Bits Bucket for December 27, 2010
Post off-topic ideas, links, and Craigslist finds here.
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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Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
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Kennedy’s exit from Congress leaves a family void
First time in 63 years there won’t be a Kennedy serving in elected office in Washington.
I would say good riddance to these parasites. Now if we could only ban Bushes for few centuries from obtaining any public offices.
My neighbor on the Cape used to take advantage of the high tide water mark law Ted Kennedy brought into being. The law said that waterfront homeowners could only keep people off property up to the high tide mark but at low tide the public had rights to that part of the exposed beach.
My neighbor and her husband were Barnstable residents (Hyannisport is a township in the town of Barnstable) so we did have beach rights but she chose to sun herself right on the beach behind the Kennedy “compound”*. One day “John John” strolled by and said hello to them after wind surfing not only not questioning their postion right below the house but friendly to boot. There were actually quite a few gifts the Kennedys gave the residents of MA. Now that I live in NY I see just how much. IE, because of Joe Kennedy a MA resident can’t have their heat shut off because they can’t make the entire payment.
*Most people are shocked to see how relatively tiny these 2 “Kennedy compound” buildings are. I have quite a few local friends whose homes are larger and much more plushly decorated. Considering the wealth and power of this family these are pretty simple buildings.
In Texas, no one can own the beach and they are open to all(although some cities require a permit to drive/park on the beach).
I guess Texas is more socialistic than even Mass!
Beat me to it.
Yeah, JFK and RFK were are a real couple of parasites. All they did was take, take, take from America. What did they ever give back?
I agree butters. They got their wealth from the bootlegging of JFK’s dad. Howeever to give credit to JFK, he pushed for a decrease in the confiscatory taxes on those who worked to achieve the American dream. From 90% top rate to a still confiscatory and shameful 70%.
Taxation is theft.
“From 90% top rate to a still confiscatory and shameful 70%.”
Still the economy and the budget were in order and America was in much better shape than today. What ’s up with that?
Now the top 0.1% are looting and hoarding wealth while the rest of America is in serious decline.
Back then stealing and looting from the rest of society didn’t pay well due to the high taxes, today it does. Thanks Reagan.
Precisely, Mike!
Taxation is theft.
Ignorance is strength.
You are quite a powerful man, Rio.
You are quite a powerful man, Rio.
Well, if you really think that, you might want to try harder to effectively persuade, bill
You are quite a powerful man, Rio.
Or he will be in 1984.
Using services without paying is theft.
Why do you want to steal from others?
From 90% top rate to a still confiscatory and shameful 70%.
Taxation is theft.
If taxation is theft, then 70% is really no better than 90%. Theft is theft and the only acceptable rate is zero.
“Taxation is theft.”
So you’ll be giving up driving on roads, doing your own verification of accuracy and safety of anything you by, and hiring your own fire and police departments, as well as building your own water and sewer system then, right?
Ye…. ah. Didn’t think so.
So you’ll be giving up driving on roads, doing your own verification of accuracy and safety of anything you by, and hiring your own fire and police departments, as well as building your own water and sewer system then, right?
Or perhaps he’ll choose to voluntarily give money to such things. Ie pay to drive on certain roads, get a septic system, and pay an independent agency to do safety/quality analysis (eg Consumer Reports).
The government isn’t NECESSARY to provide such services, and even if it can do it efficiently, it doesn’t need to take money at gunpoint for it to be able to act in these capacities.
Or perhaps he’ll choose to voluntarily give money to such things.
So what you are saying is that without mass theft also known as taxation then we would not have roads?
Duz u’all reelize how dum u’z soundin?
You can always spot the ones who slept through history class, can’t you?
You can always spot the ones who slept through history class
Any history is relevant to Bill’s potential course of action how, exactly?
(difficulty: answer without making a personal attack against me or bill. You know, like, talk about the actual issue)
Saying really stupid things typically elicits a callous response. Don’t confuse callousness with a personal attack.
And based on your posts, I’ve yet to see a serious, well thought out, pragmatic reply from you. Ever.
So what you are saying is that without mass theft also known as taxation then we would not have roads? So in order to have this wonderful thing known as roads the populace must be threatened with lethal force so as to extract their wealth to build roads?
Is this premise ok with yas?
So the most incompetent group of despicable humans ever to assemble(government employees) are also absolutely necessary to have roads?
Explain why the dog(producer/non-government thug) needs flees in order to be happy.
So the most incompetent group of despicable humans ever to assemble… are also absolutely necessary to have roads?
Duz da WalStreet bankstr peoples makes our roads now?
A dynasty of gilded thugs, aided & abetted by the fawning MSM.
What Actually Happened to John F. Kennedy, Jr.?
http://tinyurl.com/395vf9f
First, the radar data describing the path of Kennedy’s plane showed that just as Kennedy was making his final approach to the Martha’s Vineyard Airport, his plane, in the absence of any explosion or engine malfunction, suddenly plunged headfirst into the ocean, falling 2500 feet in 45 seconds. Secondly, the fuel selector valve on Kennedy’s plane was found to have been turned to the off position.
Yo, I bet you buy enough tin foil to make even the gold bugs drool.
Oxide -
Some other tin foil helmeted goldbugs told me other unbelievable tales:
1. The US Government gave billion in cash infusions to our biggest banks so they would not shut down.
2. The Federal Reserve buys up US Treasuries at approximately the same rate the US Government issues it to pay our deficit.
3. The US Government gave over $100 billion to AIG so bankers at Goldman Sachs could get paid 100 cents on the dollar rather than taking a loss on obligations to a bankrupt business like everyone else in American receives. Even more outrageous are the number of Goldman Sachs alumni running the government.
Man, you have to wear a lot of tinfoil to believe ridiculous stories like these!
I specifically remember two pilots being interviewed at the base airport following the crash…They said that Kennedy was running late and was trying to make a go/no go decision based on the weather forecast, that it was late in the day and the visual flights rules that he was allowed to fly under…He decided to go…
The speculation is that he believed he had the performance in the Saratoga to beat the sunset therefore not requiring a IFR approach & landing…Further speculation is that he was flying “hot” and hit some bad weather that would require IFR ability to control the plane especially at that rate of speed and put the plane in a death spiral…
If, as the article suggests that he was on final @ 2500 feet Alt., and he was coming in hot (This performance plane fly’s @ 200 knots) then that is 293 feet per second rate of closure…If he put the plane into a death spiral it only took 8 1/2 seconds for him to hit the water…Nobody could have recovered that plane in that period of time at that rate of speed…
…and the visual flights rules that he was allowed to fly under…He decided to go…
I talked to a small craft pilot after the crash and he said it’s not uncommon for inexperienced pilots in no-visibility conditions to “disbelieve” their instruments and fly right into the ground.
Apparently, it’s very easy to be fooled by your own sense of balance into thinking you’re flying level when you’re not and that the conviction is so strong that it takes a great deal of training to trust the instruments over your inner ear.
That is really sad.
“They said that Kennedy was running late and was trying to make a go/no go decision based on the weather forecast”
It is _extremely_ common for pilots to hang out at the airport before a flight, to do their flight planning, get updated weather reports, or even to wait and see if the weather improves either at the departure or destination airport. Hanging out at the airport _definitely_ does not mean he was waiting for a flight-instructor, as the conspiracy theory suggests.
“beat the sunset therefore not requiring a IFR approach & landing”
He would not have to “beat the sunset” to do a non-IFR approach. IFR or VFR (instrument or visual flight rules) are strictly based on the weather (cloud cover and visibility), not on available daylight. Private pilots who are VFR-only are virtually all allowed to land after sunset; the only pilots who are restricted in this regard are those who have night-specific visual impairment–e.g. night blindess.
At any rate, the “death spiral” theory made some sense to me at the time. BTW, a “death spiral” is not a straight-down descent, so it definitely would have taken more time than 8.5 seconds to develop; it is a 1G slow banking turn that feels like level flight but is actually descending. But the fact that Kennedy was almost finished with his instrument rating makes that theory less likely, IMHO. An instrument-rated pilot would have a hard time ignoring the fact that three or four of his instruments are indicating something is amiss in a death-spiral.
More likely, I think, in view of the fuel valve being in the OFF position, is that it somehow got moved (foot? passenger’s purse hooked it? I don’t know where it is located in that aircraft.), and that Kennedy did not manage to maintain control of the airplane while trouble-shooting the engine-out problem. A stall/spin would explain it equally well, and also happens to be one of the most common ways for pilots to die. Most private pilots do not take adequate spin training, at least in my view. Consider Occam’s razor…
“They said that Kennedy was running late and was trying to make a go/no go decision based on the weather forecast”
It is _extremely_ common for pilots to hang out at the airport before a flight, to do their flight planning, get updated weather reports, or even to wait and see if the weather improves either at the departure or destination airport. Hanging out at the airport _definitely_ does not mean he was waiting for a flight-instructor, as the conspiracy theory suggests.
“beat the sunset therefore not requiring a IFR approach & landing”
He would not have to “beat the sunset” to do a non-IFR approach. IFR or VFR (instrument or visual flight rules) are strictly based on the weather (cloud cover and visibility), not on available daylight. Private pilots who are VFR-only are virtually all allowed to land after sunset; the only pilots who are restricted in this regard are those who have night-specific visual impairment–e.g. night blindess.
At any rate, the “death spiral” theory made some sense to me at the time. BTW, a “death spiral” is not a straight-down descent, so it definitely would have taken more time than 8.5 seconds to develop; it is a 1G slow banking turn that feels like level flight but is actually descending. But the fact that Kennedy was almost finished with his instrument rating training makes that theory less likely, IMHO. An instrument-rated pilot would have a hard time ignoring the fact that at least four of his primary instruments are indicating something is amiss in a death-spiral.
More likely, I think, in view of the fuel valve being in the OFF position, is that it somehow got moved (foot? passenger’s purse hooked it? I don’t know where it is located in that aircraft.), and that Kennedy did not manage to maintain control of the airplane while trouble-shooting the engine-out problem. A stall/spin would explain it equally well, and also happens to be one of the most common ways for pilots to die. Most private pilots do not take adequate spin training, at least in my view. Consider Occam’s razor…
VFR or IFR I think it was to much airplane for the skill set to fly it…
I think you are correct, scdave.
Reading the NTSB accident report, I think my last comment above about a stall/spin is horse-pucky. The radar data captured do not support it, as the descent speed was much higher than a spin would allow.
From the NTSB report:
“The fuel selector valve was recovered, and the bottom of the valve was missing. All three fuel line connections were broken off. The valve had separated from the fuselage attach points. The selector valve linkage was deformed, and the valve was found in the OFF position.”
So while the fuel-selector may have ended up in the OFF position, that might well have been due to the fact that the valve itself was torn out of the aircraft by the impact. Also many other engine instruments had broken in positions suggesting that the engine was running, and thus had fuel.
From the radar data, it sounded like his headings/altitudes started to wander prior to the accident, suggesting that he was unable to manage the work-load, perhaps while he was distracted by fiddling with the VOR trying to figure out where the airport was.
He also was not almost done with his instrument training, only needing “hours” as the conspiracy-theorist suggests. According to the NTSB report, he was half-way through the curriculum that his training facility used, and took the segment on VOR navigation _four_ times. His instructor said his basic instrument skills were good, but that he might not be able to do anything else in addition at the same time. A high “work-load” would fit well with him failing to control the aircraft and keep it on course to the destination, and on intended altitude. Drowsiness or CO poisoning would also fit.
The NTSB report is very thorough, as is usual.
Yeah those NTSB reports make interesting, if chilling reading.
http://www.ntsb.gov/Publictn/publictn.htm There’s much horror in the phrase “fire damage to the remains prevened toxicological testing,” which I remember reading in a descripton of a traffic accident with a gasoline tanker.
“fire damage to the remains prevened toxicological testing,”
Ewww, that does make for quite the mental image…
The wierd thing is that the 757 doesn’t have a fuel selector switch.
So some one must have installed one the night before Egypt Air took off!!
“So some one must have installed one the night before Egypt Air took off!!”
Bwaaaahahahaha… The was LOL-good, Steve…
I will never forget the image of a bloated Ted Kennedy, capillaries ready to burst, waddling amongst the starving Africans pledging to help.
Hell, he could have unstrapped his Senatorial feed bag and fed the rest of the village with the balance of his meal.
Politics aside, he was a coward and drunkard who let an innocent woman drown.
Zapruder film has been altered
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w-rcdBNFnGs
Thanks to the blizzard, the snow is blowing up under/into the skylights, causing rain to fall onto my second floor, through the floor and down to the first floor.
The last time this happened, in the Nor’easter of 2003, we were tenants and it was the landlord’s problem.
Time to take action! Send your wife up there with a tarp.
Frackin’ blizzard is messing up Eddie’s Santa Clause rally to DJIA = 12K by December 30, 2010!
Index Futures:
S&P 500 1,249 -4.50 -0.36%
DOW 11,480 -42.00 -0.37%
NASDAQ 2,225 -5.50 -0.25%
Frackin’ blizzard is messing up Eddie’s Santa Clause rally to DJIA = 12K
…..Yeah, but to his credit, if he had said DJIA = 11,500 I would have thought it just as ridiculous. I keep expecting it to dive. I guess it is true…don’t fight the fed.
if he had said DJIA = 11,500 I would have thought it just as ridiculous ??
I agree…I count is as a “I-told-you-so” for him as difficult as it is to admit that…I guess I am eating a little crow….:(
good luck getting anyone here to admit that Eddie made a good call as to 12K
If the DJIA doesn’t get to 12K by Thursday, then can we agree that Eddie was flat out wrong and move on? Or should we keep reminding ourselves over and over again how Eddie’s failed prediction showed him to be just another huckster hoping to get lucky in order to claim bragging rights, much as Iben Browning defrauded many into believing he could predict the exact time and location of a big earthquake back in the early 1990s?
good luck getting anyone here to admit that Eddie made a good call as to 12K
I’ll admit he came pretty close and was correct that things went up instead of down as I expected. My primary frustration is with the government interference that caused the current situation, not with people who laugh at everyone else while getting rich picking up the nickels in front of the steamroller. Someday when they’re a dark spot in the road the I’m driving over I’ll try to appreciate their contribution to the road and forget about their previous obnoxiousness.
Where is my last post????? I guess we are not allowed to say anything good about Eddie.
In case this slips by big brother, I just mentioned that to his credit, had eddie said DJIA 11,500 I would have thought it just as ridiculous.
I’m of the school who likes to rub overconfident fools in the face of their failed predictions, but that’s just my style.
To each his own.
the silver lining is that you now know you have an air infiltration issue.
“Thanks to the blizzard, the snow is blowing up under/into the skylights, causing rain to fall onto my second floor, through the floor and down to the first floor.”
My sincerest condolences. Used to live in upstate NY myself.
Now, well, it sure was tough here out here in Mesa, AZ having Christmas dinner on the patio in the 71 degree sunshine. Sometimes the reflection off the pool made me squint, which is a lot of trouble.
A Belated Christmas to you all. Those of you who have been unrepentant renters (say it 3x fast) may actually be winners in the short run. If you are trying to sell your HELOC’d house, Happy New Year and Bend Over.
Those of us who have paid a mortgage down over 20 to 30 years need feel no self-pity. It is all relative. My house is worth 2/3 or less than what it was at the peak. If I buy a different house, it will likely be sold at 2/3 of the peak. With both at lower prices, in some states my property tax will be lower, depending on circumstances. Prop 13 is now my friend, but is it fair?
Happy New Year to All!
ROBIN in the once-great OC
That’s only true if you stay put and buy in the same housing market.
I know of someone being transferred to another state. The home will be going on the market soon. It is in the high end niche here and she expects to lose at least $65k after owning for little over a year although her transferring employer will absorb up to $50k of the loss. The homes where she is going are much smaller in her same price range and that market still has yet to correct. I’ve mentioned the renting thing but she makes a good point. If there was a currency collapse you are at the mercy of your landlord’s reaction to a potentially rapidly declining social stability. It isn’t out of the question to wonder if the landlord may no longer feel obligated to any contract and feel the space better suits his now homeless 3rd cousin.
A good point you say? With at least 10 million too many houses and an entrenched megatrend of declining prices, incresaing masses of people who cannot pay their obligations due to lack of money, she should bet everything against the money going instantly to worthlessness?
If society breaks down and we are reduced to chaos and lawlessness, the landlord will have a lot more to worry about than his third cousin’s homelessness. An armed gang of thugs may decide that they need the space more than the third cousin.
We’d have to go pretty far to get there.
FWIW, not even in our south of the border, failed narco state neighbor are things that bad (no roving gangs of hungry thugs). Not saying its not dangerous down there, it is, just trying to put some perspective into things.
Yeah, but where would they be without our illegals sending them money, and all of us paying for their labor on the things we import from there. It appears to me that without us they might be there. Then again if we weren’t consuming their drugs maybe they’d have come up with a sustainable economy by now.
Yeah it’s all our fault. Just look at Canada. Our drug demand has turned that place into a socialistic he’ll.
In the case of a currency collapse and ensuing chaos, I’d rather have some gold/silver coins to offer my LL than own the house. (I don’t have those, because I view the odds of a disorderly currency adjustment as a low-probability event).
Most importantly, I’d want to have some useful skills to offer both to my LL and my neighbors.
Owning would be no protection at all.
“Owning would be no protection at all.”
Owning firearms would help.
“Owning firearms would help.”
Not in my case; I don’t know where the key to my gun cabinet is; all I can do is look at my firearms.
Owning would be no protection at all?
I watched an outflux of people leave the Cape when landlords kicked them out and fixed up the places for the highest bidder. I’ve been warned by people locally about how they fixed up their places ony to have their landlords tell them it was time to go and then moved in themselves. If everyone soon only wants to rent, how much protection will the lower bidders have while an increasingly number of empty homes in shadow inventory status are left to rot in ruin w/o maintenance, heat or a/c? I think we all make the mistake of relying on how things have “always been”.
“If there was a currency collapse you are at the mercy of your landlord’s reaction to a potentially rapidly declining social stability.”
Only if he’s got more/bigger guns that you do.
That’s why I don’t get the gold-bugs (the ones who are of the “If society breaks down persuasion; I get the “hyper-inflation” variety) instance that somehow pretty metal will protect you from this Armageddon situation.
If anyone really believe that we’re going to have outright currency collapse and/or a collapse of the country; you need to be buying Glock/Ruger/S&W produced items, NOT something inflation protection!
You should refer to written history regarding all fiat hyperinflations. Do you assert that this time is different and that gold /silver holders will not retain their wealth in this here stagflation/hyperinflation?
Perhaps it would be best to state your position clearly:
Gold /silver holders will lose there wealth during hyperinflation.
Does this sound correct?
If anyone really believe that we’re going to have outright currency collapse and/or a collapse of the country; you need to be buying Glock/Ruger/S&W produced items, NOT something inflation protection!
Relax lint.
The world will not end as long as I own gold.
But if I sell it all. Be afraid.
Still you should accumulate gold at support.
As a homeowner, I’ve never figured out why some other owners are sooo concerned with “property values.” I don’t intend on selling, so I don’t CARE what somebody else* thinks my house is worth.
*Although I do car what the taxman thinks.
Even if they were never on a refinance and take out the equity merry-go-round, they think of the house as savings, something they can sell (and replace with something cheaper) and have cash left over. Unless they really were planning to sell and move to Arkansas or wherever for retirement, it is a dumb attitude, but unless that is going on, I can’t explain it either.
Well I too, regard a house as savings. Or at least a paid off house constitutes a form of savings that you don’t outlive.
But if you think of it as savings in the form of current value of future rent payments you don’t have to make, then you don’t care what it sells for. Again, unless they were planning to sell and bug out for a cheaper place, I don’t get it.
Keeps the rif-raf out.
That was the argument I used in opposing a huge “retirement community” (it went BK) in my neighborhood. The developers, of course, were all gung-ho,their main argument being that their “upscale” community will increase the appraised amounts of the houses of we people who live nearby. My argument was that I didn’t want the value of my house to increase, because I wasn’t planning on selling it in the near future. I’ll just end up owing more taxes. They couldn’t believe that someone would actually own a home as a place to raise a family, and NOT as an investment.
Hey you’re still using it as an investment. At a very real level, purchasing is an investment which grants the in-kind dividend of fixed price housing. But other want to use it as a SPECULATIVE investment.
“unrepentant renters” …..I love that! I am going to use it.
Flicks, Picked: Best And Worst Films Of 2010
December 23, 2010
Fresh Air from WHYY
Fresh Air’s film critic David Edelstein watches dozens upon dozens (upon dozens) of movies a year. Some are fantastic, some are so-so and some are truly dreck. (We’ll save those for last.)
Here, Edelstein rounds up some of his favorite films and performances from 2010 — his picks for what’s worth seeing, what movies may win big come awards season, and what you’d best avoid if you don’t want your loved ones to stage an intervention in your Netflix queue.
…
Client 9 and Inside Job Two examinations of the global financial crisis are the year’s best documentaries, Edelstein says. Client 9 is filmmaker Alex Gibney’s movie about the Eliot Spitzer scandal, which suggests the ex-New York governor’s downfall wasn’t just about the prostitution investigation that drove him from office — that the many enemies Spitzer made on Wall Street and in the New York state capital at Albany may have contributed to his political demise.
Charley Ferguson’s Inside Job, about the 2008 global financial meltdown, meanwhile, documents the types of Wall Street shenanigans that may have directly contributed to Spitzer’s demise. “These movies have not crossed over,” Edelstein says. “They appeal to a segment of the [American] audience, but they’re preaching to the choir. I think it’s extraordinary that these films are so marginalized at a time when these issues are on everybody’s minds.”
…
If inflation kicks into high gear, soon we can all be guilty of money laundering by eating at Applebeesand have our phones tapped.
I plan on watching those two movies, PB. Hadn’t heard of client 9.
I watched “Plunder” two days ago. Even though I felt it portrayed the FB’ers as victims, which to a certain extent some are, it was generally a good movie imo.
My hope is that, just as Ron Paul was branded a wacko and is now gaining mainstream popularity, the public will become fully aware of the looting and corruption that has taken place and react with an appropriate response. Such as a fair trial followed by a proper hanging.
I hope my former broker took my advice of 4-5 years ago. I recommended that he purchase a UPS hat and jacket so when the hordes break into his office he could run out the front door shouting and pointing “he’s in there”.
PB posted an article yesterday very late, and it bears repeating this morning.
SACRAMENTO —- California Treasurer Bill Lockyer raised eyebrows last week by arguing in a newspaper column that “California isn’t broken,” but it’s not allaying the fears of the state’s hard-pressed taxpayers. If the state’s top financial official is in deep denial about California’s precarious situation, then it’s time for the rest of us to be very concerned indeed.
Jointly written by Lockyer and Stephen Levy, a lefty Palo Alto economist and longtime advocate for higher taxes, the piece dismissed criticisms that California has a hostile business climate and denied businesses are leaving the state. They argued that the state’s government is relatively lean, and that California is, in many cases, in better economic shape than other states.
I read the Lockyer article and rolled my eyes.
There’s no “rush” to leave California. It’s a process that’s been going on for decades now.
Consider the two flagship Silicon Valley companies: Intel and Hewlett-Packard. Both got their start in Silicon Valley decades ago. Both were increasingly pinched by the high costs of doing business in Silicon Valley. Their original thoughts were that this was just a function of the costs in the Bay Area, and if they just moved a few miles to the “low rent” district everything would be fine. HP built a campus at Roseville CA and Intel built a campus at Folsom CA. My recollections of the history of Intel Folsom was a little shakey so I hunted up an article which discussed the history (as of 2004).
http://www.bizjournals.com/sacramento/stories/2004/09/06/focus1.html
Within a year [from 1984], Intel had two four-story office buildings, FM1 and FM2, on the Folsom site north of Highway 50, and a few hundred employees. There was plenty of room to grow, and grow it did.
Today, Intel’s Folsom campus boasts seven four-story buildings, acres of parking lots, an improved $11 million Highway 50 interchange at Prairie City Road, courtesy of the state of Califor-nia, a widened Iron Point Road, thanks to Folsom and Sacramento County, and 6,500 employees. ….
The cost of electricity was far cheaper in Folsom through Sacramento Municipal Utility District than through PG&E. Jenkins says the Folsom site saved $10 million in power costs because of SMUD’s lower costs during the past 20 years.
FM8 was finally finished a few years after this article went to press in 2004. Amazing about utility costs: Intel apparently paid $7 million to buy the land and saved $10 million just in electricity costs.
These Sacramento area campuses helped for awhile, but even 20 years ago both companies elected to plan future growth out of state. HP moved its printer division HQ (the most profitable division) to Boise ID. Intel created its largest single campus in Hillsboro OR, and another one near Phoenix AZ.
I hate to prejudge him, but Lockyer appears to have ignored the drum beat of the last 30 or 40 years in the California business climate. Profitable companies have moved from urban California to exurban California, then out of state, and finally out of country. This is hardly a “new” situation, but rather something that’s been building up since the 1970s.
I just don’t get all the pessimism. Why CA is in great shape. We can still raid Calpers for the state government expenses, we’ve got the highly tech prison industry system that give inmates on death row organ transplants, and drug trafficing to help support the underground economy in the poor areas. And those with income can move across the border, open a PO Box and have mailed forwarded to a CA rental addy to avoid paying CA taxes.
“I just don’t get all the pessimism.”
Don’t forget that marijuana is almost legal, and gay marriage is almost constitutional.
The Sacramento Municipal Utility has lower rates than PG&E? I thought socialism was inefficient and costly compared to good ol’ American free enterprise.
Depends entirely on the industry. Some industries do better if the private sector runs it, some do better if government runs it. Some industries do better with a mix of both such as heavy regulation or capped profits.
Oh, and it’s fun to spot the occasions where the capitalist sector praises their own ingenuity in public, but then privately they lobby for government cheese because that creates “jobs.”
Don’t remind me of SDG&E. When we moved to Colorado our electric bill was half of the bill in San Diego, even though our house here is much bigger. Even more amazing, the heating bill was about the same.
It’s amazing how much variation there is from state to state in electricity costs. Here’s a map that shows the average cost per KWhour from 2007 statistics.
http://www.think-energy.net/EIA%20Map_Average%20electricity%20cost%20by%20state_2007.jpg
Hmm. We’re (Ky) the third cheapest in the nation. And it’s still cheaper to heat your house with nat gas here.
Why does the Northeast rely on heating oil instead of nat gas to heat their homes? Do they not have the infrastructure to deliver it to households? Heating oil seems like an expensive pain in the a$$. It’s gotta pollute a lot more, too, no?
Natural gas occurs “naturally” in the western US. It’s pretty simple to just pipe it around for a couple of hundred miles. Here in Idaho most comes from neighboring Wyoming, whereas most of our electricity comes from hydroelectric plants (just like KY in the TVA area) and nuke plants. Idaho is “nuke friendly” due to the national labs here - all of the reactors used by the Navy for decades were built at the INL. So people aren’t particularly “scared” by nuclear energy.
The NE portion of the US is “energy poor”. The rivers don’t have enough drop to generate much hydro power, and there’s little fossil fuel other than coal. A large portion of the electricity used there is generated in hydro plants in far northern Quebec - which is about the only source of revenue keeping the moribund Quebec economy alive. NIMBYs keep out the construction of any new nuke plants.
IIRC (not going to do an in depth research on this one) natural gas was very prevalent in the NE in the early 20th century, but due to safety problems like houses blowing up, it was phased out and replaced by electricity or heating oil.
The think the infrastructure for electricity and heating oil were also cheaper to maintain at the time.
But they don’t dig up the gas lines in a neighborhood if you disconnect yourself from the gas. Of course I outside of DC and while my mid-century neighborhood has natural gas, newer neighborhoods tend to NOT be piped for gas. Instead the houses be all-electric, including heat pumps, because initial installation is cheaper.
DC is not NE. New York to Maine is considered NE.
By “early 20th century” I meant pre-1950.
Different regions have different reasons. I was just stating general conditions. There were many gas explosions from the 1800s to 1950s, and this created an aversion to nat-gas in many regions.
If people choose to not buy where nat-gas is available, then that’s their choice. A dumb one IMHO, but theirs nonetheless.
Sorry if this appears in wrong place. THANKS FOR THE state by state information, DennisN! This is really useful. Although less so in the event the grid gets whacked.
We need measures of alternative heating costs, with some lip service given to price to play. Like, “Woodstove, $400; cost of winter’s worth of hardwood hauled in and stacked, $x”. Or “Geothermal piping, $x; cost to rig circulating pipes, $x+$y”.
DennisN and other engineers out there, IMHO this might be the kind of thing where you could really make bank. Figure out a way to make that geothermal heat conveyer work without an electric pump. I will warrant that all the builder retread morons can’t do the math.
Electric rates sky rocketed in Texas once the state regulations were roved and Ken Lay and his buddies allowed to reign supreme.
All the while telling everyone that competition would bring lower rates.
Dereg has done nothing but increases consumer prices in every single industry that has been deregulated.
Except for the airline and telecommunications industry. Minor stuff.
PG&E went bankrupt in 2001. Should that be taken into consideration in comparison?
PG&E went bankrupt 2001.
PG&E went bankrupt 2001.
Ha!
In the early ’80’s, PG&E begged customers to “conserve energy” because of the high price of oil due to the late-70’s “oil shocks”.
The citizens of San Diego did so well, that PG&E had to raise rates to make up for lost income.
San Diego just did the same thing for water. They asked us to conserve, citizens complied and were rewarded for a huge hike in water rates. “We can’t lower our fixed costs because everyone conserved, so let’s just raise our rates.” How they determine these rates is totally unfair.
Take my father who did his part, cut water use by 50 percent, even let his lawn go brown. Neighbors used all the water they could to keep the landscaping looking beautiful. Under the formula the water district used to determine water rates, they looked at your highest month usage and that was your cap, exceed the cap, you pay hefty fees. Those that conserved nothing got no price hikes, now when my father decided he no longer wanted a brown lawn, he wasn’t willing to pay the higher rates and wanted the same rates as his neighbors who have identical houses and land sizes, the water district told him to pound sand.
From this day on I laugh when a utility asks me to cut back, no way, it will just raise my rates.
PG&E went bankrupt, yes, but the cause was mainly a failed deregulation scheme, where they weren’t allowed to sell power for more than it cost them to purchase on the open market (remember the whole cost of power manipulation scheme? Enron anyone?). Unlike many other recent bankruptcies, the common stock was preserved. During BK, the common traded for less than $10 per share. Now it is trading at almost $50 ($48 at last check).
Sac Muni Utility needs only to distribute power to a small, relatively populated area (dense population), fewer number of transmission lines to maintain per user of power, flat terrain (no erosion to deal with during winter storms, etc.), and isn’t looking to make a profit.
PG&E needs frequently to distribute power to much less dense areas (and maintain transmission lines, etc.), and is in it to make a profit.
If you charged the government with doing the SAME job as PG&E, I’d be surprised if they can do it for any lower COST (for Apples to Apples comparison, I’m not looking at rates charged, but at the cost structure of the organization). I’m thinking more union involvement, higher pension costs (I am familiar with PG&E’s pension program–a relative worked there for 40 years, and his pension would be significantly higher with state sponsorship), and more spread out area to maintain/service.
If I had the choice of a locally run muni power company over PG&E for my own power bill, I’d take it, but then again, I live in a densely populated area. Overall, I’d take PG&E over state run if I am honest about having the lowest cost of running the power system.
FWIW, these days any place in the first world is too expensive for HP and Corporate America. Heck, even Bangalore is starting to look expensive to them.
Question: I recall reading that American corporations were able to take a tax break if they set up a new shop, even if it was an overseas outsource shop.* What if an American corporation moves that shop from Bangalore to, say, Ho Chi Min City ? Can they take that tax break again? And is it worth the price to move the shop? Bangalore was much cheaper than California, but how much cheaper is Ho Chi Min City than Bangalore?
Although, I’m not sure where a company like HP would outsource the work TO. The only reason India can do HP work is because they deliberately chose to educate the kids in IT while neglecting physcial infrastructure. Who else has trained workers for those skills? I’m guessing South America…
————-
*The Dem house passed a bill to cut that tax break, Republicans filibustered it.
*The Dem house passed a bill to cut that tax break, Republicans filibustered it.
Really? I thought the Rs just threatened and the Ds rolled over like usual. I don’t remember seeing any real filibusters in the last couple of years, although Bernie’s speech came close.
I’ve only been posting this since Nov.
(Reuters Sept, 28, 2010) - Senate Republicans blocked a Democratic bill on Tuesday to end tax deductions enjoyed by companies that close their U.S. plants and move overseas.
With a largely party-line vote of 53-45, Democrats failed to muster the 60 votes needed to clear a Republican procedural hurdle against the measure, which would also give employers a tax break to hire new U.S. workers.
I’ve seen your repeated posting of that, and don’t mind you reminding everyone about it. That’s still not a filibuster, though.
That right. It wasn’t a filibuster. That’s the point.
Strapped Cities Hit Nonprofits With Fees
Facing budget gaps and an aversion to new debt and taxes, states and local governments are slapping residents with an array of new fees—and some are applying them to nonprofits.
That marks a sharp departure from long-standing tax exemptions mandated by state law or adopted on the theory that churches, schools and charitable organizations work alongside governments to provide services to the community.
The issue is on display in Houston, where some flood-prone roads are in such disrepair that signs warn drivers, “Turn around, don’t drown.”
Houston’s taxpayers in November narrowly voted to adopt a “drainage fee” to raise at least $125 million a year toward the cost of improving roads and storm-water systems. The city will charge fees to property owners, and it won’t grant exceptions to churches, schools and charities.
“Strapped Cities Hit Nonprofits With Fees”
Bagholder designation process continues.
Seems like a good place to spend stimulus dollars.
Instead of wasting dollars on wars and bailing out banks how about repairing storm drainage systems and roads?? and that’s just a start.
Coburn: Control Government Spending or Face ‘Apocalyptic Pain’
“Apocalyptic pain” from an out-of-control debt could cause 18 percent unemployment and a massive contraction in the economy that would destroy the middle class, a leading Republican deficit hawk said in an interview that aired Sunday.
Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., who recently issued a report on government waste, warned that the U.S. only has about three or four years to get its fiscal house in order or it could find itself facing austerity measures seen in Greece, Ireland, Spain, Portugal and earlier in Japan.
“The history of republics is they average 200 years of life. And they all fail in the history over fiscal matters. They rot from within before they collapse or are attacked,” Coburn told “Fox News Sunday.”
I wonder if the government entities would have committed to spending all that money if Wall Street (and their enablers) hadn’t blown so many bubbles.
IMHO, it is the financial industry that has caused all the problems in the public sector. First, by making the governments think they could earn hefty returns over the long run; and second, for running asset prices up for so long, and for so high, that they were bound to collapse in a dramatic fashion.
Odd how we hear so much braying about how the public sector workers (or any “regular” working Joes and Janes) need to face “austerity measures” and have their pay reduced and their benefits taken away, but we hear so very little about any “austerity measures” for those on Wall Street — you know, the ones who actually caused all the problems in the first place. The amount of money that we have (and will) throw at these criminals totally dwarfs what the “pension crisis” will cost…but not a word of it in the MSM. Coincidence? Or should we perhaps think about who controls the message we hear through the MSM?
ca renter ….you are so right . The obligations to public workers would
not of blown up had it not been for the acts of Wall Street/Bankers/Corp .
The power elite are going to try to shift the blame to anybody but themselves and expect other sectors of the economy to pay the price for their greed . I grant you that public contracts got a little padded
in recent years ,but I would rather have public workers making a good income than the Fat Cats hording billions or taking it out of this Country.These Fat Cat power brokers start working their PR campaigns the minute anybody starts wanting them to give up anything .
Corporations underfunded their pension plans along with Government ,but at the same time Wall Street got the profits from Corporations by them understating their obligations .
Why should CEO’s get millions in salary and benefits when their pension
obligations weren’t really covered and why should the government take over those obligations when they file for their fake re-structures to get out of obligations ?
I grant you that some of the retirement obligations were just unrealistic ,but why does a Corporation gain all the benefits from
what they promised yet they fill they can screw everybody now .
I have already been cut on my promised pension ( and it wasn’t even that big of a pension ).
Totally agree that the public pensions got out of hand in California when Gray Davis (& Co.) upped the formula for retirement from 2% to 3%.
But we also don’t hear about how the municipal govts were told not to contribute to the retirement funds during the good times…and how the union employees tried in vain to force/encourage them to keep making contributions.
ALL OF MSM is owned by just 6 corporations in this country.
No mystery there.
ALL OF MSM is owned by just 6 corporations in this country.
Freedum!
Damn leebrul corporations!
Oh wait…
How does debt cause unemployment? I mean this as a serious question.
Two scenarios come to mind:
1) Interest rates rise dramatically, further stifling “consumer” demand.
2) The printing presses go wild funding the gov’ts deficits, forcing a collpase in the USD, fanning hyperinflation in energy and all those imported Asian goods we’ve grown to love and depend on. People shift their spending to food and energy.
#2 is happening now, per last week’s discussion on the rising price of food in a supposedly deflationary environment.
Last Friday there was a feature on Nightly Business Report (PBS) about a family-owned dairy in Wisconsin. Small dairy farms have been going BK for decades because the price of milk has remained relatively flat. (That’s not surprising because cheap milk is a linchpin of loss-leader marketing.) So, the dairy in Wisconsin began making cheese in addition to directly selling milk, and it is the most profitable part of the business.
Americans eat 3 times more cheese than 40 years ago, which is probably a significant component of our obesity epidemic. It’s hard to find authentic Mexican food anymore, so much of it is slathered with monterey jack or cheddar cheese. Street tacos don’t have ANY cheese. And when Pizza Hut started putting cheese in the crust, I knew we’d reached a tipping point.
Americans eat 3 times more cheese than 40 years ago, which is probably a significant component of our obesity epidemic
I love cheese. I miss cheese a lot. It is very expensive here. But I’m lighter.
Abnormally high debt creates systemic risk to the system (i.e., if times get bad, not only does your new business dry up, the IOU’s that you used as collateral to build your business drop in value requiring collateral calls and termination of employees to try to stay afloat). In addition, the more debt you have this year, the less purchasing power you will have next year, unless we see rampant wage inflation (not very likely in the short term).
Abnormally high debt creates systemic risk to the system
I told you bankers are DUMB. They are. They created and pushed too much debt thus endangering our entire economic system.
People maybe are “smart”, but bankers are dumb.
I agree that using debt leverage to expand one’s business is not much different than buying tech stocks on margin. It only works well in one direction. As to the majority of banker’s being dumb, however, I do not necessarily agree. Make as much money as you can now and retire or jump ship before it sinks is the behavior that was being rewarded on Wallstreet. Is retiring with 10 million or more after 5 years of work pushing leverage games “dumb”? Albeit several other negative adjectives may apply. Note that the bankers are not the bank, and have their own motives and opposing interests.
I should add, I have seen no evidence that would convince me that if approached with a sure fire way to make millions and retire rich in 5 years (with the only draw back being that if enough people did it it would cause significant economic harm to others) that bankers are any more likely to take advantage of such opportunity than say the average Walmart or government employee. Although people would like to think they are different, psychological expirements and testing indicate otherwise. Unless you are presented with the same circumstances, I don’t think you can accurately say what you would do. Should we hang bankers merely because they were given the “opportunity” that those doing the hanging would be just as likely to accept?
experiments
As to the majority of banker’s being dumb, however, I do not necessarily agree. Make as much money as you can now and retire or jump ship before it sinks is the behavior that was being rewarded on Wallstreet.
I was thinking “dumb” more along the lines of potentially destroying, criminalizing and discrediting their own banking industry. And they did all of those things. That’s why we had to bail out their complete failure.
But if I were to label them using your apparent most respected value of money making, I would say they were more sociopathic and borderline criminal than dumb.
But I don’t solely value the sole criteria of money making.
Unless you are presented with the same circumstances, I don’t think you can accurately say what you would do.
I was presented with the opportunity to do well in a job, except that in order to do so I would have to lie to get research money. I refused to lie, and that was a huge conributor to my losing my job. Do I “pass?”
As have I.
So yes, I CAN say accurately what I would do.
But even then, that kind of opportunity is about as common as winning the lottery.
Debt service chokes off future spending freedom.
For the very reason that human nature is such that people will take advantage of any situation in which they can get rich quick and bail
and leave a ruin behind them ,regulation is necessary .
Amen, Wiz!
Printing money to bailout elite cuases everyone elses pay check to shrink. They spend more on food and fuel and less on services and manufactured goods. This increases unemployment.
Coburn had more to say yesterday:
Obama administration, Congress brace for new political reality
“Washington (CNN) — A new political reality hits Washington next week, with the first split Congress since 2004 raising questions about whether the bipartisan cooperation of the recently concluded lame-duck session can continue…
While acknowledging that “those that are more well-to-do will be called to sacrifice to a greater extent” — a traditional Democratic stance — Coburn said the increased spending of the past decade under both Obama and former President George W. Bush required immediate and significant cuts to show financial markets and investors here and abroad that the United States is serious about balancing its books.
The tax deal means that hundreds of billions of dollars that would have been raised in higher income taxes and expired tax cuts will instead get spent in the economy, Coburn noted.”
——
Coburn is lying through his teeth. We already know that those billions in tax cuts are spent in Asia’s economies. And if demand is down for products from those economies, that money is plowed into existing commodities, hoping to inflate a new bubble for a quick cheat profit instead of a solid return based on lont-term investment in “stuff.” Exhibit A: the price of oil is $90.50/barrell.
Yeah, remind me again what’s the cost, past and present, of the useless war in Iraq, not to mention that fancy embassy/state department compound that was built there. Slap a lien on the Bush/Cheney families and their grisly band of neo-CON grinches.
How about the cost of many foreign entanglements, propping up various puppets, governments, countries, etc. at the cost of American taxpayers? How about the costs of illegal immigration? How about the subsidies to multi-nationals? How about the offshoring and outsourcing that reduces tax revenue? Gonna do something about that, Coburn, huh? HUH?
I’d also suggest compiling a list of non-profit and “activist” organizations that are funded by the fedgov, and the amounts of funding they receive. I read somewhere that Catholic Charities receives some ungodly amount, like 9 billion dollars per year. Of course, this could be completely false, but it would be interesting to look into all the organizations that do get money, including the drug companies that receive taxapayer funded “research” funds, and then charge citizens out the wazoo for crappy drugs.
Palmetto for President!
ACORN received $31 million from 1998 to 2008. $3.1 million per year. Big pharma spend more than that just on *ahem* bathtubs-on-the-beach TV ads.
To Obama’s credit, there are “only” 50,000 troops or so left in Iraq. I don’t know how many contractors..
Organizations like Catholic Charities are much more likely to receive government funds from state and local governments than the fed. They run services that the states and locals contract for like foster care placement and training.
The new US embassy in Baghdad is the size of Vatican City. Estimated cost to build, over $700 million, as of October 2009 already needed $130 million worth of repairs.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/world/iraq/article6888266.ece
Holy cow! I had no idea.
“Apocalyptic pain” from an out-of-control debt could cause 18 percent unemployment and a massive contraction in the economy that would destroy the middle class, a leading Republican deficit hawk said in an interview that aired Sunday.
Uh, isn’t that already happening? As a result of our misguided economic policies and the concentration of wealth in the hands of the few? Our increasing debt is a symptom of this disease, not the cause, at least thus far.
“The history of republics is they average 200 years of life. And they all fail in the history over fiscal matters. They rot from within before they collapse or are attacked,”
Examples? I can’t think of any that fit this supposedly standard ‘history of republics’.
It’s probably the same type of math that some people use to say that Keynesian economics worked great for 40 years.
We sure did have a lot more stable economy, with far fewer and less severe bubbles and busts, when we were on a Keynesian system. We got off of it, and surprise! We’re back in a bubble/bust economy, just like we had before we adopted Keynes’ ideas.
But I guess that’s just a coincidence right? WW2 forced us to have a great economy after it ended- there was just no avoiding it. A question, though- Why didn’t WW1 do the same?
But it did. Ever heard of “the roaring 20s?”
The problem was the chaos of exploding growth resulting from lack of regulations of almost any kind and thus the subsequent collapse now known as The Great Depression.
And the credit bubble that led up to the Great Depression. Not kidding.
‘Apocalyptic Pain’
Would ‘Apoplectic Pain’ capture it better?
“Apocalyptic pain” from
an out-of-control debt couldgross wealth inequality DID cause 18 percent unemployment and a massive contraction in the economy thatwoulddid destroy the middle class, a leading Republicandeficit hawklying, hypocritical nutball said in an interview that aired Sunday.The same Republicans that voted down ending tax breaks for offshoring jobs?
Ye… ah.
A Little Fresh Air this morning from real rock musicians who used to sing and play with passion:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1EacQEhrbBQ
I am quite sure I saw them live…Just not sure where…Kind of a blur….:)
“Early last year, a buyer offered $100,000 for the condo but the lender, Bank of America, turned it down. Six months later a contract came in for $85,000, but that, too, was rejected. So was a contract for $65,000 and, just recently, one for $60,000.
The condo is back on the market at $64,900 — the least amount the bank said it would take — but Bangs doubts it will bring that much.
“That’s four prices that they’ve had the opportunity to accept for as much as $100,000 and now they’re going to see a sale below $60,000,” he predicts.”
http://www.tampabay.com/news/business/realestate/rise-in-short-sales-is-symbol-of-housing-crisis-devastation/1142122
Why should managers of too-big-to-fail banks worry about holding on to falling knife real estate assets? They will still get paid millions in compensation; why should they care?
Note that they were discussing short sales, and not foreclosures (although they are slow on dropping the price in the case of foreclosure as well, it’s usually at least 10% less than the short sale price). If banks tried helping every seller paying debt service get out of their home by voluntarily absorbing a loss, they would not have adequate capital and reserves to keep their doors open. I think they are hoping that a significant number of wannabe sellers will continue to make payments rather than have a foreclosure on their credit report, especially those with money in a recourse State.
I thought Gietner guaranteed every bank (and well connected business) access to capital to keep thier doors open??
I think they are hoping that a significant number of wannabe sellers will continue to make payments rather than have a foreclosure on their credit report,
That’ the Combo theory. Banks choose to keep the HVAC in those homes, use the FB’s meager checks to make the minimum payment on the bills, and bet on a quick reinflation. They lost their bet big time, but Obama covered them.
“…use the FB’s meager checks to make the minimum payment on the bills, and bet on a quick reinflation. They lost their bet big time, but Obama covered them.”
Hmm, what else can be done to keep banks alive and high home prices? There must be a way!!
Well I was out west a few days. I am really not in Tampa as I type, but will be in Tampa this afternoon. Then leave there again Wednesday and come back out west.
I hope this is my last long distance job. I think I have one more run at a consulting gig in the South Bay in a couple of years. Then I want to downsize my income after that and work for one of the defense firms in AZ.
Preventive health habits are going to be super important, as it takes longer workouts to burn the same calories. It is exciting to contemplate getting out of contract engineering. It should be done when you are young and with good knees! You build up your wealth when you are young, but still work out to stay thin. Then you let asset rebalancing work for you, and you care less about the money chase. I will rejoin masters swimming and get back into biking.
It is exciting to contemplate getting out of contract engineering. It should be done when you are young…
Yeah, like I’m going “build up the wealth” of some young gun who has only a vague idea what he’s talking about. No thanks; consulting contracts go to the older guys who have the resumé to back up their $150-200/hour price tag.
You build up your wealth when you are young, but still work out to stay thin. Then you let asset rebalancing work for you, and you care less about the money chase.
Because we’re all gonna bite it?
Masters swimming was my best decision of 2010. I learned how to swim, and now I’m in the middle lanes. In fact, I’m going for a swim in a little while.
Regular exercise swimming in a chlorinated pool? That’ll kill ya.
You might as well jump rope in your garage with the car running.
“Chlorine used to disinfect swimming pools is widely recognized as a health hazard. New research suggests that children who swim frequently in chlorinated pools may have increased risks of developing allergies or asthma. Among adults exposure to chlorine in swimming pools has been linked with other health problems including bladder and rectal cancer and, possibly, an increased risk for coronary heart disease.”
Weil MD
News you can use! That’s why I keep coming here.
Apparently it will rot your teeth, too.
And I have been figuring on taking up swimming since my joints are bad.
“Anyone who trains several times a week or more at an indoor pool, however, might want to start “paying attention to chest health,” Miller says. If you often feel tightness or shortness of breath, in or out of the pool, “consider getting a pulmonary function test,” he says.”
http://well.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/07/22/are-indoor-pools-bad-for-your-lungs/
It may be chloramines, formed when chlorine reacts with proteins that create the most damage.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-12-27/spanish-mortgages-for-housing-fall-24-percent-from-a-year-ago-in-october.html
Spanish mortgage demand dropping like a stone as government incentives (which the country manifestly cannot afford) expire. Prices also down 5.7% YOY. The dropping prices are bad news for the banksters, which mean their mark-to-fantasy balance sheets just dropped deeper into the red. After denying they need a bailout, my 2011 prediction is that they go hat in hand to the EU for a Greece-style bailout, which the taxpayers of northern Europe will never see again. That would also decimate the 750-billion Euro rescue fund, so when the “contained” Eurozone debt & credit implosion spreads to Ireland, Belgium, and other “core” EU countries, the ECB will be forced into Bernanke-style hyperinflationary creation of trillions of Euros out of thin air to cover their bankster puppet-masters’ bad bets.
“Spanish mortgage demand dropping like a stone as government incentives expire.”
Me gusta!
LOL…
Wis. officials: Where’d we bury that time capsule?
KIMBERLY, Wis. — Kimberly officials plan to commemorate the village’s 100th anniversary by digging up the time capsule the community buried 25 years ago. There’s just one problem: No one knows where it is.
The time capsule held coins, news clippings and a bottle of New Coke in a 2-foot-long piece of white PVC pipe. It was buried near the municipal building in 1985.
However, the time capsule had to be dug up in 1997 when the building complex was remodeled.
Kimberly street commissioner Dave Vander Velden says it’s not clear where — or even if — it was reburied.
Gosh, a 25 year-old time capsule, with a can of New Coke, some news clippings, and coins from that distant era. What a loss!
Oh the humanity!
Really. Some things should stay lost.
Here’s to hoping our justice system never stoops to this level:
Khodorkovsky Found Guilty in Trial, Lawyers Say
By Henry Meyer and Anna Shiryaevskaya - Dec 27, 2010 3:00 AM PT
A Moscow judge found Mikhail Khodorkovsky, the jailed former head of Yukos Oil Co., guilty of stealing crude from the company during a six-year period, his lawyers said.
“The trial was a charade of justice, the charges were absolutely false, but I fear the sentencing will be very real,” Vadim Klyuvgant, the lead defense lawyer, said today in an e- mailed statement. The sentence will be given this week or after Jan. 10 when Russia’s New Year holidays end, the lawyers said.
The defense team plans to appeal the decision against Khodorkovsky and his former business partner Platon Lebedev, Klyuvgant told reporters outside the courtroom. “There isn’t the slightest doubt that there was pressure on the court.”
…
None of the Russian oligarchs came by thier billions honestly.
Khodorkovsky not only failed paying off the political cast, he downright challenged them. If he’d played nicely and gave a cut of his ill gotten gains to the political cast he would still be free like all the other Russian oligarchs.
Similar to the US of A. ,make your campaign contributions and you get away with anything, like stealing hundreds of billions (see Goldman Sucks). If you don’t pay your dues to the ruling elite (see Martha Steward) and you go to jail for ripping a few hundred grand.
Granted, the methods here are not as rude but the rules are the same.
The U.S. real estate market is not the only one which has recently experienced a precipitous decline in transactions volume. Are we at the end of the real estate crash or merely at the end of the beginning?
Spanish Housing Mortgages Declined 24% in October
By Charles Penty and Ainhoa Goyeneche - Dec 27, 2010 4:37 AM PT
The number of mortgages issued for Spanish homes in October dropped the most since April 2009 as demand flagged before the expiry of a tax incentive.
The number of home mortgages fell 24 percent from a year earlier, the National Statistics Institute said in a statement today. Asking prices for existing homes in Spain slipped 5.7 percent in 2010, according to separate data published today by Idealista.com, a Spanish property website.
The drop in mortgages coincides with a slide in home sales, which fell about 18 percent from a year earlier in October to the lowest level on record. Spanish banks, which have what the Bank of Spain terms “troubled exposure” to construction and real estate of 181 billion euros ($238 billion), are counting on a recovery in demand to help them clear stocks of foreclosed property taken onto their books during the country’s housing crash.
“None of this data will be good news to all those who are looking for the beginning of the end of Spain’s property crash,” said Mark Stucklin, head of Spanish Property Insight, a Barcelona-based website that tracks trends in the housing market. “You have to wonder whether it’s even the end of the beginning.”
…
The rich are much richer than you and me
By Chris Isidore, senior writer
December 23, 2010: 3:39 PM ET
NEW YORK (CNNMoney.com) — The gap between the rich and the middle class is larger than it has ever been due to the bursting of the housing bubble.
The richest 1% of U.S. households had a net worth 225 times greater than that of the average American household in 2009, according to analysis conducted by the Economic Policy Institute, a liberal think tank. That’s up from the previous record of 190 times greater, which was set in 2004.
The widening gap came even as wealthy households’ average net worth tumbled 27% — to about $14 million — between 2007 to 2009. That’s the first time that they suffered a decline since the three-year period of 1992 to 1995.
Meanwhile, the average family’s net worth plunged 41% — to just $62,200 — from 2007 to 2009, according to EPI’s calculations.
“The typical person lost more because a bigger percentage of their wealth in 2007 had been the value of their home,” said Heidi Shierholz, an economist with EPI.
…
2012 repubican election theme/promise:
“We need to give more money to the very very wealthy, so that they can create even more & more jobs for the wee lil’ people”
“Meanwhile, the average family’s net worth plunged 41% — to just $62,200 — from 2007 to 2009, according to EPI’s calculations.”
I’ll bet the median is much lower than the average. With all the underwater folds might it even be negative?
“Meanwhile, the average family’s net worth plunged 41% - to just $62,200 - from 2007 to 2009, according to EPI’s calculations.”
So much for the concept of being deemed financially incompetent if one hadn’t cashed out all his home equity.
No FB dollar shall be allowed to escape. Not one.
“People are smart” - Ditec
If you really want to know why the rich people are so rich it is largely because millions of Americans willingly sent their money to them.
The rich didn’t steal the money, they didn’t have to. All they had to do was provide the conduits for the money flow.
And borrow money from the Fed at 0%, then turning around a lending to Joe 6 Pack for 20%.
And Joe 6 Pack is trying to get as much of this $20 percent money as he can borrow.
If the car or the furnace break down for many is there is little choice but to pull out the credit card. They aren’t spending their CC’s on designer purses.
Not all are using CC’s for designer purses, but some definitely are. I ran up about $15k in CC debt in my early 20’s on similarly frivolous expenses. That was dumb. Paying that off was a good lesson.
Max, when was that, roughly?
Some decades were more decadant than others.
That would mostly be the years 2000 to 2002. Was fresh out of college and assumed I’d be collecting a hefty paycheck in short order. After a few years of making $21k and living on $31k, I realized “fake it til you make it” doesn’t work if you never actually “make it”.
Should also add that a good chunk of that money was spent on women and booze so it wasn’t a total waste…
Ahhh, nothing like learning young..smiling
Seems like
1. Stock markets and bonds were bailed out by 9 trillion from the FED. Middle class got unemployment and wage cuts, fee increases etc.
2. Elite 400 pay effective tax rate of 15% ie 11% less than me. That’s just on what they report it’s likely much lower.
3. Read up on missing billions in war zones.
“The rich didn’t steal the money,…”
Like hell they didn’t.
Here’s a graph showing the gap between the rich and poor:
http://thepoliticalcarnival.net/2010/04/09/chart-rich-getting-richer-poor-getting/
I always found it ironic that the “good old days” of “freedom” and “hard work” — back when they added “under God” to the Pledge to the flag of “my country” — that the Palin crowd are always wanting to get back to are the same days that the rich/poor gap was the smallest. (and taxes on the rich were highest)
I’ve felt for a long time that the stock market is an excellent way to funnel wealth from outsiders to insiders. After the stresses of the most recent bubble crash, we saw the flash crash, which was the wind blowing the curtains aside for a moment. Think about it - one company able to manipulate the entire market.
Bubbles did create the illusion of wealth, in the face of a declining “real” American economy (I don’t question that demand and sales are up, but the US is moving towards being an end consumer of that, like the colonies were to Britain - at the bad end of a Mercantilist deal).
I think the bubbles and the deficit spending by the government were like meth. And eventually, meth causes a very significant crash.
The housing bull camp seems blithely oblivious to the fact that, unlike in previous real estate downturns, U.S. housing prices have been artificially propped up by government housing price stabilization measures. Hence the outsized potential future gains which normally would be present at this stage of the cycle are not currently available to investors.
Bull vs. Bear: Will housing rebound?
Posted by Nin-Hai Tseng, writer-reporter
December 27, 2010 3:00 am
It’s a question many Americans want answered: Will the value of my home rise or fall next year? Smart minds fall in both camps — here are both sides of the coin on real estate.
One of the most closely watched sectors in 2011 will continue to be real estate – a wildly emotional and divisive topic that’s puzzled investors and economists since the housing bubble burst around 2007. Earlier this year, many observers thought the market would turn around in a big way as federal tax credits spurred home purchases and the economy added jobs following hundreds of billions of dollars of government stimulus spending.
…
They STILL don’t quite know what an “upper limit” is? There are simply not eough physical people to buy. And those jobs weren’t added, they were “saved.” All this *poof*money is just preserving the status quo.
First you begin to dig the hole. <– been doing that since Reagan
Then the hole continues to dig itself. <– outsourcing and wars
Then you fall into the hole. <– unemployment
Then you grab a handhold to stop falling. <— Obama’s stimulus pak, lending freeze.
Then you slow the digging and fill in the hole under you. <— But you’re using *poof*money to keep that handhold so you don’t fall again.
Then you climb out of the hole. <— Debt Commission gores sacred oxes. Probably won’t happen in our lifetimes.
THEN you can climb the hill to higher ground. <— won’t happen in our lifetimes.
It might be easier to declare defeat and fall all the way to China, which is what we’re doing anyway.
I never knew Methodists were so dangerous.
Tea Party Nation condemns United Methodists to oblivion
http://www.examiner.com/liberal-christian-in-tucson/tea-party-nation-condemns-united-methodists-to-oblivion
The Tea Party Nation has a leader named Judson Phillips, and he has decided that the United Methodist Church should be “disbanded.”
Phillips seems to think that he has the authority to recommend that one of the major denominations of Christianity should go out of existence. I’m sure that he thinks that they should all become evangelical fundamentalists,
…he uses a sensational remark to startle potential allies by calling the UMC “the first church of Karl Marx.” This type of gratuitous insult is typical of bully politicians who want only to intimidate people into silence. However, I’m betting that it won’t go over very well with members of the Tea Party Nation who actually are Methodists.
The article relates that:
“In a recent blog post (subscription required) the founder of Tea Party Nation recounts his recent experience visiting the United Methodist Building in Washington D.C., where he saw a promotional banner for the DREAM Act, a failed piece of legislation that would have provided a path to citizenship for some undocumented immigrants who entered the country as children. “
….You will recall that the Tea Party as a whole does not believe that Church and State should be separate. Rather, they hold that the Christian Church—which is to say, evangelical fundamentalist un-Christianity—should be the de facto government of the United States.
This is one example of how labels can obscure and distract. A person who may identify with parts of a movement, in this case the Tea Party, can be branded as a nut due to some other nut hijacking the movement and calling for such things as a disbandment of a church.
If a person identifies himself with the Tea Party then he will be put on the defense in trying to explain his position which may be 100% counter to the position of a nutcase who claims to speak for all members of the movement.
Hence labels, in general, suck.
Hence labels, in general, suck.
Would that mean generalities, in general suck too?
I think that a lot Fundygelicals forget that they themselves are far from being one big happy family. If the US became a theocracy a religious civil war would break out within the “born again” camp as to which flavor of Fundyvangelicalism is the most “genuine” (are you pre, post or mid?)
Isn’t that true everywhere? There would still be a war in mideast even if Israel didn’t exist. Dems fight each other so do the Repubs.
At any given time only certain groups will have their hands in the cookie jar, the rest will definitely complain.
I think that if the “common enemy” were vanquished that the different flavors of Fundyvangelicalism would turn on each other with a vehemence and viciousness that would make any infighting in the Dem or GOP groups look like a dinner party.
Such is the nature of Triumphalism: “We’re the ‘true church’ and the rest of you are idolatrous heretics.” Heck, even now with a “common enemy” Fundyvangelicals engage in constant “sheep stealing” from each other.
Which makes me wonder… once your religion vanquishes all other religions, then the sects of the winning religion turn on each other. Once one sect vanquishes all the others, then families within the congregation of the winning sect turn on each other… then members of the winning family turn on each other. Each time, the original similarities are forgotton and the hatred is as intense as before. I guess those folks from Highlander were right: there can be only one.
“Vee are zee chosen ones!”
Actually heard this on Glenn Beckenhead this morning.
Karl Marx, although of Jewish ancestry, was raised a Lutheran.
Likewise Jakob Ludwig Felix Mendelssohn Bartholdy…
Hence his “Reformation” symphony. Wasn’t his grandfather Moses Mendelssohn?
Yawn.
“You will recall that the Tea Party as a whole does not believe….”
What we may recall of these rabid generalizations makes little difference. The fact that some induvidual is apparently looney and also belongs to a fringe political movement really does not prove anything about the “whole”. A full 1% of our population is known to suffer from some psychotic ailment, and there are undoubtedly more in the shadow inventory.
The fact that some induvidual is apparently looney and also belongs to a fringe political movement really does not prove anything about the “whole”.
But what if there is a “whole” lot of loonies?
Poll: Tea Partiers aren’t libertarian but Religious Right
http://www.secularnewsdaily.com/2010/10/06/poll-tea-partiers-arent-libertarian-but-religious-right/
Since its inception, we’ve heard many times that the Tea Party is not just about being “Taxed Enough Already”, but about liberty, freedom, and the American Way. Many Tea Partiers have attempted to paint the movement as libertarian. A new poll of Tea Partiers contradicts this image, describing instead a socially-conservative movement dominated by the Religious Right.
…they are more likely to be non-Hispanic white; …are overwhelmingly supportive of Sarah Palin; and are much more likely to report that Fox News is their most trusted source of news about politics and current events. However, when it comes to religion and social issues, the results contradict the libertarian image that organizers want to project and that members themselves often believe.
* 81% identify as Christian; of these, 57% consider themselves part of the Christian Conservative movement.
* Of all Tea Partiers, 47% identify as part of the Christian Conservative movement.
* 63% believe abortion should be illegal in all, or nearly all, cases.
* 82% oppose gay/lesbian marriage.
* 76% are Republican partisans, with 48% identifying with and 28% leaning toward the Republican party.
If this is what the Tea Party supports, we should not be surprised that the Tea Party supports radical Religious Right candidates like Sharron Angle, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, and Christine O’Donnell.
Wash. Post: Tea party, religious right often overlap, poll shows
by Michelle Boorstein
The Washington Post
A new poll shows that half of those who consider themselves part of the tea party movement also identify as part of the religious right, reflecting the complex - and sometimes contradictory - blend of bedfellows in the American conservative movement.
How is identifying with a religion and identifying with being conservative a shocking contradiction?
They probably are mostly taxpayers as well. And over 40. Shouldn’t the opportunity to vilify that be siezed?
The point is that the Tea Party is often portrayed as this new movement of libertarian/independents, that has arisen to align itself with the Republicans, against Obama and his supposedly socialist agenda. But the Tea Party is really just the same old moral majority/christian right, that has always been opposed to anything rational and forward-thinking.
OK alpha, I can accept that. I am a Christian, though Sunday mornings will likely find me in the arms of a woman without a ring on her finger. I am conservative, if that means saving some forests, eating red meat, thinking gays are harmlessly queer, not shooting folks who have a different view, not spending money we don’t have and having honesty from our pols. I think some of these tea party guys might feel the same way, just need more to be identified with a group than me. What’s the harm? I rather think it is good for our system to have a group stand up that disavows the system. Any group.
Exactly.
I rather think it is good for our system to have a group stand up that disavows the system. Any group.
Yes but. The point is that the Tea-Party disingenuously, (through ignorance and manipulation) actually and in fact promotes “the system”.
Give it a rest Rio. You cherry pick news stories to promote your point of view.
Social Justice Christianity is another hiding place for Communists, I fear them as much as you progressives fear the evangelicals.
I see no evidence to support your assertion that the whole tea party movement is being led by the religious right.
I see no evidence to support your assertion that the whole tea party movement is being led by the religious right.
Does this help Nikki?
The Tea Party’s religious roots exposed
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/belief/2010/oct/12/tea-party-religious-right
The Tea Party is not a secular movement – as a new poll confirms, it is driven by the fervour of the religious right…
A new survey challenges the conventional wisdom that the Tea Party movement in the US is a secular libertarian movement and in fact demonstrates the religious zeal in its ranks.
These results confirm what I have found reporting on the intersection of the Tea Party and religious right: that the Tea Party movement is driven in no small measure by religious fervour, and that religious-right political elites have deliberately injected themselves into the movement, both as a matter of common cause and political expediency.
The conventional wisdom that the Tea Party movement is a secular one is rooted in its portrayal as a spontaneous uprising of disgruntled, ordinary citizens against “big government” and alleged “socialism”.
This should provide an obvious enough refutation to the purveyors of the theory that the Tea Party movement is disinterested in “social issues”
…But to understand why the Tea Party resonates with the religious right and vice versa, one must understand how the anti-government rhetoric of the Tea Party movement is driven by a fundamental tenet of Christian reconstructionism:
This notion that the federal government – not only godless, but in flagrant violation of God’s will – is “tyrannical” and needs to be overthrown resonates from militias to the John Birch Society to the podiums of religious-right gatherings where Republican presidential hopefuls jockey for the support of the faithful
“Does this help Nikki?”
Keep on picking those cherries Rio. You should also consider the source, the progressive media fears the Tea Party Movement.
Keep on picking those cherries Rio.
They are not cherries. They are facts. In fact, why don’t you pick some of your own “cherries” to disprove mine?
Why? Because you can’t.
City of Houston Shuts Down Two Radioactive Water Wells
A radioactive water well that is controlled by the City of Houston, and that serves residents of Jersey Village, is no longer being used, according to the communications director for Houston Mayor Annise Parker.
On Monday, a KHOU-TV investigation revealed Jersey Village water well #3 was one of 10 water wells identified by recent federal tests as having tested high for a particularly damaging form of radiation called alpha radiation.
It is clear the the government is attempting to cover up their radioactive mess. The EPA has not worked for the interests of the American people in many years and has openly failed once again. The idea that citizens cannot know if their water is radiated due to the threat of terrorism is absolutely criminal.
At least you can find that well in the dark…
Sorry lint, but I know that area well (very, very well) and it is a case of Jersey Village, a small, independent and separate township within the city of Houston, as well as the City of Houston, who have made it a point to obstruct, and obfuscate, not the EPA.
Secondly, the EPA has been deliberately crippled by every GOP administration that could do so for the last 30 years.
Along with all the other consumer watchdog agencies.
I’m convinced that selling a home is all about (1) listing your home where prospective buyers will notice it is for sale, (2) the relationship of your home’s quality to the quality of similarly priced homes currently on the market, and (3) prospective buyers’ purchase budget limits. All the rest of the “how to sell your home” fluff adds up to a pack of used home seller urban legends.
There won’t be many buyers in the market early next year, so competition among sellers could be brutal.
Amy Hoak’s Home Economics
Dec. 27, 2010, 12:01 a.m. EST
Resolutions for home sellers in 2011
Planning to sell your home next year? Start getting ready now.
By Amy Hoak, MarketWatch
CHICAGO (MarketWatch) — If your New Year’s resolution involves selling a home in 2011, you’ve got some work to do: There’s lots of inventory out there and in a buyer’s market like this one, getting an offer on a home can be challenging.
Still, for the committed seller willing to do some prep work and come to terms with the current value of his or her home, locking in a buyer isn’t impossible.
Consider the following tips to give your home the best chance to get noticed — and sold — in 2011.
Price it right from the start
Many sellers suffer from attachment bias, said Tara-Nicholle Nelson, consumer educator for real-estate website Trulia.com. They believe that their home is worth more than they’d pay for it in another context. While it’s always a bad idea to overprice a home, it’s especially dangerous in times like this because there is so much competing inventory in many local markets.
Nelson’s advice: Give yourself a reality check by looking inside comparable homes during open houses. That can help you get a clearer idea of your home’s value.
You might even consider interviewing a few real-estate agents to get more than one take on how the home should be priced, Cammarosano said.
The longer something sits on the market, the more price reductions you might have to make and the more potential buyers will assume that there’s something wrong with the home, he said. So more often than not, it’s best not to try testing the waters with a higher price, he adds.
…
“attachment bias”
Catchy phrase for “greed”.
I thought it was a euphemism for “underwater” (as in, “permanent attachment”…).
Those wacky Euros..
New global banking rules proposed on bankers’ pay (AP) – 2 hours ago
GENEVA (AP) — New banking rules are being proposed by an influential global regulatory panel that would give investors a better idea of when CEOs and other high-paid executives get bonuses even when their companies are lagging.
The panel affiliated with the Bank for International Settlements in Basel said its proposal Monday would require banks to reveal whether a bonus is linked to a firm’s performance and to provide other details aimed at preventing lenders from hiding irresponsible risks.
Giving information on what their employees are paid to the owners of businesses, the suppliers of capital, the shareholders?
That’s socialism!
Will Banker Bonus Deferrals Help? The Atlantic, Dec 26 2010, 8:30 AM ET 7
Regulators are in the midst of trying to develop new bonus compensation rules for banks. This will likely come to the delight of many Americans outside Wall Street, who gasp when they hear of the extraordinary lump sums taken home by bankers and traders each year. But these regulations aren’t likely to limit the sizes of bonuses — just how they’re paid. One likely characteristic of the new arrangement will be to defer some payment to future years.
…Discourages Long-Term Risk Taking
First, some worry that annual bonuses encourage bankers to take long-term risk by seeking short-term profit. They point to financial products that blew up during the financial crisis as lucrative at first, but ultimately disastrous. If some portion of a bonus is deferred, then maybe bankers and traders will be more careful about the longer-term risk involved in their transactions, since their pay would also depend on performance of the trade in future years.
He said “banksters”…..
Big porkers include ATM fees, credit cards Detroit News, December 27. 2010
Banks are hogging capital, lenders are squealing about being forced to play fair, mortgage firms are wallowing in fraud and credit card companies are STILL inventing new ways to steal your bacon.
Yup, sounds like it’s time for the annual Piggy Bank Awards—or “Piggies” — the honors I annually hand out for dishonorable behavior by banksters and other scum. It’s been a year of financial “services” firms going hog-wild with excuses and rip-offs,
http://detnews.com/article/20101227/OPINION03/12270315/Big-porkers-include-ATM-fees–credit-cards#ixzz19L02Ipdo
He said “banksters” too.
Obama to top execs: I feel your pain Colorado Springs Independent
http://www.csindy.com/colorado/obama-to-top-execs-i-feel-your-pain/Content?oid=1974105
Guess who’s whining the loudest these days, wailing that they’re getting a raw deal from Barack Obama?
Not the unemployed and barely employed — even though the White House has blithely ignored their critical need for a national jobs program. Not the poor, though their ranks are swelling as millions of Americans fall out of the middle class.
No, no, the most insistent demand for attention is coming from way above the poor and the middle class. Believe it or not, it’s the CEOs of Americas biggest corporations and the top bankers of Wall Street who are stamping their little Gucci-clad feet, bawling that they should be getting more love and support from the president.
It seems that the feelings of these precious ones have been hurt by Obama’s occasional condemnation of the stupefying greed that’s been shown by the likes of health insurance executives and Wall Street banksters. As one CEO put it, Obama’s attitude “felt too much like we were the bad guys.”
…Yoo-hoo, Mr. Multimillionaire Executive, you are! Corporate chieftains are ruthlessly downsizing the middle class, carelessly polluting our air and water, gleefully destroying our democracy by using their corrupting corporate money to buy our government, and generally feeling entitled to run roughshod over everyone — all while pocketing obscene levels of wealth for themselves. Yet they’re the ones crying?
Those guys are pathetic. They’re a bunch of narcissists with a sense of entitlement.
The 1st rule of being a sociopath is to blame everyone else loudly and often while doing the very things you accuse others of doing.
Only the wealthiest firms (TBTF banks) and poorest households (e.g. those making too little to afford the cost of living in SD County) qualify for discriminatory zero-percent interest loans. The rest of us get to pay market rates. The middle class gets to suck it up.
Who eats the losses on these loans if the owners have no money available to make the balloon payment upon sale of a residence?
POWAY: City loan program helps low-income homeowners fix up properties
Participants pay no interest, have no payments until home is sold or transferred
POWAY: City loan program helps low-income homeowners fix up properties
By ANDREA MOSS - North County Times - Californian
Posted: Saturday, December 25, 2010 10:00 pm
A little-known city program is helping low- and moderate-income homeowners in Poway fix up their properties by providing zero-interest loans that aren’t payable until the homes get new owners.
Roughly 300 residents have taken advantage of the residential rehabilitation loan program since the city launched it in 1994.
Tony Winney, a senior analyst in the city’s redevelopment services department, said Monday that homeowners must meet certain income and asset limits to be eligible for the loans. For a family of four, for example, the income limit is $62,800 per year.
Successful applicants can get up to $10,000 to repair a mobile home or up to $15,000 to fix up a single-family residence, he said. The money can be used to pay for new roofs, electrical work, and fix heating and cooling systems, among other things, Winney said.
Loan recipients make no payments until they sell or transfer their homes, at which time the money is due back to the city. Poway holds a lien against the property until the loan is repaid, Winney said.
Mobile-home owner Diane Ward is one of seven homeowners who got money through the program earlier this year. She said Tuesday that her $10,000 loan paid for an exterior paint job, repairs to protective skirting that keeps animals from getting under her mobile home, and other work completed last month.
“It was a nice Christmas present for grandma,” said Ward, 70. “(The loan program is) perfect for me because I lived alone the last couple of years. But when you’re on a fixed income, you can’t get things fixed.”
Funded with federal money
Winney said the loan program was created to help low-income residents who need financial help with repairing significant health- and safety-related problems at their homes.
The city funds the loans with community block development money Poway gets from the federal government each year. Winney said the amount of federal money the city receives is based on its population and varies from year to year, with roughly $100,000 being typical.
“This is one way for us to take those federal dollars and use them to help create safer environments for those people,” he said. “It also helps create jobs, too, and helps fix up the (city’s) neighborhoods.”
…
Damn lazy poor! They need go out and get a job!
Oh wait… what jobs?
Equity Futures Lower as China Unexpectedly Raises Rates
Seeking Alpha - Gary Townsend - 3 hours ago
This morning. Equity futures are slightly lower, with March SPX futures at 1247.80, down -4.32 points after fair value adjustment. …
New Zealand Economy Unexpectedly Contracts as Earthquake Undermines Growth
Bloomberg - New Zealand’s economy unexpectedly contracted in the third quarter and moved closer to a recession as the worst …
Oil holds above $91 per barrel
Washington Post - Chris Kahn - 15 minutes ago
An unexpectedly large drop in US supplies pushed crude prices above that threshold last week.
Japan Nov Trade Surplus Unexpectedly Shrinks on Import Surge
IMarketnews.com - Dec 21, 2010
TOKYO (MNI) - Japan’s trade surplus shrank 55.4% in November from a year earlier to Y162.8 billion ($1.94 billion),
SCOTTSDALE, AZ – CNBC unexpectedly pulled its documentary Behind the Counter: The Untold Story of Franchising after receiving a threatening letter from Kahala’s newly retained counsel Robert Zarco, who the letter refers to as “the leading franchise attorney in the country.”
Baby Gorilla Unexpectedly Born At Hannover Zoo (VIDEO)
Huffington Post - Dec 22, 2010
Germany’s Hannover Zoo had expected a baby gorilla in time for Christmas, but zookeeper Klaus Meyer was surprised that it was a different mother
Rio, this comment is “unexpected”
Funny eh how economists are always “surprised” by unexpected data or trends?
And yet, get paid for being wrong.
Say whatever else you want about QE, but you can’t deny that it has succeeded in driving up inflation expectations (the antithesis of deflation expectations).
Got pennies?
Copper futures close at a record high Monday
Pennies are no longer made from copper, although they are plated with a very thin layer. If I am not mistaken, they are copper plated zinc.
yes, but many pennies in circulation still are. Anything <=1982, I believe. I’m still adding to my collection as I come across them.
Got a 1940s (IIRC) quarter recently as well, that’s got a large silver component.
And the zinc mining lobby is trying to make sure we keep minting them even though it costs more than once cent to mint one.
And the zinc mining lobby is trying to make sure we keep minting them even though it costs more than once cent to mint one.
Becaus Freedom aint free ,
http://www.coinflation.com/
1982-2011 cent is 97.5% ZINC!
The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sues a firm for using credit histories in its hiring system, a practice that the agency says has a ‘disparate impact’ on blacks.
By David G. Savage, Washington Bureau
December 27, 2010
The federal agency that enforces workplace anti-discrimination laws is warning employers they could be sued if they refuse to hire blacks or Latinos because of a bad credit history or a criminal record.
http://tinyurl.com/32rxcrg
The federal agency that enforces workplace anti-discrimination laws is warning employers they could be sued if they refuse to hire blacks or Latinos because of a bad credit history or a criminal record.
but it’s okay to do so for whites? And somehow that isn’t an equal opportunity issue???
I noticed that too the other day when the story came out.
Reverse discrimination is real. I’ve seen it personally.
Reverse discrimination is real. I’ve seen it personally.
But if I were hiring I’d hire a person of color because they’re usually more hot.
What?
You’ve lost me.
You would not hire a person of color from the southeastern USA. Why? Come over here and find out.
Reverse discrimination is real. I’ve seen it personally.
Holy crap. Are you actually somewhat agreeing with a comment I made?
Is it opposite day or something?
When you’re right and have the facts, of course I’ll agree with you.
I’m often hard because I’ve seen far too much damage done to people’s lives, as in needless death, when the facts are ignored or lies made into action and laws.
So when I see the truth, I also try to encourage it.
I’m no one trick, one message, pony. But I don’t waste subtlety on those who don’t appreciate it.
Conservatives: If you want to influence a liberal, act nice?
Liberals: If you want to influence a conservative, act angry?
Political Leanings Revealed by the Eyes
http://www.livescience.com/culture/liberal-conservative-revealed-by-eyes-101227.html#commentForm
It may be time to take the phrase “political viewpoint” literally. A new study suggests that liberals are more likely than conservatives to follow other people’s eye movements.
People normally respond to “gaze cues,” or the direction that another person is looking, by glancing to see what caught that person’s attention. The new study, to be published in a forthcoming issue of the journal Attention, Perception & Psychophysics, finds that liberals respond much more strongly to such cues than conservatives. The finding is the latest in a series of clues that liberals and conservatives may be subtly different on a biological level, said study researcher Michael Dodd, a psychologist at the University of Nebraska, Lincoln.
“Across a variety of tasks, we are beginning to find a consistent pattern where conservatives are more responsive to threat/disgust, more responsive to angry faces, and less sensitive to gaze cues than liberals,” Dodd wrote in an e-mail to LiveScience. “Liberals, on the other hand, are proving to be more responsive to positive/appetitive stimuli, more responsive to happy faces, and more sensitive to gazes.”
Not only are liberals more positive, intuitive, and pleasant to be around, but they’re also much more likely to be scientists:
“A Pew Research Center Poll from July 2009 showed that only around 6 percent of U.S. scientists are Republicans; 55 percent are Democrats, 32 percent are independent, and the rest “don’t know” their affiliation.”
No wonder they don’t believe in global warming. They can’t ‘do’ science.
No, they can’t. I’ve found this too be very true in real life . The very definition of conservative is too maintain the status quo. (unless they’re robbing someone blind, then they are as innovative and creative as anything in history)
Science destroys the status quo every day.
I wonder if being aware of what someone else is looking at might indicate a greater capacity for empathy.
Just my own personal observations, but most of the “right wing” (speaking primarily about very conservative financially-speaking, not religious) people I know tend to have an, “I’ve got mine, f*** you” sort of attitude; whereas the more liberal people I know are genuinely concerned about the well-being of others and are willing to make sacrifices, to varying degrees, in order to help those who are less fortunate.
Wow!
Al Gore invented global warming just in time.
Was that before or after he invented the internet?
LaviD –
I realize that global climate change is a tough issue to comprehend and that it has become politicized and obfuscated in that sort of rhetoric. But 389 ppm is a big deal and the rate of increase is accelerating. An overwhelming majority of scientists agree that the science behind global climate change is sound and that we are heading into potentially dangerous, uncharted waters not see since the Oligocene epoch ~23 MA, regardless of what semi-knowledgeable climate change deniers will tell you about the Medieval Warm period or the Thames freezing over, etc. etc.
It’s true that in the 1970s, there was a push toward global cooling, and that scientific theories can be and have been overturned. However, these are the people that gave you every modern invention including the Internet upon which we now converse. Do you think that they, not Al Snore, might have a better handle on things, irrespective of the money involved (it’s really just fame that drives us) and the liberal bent of most researchers, than you?
I realize that you could make a case for those on this board knowing the housing issues better than Realt-whores, but climatologists are people who have put years of their lives into their research and in understanding fundamental scientific principles, not people who drive you from stucco shack to stucco shack in a Lexus will no credentials but a few night courses.
I’d rather not get into a shouting match today about this issue. It’s just that these flippant, “See, it’s snowing here therefore there’s no climate change and Al Gore is fat” comments can do a lot of harm when they are picked up on by those who don’t understand the issues Comments like yours may coax them into thinking that there is a debate in the scientific world concerning climate change, which there is not, and that they are just as knowledgeable on the issues as say, the late Dr. Steve Schneider and that non-scientist pundits are right, which they are not on both counts.
MrBubble
Al Gore invented global warming just in time.
I know.
I didn’t even sweat that much today.
If you slept in science class, skip this post
Bundle Up, It’s Global Warming
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/26/opinion/26cohen.html?src=twrhp
As global temperatures have warmed and as Arctic sea ice has melted over the past two and a half decades, more moisture has become available to fall as snow over the continents. So the snow cover across Siberia in the fall has steadily increased.
The sun’s energy reflects off the bright white snow and escapes back out to space. As a result, the temperature cools. When snow cover is more abundant in Siberia, it creates an unusually large dome of cold air next to the mountains, and this amplifies the standing waves in the atmosphere, just as a bigger rock in a stream increases the size of the waves of water flowing by.
The reality is, we’re freezing not in spite of climate change but because of it.
Thanks, I was just going to post this article, since some HBBers can’t seem to grasp how such a pesky scientific paradox could occur. “I look outside my front door and it’s snowing, therefore global warming is a hoax…” yaddah yaddah
Is NYC spending taxpayer money on Hollywood propaganda, or is it being funded by the MPAA? … Wouldn’t it actually save more jobs if NYC wasn’t wasting taxpayer money on propaganda campaigns based on bogus information?
-Techdirt
It would if politicians actually cared what anyone who makes less than a million thinks.
Ron Paul is going to be a very busy man once he takes charge of the Senate Banking Committee.
FT dot com
Fed fund boosted healthy banks
By Robin Harding in Washington, Bernard Simon in Toronto and Christian Oliver in Seoul
Published: December 27 2010 22:04 | Last updated: December 27 2010 22:04
Some of the world’s strongest banks have profited from an emergency credit facility set up by the US Federal Reserve to shore up confidence in the global financial system, according to a Financial Times analysis of data released by the Fed.
More than half of lending under the Fed’s term auction facility – the largest of its crisis programmes – went to foreign banks. Details of the varied uses to which they put it may add to political criticism of the Fed.
The Taf was set up in December 2007 to provide one-month loans to creditworthy banks as markets dried up for lending longer than overnight. In August 2008, it began offering three-month loans as well.
Rabobank of the Netherlands and Toronto-Dominion of Canada, two of the only banks in the world with triple A credit ratings, used more than $20bn in cumulative Taf loans.
Ed Clark, TD chief executive, said that using Taf was logical even though his bank never had a liquidity problem. “That wasn’t how we made a lot of money. But you make a dollar here, you make a dollar there. What’s the spread you make on a billion dollars?” he said.
In the summer of 2008, TD was borrowing $1bn from TAF at rates of between 2 and 2.5 per cent. For that borrowing it used the lowest quality – and hence highest yielding – collateral acceptable to the Fed.
More than 80 per cent of its collateral had a triple B credit rating at a time when such bonds yielded about 7 per cent. TD could therefore have made a notional gross spread of about $4m a month during 2008.
Mr Clark said the authorities were encouraging healthy banks to use schemes such as the Taf so as not to stigmatise their weaker counterparts. In January 2008, Ben Bernanke, the Fed chairman, said the Taf appeared to be succeeding because “there appears to have been little if any stigma”.
“You go through the whole crisis and there were lots of things we did that weren’t necessarily economic but were the right thing to do for the system,” said Mr Clark. “So I’m not embarrassed by this at all.”
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EDITOR’S CHOICE
Backlash over use of Fed crisis cash - Dec-27
Money supply: Rolling back the risks? - Dec-27
Slow US growth highlights fragility - Dec-22
Fed extends central bank swap lines - Dec-21
Affordable housing is starting to come on the market in San Diego County. Here is an example of a current listing on ZipRealty dot com:
826 GALOPAGO, Spring Valley, CA 91977** Foreclosure Short Sale
School District: LA MESA-SPRING VALLEY
Beds: 5 Type: SFR Sq. Ft.: 1,764 Lot Size: 9,104 Sq. Ft. MLS #: 100070459
Baths: 2/0 Built: 1966 $/Sq.Ft.: $91 List Date: 12/07/10 On Market: 20 days
List Price: $160,000 - $190,000
Estimated Monthly Payment: $1,064
This is a short sale and is going to sale 12/27. Indy Mac. There are violent tenants that have left property but are playing the ususal legaltactics (SIC). From inspection a good home with a totally trashed interior. Offer subject to inspection Lender must evict tenants although they have abandoned the property. Warning tenants may be very!!!!uncooperative if present.
Sounds like a real dream of a home.
Bend that Spanish property bubble like Beckham.
What David Beckham Has To Do With Spain’s Boom And Bust
Categories: Housing, Debt
04:00 pm
December 27, 2010
You can see them from 30 miles away in any direction: four shiny new skyscrapers that tower over Madrid.
“It’s like some aliens have landed at one of the ends of the city,” says Patricia Gosalvez, a Spanish architecture critic.
Those aliens say a lot — about the fates of David Beckham and other big soccer stars, about Spain’s economic boom, and about the real estate bust that could lead to the European Union’s biggest bailout yet.
Less than 10 years ago, soccer fields covered the spot where the towers now stand. Madrid’s soccer team, Real Madrid, practiced there. In 2001, as Spain’s real estate boom took off, the team’s owners did something people all over Spain would do in the coming years: They sold their land for a ton of money.
They got 480 million euros — more than half a billion dollars at today’s exchange rates. It was enough money to pay off all of their debts. And over the next few years, Real Madrid bought Beckham and three other soccer superstars.
Two construction companies, an insurance company and a savings bank built the four towers. The companies were flush from the boom, and each building seemed more glitzy than the next. One had this panoramic glass elevator, supposedly the fastest in Spain. Another installed a two-story restaurant in the sky. The third had a garden in the sky, with more than 20,000 plants. The fourth went with a chapel — the highest in Spain.
There was a rumor that the towers might be named after the soccer superstars the team bought with their real estate windfall. It never happened.
By the time the last of the towers was completed in 2009, it was clear that the boom was over. People were not renting office space. Unemployment went up to 20 percent. Construction companies went going bankrupt.
The four towers are currently 75 percent unoccupied.
“They are a metaphor of the boom, and how big we thought, and how little we achieved through it,” Gosalvez says.
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Mocked Meteorologist Gets Last Laugh
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TkzNmWlCig8&feature=player_embedded
Another government conspiracy to tax the heck out of us gets revealed for what it were.
As the USA mass murders and steals the middle east ….
Why would China do this except for diversifying from its dollar holdings?
China Spends Close to US$ 1 Billion Buying Power Plants in Brazil
Monday, 27 December 2010 03:27
Electric power in Brazil Beijing-based State Grid Corp. of China completed the purchase of seven electricity distribution businesses in Brazil for US$ 989 million, announced the Chinese government this past week.
Beijing-based State Grid will run electricity transmission services in the southeast of Brazil and supply power to Brazilian capital Brasília, São Paulo and Rio de Janeiro, according to a statement at the website of the Chinese government’s state-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission.
China’s biggest electricity network operator agreed in May to buy controlling stakes in seven power transmission units in Brazil from Elecnor SA, Abengoa SA, Isolux Ingenieria SA and Cobra Instalações e Serviços SA.
Latin America’s biggest economy is attracting local and overseas investors to develop its energy infrastructure to meet power demand as its GDP expands more than 7%.
State Grid has obtained a 30-year right to transmit power to the southeastern region of Brazil, the statement said. The electricity distribution businesses will generate annual profit of about US$ 110 million, according to the statement.
The American Dream Deferred: What Befell our Strategic Defaulters?
By: Paul Solman and elizabeth shell
We’ve devoted a lot of attention to the foreclosure crisis that is threatening the homes of so many Americans, and to various ways they’ve sought help: non-profit third parties; the government’s loan modification program, HAMP.
Making Sense
But you may remember that some of those we covered had decided to simply stop paying and, if necessary, walk away from their property, aka ’strategic default.’ The financial reasoning is pretty straightforward, according to a twenty-something Cape Coral, Florida resident and restaurant manager named Josh Bartlett, to whom we introduced you in April 2010.
“My $20,000 down-payment is gone,” he told us the other day. “It became a business decision to me. It came to a point where I’m just working to try and pay [the mortgage], but I’m not living my life because every cent I made went into this place. Even if I was up to date with my mortgage now, I’d still be $150,000 underwater. My kids wouldn’t even see that equity. And I don’t even have kids yet.”
Bartlett estimates that between the initial and monthly payments, he’s invested $50,000 on a condo now worth only $40,000. In December 2007 he stopped paying his mortgage. Checking back in with him, exactly three years from his first non-payment, it turns out he’s still living for free. His justification?
I was on time with every single one of my payments. I begged for a year for them to do something with the ridiculous interest rate, but I never got a response from the bank. I showed proof of my lost job, that I sold my car, and that I had no debt except this house.
My 401k, my savings, my investment portfolio, everything was gone in a year. I could have kept making those payments and going into debt, but it’s just worthless now. I’m going to suck out the free rent as long as I can. That’s what I’m living off of.
While a mortgage at $0 per month may seem like a gift from the banking gods, Bartlett says it’s anything but.
“I want to get on with my life and get this credit mark off my past. I can’t propose to my girlfriend because I don’t know where I’m going to be next week. I can’t rent a car. If they want to come and get me, come on and get me the hell out. It’s so depressing to see where I might have been if I hadn’t tried to have the American dream.”
WHICH DO YOU THINK MORE NEARLY REPRESENTS ECONOMIC JUSTICE?
A. Homeowners should live up to their contractual commitment
B. Banks should adjust loans so owners can stay in their homes
A - A. Homeowners should live up to their contractual commitment
[ 25% (31 votes) ]
B - B. Banks should adjust loans so owners can stay in their homes
[ 75% (92 votes) ]
Powered by Twtpoll
Bartlett blames himself. But he blames the bank too.
“I grew up in a blue-collar family and was taught to work hard and pay the bills. I signed that paper; I thought it was the right thing to do. But I want them to show me where they were right; where they didn’t have ulterior motives, where they didn’t line their pockets. The American dream has turned into my life’s biggest nightmare.”
Fellow Floridian and strategic defaulter Jason Welsh, a golf pro who we also interviewed back in April, says the foreclosure process hasn’t moved an inch since we last talked with him. It’s now been over a year since he made his last mortgage payment.
“This was more of a business decision. I have to think about my family, my three children,” Welsh says. “I’m still in foreclosure process: every time you turn around, it’s a different person you talk to. It’s a nightmare and a frustrating process. The neighborhood went down. It’s a bad situation down here.”
In 2009, Welsh tried to sell his home, but offers were at least $125,000 below his current mortgage.
“[The bank] had no problem appraising my house for $300,000 around 2004. I wanted to sell, but to be $150,000 upside down in your house, what are you supposed to do? What if the roof breaks?”
The experience has led Welsh to an extreme conclusion:
“I’ll never own again. Honest to God, it’s absolutely not worth it.”
As to the thinking behind his strategic default?
“I just wanted to get out of a bad situation at a bad time. I wanted to keep my family safe.”
We end this update with a question for readers of this page: Have any of you decided to strategically default on your mortgage? If so, we’d like you to let us know why, and if you’ve already defaulted, how it’s been going, how you feel about it. Other readers are bound to be interested.
Deflation in things you don’t need.
Ryan Nakashima, AP Business Writer, On Monday December 27, 2010, 10:02 am EST
LOS ANGELES (AP) — Concertgoers sick of ballooning ticket prices should have some extra pocket change to rattle with their rock ‘n’ roll in the new year.
2010 was tough for the concert business as high prices kept many fans at home. Promoters now say they plan to make shows more affordable in 2011. But they’ll also try to sell more T-shirts and other merchandise to make up for lost revenue.
Heading into last summer, usually the busiest time of the year, prices were set too high despite the sluggish economy. Managers and promoters believed fans would keep paying for the one or two concerts they see on average each year.
Instead, many stayed home and dozens of shows were canceled. Lots of venues filled seats with fire-sale prices.
Global warming is real. Evidently, so is global cooling.
New York Airports Open After Heaviest Snows in Six Decades
By Aaron Clark - Dec 27, 2010 5:19 PM PT
New York City’s major airports resumed operations after the heaviest December snowfall in six decades left travelers in the Northeast struggling amid waist- high drifts and blizzard winds.
The city’s Central Park had 20 inches (51 centimeters) of snow by 8 a.m., the most for the month since 1948, the National Weather Service said. Skies cleared over New York by daybreak as the agency issued blizzard warnings for Boston and into Maine.
The storm forced airlines to cancel more than 6,000 flights since yesterday, when airports began to close. The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey said LaGuardia, John F. Kennedy International and Newark Liberty airports opened tonight for outgoing traffic.
“There may have been storms that equaled this, but it doesn’t get much worse than this,” Tom Kines, a meteorologist at State College, Pennsylvania-based AccuWeather Inc., said by telephone. “To get this much snow with the amount of wind that is accompanying it, that is devastating.”
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Since housing prices are not considered part of inflation, manipulating them is not part of the Fed’s mandate. So why are they back stopping housing prices, then?
Bloomberg
Dollar Falls Most in Two Weeks Versus Euro Before U.S. Home Data
December 28, 2010, 1:16 AM EST
By Monami Yui and Ron Harui
Dec. 28 (Bloomberg) — The dollar fell by the most in two weeks against the euro on concern a U.S. report today will show home prices declined, backing the case for the Federal Reserve to keep interest rates near zero.
The dollar weakened versus 15 of 16 major counterparts as economists surveyed by Bloomberg News said the S&P/Case-Shiller Index of property values will show its first decline since January. Australia’s dollar rose to a six-week high on speculation China will succeed in curbing inflation, underpinning demand for higher-yielding assets. South Korea’s won reached the highest level in two weeks on prospects Asian economies are improving.
“Cheap housing prices imply the Fed is still far from the exit,” said Toshiya Yamauchi, a senior analyst in Tokyo at Ueda Harlow Ltd., which provides foreign-exchange margin-trading services. “It makes investors hesitate to buy the dollar, especially when the market thins at the end of the year.”
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Nonprofits get first shot at foreclosures to help homebuyers, stabilize neighborhoods
The Associated Press
By BOB CHRISTIE Associated Press
PHOENIX December 27, 2010 (AP)
Francisco and Pam Cruz maneuvered around boxes of new flooring and open cans of paint as they surveyed the foreclosed Phoenix house they would soon call their own.
This house wasn’t typical of the thousands in foreclosure-battered Arizona that banks have auctioned for cheap — often to investors who make just enough repairs to satisfy a potential renter.
The Cruzes will become first-time homeowners, helped by one of many nonprofit groups that can snag foreclosures at a discount — and sometimes for free — before banks make them available to speculators.
It’s a glimmer of hope for struggling neighborhoods that are watching banks foreclose on a record number of homes this year.
In the Cruzes’ case, Rebuilding Together obtained the home for free from JPMorgan Chase & Co., the bank that foreclosed on its previous owner. Honeywell International Inc. provided the labor to renovate it and $25,000 cash for the materials.
In a market hot with speculators snapping up cheap foreclosures, Rebuilding Together’s program is one of many that give a leg up to nonprofits and redevelopment agencies trying to stabilize neighborhoods dotted with vacant houses.
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Where is my pitch fork?
“Foreclosure Nation” and one more foreclosure fraud horror story
by Joan McCarter
Mon Dec 27, 2010 at 07:30:11 PM PST
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