Bits Bucket for October 20, 2013
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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Hearing a lot of chatter about people thinking they are great investors in stocks once again. Are they being set up again?
Probably. There’s nothing like rising prices to draw them in.
Amazingly strange if one cares to think about it: Raise prices and this makes people want to buy?
Kinda throws out the window the teachings of Econ 101.
do you dare to try and short the rigged market? Can u believe FB is at 54 with a 200 PE? The sheep are really chasing the market.
Does the stock market still forecast the economy 6-12 months in advance? The theory of the business cycle must have been distorted by the Fed or something else must be at play.
On the flip side, what is the level of insider selling or is that being masked by stock buy backs (funded by issuing debt)?
the stock market has been forecasting money printing for the past 5 years.
Any stock holders here that own actual paper stock certificates? It’s all digital just like digital money printing. I don’t think the number of paper dollars in circulation has expanded that much.
Speaking of money printing, has anybody seen the new $100 bills? Banks should be taking the old ones out of circulation daily by now.
when is wall street going to tank the market again and flush out the weak hands?
I am one of the chatterers probably. I had huge losses in 2000 and 2001 in stocks. But I dollar cost averaged into mutual funds still and am at a good cost basis over a dozen years. From that basis, the value may go down 30% if the general market plummets 50%. I have taken 30% drops before.
As far as individual stocks, 95% of those I invested in staffing in health care and IT with now an average cost of less than one fifth of the current market value. it is taking advantage of the Donkey Deity’s policies of DonkeyCare making full time permanent jobs scarce and temp jobs with low pay common. I am betting on my pal, the Donkey Deity. I like his character and would have a couple of beers with Mr. Deity. He is only the agent of the voters and doing what his voters want. Now where did I place my DonkeyPhone?
As far as my new allocation outside my IRA and 401k it is now mostly cash and precious metals.
If you had one commodity to choose as an investment and you had the capacity to store that commodity what would you choose?
Gold.
Lead, copper and brass
Just kidding. I’d actually look for a PM or basket thereof sans gold, to avoid the gold price movements driven by the crazy theories that gold is some kind of superior form of money (currency) which are exacerbated by central bank portfolio adjustment.
It is a good idea to mix your precious metals with silver and platinum. My 2015 purchases will be strictly platinum.
I also like oil stocks. Owned HES (Hess oil) and made a modest short term gain this year.
I think they are getting confirmation bias. Since the market is rising and the world goes on after TheShutDown and many market shills are saying to stay in it to win it, who wants to think the rug can be pulled out under one? I am an asset allocation fan. How long does the market keep rising and rising? Sometimes things go on sale. Seems all the market has been counting on is expanding government debt. Is that a major correlation?
Full disclosure: I am about 30% into equities with my retirement funds. The rest is bonds,cash/copper. Every day is something new. One day I wonder if the government will confiscate our bank savings. Another day I wonder if inflation will jump and catch most off guard. It is risk, plain and simple. What is the reward we are getting for risk-taking? The risk that the market could drop because of some black swan event.
‘I wonder if the government will confiscate our bank savings’
Correction; these are now classified as cash hoardings.
Does reclassification as ‘cash hoardings’ make it easier for the bankster clan to politically justify their confiscation?
‘Correction; these are now classified as cash hoardings.’
Exactly. That is why converting it to copper cents is making me a full-fledged urban pirate kinda muppet.
You cannot deny that cash (physical fiat), physical precious metals, liquor, ammo, guns, and the like are places you need to allocate into for insurance against confiscation of some of your electronic assets.
Looking ahead, a ten percent one time tax is what they will probably do. If they tax anymore like that, they will incite revolution. So a ten to fifteen percent asset allocation into movable, hidable assets will offset the theft and provide you assets you need to live through the revolution against theftocraps.
“…a ten percent one time tax…”
Wait a minute…aren’t capital gains on assets already typically taxed at over ten percent (except for home equity gains
)?
Since Uncle Sam doesn’t like economic growth, he taxes it.
Oh yes they are already taxed. But that is not enough. More and more governments doing it like it was said.
Poland grabbed 50% of private pensions to pay off some of its sovereign debt. Why should the US politicians that are as rational as Nancy Pelosi and Howard Dean avoid doing the same?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2013-09-06/poland-confiscates-half-private-pension-funds-cut-sovereign-debt-load
The beauty of asset allocation in contradictory assets is that there are times you need the lowest performing asset, cash. Well in those times you sell your biggest gains. I sold gold before, a few years ago to raise cash. This year and last year I sold stocks to raise cash. I am expecting to sell some of my former company stock in January to raise cash. It’s like rebalancing. This style, and being debt free both helped me to have solid yearly net worth gains since I started watching in January 2009.
Those who are 100% in any asset class are gamblers or fools. I also started dollar cost averaging into a REIT, since I am weak on real estate.
“The risk that the market could drop because of some black swan event.”
bingo…no clue as to what “it” will be, but “it” will be big…hold on to your hats and keep your powder dry.
Here’s the question: How do you change your allocation to cash over time? Do you keep it a steady percentage of your portfolio? Or do you increase/decrease depending on market circumstances?
In the past, I have generally gone entirely to cash, or moved all-in at various times, but am thinking that setting a minimum cash amount may be the best strategy to take advantage of market moves downward.
Here is an article on Tiger 21’s investors, and how much cash their members hold at any given time:
http://www.cnbc.com/id/101122232?__source=ft&par=ft
And nobody lost anything during the last crash in 2008. It was just a blip and now everyone is whole again.
I don’t know why all those pension funds are broke. Their projections of 8 percent growth into infinity have become true once again.
I learned from the 2001-2003 drop to stay in during the next drop, and keep dollar cost averaging. Fools rush out, fools rush in. Wise people make slow measured moves.
As the dollar continues to lose value…
???
The dollar today is right where it was in 1991.
“As the dollar continues to lose value…”
Well that’s a good case for being primarily in stocks and precious metals. Got that covered.
report inventory in your area over the last 3 months
SOUND OFF !
22151 at 30 units now par is 45 and the low 3 months ago was 19
95050-95054…..
Total inventory of SFR’s available is 46….Historically a bottom low although there was awhile back in the spring that it got to the teens…A healthy balance would probably be around 150-200….
I would like to add that this is in a town of roughly 110,000 people…I think its informative that we see the relationship between inventory available vs. size of the city…
Have you ever been to hayward? Whats it like?
Hayward is basically a heavy industry area…Big land sites with big metal buildings…Probably developed out of the 50’s after the war…Over time it will redevelop…Its happening already…The BART system helps given that we are becoming more & more congested and it will be extended to San Jose in the next 7-10 years…
I wonder if rents are going to jump in areas where flood insurance rates are going to normalize? The headline stories coming out of Florida and other coastal areas have mostly covered the effect on home owners who have seen their flood insurance rates jump from $500 to $4,500. Since the changes were announced some parts of Florida have seen RE sales plummet.
http://tbo.com/pinellas-county/florida-lawmakers-exploring-flood-insurance-alternatives-20131018/
“While only 20 percent of flood policies nationwide will see rates go up as part of the 2012 Biggert-Waters Act, Florida — and especially the Tampa Bay area — will be hit harder than most parts of the nation.
Homes built before communities entered the flood program and drew up floodplain maps in the early 1970s have received artificially low rates for decades; the federal government is eliminating those subsidies.
Pinellas County has the highest number of those older properties in the country, estimated at more than 50,000, including condos and businesses, while Hillsborough has nearly 22,000 single-family homes alone being effected.
“These outrageous rate increases are going to destroy communities across the state,” said state Sen. Jeff Brandes, R-St. Petersburg. “Tampa Bay is ground zero for this flood insurance crisis.”
Realtors on both sides of the bay have reported that sales of those older homes have plummeted over the past month because of a provision in the law that makes flood rates immediately jump to full risk rate when a property is sold.”
Arbitrarily raise rents to cover carrying costs? It’s never worked before, why would it work now?
Cry me a river. Never trust a federal subsidy. Rates didn’t jump, they were always high, it’s just the fedgov subsidized them. That subsidy is gone now. People now have to pay full boat.
Old problem: Finding yourself literally underwater because you live in a flood plain.
New problem: Finding yourself figuratively underwater because you can’t find a buyer willing to pay the assume the flood risk unless you sell at a deep discount to what you paid.
Deep discount? how about zero? that is what half the homes would discount for. We’re not talking about Mcmansions.
New problem: Finding yourself figuratively underwater because you can’t find a buyer willing to pay the assume the flood risk unless you sell at a deep discount to what you paid.
There is a delicious irony to that, isn’t there, PB??
Here’s an interesting read about the insurance cycle, FWIW:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Insurance_cycle
I became interested in the dynamics of the insurance industry when I realized the return on the industry’s float went to zip (just as everyone else’s return went to zip.) and this meant the subsidy that this return on the float offered to insurance companies went to zip which meant insurance rates were destined to go up.
Another feature of deflation is the return on the float going to zip but others won’t see it that way - see it as deflation - because all they will pay attention to is the rise in rates, which in part is caused by the low return on the float.
What you call float is their profit.
Pinellas is a blue county, so expect Tallahassee to do nothing. 77,000 homes with zero value, what will that do to the tax base? This reduction in home values exceeds even HA’s expectations. Elevation vouchers? half these homes are worth less than $100,000.
What can Tally do? It’s federal program. Although I did hear Senator Bill Nelson make some feeble noises about it. Good luck with that. The poor guy is so ineffectual it hurts to watch him sometimes.
From another board: “Yuan is the loneliest number that you ever heard!”
Juan is the loneliest number 2, considering the shutdown poisoned the well for CIR.
I think there will be an open revolt in the stupid party if Bonner, Ryan, etc. try to pull the same stunt they did last week.
Why the Dollar Will Always Be the Reserve Currency for the World
By Lauren Lyster | Daily Ticker – Fri, Oct 18, 2013 12:12 PM EDT
On Friday morning the U.S. dollar came close to its lowest point of the year against the euro, according to The Wall Street Journal, on expectations that the Fed will have to continue its easy money policies for longer than first forecast thanks to the government shutdown.
More broadly, the shutdown and fiscal brinksmanship over the debt ceiling has again renewed the debate over the dollar and its status at the center of the financial system as the global reserve currency.
An op-ed earlier in the week from the Chinese state-controlled news agency Xinhua made waves calling for consideration of a “de-Americanized” world in response to the D.C. drama. This world, according to the article, may include “the introduction of a new international reserve currency that is to be created to replace the dominant U.S. dollar, so that the international community could permanently stay away from the spillover of the intensifying domestic political turmoil in the United States.”
Meantime, famed UBS director of floor operations Art Cashin said in an interview that the drop in the US dollar was concerning him. He told CNBC it could be the unwinding of the flight-to-safety trade, but said if it continued a couple of days “it may indicate the Washington follies did a little damage to the full faith and credit of the United States.”
But in the accompanying video interview with Martin Wolf, chief economics commentator for the Financial Times, he tells The Daily Ticker the dollar is under no threat as the world’s reserve currency.
“I’ve never been very worried about this,” he asserts. “The reason for that is there really is no alternative. The Chinese are not going to offer – and they cannot, given where they are in development, I think, for a decade or more – a genuine competitor for the dollar.”
…
Hmmm. Always is a long time :-).
But even the guy who says he’s “never been worried about this”, throws in that it might be “a decade or more before the Chinese can offer a genuine competitor for the dollar”. That line alone begs for the headline to be changed.
“I’ve never been very worried about this,” he asserts. “The reason for that is there really is no alternative.
+1 When the NASDAQ (dot-com) crash hit Greenspan’s fed decided that it was time to use all that home equity just sitting idle out there. Bubble time!
Correction: “Yun is the loneliest liar”
World Stock Markets
Dollar Slips as Fed Worries Continue
Treasury Yields Fall as Investors Focus on Effects of Government
By Michele Maatouk
Updated Oct. 18, 2013 10:46 a.m. ET
Expectations that the Federal Reserve will have to keep its easy-money policies in place for longer following the partial U.S. government shutdown pushed the dollar close to its lowest point of the year against the euro and U.S. Treasury debt prices to their highest point since July.
Yields on the 10-year Treasury note, which move inversely to prices, touched 2.538%, the lowest level since July 24, according to CQG. The dollar continued its slide against major rivals, including the euro, the yen and the pound. The euro recently bought $1.3686 from $1.3676 late Thursday, while the pound fetched $1.6186 from $1.6165. The greenback traded at ¥97.71 from ¥97.93.
The drop in the dollar and the rise in Treasury debt prices were set in train earlier this week after lawmakers reached a temporary solution to raise the so-called debt ceiling, showing that investors doubt the Fed can start to reel in its stimulus measures—a process dubbed tapering—for as long as economic performance and data is compromised by the now-ended shutdown, and as long as the risk of repeat shutdowns lingers.
“As policy remains uber accommodative, the dollar has adjusted downwards,” said Scott Jamieson, head of multi-asset investing at Kames Capital in London, with $24 billion under management.
“While we have been inclined to see tapering next year, the market is only now coming to appreciate this,” said analysts at Brown Brothers Harriman. “After the September disappointment, surveys suggest that a majority shifted their expectations to December. Now in light of the fiscal drag and new uncertainty, the mid-January and mid-February limits on spending and debt issuance will loom large at the December Federal Open Market Committee meeting, and likely reduces the possibility of tapering then. The focus is likely to shift to the March 2014 FOMC meeting for the first tapering,” they said.
…
So let me see if I understand this correctly:
If the the debt ceiling is not raised then the dollar will go to hell because the nation will be forced to default on the debts it owes.
But if the Fed keeps its easy-money policies in place then the dollar will go to hell because its buying power will be diluted.
Which is why I solely consider the dollar as a transitional asset and insurance. One with which you can get by on in case you alluva sudden have to buy a new economy car or a hospital deductible. Or several months of unemployment.
Precious metals bullion in your possession is insurance against Obama and his successor Hitlary.
I’m going to stick my neck out here and predict Hillary won’t run for Pres. in 2016. She’s past her ’sell by’ date. Factoring in demographics and the growing number of women (80% democrat) already in congress I think Warren will head the ticket with a Hispanic as VP.
If anything ever tempts me to vote D it would be far more likely to be Warren than another Clinton.
Warren is too old. I like him only because he is an atheist. And since he is an atheist, his lack of faith will make him lose far more than his age.
Warren is too old. I like him [...]
Wrong Warren–they were talking about Elizabeth Warren.
Bill,
Sorry for the confusion, I meant Sen. Elizabeth Warren.
Just thinking strategically, Gov. Chris Christie would be the best GOP candidate. We can also safely assume he will be savaged by the hard right like they did to Jon Huntsman.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/10/14/what-really-decided-the-2012-election-in-10-graphs/
Or were they talking about Warren Beatty?
Hmm…I don’t know enough about Elizabeth Warren to warrant a guess to see if she would be as socialistic as Bhengazi Hitlary. I think most of the g.p. can say the same. It would be a smart move, but a risk, for the Dems to groom her for the job and kick out Bhengazi Hitlary.
WSJ article - she wrote an op ed last year against the 2-3% medical device surcharge for DonkeyCare. However I saw a CBS link that she sides with the “you didn’t build that” Marxism by the Donkey Deity.
The Dems successfully put an unknown out in front in 1976 and we got the Cheshire Cat Pres that traveled around the world telling everyone why they should hate America, told everyone at home to sacrifice (as opposed to Reagan’s encouragement of people to go into business).
Then later another unknown, Duka-Kiss-my-a$$ who turned into a dud.
I don’t know enough about Elizabeth Warren to warrant a guess to see if she would be as socialistic as Bhengazi Hitlary.
she’s just about as bad as hitlary. she lied about having an indian heritage for political and career gain.
she’s earned the nicknames ‘liawatha’ and ‘fauxcahantas’. she’s a lying scumbag socialist. we’ll probably elect her.
“Or were they talking about Warren Beatty?”
+1 LOL!
I must admit I am confused by the logic that something (treasuries) that pays interest denominated by a currency that is losing value will rise in value. Maybe it would help if we think of treasuries not as debt but more like shares of stock in America Inc.. In that light then the Feds QE is just another form of a stock buyback program.
Eureka!
Posted: 6:00 a.m. Sunday, Oct. 20, 2013
Out with ‘The Great Gatsby’ and in with ‘The Glass Castle’?
By Sarah Carr
The Hechinger Report
MIAMI —
In Chris Kirchner’s freshman English classes at Coral Reef Senior High School, novels like “To Kill a Mockingbird” and “The Great Gatsby” have been squeezed off the syllabus to make room for nonfiction texts including “The Glass Castle” and “How to Re-Imagine the World.” For the first time, students will read only excerpts of classics like “The Odyssey” and “The House on Mango Street” instead of the entire book. And Kirchner will assign less independent reading at home, but will require students to write more essays, and push them to make connections across multiple texts.
“I’m trying to go big with the change and see what works,” says Kirchner, who has taught English in Miami-Dade schools for more than 30 years.
—————————————————————————–
How to Re-Imagine the World
Who says that all possible social and political systems have already been invented? Or that work — or marriage, or environmentalism, or anything else — must be just what they are now?
This book is a conceptual toolbox for imagining and initiating radical social change. Chapters offer specific, focused, and shareable techniques:
Leap-frogging new kinds of cars and better mass transit in turn, why not a world in which “transportation” itself is unneeded?
http://www.newsociety.com/Books/H/How-To-Re-Imagine-The-World - 30k -
—————————————————————————–
The Common Core includes a list of exemplar texts to illustrate the level of complexity and quality that students should engage with in a given grade band.
Grades 2–3
The Boy Who Harnessed the Wind
William Kamkwamba and Bryan Mealer (Dial, 2010)
A true story about a young man who built a windmill to bring electricity to his African village
Grades 4–5
The Magic School Bus and the Climate Challenge
Joanna Cole (Scholastic Press, 2010)
Ms. Frizzle teaches her students the science behind climate change.
A Warmer World: From Polar Bears to Butterflies, How Climate Change Affects Wildlife
Caroline Arnold (Charlesbridge Publishing, 2012)
A compelling account of how climate change has affected ecosystems and the animals that live in them
Grades 6-8
Oil
James Laxer (Groundwood, 2008)
How the availability and low cost of oil triggered the development of the world’s leading economies—and now threatens Earth’s future
World Without Fish
Mark Kurlansky (Workman Publishing, 1998)
An illustrated chapter book that explains why the fish we eat could disappear in 50 years
Grades 11-CCR
The Glass Castle: A Memoir
Jeannette Walls (Scribner, 2006)
The daughter of stubbornly nonconforming parents recalls her nomadic life.
Common Core Book Lists and Nonfiction Text Types | Scholastic Inc.
http://www.scholastic.com/commoncore/common-core-book-list-nonfiction.htm - 64k - Cached -
English class, subtly poisoning children’s minds with liberal propaganda for years.
FACTS AND DEFINITIONS
In 2009, as part of Obama’s so-called ‘recovery program’, the federal government offered grants to all states. The stipulation in these grants amounted to a national takeover of our schools. Most of the Governors accepted this money and signed grant contracts, with many strings attached, to implement Common Core State Standards.
The Common Core State Standards were devised in closed door sessions by the “Council of Chief State School Officers”, in collaboration with the so-called federal government, per the terms of the grant.
Common Core Comes to Town
Posted on October 5, 2013 | Leave a comment
WASHINGTON, DISTRICT OF CORPORATIONS, HAS TAKEN OVER THE COUNTRY’S PUBLIC SCHOOLS, THANKS TO STATE GOVERNORS AND OBAMA’S RECOVERY ‘ACT’!
by AL Whitney (C) copyright 2013
Permission is granted for redistribution if linked to original and the AntiCorruption Society is acknowledged
The following information applies to all states that have signed on to the Common Core State Standards. While the following revelations are about Ohio, the plot is the same in other states as well.
In the Common Core State Standard (CCSS) system, children are to be indoctrinated, tested and then statistically categorized as human resources for their “value-added” to the system. Market-oriented education reform refers to a series of CCSS initiatives that include educator evaluations based in large part on student standardized test scores. Top-down pressure from federal education policies, with deliberately misleading names such as Race to the Top and No Child Left Behind (bolstered by organized advocacy efforts), is making a set of market-oriented (“value added”) education reforms look more like the new status quo than real reform.
In 2009, Ohio’s Governor Strickland adopted a new statewide educational policy of the ‘feds’ that is changing all of Ohio’s public schools. He did this by accepting a federal grant from Obama’s so-called Stimulus package.
ALL FEDERAL GRANTS AND LOANS ARE BRIBES – WITH STRINGS ATTACHED!
The following text in italics is direct quotes from the Ohio Parent Teacher’s Association’s web site.IMPLEMENTING THE STANDARDS IN OHIO
http://ptacommoncore.org/OhioCCSSI.aspx
[In 2009 Governor Strickland single handedly altered public education in Ohio]
Governor Ted Strickland and State Superintendent Deb Delisle, signed a Memorandum of Agreement to participate in the Common Core initiative in April 2009. The Ohio Sate Board of Education adopted the standards in June 2010 [1]. Full implementation of the new standards and assessments [student testing] will begin in the 2014-15 school year. [He accepted a federal grant from Obama's Recovery Act portfolio.]
[Parents to accept new standards without questioning the source or desirability]
Parents can be advocates for their children and schools in two important areas. Parents should be aware of the new assessments that will be aligned to the CCSS. States are already joining consortiums to have assessments in place. Ensuring that students are properly prepared for the tests will help raise the level of student success.
[Schools to raise taxes to implement new curriculum]
Parents can also advocate for school districts to invest in educational materials aligned to the CCSS. Adopting, implementing, and assessing the new Common Core State Standards can only go so far if teachers only have old materials in which to use in the classroom. School districts will need to find funding in their very tight budgets to make the CCSS a success for students.
http://anticorruptionsociety.com/2013/10/05/common-core-comes-to-town/ - 103k -
ha-ha, you do know Jeb Bush is up to his elbows in Common Core, right? Just like Neil had his fingers in the No Child Lef Behind boondoggle. (I forget, but I think it was testing services or some such BS. Think about it. Your kidz are subjected to stupidity and misery so The Family can make some $$. Don’t that suck all?) What IS it with the Bushes and eddimication? I mean, given the example shrubby set, I’d think The Family would well stay out of it. But no. Shame and embarrassment is not in their lexicon.
Sheesh, I guess finance not particularly being their forte, they glommed onto the next best thing. Follow the fedgov money and get on that eddimication gravy train. Sit yo’ ass in a tubba butter, boyz!
MSNBC Host Melissa Harris-Perry » All Your Kids Belong To Us …
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N3qtpdSQox0 - 131k -
Once again, this is what happens when you accept a subsidy from the fedgov, as in eddimication, free lunches, head start, after school programs, etc., etc. Dance to the music, you gotta pay da piper.
Besides, many “parents” have dumped their responsibilities and left it up to the state, to the point of making money off their kids.
Oughta be a school choice law, that’s for sure, to protect those parents that want to and do take responsibility for their progeny.
Unless you live in DC, little Federal money goes to running schools and paying teachers salaries.
“Unless you live in DC, little Federal money goes to running schools and paying teachers salaries.”
Just sign here for you federal simulus $ and we’ll tell your children what books to read.
“The following information applies to all states that have signed on to the Common Core State Standards. While the following revelations are about Ohio, the plot is the same in other states as well.”
“In 2009, Ohio’s Governor Strickland adopted a new statewide educational policy of the ‘feds’ that is changing all of Ohio’s public schools. He did this by accepting a federal grant from Obama’s so-called Stimulus package.”
never trust a black woman with 3 slave names.
“ha-ha, you do know Jeb Bush is up to his elbows in Common Core, right?”
Jeb Bush? Obama? Reid? Pelosi? McCain? Ryan? McConnell?
“To consider options, it’s wise to drop the foolish left-right political schism meant to keep us arguing while politicians deceive us. Both sides of the aisle house the same monster that really only wants to feed itself by catering to the so-called one percent.”
PF Louis
Natural News
October 13, 2013
Yep, just as I say, two sides of the same lousy coin.
The Web Of Power: Council On Foreign Relations, Bilderberg, and Trilateral Commission
Posted on June 4, 2013 by Michael McGuerty
Council on Foreign Relations: The Council on Foreign Relations, from hereon referred to as the CFR, was founded in 1921. It’s architect was Colonel House, the behind-the-scenes power to Woodrow Wilson and representative of the turn-of-the-century American industrialists and bankers, including J.D. Rockefeller, J.P.Morgan, Jacob Schiff, and Paul Warburg.
The late Carroll Quigley, Georgetown University professor and CFR member, stated in his book Tragedy and Hope, “The CFR is the American Branch of a society which originated in England, and which believes that national boundaries should be obliterated, and a one-world rule established”. Simply stated, the goal of the CFR is to influence all aspects of American society in such a subtle, gradual process that one day Americans would wake up and find themselves in the midst of a one-world system.
The illusion of ideological differences between the two political parties that is conveyed to the unsuspecting American public is best summarized by the advice of former CFR and cabinet member Henry Cabot Lodge to his colleagues “Is there anything we can APPEAR to do?” This charade is given credibility and legitimacy by the controlling CFR influence of top management within corporate media. In reality, a uni-party collusion between the CFR represented politicians and their corporate counterparts continues to solidify and presses its totalitarian agenda.
To insure their power, the Establishment covers their bases. For decades, presidential candidates from both parties have been CFR members. When Bush, Cheney, McCain, Bradley, Gore, and Lieberman, all CFR members. touted the corporate globalization agenda such as NAFTA, FTAA, WTO, World Bank, ad nauseum, one could question where their loyalties might be.
Even in the event that a presiding president’s administration gets caught in some unsavory practice, the chosen legislators that head the investigative committees are often members of the CFR; thus, the truth is never revealed and the issue is quietly swept away. During Clinton’s Whitewater investigation, Jim Leach, House Republican from Iowa (CFR) directed the investigation. During George W. Bush’s tenure, Lieberman (CFR) Dodd (CFR) and Levin (CFR) headed committees that investigated the Bush Administration while Paul Volker, former Federal Reserve and Trilateral Commission chairman, was named chairman of an oversight committee for the International Accounting Standards Board to review recent lapses in accounting ethics.
The governmental solution presented for disciplinary or reform action is often presented by one of their own foxes watching their henhouse, assuring no constructive changes are even implemented. Through the influence of revolving door politics, corporate executives are assigned to direct public regulatory agencies that dismantle the very laws that were designed to protect the public from the abuses of corporations.
For a quick examination into the media’s influence on public opinion, consider the virtual monopolistic view of the CFR promotes through mainstream media. Think you’re getting the true scoop on the Sunday talk shows? They might as well call this political commentary the CFR Misinformation News Hour. You have CFR guests from both Republican and Democratic parties interviewed by CFR journalists (George Stephanopoulos, Diane Sawyer, George Will) with CFR commercial sponsorship (Archer Daniel Midlands, Merrill Lynch, IBM, etc.). Switch to PBS, you say? Jim Lehrer (CFR) will also make sure the incriminating questions are never asked.
Under the guise of risk management, multinational corporations’ global conquest may encounter risks, so when private insurers are unwilling to accept the risks, corporations turn to national and multilateral government agencies which offer investment guarantees and political risk insurance backed by taxpayers.
These companies have even cornered the market on the cures for the very ills they create. General Electric, which owns four of the largest air-polluting companies, is the largest producer of air pollution equipment. Dupont, one of the largest toxic waste producers, has created a lucrative line of toxic waste disposal services and Westinghouse, which earns its money selling nuclear weapons, also profiteers from selling equipment to clean up its mess. Also, alcohol companies own rehabilitation centers and tobacco companies own cancer clinics. A vicious cycle.
The processes of corporate power do not work in isolation. The economic and legal mechanisms that allow the privatization of the commonwealth, externalization of costs, predatory economic practices, political influence-buying, manipulation of regulation and deregulation, control of the media, and the use of police and military forces to protect the property of wealthy, all of these work synergistically to weave a complex web of power. The institutionalization of multinational corporations and banks is exemplified through the structural adjustment programs of the World bank and the international Monetary Fund. These programs channel more of the debtor country’s financial and productive resources to war debt payment, an extortion process which ultimately opens easy access for American and Western European companies to exploit these countries’ cheap sources of labor and raw materials.
In parting, George Orwell, in his wisdom, may have left us, the people, with some equally powerful seeds to sow…”In times of universal deceit, telling the truth is truly a revolutionary act.”
http://dcclothesline.com/2013/06/04/the-web-of-power-council-on-foreign-relations-bilderberg-and-trilateral-commission/ - 56k -
Hillary Clinton admits the CFR gives the Orders - YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ba9wxl1Dmas - 132k - Cached - Similar pages
Jul 22, 2009
Hillary Clinton admits the CFR gives the Orders
She looked a lot younger back then. That Hillary was electable. Now she looks like Granny Clinton.
In California no dollar will be allowed to escape …
Here’s a lotto commercial that, IMO, needs a laugh track:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-MRnrR_Jdu
Video was pulled. What was the yuk-yuk factor?
video not available?
I wonder how much the state takes in from these indian casinos?
I stop by the local casino for some cocktails once in awhile. while walking through the parking garage I always find people sleeping in their cars.
Make that:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O-MRnrR_JdU
Seen worse commercials. Wish they would show a follow up to those who won and how they are broke now.
havent played in years. I know someone who won and got 200k for 20 years and they are flat broke living rent free in a bank owned property for the past 5 years.
A black swan to win that much money. We have an occasional pool at work. My only comment is that people there start thinking it is worth putting $$ into when the prize is 9 digits. All of a sudden, the odds look better? I am not a math expert, but it is curious to see how fever builds. I am feeling that way with metals now. Thanks Bill.
“My only comment is that people there start thinking it is worth putting $$ into when the prize is 9 digits. All of a sudden, the odds look better?”
With Powerball and Mega Millions, my thinking is that the odds are the same regardless of the prize. So I might as well save my daydreaming for when the prize is large. I throw away less money on an improbably payout by playing infrequently. The daydreaming focuses my mind on what I would do if I did not have to worry about supporting my family. I ask myself if I am living the life I should be leading and how I can live that life without a lot of money.
It is a forced tax, but not by the government, by your friends. You have to buy in for a dollar cause if they win and you don’t, you’ll be miserable forever!
All of a sudden, the odds look better?
No, the odds are the same, but the “expected value” of a ticket gets WAY better when enough weeks with no winner have gone by.
I’ve only payed the lottery tax a few times in my life, but on general principle, I only do so when the expected value of a ticket is greater than or equal to the cost of a ticket.
If I wanted to take risks with a negative expected value, I could do that at any time in Vegas, and at least get free drinks.
It’s not just the odds of winning it’s also the odds of others also winning - the odds of the winner having to share the pie.
The greater the number of particiants the greater the are the odds that the prize will have to be shared with somebody else, or maybe several somebody elses.
There are really two unknown variables here:
1. The unknown winning numbers, and
2. The unknown number of people who have chosen those same winning numbers.
‘It is a forced tax, but not by the government, by your friends. You have to buy in for a dollar cause if they win and you don’t, you’ll be miserable forever!’
Gotta admit, that was the only reason really I added to the pool when they were solicited at work. Winning is one dream, but the forever dunce cap image on my head is a stronger motivator, lol. Hey, the money was for the children is what I told my co-workers as I walked away and forgot that I just voluntarily paid taxes.
Did we discuss this on the HBB last week:
http://blogs.wsj.com/emergingeurope/2013/10/03/russia-to-grab-pension-money-temporarily/
Never happen in the US.
It’s easier to get blood from a turnip than getting money out of the hands of a Wall Street banker.
They don’t have to take the equities. They can tax stuff though. One-time taxes on wealth already that has been taxed. Go after Roth IRAs. We did not build our wealth. We had help. That help needs to get a cut.
And people wonder why the USD is the world’s reserve currency. As much as the Galt Gulch crowd complains they make more money here and their money is safer.
It could never happen here in the U.S.A.
Government reaches debt limit, borrows against federal pension funds
May. 16, 2011 - 05:58PM | By SEAN REILLY
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner testifies before the Senate Appropriations Subcommittee on Financial Services and General Government in Washington in April. Treasury officials have begun to borrow against federal pension funds to meet the government’s financial obligations, as the U.S. is expected to reach the limit of its borrowing authority from other sources under the $14.3 trillion debt ceiling on Monday.
(Jewel Samad / AFP via Getty Images)
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“Realtors Are Liars®”
You better believe it mister. And the worst kind of liars.
FYI:
C-SPAN1 has a great discussion on the state of the RE market hosted by the American Enterprise Institute. If you miss it check their archives for “Panel Looks at Housing Markets & Fed Nominee Yellen” recorded on Thursday, Oct. 17th. 2013, filed under the category of “Housing & Government Finance”.
Yo Jethro….. your Pats got smoked……. by the Jets…. LOLZ
Would a Republican civil war benefit the Nation?
Republican Civil War Erupts: Business Groups v. Tea Party
By Michael C. Bender & Kathleen Hunter - Oct 18, 2013 7:51 AM PT
Tea Party activists cheer during the “Exempt America from Obamacare” rally on Capitol Hill, in Washington, on Sept. 10, 2013. Photographer: Drew Angerer/Getty Images
A battle for control of the Republican Party has erupted as an emboldened Tea Party moved to oust senators who voted to reopen the government while business groups mobilized to defeat allies of the small-government movement.
“We are going to get engaged,” said Scott Reed, senior political strategist for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. “The need is now more than ever to elect people who understand the free market and not silliness.” The chamber spent $35.7 million on federal elections in 2012, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, a Washington-based group that tracks campaign spending.
Meanwhile, two Washington-based groups that finance Tea Party-backed candidates said yesterday they’re supporting efforts to defeat Mississippi Senator Thad Cochran, who voted this week for the measure ending the 16-day shutdown and avoiding a government debt default. Cochran, a Republican seeking a seventh term next year, faces a challenge in his party’s primary from Chris McDaniel, a state senator.
McDaniel, who announced his candidacy yesterday, “is not part of the Washington establishment and he has the courage to stand up to the big spenders in both parties,” Matt Hoskins, executive director of the Senate Conservatives Fund, said in a statement supporting him.
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How will Cruz supporters for a 2016 presidential run deal with his Canadian birth certificate? Any change they will try to doctor it?
Cruz Emerges Stronger From Republican Debacle
By Albert R. Hunt Oct 20, 2013 8:00 AM PT
In the aftermath of the U.S. government shutdown and a close call with default, there is a political consensus among Democrats, many Republicans, establishment conservatives, business leaders and the inside-the-Beltway commentariat: Senator Ted Cruz of Texas and Tea Party members in the House have done grievous harm to themselves and their brand.
They caused economic and political wreckage and got nothing for it. The silver lining, critics say, is that these right-wingers may now be chastened, and Cruz’s national ambitions have been dealt a lethal setback.
That, however, isn’t the way Deedee Vaughters and Bob Vander Plaats see things.
“We’re winning this argument and now have to go back at Obamacare and getting our fiscal house in order,” says Vaughters, a Tea Party activist in Aiken, South Carolina. Vander Plaats, who heads an influential family-values group in Iowa, agrees: “Ted Cruz is a rock star sucking all the energy in the conservative movement. He’s making all the right enemies with the Republican establishment, which is taking him to unprecedented heights.”
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‘there is a political consensus among Democrats, many Republicans, establishment conservatives, business leaders and the inside-the-Beltway commentariat’
In other words, the echo chamber of the establishment.
It isn’t R v. D. It’s both against you!
bingo…. and they run the show because we let them.
The real civil war is between the political and bankster classes versus America.
Would a Republican civil war benefit the Nation?
If by some miracle they came out of it a clearly superior alternative to the Ds, yes it would.
How do these puny settlement charges compare to the amounts of profits Megabank, Inc earned off subprime lending?
ft dot com
Last updated: October 20, 2013 8:29 pm
Mortgage watchdog seeks $6bn from BofA
By Tom Braithwaite, Kara Scannell and Camilla Hall in New York and Gina Chon in Washington
The US government agency that secured a large slice of the record $13bn penalty against JPMorgan Chase is demanding even more from Bank of America, as it ratchets up pressure on other big banks.
Regulators at the Federal Housing Finance Agency are seeking a penalty of more than $6bn from BofA, compared with the $4bn to be paid by JPMorgan, according to people familiar with the matter.
JPMorgan agreed to pay a total of $13bn to a variety of US state and federal agencies during a phone call on Friday night between Jamie Dimon, chief executive, and Eric Holder, attorney-general. The penalty, if confirmed, would be the biggest imposed on a single company by US authorities.
The $4bn portion that JPMorgan has agreed to pay the FHFA may end up being the largest single amount, although the remaining $9bn – a combination of $5bn in cash and $4bn forgiveness of consumer debt – is still being divided up between the Department of Justice and New York’s attorney-general.
The FHFA is the housing regulator that oversees Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-backed mortgage companies which came close to failing in 2008 because of the bad mortgage-backed securities they acquired from banks.
The FHFA has sued 17 institutions asserting that they broke securities laws when selling the mortgage-backed securities to Fannie and Freddie. Bank of America has the biggest potential exposure, with a notional value of the securities of more than $57bn compared with $33bn at JPMorgan. Bank of America declined to comment on the case, which it is so far continuing to fight in court. The FHFA declined to comment.
Royal Bank of Scotland has a $30bn notional exposure and also faces a multibillion-dollar fine unless it manages to win the case in court. Credit Suisse, Goldman Sachs and Barclays are among the institutions with smaller claims against them.
The settlement between the FHFA and JPMorgan is expected to be made public this week, the latest marker for banks that have so far declined to settle their claims. UBS, Citigroup and General Electric have already settled.
Some people involved in sprawling negotiations between the industry and different government agencies believe the biggest banks will end up with large sweeping settlements similar to that just agreed by JPMorgan, incorporating resolution of claims from the Department of Justice.
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