Bits Bucket for December 13, 2011
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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Apropos yesterday’s discussion of HUD (and Mitt’s Daddy, George Romney’s participation in same under Richard Nixon,) I thought I’d post the following letter I got in the weekend mail:
FAMILY– LIFE’S MOST IMPORTANT ASSET
At the center of every family is a place they call home– a place where memories are made. You’ve worked hard to provide a home for your family and ensure that they are happy, safe and sound.
However, today’s economy has impacted many hardworking families. Unemployment, plummeting values and other hardships have put people in a difficult financial situation, affecting their ability to pay their mortgage– and they don’t know where to turn.
KEEP YOUR HOME CALIFORNIA has state-run programs that provide financial assistance at no cost, to help struggling homeowners stay in their homes. More than $2 billion has been allocated from federal funds and now California homeowners have relief in sight.
Don’t risk everything you’ve worked for. Contact KEEP YOUR HOME CALIFORNIA for information about programs available to you. We can help!
ENGLISH/ESPANOL
Call/Llame a 888.952.2272
Visit: KeepYourHomeCalifornia.org
ConservaTuCasaCalifornia.org
(The “Keep Your Home California” program is administered by the CalHFA Mortgage Assistance Corporation (CalHFA MAC) a nonprofit public benefit corporation closely affiliated with CalHFA.)
#########
Dear “Keep Your Home California,”
I have a whole lot of friends over at thehousingbubbleblog who lived responsibly, played by the rules, didn’t overbuy, and now find themselves priced out of the housing market– all while being taxed to pay for this “program” for people who don’t even speak English.
So tell me. What do you have to offer THEM?
“being taxed to pay for this “program” for people who don’t even speak English.”
Wow, you really said that?
“What do you have to offer THEM?”
Like LaRaza’s motto says, “For The Race, everything! For everyone else, nothing!”
All kidding aside, whenever I see one of these “programs”, all I can think of is that $2 billion going to office space, furnishings, supplies, personnel, phone banks, symposiums, speakers, consultants, etc.
“state-run programs that provide financial assistance at no cost,”
What does that even mean, financial assistance at no cost? No such thing.
“…at no cost,”
The Free $hit Army must keep their illusions alive!
And illusions they are. 2 billion would pay off the balance on 10,000 200K mortgages. How many underwater mortgages are there today in California? Millions?
It would take trillions to bail everyone out.
Then again, when the banksters needed that kind of dough, it was “no problem”.
Sometimes we lose sight of who the real “free $hit army” really is.
Then again, when the banksters needed that kind of dough, it was “no problem”.
To be fair about it, those were loans, not handouts.
I’m guessing the underwater loanowners wouldn’t be paying that money back…
To be fair about it, those were loans, not handouts.
At near 0% interest. I wouldn’t mind one of those for my mortgage.
Sometimes we lose sight of who the real “free $hit army” really is.
EXACTLY!! The amounts the bankster/corps get compared to the humans is ridiculous.
“state-run programs that provide financial assistance at no cost,”
What does that even mean, financial assistance at no cost? No such thing.
What they mean is, no cost to the Free $hit Army, the Democrat Party’s core constituency. As far as the dwindling middle class taxpayer base, most of them are vegetables who will pay and pay while casting votes for their own destruction.
“…most of them are vegetables…”
Here’s the last paragraph of a letter written to WSJ by a prof at UCLA, in today’s edition.
“I teach a seminar in an honors curriculum for incoming freshmen. I hand out a 100-page collection of famous poems, from the 23rd Psalm on up. To pass, a student need but choose one and compose a one-page paper to be read aloud. Simple? Easy? If I graded for plain English, 18 or 19 out of 20 would fail. Very few produce grammatical sentences or correct spelling. And that is the case for UCLA students ranked at the top 12% - 15% of California’s high school graduates admitted to one of the top universities in the world.”
Vegetables indeed. So how do such vegetables find and hold a job? Maybe that’s one reason so many of them move back in with Mom and Dad.
“If I graded for plain English, 18 or 19 out of 20 would fail. Very few produce grammatical sentences or correct spelling. And that is the case for UCLA students ranked at the top 12% - 15% of California’s high school graduates admitted to one of the top universities in the world.”
OMG, that’s mind-blowing.
Gee, and I didn’t have a prayer of getting into UCLA when I was in high school, because I didn’t go through the right hoops. My fault for not taking Algebra II, or Latin III, or whatever it was.
Born too late…
“Vegetables indeed. So how do such vegetables find and hold a job?”
Your mileage may vary at UC. Most UC campuses have very high SAT/ACT requirements for admission, but will lower the bar for “protected classes”. I know that there has been controversy in California over high scoring whites and Asians who are denied admission while mediocre scoring applicants from protected classes are accepted.
Minimum requirements for UC consideration in the late 60’s were:
Four years of foreign language (five preferred)
Three years of Science (four preferred)
Three years of Math (four preferred)
Four years of English
Three years of history (four preferred)
Four years of Elective with achievement
(AP classes preferred.)
Minimum GPA of 3.25 out of 4
A score of 1250 or higher (out of 1400 possible,) on the SAT for guaranteed admission to one of the campuses.
“Quotas” were instituted in the mid-70’s to weight for much-needed diversity, but they were de-instituted in the mid-2000’s resulting in a significant decline in the number of “minority” students accepted at the preferred campuses. (Berkeley, UCLA, and to a lesser extent, UC San Diego.)
The Cal State system was (and is,) less stringent.
“I teach a seminar in an honors curriculum for incoming freshmen. I hand out a 100-page collection of famous poems, from the 23rd Psalm on up. To pass, a student need but choose one and compose a one-page paper to be read aloud. Simple? Easy? If I graded for plain English, 18 or 19 out of 20 would fail. Very few produce grammatical sentences or correct spelling.”
I have a friend who’s an adjunct instructor at the University of Arizona’s business school. This semester, she taught two classes, and guess what? She was pleased to report that her students are good writers. Apparently, that doesn’t always happen.
Isn’t UCLA a private university, not part of the CA public university system?
Isn’t UCLA a private university, not part of the CA public university system?
UCLA is part of the CA public university system. OTOH, the University of Southern California (USC) is a private institution.
Got it. I knew one of the big ones that sounds like it might be public isn’t.
Isn’t UCLA a private university, not part of the CA public university system?
California has a 3 tiered public higher ed system.
At the bootom of the food chain are the community colleges, which remain a bargain.
The next level are the “Cal State” schools. Like SDSU.
The top of the food chain is the University of California system, whose schools are called UC “City Name”;
UC Los Angeles, UC San Diego, UC Irvine, UC Berkely, UC Davis, UC Santa Barbara, UC Santa Cruz, etc.
I don’t believe it. You need a 4.0 or above to get into UCLA these days.
Before the mid-1970’s, a 4.0 was the highest high school GPA one could attain. AP classes were weighted the same as any other.
The highest combined SAT one could attain was 1400.
no cost to the Free $hit Army, the Democrat Party’s core constituency.
Who told you all this and how can you believe it? The math and 30 years of public policy do not bear this out.
Federal budgets have two components, spending and revenue. In the past 30 years the Republicans have been more the “Free $hit Army” than the Democrats. The Democrats want Free $hit but would have paid for much more of it with historical levels of taxation.
The Republicans want the Free $hit (and wars) but wanted to cut taxes (mostly on the rich) and pay for it with our children’s debt.
So who is the real Free $hit Army now?
Both parties are to blame. The Republicans with their borrow and spend policies, and the Democrats with their promises of “free” largesse to the masses.
Both parties have Free $hit Armies, just on different business and demographic levels.
The real “Free $hit Army” got 3T in bailouts. Most are not Democrats.
America’s poor don’t even come close.
top 12% - 15% of California’s high school graduates
It has always been my suspicion that most of the highest-ranked schools and students in California would be no better than average if ranked nationally.
You would be wrong. UC admits selectively from all over the planet and its campuses are consistently ranked in the top 50 universities internationally. Berkeley and UCLA are particularly notable.
“It has always been my suspicion that most of the highest-ranked schools and students in California would be no better than average if ranked nationally.”
In principle, your conjecture is easily falsified, if you agree on a standardized benchmark, such as SAT scores, or percent of graduating students going on to college.
I can say anecdotally, based on tutoring my HS aged kids, that they are getting a far more rigorous education than I received at my mid-tier Midwest HS.
Four Poway Unified Schools Make National High School Challenge Rankings
The rankings, from The Washington Post, gauge how well high schools prepare their students for college.
By Eric Yates and Shauntel Lowe
May 23, 2011
Four Poway Unified campuses, including Rancho Bernardo and Poway high schools, were included in a recent Washington Post ranking of how well schools prepare their students for college.
The High School Challenge, posted annually by The Washington Post, ranks high schools by a simple formula: the number of Advanced Placement, International Baccalaureate or other college-level tests given at a school is divided by the number of graduating seniors to get the “Challenge Index” score.
Of the 27,000 high schools across the country, only 7 percent (or about 1,900) have an index greater than 1.00, which was the baseline to be included on the list. To meet the baseline, a school would just need for half of its students to take one college-level test in both their junior and senior years.
This was the first year the rankings, begun in 1998, included schools outside of the Washington area.
The highest ranking schools in San Diego County were:
The Preuss School UCSD (La Jolla), which was ranked 24 with an index of 7.374.
Torrey Pines High School (La Jolla), which ranked 110 with an index of 4.145.
Canyon Crest Academy (San Diego), which ranked 193 with an index of 3.487.
La Jolla High School, which ranked 216 with an index of 3.358.
Westview High School (San Diego) which ranked 253 with an index of 3.230.
…
“being taxed to pay for this “program”
lol…we’ve been tapped out, bent over a barrel and busted for quite some time…our children and grandchildren are being taxed to pay for it.
All kidding aside, whenever I see one of these “programs”, all I can think of is that $2 billion going to office space, furnishings, supplies, personnel, phone banks, symposiums, speakers, consultants, etc.
My thoughts as well. 2 billion is a drop in the bucket as far as aggregagte mortgages go, and I concur that most of it will get gobbled up as you have described.
All kidding aside, whenever I see one of these “programs”, all I can think of is that $2 billion going to office space, furnishings, supplies, personnel, phone banks, symposiums, speakers, consultants, etc.
Maybe I’m overly cynical, but I think the same thing every time I hear “nonprofit organization” or “charity.”
Interesting two sentences”
“KEEP YOUR HOME CALIFORNIA has state-run programs that provide financial assistance at no cost, to help struggling homeowners stay in their homes. More than $2 billion has been allocated from federal funds and now California homeowners have relief in sight.”
At no cost, except the $2 billion.
“… to help struggling homeowners stay in their homes.”
To buy them time so they can keep struggling to stay in their homes?
Who benifits from all this struggling? Banks, perhaps?
As in: Keep ‘em stayin’ and keep ‘em payin’.
“You’ve worked hard to provide a home for your family and ensure that they are happy, safe and sound.”
What’s with the pushy advertising-speak? and exactly what is a “non-profit public benefit corporation.” Sounds like one of those vaunted public-private partnerships — you know, the outfits whose sole purpose is to capture as much taxpayer money as they can while hating on government as much as they can.
That is just the name of the California version of a non-profit corp. Most (all?) states have some version. They are generally non-stock corporations so are not technically “owned” by anyone, though they can be controlled by another entity by the other entity being allowed to appoint their board of directors. The names vary slightly, but they are the same basic thing. State non-profit status doesn’t mean it is automatically non-profit under federal law. You have to apply for that. Most states have some sort of approval process as well even if you are organized using their non-profit corporation statute.
And the name doesn’t mean it has anything to do with a public/private partnership. It could be involved with one, but it also could just be a generic non-profit company, like a private school or any other charity group that is using that form.
So this would be a non-profit corp that gets seed money from the fedgov? As opposed to private donations or private funding?
Also, what is the difference between “non-profit” and “not-for-profit”?
Seed money from the fed gov? No. Presumably, you have to apply to be part of the program. That generally means you have to have a track record. That means you have to exist and be in operation for a while. And it costs to become a non-profit in the first place. You can look up any org that is exempt under federal law. Just to see if it is exempt, you use a look up function on the IRS website. To look at their finances, you sign up at a site called guidestar.org. It is free. There is all sorts of info - exective salaries, income, spending, balance sheet, etc.
Difference between non-profit and not-for-profit? Generally nothing. States use slightly different language in their statutes. By the way, neither phrase means that the organization doesn’t make a profit (earnings in excess of expenses) in any given year. The phrase refers to compliance with the state statute. And you will find that the org cannot disribute those profits to its owners (if it has any in a meaningful sense without stock) or insiders with no limit. It can pay employees, but can’t say, “Hey we have extra money this year. Lets split it up among us.” The feds avoid the confusion by using “tax exempt” instead of the numerous variations on “non-profit.”
“What’s with the pushy advertising-speak?”
It’s a smoking gun to let you know some kind of scam is taking place.
+10!
ahansen
Thank you for the acknowledgment. Big cyber hug.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/housing/story/2011-12-12/Home-sales-revision/51838420/1
NAR inflated home sale numbers from 2007-2010?! I am shocked, shocked!
Oh, and realtors are liars.
‘Among the reasons for the inflated figures, the Realtors group says: changes in the way the Census Bureau collects data, population shifts and some sales being counted twice. Last year’s total sales figure of 4.91 million was the worst in 13 years.’
‘The changing numbers could impact how economists view data from the trade group.’
That’s right. Sales volume is at 13 year lows….. and falling.
Gee…. you don’t think it might have something to do with the grossly inflated asking prices of resale housing do you?
Constructors are having a field day eating the lunch of Iying, corrupt reaItors.
Why the F_CK are LYING REALTORS advising the public to buy housing when prices are grossly inflated and falling?
Why the F_CK are LYING REALTORS advising sellers to hold their price when sales are at 13 year lows and falling?
Why the F_CK are LYING REALTORS allowed to continue to operate a ongoing corrupt enterprise?
LYING REALTORS are the problem. Dramatically lower housing prices is the solution.
These people belong to a trade group. Whose fault is it that the ‘experts’ and media turn to them for data? Yes, their booster-ism should always be taken with a bucket of salt.
What I would like reformed is the monopoly on MLS data. I don’t see how this is acceptable in the data age we live in. They use this monopoly to the disadvantage of consumers. For instance, there is a set of data on any listing that they will hand out, and another that is restricted to them. This is the most important data on any property.
Also, as the gate holders of these listings, they are colluding with lenders in the shadow foreclosure inventory manipulation.
Ben,
Maybe I’m misinterpreting your post but it sounds like you’re excusing them to some degree?
I’ve never expected much from them just like I wouldn’t expect much from the Used Car Salesman Association (UCSA). It never made sense that the press would call the NAR economists and expect the bare truth. You’ll notice the media doesn’t use their numbers as much these days.
It’s a trade group, that’s given much more influence than they should have; probably cuz of all those campaign donations. There are good members and bad, IMO.
But where does this MLS monopoly come from? We wouldn’t let the UCSA get away with that. And I’m seeing these agents play along with the lenders on shadow inventory, and it should be illegal.
The fundamental issue is that they misrepresent themselves as a research organization much like Zacks or S&P when in fact they’re a sales operation. They’ve already proven they cannot be trusted to be truthful about market fundamentals(their research).
Exactly.
Why, RAL, would you expect an association that is organized to promote the interests of its industry to do anything other than come up with arguments why people should buy (and sell) houses?
It is like expecting the AMA to tell people they should never go to the doctor again.
And when you misrepresent material facts on a mortgage app, you’ve committed bank fraud. Yet when you misrepresent yourself as a repository of market data, then misrepresent the data in order to profit, it’s ok?
As far as I know, when you deliberately or knowingly misrepresent the value of an asset, you’ve committed fraud.
There’s that. But what gets me these days is when they withhold information from the potential buyers. BTW, when you’re looking at a foreclosure, notice these lenders put in language that they aren’t disclosing anything. But they know a lot about what’s wrong with a house. I can’t get away with that as an individual seller.
Are you talking about what the organization is saying? Or what the members say? How do you prove the organization is misrepresenting what the value of any given house is? They don’t put out that information. If all they do is put out statistics and they reveal the methods they use to put together those statistics, they haven’t misrepresented anything.
Give me an actual statement put out by the NAR that you think rises to the legal definition of fraud. If I can, I will show you the places where it might not reach the level required to be an actual violation of the law.
they are colluding with lenders in the shadow foreclosure inventory manipulation.
+
is when they withhold information from the potential buyers.
And the difference between:an “informed deci$ion“ and an “Educated gue$$” is what?
Are not ProFEESsionals obligated to: the-truth-the-whole-truth-&-nothing-but-the-maninpulated-truth?
(They really should not $elf-abu$e their hard earned title-of-tru$t)
what?…what!
Imagine you’re a journalist. One of your big advertisers is also helpful enough to provide content for your medium, be it radio or print. You get clean, polished content and your advertiser gets more de facto ad time. Win-win.
That’s why we get Brawndo from the media.
Ya’ll have a problem with corporate communism?
I love you guys. As a former member of some of the real estate associations (monopolies), the meetings would send my bp sky high. Every principles & value I was ever taught was challenged.
THE MLS is a multi-tier system, Ben’s right.That DOJ lawsuit didn’t even pierce the corruption, collusion, and crimes on the buying public.
Yet to renew your license, you need credits in an ethics class. LOL. oy vey.
I love how they cover their liability in the MLS by checking the seller said so box.
I love how they have property histories hidden from the public. Redfin discloses some, but not all. It should be illegal not to disclose what is public record to a perspective buyer.
Somehow, the FIRE sector never seems to break any laws, regardless of how outrageous the behavior.
That’s because they are the law.
The Mafia wouldn’t be breaking laws if they could buy politicians and write laws either.
But I repeat myself
I don’t think that there are any special exceptions to the laws of fraud for realtors or the NAR. I just think that the fraud rules are harder to break than you guys seem to think.
For example, anything that is in the general nature of “it is a great time to buy” is an opinion and it is outrageously hard for an opinion to be fraud. Possible, but really, really hard.
Fraud has a LOT of elements. Missing even one of them means there is no legal fraud.
Both the NAR and it’s members have used the term “investment” when telling people they should buy a home. Seems to me like there should be some fiduciary responsibility on the part of the realtors.
Both the NAR and it’s members have used the term “investment” when telling people they should buy a home. Seems to me like there should be some fiduciary responsibility on the part of the realtors.
When I think of an investment, I think of something that will pay me on a regular basis. Like a business. Or a dividend-producing stock.
Unless I’m missing something, my house has yet to pay me on a regular basis. But after the rain stops, I’ll resume my search for the Arizona Slim Ranch’s on-site ATM.
Seriously? You think any time a person says that something/anything is an investment that you automatically get the protection of a legally enforceable fiducuary duty? The way you would if someone was holding assets for you in a trust?
You guys have some really weird ideas about the extent of legal protection and the limits of the First Amendment.
I wasn’t saying that a buyer should have legal protection necessarily, but that a realtor shouldn’t be able to tell people that a house is a good investment, because it sounds like they are giving investment advice. There are many sheep out there that take that advice as being word because a “realtor” told them.
Today’s house: Grossly inflated:
http://www.zillow.com/homedetails/13209-Superior-St-Rockville-MD-20853/37307011_zpid/
1957 3/2 cutie-patootie rambler on 0.17 acre. Beautiful little yard (meaning, very plain), well kept, good basement, good kitchen, needs cosmetics (pink bath eek). New carpet, whoopee.
Dec 2011: Listed $299K. Not much other info — clearly been Zillow-scrubbed. This house was on Zillow for a few months with just one pic. Then, it shows up with 17 photos and “nine days on Zillow.” I suspect somebody kicked out the residents, slapped down new carpet, took some beauty pix, and relisted it for the same price. This house should be $250K at most.
(Yes, I know that in Phoenix this would be $90K. But even in 2001 similar houses were selling for ~200K.)
The big thing that needs to happen, is that we stop seeing 200k as some sort of entry level price - compared to whenever. Notions of reasonable pricing should be based on local incomes and rental value.
I think that living room looks awfully small. The only real living space in the house is in the basement. If the bedrooms were in the basement and the upstairs was open, it might work, but then the bathrooms wouldn’t be near the bedrooms.
Polly, it’s a thousand square feet. That’s about the lower limit for a 3-bed house, and typical for a house of that era. The basement is where you put stuff. I would rather have the land than the house.
I guess I am spoiled in my current place - 1000 square feet for a one bedroom. Means the space where I actually spend my time is fairly large.
3 beds in 1000sqft is small. 2 beds is small.
Where I live, 1 bed apt at 1000sqft is average.
It’s kinda hard to compare houses on the east coast to those out west. Out west, a 1000 sq ft house is 1000 sq ft, there is not some other 1000 sq ft area underneath the house that somehow isn’t included as sq footage. Even if you only use the basement for storage, then you compare a 1000 sq ft closet to 3 2X2 closets, and you’d expect to pay more for that.
So on .17 of an acre and only 2 blocks from a very narrow state park 15 miles from DC, and 45 from the Chesapeake Bay, this house only seems slightly over priced at the Zestimate of $259k, not dramatically overpriced. $259 vs $299 is only 14% difference, so I’d say even $299 isn’t impossibly wishy.
What a horrible house. You couldn’t PAY me 300K to live there.
No wonder everyone in DC is mean and crazy….
‘The changing numbers could impact how economists view data from the trade group.’
Garbage in, garbage out.
‘The changing numbers could impact how economists view data from the trade group.’
Did they previously take NAR data at face value without questioning the source?
Of course.
The NAR is made up of thousands of certified real estate professionals. What’s not to trust?
“I have ruled for twenty years, and from these I have derived a few certainties: (1) America is ungovernable, for us; (2) Those who serve a revolution plough the sea; (3) The only thing one can do in America is to emigrate; (4) This country will fall inevitably into the hands of the unbridled masses and then pass almost imperceptibly into the hands of petty tyrants, of all colors and races; (5) Once we have been devoured by every crime and extinguished by utter ferocity, the Europeans will not even regard us as worth conquering; (6) If it were possible for any part of the world to revert to primitive chaos, it would be America in her final hour.” - Simón Bolívar, on South America, as quoted in Niall Ferguson’s Civilization
Sounds almost applicable to today’s USA…
Meh. One forgets that although Simon Bolivar was a glorious historical figure, he wasn’t much of a ruler, or governor. Certainly didn’t know how to take care of those who took care of him. Conqueror, yes. Ruler after the fact, no. The above is his sour grapes for not realizing what he had, and how to manage it. Bolivar blew it. The above is his excuse.
Ya gotta a point there, palmetto.
That was one area where George Washington really excelled. He was the top commander of the Continental Army during the American Revolution, and went on to be President of the United States. He did a pretty good job in both places.
However, unlike Bolivar, Washington wasn’t that much of a glorious guy. If anything, he had a command presence, but he was pretty quiet.
Then there was Dwight Eisenhower. Supreme Commander of the Allied forces in Europe. Did a pretty good job of it. But as President of the United States? Ehhh, not so much.
Realtors Are Liars®
Congress Are Whores®
Voters are Imbeciles.
Except Ron Paul supporters, of course. We’re geniuses, every one of us.
good point
The squad likes hearing them referred to as vegetables. Dunno why but always get the visual of an army of obese people in Wal-Mart mobility carts cruising toward me at 2 miles per hour.
I like to refer to them as “The Dulls.”
don’t forget the ones leaning on the carts like My First Walker.
“I like to refer to them as “The Dulls.””
That just evoked a beautiful image in my head.
Imagine a Wal-mart, at midnight on Black Friday. Except this Wal-mart is different—only obese folks in powered scooters are allowed in. Bargains are everywhere, and they must rush rush rush in their 2mph scooters to locate and grab them.
We could call it “The Running of the Dulls.”
I think I’d prefer to take my chances in Pamplona….
“The Marching Morons”
-CM Konrbluth
Read it and weep.
Merry Christmas Everyone.
Grandma got run over by a Deadbeat
Walking home from our house Christmas eve
You can say there’s no such thing as Deadbeats
But as for me and Grandpa, we believe
He’d been drinkin’ too much egg nog
Where`d my refi money go?
I`ll go see my mortgage broker
So he staggered out the door into the snow
When they found her Christmas mornin’
At the scene of the attack
A foreclosure notice on her forehead
Thirty-six late payment letters on her back
Grandma got run over by a Deadbeat
Walkin’ home from our house Christmas eve
You can say there’s no such thing as Deadbeats
But as for me and Grandpa, we believe
Now were all so proud of Grandpa
He’s been takin’ this so well
See him in there watchin’ football
Drinkin’ root beer and playin’ cards with cousin Belle
It’s not Christmas without Grandma
All the family’s dressed in black
We`re all talking bout the Deadbeat
How is it that he`s still living in his shack?
Grandma got run over by a Deadbeat
Walkin’ home from our house Christmas eve
You can say there’s no such thing as Deadbeats
But as for me and Grandpa, we believe
Now the goose is on the table
And the pudding’s made of fig
Maybe we should blame the banker
Who refied his house so he could by that rig
I’ve warned all my friends and neighbors
Better watch out for your own
They should never give a license
To a man who drinks and doesn`t pay back loans
Grandma got run over by a Deadbeat
Walkin’ home from our house, Christmas eve
You can say there’s no such thing as Deadbeats
But as for me and Grandpa, we believe!
That is awesome!
ok so how about Here Comes Fatty with a Sack of S***?
From thehill DOT com: Google chairman says online piracy bill would ‘criminalize’ the Internet
“An online piracy bill in the House would “criminalize linking and the fundamental structure of the Internet itself,” according to Google Executive Chairman Eric Schmidt.
Schmidt said the controversial Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA) would punish Web firms, including search engines, that link to foreign websites dedicated to online piracy. He said implementing the bill as written would effectively break the Internet.
“By criminalizing links, what these bills do is they force you to take content off the Internet,” Schmidt said, calling it a form of censorship.”
Ah, no wonder I saw a lot of deceptive TV ads in favor of this bill this weekend. Ditto for fossil companies wanting to stop some new EPA rules. I didn’t look up the details, but my view is that if they have to resort to vague ominous language, then they have nothing of substance.
I wouldn’t call a few million dollars in lobbying money, nothing of substance.
Oh you meant for the rest of us!
I wish Google’s creepy spying on its users would also be criminalized.
As the user of a Droid smartphone running on Google software, the squad assumes that they are watching/monitoring everything, including the majority of squad posts to the HBB.
“You have no privacy, get over it” - Larry Ellison
You want the government to tell a private business that collects information in the course of its operations that it can’t use that information in its business? Really?
What other private behavior would you like the government to criminalize?
What right does the private business have to use MY private information?
In other words, why does its actions supercede the powers of the government?
What do you consider private information? Your internet searches? You gave Google that information when you did that search using their product. It isn’t your private information anymore.
No problem if the company I choose to use retains my information…that was my decision.
It’s another matter entirely if that company sells my information to a third party - including the government. And frankly, I don’t give a rat’s patootie about any disclosure agreements that I “agree” to or not.
The practice of selling information to a third party ought to be outlawed - in ALL instances and for ALL parties. No exceptions, ever.
creepy spying on its users would also be criminalized.
The Mormons are data collectors as well. Only they are “connecting-the-dots” as in, “whose you daddy”! :-/
Or to quote a former Israeli Defense Minster:
“The book is open,… the names are being written.”
Of course they want to criminalize the Internet. It is the biggest threat to the PTB that ever existed.
What they don’t realize is that they can’t control it. We live in a truly historical time.
What they don’t realize is that they can’t control (the internet)
Why could governments not control the internet if they chose to do so?
The basic concept and structure of the Internet was designed to survive a nuclear war. It is cellular in nature and autonomous rerouting around blockages is automatic.
This inherent redundancy is what makes it impossible to fully control.
And that’s just the basics.
Unknown to the average person the 2nd Internet being built. No, I’m not talking about IP6, but system based on advanced P2P and torrent technology where every single PC holds an almost holographic part of the entire internet. This is NOT being built by the universities and corporations.
Don’t get me started on the technical reasons.
As they said with the nuclear bomb, the genie is out of the bottle.
That is poetic, turk. And the implications, approaching spiritual. Nice.
Goodbye House, Hello Pot Plantation
By CATHERINE RAMPELL
Published: December 10, 2011
A MAN’S home is his castle — except when it becomes someone else’s marijuana plantation, crack den, movie set, homeless shelter, farm or public park.
Such opportunities for conversion present themselves in the United States, which now has about 1.2 million more vacant homes than there would be in normal economic times. In fact, the depressed housing market has become a case study in how an economy adapts — if only in an early transitional phase — when one of its pillars suddenly collapses.
Foreclosures, home abandonments and devalued houses have helped to inspire creative thinkers, political protesters, opportunists and civic leaders who envision new uses for homes besides nesting.
Across Ohio, Michigan and many other states, governments are simply bulldozing empty homes and replacing them with urban farms, public parks or other infrastructure. It’s little wonder houses sit unsold and empty when tighter credit requirements have most likely discouraged some 13 million households from buying homes, according to Capital Economics. As a result, rents are at record highs, prompting some homeowners to voluntarily vacate so they can rent out their homes at a tidy profit — the so-called leveraged move-out.
The Obama administration has expressed interest in increasing this shift from failed ownership to renting, and already federal programs are backing the process. Spacious homes in wealthier areas of Newport News, Va., and Antioch, Calif., have been converted to Section 8 housing, a program that subsidizes rent for low-income families by directly paying private landlords.
This is hardly the first time that overbuilding of luxury homes has meant hand-me-downs for low-income Americans, of course. Harlem was originally built up as a luxury community in the late 19th century, in anticipation of a new mass transit station’s coming to the neighborhood. Then overbuilding and subway construction delays (sound familiar?) led housing values to plummet. By the early 1900s, poor immigrants and blacks instead absorbed the excess housing and redefined the neighborhood.
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/11/sunday-review/the-housing-busts-repurpose-driven-life.html
“Harlem was originally built up as a luxury community in the late 19th century,”
Seriously? I had no idea.
“Next stop, 125th Street! 125th Street, next stop!”
(you’d have to be or have been a Westchester-NY commuter to understand)
heh…. now it’s computer generated mono-tone voice. Next stop is(delay delay delay)………. White Plains.
Do conductors still punch/take tickets? LOL, that’s how long ago I rode that railway.
They do. Cars still uncomfortable as ever. Platforms are still cold as ever.
“(you’d have to be or have been a Westchester-NY commuter to understand)”
We used to get off at 125th Street on the way to Yankee games and walk the couple of blocks to the subway. But even as young stupid think you are bullet proof 17 and 18 yearolds we did not do it on the way home, we went all the way to Grand Central.
The Brother from Another Planet (1984) - New York Subway
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBG140hMCu8
“poor immigrants and blacks instead absorbed the excess housing and redefined the neighborhood.”
That’s Souf Hi’bro county they’re talking about.
“The Obama administration has expressed interest in increasing this shift from failed ownership to renting, and already federal programs are backing the process. Spacious homes in wealthier areas of Newport News, Va., and Antioch, Calif., have been converted to Section 8 housing, a program that subsidizes rent for low-income families by directly paying private landlords.”
Dr. Zhivago, anyone? This is the corporatist version of communist housing, IMO. No, they don’t directly live in YOUR home, yet.
But I wonder, are there enough people in the Section 8 program to rent all the qualifying Section 8 housing? And if not, will there be an expansion of the program?
Abolish HUD. Really, just abolish it.
‘This is hardly the first time that overbuilding of luxury homes has meant hand-me-downs for low-income Americans, of course.”
WTF???!?? What about middle class like me? Where MY hand-me-down luxury home? Oh wait, as my reward I get to compete with all that Section 8 money.
There wasn’t any section 8 money in the early 1900s. The original housing stock in Harlem is gorgeous. It was mostly carved up into less than lovely rentals, but the people who guessed right and managed to buy up buildings that eventually became vacant had quite the opportunity to restore buildings with lots of potetial. Transportation is an issue. The north/south subway lines are fine, but there are areas where it is a hike to get to them. And until recently (perhaps still in some areas) amenities were not great. When I lived on 119th street I tried going to the grocery store that was 6 or 7 blocks north (rather than one of the several that were within 12 blocks south) of my building once. Only once. There was no food that you would want to buy in that store. No decent bread. No produce at all. Cans were dented. No dairy. Nothing frozen that I would eat. I don’t think I was even able to find a box of Cheerios. Part of the problem might have been the tiny (under the kitchen counter sized) refigerator I was sharing with a roommate, but I don’t think so. There was just no real food.
“The original housing stock in Harlem is gorgeous.”
In some ways, the area being a less prosperous area “saved” a lot of the older brownstones from being torn down and replaced by those hideous white brick faced high rises, etc.
“It’s little wonder houses sit unsold and empty when tighter credit requirements have most likely discouraged some 13 million households from buying homes, according to Capital Economics.”
Thank god it has nothing to do with lack of good paying jobs.
“It’s little wonder houses sit unsold and empty when tighter credit requirements have most likely discouraged some 13 million households from buying homes, according to Capital Economics.”
Thank god it has nothing to do with artificially inflated house prices and a massive shadow inventory.
Yeah, they are basically expecting Lucky Duckies to buy expensive houses.
As well Jeff. Good point.
Across Ohio, Michigan and many other states, governments are simply bulldozing empty homes and replacing them with urban farms, public parks or other infrastructure.
A few blocks away, there’s a lot for sale. For a brief time, the “for sale” sign had been altered to read:
Lot for Park — the word “Sale” had been painted over.
Instead of the call to action and the phone number, the word “Donate” was put above the phone number.
My wife has steadily complained since I initiated the practice of padlocking the front gate to the backyard area of our rental property a couple of years ago. Yesterday she changed her mind, thanks to a home invasion robbery that occurred the night before, across the street, two doors up from us.
For clarification, I lock up when we go to bed, and unlock the next morning. A determined robber could defeat this simple, low-cost deterrent, but I assume most home-invasion robbers are looking for soft, accessible targets. At any rate, anyone who managed to get inside our place would be disappointed at the dearth of easily-fenced, cutting edge electronic gadgets to be found. With a little luck, they would find and steal my kids’ WII System II.
“dearth of easily-fenced, cutting edge electronic gadgets to be found. With a little luck, they would find and steal my kids’ WII System II.”
I’ve always heard that the majority of home invasion cases are drug-related. Generally, the invaders are hitting a dealer’s house, that they’ve usually visited before buying drugs, and therefore they know that there are drugs and/or cash on the premises.
As you point out, ther is a dearth of easily stolen, valuable items in the average home. Are they gonna pry the plasma TV off the wall? That would take two guys twenty minutes to get out the door, and they’d need a truck to put it in. Steal your iphone? Hell, they could snatch it far more easily from your hand on the street. But in drug dealer’s houses there is a reasonable expectation of something worth risking a home invasion for- drugs and money.
There are exceptions, of course. But I bet most of these other home invasions are still done by someone who has some connection to the house being invaded, some knowledge of what’s inside.
My husband’s home was broken into when he was a kid. They came home and interrupted the event. The oriental was rolled up in the middle of the floor and it was filled w/lots of different items. My husband’s cousins in MA have had jewelry stolen several times as well as my friend from RI. My husband’s family did not know the people arrested during that event. They had apparently gone right down the road and been hitting different homes over the previous few weeks. I think that was in the 70s.
From time to time around the lake homes, you’ll hear there’s another rash of break ins. It won’t be on the news but if you know people the whispers to watch out start making the rounds. Yard sales sometimes lead to break ins. They’d peak in your home, case it and plan a future break in if they saw anything they liked. It seemed like many of these stories were where older women were living alone.
You’re talking about burglaries, though. I’m talking about home invasions.
Wifey got more info (she is a Neighborhood Watch coordinator). It seems the man of the house across the street may have inadvertently left the sliding glass door unlocked, as there was no break-in with the entry. And, as I mentioned above, they have no flood lights or fence around their home.
I submit that an absence of any defenses increases the probability of home burglary or robbery.
For clarification, I lock up when we go to bed, and unlock the next morning. A determined robber could defeat this simple, low-cost deterrent, but I assume most home-invasion robbers are looking for soft, accessible targets.
Our 100 lb German Shepherd serves as a pretty good deterrent.
Our two dogs keep everyone away from our place. I would not want to trespass at night;
they’re aggressive.
My wife doesn’t want to own a dog, but luckily the neighbors on both sides have large-sized dogs, letting us free ride on their sentinels.
I don’t have any pets. But I do have an eagle eye, and I’m not the least bit hesitant to call 911. If the matter isn’t an emergency, I’ll send an e-mail to the neighborhood association, which then forwards it to the appropriate destination.
Yes, we had a home invasion robbery attempt a few streets over during the Thanksgiving weekend. They messed the guy up pretty good, but he was a tough old bird who went on the TV news, despite being blackened in the eyes and bloody in the face.
Any home invasion crew that hits my place better be wearing bulletproof vests and kevlars.
That would be the police.
I’ll repeat my comment above. Since police have no valid reason to invade my home, I’ll assume any invaders are criminals and respond accordingly.
Yes, well, even though they may be mistaken, the POHleece will have already assumed YOU are a criminal and will be responding accordingly as well. Apologies will came later, if at all.
Apologies will came later, if at all.
Resist one of those no knock warrants and you won’t be around to receive an apology.
A padlock on the back fence is not going to “harden” your property to any burglar or meth head or obama voter.
A huge dog might
Big NRA stickers might
Lots of outdoor flood lights might
Bars on the window and a steel door might
Yourself with a big baseball bat (for playing catch!) on the front porch might
For clarification, we have a permanent padlock on the back fence; the one to which I refer above is on overnight, and locks the front gate. Without that lock, anyone wandering the neighborhood could easily walk right up to our French doors, which are ten feet inside the gate. We also have flood lights on overnight, all around the house.
That said, I think you are unduly pessimistic. Think of it this way: Suppose there are two kinds of criminals –
1. Those who specifically want to rob my house.
2. Those who want to rob SOME house.
I will assume the number in category 1. is vanishingly small, as any criminal dumb enough to rob us would end up disappointed and unrewarded for the risk they took, and we don’t have many meth heads roaming our neighborhood.
That leaves category 2. If our home has a locked gate between the curb and the front door, and the home across the street has no fence or gate or floodlights shining on the front door (the situation for the home that was robbed), which will make a more attractive target for category 2. criminals?
There was a small gap in time (about 6 months) between when my older Rottweiler died and we got a new Rottie. I felt so vulnerable during that time, not having realized how much protection a big dog offers.
She is loving and sweet and almost 100 pounds. And if she does not want you to come in the house, you’re not coming in.
Here I am, in a so-called tough neighborhood. I live by myself, and I’m of the fairer sex.
But no big dog. No loaded gun. No baseball bat. None of that.
What do I use to help keep the bad guys at bay? A variety of things, ranging from a simple “don’t answer the door if I’m not expecting anyone” policy to a pretty robust network of contacts around the neighborhood. Believe me, if we see something, we say something.
We had 5 burglaries in our neighborhood 2 years ago and one right next door 2 months ago.
I’ve lived in a situation like that a couple of times in my life. Not sure in retrospect whether I think the convenience and affordability fully offset the negative psychological impact of the crime risk.
Location cubed defines desirability for a reason.
You pay for accessibility, neighbors and access to infrastructure.
You’d be surprised how many crimes occur…wherever you live. In Portland there is a website that shows reported crimes within a given radius of a property address you enter. I’ve just about always lived in Portland proper (not the ‘burbs), where I assume the numbers are higher, but suffice it to say that seeing it shattered my illusion of being in what I thought was a saFER area of town.
The 20 duplex/house “cul de sac” I live on in Rio (gate, no guard) has not been robbed in 20 years.
I’m knocking on wood right now. (a lot)
My house contents would greatly disappoint any burglars. No flat screen t.v. (heck, I still have a great 20″ Magnavox from 1994!). Old computer. No expensive jewelry. They might end up leaving me some cash
32″ JVC from the same year. Cheers.
My wife has steadily complained since I initiated the practice of padlocking the front gate to the backyard area of our rental property a couple of years ago.”
I always lock my gates. Often leave them locked “by mistake” until I get my deposit back. Often forget to return the garage door clickers as well until I get my deposit back.
Deposit back means a fair part of it. A few times as a renter I get the landlord who just ignores my request for my deposit back. Usually a RE agent landlord is prone to do this while owner landlords are pretty fair.
So in other words I have learned to be a renter again after owning for 20 years.
As far as robberies go they were way more common in Phoenix AZ than Poway or Moorpark CA.
Ggood thing about Phoenix I could carry my 9mm around with me, God knows what would happen if I did that here in CA ?
I’d be competeing with the police and showing my independance they frown on that here.
I live in Canada and don’t lock my doors at night. Nor do I have searchlights, cameras, baseball bats. Guns are banned.
My doors swing open whenever anyone wants to transit.
It helps my big mean Rotweillers.
I haven’t had to feed them in years.
tongue in cheek
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/belgium/8953449/Belgium-grenade-attack-leaves-at-least-two-dead.html
The Religion of Peace strikes again.
Diversity is our stength
If it wasn’t true HR wouldn’t make it our mantra.
Owwww, my lobotomy scars are throbbing again.
“The Religion of Peace strikes again.”
Which one?
The Religion of Peace strikes again.
And you conclude that is a religious motivated attack how?
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/italy/8953863/Florence-street-vendors-shot-dead-by-lone-gunman.html
And again and again.
“A Belgian Interior Ministry official, Peter Mertens, says there was only one attacker, who was killed in the incident, adding that it was not related to terrorism.”
How bout we wait until we find out the cause before blaming it randomly on an entire ethnic/religious group?
Gerry Sandusky defines all older guys who mentor young men and boys.
Nineteen brown guys on 9/11 define all brown people.
Pedophile Catholic priests define all Catholic priests.
“We should be careful to get out of an experience only the wisdom that is in it - and stop there; lest we be like the cat that sits down on a hot stove-lid. She will never sit down on a hot stove-lid again - and that is well; but also she will never sit down on a cold one anymore.” — Mark Twain
Hey! You left out the white guy with the buzz cut who blew the building in OKC. I see more and more of them every day. I give them wide berth every time. Very wide berth.
Thank you, Neuro.
I think Mr Weidner is saying, in so many words, that the eurozone is TOO BIG TO FAIL.
Dec. 13, 2011, 12:01 a.m. EST
Europe’s bank meltdown will hit home here
Commentary: Without more capital, banking dominoes wobble
By David Weidner, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Europe is a lot closer than you might think.
No, I’m not talking about some new sale on airfare. I’m talking about your bank account.
In less than six months our personal wealth has gone from having some, but mostly indirect, connection to Europe, to being held hostage by the Angela Merkels, Nicolas Sarkozys, Mario Draghis and Mario Montis.
Moreover, it’s not just our wealth, it’s our ability to attain credit and earn interest on our assets. Europe has long put a squeeze on the world’s financial markets. Now it’s putting our personal finances at risk.
Simply put, Europe’s banks look to be on the brink of collapse.
…
ECONOMY
DECEMBER 13, 2011
Markets Doubt Europe Deal
Investors and Ratings Firms Skeptical of Fiscal Unity Pact; Euro Falls Sharply
By TOM LAURICELLA, JONATHAN CHENG and STEPHEN FIDLER
The glow of last week’s European Union summit faded from the markets on Monday as global investors drove down stocks, bonds and the euro amid concern about the Continent’s ability to tackle its debt crisis.
Germany’s main stock index fell 3.4%, France’s was down 2.6% and Italy’s plunged 3.8%. The gloom extended to bonds and the euro, which fell sharply against the dollar, losing more than 1.5% to $1.3188, the biggest decline in more than a month. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 162.87 points, or 1.34%, to 12021.39. In early trading Tuesday morning, Japanese, Australian and South Korean benchmark indexes all fell 1.4%.
Investors and credit-ratings firms said they are worried that the steps taken by the EU last week fell short of what is needed to stabilize Europe’s battered bond markets. Greece still teeters on the brink of default, and yields on debt of Italy and Spain are near unsustainable levels. Many worry that prolonging the crisis raises the risk of a severe recession throughout the region, and could lead to the breakup of the euro zone.
…
Dec. 13, 2011, 12:00 a.m. EST
California, Florida, Ohio cities in Bottom 10
Warm-weather cities dominate lower rungs in MarketWatch survey
By Russ Britt, MarketWatch
LOS ANGELES (MarketWatch) — If you’re a prospective business owner, you’re probably not going to find much that’s inviting — other than weather — about inland California or southwest Florida.
And in parts of Ohio, they don’t even have fine weather working in their favor.
Never before has the Bottom 10 in MarketWatch’s study of the Best Cities for Business been so neatly confined to three clearly defined regions of the country. Five inland California communities, three regions around Florida’s Gulf Coast and two parts of Ohio get this dubious distinction for 2011.
Many of the usual suspects are in the bottom ranks of the survey, which annually measures the regions with the highest concentration of business and the strength of their economic output. More often than not, a city will suffer a low ranking in part because of its proximity to a bigger, more alluring metro area. In some cases, though, a city may just be so isolated in a region that receives little attention.
MarketWatch surveyed all U.S. cities with populations of 500,000 or more — 102 in all examining 15 criteria. Read about the survey’s methodology.
In order, from worst to, well, less-worse:
102. Stockton, Calif. 248.5 points: It’s probably not surprising that this city, which has vied with Las Vegas for foreclosure capital of the U.S., ends up at the bottom of the list.
…
Interesting, in that, Florida is a right-to-work state. Meaning very few union goons.
Dec. 12, 2011, 8:00 a.m. EST
Fed busy behind scenes on third year of zero rates
No rate change expected but internal debate seen fierce
By Greg Robb, MarketWatch
WASHINGTON (MarketWatch) — The real activity at the Federal Reserve won’t be seen in the interest rate announcement due Tuesday but will show up next year as central bankers prepare for big decisions in the coming months.
“While the December [Federal Open Market Committee] meeting is likely to produce no explicit action…the elves in Chairman [Ben] Bernanke’s workshop are busy at work behind the scenes trying very hard to make the holiday season, and the outlook for 2012, a little brighter,” said Julia Coronado, chief economist for North America for the French bank BNP Paribas, in a note to clients.
Many economists think that the Fed will engineer another round of asset purchases, or quantitative easing, early next year.
“There is a 75% chance the Fed will buy mortgage-backed securities in the first half of the year, possibly by January,” said Lou Crandall, chief economist at Wrightson ICAP LLC.
…
Is the Fed the only borrower that can set its own interest rates?
That’s like me telling my credit union, “hey guys I’ll pay you 1% for that 1 million dollar cash advance that I intend to blow up on h00kers in Vegas, and of course you know that I’m going to pay you back in IOUs, right?”
Lucky they bank with China.
“Is the Fed the only borrower that can set its own interest rates?
Eventually they will screw up and cause out of control inflation again. Bernake says inflation is easy to control compared to deflation.
they have no fear at the FED. They are super educated and can centrally control everything. Just wait you’ll see…
Eventually they will screw up and cause out of control inflation again
You mean that’s not the plan?
Fed is a borrower?! Um, no.
The Fed is a LENDER. It loans money to banks at zero interest. It loans money to the federal government by buying the government’s bonds. It loans money to the ECB.
You did get one part right. Lenders do indeed set the interest rate.
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=199048
Vote for Gingrich and you’re voting for national bankruptcy. Of course the sloped foreheads of the Establishment GOP voting base will vote for whoever the Republicrat Duopoly and MSM deem “electable.”
sloped foreheads… lmao.
But you hit a homerun again.
The US government is already bankrupt.
I saw an analysis of his tax plan from Brookings
top 0.1% would pay around 10%
top 1% would pay around 12 %
95-99% would pay around 17%
90-95% would pay around 18%
80-90% would pay around 18%
60-80% would pay around 16%
40-60% would pay around 14%
What’s not to love if you are the elite. You get to strip wealth and get bailed out by the gov, and all the costs get dumped on the upper middle and middle class.
Taxes are paid in dollars not rates. The only fair tax is the same dollar amount for everyone. But I would settle at least for the same rate for everyone.
OT
Any guitar players on site besides CarlMorris?
Bad Chile…
Chile…..
I’m headed to Guitar Center to test drive some new solid body electrics. I really don’t want to spend more than $500 max.
Suggestions?
What guitars do you already have and what type of music do you like?
I have a mexican telecaster, an ephiphone SG-400, and a Squier Fat Strat. I think they are all still less than $500. I don’t like the neck shape on the Squier (C shape is too small), so I play with it much less. I think the G400 and Telecaster are perfectly serviceable, and played both live many years ago on a regular basis.
Mexican telecaster = fender telecaster made in mexico instead of the US. The US versions are about $300 more expensive, depending on finish.
Had all the best stuff the 80’s and early 90’s and dumped it all when we married. 60’s and 70’s Strats, teles, 80’s LP custom, and the prized 1961 Gibson 335 in Argentine Grey(only one know to exist in that color), Fender twins and deluxe, blah blah. In 04 I bought and still have a Larrivee D-3 that I use on Sundays. Acoustic is getting quite lame.
I want to emulate early 80’s metal. I’m thinking of an Ibanez and Line 6 amp. But I want the means to get the contemporary strat/PRS tone a’la Dangerous Dan Toler too. I think the Line 6 spyder is versatile enough to do that, no?
Absolutely, and I’d agree Ibanez is great if you want a metal sound. I’ve never used Line 6 equipment, but I have a smaller cheaper multi-effects unit, and it has ’80s metal presets that are decent built in, and you can also dial in your own sounds to make adjustments.
That’s not a genre I play along to very often, so I can’t speak to how well those sounds are emulated, but I’ve heard nothing but good things about Line 6 (the only people who badmouth are people who don’t like digital multi-effects at all), so I’d say go for it. I guess the other option is buying a Marshall stack and turning it up to 11, but that would make your neighbors mad.
I believe that Ibanez has better options for adjustments than actual Strats do, so you should be able to dial something approximating a Strat sound as well.
Thanks O-Dogg.
Back in the 80’s, all the newer metal type guitars and digital processing was cost prohibitive or I just plain didn’t have the money for it. I don’t any experience with any of it so I have to go by what others say. Anyways, guitars and DSP amps seem to have taken a dive in price over the last 6 months so It’s time to really start looking. Playing 60’s and 70’s stuff on a strat or LP through a Fender twin and distortion pedal is something I don’t want to live over again(laughing).
Everything has already been asked. A few years ago I picked up a Michael Kelly Patriot on the cheap, mighty fine axe for a Les Paul-style rock/metal machine. I love it.
But you’re right: back in the 80s and 90s when I was first into guitars it was cost prohibitive. For $500 right now you could get a great bedroom/small cafe setup and be pretty happy.
I don’t do multi-effects/digital modelling amps *, but have played through a friends Line 6 Spyder III amp. For what it was I was pretty impressed. A competitor to A/B would be the Peavey Vyper series, but I’ve never played one.
I’m a pedal geek, so I just use the clean channel on a Peavey Bandit 112 and pile the pedals in front of that.
Enjoy!
Gibson Songbird Deluxe, Martin D-28 Custom, Garrison G35 E, Yamaha APX-10NA Classical, Yamaha CPX-500, 70’s Epiphone Classical, Art & Lutherie Parlor, Simon & Patrick S&P Cedar 12 String, Fender Eric Clapton Strat, Gibson Les Paul Studio, 60’s Kay Banjo, Rogue Resonator, Washburn XB100 Bass
I sold my Gibson Custom Shop’s Western Classic Brazilian and Advanced Jumbo before moving to Brazil. (and a few more too)
Look at the PRS imports for good sub $500 solid-body electric IMO.
P.S. I bought a 66 ES-335 with part of a student loan back in the day. My best friend thought that was funny. But I did graduate and I did pay back the loans.
You dog. DOG.
Ye Gads, Rio! That’s quite the collection. Please let us know when you’ll be performing ’round these parts?
Headline: Hurricane predictors admit they can’t predict hurricanes.
“We are discontinuing our early December quantitative hurricane forecast for the next year … Our early December Atlantic basin seasonal hurricane forecasts of the last 20 years have not shown real-time forecast skill even though the hindcast studies on which they were based had considerable skill.”
http://www.ottawacitizen.com/mobile/story.html?id=5847032
But climatologists CAN predict the course, over the next several decades, of anthropogenic global warming, oops I mean global climate change.
It’s easy to predict ants will build anthills. It’s hard to predict which ones will get stepped on in the process.
The way aah reads this, when ya say “23rd Psalm on up”, that would be like 23rd, 24th, 25th and all the way to 122nd Psalm. And if ya gave me a hundred pages of that $hit to read and comment on, that would make ya a religious nut. If I wanted to study this stuff I’d go to a monastery or something.
I’m not sure if that is what was meant. The 23rd Psalm (”The Lord is my shepherd…”) is perhaps the best known Psalm. “And up” might simply have meant other well known literary snippets from throughout the ages (”To be or not to be…”, etc.)
If there really is a God
This is what I know
He doesn`t like Marion Barber
But he does like Tim Tebow
Ugh! Please don’t mention him. He’s the ONLY thing people talk about these days in our neck of the woods.
“Ugh! Please don’t mention him. He’s the ONLY thing people talk about these days in our neck of the woods.”
God or Marion Barber?
Tebow, my butt. He couldn’t even get enough first downs to get into reasonable field goal range. Poor guy kicks two 50-yarders (unheard of), and Timmy gets all the credit.
What the locals are bloviating is that Timmy is providing “leadership” and inspiring the team to win.
Which might be true. It sure isn’t from his skill on the field.
“It sure isn’t from his skill on the field.”
Lets look at it this way. There are 1.2 million kids that play high school football every year. About 30,000 play college football every year (less on scholarship)
Current Number of Players on NFL Roster
32 teams x 53-man roster = 1,696 players
1.2 million players down to 1,696 players
If you make it to the NFL you got skills.
The BoZ and Tony Mandrich might poke a few holes in that statement.
“The BoZ and Tony Mandrich might poke a few holes in that statement.”
So does JaMarcus Russell and Ryan Leaf. But they still made it from 1.2 million to 1,696. They both had skill, the problem is when a QB gets to the NFL skill (throwing a football 80 yards) is not enough.
As far as the BoZ and Tony Mandrich go, they both played in the NFL but not at the level expected. Bozworth played pretty well for the Seahawks but is remembered for getting trucked by Bo Jackson. Tony Mandrich deflated when he came off the roids but did come back and start for the Colts in Peyton Manning`s 1st or 2nd season.
When it comes to this subject I remeber a comedian (I don`t know if it was a movie or what) who said….
I was a great hockey player! I was just bad compared to other profesional hockey players.
Eerily similar to early stage of US housing crash…
China’s housing bubble is losing air
Los Angeles Times | 12/13/2011 | David Pierson
Home prices and sales plunge after China’s government intentionally slams on the brakes. Some recent buyers stage demonstrations, destroy real estate offices and demand refunds of up to 40%.
Falling home values. Debt-strapped borrowers. Real estate woes dogging the economy. It’s old news in the United States, but now the air has started to leak from another great housing bubble — in China.
Home prices nationwide declined in November for the third straight month, according to an index of values in 100 major cities compiled by the China Index Academy, an independent real estate firm. Average prices in the Shanghai area are down about 40% from their peak in mid-2009, to about $176,000 for a 1,000-square-foot home.
Sales have plummeted. In Beijing, nearly two years’ worth of inventory is clogging the market, and more than 1,000 real estate agencies have closed this year. Developers who once pre-sold housing projects within hours are growing desperate. A real estate company in the eastern city of Wenzhou is offering to throw in a new BMW with a home purchase.
The swift turnaround has stunned buyers such as Shanghai resident Mark Li, who thought prices had nowhere to go but up. The software engineer closed on a $250,000, three-bedroom apartment in August, only to watch weeks later as the developer slashed prices 25% on identical units to attract buyers in a slowing market.
Outraged, Li and hundreds of others who paid full price trashed the sales office, scuffled with employees and protested for three days before police broke up the demonstration. Walking away now would mean losing the $75,000 down payment that he borrowed from his working-class parents.
“I still haven’t told them,” Li, 29, said of his home’s plummeting value. “It will just make them worry, and it’s already too late.”
Some recent buyers stage demonstrations, destroy real estate offices and demand refunds of up to 40%.
Interesting how a people who essentially live under a dictatorship get angrier and will act more than the inhabitants of the “land of the free”
Maybe they need their own version of “Dancing with the Stars” to keep the masses lobotomized.
And yes, eerily similar (except for the violence) to what happened here. I suppose the belief that “It’s different here” is somehow hardwired into the human psyche.
You have seen video’s of the police tactics with OWS right.
Yup, hence my snide remark about “the land of the free”.
However, my point was Chinese FB’s are getting pissed and violent, unlike our own sheeple FB’s.
I’ll be visiting China for a few weeks in just a few days. I’ll keep my my eyes open for any information.
Cool! Where will you be visiting?
Thanks for asking…
Chongqing. It will be a bit chilly at this time of year.
But, but, but - aren’t China’s leaders supposed to be prodigious students of capitalist tactics that will successfully engineer a soft landing? That’s what the emerging market hacks/cheerleaders keep preaching.
How could they be when even ours aren’t?
“aren’t China’s leaders supposed to be prodigious students of capitalist tactics that will successfully engineer a soft landing? That’s what the emerging market hacks/cheerleaders keep preaching.”
One thing they are is decisive. Our polarized ‘democracy’ here tends lately to make problems worse. When the Chinese decide on a course of action, they carry it out. I don’t know if they can engineer a soft landing, but I’d bet they can do it better than we.
A real estate company in the eastern city of Wenzhou is offering to throw in a new BMW with a home purchase.
Hmmmm …. methinks that these houses were targetted at the managerial class … the problem is … there aren’t that many of them and the Foxconn crowd can’t afford a BMW, never mind a house, which I’m guessing is pricey even by our standards and probably costs far more than 10 factory workers combined lifetime incomes.
Saw the same car giveaways here in our own little bubble.
Like I really want to amortize the price of a car over 30 years.
Just lower the DAMN PRICE…
“there aren’t that many of them and the Foxconn crowd can’t afford a BMW”
I drove a Chinese guy from SFO to Sacramento yesterday, he was from Beijing. I could barely understand his English–he spoke badly, but FAST. Bad combo. Anyway, he thought it was hilarious that when he comes here, he goes shopping for jeans, because they cost almost half here what they do in China, and when he looks at the tag, it says “made in China”.
Some recent buyers stage demonstrations, destroy real estate offices and demand refunds of up to 40%.
Wow! That’s a real outburst! Angry Chinese could give angry Americans some lessons.
China Housing (from today’s LA Times)
The swift turnaround has stunned buyers such as Shanghai resident Mark Li, who thought prices had nowhere to go but up. The software engineer closed on a $250,000, three-bedroom apartment in August, only to watch weeks later as the developer slashed prices 25% on identical units to attract buyers in a slowing market.
Outraged, Li and hundreds of others who paid full price trashed the sales office, scuffled with employees and protested for three days before police broke up the demonstration. Walking away now would mean losing the $75,000 down payment that he borrowed from his working-class parents.
“I still haven’t told them,” Li, 29, said of his home’s plummeting value. “It will just make them worry, and it’s already too late.”
All your houses are belong to us.
“The swift turnaround has stunned buyers such as Shanghai resident Mark Li, who thought prices had nowhere to go but up.”
Nobody could have seen it coming!
Just wait until their all-cash California real estate investments start losing air. It will be quite a double whammy for some Chinese real estate investors…
I’m so glad I’m not the only one who was considering the fate of all those investment properties. California is absolutely lousy with Chinese RE infestors.
My job gives me a unique insight into who’s buying properties, and since the bust there’s been a disproportionately high number of Chinese nationals buying “investments” in my neck of the woods. The problem being that many of these are in marginal (at best) neighborhoods, and the values are still continuing to sink. I wonder how long until the trouble of landlording in the hood outstrips the allure of a monthly check?
I wonder what Mark Li’ income is. I would wager it’s not the equivalent of $60K.
Running out of money after the private sector has been out-sourced who could have forseen this ?
COLUMBUS, Ohio (AP) — After nearly 40 years in public education, Patrick Godwin spends his retirement days running a horse farm east of Sacramento, Calif., with his daughter.
His departure from the workaday world is likely to be long and relatively free of financial concerns, after he retired last July at age 59 with a pension paying $174,308 a year for the rest of his life.
Such guaranteed pensions for relatively youthful government retirees — paid in similar fashion to millions nationwide — are contributing to nationwide friction with the public sector workers. They have access to attractive defined-benefit pensions and retiree health care coverage that most private sector workers no longer do.
Experts say eligible retirement ages have fallen over the past two decades for many reasons, including contract agreements between states and government labor unions that lowered retirement ages in lieu of raising pay.
With Americans increasingly likely to live well into their 80s, critics question whether paying lifetime pensions to retirees from age 55 or 60 is financially sustainable. An Associated Press survey earlier this year found the 50 states have a combined $690 billion in unfunded pension liabilities and $418 billion in retiree health care obligations.
Three-quarters of U.S. public retirement systems in 2008 offered some kind of early-retirement option paying partial benefits, according to a 2009 Wisconsin Legislative Council study. Most commonly, the minimum age for those programs was 55, but 15 percent allowed government workers to retire even earlier, the review found. The study is widely regarded as the most comprehensive assessment of the issue.
Police and firefighters often can retire starting even younger — at around age 50 — because of the physically demanding nature of some of those jobs.
millions nationwide ???
So this article is suggesting that millions of people get fixed benefit plans earning 174k a year, very misleading. What percentage of his pension is fixed?
What sort of job did this guy do prior. Was he just a school teacher, I doubt it.
Great journalism? NOT.
It’s not really a news article, it’s more of an attempt to shape public opinion. Why, all of those people with 6 figure pensions are whats wrong with this country, by gawd. (never mind that these people are a very small number of public sector retirees) I can’t believe the crap that passes for journalism these days.
Exactly. It’s an incendiary article whose sole purpose is to get people angry at government employees.
This “article” was on the front page of our local rag (The Loveland Reporter Herald).
I had a skype video chat with a friend last night and was explaining to him that our MSM is the Cropy Capitalist equivalent of Pravda and that I go offshore to find the news (and that Al Jazeera is one of my favorites).
I had a skype video chat with a friend last night and was explaining to him that our MSM is the Cropy Capitalist equivalent of Pravda and that I go offshore to find the news (and that Al Jazeera is one of my favorites).
Right now, I’m listening to Pacifica’s “Democracy Now.” Heckuva good interview with presidential candidate Rocky Anderson, BTW.
Any-hoo, the aforementioned show does air content from Al Jazeera. And it’s pretty darn good.
And yet my friend, who walks the border and whose income is funded by taxpayers, will complain about government largesse and spending while claiming he deserves HIS ability to retire at age 50 with, to my knowledge, full benefits.
When I was in College in mid 80’s the Border Patrol came to school to recruit, and I was their “target” recruit because I could speak Spanish and could use computers.
The starting salary was a joke, $14K a year IIRC.
In any case I don’t think I would have been happy chasing down and arresting illegals on the border for 30+ years.
“In any case I don’t think I would have been happy chasing down and arresting illegals on the border for 30+ years.”
Agreed, and in general I’m supportive of the agency and am fascinated by the stories. He fails to see, however, the irony of his denouncement of OTHER gov’t agencies (and, of course, OWSers) as entitled pigs.
What happens when austerity comes to the US and he, as a mid-40-something, in a cost-saving measure, is replaced by troops returning from duty? I haven’t thrown that trump card in discussion YET, but I’m often tempted.
What I’m getting at is he’ll find a way to justify why he can take the 99 weeks when the austerity he is calling for actually happens…
There are over 6000 ex-teachers in California alone collecting six-figure pensions. That’s hardly a “very small number.”
The number of firefighters is even higher.
I tried to google the author, can’t find a picture of her. I often wonder if some of these people even exist, or write what get’s printed. .
What sort of job did this guy do prior. Was he just a school teacher, I doubt it.
He was probably a high ranking muckety muck. My FIL was an private sector executive (director level) and he has that kind of pension.
60 IS NOT youthful. Not even “relatively.”
What utter bullcrap.
Modern medicine keeps alive a lot of people who 100+ years ago would have been pushing up daisies at their age.
tee-hee - gotta luv those public unions.
Being the top 8/10 of money contributors to political campaigns does pay off…
But it is FOR THE CHILDREN!!!!
RE: China Housing
If it really is going bust, I can only imagine what will happen to the price of…everything–oil, coal, copper (I follow the JJC copper ETF)…..
Could China get so desperate that they even cut prices on all the other things they are overproducing? (i.e. TV’s etc)
I think for a few weeks in 1932 the US had negative absolute rates on its treasury bonds…ya’ gotta wonder where it all ends.
“…what will happen to the price of…everything…”
Don’t forget about the price fixer of last resort.
Mortgage Bonds Rally as Fed Backstop Seen
By Jody Shenn - Dec 13, 2011 3:18 AM PT
The Fed started in October to recycle proceeds from past investments in housing-related debt to help real estate escape its worst slump since the 1930s. Photographer: Jonathan Alcorn/Bloomberg
Relative yields on mortgage-backed securities that guide new loan rates have fallen to the lowest in five months as investors wager the Federal Reserve is on standby to expand its holdings if the U.S. economy or Europe’s debt crisis worsens.
Yields on Fannie Mae’s current-coupon, 30-year bonds ended last week at 94 basis points more than 10-year Treasuries, the narrowest since July 8, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The spread widened to 98 basis points yesterday after reaching 121 basis points, or 1.21 percentage points, on Nov. 24.
The Fed is already bolstering the market, adding “dollar roll” trades this month that lower financing costs for investors, after starting in October to recycle proceeds from past investments in housing-related debt to help real estate escape its worst slump since the 1930s. While a smaller share of economists predict the central bank will add to its $1 trillion of holdings as the U.S. grows, bond buyers may benefit regardless, said Dwight Asset Management Co.’s Paul Norris.
“Let’s say that something bad happens in Europe,” said Norris, a senior money manager whose Burlington, Vermont-based firm oversees about $50 billion. “Initially mortgages may widen out a bit but what that would likely lead to is a really quick implementation of QE3,” he said, referring to what would be the third round of Fed asset purchases called quantitative easing.
…
SAVAGE OFFERS GINGRICH $1 MILLION TO DROP OUT OF THE RACE (Only 48 hours remain)(SUBJECT TO ALL THE TERMS AND CONDITIONS TO BE EXPRESSLY STATED BY DR. SAVAGE, INCLUDING GINGRICH DROPPING OUT WITHIN 72 HOURS OF TODAY)
THE REPUBLICAN PRESIDENTIAL FIELD HAS COME DOWN TO TWO CANDIDATES WHO HAVE A REAL CHANCE OF GETTING THE NOMINATION: NEWT GINGRICH AND MITT ROMNEY. WHILE IT’S TRUE THAT ROMNEY IS NOT AS STRONG A CONSERVATIVE AS MANY WOULD LIKE HIM TO BE, THE MOST PRESSING ISSUE BEFORE AMERICA TODAY IS DEFEATING BARACK OBAMA. AND THAT IS SOMETHING NEWT GINGRICH CANNOT DO. FOR WEEKS ON MY SHOW, I HAVE ENUMERATED THE REASONS WHY GINGRICH CANNOT SUCCEED IN AN ELECTION AGAINST OBAMA:
•WHEN HE WAS SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE, GINGRICH FAILED TO DELIVER ON HIS SO-CALLED CONTRACT WITH AMERICA.
•HE MADE ADS WITH NANCY PELOSI PROMOTING THE FALSE THEORY OF GLOBAL WARMING.
•HE’S IN FAVOR OF AMNESTY FOR ILLEGAL ALIENS.
•HE’S TAKEN HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS OF DOLLARS FROM FANNIE MAE AND FREDDIE MAC, TWO OF THE MOST CORRUPT FINANCIAL INSTITUTIONS IN HISTORY.
•HE’S CHEATED ON TWO WIVES AND LEFT BOTH OF THEM WHILE THEY WERE BOTH SERIOUSLY ILL, WHICH WILL DESTROY HIS CHANCES AMONG FEMALE VOTERS.
•HE CALLED THE REPUBLICAN PLAN TO REFORM MEDICARE “RIGHT WING SOCIAL ENGINEERING.”
•IN A PRESIDENTIAL DEBATE AGAINST OBAMA, REGARDLESS OF HOW WELL HE DOES, ON TELEVISION, HE WILL COME OFF BADLY COMPARED TO OBAMA AND LOOK LIKE NOTHING MORE THAN WHAT HE IS: A FAT, OLD, WHITE MAN.
NEWT GINRICH IS UNELECTABLE. MITT ROMNEY IS THE ONLY CANDIDATE WITH A CHANCE OF DEFEATING BARACK OBAMA, AND THERE IS NOTHING MORE IMPORTANT THAN THAT FOR FUTURE HEALTH, SAFETY, AND SECURITY OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. THEREFORE, I AM OFFERING NEWT GINGRICH ONE MILLION DOLLARS TO DROP OUT OF THE PRESIDENTIAL RACE FOR THE SAKE OF THE NATION.
IF NEWT GINGRICH REALLY LOVES THIS COUNTRY AS MUCH AS HE SAYS HE DOES, IF HE REALLY WANTS WHAT IS BEST FOR AMERICA, HE WILL SET HIS EGO ASIDE, CALL ME, AND ACCEPT MY OFFER. HIS CONTINUED CANDIDACY SPELLS NOTHING BUT RUIN FOR CONSERVATIVES, REPUBLICANS, AND ALL TRUE AMERICAN PATRIOTS. ONE MILLION DOLLARS IN EXCHANGE FOR PRESERVING THE NATION, NEWT. I SAY TAKE THE MONEY… AND DON’T RUN
I LOVE THE SAVAGE NATION,MOST ENTERTAINING SHOW ON TALK RADIO,AND HE MOSTLY SPEAKS THE TRUTH !!!!
Terry Savage??
Stop shouting!
+1
A million bucks? He must be kidding.
Try ten times that. He can make a million bucks in a couple of weeks on the rubber-chicken-lecture circuit.
Newt can generate a $1-million in a couple of days as a history consultant.
I’d say that offering Mr. Gingrich a million dollars to get out of the race is about the best way possible to guarantee that he stays in. It is exactly the sort of thing he is likely to interpret as people being scared that he will win. It will also remind him of how much more valuable his time will be even if he loses if stays in and fights to the end and then gets to spend the next 4 years giving “I told you so” speeches.
Seriously. Was this “offer” paid for by Mr. Gingrich’s campaign?
I found this to be intriguing: “HE MADE ADS WITH NANCY PELOSI PROMOTING THE FALSE THEORY OF GLOBAL WARMING”
Wouldn’t that be a fun campaign commerical for Dems to air in Summer 2012…
Especially when the temperatures, drought and tornadoes set yet another record.
And the hurricanes too.
Take the caps lock off and calm down.
Breathe deeply. Close your eyes. Breathe deeply. Count to 10 if you have to.
Feel better now?
It’s Mike Savage who is the “Savage Nation.”
Terry Savage is the “Savage Truth.”
There is too many Savages running around.
I’m surprised that no one has mentioned Dan Savage, who writes an advice column about, ummm, intimate relations.
And who caused Mr. Santorum’s google problem.
Crossed my mind, Slim!
Does it seem as though this story shows up on a weekly basis, week-in, week-out?
BUSINESS
DECEMBER 13, 2011
Banks in Push for Pact
By RUTH SIMON, NICK TIMIRAOS and DAN FITZPATRICK
Five large lenders could be forced to make concessions worth roughly $19 billion as bank representatives and government officials push to put the finishing touches on a settlement of most state and federal investigations of alleged foreclosure improprieties.
Housing and Urban Development Secretary Shaun Donovan and state officials hope to reach a deal as soon as this week, though any agreement could be delayed by unresolved issues including the naming of a monitor to oversee the agreement.
North Carolina Commissioner of Banks Joseph A. Smith Jr. is being considered for the monitor post.
The settlement would end months-long negotiations among federal officials, state attorneys general and the nation’s five largest mortgage servicers: Ally Financial Inc., Bank of America Corp., Citigroup Inc., J.P. Morgan Chase & Co. and Wells Fargo & Co. The talks center on the banks’ use of “robo-signing,” in which employees approved legal documents without proper review, and other questionable foreclosure practices. Representatives of the five banks declined to comment.
The value of the settlement could be as large as $25 billion if it includes California, which left the talks in September. California accounted for 13.1% of all mortgages outstanding at the end of September and 10.8% of all loans in foreclosure, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association. Without California, the value of the deal is likely to be roughly $19 billion, people familiar with the talks said. A spokesman for California Attorney General Kamala D. Harris declined to comment.
The dollar value of the deal would include the value of principal write-downs, interest-rate reductions and other benefits to homeowners as well as cash penalties.
…
It’s all theater to avoid doing anything for as long as possible. The current system benefits a lot of big players. They’re not going to voluntarily change it until… well… until it really does break.
The theater seems to please the markets. If all it takes to keep the system running is the market hearing these pronouncements - well… good for them.
But, this is all about figuring out who’s going to pay for bad loans. It’s like being next to a leaking levee holding back a rising tide. They’re sandbagging and fixing leaks. I guess time will tell if they manage to prevent the levee from breaking. Or if a storm surge will breach it.
Exactly. The whole point of the bailouts and stalling is quantitative easing… for the rich.
Something I predicted with the first bailout. It was NEVER about reviving the economy.
THIS WAS SAID ABOUT NEWT:
“The higher a monkey climbs on the pole the more you can see his butt.”
-
Please stop yelling.
AAR is experiencing a “shortage” of people who want to work. Damn lazy azz Amerricuns.
http://tinyurl.com/7gb3mto
What a surprise.
I’m surprised that AAR doesn’t just offshore the work to Mexico. Set up a facility next to the Juarez Airport and it isn’t all that far away. Pay above average wages (which there are probaly $3/hr) for mechanics, and continue to charge $50/hr for the work.
Wasn’t there a thread here the other day that claimed that if you were in the top x% of your profession that you could write your own ticket?
AAR was one of the few airlines doing heavy maintenance “in-house”
That’s why it seemed like they were always getting fined by the Feds; basically, AAR and SWA are the only two majors left for them to inspect and fine.
Every other airline has outsourced their heavy maintenance to our neighbors to the south and across the Pacific years ago. Now that they can throw their union contracts away, expect AAR to do the same.
Time to short/sell SWA. They are the “high-cost” airline now.
Dirty Little Secret ……you don’t have to be a “FAA certified mechanic” to turn wrenches on an airliner. Per the FAA, if you work for a Part 145 “Repair Station” (either here, or in China, Mexico, Etc) you can jump straight from Jiffy Lube to overhauling engines, if there is adequate supervision and quality control in place.
The rule was initially put in place, because it made no sense for anyone to fly an aircraft halfway around the world to do a minor inspection/repair. Especially back in the days when all the airlines had their own trained and licensed mechanics.
Of course, in our new globalized, deregulated paradigm, the definition of “adequate” is a loophole you can drive a B747 thru.
I suspect that the cost cutting wil continue until jets start falling out of the sky.
You all have confused AAR with AMR. AAR is an outsourcing maintenance company (large operations in Miami), AMR is the holding company for the 3rd largest airline in the US known as American Airlines.
AMR does in house maintenance and considers this in-house maintenance a competitive advantage. Here’s to hoping they keep it after bankruptcy, which seems likely given that AMR has been handing maintenance for other airlines, such as Republic Air Holdings and Allegiant.
Thanks, moman.
I heard that story how they train workers who then leave for the oil and gas companies or overseas work and more pay”
H1B is the answer can’t find enough us workers
I heard the same complaint about truck drivers on NPR.
I started out working quite cheaply and had to switch jobs many times to get up to “normal” pay once I got experience. Plus a degree that helps too.
hard to start over again at middle age which I think many folks are having to consider much easier to be poor when you are 20 than 50.
Heard this on the news the other day. I literally guffawed.
Investors seeking to “flip” homes for quick profits played a significant role in driving up home prices during the housing bubble and their subsequent collapse, economists at the New York Federal Reserve have concluded.
http://community.nasdaq.com/News/2011-12/did-flippers-feed-the-housing-bubble.aspx?storyid=108027
They COMPLETELY ignore the system which enabled the flippers. It would be like FEMA saying that people died in Katrina due to their inability to swim, not because the levees failed.
Blame a symptom and not the root cause.
These accidental jokesters will do everything to ignore the broken debt markets that encourage the generation of bad loans by separating lenders from repayment risk.
“It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends on his not understanding it.” — Upton Sinclair
BINGO
Another prime example of the press being used for propaganda.
Blame the gov
Blame the home owner
Don’t look behind the curtain.
Did anyone watch the LD “debate” between Jon Huntsman and Newt Gingrich on CSPAN last night?
After the recent weeks of reality sideshow elimination rounds, it was a genuine pleasure to listen to two thoughtful, reasoned (well, Newt IS Newt,) statesmen engage in a substantive discussion of US foreign policy before an educated (and well-mannered) audience.
If Huntsman could articulate a bit more of Ron Paul’s message, he’d have a real chance to pick up the independent-leaning vote for the nomination.
Here’s an article about MF Global that made me angry; the gist of it is that it’s the poor _employees_ who are the real victims.
Horse-puckey. What a load of bunk.
Sure, it’s inconvenient when your company goes bankrupt suddenly—I’ve been there, done that.
But it’s nothing like finding out the money you assumed was safely held in a reliable firm was actually spirited, most likely fraudulently.
Grrr.
http://finance.yahoo.com/blogs/breakout/real-victims-jon-corzine-mf-global-bankruptcy-131108203.html
Yeah - like who could have seen it coming?
And talk about irony (but laws are for the little people anyways):
Jon Corzine — the prominent Democrat politician who served as New Jersey governor and senator before moving on to head MF Global Holdings Ltd the “leading cash and derivatives broker-dealer” from which he managed to misplace $1.2 billion — was among the supporters of the intrusive Sarbanes-Oxley Act of 2002 which promised an end to greedy corporate skullduggery.
————————————-
An eviscerating article in Sunday’s NY Times called into question just how hands-off Mr. Corzine was. Citing inside sources, the Times says “Mr. Corzine compulsively traded for the firm on his Blackberry during meetings, sometimes dashing out to check on the markets.”
A presumption of innocence aside, Corzine’s having been an actively trading CEO yet claiming ignorance as to the clearing and processing activities of his firm falls somewhere between implausible and the lie of a financial sociopath.
That said it sounds like Corzine encouraged the employees to invest their money in MF Global. A stark contrast to the reported warning message that likely came from MF Global to the Koch brothers to get their money out of the system before MF Global went BK.
I wonder how much he had riding on the firm??
Anyone had any experience with the “MagicJack” phone system?
I tried it and had mixed results. When there was other heavy bandwidth activity (say a you tube download) it would break up. I supposed that with a higher badwidth line it would be OK. I have 5 Mbit download at home.
Do you still use it?
try this
http://www.ooma.com/
Dang, things are ridiculous at work - people retiring out of the blue, transferring out, quitting… it’s crazy, like animals scattering before a tsunami.
Were the police there?
No, and sorry I didn’t respond last night. I have very little free time these days. K12 districts in FL are drawn by county, so really large districts usually have their own police force for background checks and security at the school board. My district has about 17,000 employees. There are police at each high school and middle school, and then the district force at HQ. I’m so desensitized to it that I’ve never really thought twice about it until your post.
But yes, there are regularly people that show up at HQ that are escorted to HR/OPS with an armed officer. It’s like working at a courthouse to some degree. The design of the building is genius in that it’s all compartmentalized so that if there ever were a shooter it would be easy to button the joint up and isolate them.
Crazy, huh?
rms, I think you also asked about tenure. FL doesn’t have it, we have annual contracts now (or professional contracts if you’re grandfathered in), but the person I was referring to was an administrator and they can be cut loose at any time.
“like animals scattering before a tsunami.”
Might be telling you something.
Muggy, please give us some details.
Well, here is a generalization:
1. Younger rising stars leave whenever to take higher paying jobs in neighboring districts. Leaving midyear used to be taboo in the education world, but now that everyone hates teachers, they wheel and deal like NBA players for better pay.
2. Older, experienced people sometimes just cave — a little pressure, and poof! They disappear before they can be fired.
3. Because of the increased pressure and accountability, the turnover is occurring with higher frequency. Whenever someone new takes the helm, they undo everything the previous leader did and start a bunch of new initiatives, destined to be undone by the next leader. Like teachers, administrators used to stay in posts for 10 years, but now it’s like 1-3 years and then on to something else. The amount of movement is unbelievable, and creates inefficient systems.
4. A few people mid-career people have simply walked off, never to be heard from again. With time I’ll learn their stories.
“Muggy, please give us some details.”
BTW, I’m not trying to be vague…
WASHINGTON — A measure that Congress will likely pass this week allowing indefinite detentions of Americans by the U.S. military will mark a significant loss in the war on terrorism, says a retired admiral who ran the Navy legal system.
The National Defense Authorization Act, passed by the Senate just over a week ago after a heated debate, includes a provision that requires the military to hold foreign-born terrorism suspects, and also lets the military grab U.S. citizens for indefinite detention.
The House and Senate are expected to release the final legislation as soon as late Monday, and in spite of a personal lobbying effort by President Obama, it is expected to include the controversial language.
To Ret. Adm. John Hutson, who was Judge Advocate General of the Navy from 1997 to 2000 and is dean emeritus of the University of New Hampshire School of Law, the idea that the United States is chipping away at one of its fundamental principles of civilian law enforcement is a win for terrorists.
“The enemy is just laughing over this, because they will have gotten another victory,” Hutson told The Huffington Post. “There’ll be one more victory. There won’t be any bloodshed or immediate bloodshed, there’s not a big explosion, except in a metaphorical sense, but it is a victory nonetheless for the enemy. And it’s a self-inflicted wound.”
Proponents of the measure, including the top members of the Senate Armed Services Committee, Sens. Carl Levin (D-Mich.) and John McCain (R-Ariz.), see it very differently — as a commonsense step to give the military the legal authority it needs to fight the unconventional war on terrorism without treating would-be attackers as common criminals.
“There’s a fundamental principle in that we don’t want to criminalize a national security issue,” McCain told reporters on Capitol Hill last week. “Any enemy combatant is an enemy combatant,” he added, specifying that it does not make a difference under the bill if the suspect is an American citizen, except that the military has the choice of releasing citizens to law enforcement.
File this under “I can’t believe it started with Viking appliances and now look where we are.”
The village of Wukan, fed up with corruption and crony capitalism, has risen up against their Communist overlords. Contrast these gutsy people and their demands for freedom and dignity with the sorry excuses for citizens in our country who with their votes for Obama and McCain consented to less freedom, more corruption, and continued crony capitalism and venality by the .01%.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/china/8954315/Inside-Wukan-the-Chinese-village-that-fought-back.html
For the first time on record, the Chinese Communist party has lost all control, with the population of 20,000 in this southern fishing village now in open revolt.
The last of Wukan’s dozen party officials fled on Monday after thousands of people blocked armed police from retaking the village, standing firm against tear gas and water cannons.
Since then, the police have retreated to a roadblock, some three miles away, in order to prevent food and water from entering, and villagers from leaving. Wukan’s fishing fleet, its main source of income, has also been stopped from leaving harbour.
The plan appears to be to lay siege to Wukan and choke a rebellion which began three months ago when an angry mob, incensed at having the village’s land sold off, rampaged through the streets and overturned cars.
Although China suffers an estimated 180,000 “mass incidents” a year, it is unheard of for the Party to sound a retreat.
Expect to see a lot more of this in the months ahead. And not just in China.
Time to take an eraser to the Chinese map, and change all the chinese history books.
There isn’t now and there has never been a city by the name of Wukan.
So now the real estate experts are saying no housing recovery will ensue until 2016. Never been a better time to rent.
Which makes me wonder whether Douglas Duncan ever got around to buying a home? Last I recall, he was renting, rather than trying to catch himself a falling knife, but that was back around 2006 or so.
Q&A with Fannie Mae’s chief economist
Written by Lily Leung
1:28 p.m., Dec. 13, 2011
Updated 2:47 p.m.
The U.S. is in its fifth year of what could be a decade-long housing recovery that likely will see minor traction in 2012, said Fannie Mae Chief Economist and Vice President Douglas Duncan at a San Diego real estate conference on Tuesday.
Duncan, who has been in his current role since 2008, said a mix of consumer hesitation, stagnant or reduced income levels, and the expiration of tax cuts contributed to his forecast of 1 1/2 percent growth in 2012. Duncan addressed about 300 real estate professionals on campus at the University of San Diego to give a big-picture view of the residential market.
“They’re worried about their job…so what’s the urgency to act today?” referring to consumers’ attitudes toward homebuying.
Fannie Mae is a government-sponsored enterprise whose connection with subprime mortgages caused its downfall and eventually led government take-over. The giant buys mortgages from lenders and sells them to investors on the secondary mortgage market.
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What will keep us back?
-The expiration of tax cuts to households and business by Dec. 31.
-Increased taxes tied to healthcare bill.
-Net 0 percent growth in small business, which he called an “engine of employment growth.”
-Signs of income reductions or freezing.
-The fact 4.5 million households are more than three payments behind on their mortgages. That must be worked through.
-The risk coming from the European markets.
-Borrower concern about their jobs and expectation that their expenses will exceed how much they make.
-The shift to renting as a good decision over buying. Duncan said the current market is different from the one seen in 1995-2005, when the country created zero net rental households.
–About 60,000 new finished homes are on the market, the lowest level since World War II. Our population is now 2-1/2 times bigger since then. Duncan said the result may be rapid price appreciation because the resources to build rapidly may not exist in the future.
Yeah, Doug, never mind them 7-10 million homes with defaulted mortgages, which will presumably reenter the market some time over the next decade as used homes for sale, or the tsunami tide of baby boomers who will be trying to sell their empty nests and downsize their living space over the next two decades. We might be able to get through 2030 without constructing a single additional McMansion.
Bloomberg
U.S. Mortgage Debt Falls to Five-Year Low as Wealth Effect Fades
December 10, 2011, 10:21 AM EST
By John Gittelsohn and Kathleen M. Howley
Dec. 8 (Bloomberg) — U.S. mortgage debt, a driver of consumer spending during the real estate boom, dropped to the lowest level in almost five years in the third quarter as foreclosures wipe out home loans and housing purchases fall.
The volume of outstanding home mortgages declined to $9.88 trillion from $9.94 trillion at June 30, according to Federal Reserve data released today. The reading was the lowest since the end of 2006. Mortgage volume peaked at $10.6 trillion in early 2008, the final months of a decade-long borrowing binge.
The mortgage lending that boosted spending and padded bank profits during the 2001 to 2006 surge in home prices is failing to aid the U.S. economic recovery as the worth of real estate plunges, Doug Duncan, chief economist of mortgage-financier Fannie Mae, said in a telephone interview from Washington. Outstanding home-loan volume may drop “for at least another couple of years,” he said.
“Consumers are still leveraged well above average,” Duncan said. “That has to be worked off before you’ll see a return of robust consumption.”
Lending for mortgages to purchase homes probably will fall to $80 billion in the fourth quarter, the lowest since 1991 and one-fifth the volume of a record high in mid-2005, according to the Mortgage Bankers Association in Washington. Home prices are down 31 percent from a July 2006 peak, based on the S&P/Case- Shiller home price index of 20 U.S. cities.
Underwater Loans
Declining property values have wiped out more than $4 trillion in real estate wealth over four years, according to the Federal Reserve, and left almost a third of U.S. mortgage payers owing more than the value of their house, data from Zillow Inc. show. The 29 percent of mortgaged homeowners who were underwater on their loans in the third quarter is up from 23 percent a year earlier, according to the Seattle-based real estate information and sales service.
Kenna Stormogipson, in Oakland, California, is one of those underwater borrowers. She said she’s stuck in a house she bought for $485,000 in 2005.
“You can’t leave,” said Stormogipson, 31, a high school science teacher. “You can’t really spend money on anything else.”
The duplex home, which has first and second mortgages totaling $462,000, would sell for about $200,000 today, she said. Loan payments took up more than half of her monthly $5,000 salary, she said.
Stormogipson stopped making full mortgage payments six months ago because her lender wouldn’t agree to a loan modification. This Christmas, she’s going to make gifts at home, such as soap and arts and crafts items.
‘Big Problem’
“Negative equity is the big problem,” Stan Humphries, chief economist for Zillow, said in a telephone interview. “It’s hard to come up with a way to erase the negative equity that’s fair to homeowners who were going to continue to pay and in a way that doesn’t bankrupt either the banks or the taxpayer.”
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Shouldn’t Gingrich’s problem be with evangelical’s/right wing of party, not with ‘independents and swing voters’?
From the WSJ:
Republican voters now heavily favor Newt Gingrich over Mitt Romney as the party’s nominee, according to a new Wall Street Journal/NBC News survey, but the poll also found deep unease with Mr. Gingrich among independents and swing voters who normally decide presidential elections.
With less than three weeks before the first votes are cast in Iowa, Republicans give the former House speaker the most commanding lead of any candidate this year: He has 40% support among likely GOP voters, compared with 23% for Mr. Romney. All of the other Republican candidates fell short of 10% support in the poll.
If Gingrich wins the nomination, Democrats will draw knives on short order. First they will go over Newt’s marital infidelities, then they will move on to his lucrative consulting deals.