Bits Bucket for May 15, 2014
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.
About Me
Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
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Considering we’re profitable building new structures anywhere in the country at $55/sq foot(lot, labor, materials and profit), why pay more than $35-$40/sq ft for a 20+ year old house?
Sounds like go time in San Diego.
Stay safe everybody, check in if you can.
There has never been a better time to buy a home in San Diego!
Conditions for San Diego County wildfires ‘are going to get worse’
A home is destroyed by the brush fire in Carlsbad off Poinsettia Lane near the 5 Freeway. (Gina Ferazzi / Los Angeles Times)
Joseph Serna contact the reporter
- Weather conditions for firefighters in San Diego County will only get worse on Thursday, forecasters say
- Tens of thousands of evacuation notifications have been issued in San Diego County wildfire areas
The dry, hot, windy conditions that fanned an out-of-control wildfire in Carlsbad on Wednesday were only expected to get worse before they got better, offering firefighters little in the way of any short term relief, forecasters said.
Vegetation in the Carlsbad hills has been drying all week, and whatever moisture is left will dissipate “rapidly” by Thursday, said Philip Gonsalves, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service.
“I think between this afternoon and tomorrow afternoon, things are going to get worse,” Gonsalves said. “Only because the conditions will be prolonged. But you can’t get much worse than it is right now.”
Fire officials said the sustained winds, combined with extreme temperatures, had created a “very dynamic situation” as they tried to gain a hold on the Poinsettia fire, which by Wednesday afternoon remained 0% contained.
Roughly 15,000 evacuation notifications had been issued to areas west of El Fuerte Road, south of Palomar Airport Road, north of Aviara Parkway and west to the coast as a result of the Poinsettia fire alone.
Several other fires, including in Fallbrook, Camp Pendleton and Rancho Bernardino, prompted their own evacuations as agencies from other jurisdictions sent resources to aid in the fight.
Temperatures have hovered in the 90s this week with humidity in the single-digits, while wind gusts have been upward of 35 mph, Gonsalves said. But by Thursday afternoon, the winds could shift, throwing a wrench into whatever strategy firefighters may develop to get ahead of the blaze, he said.
“With the wind directions becoming variable, it’s more difficult to predict which way the fire is going to grow,” Gonsalves said. “There’s an abundance of fuel to consume.”
…
I’ve visited San Diego once. I had been flying over desert for quite a while, until I started to wonder when the plane was going to cross from Arizona into California. Suddenly they announced the landing. It surprised me just how much of CA was a bunch of nuthin’, with just a little skinny strip of green on which to live.
Not much to graze on in the desert.
I’ve visited San Diego once.
What did you think of the landing? San Diego’s Lindbergh Field is supposed to be one of the most hair raising landing in the US.
I honestly don’t remember the landing. I guess it wasn’t too bad. But landing 4 feet from the Potomac river is nice.
Wildfires scorch San Diego County: ‘Mother Nature was not on our side’
By Michael Martinez and Dan Simon, CNN
updated 10:32 PM EDT, Thu May 15, 2014
Carlsbad, California (CNN) — In her 42 years of living in Southern California, Sophie Payne of Carlsbad has “never, never, never” witnessed so many wildfires at one time.
Three dozen raged overnight. Eight of them continued to burn Thursday in a patchwork across of San Diego County, ravaging 10,000 acres since Tuesday, and killing at least one person. Payne’s hilltop house was an exhibit of their destruction: It was burned to the ground, except for a stone archway and several walls.
“This is my dream house, and what can I say,” she said, looking at the destruction to the three-bedroom, four-bathroom house. “Now it’s all gone.”
Payne found some family keepsakes in a small safe, and while intact, the papers were charred at the edges. “It’s just falling apart,” Payne said.
Another family in Carlsbad similarly lost its house, but everyone — including the dog — survived.
“We walked up to this place, and it was like a bomb went off. I can’t even explain to you how just horrific it was,” Anya Bannasch told CNN’s “Anderson Cooper 360″ on Thursday.
“I’ve never seen anything like it. I pray for all the other families too out there that are going through this right now, because I know there’s fires everywhere,” she said.
Gay Walker was evacuated from her home in nearby Encinitas and doubted she would even be allowed to return by Friday. Police told her to evacuate immediately.
“It was an orderly evacuation, but it was reminiscent of something apocalyptic,” Walker said.
…
Another day, another ten fires…
Host of Fires Clear San Diego-Area Neighborhoods
SAN MARCOS, Calif. May 15, 2014 (AP)
By ELLIOT SPAGAT and JULIE WATSON
Associated Press
Tuzo Jerger was one of thousands told to evacuate as a wildfire ripped across Carlsbad, a suburb north of San Diego. The 66-year-old real estate broker packed files, a surfboard, golf clubs, clothes and photos and sought solace at a friend’s hilltop house in nearby San Marcos, only to see another fierce wildfire break out there and force thousands from their homes.
“I thought, ‘Oh my God, it’s going to come this way,’” Jerger said at a San Marcos restaurant where he found relief in a slice of pizza.
Such was the state of San Diego County, where one wildfire after another broke out Wednesday, driving tens of thousands from homes, shutting down schools and amusement parks and destroying at least eight houses and a condominium complex.
Nine fires in all were burning an area of more than 14 square miles as another day of sky-high temperatures and dry winds were expected Thursday, county officials said.
…
and california pulls ahead in the hbb 2014 wildfire season betting pool
I guess there is a good reason San Diego real estate agents call this the “red hot spring sales season.”
I just booked a rafting trip on “the Numbers” section of the Arkansas River a few weeks from now, but they said it’s possible that section of the river could be closed to rafting because of high water from the snowmelt.
Our little burg sends a newsletter every month with the electric/water/etc. bill. In this month’s edition they warned of potential flooding from the snowmelt.
“Bloody red sky of phantastic L.A.” - The Doors
Was visiting friends in Coronado, CA,I believe in 2007 when the sky was red and it ash rained down covering my car.
BTW, this is probably one of the best hedge fund managers:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/steveschaefer/2014/05/15/tepper-touts-caution-hedge-fund-honcho-wary-of-stocks/
I’m glad these guys didn’t start coming out of the woodwork to warn on stocks before I finally coached my dad away from his very stock-heavy portfolio position.
Guess it was “bloody red sun of fantastic L.A.”
May Firestorm Special Section
Handful of fires threaten San Diego area in early start to season
Life on Hold for Thousands as Fires Engulf North County
Thousands have been forced to flee, as wildfires throughout San Diego County on Wednesday, particularly North County, scorched more than 9,000 acres.
By Sam Schulz | Thursday, May 15, 2014 | Updated 5:45 AM PDT
Wildfires continued to rage throughout San Diego County Thursday morning, leaving tens of thousands of residents unsure of when, and whether, they might be able to return home.
At least nine fires ravaging more than 9,000 acres have destroyed homes and forced thousands to flee in communities throughout North County. Local officials say the blazes, which are scorching San Diego uncharacteristically early in the fire season, are the worst they’ve seen in years.
“I’ve never seen anything like this in 20 years,” San Diego County Supervisor Bill Horn said.
By Thursday, the fires had consumed more than a dozen structures and caused tens of millions of dollars in damage. The threat of additional losses loomed Thursday, as the National Weather Service warned of hot and dry conditions and winds of up to 45 mph that could further stoke the flames.
…
“I’ve never seen anything like this in 20 years,” San Diego County Supervisor Bill Horn said.
Worse than the Poway Fire ?
San Diego County fires: ‘It’s like a scene from Armageddon’
By Tony Perry, Veronica Rocha, Jill Cowan
MAY 14 | 6:58 PM | REPORTING FROM SAN DIEGO
Brush fires broke out in more than half a dozen spots in northern San Diego County and spread at a dangerous pace as hot, dry, erratic winds, backed by record temperatures, raked Southern California for a second day Wednesday.
The fires forced evacuations of schools, businesses, homes, a mobile-home park and Cal State San Marcos, along with causing massive traffic jams and stretching firefighting resources almost to the breaking point.
The most destructive of the blazes was the Poinsettia fire in Carlsbad, which burned several hundred acres, hopscotching between pricey neighborhoods near brushy canyons.
By midafternoon Carlsbad Fire Chief Michael Davis said three homes had been destroyed, and eight homes and an eight-unit apartment building were damaged or destroyed, although he warned those figures might increase. An official with the California Department of Forestry and Fire Protection also suggested the number of destroyed homes could increase.
Firefighters have “days of work to be done,” Davis said. The fire broke into “fingers” and raced up canyons, as embers were launched by high winds into new areas. By day’s end, the fire was no longer spreading but was still not contained, and hot spots remained troublesome, officials said.
Homeowners had only minutes to gather treasured belongings and pets and flee.
“There was just no time,” said Greg Staska, 63, whose adobe home was destroyed. “But it’s OK; I’m alive.”
…
WE WILL REBUILD! Even if it happens again and again and again.
Like I said:
Home flooded out by a hurricane? WE WILL REBUILD!
Flattened by a tornado? WE WILL REBUILD!
Destroyed by wildfire? WE WILL REBUILD!
Destroyed homes = less inventory and people in need of housing.
There was a fire back in 05ish that destroyed something like 1600 homes in SD County. That was significant.
With 25 million excess empty houses, you’re gonna need alot more fires.
It was the Cedar Fire in 2003. Not 05.
And it was not significant. These fires and fire stories are just silly. Usually so far away that no one cares but a teeny tiny group who are in the path. But they get reported as if so show all of Southern California is on fire.
Similar to the knockout game.
“Similar to the knockout game”
Fire is racist?
its time to loosen lending standards to suck in some more buyers to keep the party going.
Who is the next angelo?
You would be surprised at how densely packed some of these OC and SD nabes are in hilly terrain, which has lots of brush to make this the worst fire season…with a good sized drop in inventory.
I got my “but out” bag.
we need a global warming tax to pay to fight the fires?
Another article showing that CAGW is an intolerant religion and not science:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/05/15/newsbytes-climate-science-mccarthyism/#more-109286
Bill, you must have the heaviest bug-out bag in the world.
One of the bonus effects of emergency preparedness is that — properly done — it forces you to get organized.
I would ask myself, in a go-time scenario:
If I have 30 seconds, what do I take.
If I have 3 minutes, what do I take.
If I have 10 minutes, if I have 30 minutes…etc.
(and do I have the car)
Just getting an answer to the questions means you have to prioritize the important stuff, separate it out from the junk, fill in any documents and papers that you’re missing, and get it into one spot for easy grab. It’s an exercise in decluttering. I don’t want to be that person who’s shown on the news going back after some disaster and searching through wreckage for some sentimental something; that would be embarassing.
It’s easy for me. Most of my important stuff is in Phoenix and I don’t need that for a month or so. The stuff I really need short term fits in a bag. I’m a temporary worker in California so I don’t have much. I could leave behind my wine fridge with 5 bottles of $85 or more wines in case SHTF - no biggie.
“I would ask myself, in a go-time scenario:
If I have 30 seconds, what do I take.
If I have 3 minutes, what do I take.
If I have 10 minutes, if I have 30 minutes…etc.
(and do I have the car)”
We don’t expect to evacuate this time unless conditions drastically turn for the worse. Even though the Bernardo Fire started less than a mile away from us, and my wife was in panic mode the day it started, the nearest actively burning part of any fire is currently at least five miles from us, and the wind is blowing it away.
But last time, it went like this:
- Early in the evening as the fire bore down on us, I loaded all of our musical instruments sans the piano into the back of our minivan, along with family photo albums.
- At 5am the next morning, our next door neighbor called to notify us that the fire was in our zip code. Since we were downwind of the rapidly encroaching flames, we mobilized the kids and were on the road by 6am.
- By 8am, a mandatory evacuation order was issued for our area.
1,600 burned / circa 1,000,000 housing units = 0.16% — not significant as a share of the San Diego housing stock, especially given the ability to quickly rebuild the structures. We saw this with the Witch Creek fire in 2007; the areas that burned are completely rebuilt and you would never know you were looking at the site of past and future wildfires if you toured the neighborhoods that burned down.
you should compare the numbers structures built to the number of units available for sale. The Cedar Fire In 3 did indeed have a significant impact on local housing market.it displaced 1600 families who had to seek immediate housing. But if you want to call it insignificant that’s your prerogative.
‘ built’ should be ‘ burnt’.
It is still teeny tiny. Quit trying to pimp the lie.
With 4.4 million excess empty houses in CA, I’d wager a good 20% or more are in San Diego.
Wouldn’t it have more of an effect on the rental market? Since the families still had the land, they would only need to rent until houses were rebuilt.
“you should compare the numbers structures built to the number of units available for sale.”
It’s irrelevant.
The relevant number is how many San Diego houses are in the hands of soon-to-retire or -die owners — say age 60+. These are the folks whose looming life changes make it nearly inevitable their homes will soon come on the market as new inventory or rentals (the latter if the kidz decide to hold on “until prices come back”).
I haven’t checked the numbers, but my guess is that the number of soon-to-transition homes in SD County is big.
Consider this;
35 million boomer couples(who drove the 1998-2006 bubble in the first place) are now just beginning to expire. They own 35 million houses (assuming they own just one which we know is likely 1.5 houses/) which are just beginning to bleed onto the market. This is not going to be a friendly environment for anyone who thinks they’re sitting on a pot of gold.
Exit now and do so decisively.
The 1600 units or so destroyed in 2003 were not irrelevant. It put a lot of pressure on an already tight housing market. Minimizing the impact of that displacement on the market at that time is just wishful thinking. It impacted both home sales and rentals.
Hopefully, only a minimal number of homes are destroyed by the current fires. I wouldn’t wish that on anyone, losing photos and family items, etc.
“The relevant number is how many San Diego houses are in the hands of soon-to-retire or -die owners — say age 60+.”
Good luck with that.
If the housing market were actually “tight”, you might have a point.
There was a fire back in 05ish that destroyed something like 1600 homes in SD County. That was significant.
A former coworker of mine lost his home in that fire.
Big fire years out here were 2003 (Cedar Fire) and 2007 (Witch Creek Fire), not 2005.
He was in RB, so I believe it was the Witch Creek Fire
“He was in RB, so I believe it was the Witch Creek Fire”
October 21, 2007. See my account of our evacuation above.
Everyone Must Check In
FEMA region VIII checking in
Region IX is entirely on fire.
I gotta got to the ATM to build another house.
“Anyone who took the Fed’s bait to buy a house in the last two years is screwed.”
You better believe it Mister.
With the U.S. economy continuing to heat up, there should be no reason for the Fed to delay its QE3 taper.
New York Markets Open in: 0:14:13
Pre-Market Indications | Analyst Ratings
Futures: S&P 500 -0.2% DOW -0.2% NASDAQ -0.1%
Jobless claims fall to lowest level since 2007
• Manufacturing strengthens in Fed’s New York region in May
• U.S. consumer prices rise sharply in April
Two articles linked from google news pimp the class warfare:
http://www.salon.com/2014/05/08/my_personal_wal_mart_nightmare_you_wont_believe_what_life_is_like_working_there/
“Music by a mariachi band kicked off the early morning demonstration. Rain pancho-clad demonstrators circled the McDonald’s with signs and chanted in Spanish, “What do we want? $15 When do we want it? Now” and “McDonald’s we are here”
http://www.chicagotribune.com/business/breaking/chi-fast-food-strike-20140515,0,6880227.story
Depo Provera.
Do we really think that there is no cheap effective male birth control pill? C’mon.
I dunno, but I guess the Si se puede crowd never got the memo about why they were so desirable in the first place. CHEAP LABOR! They were willing to work for less and undercut citizens in fast food, agriculture and other service jobs. “We clean your houses! We scrub your toilets! We pick your crops!” So the taxpayer was forced to subsidize their family formation, thus subsidizing the corporations involved.
Now, they want high wages AND subsidization. Who could’ve seen THAT coming?
No worries, there are more immigrants where they came from.
No, they’re coming from even further south, and I’m hearing that Mexico is starting to get really pissed about the Central Americans coming up through their country.
Now, repeat after me: “Fries widdat?”
Load the US up the butt with immigrants, both legal and illegal, encourage massive reproduction through subsidization, provide low wage jobs AND THEN pull the plug on government subsidies. And be sure to get racial and ethnic groups going against each other.
A real recipe for domestic peace in the US.
No, they’re coming from even further south, and I’m hearing that Mexico is starting to get really pissed about the Central Americans coming up through their country.
It has been that way for a while. And while Mexico bitches and complains about how poorly their citizens are treated in the USA, what with the foodstamps, section 8, free K-12 education, free healthcare and in state college tuition rates, Mexican law enforcement beats Central Americans who have the temerity to enter Mexico illegally, before expelling them without any due process.
Central Americans hate Mexico even more than Mexico hates us. When the Mexican Soccer team has to play world cup qualifying matches in Central American countries, the team’s hotel has to be kept a secret to keep the team safe.
I suspect a lot of the animosity in the US has been caused by Hispanic activists who are not Mexican, like Congressman Louis Gutierrez and Janet Murguia of the National Council of LaRaza, both of whom are Puerto Rican. It’s sort of an opportunity to do some pot stirring and get votes and donations and be part of some glorious “cause”.
I made the mistake of getting into it about illegal immigration on line years ago with one of these “activists”. I suspect she was based in New York, of Puerto Rican descent. From my end, I held to my positions. From her end, the conversation descended in three stages:
1) Started out with lots of anger and spitting and hissing, accusations of racism, gringo this and gringo that, etc.
2) Regressed to the taunting stage of “Learn to speak Spanish” and mocking Ellis Island and jobs Americans won’t do.
3) Descended into piteous pleas for help and understanding for the “poor immigrants who just want to feed the families”.
It’s a shame to see all this happening. I was raised a Catholic and went to schools which were at least 1/3 Latino of some sort, from Cuba, Puerto Rico, South America, etc. Everybody played nicely with each other.
That is odd, why would Puerto Ricans be members of La Raza? Unlike Mexicans, all Puerto Ricans are US citizens. What I have heard in Hispanic circles in the US is that non Mexicans resent Mexicans here because they have become the overwhelming majority of American based Hispanics. What this means is that Mexican culture overwhelms theirs. Can the average American name a single holiday from Central America? I also understand that they resent the Mexicanization os Spanish language TV in the US. They hate it that Mexican League soccer is shown all the time, but it’s very rare to see any Central American Futbol on TV. And most of the shows are Mexican, etc.
Joining La Raza is joining the enemy for them.
“That is odd, why would Puerto Ricans be members of La Raza? Unlike Mexicans, all Puerto Ricans are US citizens”
I dunno, you’d have to ask Janet. But like I said, it’s about stirring pots and getting votes and most of all, getting $$.
You want to see some infighting among Latino groups, live in Miami. What a scene. Even back in the day when I was there, it wasn’t unusual for the Cubans, Colombians, Venezuelans, etc. to complain about each other to the Anglos. Not so much the Mexicans or Central Americans, not too many living there.
What I have heard in Hispanic circles in the US is that non Mexicans resent Mexicans here because they have become the overwhelming majority of American based Hispanics. What this means is that Mexican culture overwhelms theirs. Can the average American name a single holiday from Central America? I also understand that they resent the Mexicanization os Spanish language TV in the US. They hate it that Mexican League soccer is shown all the time, but it’s very rare to see any Central American Futbol on TV. And most of the shows are Mexican, etc.
Around the country I’ve seen or read about little neighborhoods with Guatemalan stores or Ecuadoran restaurants, whatever. It’s just at a national level that Spanish-language media is dominated by Mexican stuff. I can’t imagine that anyone would have much sympathy for these people.
Are you worried about a bear market eating your stock market portfolio for lunch?
May 14, 2014, 12:58 p.m. EDT
Stocks are telling you a bear market is coming
Opinion: Expect a choppy, sloppy end to the six-year bull run
By Michael Sincere
MIAMI (MarketWatch) — This is how bear markets begin.
Two months ago, I pointed out that the U.S. stock market had topped out and was going through a churning process.
Since that observation, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA -0.61%) has risen a bit higher but the Nasdaq (COMP -0.72%) and Russell 2000 (RUT -1.61%) indexes have dropped below their 50-day and 100-day moving averages. It’s only a matter of time before the Dow follows.
Bear markets start with a whimper or a bang. When it starts with a bang, the first clue will be a major break in the market that no one can correctly explain. That will eventually be followed by a correction (or crash), and everyone will know that something bad has happened. The indexes will fall by double digits, investors will panic, and stocks get slaughtered.
Investors will be told to stay calm and not sell — but they will when the financial pain gets too great. They are also told that the market always comes back (although not all stocks will). Anxiety turns to fear as the market plunges. After a correction or crash, investors look for scapegoats while commentators ask, “Who could have known?” (Hint: Those willing to act on the clues and indicators were out of the market well before the most damage was done.)
But when a bear market starts with a whimper, it confuses nearly everyone. A meandering, volatile market is frustrating. At first, bulls are hopeful that the market will keep going up, but eventually, the market tops out and retreats.
I call this “death by a thousand pullbacks.” Instead of new highs, the market will make a series of short-lived but painful pullbacks. At first, the buy-on-the-dip investors will enter the market with new orders. As the bear market continues, the buy-on-the-dip strategy will stop working (along with most other long strategies).
Typically, a market making new highs is a healthy sign. In a looming bear market, new highs on lower volume is a red flag. That’s happening now. Also, leading technology stocks have gotten smashed, replaced by new leaders. After these new leaders fail there will be nowhere to hide.
…
when will wall street and the FED decide the party is over and decide to tank assets again?
Its funny how the media gets on the bandwagon to say everything in the economy is great when in reality the only thing that has changed is more money printing and dilution of the currency.
The FED has offered to end the party once the economy comes back to life, through its QE3 taper.
And since all signs point to a healthy, steadily improving economy, including nascent signs of inflation, the QE3 taper is proceeding on schedule.
A tapir is eating people’s portfolios.
Unless they are loaded with long-term Treasurys!
Bond Report Archives
May 15, 2014, 3:24 p.m. EDT · CORRECTED
Treasurys rally for third day; 10-year yield at 2.5%
Yields pushed to fresh low by technical positioning
By Ben Eisen, MarketWatch
An earlier version of this story gave an incorrect direction of yields in the headline. The story has been corrected.
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Long-term Treasury prices rallied Thursday, shrugging off strong U.S. data points as technical positioning continued to dominate the tone of the market.
Solid numbers for consumer prices, jobless claims, and New York-area manufacturing sent yields higher in the immediate wake of the release. But as investors closed out short positions by buying back into the market, yields quickly reversed course, and continued to gain after softer numbers.
The benchmark 10-year note yield, which drops as prices climb, fell 4.5 basis points to 2.498%, setting a fresh low since last October on a closing basis. The benchmark yield hit an intraday low of 2.475%.
Investors have been expecting rates to rise for much of the year, and have done so by accumulating short positions. However, rates have defied those assumptions and gone in the other direction, leading to losses for the short base. After rates initially rose Thursday, investors used that as opportunity to close out their short positions with smaller losses, according to Thomas di Galoma, head of fixed-income rates at ED&F Man Capital Markets, who said the “market is completely off sides.” They take action by buying into the market, thereby sending yields lower .
The 30-year bond yield dropped 4 basis points to 3.334%, and the 5-year note yield fell 3 basis points to 1.533%.
…
Its funny how the media gets on the bandwagon to say everything in the economy is great when in reality the only thing that has changed is more money printing and dilution of the currency.
You should change the media that you read. Since you have acccess to the internet, that should be easy.
The Market is following the trajectory of a heroin addict.
Lompoc, CA Housing Demand Plunges 22% YoY; Falls To 4-Year Low
http://www.zillow.com/local-info/CA-Lompoc-home-value/r_19078/#metric=mt%3D30%26dt%3D1%26tp%3D6%26rt%3D8%26r%3D19078%252C27662%252C12771%26el%3D0
Hope and Change
“The loss of affordable housing units in the District has caused a surge in the region’s homeless population, according to a new report that says single mothers and their children account for most of the increase.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/number-of-homeless-in-dc-region-rises-as-rents-increase/2014/05/14/db4638e4-dac4-11e3-b745-87d39690c5c0_story.html
Higher taxes and more government programs should solve this, because it’s “for the children”
Hope and Change linked from Drudge
“Segregation is making a comeback in U.S. schools.
In New York, California and Texas, more than half of Latino students are enrolled in schools that are 90 percent minority or more … In New York, Illinois, Maryland and Michigan, more than half of black students attend schools where 90 percent or more are minority.”
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SCHOOL_SEGREGATION?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-05-15-03-35-17
Higher taxes and more government programs can solve this, because it’s “for the children”
‘Higher taxes and more government programs can solve this, because it’s “for the children.”‘
Riotard agrees.
That’s a paraphrase of 2Brony, but it’s appropriate for this article.
This article is a nice example of what happens when cultural relativism meets racial reality.
All the utopian Souper Bowl Coke commercials in the world are not going to make racis white parents send their kidz to school with a bunch of black and brown poors.
Racists gonna race. To the other side of the tracks.
Regardless of race, poors are gonna poor.
Messicans hate Americans anyway, so it’s not worrisome.
I know a guy who pronounces Mexican in that way. He did time in prison for fooling around with an underage girl.
it’s good to be the king:
http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/morning_call/2014/05/luxury-homebuyers-busy-across-metro-denver.html
meanwhile, underwater debt donkeys loose their homes to evil mr. banker:
http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/blog/finance_etc/2014/05/colorado-foreclosure-filings-jump-21-in-april.html
Highlands Ranch rules, Aurora drools.
What’s your obsession with Highlands Ranch?
It’s a relatively affluent part of metro Denver, but I don’t think it’s all that. Cherry Hills Village is much nicer.
And yes, Aurora is a toilet, recent article somewhere noted that 16% of Aurora houses are still underwater.
What’s your obsession with Highlands Ranch?
It’s a relatively affluent part of metro Denver, but I don’t think it’s all that. Cherry Hills Village is much nicer.
I agree that Cherry Hills is nicer and more affluent. There is a lot of one upmanship in HR, which is why I use it in my jokes. I would never live there.
My point was that people move to places like that so their kids don’t have to go to school with the unwashed.
Because millennials are a generation of broke ass loosers:
“there’s a growing body of evidence that rising levels of student loan debt are restraining the ability of young adults to enter the “grown-up” economy — to buy a car and to buy a home and start filling it with big stuff.
One of the crucial reasons the housing market has not expanded enough to support robust economic growth is that young adults are not setting up their own households anywhere near the historic norm.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/15/upshot/the-role-of-student-debt-in-stunting-the-recovery.html
What those Starbucks baristas with a Bachelor of Arts in Obama Studies living in mom’s basement need are $500,000 starter homes!
I love articles like this. They pushed debts and nothing but debts and now suddenly they realize the obvious.
Freaking Morons!
Who pushed the debts? Wasn’t it people like you, housing CEO?
The battle of the debts.
Where can I get me a cat like this one?
AMAZING VIDEO: Cat saves boy from dog attack in Southwest Bakersfield
Dog will be euthanized, police said
Lesley Marin, Derek VandeWeg, Anne Stegen
6:17 AM, May 14, 2014
1 hour ago
I saw that! Completely amazing. Never known a cat to do such a thing, unless it’s one of the big cats (lions, tigers, cheetahs, bobcats, etc.) defending their young.
Seriously, if that cat hadn’t intervened, that little kid could have been toast, the dog was starting to drag him off for the kill. Never get between a cat and its boy.
“Never get between a cat and its boy”
creepy
Aw, you’re just jealous because I came up with “racists gonna race”.
Whoa, Russia dumps treasuries, “Belgium” snaps ‘em up. Talk about global manipulation.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-05-15/russia-dumps-20-its-treasury-holdings-mystery-belgium-buyer-adds-another-whopping-40
And yet long-term Treasury bond yields are at their lowest levels since spring 2013. What gives?
Recession coming? Of course, that assumes the recession really ever ended which is a dubious assumption.
Slow growth ahead at least in low end retail.
What about the internet though check out CSCO
must have more bandwidth
The Banking Clan’s will is being done.
Taper never happened?
I think that the Fed and the banking clan that controls them may have created a situation that actually works against them. When interest rates stay low many assume that is because the economy is going to stay weak or might go into a recession. Thus, corporations do not invest. Additionally, potential homeowners have no reason to try to beat rising interest rates. Thus, the manipulated lower interest rates may be slowing the economy more than they are helping the economy. Or course, the flaw in my analysis is that the Fed actually cares about the economy and not just whether the banking clan can keep fiat money and the ability to manipulate markets to benefit the people that have inside knowledge of Fed policy.
Denial isn’t going to save you.
It looks like a herd movement into bonds may be underway — aka a “flight to quality.” Time will tell whether this is indicative of a temporary reversal or a major paradigm shift.
May 15, 2014, 11:51 a.m. EDT
Dollar dragged lower by falling Treasury yields
By Saumya Vaishampayan, MarketWatch
NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — The dollar reversed course on Thursday, falling against the British pound and yen and giving up gains against the euro as U.S. Treasury yields slumped.
The ICE dollar index, a gauge of the greenback’s strength against six currencies, fell to 80.015 from 80.060 late Wednesday. The WSJ Dollar Index, an alternate measure of dollar strength, inched down to 72.89 from 72.91.
The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note (10_YEAR -2.24%) hit a seven-month low on Thursday, falling below 2.5%.
“The sharp slide in Treasury bond yields is undermining the dollar pretty much across the board,” said Omer Esiner, chief market analyst at Commonwealth Foreign Exchange.
…
A flight to quality doesn’t necessarily have to be a flight to government debt. It could be a flight to cash. Just sayin.
It’s not like I am the only observer noting the panic buying of long-term Treasury bonds. There was a front page article on it in today’s dead tree edition of the Wall Street Journal.
And this one:
May 15, 2014, 1:07 p.m. EDT
Treasury-bond market shows signs of fear, panic buying
By Michael A. Gayed
The behavior of long-duration Treasurys so far in 2014 has been nothing short of incredible. The rallying cry entering the year was that the bond rally was over. Rising rates were coming thanks to Fed tapering, and a strengthening economy. Yet, to normalize rates, growth and inflation must normalize.
Furthermore, rates we are seeing now may actually be normal in the context of structural-deflation forces decades in the making: the wealth gap, technology and demographics. It seems far more likely that the average level of rates must be lower than recent history because of these megatrends which are only accelerating in time.
…
You all should be thanking your lucky stars you didn’t sign up for 30 years of mortgage slavery in the last few years…..
“I have so much money left after “throwing money away on rent” every month that I don’t know where to throw it”
You better believe it
Don’t be a debt donkey
And Bill in Los Angeles = WIN
I am getting more of a liking to my growing pile of blue $100 bills next to my bottles of gleaming 1/4 oz American eagles.
Buckets O’ Money,
Contrast that with my friend. He and his wife are roughly $200k underwater on a BubbleDump with $80k in credit card debt and two auto loans. We were over there last fall for some Sunday NFL when he confessed all this. He said he spent the $80k on “filling the house up”. I glanced around the gargantuan rooms a bit and asked him….. where? What did you buy? His eyes glazed over and he said he didn’t know and doesn’t remember.
What a sad sack looser.
Mr. Banker loves him
“he didn’t know and doesn’t remember.”
Dude, where’s my equity?
‘he didn’t know and doesn’t remember.”
Did he beg you to strangle him?
He’s the type with the fortitude to throw himself off a bridge. It hasn’t happened yet.
Homebuilders feeling less confident in May
Alex Veiga, The Associated Press 10:50 a.m. EDT May 15, 2014
AP Builder Sentiment
U.S. homebuilders are feeling less confident in their near-term sales prospects, reflecting doubts stirred by a sluggish start to the annual spring home-selling season.
The National Association of Home Builders/Wells Fargo builder sentiment index fell this month to 45. That’s down one point from a revised reading of 46 in April.
Readings below 50 indicate that more builders view sales conditions as poor rather than good.
Still, builders are more optimistic that sales will pick up in coming months.
…
NAHB… lol
These guys represent what….. 15% of all new SFR’s?
Make no mistake….. sentiment is very high considering the margins are massive on new SFR’s relative to current resale asking prices.
Wildfires in SD, oil spill in LA, radiation pouring in from Fukushima, and probably due for a major earthquake sooner or later on the Andreas fault… Why the hell does anyone think its a good idea to live in CA?
“California Most Impoverish State In The US”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._states_by_poverty_rate
(geography adjusted)
DC actually tops the list but that particular nest of corruption isn’t a state…. thank God.
Why the hell does anyone think its a good idea to live in CA?
You got me. More often than not, the weather is used as justification. When we left, our acquaintances told us we were nuts. “It snows in Colorado” we were gently reminded. “It’s cold, there’s no beach.”
There is very little I miss from our years in San Diego.
Yes, the weather is nice in California. However, the weather is cold comfort when you have to commute 45 minutes each way to your one-bedroom apartment in a car that is falling apart.
“Why the hell does anyone think its a good idea to live in CA?”
OK, let’s see: Midwest–tornado alley, hot humid summers and frigid windy winters. No thanks. Northeast–same as above, just no tornadoes and a cost of living to match or surpass Ca. No thanks. Southeast– Nice winters I guess, like Ca, but with hurricanes. No thanks. Northwest? Maybe. I like rain, so I guess it would be alright, but it’s the same as Ca as far as earthquake faults and this Fukushima radiation stuff. Southwest– I like the desert as a place to visit, not sure I’d want to live there. Maybe in the mountains, but then we get into cost of living issues again. And fire issues.
Where do you suggest we Californians move to?
Somehow, people in the other 49 states manage to survive uncomfortable weather for at least part of the year. Also, I think that your facts are incorrect about torandoes and hurricanes. The entire Midwest is not prone to tornadoes and there are many areas of the South which get hurricanes less frequently than LA gets earthquakes.
If you’re dissatisfied with the cost of living in California and those are really your reasons for not moving, then the nice weather must make that higher cost worth it to you.
“The entire Midwest is not prone to tornadoes…”
My BS detector is tingling. Name one state in the Midwest which is not prone to tornadoes!
One of my all-time favorite tornado videos, from a lake in Minnesota:
Tornado in Minnesota
As witnesses watch a tornado, within moments curiosity turns to panic.
Woodward, Iowa extreme tornado video
Storm Stock Storm Stock·69 videos
Uploaded on Sep 1, 2010
A rare, up-close view of a tornado and its immediate aftermath. This tornado impacted the small Iowa town of Woodward on November 12, 2005. Exclusive to StormStock.
…
National Geographic - Witness Joplin Tornado (Documentary)
Published on Jun 26, 2013
On May 22, 2011, an EF-5 tornado struck Joplin, Missouri, a city of 50,000 in the southwest corner of the state. Packing winds of more than 200 miles an hour, the tornado tore through the center of the city, tearing off two floors of the city’s main hospital, demolishing churches and businesses, and rendering whole neighborhoods unrecognizable. More than 150 people lost their lives in the storm, and the devastation to the city was enormous.
Aerial footage shows scale of Arkansas tornado devastation
Bird’s eye view reveals the scale of destruction left by the tornado that hit Arkansas’ Little Rock suburb of Mayflower
12:09PM BST 28 Apr 2014
Residents in Arkansas’ Little Rock suburb of Mayflower were surveying the damage on Monday after a powerful tornado carved an 80-mile (129 kilometre) path of destruction through the area.
The tornado was the largest of several produced by a powerful storm system that rumbled through the central and southern US killing at least 16 people. Another twister in Oklahoma killed one.
The twister shredded cars, trucks and 18-wheelers stuck along the road north of Little Rock.
The weather service’s North Little Rock office said it was virtually certain that the Mayflower and Vilonia storm would be rated as the nation’s strongest twister to date this year.
…
Tornado northeast of Ruston, Louisiana December 21, 2013!
Published on Dec 21, 2013
Video from TVN storm chasers from supercells in northern Louisiana, including a large tornado near Farmersville, LA that downed massive trees all around the Dominator team’s armored chase vehicle.
…
Evolution of the world-record EF-5 El Reno, Oklahoma tornado on May 31, 2013
Published on Jun 1, 2013
Storm chasers Gabe Garfield, Tim Marquis, Amy Edmonds and Logan Karsten documented the evolution of a massive multi-vortex-to-wedge tornado on May 31, 2013. The tornado and its very dangerous parent thunderstorm complex was responsible for considerable damage to life and property in the Oklahoma City.
“The entire Midwest is not prone to tornadoes…”
My BS detector is tingling. Name one state in the Midwest which is not prone to tornadoes!
A little Googling finds this Wikipedia page:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tornado_Alley
I guess the issue is how many tornadoes a person willing to tolerate in, say, a decade. If you want zero, there are only some sparsely populated areas in the Midwest to choose from. On the other hand, it appears that there has been at least one tornado in Southern California. Also, non-Midwestern states like North Carolina and Massachusetts have had around the same number as Ohio or Michigan.
I’m not proud of the fact, and a bit concerned about the implications, but I just never tire of watching videos that show drunk yokels running the camcorder while a twister bears down on them.
Here is a little info for Midwest folks stuck in tornado alley: I personally would rather live within a few miles of raging wildfires than in the future path of F5 twisters. I lived several decades in the Midwest, and I have never suffered nightmares related to wildfires or earthquakes since relocating to CA which compare to the frequent tornado nightmares I suffered in the Midwest, which were related to actual waking experiences I survived.
I suggest Californians pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to live in the earthly paradise!
‘The “humanitarian” U.S. military occupation of Africa has been very successful, thus far. “The Chibok abductions have served the same U.S. foreign policy purposes as Joseph Kony sightings in central Africa.” Imagine: the superpower that financed the genocide of six million in Congo, claims to be a defender of teenage girls and human rights on the continent. If you believe that, then you are probably a member of the Congressional Black Caucus.’
Or work for a member, as I think Rio/Lola does.
http://swva.craigslist.org/npo/4470201875.html
At least this intern position offers a stipend.
Yes, but it also requires experience. Internships don’t generally go to people with experience, as those individuals typically apply for jobs.
In addition, I would like to point out that the person who wrote the job description does not know the difference between a requirement and a duty, so maybe that person is an intern too.
Internships don’t generally go to people with experience, as those individuals typically apply for jobs.
In the past, yes.
At HP we used to hire paid interns. They were pretty much expected to hit the ground running. It was more of a test run, to see which students could actually write code, and which ones couldn’t. Those that could were usually offered a job upon graduation.
Meanwhile staffing company stocks r catering. Kelya, ahs, ccrn…
Market forces are shifting with the fiery winds.
Jill Abramson obviously didn’t get the memo.
The new business paradigm isn’t about paying women less for the same job.
It’s about $##t-canning the old guys/gals, and paying their replacements (whatever their orientation, race or gender) 33-50% less.
I have seen this in person.
Another favorite trend: the replacements are brought on board as “contract-to-hire”. No bennies. No insurance, no paid time off, etc. And they are rarely hired. And even as contractors, their wages are less than those of full time employees.
That’s how I got my current job. The “management ” company I was working for screwed up, by charging more for my services than what I would take as an actual full-time employee.
(Sorta like how my ex- screwed up, by making a divorce a “break-even” proposition for me…….but I digress…..
)
But hey, this is their first airplane………everybody figures out eventually that most of the time, you need a full time mech.
We currently have a “two-tier” wage scale in this country. Anyone who managed to avoid a layoff/Chapter 11/shutdown in 2008-2012 is doing okay.
If you had to start over somewhere else, you are getting paid 25-50% less for the very same job..
Had a salary discussion with my current employer a few weeks ago, about this very matter. Was told that “salary surveys” didn’t mean squat, this is what we have budgeted to pay you, and they would encourage me to go somewhere else, if I felt I could do better.
So what it comes down to is this: Nobody is going to get raises/COLAs until enough people get job offers that pay enough to justify all of the risks of quitting. And all of these guys making job offers are like the guys at the New York Times. They believe that there are 100 people looking to fill every job opening, and low-ball accordingly.
As usual, none of this will be a problem, until it blows up in their faces. In my business, that won’t happen until airplanes start being grounded because there is nobody around to do the work/inspection.
I have personally observed two cases in the past few months of people who initially took a lowball offer of a job (actually the same job at the same company), but quit soon after for a better gig. The company subsequently raised their pay range for the position, and now they have a person who seems like he’s going to stay. I don’t know about the airplane business, but I think this bodes well for the labor market in general.
I think direct hire jobs are going to make a comeback over the temp staffing very soon.
I am very confident the staffing jobs in white collar jobs are not worth the time anymore for the temps. It’s partly caused by greed of the recruiters and partly by the naive new temps who bid lower than what they are worth.
It’s been a good cycle from 2000 to now. But I see KELYA, AHS, CCRN all suffering. KELYA was in essence voted “most likely to succeed” of all staffing companies this year (by anal ysts - gap intended) and then flopped big time.
My new company compensation is still a mystery to all of us. We are not officially purchased yet. Our boss has met with the HR dept of new company.
It’s drama for me because I have eye surgery coming up and want to know if my current company plan will cover it. Heard the new company is also the same insurance company, but the surgical coordinator lady still insists she wants confirmation very soon and before the surgery of course - which is early June.
The goal is to be in new company officially by June.
And I ran out of popcorn.
Fxr, you went silent on HBB about the same time this happened:
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/national/kansas-man-arrested-airport-bomb-plot-article-1.1547082
Bad news: I thought maybe it was you
Good news: I was ready to smuggle whiskey and cigs to you
Went to the grocery the other day. While browsing, saw some store-brand “Jello with fruit” snack cups on sale. “On sale” being relative. The package was $1.50, or something like that, about 15% cheaper than the “name brand”.
What surprised me was on the label in back……..”Product of China”
We are totally screwed when even the price of “Made in USA” jello is considered too high. How does hauling jello half-way around the world even make economic/financial sense?
The current Kabuki of economic sanctions against Russia is even funnier. So much stuff is being outsourced, that sanctions issued by Washington screws the USA worse than the target of the sanctions.
What moron decided to make Russia the exclusive source of rocket engines?
Watching the US government apply economic sanctions reminds me of the scene in “Indiana Jones”, where Jones tries to pull his gun out of the holster, only to discover it isn’t there.
Even more astonishing — a current online marketing campaign for Kleenex is pitching tissues in colorful boxes (for more $ than the plain boxes, I assume.) Finally! Snot rags in designer boxes! How much did that campaign cost?
This is what passes for American ingenuity these days.
What moron decided to make Russia the exclusive source of rocket engines?
I thought that the Merlin engines used by SpaceX’s Falcon rockets were American.
What is interesting though is that the Russians want out of the ISS. If they bow out, how will we get anyone up to the ISS? Or will the Russians continue to provide rides on their Soyuz rockets, for a fee of course?
Don’t complain about your Jello too loudly:
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2014/05/14/Dept-Of-Agriculture-Orders-Submachine-Guns-With-30-Round-Magazines
We are totally screwed when even the price of “Made in USA” jello is considered too high. How does hauling jello half-way around the world even make economic/financial sense?
It must make sense the way that other imports form China make sense. The savings on the labor is greater than the cost of the shipping.
I read something recently re: chickens that are raised here will be sent to China for processing, and then returned to the US. Apparently it is cheaper to send them there for processing and pay the cost of transportation both ways, than to simply do it here.
They can’t raise the chickens in China thank goodness due to some import restriction or something.
I heard the same thing about Scottish smoked salmon. The salmon is caught in Scotland, sent to China to be smoked, and then shipped back to Scotland.
X-GSfixr
Absolutely. I’m interviewing as a replacement gal, and that’s what is going on. Salaries are way down.(So Ca)
My neighbor (great guy) thinks the BLS is trustworthy. lol
Labor Force Participation Rate Sinks To 36 Year Low
http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS11300000
I’m still having trouble convincing people that many jobs are actually a means to go slowly broke, when you look at the pay vs. costs incurred by working.
http://money.msn.com/saving-money-tips/post–young-men-earn-much-less-now-than-in-1973
Bow wow wow…. The dow cratered $200.
Fearless prediction from the -fixer.
The vacation travel season is going to suck.
The history (short version)……….after the Buffalo Colgan air crash and subsequent investigation, the FAA decided to mandate that Part 121 air carriers have ATP-rated pilots flying their airplanes. (before this, only the pilot was required to have one…..they guy/gal in the right seat could be a 600 hour total time newbie)
(Note- It usually takes the typical newbie pilot around 100 hours to even get a “Private Pilot” certificate)
The airlines requested and got two years for the requirement to go into effect, in August 2013. They figured it would take that long to get all of their guys certificated.
Fast forward to last May-June…….evidently, the airlines did a review of “Where we are at” vs. “Where we need to be in August” and realized they were going to come up short. Commencing in June, everybody with an ATP and/or B737-type rating started getting recall notices, including nice starting salaries, and signing bonuses. A bunch of corporate flight departments who had lowballed these guys back in 2008-2009 suddenly found themselves without pilots.
Even then, they couldn’t get enough guys. Note the number of flight cancellations starting in mid/late August last year. Most of them were blamed on weather or mechanical issues.
So this summer could be interesting…….one beauty of the airline’s ticketing and reservation system is that they know what flights are occupied by regular and business customers paying full priced fares, and what flights are occupied by “budget-minded ” customers flying on discounts. They also know that they don’t want to pizz off the oligarchs in NYC, LA, and DC, lest their “shortage of pilots” issue becomes national news. Needless to say, these flight will fly.
So……..if you are an airline customer flying from BFE to a vacation destination on a planeload full of discount ticket holders, make sure you have backup travel plans not involving the airlines.
There was a whole generation of young pilots that got boxed out of the business by a shrinking industry. Most of them moved into other fields or left the country years ago to work in tax free Dubai or China. Now the industry wonders why nobody wants to live in New York or Boston and fly for 35k a year. Most of the guys I know who could do the job would be taking a $100,000 pay cut to go back to flying.
I think I get what you’re saying but I’m still a bit lost. So, you mean that there is a pilot shortage, and therefore the airlines will prioritize the pilots to larger planes full of business class suits. The “regional” puddle jumper spokes from the hub to the countryside B&B is likely to be cheap vacationers and will therefore will be junked due to “mechanical” problems.
I remember reading an article on the crash — or something similar, on overworked young pilots. Sometime after that I was deboarding a plane at 10:30 pm and said to the pilot — “now home to the crash pad, right?” He gave me a very uneasy nod and giggle. Those poor guys… can’t even bang the stewardesses anymore.
As always, fixer, thank you for your insight.
“The history (short version)……….after the Buffalo Colgan air crash and subsequent investigation, the FAA decided to mandate that Part 121 air carriers have ATP-rated pilots flying their airplanes.”
I thought passenger operations were part 135 especially those over 12,500-lbs. Most skydiving operators are part 105/121 (take-off and land at point A) unless they operate aircraft larger than the typical dhc6-100,200.
FWIW, I was a parachute rigger at a small cessna dz that was a part 91/105 operation. They were busy during the summer months, but barely clung to life when the clouds and rain rolled-in. It was fun as a single guy, but there wasn’t enough money sloshing around to pay family supporting wages. Those news stories about the Colgan commuter pilots barely getting enough sleep, underpaid and saddled with huge student loans were just awful. I like aviation, but not enough to go hungry.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/big-increases-obamacare-premiums-deductibles-100000679.html
My premiums just went up 17%.
And every dollar of that will be matched with reduced consumption, my savings rate will remain unchanged.
Just doing my part to keep this Obama recovery on track
More cash under the mattress is unpatriotic. The NSA should be investigating you. And no kids? You don’t want to own a house in an Obama neighborhood and be a slave to Bank of Bama? You should be banished from progressive Amerika.
What’s an Obama neighborhood?
Any nabe with section 8 or other housing subsidies
It is unpatriotic of you if you refuse to buy a house next to section 8.
Any nabe with section 8 or other housing subsidies
The tax deduction for mortgage interest is a kind of a housing subsidy, so it would be hard to find a neighborhood that’s not an Obama neighborhood.
Also, section 8 was enacted decades before Obama was born.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_8_(housing)
CNN says that extreme fear is back on the stock market. Tomorrow it will go up by 25% before noon.
Promise me that please. I will then sell more shares of staffing company stock. There is a slight depression on my mattress below my left calf muscle and I need to stuff more $100s there.
Every 30-something I work with is trying to buy a house.
Same here if they haven’t already.
I pay $X in rent every month.
My budget for outdoor recreation is $X/2 every month.
My savings rate is $X*2 or more every month.
If I bought an overpriced house, my mortgage payment would probably be $X*3 or more every month.
Therefore, I rent.
You have to pay for outdoor recreation? Can’t you just go somewhere public and run around a bit? Frisbees are pretty cheap.
He’s into skiing, which is an expensive hobby.
Downhill skiing is addictive. I was really into it. Then I became a cheapskate. I guess I hear the ghost of my dad saying “cross country skiing is free.”
“cross country skiing is free.”
Not really. You have to either live where there is lotsa snow or pay to visit — both expensive propositions.
Then there’s the cost of all of the equipment.
Every 50 something I work with is trying to get rid of two. Their own and their dying parents.
Have neither. My parents died while I cherished them. I was 30-something when my mom died and just turned 40 when my dad was diagnosed with terminal “c”.
I have an ex girlfriend battling the big c right now and on chemo and radiation. She is one of my main preoccupations of late. Very sweet lady - why after Nixon’s 1970s “war on cancer” do we still have this dreadful disease - (conspiracy theories welcome)?
good question.
I work with a few younger baby boomers who occasionally complain about being trapped on the HAMPster wheel. They wish they could sell their houses and drop out, but they’re underwater. They also feel like they can’t retire until 65 because that’s when Medicare kicks in.
- Must own house.
- Must have health insurance provided by larger force.
- Oh, BTW, must have all retirement “savings” invested in 401k, which is naturally conservative, and somehow magically not stocks.
- Must stay on HAMPster wheel.
It’s possible that Obamacare has made it easier for an individual to buy insurance as the age of, say, 60. Previously, it was pretty risky. A person of that age without any serious preexisting conditions might be able to get insurance at that age. However, if something serious health problem came up it would probably become expensive or impossible to renew the health insurance.
One trick that I heard of somewhere was retiring at the age of 63½ and then getting insurance through COBRA for the last 18 months before Medicare.
Spying Is Meant to Crush Citizens’ Dissent, Not Catch Terrorists …
http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2014/05/spying-meant-crush-dissent-terrorism.html - 76k -
MSM Pushes Doomsday Arctic Ice Sheet Propaganda
Dubious prediction isn’t even expected for 1,000 years
Paul Joseph Watson
Infowars.com
May 14, 2014
Scaremongering headlines about the “collapse” of the the Antarctic ice sheet omitted the fact that such an event isn’t predicted to happen for as much as 1,000 years, underscoring once again how the mass media grossly exaggerates the threat posed by global warming.
On Monday, the Guardian reported that the “Western Antarctic ice sheet collapse has already begun,” prompting the likes of NBC News, the New York Times, the LA Times and CNN to hastily regurgitate the alarmism.
It isn’t until the third paragraph of the Guardian article that the true context of the story becomes clear, when Suzanne Goldenberg acknowledges that the potential loss of the ice sheet along with a 13ft sea level rise “is still several centuries off, and potentially up to 1,000 years away.”
The article also failed to mention that Antarctic sea ice expanded to record levels for April, growing by more than 110,000sq km a day last month to nine million square kilometers.
Even New York Times environmental writer Andy Revkin, a proponent of the man-made global warming theory, slammed the “awful misuse” of the word “collapse” in the headline of the story.
Such predictions also routinely fail to include the proviso that climate models have proven to be spectacularly wrong on numerous occasions in the past.
In December 2008, Al Gore claimed that the “entire north polar ice cap will be gone in 5 years,” a forecast proven embarrassingly inept by reality.
In 2007 BBC News, citing climate scientists, also predicted that Arctic summers would be “ice free” by 2013. What actually happened was that Arctic ice grew by a mammoth 533,000 square miles in a year from August 2012 to August 2013.
Back in January, Obama science czar John P. Holdren dubiously claimed that the ‘polar vortex’ which caused record low temperatures across many areas of the United States this past winter was caused by global warming, contradicting the United Nations IPCC, which in its 2007 report stated there was, “likely to be a decline in the frequency of cold air outbreaks… in [northern hemisphere] winter in most areas.”
Last year, climate scientists were forced to admit that computer models of predicted temperature increases calculated in 2007 were off by 75%. Figures show that there has been no global warming for over 17 years.
As agenda-driven climate scientists continue to blame every weather pattern on man-made global warming for political purposes, the real climate threat is likely to emerge out of the fact that sunspot activity is at its lowest for 100 years, which researchers warn will lead to plunging temperatures and the onset of a new mini ice age.
Tags: environment, science
“in 2007 were off by 75%.”
A bit like housing prices.
crates
Alert: Imperial Psychiatric Empire is Invading the Mind
Jon Rappoport
Infowars.com
May 15, 2014
A federal bill, HR 3717 (Helping Families in Mental Health Crisis Act of 2013), is being refined in the hope of gaining big support from both sides of the political aisle.
Rep. Tim Murphy (R-Pa.) is the key point man for the American Psychiatric Association.
This bill is playing off of Aurora, Sandy Hook, Boston, and other recent “mass events.”
The propaganda hook is: catch mental illness early, prevent tragedy.
The strategy is: expand mental health services into every cranny and nook of the society, starting with children.
Translation: diagnose mental disorders and drug patients with toxic compounds.
As I’ve demonstrated in many past articles, none of the 300 officially certified mental disorders has any defining diagnostic test. No blood test, no urine test, no brain scan, no genetic assay.
The names and descriptions of all the disorders are outright frauds, packaged to sell harmful drugs.
But that doesn’t stop the juggernaut.
HR 3717 is designed to do the following, as described in a recent article in Psychiatric News, “Comprehensive Mental Health Bill Introduced in House”:
“Among the bill’s provisions is the creation of a new assistant secretary position in the Department of Health and Human Services to coordinate activities within the agency on prevention and treatment of mental health and substance abuse.”
That means far greater clout for the feds in foisting psychiatric treatment on the public.
“…increase funding for crisis-intervention team training for police officers and firefighters…”
This adds a psychiatric component in instances of “crises,” wherein suspects, witnesses and even government workers will receive “mental health” evals and counseling (and drug prescriptions). It’ll be SOP for anyone within shouting distance of a police raid, for example, to experience a brush with the psychiatric system, whenever possible.
“…permit disclosure of information about individuals with mental illness to caregivers or immediate family members under certain circumstances.”
There goes privacy and confidentiality…one leak and cross-reference after another.
“…$40 million a year for the National Institute of Mental Health to fund the Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies (BRAIN) Initiative…or other ‘research on the determinants of self- and other-directed violence in mental illness, including studies directed at reducing the risk of self-harm, suicide, and interpersonal violence.’”
More $$ to study how to control the brain. More fraudulent research aimed at blaming “chemical imbalances” as the cause of crime, which again results in more mental-disorder diagnoses and drugging. Keep in mind that increasing numbers of people are being driven over the edge into committing violence, because psychiatric drugs, such as the SSRI antidepressants, are scrambling their neurotransmitters. This is a self-fulfilling prophecy.
“…adopt a ‘need-for-treatment’ standard for assisted outpatient treatment (AOT), he [Rep. Murphy] said, adding that the current legal standard requiring ‘dangerousness to self or others’ to permit involuntary evaluation and treatment was a bar set too high.”
This means the government can order more people to receive psychiatric care and forced drugging, erasing the previous restriction.
Jeffrey Lieberman, president of the American Psychiatric Association: “We need a public-health initiative for mental health care that moves out of clinical settings into the community, whether it’s in primary care, education, the workplace, or faith-based organizations.”
Meaning: tons of new propaganda about the need for psychiatric treatment; the building of community psychiatric centers all across the country; pressure to submit to treatment applied in ordinary doctors’ offices, in schools, in private companies, in churches.
This is a diabolical legislative package.
If it’s fully implemented, you’ll witness a sea-change in society, in the coming decade. Diagnoses of mental disorders and consequent drugging, already widely in effect, will become as common and ordinary as people eating at fast food restaurants.
And the population will eventually forget things were ever different.
“Hey, can I borrow your Valproate? My son took my bottle because he ran out.”
Look for schools to set up monitoring systems, so they can be sure students are taking their psychiatric meds at the proper times during the day.
On their wireless devices, all children will have ID packages that allow them to check into any pharmacy and pick up a prescription refill.
And esoteric concepts like “consciousness?” They’ll fade from view, because “states of mind” will be defined by mental-disorder labels.
This is about more than Pharma profits. It’s also about putting a ceiling on how human beings view themselves.
As exemplified by this bill before Congress, the federal government has set itself up as a legal partner and enforcer of a monopoly of the mind.
Understand that. There are a million ways to explore and understand the inner life of a person. Psychiatry is just one of those. It’s a pseudoscience and a con and a hustle.
But it has the unflinching support of all three branches of government.
Which is why the freedom to refuse treatment must be protected, against any and all attacks.
Jon Rappoport – The author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics, health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world. You can sign up for his free emails at http://www.nomorefakenews.com
This article was posted: Thursday, May 15, 2014 at 1:12 pm
The names and descriptions of all the disorders are outright frauds, packaged to sell harmful drugs.
This is complete nonsense. Depression was written about by the ancient Greeks, many centuries before there was a pharmeutical industry.
Depression was written about by the ancient Greeks
So what? They were in on the fraud too. Human depravity of this sort knows no limits in space or time.
that article is a phony scandal
crater
Too-big-to-fail battle between Larry Summers, Nassim Taleb
May 15, 2014, 10:05 PM ET
A riveting debate between “Black Swan” author Nassim Taleb and former Treasury secretary and White House adviser Larry Summers captivated the SALT hedge-fund conference in Las Vegas Thursday.
Taleb, who recently authored a paper entitled “Skin in the Game,” argued that the aftermath of the financial crisis unfairly rewarded bad actors and that the system remains dangerous.
Summers, who served as Treasury secretary under Bill Clinton and more recently as an adviser to Barack Obama, took exception and charged that Taleb was being unrealistic about the difficulties identifying the institutions that pose systemic risk.
Summers told Taleb that he was for more capital, more liquidity, living wills for banks and procedures to wind them down. “What are you for?” he challenged.
“I’m for punishment,” Taleb replied.
Taleb outlined a system in which everyone would know which systemically important banks would be bailed out, but would presumably see strict oversight of bonuses and operations afterward. Other institutions would be left to fail, he said.
Summers countered that such a system was in place prior to the financial crisis. But when push came to shove, Bear Stearns, an investment bank that wasn’t envisioned as systemically important, was rescued. And then we all know what happened when Lehman Brothers failed.
Summers said that building a system is sort of like saying you’ll never pay ransom to kidnappers. It sounds good in practice, but in reality sometimes even the Israelis pay ransom, he said.
Taleb had the final word, saying the system should be designed so that you can’t get upside without being exposed to the downside.
The audience seemed split between the antagonists, with each getting smatterings of applause in the back-and-forth debate.
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May 12, 2014, 7:34 a.m. EDT
Regulators cannot protect bitcoin buyers
Why regulators can’t do much on cryptocurrencies
By Chuck Jaffe, MarketWatch
The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission this week finally issued a blanket investor alert about the potential dangers of investments in and with virtual currencies like Bitcoin.
It was too little, but not entirely too late, because it’s clear that the more cryptocurrencies are accepted and used by the general public, the more they will be promoted and abused by hucksters, sharpies and fraudsters.
What’s clear from all official statements that regulators have made about virtual currencies is that issues stemming from Bitcoin and other new mediums of exchange are off the edge of their map, in the area that in olden times was labeled “Here there be monsters.”
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