear you, DD. Finally being middle-aged is good for something!
Yeah, I remember (and got) the vaccine back in 76. Went as a kid with my family to the basketball arena and got an air gun shot. Hurt worse than a regular shot, but then I got a happy meal at Burger Chef, and all was forgotten. I’ve also wondered if that gives you some immunity now, as I’ve been around people who have swine flu and I haven’t got it (yet).
I got the gunshot in the arm at student healthin ‘76 when I was a student in Ann Arbor. But a quick search tells me that it doesn’t confer immunity for H1N1. Oh well. My employer tells me that I have to get both a swine flu and regular flu within the next 6 weeks or I have to wear a mask at work. I usually decline immunizations - flu shots used to make me sick. I hate being forced to do anything.
Burger Chef
Wow. Brings back memories.
happy meal at Burger Chef,
THAT is your immunity!
All the best Polly.
Pump yourself full of Vitamen C and as PBear said, drink water and flush that baby out.
George
Sorry to hear you’re under the weather, but misery loves company. I felt myself coming down with something on Monday night and at this point I’m not sure if it’s a cold or the flu.
I did do some google research on the H1N1 flu symptoms, and what was reported was that the H1N1 symptoms include vomiting and diarheaa, which are not normally present with the regular seasonal flu.
“I’m guessing I have a mild version of H1N1. All in all, I wish I had had time to get the vaccine instead.”
Is the H1N1 vaccine available yet? It was due sometime this month IIRC, but all I know is that DD’s pediatrician hasn’t got any.
Very, very limited. Mostly going to health care workers and first responders (EMTs, police, firefighters). I think the very first doses for the regular population are out, but not that many. Radio this morning said Maryland was trying to prioritize distribution to pregnant women and children between 6 months and 3 years because the state only got about 20% of the doses they expected this week.
No news from the office about vaccine available for federal workers. They have run out of regular seasonal flu vaccine, as have most of the pharmacies and doctors offices in my area.
EPSOM Salts hot baths will detox you and make you tired enough
to sleep.
Detox with epsoms salts couple times per day. Works.
My cure all is cayenne pepper. 1/2cup lemon juice. 1/2cup hot water and 1/2tsp of cayenne pepper,and hold your nose and drink. It burns any sickness out.
I do hope you get better soon. Do get lots of rest, and if you have breathing difficulty’s please do not hesitate to go to the hospital.
One of the great things about the HBB is the breadth and depth of knowledge one can obtain on an endless variety of subjects, beyond just housing. I will try this concoction - thanks for posting.
Awesome, innit? I don’t bother with wiki anymore.
Why, I learned how to restore and care for beautiful old antique wooden-handled knives from posters here. This is last year. And to anyone who says: ‘Oh, that’s a trivial subject and unworthy of discussion’, well, too bad you aren’t handy, or you’d suddenly have a beautiful old antique knife stickin’ outta yer.
And the good part is, the handle would entirely repel your various fluids! That is how exquisitely they are maintained, because of knowledgeable HBBers.
Thanks, HBBers, thanks.
The burning cayenne makes you forget all about any other illnesses.
Made the mistake of taking a little too much of this once. My first out-of-body experience.
Did that 1x, was in Portland and thought I would die. In fact, Portland although nice has been where I have been sick to many x.
Pneumonia, childhood illnesses, then that outofbodyexperience. yi yi yi yi yi Rhobutissin will do that to you.
And when it comes out in the end it makes you forget all over again.
When we lived in MA we counted several of Newton’s Asian restaurant hot and our soups as tops on our cure list. At least you got a few hours of cleared out sinuses and could sleep.
Make a hot toddy. That will help you sleep and make you feel good. My dad would make one for us kids when we got sick.
A year or so ago, someone described a program of soaking lots of black peppercorns in vodka then taking a hot bath and drinking some of the vodka while concurrently drinking lots of water, then sleeping for 12 hours or more. It might be nice to have some chicken soup first.
Feel better soon, Polly.
My former neighbor swore by Lipton powdered chicken noodle soup for the flu. She preferred that when sick, rather than me making real chicken soup for her, even though normally she enjoyed home-cooked food more than artificial processed stuff.
I like miso soup when I am sick or just not feeling well. I think in both cases, it might be a matter of the salt drawing toxins through the mucous membranes (the way the Epsom salts do in the bath).
I think in both cases, it might be a matter of the salt drawing toxins through the mucous membranes (the way the Epsom salts do in the bath).
Ewwwww! Now I’m gonna barf, and never look at miso soup with the same simple fondness again.
Maybe you like miso soup when you’re sick because it tastes good.
…Although I do like your thought of getting into a nice hot bathtub of salty miso soup when I have sick membranes. That seems like good advice, there.
getting into a nice hot bathtub of salty miso soup
Now that is a good idea. Swirling green waters with a few chopped chives thrown in for good measure.
And decorative appeal.
Then submerge.
Might I recommend a cayenne high colonic? (I think I might!)
Polly drink plenty of carbonated soda….seltzer or even diet ginger ale…the carbonation will help with dry or sore throat….especially in the middle of the night
No sugared soda.. that makes my mouth “sticky” and i don’t need the extra calories.
Get well soon polly. Keep us posted.
Good luck and I feel your pain. There is something really nasty making the rounds in DC this season (and no, I’m not refering to legislation ;).
I had it about a month ago. Not the flue, more like a really nasty, lingering cold but had exactly the same symptoms you described.
wishing you well
I already had the DC cold. That was around Labor Day. But it wasn’t lingering. It was nasty, but pretty darn short - no fever. I never get a fever with a cold. Never. My normal temp is closer to 97 than 98.6, especially in the morning. This one has a fever and that is what makes me think it is more likely mild flu. Plus very limited nasal involvment though that is picking up a little bit today.
Awww, sorry you’re sick, Polly! I missed that yesterday. Get well, soon!
Please get well soon, Polly.
Gargle with hydrogen peroxide throughout day. Good for throat/bacteria etc.
Honey/lemon hot water, throughout day.
Add 1 shot of cognac to ease muscle pain. If you can get it down.
Good luck.
Hydrogen peroxide will also whiten your teeth.
Doncha want to look mahvelous while recuperating!
Nah, just the cheapest, easiest ways to heal.
Take care.
Best wishes for a speedy recovery, Polly. and +1000000000 on drinking plenty of water.
Those rapid tests are worthless. They have a sensitivity rate of 50%, meaning they only pick up half of all H1N1 cases.
The vaccine for H1N1 still isn’t widely available, so there’s no way you could have avoided getting it, if that’s indeed what you have. Glad you’re on the mend!
Get well soon, polly.
Get Polly soon, well?
From the Politico: “On Tuesday, Matt Drudge ran a headline about the weakening U.S. dollar on his website, Drudgereport.com. In and of itself, that would be unremarkable, except that it was the 18th time Drudge had posted a link to a story about the weak dollar this month.” ““He’s fixated on it,” said Tom Rosenstiel, director of the Pew Research Center’s Project for Excellence in Journalism. “There’s no question that Drudge can alter what people are paying attention to.”
Gee, heaven forbid that someone is paying attention to the falling dollar. Someone needs to alter what people are paying attention to since the MSM just a government puppet.
And pay attention to Matt Sludge? Or how about the Drugster? Everyone knows how honest and forthright he is.
Riiiiiiight..
Matt doesn’t ‘do’ any of his own writing. He simply re-posts existing articles. ( Kind of like we do here ) It’s then up to us whether we award them any validity.
What!? Only Housing Bears like Peter Schiff can bemoan the freefall? It’s not like people aren’t talking about it. Do you ‘read’ Drudge?
Once again Exeter is shooting the messenger. You learn well from Obama.
I’m surprised anyone is paying attention to the dollar. Don’t they know there was a child in a balloon loose in Colorado???
What!.. Huh? where ?! When!? Wait a sec, are there any white chicks missing? lost children? Predators? Black dudes doing bad things? Huh? Where?! What!? When!? God this is all so confusing!
OK, snark off
It IS sad though that we have become a nation of spoon fed idiots.
become a nation of spoon fed idiots ??
Well, I don’t know about a nation but just try your radio going across a thousand miles of flyover land and see what diversity of opinions you get…
John Mauldin:
Tax Hikes Will Kill the ‘Recovery’, Which Isn’t Real Anyway.
Oct 21, 2009 Aaron Task ~ Newsmakers
The economic recovery currently underway is a statistical mirage, based on easy year-over-year comparisons and inventory rebuilding, John Mauldin, president of Millennium Wave Securities.
The unemployment rate is closer to 12% when you include people who’ve been dropped from the survey and the “underemployment” rate - people working part-time vs. full time - is 17% to 18%, “and rising,” Mauldin says. “That doesn’t feel like recovery.”
Mauldin, who writes the popular Thoughts from the Frontline e-letter, predicts the U.S. economy will be back in recession next year because of higher taxes, both new and with the expiration of the Bush tax cuts.
“The Obama administration [and] the Democrats aren’t going to be able to help themselves,” he says. “The deficits are going to be running so high they’ll feel - politically — the need to do something. The way they want to solve it — instead of cutting spending is to increase the revenue. That’s going to suck a lot of air out of the room.”
As for the long-term, Mauldin worries America could repeat Japan’s experience of a lost decade (or two), if not the Great Depression itself, citing the risk of policy errors such as trying to solve a debt crisis by issuing more debt.
Posted end of yesterdays Bits about Japan and its current Debt economy. Linked.
HOpe it showed up.
OOPSy
See below.
Cougar found it and got it posted w/o link. Thx.
To be very honest, cutting spending would suck a lot of air out the room too. Federal funding is propping up a LOT of regular state spending right now - road repairs, schools, law enforcement, etc. If you want to put the money where it will be spent rather than saved, then I have to go with the states over fairly wealthy human beings.
BINGO
Now another story on runaway debt and unrestrained spending……… in Japan.
Rising Debt a Threat to Japanese Economy
NYT
TOKYO — How much debt can an industrialized country carry before the nation’s economy and its currency bow, then break?
The question looms large in the United States, as a surging budget deficit pushes government debt to nearly 98 percent of the gross domestic product. But it looms even larger in Japan.
Here, years of stimulus spending on expensive dams and roads have inflated the country’s gross public debt to twice the size of its $5 trillion economy — by far the highest debt-to-G.D.P. ratio in recent memory.
Just paying the interest on its debt consumed a fifth of Japan’s budget for 2008, compared with debt payments that compose about a tenth of the United States budget.
Yet, the finance minister, Hirohisa Fujii, suggested Tuesday that the government would sell 50 trillion yen, about $550 billion, in new bonds — or more.
“There’s no mistaking the budget deficit stems from the past year’s global recession. Now is the time to be bold and issue more deficit bonds,” Mr. Fujii told reporters at the National Press Club in Tokyo. “Those who may call this pork-barrel spending — that’s a total lie.”
For jittery investors, Japan’s rising sea of debt is the stuff of nightmares: the possibility of an eventual sovereign debt crisis, where the country would be unable to pay some holders of its bonds, or a destabilizing collapse in the value of the yen.
Has the US reached the critical tipping point.
There have been 28 episodes of hyperinflation of national economies in the twentieth century, with 20 occurring after 1980. Peter Bernholz (Professor Emeritus of Economics in the Center for Economics and Business (WWZ) at the University of Basel, Switzerland) has spent his career examining the intertwined worlds of politics and economics with special attention given to money. In his most recent book, Monetary Regimes and Inflation: History, Economic and Political Relationships, Bernholz analyzes the 12 largest episodes of hyperinflations — all of which were caused by financing huge public budget deficits through money creation. His conclusion: the tipping point for hyperinflation occurs when the government’s deficit exceed 40% of its expenditures.
According to the current Office of Management and Budget (OMB) projections, US federal expenditures are projected to be $3.653 trillion in FY 2009 and $3.766 trillion in FY 2010, with unified deficits of $1.580 trillion and $1.502 trillion, respectively. These projections imply that the US will run deficits equal to 43.3% and 39.9% of expenditures in 2009 and 2010, respectively. To put it simply, roughly 40% of what our government is spending has to be borrowed.
One has to ask whether the US reached the critical tipping point. Beyond the quantitative measurements associated with government deficits and money creation, there exists a qualitative aspect to such a scenario that may be far more important. The qualitative perceptions of fiscal and monetary policies are impossible to control once confidence is lost. In fact, recent price action in metals, the dollar and commodities suggests that the market is already anticipating the future.
Interesting. And scary.
However…
Do Bernholz’s studies indicate whether the 40% tipping point generally is reached via a very quick ramp / spike (as ours is) vs. a slower ramping? One would think that that the latter would be worse, since the debt pile left behind it would be larger.
As a point of reference - our spending was well beyond 40% deficit during WW2, and even WW1. During WW2 at one point outlays were $92 billion with receipts of $44 billion, thus a deficit of $46 billion - just above 50% of expenditures. This was generally true for about a 3-year period. WW1 was even worse - deficits were about 70% of expenditures, though for only about a year.
That being said - in both of those cases we returned to surplus levels within 1-2 years. Current forecast is continued huge deficits.
Good question. I don’t have the answer as the excert above was a copy and paste from another article. More or less gave up on posting the URLs some time ago.
Something else to consider is that deficit spending may very well increase significantly given the various unfunded liabilities that are still to come. This could in essence be the slow ramping example you mentioned.
Another point - in none of those 28 cases was the currency that hyperinflated the world’s reserve currency.
We may go down, but if we do we’re taking the rest of the world with us.
I’m looking forward to the Treasury bringing back the $10,000 bill.
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/1009/28530.html
god forbid the american people start paying attention….we just can’t have that.
Great Slow Motion California Foreclosure Trainwreck continues.
Sign of incipient capitulation noted: The DataQuick people are starting to talk reality talk.
County’s foreclosures drop slightly
Homeowners are still in distress; defaults up
By Roger Showley
Union-Tribune Staff Writer
2:00 a.m. October 21, 2009
…
“There’s a batch of truly nasty loans that were made in mid-2006,” DataQuick President John Walsh said. “There’s another batch made in late 2006. These are worse than the month before and after, and it’s taking a long time to process them.”
DataQuick analyst Andrew LePage said that both statewide and in San Diego, the center of distress is moving from low-cost, subprime loans for inland locations to higher-cost, prime loans for coastal properties.
“That’s where the growth is,” LePage said. “They were at relatively low levels a year ago but are now seeing big increases. But the numbers are still pretty low.”
For example, six high-priced ZIP code areas reported increases of 36 percent to 140 percent in default notices compared with their average over the past year. But defaults were still unusual — 12 in Del Mar, eight in Coronado, 39 in Encinitas, 21 in Hillcrest, 34 in Carmel Valley and 26 in Mission and Pacific Beach.
“What concerns me is how much distress is stacking up out there that has not entered the foreclosure system at all,” LePage said.
The Mortgage Bankers Association reported in August that mortgage delinquencies were reaching all-time highs, dating back to 1972. The seasonally adjusted delinquency rate stood at 9.2 percent at the end of the second quarter, up 2.8 percentage points from mid-2008. Third-quarter numbers are expected next month.
…
Statewide, DataQuick reported third quarter foreclosures at 50,013, up 9.5 percent from the second quarter but down 37.1 percent from year-ago levels. Defaults stood at 111,689, down 10.3 percent from the second quarter and up 18.5 percent from the third quarter of 2008.
“The seasonally adjusted delinquency rate stood at 9.2 percent at the end of the second quarter, up 2.8 percentage points from mid-2008.”
Nearly one in ten.
That’s on a national level, of course. I presume the delinquency rate must be much higher than one in ten for places formerly known as “a bit frothy,” like California, Nevada, Arizona and Florida. Not to suggest this has anything to do with incipient shadow inventory or anything — I am sure the foreclosure crisis is contained, just as subprime was contained before it.
If you Google around a bit, you can probably locate Sprott’s article on the “visible hand” of the PPT…
My kneejerk response to this Cassandra-like article: Sounds like quantitative easing and a host of other extraordinary Fed interventions are here to stay for the foreseeable future.
Oct. 20, 2009, 12:25 p.m. EDT
Hedge manager Sprott sees trouble when easing ends
US government is new “dead man walking”, investor says
By Alistair Barr, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) - When so-called quantitative easing by central banks ends, the world economy may slip back into trouble, Canadian hedge fund manager Eric Sprott warned on Tuesday.
Toronto-based Sprott called Citigroup, Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, and General Motors “dead men walking” in late 2007. On Tuesday, he said the U.S. government is the new dead man walking, partly because it may struggle to keep borrowing enough money if the Federal Reserve stops buying Treasury bonds.
Sprott’s Canadian hedge fund, Sprott Hedge Fund LP, is up more than 400% since inception in 2000 as it rode a surge in gold prices and shares of gold miners and other raw materials companies.
Bank bailouts and other dramatic efforts by central banks have stopped the world “going into the abyss,” Sprott said during a presentation at the Value Investing Congress in New York.
The “granddaddy” of all those bailout efforts is quantitative easing, in which central banks in the U.S. and the U.K. especially buy government bonds to keep interest rates low, Sprott said.
The U.S. government has raised roughly 200% more by selling bonds this year, versus last year, Sprott noted. Through the end of the second quarter of 2009, he said the only major buyers of these government bonds were central banks.
“When quantitative easing ends, what’s going to happen?” he added, noting that there are already two clues to answer that question.
…
The only question that people will have is whether the US government can continue to pay the interest on the debt. If the dollar keeps devaluing, and interest rates remain so low on government debt, then at some point folks may stop lending to the US government. If they have to print money to pay more interest, thus devaluing the dollar further, well, that is the time when the politicians will get some fiscal discipline. But probably not before that.
Time to buy the dip?
Indications
Oct. 21, 2009, 9:10 a.m. EDT
U.S. stock futures point to second straight dip
Yahoo higher in wake of third-quarter results; Boeing weakens after outlook cut
By Steve Goldstein & Kate Gibson, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — U.S. stock futures on Wednesday pointed to a second straight day of declines, as a wave of earnings rolled in with an assessment of the economy from the Federal Reserve to come.
Moving off earlier lows, S&P 500 futures fell 4.7 points to 1,085.00 and Nasdaq 100 futures dipped 6.5 points to 1,751.75. Futures on the Dow Jones Industrial Average dipped 43 points.
U.S. stocks on Tuesday returned a portion of the prior day’s advance, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average moving down 51 points, the S&P 500 losing 7 points and the Nasdaq Composite sinking 13 points. Disappointing economic data offset mostly well-received earnings updates from the likes of Caterpillar and Apple.
“Markets are being pulled between generally better corporate results, and occasional disappointments on the macro economic data. This is not perhaps unexpected, if the economic profile resembles the Nike ’swoosh’ more than the classic V,” said Paul Donovan, senior economist at UBS.
…
I see green shoots!
England put a Crime Map online to boost citizens’ confidence in their police force by offering up statistics about crime in well defined areas.
“But today The Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors (RICS) warned that the ’sensational’ publication of crime data could seriously affect house prices.”
I guess it could if the property one owns is in a crime-ridden area. I’m not sure that’s a bad thing, though. Who am I trying to kid? Public safety? No one cares about that. Keep those home prices up!
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1221604/Online-crime-maps-wipe-thousands-house-prices-overnight.html
“…problem…” Crime problem.
(now waiting for the minute roll by to post the correction)
La de da de, la de da, la de da de DA, da-da-da-da, la de da de la de da, dadadadadaddaa, dumdum.
Down here in sunny Wilmington, Delaware, an auction is planned this Saturday to dispose of previously unsold condo/townhouses. Per the site (www dot maxspann dot com):
Minimum Bids From $85,000-$190,000
Previous Asking Up To $644,000-$1,100,000
This is in a brand new artificial “community” in what is basically an industrial area surrounded by ghetto neighborhoods. Hurry, they won’t last!
That link won’t open for me,
however it doesn’t surprise me that condos are unsold in Wilmington. I always wondered how the folks right up the road in Greenville feel secure, with the hood a leisurely 2 mile bike ride away.
It’s not so much that I wouldn’t feel secure there, but if you’re going to buy a condo and be in a city, I feel you should be able go through most of your routine life without needing a car. This is in the Riverfront development, and there are restaurants, a few boutiques, and a stadium there, but for more mundane stuff like groceries, schools, libraries, the post office, you have to drive. It’s actually only about a mile from downtown, so in principle you could walk to work, but the walk would take you under the train tracks, across a busy boulevard, and through a marginal neighborhood, so I doubt many people do it.
Is it where Harry’s Savoy’s (seafood) is located?
My friend’s daughter got robbed at gunpoint when she was closing Timothy’s. The perp blackjacked her and locked her in the cooler.
So…it’s not a secure neighborhood, with the added attraction that it’s not convenient to downtown, where all the jobs are. I predict the condo auction will result in no sales AND a few unlucky pre-construction buyers demanding their deposit back.
So much for attempting to make Wilmington a destination city.
Those aren’t ghetto neighborhoods. The correct REIC term is “pre-gentrification.” Suzanne said so.
Living in the ghost town of a bankrupt developer:
http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/chicago/chi-kirk-homes-zone-21-oct21,0,5516746.story
My favorite line: “It’s a eyesore,” said Sargeant, a technology consultant who bought his four-bedroom house on Braeburn Way for $425,000 in December 2006. His home was recently appraised at $315,000, but he has no illusions of being able to sell any time soon. “We’re here for the rest of our lives,” he said, laughing.
Steve W,
LOL! Yeah well “I” grew up playing on a bulldozer and I turned out ‘alright’? Mostly..?
Bollingbrook is next to Lemont isn’t it? IIRC that’s primarily a lower area and kind of swampy, no? Sorry to hear that. Another example of some of the best farmland on the globe turned over for REIC-bucks.
ehh, it’s a bit northwest of lemont, other side of the river, not really too swampy. But the farmland was good there. I remember driving out as a kid to that area (we had friends who bought in one of the newer subdivsions out there) and some of the roads were still gravel. not anymore.
LOL! Yeah well “I” grew up playing on a bulldozer and I turned out ‘alright’? Mostly..?
Offhandedly?
With that response, you don’t have a leg to stand on.
DD,
This is a true story, but since my brother passed away last summer ( sworn to secrecy ) it died w/ him.
When we were about 6 & 8 we were “playing” in a new construction site. There was this dozer and Tommy somehow released the parking brake and uh… it began to ROLL! ( In truth.., we were trying to start it )
So it begins to pick up momentum.., and MORE momentum! I was crying my eyes out pleading w/ him to “just jump!” So he finally musters the courage and lands softly in a loose pile of dirt and… the bulldozer..? Not so fortunate. It finds it’s way into the newly poured foundation of a home and… catches fire!
Yes, now, as a conservative, I’ve had more FUN in my life than every lib. on this blog ( and others… put -together- ! ) Just another day. Miss ya’ kid.
Kids are not libs nor conservative. They are just kids.
Glad you were safe then. Sorry your brother is gone.
Must have been close in age? That seems to be when kids are best friends. 5+ not so much. Who are you horning in on my territory?
Got a couple of those kid stories that adults worry about!
DD,
Thanks, actually we were quite close up until the last few years. Mom says it was alcohol but I’m pretty sure it was drugs. In the end, does it matter?
Still I wonder, most people that were the toast of the town during the 80’s doing blow etc. didn’t start by “huffing” paint. It’s only when their resources dry up that they resort to household cleansers etc.
So when someone that did pot in the 60’s, smack in the 70’s, blow in the 80’s and meth in the 90’s finally can only afford MD 20-20 do we say they “died from alcohol”? I know the pro-legalization crowd loves to characterize things that way.
I still blame a lot of this country’s problems on 70s disco and cocaine.
I believe now it’s gangsta rap, death metal and meth.
’Ive posed this before and never got an answer: if everyone saw all of this “collapse” coming, why didn’t you become rich beyond your wildest dreams from it? You could have had 1000X ROI had you simply bought options on banks and mortgage companies.
This remark was posted late yesterday by a new HBBer, Eddie. I thought it would be interesting to re-post it here for comments.
Speaking for myself, Eddie, I did benefit greatly by seeing the collapse coming. I didn’t do any cash-out refinancing, but sold a house in a flood zone that I never should have bought in the first place, took all of the “equity”, and put it in a house that we intend to live in until we die. I took our considerable retirement savings out of stocks in early 2007 when the Dow was 1350, thus avoiding the losses that most others sustained. I bought “dream” purchases like a grand piano from foreclosure victims at firesale prices. I bought individual stocks last Dec and this March at what I hope will be lows. I just bought a used car for a low price from some guys who re-sell repossessed autos. I don’t understanding shorting or options, so didn’t do it, but I enjoyed reading posts by HBBers like Hoz and TxChick, who reported making good money.
Thanks to the Ben’s Housing Bubble Blog, I kept my sanity by finding like-minded others, and have achieved financial security.
Because not all of us were in a position to do so. Some of us were moving around, going to undergrad or grad school, etc … and we were watching from the sidelines. You can’t sell a house and cash out if you don’t already have a house bought on the cheap to begin with. All we could do was try to save and do the best we could.
Very sad … sitting on the sidelines, watching the mess, and at least thankfully we didn’t fall for it, or that we were too young to have gotten involved …
“if everyone saw all of this “collapse” coming, why didn’t you become rich beyond your wildest dreams from it?”
simple…i had no balls eddie…i had no balls.
RE Hobbyist,
Thanks for reviving that. I’d have to say I fell somewhere in between by playing the stock mkt. more or less on the defensive and selling our house and renting in ‘04.
But of late I’ve come to the opinion that there really won’t be any “winners” here, no matter how well you played it. This has become the NAR’s wet dream. Anyone recall all those RE-bull “careful what you wish for!” posts? Well, it’s more or less come to fruition.
What’s worse is that, there are no brownie points for not getting over extended. The REIC’sters are -still- calling the shots and trust me, they’re actively hoping we take it in the shorts every bit as hard as they have. The long, sad faces in our little OR town have turned meaner and more scary w/ each passing day. They have it ‘in’ for us, don’t kid yourself.
I did not make a killing, but I got completely out of real estate in 2005 and avoided what would have been a brutal shellacking. Also got 70% of my retirement savings out of stocks in 2007, but was not quick enough to go back in this spring when things turned around.
The bubbles always take to long to burst, and the bear market rallies always happen too early and too quickly for a deliberate person to take advantage.
There were active traders on this board who did make money.
(You’d have to go back into the archives to read the threads.)
“simple…i had no balls eddie…i had no balls.”
And neither does EddieTard.
Ouch that hurts man. You called me a name that uses my name and implies I’m a retard. Wow, did you think that up all by yourself or did you need your pals at Kos to help you? As usual you avoid the issue at hand and go for the non sequiter. Typical.
Oh and you smell funny too.
actually i take it back:
- i convinced my wife to sale the condo and rent…paid 175k…sold it for 350k.
- i didn’t put that money in the stock market when the dow was at 13k.
- and the houses in the neighborhood we want to buy have decreased by up to 200k.
so from that perspective i guess i made money by just not losing it.
That’s great to hear. And that’s exactly the attitude that everyone should have. If you’re as sure of what’s coming as people here seem to be, and were, there’s tremendous opportunity for profit. What I don’t get is the moaning about banks this, and pigmen that. If you know it’s happening, profit with them.
I sold my house close to the peak as well. Missed the absolute peak by about 6 months for my neck of the woods. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that when my house more doubled in value in less than 2 years something wasn’t quite right. I, like you also got out of stocks in 2007, May and June. And I bet the other way with options on all sorts of financials, GM, Harley Davidson and retailers. A recession was inevitable. It came, I made money. I was happy.
But the difference between me and the HBB crew is that I see the recession as your garden variety recession. It happened, people suffered, politicians vowed to do something, as usual they only make things worse but look good in the photo op while wasting trillions. But as all recessions do, this one has ended. And my investments are almost a mirror opposite of what they were in 2007/2008. Instead of shorting financials and retailers, I’m long both of them including some long term calls that have done exceptionally well the last 2-3 months.
As for real estate, it’s home buying time for me. I haven’t yet only because my wife and I have not had time. We’re looking to move to Tampa and we just don’t have the time right now to do a solid search of homes. Maybe in December I’ll be able to take some time. It’s this darn depression that’s keeping my business so busy as to not be able to take 2 weeks off. We could go there for a week again and look at a few houses, but I can’t just spur pf the moment buy like that. My last house took about 3 months of searching before finding the right one.
As for renting, I posted what I found back a couple of months ago. To rent anything decent in Tampa is $2500 to $3000. To buy something decent is $500-600K. Do the math and you’ll see renting is marginally cheaper per month. But throw in the tax deduction and it’s a toss up. I’m not trying to convince anyone to go out and buy 12 houses. I’m telling you my opinion which I know will be disagreed with by one and all here.
Well enough droning on….back to work.
Eddie,
I suppose I can agree w/ you on all but the “I was happy” part. You’re totally discounting the horrific price we’ve paid on “profits” that are now denominated in an ever shrinking dollar.
And… ever shrinking job opportunities for our kids. Most here never shorted the market w/ glee ( we were trading out of defensive postures ) Simply things that had to be done. “I” certainly took no pleasure in it. Look where we are now! You can’t just ‘discount’ that so casually.
Eddie, I can’t believe that you think we are in another “garden variety recession” and couldn’t disagree more.
Sounds like you are well off financially and can afford the house price decreases to come in the next two years.
Time will tell if you are right to have gone back into stocks, but I think that you are wrong.
“To rent anything decent in Tampa is $2500 to $3000.”
Uh…
BTW, maybe you have a specific reason for Tampa, but a waterfront 3/2/2 +pool/dock in Harbor Bluffs recently rented for $1,500/mo.
I’ve seen what $1500 gets you in a 3/2/2 in that area. To me that is not even in the ballpark of decent.
I benefitted, and I have made it clear to Ben that beers are on me for life. Partly because of what I learned here, I sold a piece of property that I loved dearly, but never used for nine times what I paid in 1998.
“I benefited, and I have made it clear to Ben that beers are on me for life.”
I hear Cassandra, beers for Mr. Ben…is there one that goes with the “cool weather” in the Flag? say… mid-Jan
Got to find one with a high enough alcohol content that it doesn’t freeze when consumed outdoors.
Keeping Mr. Jones in beers is a tough job, but someone has to step up and do it.
Mr. Jones, call or email if you want to get together, you know the number.
’Ive posed this before and never got an answer: if everyone saw all of this “collapse” coming, why didn’t you become rich beyond your wildest dreams from it? You could have had 1000X ROI had you simply bought options on banks and mortgage companies.
Just because you’re pretty sure the Colts will beat the Rams this weekend, doesn’t mean you should bet your life savings on it.
There’s “put your money where your mouth is”, and there’s stupid. Trying to get 1000X ROI is just stupid, regardless of how sure a thing anything is.
packman,
Right, and unlike what the ScottTrade commercials would have us believe ( and I can’t believe someone hasn’t put together a “Best Of” online gambling… ( trading! ) TV spots yet? ) primarily, we trade to mitigate risk!
NOT generate profits! More of us would have done a LOT better had Schiller rolled out his CBOE-traded Housing Futures a little sooner. If you’ll recall, initially it looked like they’d die on the vine. There was only one-side to the trade. SHORT!
Not really. A well placed bet can return 1000X. Had you bought $5 puts puts on CFC in 2005 you could have made 1000X your money. Buy $1K become a millionaire. Worst that happens is you lose $1K.
And you can’t compare the two. If the Rams and Colts play 10 times, one team will win 6 or 7 times. The odds of one team winning all 10 times is astronomical. But the odds in 2005 that by 2007 CFC would be in the crapper was about as sure a bet as they come.
Since it’s so obvious and easy, may we assume that you are extremely wealthy? And yet you still work, don’t you? Why is that?
I did very well with the crash but not 1000ROI. Problem with seeing the crash comming was I couldn’t time it well enough to make a mint.
There are always crazy Fed/Gov interventions to “save” things. Or at least really much up your timing. Like announcing rate reductions on option experation dates.
Pretty depressing at points because you look at the situation and really powerful moves can whipe you out.
So, I’m short the market and made a killing; then I go to cash and sit while the market recovers 50%. Sigh.
Why is the market recovering so fast? Oh, probably a lot of the free money from the Fed going to the hedge funders. Good bit of capital returning from overseas. Just general liquidity sloshing around. More people gambling in the market with increasing desperation and nothing to lose. All that together.
You can look at a lot of metrics and see the market is largely over priced again. What to do though?
Again, looking at this from that monetarist viewpoint. It’s inflation or deflation occuring. Hardly see any productivity gain relative to inflation. When does this run out of steam? Pretty soon I’d guess. Not sure of the timing enough to do options. Would guess the WH and congress are feeling a lot of pain for engaging in bailout of the rich. Probably can keep at it for a while because the republicans don’t offer an alternative. Would imagine some more moderate candidate offering encorporating Ron Paul’s anti-Fed rhetoric might rise up.
My guess is the dems lose the congress in the next four years. The senate in 6 years. Not that I care here. Perhaps a stronger blue dog type congress is in the future.
Again, there will be inflationary and deflationary effects going on that will be confusing. Worry about bad structural decisions from the democrats.
Overall, things are a big mess for the country on almost all fronts. Personal, business, ethics, morals, monitary.
The longer the bad banks get supported the slower/weaker the recovery will be as they leach life out of everything else.
I agree in part with you. But you’re missing the big pictiure. You’re stuck on the same theme that you don’t agree with what’s happening so you won’t participate. I’ve said this numerous times. All things being equal I would prefer no govt intervention in the economy. But that is a pipe dream. The govt will spend, spend, and spend some more. All that money has to go somewhere. And for the time being it is going to stocks. Your choice as an investor is to go along for the ride or sit in a money market accounbt earning 0.75% while the stock market goes up 75%.
Business and investing should never involve emotion. One of my business partners is about as liberal as one can get. He is everything I am not politically. I was once asked by another friend how can I work with him so closely when I disagree with everything he stands for. The answer was simple. Money is apolitical. I’d work hand in hand with Barrack himself if it meant a profit for me. I have also seen this in the defense industry, guys who make millions selling things that go boom to the DoD and then donate money to greenpeace.
you don’t agree with what’s happening so you won’t participate.
I don’t agree. lol. Nah, it is just where, when, and how much.
I think alot of folks don’t agree with how/why the recession is where it is. But one has to be smarter than reactionary and just jump in willy nilly anywhere just for the sake of hoping your guess is as good as the ‘guys’ that that more money to waste/spend.
Sold my house in 2006 for 100% profit
Started renting
Houses in the neighborhood where I started renting have fallen at least 20-25%.
I moved out of stocks almost completely. So I lost no money.
So in a deflationary environment I made out like a bandit at least until May/June. Then I have to admit I got burned a bit by the green shoots, 10% in trading account 2% over all. I have most of my money in cash CD’s TIPS and more recently treasuries. Housing will continue to slide and sometime in the next year or two I’ll buy a house for cash and insulate it and put solar on it so that I have very few costs when inflation hits.
Not too many people go all in when the future of the market is so manipulated. Even when people were certain things were going to crash you can’t discount the printing press and the ability to prop up markets. I suspect most here are in much better financial shape then their msm following friends.
I didn’t profit (nor lose) one cent as I’m still recovering from having lost everything in the last tech crash.
ITEM: The debt is now nearly $12 trillion and is expected to grow by $9 trillion over the next decade. A renewed push for a legislative remedy comes just after the deficit reached a record high, $1.4 trillion for fiscal 2009. The previous deficit record was $455 billion in 2008.
~ Annual deficit of nearly a trillion a year for the next 9 years? Can’t happen. The U.S. must default on its debt long before 2018. It probably will do it by stepping up “money” creation to such a level that the dollar will become worth a fraction of a cent, Zimbabwe style, thereby ruining holders of U.S. securities.
However, the rules must be changed in order for the Fed’l Reserve to inflate at that level, so hyperinflation may not be the method government uses to wipe out federal debt after all.
However, the rules must be changed in order for the Fed’l Reserve to inflate at that level, so hyperinflation may not be the method government uses to wipe out federal debt after all.
Well, that’s a loaded comment. Can you elaborate? What rules need to be changed and why do you think they won’t be? Are you seriously implying that debt repudiation is in the cards?
Frontline or pbs THE WARNING.
Story of the “armageddon” as told to Greenie etc earlier than 97.
Lots of rules. Any rules. Any at all. But the ptb do not want rules. They want wild open prairies to run rampant at will. To hell with civilization as long as they get theirs.
DD,
I’m thinking…, wrong!? Look back to the Mutual Fund Scandals of 2003. The PTB certainly didn’t seem to have any problems or qualms breaking it off in ‘their’ @zz?
That’s b/c fund mgmt. companies have a specific charter. They have a prospectus they have to live by w/ clearly stated objectives.
Hedge Funds otoh, operate without ANY scrutiny! It’s not that the Gov. doesn’t -want- to see these guys on a leash, it’s just that every time they get within striking distance, they morph into something else?
Just like the REIC is currently re-inventing itself on a daily basis without so much as a furled eyebrow. Loan peddlers jumped on the ‘modification’ bandwagon just as regulators were closing in on them. “Oh you can’t go after me for ‘that’, I’m not a mortgage broker any more! Ha HA!”
That’s b/c fund mgmt. companies have a specific charter. They have a prospectus they have to live by w/ clearly stated objectives.
Really? And those can’t change either, OR they can’t be obviated into something else?
Really? wrong? really?
Maybe you will want to review the Warning.
Saw it in real time too years ago.
DD<
Yes, wrong, really. If there’s to be a “change” in the prospectus many times shareholder approval may be required. At times funds may be “rolled into” other funds if there is duplication or an acquisition but -nothing- along the scale of what HF’s pull off on a daily basis.
Post Tech-Wreck a lot of ‘hot’ tech funds were simply shut down, there just wasn’t enough $’s for them to even make sense. Shareholders were simply given cash based on the number of shares when they pulled the plug.
The point is, because… they have a charter and clear objectives, they’re much easier to regulate. Personally, I’d hoped the regulators would have drove a stake thru the heart of this whole HF matter NLTN ‘04.
Less than 10 years ago the debt was only $5.7 Trillion - less than half the current debt. I would imagine that anyone guessing back then that if the projected debt was $12T by 2009, that they would have made the same statement - that there’s now way we could do that - that we’dl repudiate and/or hyperinflate first before we could possibly get to $12T.
Yet here we are.
Somehow there was enough liquidity floating around there in the system to allow that extra $6.3T of debt to be soaked up by investors, without crashing the stock markets, which are exactly where they were 10 years ago (at least in the U.S. anyhow). While much of that $6.3T has come from overseas, the majority has been domestic.
My questions are these:
A. How did this happen? Was there really $6.3T of cash out there? Or if not where did this come from? Did this largely come from home equity perhaps? Money markets? Pensions? Social Security? I’d be curious to see info on what investment areas have seen significant shifts from X into U.S. treasuries, though I’m sure such information isn’t collected in any one place, such that it’s publicly available at least.
B. How much additional money is out there? Might it actually be $9 Trillion? Just $5 Trillion? Just $1 Trillion?
(I mean outside of newly-created Fed money)
Here’s a beautiful visual. Enjoy.
http://tinyurl.com/yj34jph
Here’s a beautiful visual. Enjoy.
http://tinyurl.com/yj34jph
I notice that conveniently leaves off 2009.
FWIW though - I’ve many times pointed out to people the fallacy of Republican fiscal conservativeness.
Also FWIW
- Our budget is determined more by Congress than the president.
- There’s a lag of several years between the effects of government spending/taxation and the economy.
- The economy determines the governments surplus/deficit more than the other way around.
Another Thanksgiving dinner visual for the “TrueDeceiver’s™”
not sure what the exact answer is but it’s got something to do with cheap labor overseas and lots and lots of big guns and boats with even bigger guns.
Quadrillion will be the new trillion! But fortunately the U.S. of A. is too big too fail. Right?
wmbz,
My guess is there are roughly 200 million adult Americans. $20 Trillion is $100,000 worth of debt/adult American. $100,000 @ 3.5% interest is $3500/year in interest payments per year forever.
IIRC, average income in the USA is $39K/year. So, if every adult American made the average income, the debt payment would be less than 10% of gross income. Obviously every American doesn’t even have a job, so the situation is worse.
I think the situation is potentially sustainable. Moderate inflation directed especially at wages would resolve the issue. I just don’t see that this level of debt accumulation would necessarily cause Zimbabwe style inflation or a massive devaluation of the dollar.
RE guy yesterday (from romania)at the foreclosure condo on leased land with high HOA, said that all people not on unemployment became self employed. That is why the UE rate is really lower. He said.
I swear, where do these people get their information?
Exactly right Jon. It’s easy to get hysterical when big numbers are used. Did you know that there are billions of germs on your desk at any one time? OMG, quick to the store to buy a gross of disinfectant wipes before one of those little buggers gives you the flu!!
Same with the debt. 10 trillion is a lot without context. Broken down per capita, it’s a Honda Accord. Not exactly the end of the world.
Same with the debt. 10 trillion is a lot without context. Broken down per capita, it’s a Honda Accord. Not exactly the end of the world.
Do you have any kids? If so - can they afford a new Accord - each? Mine can’t.
BTW - are Accords going for $40K these days?
Yes it is a big deal.
“People who play by the rules, stay in school, refuse to take drugs, marry before having children and stay married, are no longer considered worthy role models by government, which has no intention of making them the norm. These norms have disappeared in a cloud of diversity and political correctness. Government now proposes to transform health insurance and tax responsible citizens at increased rates to pay for the votes, uh, benefits of others who are more content to take slices of other people’s pies rather than learn to bake their own.”
~ Cal Thomas
The problem with Cal’s agenda driven opinion is that the votes tallied the way they did because there is a demand that something be done about the insurance company crime syndicate.
Cal is entitled to his ideological dripping opinons but not his own facts.
the government crime syndicate will be much better.
“The problem with Cal’s agenda driven opinion is that the votes tallied the way they did because there is a demand that something be done about the insurance company crime syndicate.”
Actually, the problem with your analysis, exeter, is that the votes tallied the way they did because of the massive opportunities for GRAFT, FRAUD, WASTE, AND CORRUPTION that the Democrats are divvying up. The entire “healthcare debate” is nothing more than robbing the taxpayer at gunpoint while politicians mouth meaningless slogans and phrases that charm and calm the unsuspecting and inexperienced.
Everything the criminal ObamaNation administration has forced or is trying to force down this country’s throat is to make a select few richer and more powerful at taxpayer expense. Absolutely NOTHING represents a long term benefit of any type for “the little guy”.
It will take about 12.8 trillion years for anyone to clean up the mess the psychopath mobster Obama and the Democrats leave behind.
Sorry but the votes tallied….. apparently not in your favor as evidence by your deluded rant. The people spoke.
And the people will speak again.
People want a public option and the insurance corps are all about NOT ins. Just money, skroo people. Who needs em after they collect the premiums which continue to go uP.
Bottom line Cobalt
Private insurance strips 22-24 cents on the dollar for administartion
Medicare is well under 10 cents
Just take a look at the privately managed medicare accounts they provide a similar benefit as medicare but charge the gov much more for it.
Socialized medicine around the globe costs 40-50% less than US privatized system and delivers similar to supperior results.
With your privatized system it is actually easier for politicians to steal from you. They do the bidding of the wealthy health care executives who make massive profits, these companies are not subject to freedom of information press investigations. The health care companies then send politicans massive amounts of “campaign contributions” and take them on junkets.
+1 exeter
Oh yes, holy Cal! Your uncle Jesus would surely be against health care for everyone. He was so judgemental that way- didn’t want any pie-sharing going on. (Seriously, do ‘Christians’ even read the bible anymore?)
Yes. Some of us do.
jesus would borrow/steal money from tyrannical rulers who generated the savings from the toil of slave laborers to support his insatiable addiction to debt and wonton lifestyle and provide long-term health care for his fat, diabetic sloth lifestyle.
that’s exactly what jesus says to do in the bible.
I’m not familiar w/ Cal Thomas but there was no mention of religion at all in the excerpt. How did that even come up? Just the mere mention of marriage? O.K, it’s common-law.
I don’t know if some of you realize this but.., the first, last and -only- thing that drew us all together in the 1st. place was a shared hatred of the Housing Boom. Now that it’s been well established ( there is -indeed- a Housing Bubble ) it’s as if the liberal factions here need a “new enemy” and have turned in a pretty ugly way on the few remaining conservatives that still post here.
You’ve managed to run most off and… I have my days? If one-sided liberal knee jerk responses are going to be the only ones being given any credibility whatsoever, then what’s the point? Just curious.
In other words, you guys can “stop campaigning” too now.
No one is campaigning, cept you? Just defending and asking for clarifications.
i think it all started going downhill when we ran out of lucky lager.
; )
liberal factions here need a “new enemy”
naw, it is still the demonizing from the cons against workers, libs, generalized to illegals etc that gets hackles up.
So, unless and until we can all not slam -w/o sounding like it is coming straight from faux noise, but actual experience or real research, then don’t discount the venom from the cons, which you are ignoring cause you agree.
No one has run anyone off, except you guys again aladinsane etc. I think people are just busy working or trying to make ends meet.
DD,
Well I work/blog at the same time ( to keep from nodding off ) but ALL… during the run-UP of The Boom, folks here of all stripes referred to ‘workers’ as FB’s. Or Fooked Borrowers.
It wasn’t until BO took the lead in the polls they became ‘workers’. Previously we were all concerned about them abusing their Buying POWER w/ funny money loans and 40 yr. mortgages and over-sized MEW lifestyles but now that there’s been a change in parties all of a sudden everyone is going to rush to the ‘worker’s’ side!? Sorry, not buying it.
And over the last few months I’ve had ( personally ) several last ditch “You know.., I just don’t recall ‘that’?” defenses so everyone ( and I DO mean everyone ) please, just spare me! Really guys, it’s gotten sickening.
DinOR-
“Workers of the World Unite!”
Qwicherbichin’ and fall in line, boi…
Today we all get fitted for our Mao jammies. The bad news is they’re all the same style.
The good news: we get our choice of colors -
Black, or Dark Black.
If you’re not familiar with Cal Thomas, google him. He’s a classic right-wing bible thumper, the type who can read the sermon on the mount and think it calls for tax breaks for the rich.
the type who can read the sermon on the mount and think it calls for tax breaks for the rich.
Haha! Nice.
..Plus he has scary eyebrows and the debauched and weary face of a lesser Roman senator who is overly fond of goats.
I expect some deeply sordid and super unseemly secret to come out about ol’ Cal one of these days, and I just can’t wait.
You know it Olygal, you know it.
Who the heck have I run off? Sorry if I interfere in the dissemination of the right-wing talking point faux scandal of the day by bringing an opposing viewpoint to the echo chamber.
Am I picking on the few remaining right wingers? They don’t seem like an endangered species around here to me. I find it hard to get a word in edgewise.
It is pretty hard for you to admit there might be some moral hazzard in your health care love fest.
Honestly, not sure where I’m at with education and healthcare.
I think there should be reform and regulatory changes. Also like better cost controls in place. Not sure how to make education more available. Both parties have been on the inflationary bandwagon aka more student loans causing the costs to run away.
Not sure why you guys are so happy with O and the liberals in congress either. At this point you should start to be kind of disapointed. I am. There was a push for credit card reform; what happend is they allowed banks to raise rates on existing balances till the end of this year and for those rates to stay elevated. Nice.
What about the Iraq situation? Lots of promise on what was going to be done but if the troop surge and situation had not improved on it’s own, didn’t look like anyone was going to leave.
Afganistan… a mess with no plan to go forward.
Iran… playing games with these guys will not go well
NK… see above
Taxes… oh, Obama followed in bushes footprints.
Natural disaster response: Does Obama have any idea that Samoa is part of the US? What would have happened if we’d had another Katrina?
Wondering if any of the stimulis money that “had to be spent” went into anything that would help with long term economic competativeness?
Maybe it is all hopeless anyhow. Perhaps like most empires we are collapsing under our own weight and heading down the historical flusher.
I’m pretty disapointed all over with this admin. You guys… oh, keep trumpeting that he isn’t bush. Like that does any of us a lick of good.
I used to be a conservative. Then I found out GW Bush is a conservative. So I can’t possibly be a conservative. I’m pretty sure I’m not a liberal. I’m certainly not for the government paying health insurance companies tax dollars to cover poor people. Just not sure where I fit in any more.
certainly not for the government paying health insurance companies tax dollars to cover poor people. Just not sure where I fit in any more.
BINGO
private vs public debate is nice but this crap of the gov giving private insurers money to cover the poor or to manage medicare is outright theft.
Nice to see that former vice president of the Moral Majority has not lost his touch.
Wow…. VP of the moron minority? Good info. What a creepy clan they are.
LOL. Moral Majority == Hitler followers
“The stock market has never been this overbought.”
~John Hussman
+1000
What about in early 2000? Or the last peak before financial Armageddon in Fall 2008? Or just before the Great Crash in 1929?
I don’t get his point…
Nor do I. Sound-bite?
Hussman has a VERY short memory. Many tech stocks were trading with a P/E in excess of 400 just before the tech bubble burst.
Hussman has a VERY short memory. Many tech stocks were trading with a P/E in excess of 400 just before the tech bubble burst.
A. Who cares about a few select stocks. The market as a whole had a P/E of 43 then.
B. P/E is way overutilized as a measure of market fundamentals. Currently P/E is only 18. By that measure the market is extremely cheap now. Problem isn’t that prices are high - the problem is earnings are very low, and they’re expected to stay there for a long time.
A better measure is price/revenue. I’m not sure if that’s posted anywhere though.
A. Who cares about a few select stocks. The market as a whole had a P/E of 43 then.
P.S. Don’t get me wrong - 43 was still a huge bubble - by far the highest P/E the market has ever been in fact, including in 1929 when it peaked at 32.
A better measure is price/revenue. I’m not sure if that’s posted anywhere though.
This too can be greatly inflated by borrowing large sums of money to prop up a failing business. Debt has to be accounted for.
This too can be greatly inflated by borrowing large sums of money to prop up a failing business. Debt has to be accounted for.
Agree. Though it’s not as volatile as earnings.
Earnings for instance went from 85 -> 7 (yes, 7) over the last couple of years. As a result, short-term P/E ratio went from 17 -> 123. So short-term earnings movements, as well as P/E, are quite irrelevant with regards to stock fundamentals. Revenue is a better measure, though long-term P/E (what I quote above as being 43 in 1999) is at least better than short-term P/E.
(This is all from Shiller’s stock analysis data)
When, as, and if, the Fed ever decides to return from full blast printing and counting worthless loans as assets, it may encounter a few problems -
Monday’s Reverse Repo Test?
Gee, who could have seen this coming?
On Monday the Federal Reserve held a major reverse repo test, as was announced by the NY Fed. We have subsequently received several unconfirmed reports that the conducted test has been a disaster (we have calls into the Federal Reserve to confirm or deny this, we are eagerly awaiting their reply).
How do you do a reverse repo when there’s no cash to tender?
Bottom line: JP Morgan/Chase appears to have only $21 billion in actual cash. Their “Cash” position as stated on various publications and sources includes deposits with banks and fed funds -that is, cash “equivalents” that are not actual money in their possession.
That, of course, doesn’t count when The Fed wants to drain liquidity and needs to drain actual cash.
It also belies a bigger question - what is the true leverage ratio of JP Morgan/Chase, if their actual cash is only $21 billion? Oh, that’s kind of an ugly question, especially with some $700 billion in debt outstanding….
Are people really this dumb over at The Fed?
It appears so, and begs the question - how big of a disaster are we about to undergo?
(From K. Denninger)
LINK?
On-demand free view of Frontline’s Warning is on PBS.org.
AG, Larry Summers, Tim G, R. Rubin where the key supporters of an unregulated Derivatives in late 1990s and ran Brooksley Born out of town as she tried to reign in and regulate the market. Much started, gained momentum in the Clinton administration and interesting that Hillary and Born were close colleagues. So like Faster and Kissinger say, you never really have any alliances or friends, you only have aligned interests and when interests no longer align, so long relationship.
There were a few photos of AG, Larry Summers going after Born during Senate hearings. What gastly little people. This is our leadership.
Born was asked why she was blowing the whistle in 1998 on unregulated Derivative market. She said she was trying to protect the taxpayer’s money. That she was able to cut to the chase way back then and see the final outcome once all fell was impressive.
Born does not believe we have learned our lesson and the boom, bust, bailout cycle will continue.
“…the boom, bust, bailout cycle will continue.”
And Megabank, Inc will continue to play ‘heads we win, tails you lose’ capitalism, collecting taxpayer-financed bailout insurance claims payments at every bust turn of the cycle.
Right. So knowing that, what is the best positioning?
bent over, grabbing your ankles…
Thanks ‘Donknow..’. It made me so po’d that those creeps were such creeps to Brooks Born whose answer was incredible and forthright.
‘why are you telling us this’. To Protect the taxpayers money.
I just want to biyotch slap those creeps.
The fed took away all power from the offices she ran, and to this day, there is no power within that office to set up rules, guidelines, or punish those who are doing the wrongs.
Business as usual. Damned are those who try to stop them.
And then Greenspan couldn’t even answer honestly that he was wrong. He danced around with a smoke/mirrors answer in front of a camera.
Yep, watched that Frontline last night and while it wasn’t really any new information it still made my blood boil.
And here we are, deja-vu all over again.
It really makes you ask, are the guys in charge REALLY that stupid or is this all totally deliberate, a’ la ‘Disaster Capitalism’, SPECIFICALLY engineered and intended to wreak the american economy and send us all to serfdom?
And the REALLY painfull irony of all this is that I make these statements from my own (admittedly) far left viewpoint! Never thought I would find myself agreeing with ANYTHING the wingnuts on the right would say.
Serfdom
It’s all about concentrating the wealth, they don’t care how big the pie is they care about how big their slice of the pie is. The bigger your slice the more you control the game.
Exactly, measton, and it’s a tale as old as mankind.
Don’t you feel like we are repeating history all oer again. Take a look at the late 1800s to the turn of the 20th century. Wealth was concentrated, monopolies were rampant, money bought access to our congress critters, Supreme Court ruled in favor of big business. Kind of sound like what’s happening now.
No, impossible! That was back when we had free markets, no regulation, and no gov bail-outs. Everything was perfect then, because the unrestricted market made it so! Maybe someday we can relive this perfect time.
“It really makes you ask, are the guys in charge REALLY that stupid or is this all totally deliberate”
Don’t explain by malice that which can be explained by stupidity. Yes, the guys in charge are really flying by the seat of their pants.
Don’t explain by malice that which can be explained by stupidity. Yes, the guys in charge are really flying by the seat of their pants.
I see differences at four different levels:
1. At a long-term strategic level, they’re malicious, in that they have created an engineered economy based on influence of government and central entities like the Federal Reserve. This is working fairly well. Not stupid, just malicious.
2. At the medium-term strategic - it appears this latest bubble they’ve engineered got way out of hand. The PTB are experiencing significant backlash, that may set them back some w/regards to point 1. This was stupidity.
3. At a very short term tactical level - they’re milking this crisis for all its worth - using the TARP to prevent the stupid entities (see point 2) from failing, and providing for huge bonuses at the same time, etc. etc.. Plus taking advantage of the crisis to set other precedents for government interference - takeover of auto companies, all kinds of stimulii, etc.
0. (This is kind of above 1, but I put it here since it’s an interesting conclusion) At the very, very long term level - the engineered economy will be a case of killing the golden goose. There’s a very good chance we’re moving towards a worldwide Mad Max scenario, which will bring down most or all of the PTB with the rest of the world. A parallel would be the fall of the Roman Empire. It was very slow and painful, and brought about because the PTB got too greedy and extended themselves too far, allowing forces beyond their control to erode the empire from all sides and even from within. This is stupid.
So the score is tied - 2 stupids to 2 malices. Time for overtime.
“It really makes you ask, are the guys in charge REALLY that stupid or is this all totally deliberate, a’ la ‘Disaster Capitalism’, SPECIFICALLY engineered and intended to wreak the american economy and send us all to serfdom?”
What surprises me the most is that the same folks who caused the crash are still in charge, and they’re to be trusted to guide us out of this mess. They should be in prison — all of them.
Your comment about how they should be in prison. I think that is exactly why Greenspan was so quick to declare that he never saw this coming and was wrong about free market regulation.
Brooksley Born = 4
Sir Greenspud = -10 AKA (”The Wizard” “The Maestro” “Sir Greenisspent”)
23 states report higher unemployment in September; slight improvements seen in the Midwest. October 21, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) — Unemployment rates rose last month in 23 states and fell in 19 as the economy struggled to create jobs in the early stages of recovery.
The Labor Department says Nevada, Rhode Island and Florida in September posted their highest jobless rates on records dating to 1976.
Michigan reported the nation’s highest unemployment rate at 15.3 percent. It was followed by Nevada at 13.3 percent, Rhode Island at 13 percent, California at 12.2 percent and South Carolina at 11.6 percent.
There were some bright spots: Ohio and Indiana, two states hit hard by the downturn in manufacturing, reported significant drops in unemployment.
The jobless rate in the Midwest fell to 9.8 percent last month from 10 percent in August. It was the only region where the unemployment rate dropped.
Ohio. Every road/highway in that entire state is under construction - recipient of loads of stimulus money. Outside of road and bridge construction though, it is becoming a ghost town. I just returned from work in Dayton. GM plant just closed and now major employer NCR leaving for GA and better tax structure.
So, Gov money and programs are taking effect to some degree in slowing, stabilizing unemployment.
Sounds like a lot of people retired and are no longer counted as jobless.
Let’s check out the change in employment from the household survey before celebrating the change in the unemployment rate.
Nationally, it was minus 785,000 when seasonally adjusted, the third worst month of this disaster.
I also get the feeling that everyone under 30 from Ohio is showing up in Brooklyn, NY. In the long run, that’s probaby better for Brooklyn than for Ohio.
How do private mortgage insurers survive with so many government-guaranteed mortgage originations underway?
Oct. 21, 2009, 10:20 a.m. EDT
Investors back away from housing, mortgage-related stocks
Share decline broadcasts further housing weakness; foreclosures a key concern
By John Spence, MarketWatch
BOSTON (MarketWatch) — The pullback in stocks tied to the U.S. housing and mortgage markets the past month is a worrying signal that residential real estate will see more pain as delinquencies and foreclosures rise.
Companies linked to the mortgage-insurance business like Radian Group Inc. (RDN 6.33, +0.02, +0.32%) , MGIC Investment Corp. (MTG 5.51, -0.22, -3.76%) , PMI Group Inc. (PMI 2.88, +0.09, +3.23%) and MBIA Inc. (MBI 5.22, -0.04, -0.77%) have been among the market’s worst performers over the past four weeks. The overall financial sector has been slightly positive over the period in volatile trading.
Shares of mortgage-finance giants Fannie Mae (FNM 1.23, +0.11, +9.82%) and Freddie Mac (FRE 1.39, +0.15, +12.10%) sold off this week after some Wall Street analysts said the firms’ common and preferred shares are likely worthless even if the troubled companies are recapitalized by the banking industry. The stocks were recovering somewhat on Wednesday.
Additionally, home-builder stocks such as KB Home (KBH 15.35, +0.03, +0.21%) and Pulte Homes Inc. (PHM 10.03, -0.05, -0.50%) have seen pullbacks in the range of 20% over the past month.
On Monday, a builder trade group said its industry confidence index posted an unexpected decline in October.
Builder stocks traded lower Tuesday after the Commerce Department reported housing starts were roughly flat in September. “The looming expiration of the homebuyer tax credit has likely begun to affect new construction at this point,” wrote Adam York, an economist for Wells Fargo Securities. Building permits for single-family homes dropped 3%.
…
(Excerpt) TDR B.Bonner 10-20-09
Mortimer Zuckerman, editor of US News & World Report, provides the figures:
Of people who are out of work, more have been jobless for longer than at any time since 1948. More exhaust their unemployment benefits before finding a new job than ever before. And if they are lucky enough to find work, they’ll work the shortest workweeks since 1951.
In other words, the baby boomers have never seen times so rough…for themselves as well as for their children. One American in nine depends on the government for his daily bread. There are 6.2 million more people on food stamps than when the recession began. And there are 6 people waiting in line for each job opening, up from 1.7 when the recession started.
The baby boomers meanwhile figure they will have to keep working longer than expected. Sixty-three percent of them say they expect to delay retirement in order to build up more retirement savings.
This is bad news for younger workers, who were hoping the boomers would get out of the way to free up some jobs. Among young Americans, unemployment hasn’t been so high since 1945.
If that weren’t bad enough, the government has made things worse by increasing the minimum wage; that alone cost the young an estimated 300,000 jobs. In a depression, prices fall. The price of labor falls too…but not easily. That’s why inflation usually helps increase employment – it lowers the real cost of labor. But people do not accept wage cuts readily. And then, along come the feds with a crackpot scheme to INCREASE wages…making the situation worse.
Naturally, Zuckerman looks at these facts and comes to the wrong conclusion. The headline:
“The free market is not up to the job of creating work.”
“Only massive programs are equal to the challenge of restoring stable growth to our economy,” he writes, in The Financial Times. What kind of massive projects? He mentions an “infrastructure bank.” He might have said a war. WWII worked wonders for unemployment. All of sudden, anybody who wanted a job could find one.
But it’s all hokum and claptrap. The Soviet Union put everyone to work. You can see where that got them. It’s not the fact that people are sweating on a job site that makes a society prosper; they also have to be doing things that add to their wealth. Infrastructure, like any other capital investment, makes sense only when it pays off. The Japanese poured more concrete per square inch than anyone before or since. They proved that you can put up all the bridges and canals you want; it still won’t restart the economy.
The free market is the only thing that can create worthwhile work. Because it is the only thing that knows – by sales and earnings – which projects make sense.
But we’re facing a losing battle. People much prefer soothing lies.
“One American in nine depends on the government for his daily bread.”
Or put another way, 1 in 9 Americans doesn’t need to look for work since he/she is taken care of by the nanny state. Gee, what a shock then that people are staying unemployed longer. Given a choice between working and not working while living the same way, I would wager 95% of people will choose not working.
Eddie:
People ARE working on their own projects…..nobody i know is sitting watching tv all day.
or maybe its just where you are from..it’s true
————————————
Given a choice between working and not working while living the same way, I would wager 95% of people will choose not working.
Hey, if I were laid off I might be tempted to simply write my public policy blog, volunteer, and do other things for a while, rather than look for work in this market. Maybe obtain a couple of skills I’m interested in having.
My wife would probably decide the same.
If we were both unemployed, different story.
I’m in my 50s. I’m making 1/6th as much money on unemployment as I did on my last paycheck in July. Nobody in my business is talking about hiring anybody before mid-2010 at best. Unemployment is not a choice I made. This is the first time I’ve been unemployed since 1974.
But you are right about one thing………..I’m not going to put my certificate on the line for $10-15/hr. Especially when people that cheap are cutting corners in a lot of other ways.
You need to get out more.
Yeah Eddie, that $490 week unemployment check would have been a viable substitute for the job I lost in July. I don’t even know why I bothered looking for a new job when I could have lived it up on that generous weekly benefit that’s only a fraction of my old and new paychecks.
Of course, had I not been so lucky and found a job right away I woud have been a goldbrick, a parasite in your book right?
“Or put another way, 1 in 9 Americans doesn’t need to look for work since he/she is taken care of by the nanny state. Gee, what a shock then that people are staying unemployed longer.”
So what would you suggest? throwing everyone out on their a$$ and telling them to ‘tough it out’? Interesting thought experiment in social darwinism but the actual results might be a little more bloody.
The simply fact of the matter is that we dont HAVE a free market now and havent for decades. Its an oligarchy, a kleptocracy if you’re feeling a little less generous with your adverbs. Dont take issue with safety nets, take issue with the people who have made those nets the only alternative.
“Gee, what a shock then that people are staying unemployed longer.”
It sounds like what Joey is trying to say is that anyone presently un- or under-employed is in that predicament simply because s/he isn’t motivated to actually seek work.
According to the BLS, more people are paid less than the Federal minimum wage than actually paid the Federal minimum wage (Food Service being the majority).
This correct.
Also, if you can’t afford to pay minimum wage you shouldn’t be in business in the first place.
The free market is the only thing that can create worthwhile work.
The problem is that the free market is dieing. Companies are consolidating and becoming entrenched, small competition is eliminated. The elite control the system.
The free market is the only thing that can create worthwhile work?
Really? Current events notwithstanding, right? Let just ignore the 800lb gorilla sitting here shall we? And a recession every 5 years? Yep, I can see your point.
A society that puts a price on everything values nothing.
Universal Insurance gets rate hike approval
South Florida Business Journal
Universal Property and Casualty Insurance Co. has received state approval to raise its premiums for homeowner insurance by an average of 14.6 percent statewide.
Universal is a subsidiary of Universal Insurance Holdings (NYSE: UVE) a vertically integrated insurance holding company based in Fort Lauderdale.
The new rates go into effect Oct. 22 for new business and Dec. 11 for renewals.
We need a public option ASAP!!
Why? Either the market will bear it or they’ll have to reduce rates or fold up shop.Business is free to come and go, so far.
Of course I know you’re just trying to be a smart azz, but I think most folks know how markets work.
Yesterdays idea still holds… everyone drop your insurance coverage. IF everyone or at least 50% did it, then someone in the ivory towers would notice.
Drop car, home insurance at least.
DD, it has never occurred to me to drop homeowner’s coverage, even though I’ve never made a claim. I own two little houses free and clear, and relatives are living in them. I wish I had the guts to drop the insurance, but I don’t.
yea, me neither. But it was interesting when posted yesterday. we all want to protect what we have. But the premise works!
Just in time for the holidays..
Santa need da dough for the insurance man so You aint gettin nuttin kids ..maybe Christmas night we can go around the nabahood and scarf up all the old toys they threw owt.
Dec. 11 for renewals.
Screw the small fry say the big dogs, so what’s the gubmint gonna do? Make banks lend? Or just loan directly?
Top banks cut small business lending by $8 billion
As small business loans continue to dry up, the President readies a new set of initiatives aimed at reversing the trend.
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — President Obama is trying — again — to help small business get the cash they desperately need.
The President will visit a small business in Maryland on Wednesday to present a series of initiatives aimed at increasing bank lending to small businesses, according to a White House official.
The programs the President will unveil include an increase in the maximum amount businesses can borrow through the Small Business Administration’s primary loan program, which currently stands at $2 million. In addition, the Treasury Department will expand access for smaller banks to the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP), a move aimed at spurring more local lending by community banks.
The TARP program was set up to recapitalize banks so that they would bolster their lending to consumers and small businesses. In March, as the administration and the SBA took steps to stimulate small business lending, Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner ordered the top TARP recipients to begin sending the Treasury monthly reports on their small business lending activity.
“We need every bank in the country to do everything in their power to provide the credit that small businesses need to operate, expand and add jobs,” Geithner said as he announced the new requirements. “Given the role many banks played in causing this crisis, you bear a special responsibility for helping America get out of it.”
But in the five months they’ve been sending in those reports, the 22 biggest TARP recipients haven’t increased their small business lending. Instead, they’ve cut their outstanding balances by $8 billion. As of Aug. 31, the 22 reporting banks held a collective small business loan balance of $261.3 billion, down 3% from when they began reporting in April.
A dear friend sent me a first-edition copy of Cervante’s “Don Quixote” for my birthday. Since I wasn’t feeling well today, I stayed home and will now have the rare luxury of lighting the fireplace, petting my mutt curled up next to me, downing a couple of brandies, and being transported back to a different era in the solitude and silence of my living room.
That’s a good friend. Wasn’t it published around 1600? Did they have “first editions” back in those days?
I misspoke - it’s not a “first edition,” it’s the translation by Charles Jarvis. The publisher is Belford, Clarke & Co. in Chicago. I can’t find a date on it but am guessing the copy she sent me is well over 150 years old. The binding and parchment seem ancient, but are well preserved. I love reading these old classics, when I can find the time.
Read it when I was 13 …re-read it again when I was 29…there were some things my mind could not “get around” in the first reading.
“Every man is as Heaven made him, and sometimes a great deal worse.”
(Made-Off, Cheney, L.ronnie Hubbard, jimmy “kool-aide” jones etc, etc…)
Oh, why not… today’s a “First Day” anyways:
“I drink when I have occasion, and sometimes when I have no occasion.”
I stayed home and will now have the rare luxury of lighting the fireplace, petting my mutt curled up next to me, downing a couple of brandies, and being transported back to a different era in the solitude and silence of my living room.
That sounds delightful. I hope you have a wonderrrrrrful time. Here, I’ll loudly sing ‘the Man from la Mancha’ in order to add to your cozy ambiance.
*sings loudly and uglily, but with spirit *
It was wonderful, thanks. And my dawg did cast puzzled looks off toward the west at several points, so perhaps the lilting Oly serranade wafted this way on the icy breezes? Then again, I’m pretty sure he cast puzzled looks toward all points of the compass this morning.
I had a sixth grade music appreciation teacher that took our class to a musical (Man of La Mancha), an opera, and a symphony. I believe that was when I fell in love with musicals and classical music.
To dream … the impossible dream …
To fight … the unbeatable foe …
To bear … with unbearable sorrow …
To run … where the brave dare not go …
To right … the unrightable wrong …
To love … pure and chaste from afar …
To try … when your arms are too weary …
To reach … the unreachable star …
This is my quest, to follow that star …
No matter how hopeless, no matter how far …
To fight for the right, without question or pause …
To be willing to march into Hell, for a Heavenly cause …
And I know if I’ll only be true, to this glorious quest,
That my heart will lie will lie peaceful and calm,
when I’m laid to my rest …
And the world will be better for this:
That one man, scorned and covered with scars,
Still strove, with his last ounce of courage,
To reach … the unreachable star …
Homes: About to get much cheaper - Yahoo Finance (today)
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Homes-About-to-get-much-cnnm-699910894.html?x=0
End of article states ‘then they will stabilize”.
How do they know this? Do they KNOW that jobs will return? Good paying jobs? No more job loss?
Well, based on my observations here in 1990s-
94-98 it went down down and stayed down. As ppl needed to sell, or lost their homes due to jobs, health etc, the housing went lower.
And that was
“Fiserv, Inc. provides integrated information management systems and services, including transaction processing, electronic commerce products and services, business process outsourcing, document distribution services, and software and systems solutions. Its operations are classified into three segments: its financial institution services business segment; its insurance services business segment and its CheckFree business segment.”
And this company is qualified to forecast housing price trends because…?
Just another example of lazy journalism, turning a press release into a news article.
Uncle buck is getting smacked today.
Just broke below 75.
How soon till it sets a new all-time low, below 72?
Is the “strong dollar policy” analogous to the “affordable housing policy”?
Dollar dropping like a rock now, as oil skyrockets and gold up also. The beat goes on.
From Bloomberg:
CURRENCY VALUE CHANGE % CHANGE TIME
EUR-USD 1.5044 0.0099 0.6607% 14:08
GBP-USD 1.6618 0.0235 1.4358% 14:08
USD-CHF 1.0037 -0.0081 -0.7981% 14:08
USD-SEK 6.8162 -0.1289 -1.8566% 14:08
USD-DKK 4.9474 -0.0341 -0.6840% 14:08
USD-NOK 5.5281 -0.0622 -1.1124% 14:08
USD-CZK 17.1980 -0.0674 -0.3904% 14:08
USD-SKK 20.0280 -0.1341 -0.6651% 14:08
USD-PLN 2.7658 -0.0209 -0.7507% 14:08
USD-HUF 175.7020 -1.3130 -0.7418% 14:09
USD-RUB 29.0930 -0.1395 -0.4772% 12:59
USD-TRY 1.4593 -0.0062 -0.4231% 14:08
USD-ILS 3.6898 -0.0076 -0.2049% 14:00
USD-KES 75.2750 0.0000 0.0000% 10:05
USD-ZAR 7.3502 -0.0154 -0.2087% 14:08
USD-MAD 7.5907 -0.0289 -0.3793% 14:08
Interpretation for the numerically baffled: Every currency on that list except KES is going up relative to the dollar.
Thanks for the shorthand PB.
IT was that guy Snow a few yrs ago who said, the devalued dollar was a good thing.
I didn’t believe him then and suspected then we were in for some major troubles.
Deserted shopping mall bleak symbol of Fed bailout.
OKLAHOMA CITY (Reuters) - A $29 billion trail from the Federal Reserve’s bailout of Wall Street investment bank Bear Stearns ends in a partially deserted shopping center on a bleak spot on the south side of Oklahoma City.
The Fed now owns the Crossroads Mall, a sprawling shopping complex at the junction of Interstate highways 244 and 35, complete with an oil well pumping crude in the parking lot — except the Fed does not own the mineral rights.
The Fed finds itself in the unusual situation of being an Oklahoma City landlord after it lent JPMorgan Chase $29 billion to buy Bear Stearns last year.
That money was secured by a portfolio of Bear assets. Crossroads Mall is the only bricks and mortar acquired through bailout. The remaining billions are tied up in invisible securities spread across hundreds, if not thousands, of properties.
It is hard to be precise because the Fed has not published specifics on what it now owns. The only reason that Crossroads Mall has surfaced is that it went into foreclosure in April.
Noah Diggs, who had just successfully concluded a search for work here as a shop assistant, was surprised and somewhat alarmed to learn the U.S. central bank now owned the property.
“That is a bad thing, right?” he said, surveying the empty parking lot on a rainy morning in early October.
Revealed: The £1m bullet-proof SUV (but that’s cheap compared to the vodka that comes with it)
By Mail Foreign Service
21st October 2009
This is the world’s most expensive SUV - but with three bottles of the world’s most expensive vodka included in the price tag, it actually appears to be a bargain.
The £1million Dartz Prombron Monaco Red Diamond Edition has gold-plated windows, pure tungsten exhausts, and the speed gauges are encrusted in diamonds.
The seats are not for the squeamish. They are made of one of the softest materials around - leather from a whale’s penis.
And, just to send the bling factor right through the roof, this SUV also comes complete with an exterior bulletproof Kevlar coating.
But that’s nothing compared to the vodka that comes with it.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnews/article-1221947/Revealed-The-1mn-bullet-proof-SUV-thats-cheap-compared-vodka-comes-it.html
You know you have too much money when…
The City is back and better than ever.
…you have enough cold cash to buy a car that is upholstered in whale wang.
As for the vodka, I’ll put up locally distilled Dogfish Head against the uber pricey Russo-Baltique…
“The car is made by the company that produced armoured vehicles for Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, and Tsar Nicolas.”
How did that work out for them?
Let’s get one for that “Saudi”…Osama Been Hidin’
Vladimir Lenin, Leon Trotsky, and Tsar Nicolas
None of them died in a car.
There weren’t any “Predator Drones” during their time.
“…They are made of one of the softest materials around - leather from a whale’s penis.”
That’s pure pre-mature econjecture!
“How did they get the leather for the seats, with a specialist team of ”four skin divers” ;-), and if you rub the passenger seat does it turn into a couch” ???
Posted by- Addy Schicklegruber, Madrid, 21/10/2009 20:50
Survey: South Florida home values to plunge even more; Miami will be biggest loser with 29.9 percent decline
By MONICA HATCHER
Miami Herald Staff Writer
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
While recent evidence shows South Florida’s home values have begun to flatten out, a new forecast says prices of single-family homes will take another serious tumble in the year to come.
And, among 381 metropolitan areas ranked nationwide, Miami will be the biggest loser, according to Fiserv, a financial information and analysis firm.
The firm predicts Miami home values will plunge another 29.9 percent by June 2010, on top of price declines of 48 percent since peaking in 2006. Orlando fared second-worse, with values shrinking 27 percent. Prices are forecast to fall another 26 percent in Fort Lauderdale.
Nationwide, Fiserv predicts home values will slide another 11.3 percent
In Miami, that means the median home price would fall to $150,500 by next June and $153,100 in the Fort Lauderdale metro area. The price deductions are calculated from the median price at the end of the second quarter.
The forecast contradicts recent evidence from the highly regarded S&P/Case-Shiller index as well as median price data from the Florida Association of Realtors. Both measures have shown single-family home values mellowing in South Florida. Fiserv bases its forecast on Case-Shiller data, but also other economic variables, including interest rates, demographic trends and labor market conditions.
Jack McCabe, a Deerfield Beach-based real estate analyst, said the Fiserv forecast was unrealistic. He predicts prices will fall another 10 percent to 15 percent region-wide before bottoming out. After that, they will remain flat for two more years, as the effect of a massive number of foreclosures lingers.
McCabe said Case-Shiller data generally lagged other real-time housing indicators available to analysts. He agreed, however, that South Florida’s housing woes were not over.
“Distressed properties are going to fuel the inventory pipeline through 2010,” McCabe said.
“Because they are distressed, they are going to have the lowest asking prices and they are going to dictate market conditions.”
Hop on the shortbus EddieTard….it’s time to scoop up a bargain!
Here’s another dope that doesn’t get it! This is a ‘jobless’ recovery, wall street is all about earnings, the more companies cut jobs the mo money they get to add to their bottom line. I mean, damn it’s simple math, so get to s-canning some more folks so the street can reap more profits…
“Where are the %&@*!# jobs”?
Repeat after us. There is no strong recovery without job growth. There is no strong recovery without job growth. Why does Wall Street not get that?
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — Is anybody out there hiring? Seriously. I’m not looking for a job but I’d like to know if any major corporations are actually looking to boost their headcount anytime soon. Do I hear crickets?
Investors are continuing to celebrate healthy third-quarter earnings reports in what’s turning out to be a far less scary October than usual for stocks. But a lot of the better-than-expected profits are coming thanks to job cuts.
And there still doesn’t appear to be much evidence of an improvement in the labor markets coming anytime soon.
Sun Microsystems (JAVA, Fortune 500) announced Tuesday evening that it was planning to cut 3,000 jobs — about 10% of its total workforce — while it waits for regulators to approve its sale to software giant Oracle (ORCL, Fortune 500).
The New York Times (NYT) said Monday it was going to get rid of 100 jobs in its newsroom. That works out to an 8% reduction in the editorial staff at the Gray Lady.
Earlier this month, struggling PC maker Dell (DELL, Fortune 500) said it was closing a plant in North Carolina, resulting in the loss of more than 900 jobs. And medical equipment manufacturer St. Jude Medical (STJ) said a few weeks ago that it was cutting more jobs than it had originally planned back in the second quarter.
These are just a few examples of the continued bloodletting in Corporate America.
I hate to beat a dead horse here. Heck, I think this horse has already made a trip to the glue factory. But how can Wall Street remain in such a celebratory mood this earnings season when all signs point to more job losses and rising unemployment as far as the eye can see?
This behavior only squares if one takes a rapid and vigorous recovery as a given. Otherwise all that declining revenue should be a huge red flag.
Man, are expectations running high right now or what?
And what’s with the closing hour plunge today? That’s so 2008.
That is very surprising considering the shortage of hi-tech workers there is in the US. Luckily, help is on the way thanks to Rep. Gifford:
Bill Would Double Cap on H-1B Visas
? Grant Gross, IDG News Service
October 20, 2009
A bill introduced in the U.S. Congress would double the number of immigrant worker visas available each year under the H-1B program, earning the legislation praise from Microsoft.
The Innovation Employment Act, introduced by Representative Gabrielle Giffords, an Arizona Democrat, late Thursday, would increase the cap in H-1B visas from 65,000 a year to 130,000 a year. In addition, there would be no cap on H-1B applications for foreign graduate students attending U.S.
colleges and studying science, technology and related fields. Currently, there’s a 20,000-a-year cap on visas for graduate students in all fields.
Seven houses down from us, a REO that has had a For Sale sign out for 18 months has finally sold. A retired Navy family moved in.
Bring ‘em some navy bean soup and say: “Thank You! Thank You! Thank You!”
House Agriculture Panel Approves Bill to Regulate Derivatives:
Oct. 21 (Bloomberg) — The House Agriculture Committee today approved legislation to regulate the $592 trillion over- the-counter derivatives industry.
Did they get their “T’s” & “B’s” discombobulated?
Thanks for opeing the door Brooksley!
The American financial system almost collapsed in 1998 when a hedge-fund, “Long Term Capital Management” went belly up. In a harbinger of 2008, banks had placed huge derivative bets on the Russian economy with LTCM.
The Fed forced 13 US and international banks to purchase the hedge-fund. Altogether $4.6 Billion was lost.
A PBS Frontline Documentary “The Warning” magnificently shows that although the American (and world) economies are at stake, the Clinton and Bush Administrations refused to regulate the derivative market, and allowed it to grow to an eventual $595 Trillion during the housing bubble.
Not only did they refuse to regulate the industry, they forced out Brooksley Borne, the Chair of the Commodities Futures Trading Commission, who had demanded action.
During the credit crisis last year, former Fed chairman Alan Greenspan was hauled before Congress and asked why he had refused to regulate these markets. The documentary shows him confessing that he had been “mistaken.” The “world view” that had guided him for 40 years –that markets were self regulating– had been wrong.
Mr. Maggo was wrong? Some mistake. How is he going to fix it, again?
I liked the Frontline piece, but it didn’t tell me anything I didn’t know.
Roidy
it didn’t tell me a
Me neither, but hopefully it woke someone who is NOT on the HBB. Hopefully.
They all had a hand in history - is there something about the man who keeps his hand hidden? Or is it all in the hands they play?
Interesting article regarding public poses and freemasonry -
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=2536
Hmmm, saw this one too:
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=58
Fed survey finds housing, manufacturing improvements drive early stages of recovery.
October 21, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) — Improvements in housing and manufacturing are driving the early stages of the economic recovery, according to a Federal Reserve survey released Wednesday.
AP - FILE - In this June 17, 2009 file photo, James Sellers, left, vice president of AUS Manufacturing Co., …
AP - FILE - In this June 17, 2009 file photo, James Sellers, left, vice president of AUS Manufacturing Co., …
The Fed’s latest snapshot of business conditions nationwide found “many sectors” of the economy either stabilized or logged modest improvements over the last six weeks. The pickups, though, often were from “depressed” levels of activity.
Still, the new report adds to evidence that a recovery has started from the worst recession since the 1930s. Only two of the Fed’s 12 regions — Atlanta and St. Louis — reported weaker overall economic activity.
An $8,000 credit for first-time homebuyers boosted the housing sector. There’s been concern among private economists and some lawmakers that recent gains in housing will fizzle out when the credit ends. It is slated to expire Nov. 30, although some in Congress are mulling an extension.
Meanwhile, factories increased production as businesses restocked depleted inventories. Part of that restocking was due to the now-defunct Cash for Clunkers rebate program, which caused a brief burst in car sales.
Both housing and manufacturing continued a “pattern of improvement that emerged over the summer,” the Fed observed.
By contrast, the Fed said weakest link in the recovery was commercial real estate. Conditions were described as “either weak or deteriorating” across all 12 regions surveyed.
“Fed survey finds housing, manufacturing improvements drive early stages of recovery.”
Cool! Given the vigorous recovery underway, there must be no further need for:
- Fed Treasury-bond yield buy-downs
- MBS purchases to suppress mortage interest rates
- Renewal of the first-time home buyer tax credit
- Cash-4-anything (where “anything” could be Clunkers, Crapshacks, Criminals, Consumption Binges, etc.)
So what’s the hold up? The democraps control the house & senate & D.C., this stuff should be a piece of cake. What gives?
Dems go after antitrust exemption for insurers
Health care legislation may also end antitrust exemptions for insurance industry. Wednesday October 21, 2009
WASHINGTON (AP) — Democrats launched a drive at both ends of the Capitol on Wednesday to strip the insurance industry of its decades-old exemption from federal antitrust laws, part of an increasingly bare-knuckled struggle over landmark health care legislation sought by President Barack Obama.
If enacted, the change would put an end to “price-fixing, bid-rigging and market allocation in the health and medical malpractice” insurance areas, said Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-Vt., chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee. Leahy said he would seek a vote on the plan when the Senate debates health care legislation in the next few weeks.
Leahy made his comments at virtually the same time the House Judiciary Committee voted 20-9 to end an industry exemption that dates to 1945. Three Republicans supported the move.
Senior Democratic officials in the House said the leadership was inclined to incorporate the measure into the broader health care bill expected to be brought to the floor for a vote within a few weeks. No final decision has been made, they added.
I can’t remember how many times Cheney-Shrub tried to get something like this done, dang…. must’ve been close to what? 0?
Pay Czar to Slash Compensation at Seven Firms.
WASHINGTON — The U.S. pay czar will slash compensation for the 25 highest-paid employees at seven firms receiving large sums of government aid and demand a host of corporate-governance changes at those firms, according to people familiar with the matter.
Kenneth Feinberg, the Treasury Department’s special master for compensation, will lower total compensation for 175 employees by an average of 50%, these people said. As expected, the biggest cut will be to salaries, which will drop 90% on average.
But while the overall levels will fall, some executives will still walk away with large paychecks. For instance, several Bank of America Corp. employees will still receive compensation totaling millions of dollars.
At the same time, Mr. Feinberg will demand a series of corporate-governance changes at the firms, including splitting the positions of chairman and chief executive officer; requiring boards of directors to create a committee to assess risk, and eliminating staggered boards.
Some of the toughest pay restrictions will come at the financial-products unit of American International Group Inc., which has been blamed for the firm’s near-collapse. No employee within that unit will receive compensation of more than $200,000, these people said.
Karl Marx Predicted Collapse of US Dollar in 1857.
Source: Pravda.Ru
The great October fall of the US dollar is turning into an avalanche. On Tuesday, the American currency lost nine kopeks in Russia and reached a new minimum mark this year - 29.5 rubles per dollar. Within six months (April through September) the dollar lost over 10 percent at the world foreign exchange trading, which marked the sharpest decline since 1991. Some experts believe that the American currency is close to collapse, which may lead to a new financial crisis.
The tendency of the US dollar devaluation has been observed for a few years, but the current rate of decline is unprecedented. Some jokesters even rushed to re-read the letters of Karl Marx to Friedrich Engels written during the US financial panic of 1857 discussing the collapse of America. It would have been funny if it wasn’t so serious.
The chief economist of HSBC Bank Stephen King believes that if the US officials fail to stop the fall of American currency, it may provoke another financial crisis. “A dollar collapse would be a disaster all round… It would leave the international monetary system short of stability and long of fear. It would unleash economic upheavals on a similar scale to those seen in the 1970,” King wrote for The Independent.
American officials don’t seem to be overly concerned since nothing is being done about it. The US hasn’t done anything to support the currency since 1955. But is a collapse inevitable? From the viewpoint of macroeconomic indicators, the US state of affairs is, indeed, scary: record budget deficit of $1.4 trillion, record state debt that now exceeds $11.9 trillion, high unemployment and weak currency. Huge inflows of capital into the economy that Obama is proud of haven’t yet shown results.
But on the other hand, weak currency may be good for the US.
“The economy is supported by industrial orders based on the current weak dollar and higher prices in the future. Key players in the market are ready to support their manufacturers by weakening the currency,” says Alexander Kuptsikevich, FxPro financial analyst.
If the state debt is growing, it means that the US continues to obtain loans.
“Market participants prefer to borrow money in dollars, and dollar loans are relatively affordable. They invest into more active instruments denominated in currencies of developing countries,’ explains Yevgeny Nadorshin, chief economist of Trust Investment Bank.
This causes growth of stock index. For example, Russian Trading System increased by 34 percent within two and a half months.
“Karl Marx Predicted Collapse of US Dollar in 1857.”
Apparently, stopped clock predictions some times outlive the predictor by generations!
Is today reversal day?
ʎɐp dn ǝpısuʍop s,ʇı
whoa.
¡ʇsod sıɥʇ sɐ uʍop ǝpısdn sɐ ʇsɐǝl ʇɐ ǝɹɐ sǝƃɐƃʇɹoɯ ʎuɐɯ
It’s been quite a while since we’ve seen a plunge of any significance in the final hour and see it stick, that’s for sure. Who knows though, it’s easy to concoct “less bad” news this qtr.
That’s a sure sign tomorrow will be a good day on the stock market.
How did the Glass-Steagall Act work again? The US banking system was reasonably stable from its passage in 1933 up until when it was repealed in 1999. After that point, your friendly neighborhood bank morphed into a plutocratic parasite designed to suck away money from Main Street to fund Wall Street’s speculative binge.
At any rate, the too-big-to-fail problem could be eliminated if Megabank, Inc’s free self-inflicted financial crisis insurance program was phased out.
The Fed
Oct. 21, 2009, 1:51 p.m. EDT
Don’t count Fed’s Tarullo as proponent of splitting up banks
Idea is gaining prominent supporters, on both sides of the Atlantic
By Greg Robb, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — Federal Reserve Board governor Daniel Tarullo said Wednesday that he opposes the “provocative idea” of getting banks out of the business of trading risky securities so they can focus on lending.
In a speech to a business group, Tarullo said he doubted any such ban would end the problem of too-big-to-fail institutions, laying out a pair of objections to the idea of legislation intended to split banks up by their lines of business.
For one thing, Tarullo said, splitting them up wouldn’t end too-big-to-fail concerns because banks have shown the ability to get into trouble through risky lending alone.
Moreover, trading in higher-risk securities would have to go somewhere else if banks couldn’t engage in such activities and wherever it went, the too-big-to-fail problem would go along with it, he said.
So far, no one has come forward with a blueprint on how to go about separating the bank businesses, he said.
“This is, in other words, more a provocative idea than a proposal,” Tarullo said.
…
The politicians in DC are not going to do anything substantive about reforming the financial system until there is true financial collapse.
They’ve managed to promise 19-24 trillion dollars, and that seems to have stopped the ship from sinking, and maybe with the bilge pumps working nonstop, they can keep the cruise ship motoring along. Until the pumps stop working, and a lot of passengers start getting wet, substantive change is not going to happen I think.
I just saw on Bloomberg how the bill to regulate the 592 trillion dollar derivatives market just got a loophole put into it big enough to keep banks happy:
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601103&sid=aMxy9IQDJ2tA
My focus at this point is to figure out how to preserve my wealth when the stealth tax really gets going - devaluation of the dollar and inflation. All I can really think of is gold - but it’s so high now. I wonder what other options exist? TIPS? Other?
These might be worth a look, if you believe higher l-t T-bond yields are in the cards:
ProShares Registers Two Treasuries-Linked Funds
Written by Cinthia Murphy
Thursday, 15 October 2009 13:20
ProShares Trust is adding two new Treasuries-linked funds to its lineup of offerings.
The funds—the ProShares Ultra 7-10 Year Treasury, and the ProShares Ultra 20+ Year Treasury—will seek to capture 200 percent of the daily performance of their underlying indexes.
ProShares already offers two short funds tied to a 20-year Treasuries index from Barclays Capital—the ProShares Short 20+ Year Treasury (NYSEArca: TBF), and the ProShares UltraShort 20+ Year Treasury (NYSEArca: TBT). These funds provide -100 percent exposure and -200 percent exposure, respectively, to the underlying index.
The firm’s other fund, the ProShares UltraShort 7-10 Year Treasury (NYSEArca: PST), offers -200 percent exposure.
Thanks! Very interesting.
Oct. 21 (Bloomberg) — Google Inc. backs “extreme regulatory standards,” AT&T Inc.’s top Washington official says. His rival at Google calls the phone company’s campaign against new Internet rules “almost laughable.”
Google’s Richard Whitt and AT&T’s Jim Cicconi are jousting publicly and behind the scenes before the Federal Communications Commission takes its first vote tomorrow on plans to write so- called net neutrality rules governing Internet traffic.
The rules would bar Internet providers led by AT&T, Verizon Communications Inc. and Comcast Corp. from favoring or blocking Web content from companies such as Google, Amazon.com Inc. and Twitter Inc. The prospect of losing some control over their networks has phone, cable and wireless services on the defensive, said former FCC chairman Michael Powell.
“It looks like a fait accompli to many companies,” said Powell, a senior adviser in Washington with Providence Equity Partners Inc., in an interview. “They fear it is an effort to commoditize their businesses and that is terrifying.”
Julius Genachowski, a former Internet executive named by President Barack Obama to head the FCC, has led the push for new regulations. The commission will vote tomorrow on a road map for writing rules. That action will open “a multi-month” proceeding, said Jen Howard, an FCC spokeswoman.
Maintaining Openness
Regulation is needed “to preserve Internet openness, helping ensure a future of opportunity, innovation and a vibrant marketplace of ideas,” Genachowski said in a Sept. 21 speech. The open-Internet rules would apply to wireless service as well as cable and phone providers, he said.
If you are writing your gov official you might want to include a line on supporting net neutrality as well. We wouldn’t want Ben’s site to be blocked or slowed to a crawl.
Oh wait that would be regulation never mind.
If only Cable was subject to the same pressures.
OLY OLY OLY ox in free.. (or however you spell it)
Oly, right this minute the food channel is having a major Pumpkin carving contest. Timed. Free carved, inside or out.
I know you don’t carve yours, but you might appreciate theirs.
Post knee surgery is official, MD said I have “angry knee syndrome”.
Polly, glad yours is doing better.
Oly, Oly, income-free! (ha-ha)
I don’t like these ‘new-fangled’ pumpkin carvings. I say carve a good old-fashioned evil face and be done with it. Let’s keep it satanic!
I say carve a good old-fashioned evil face and be done with it.
Link?
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/98/Greenspan.jpg
Glug, glug, glug,…
Irwin Kellner
Oct. 20, 2009, 12:01 a.m. EDT
Walk the line
Commentary: Fed will have to tread carefully between too much tightness and not enough
…
Thus the hard part of the Fed’s job is about to begin.
It was easy flooding the economy with money to stave off deflation. After all, just about everyone likes cheap money and plenty of it.
The hard part will be when and how fast to withdraw this excess cash.
Economic growth, such as apparently occurred in the third quarter and is set to continue in the current period, is not enough. After all, millions of homeowners are still suffering, while the unemployment rate is nearly 60% higher than it was last year at this time and shows no signs of peaking.
To make matters worse, the number of long-term unemployed is the highest in recent memory, with jobs increasingly hard to get. As I noted two weeks ago, Manpower says that employers’ hiring plans for the current quarter are at their lowest point since this survey was started, back in 1962. ( See Oct. 6 column.)
If this was all the Fed had to concern itself with, it would be a slam-dunk for the central bank to keep its benchmark fed funds rate at its current record lows and leave its swollen balance sheet alone.
But there is another view that is slowly starting to take shape among investors. It’s called fear of inflation.
You can see it in the price of gold. The yellow metal is up by $258 an ounce, or 32%, over the past year, to just under its all-time high.
Another indicator that the Fed should be paying attention to is the difference in yield on the plain-vanilla Treasury note and that of the Treasury-Inflation-Protected-Security of comparable maturity. This is known as the Treasury-TIPS spread; the bigger the spread, the more investors fear inflation.
According to data made available by the Federal Reserve Bank of St. Louis, this spread is currently a tad under 2%. Last year at this time it was half this much and heading lower, reaching zero by year-end, when inflation fears were virtually nonexistent.
Then there is the price of oil. Light sweet crude oil closed Monday at $79.51 per barrel. This is above its year-ago levels — and 2-1/2 times higher than the price at which it started this year.
The weak dollar is fueling these inflation fears. As I observed last week, the dollar’s value is determined by supply and demand — and right now the financial markets are swimming in dollars.
…
The prospect of scheming, scamming bankers colluding to withhold inventory, not to mention speculators hedging against inflation and first-time buyers buying to capture $8K in free money makes the housing outlook very hard to assess, indeed.
* The Wall Street Journal
* OCTOBER 22, 2009
Waiting for the Next McMansion to Drop
By JAMES R. HAGERTY
Some bank-owned homes have sparked bidding wars recently in Las Vegas, but pending foreclosures are likely to increase the supply.
Despite some tentative signs of recovery, the U.S. housing market remains vulnerable to further price drops—especially in areas where large numbers of mortgages are headed toward foreclosure over the next few years.
The Wall Street Journal’s quarterly survey of housing-market data in 28 major metro areas shows sharp drops in the number of homes listed for sale across the country. But the potential supply of homes is far larger because banks are likely to acquire significant numbers of foreclosed homes in some areas, notably Las Vegas, Atlanta, Detroit, Phoenix, Miami and other parts of Florida, and Sacramento, Calif., over the next few years.
Sales of those homes may depress prices further. By contrast, metro areas with relatively low foreclosure and mortgage-delinquency rates include Boston, Denver, Minneapolis, San Francisco, Seattle, Raleigh, N.C., and Portland, Ore., making them less vulnerable.
Where Housing Is Headed
See The Wall Street Journal’s quarterly survey of housing-market data in 28 major metro areas.
Homeowners and potential buyers have been whipsawed by conflicting signals about the state of the market in recent months. Ulani and Mike Thiessen found the market surprisingly hot when they went shopping for their first home in Las Vegas during the summer. With the help of Kim Kelly-Reed, an agent from One Source Realty & Management, the Thiessens finally bought a foreclosed house in September for about $136,000—but only after being outbid on three other houses.
“It’s a crazy market out there,” says Ms. Thiessen, who works for an electrical contractor.
…