Bits Bucket for March 5, 2015
Post off-topic ideas, links, and Craigslist finds here.
The Housing Bubble
Examining the home price boom and its effect on owners, lenders, regulators, realtors and the economy as a whole.
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Name:Ben Jones
Location:Northern Arizona, United States
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Has China GDP growth reached a ‘new normal’?
China signals ‘new normal’ with higher spending, lower growth target
By Koh Gui Qing and Kevin Yao
BEIJING Thu Mar 5, 2015 5:29am EST
(Reuters) - China plans to run its biggest budget deficit in 2015 since the global financial crisis, stepping up spending as Premier Li Keqiang signaled that the lowest rate of growth in a quarter of a century is the “new normal” for the world’s No.2 economy.
…
China cuts growth target as country moves towards ‘new normal’
Sub-7pc growth is on the cards as premier Li Keqiang says difficulties facing world’s second largest economy may be “more formidable” than in 2014
By Szu Ping Chan, and agencies
8:33AM GMT 05 Mar 2015
China has set an official growth target of “approximately 7pc” for 2015, as the world’s second largest economy moves towards a “new normal” of lower, more sustainable growth.
The announcement by Chinese premier Li Keqiang on Thursday is in line with government plans. Last year’s target was 7.5pc, although actual growth came in at 7.4pc, the lowest since 1990.
“With downward pressure on China’s economy building and deep-seated problems in development surfacing, the difficulties we are to encounter in the year ahead may be even more formidable than those of last year,” Mr Li told the opening of the annual National People’s Congress.
…
Now PB, we already know that’s not possible.
Barron’s Take
China’s Premier Li Sets Course To New Normal
While the growth target was cut to about 7%, the pressure is rising on Beijing to deliver much needed reforms.
By Thomas Streater
March 5, 2015
Premier Li Keqiang delivers the government work report during the opening meeting of the third session of China’s 12th National People’s Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing, March 5, 2015. Source: State Council (Photo Xinhua)
China’s government has backed its talk of a “new normal” for the world’s second largest economy by lowering its growth target to “about 7%” for this year, with the revised target standing as the flag bearer for the Communist Party’s attempts to transition towards a more durable and sustainable pace of growth.
China’s Premier Li Keqiang unveiled the widely expected cut from 7.5% to 7% during his work report at National People’s Congress in Beijing, underscoring the fact that the days of turbocharged double digit growth are a thing of the past. What can’t be relegated to the dustbin of history is the legacy of debt, deflation, environmental destruction and pollution bequeathed by China’s frenzied industrialization.
…
The Telegraph
Liquidity evaporates in China as ‘fiscal cliff’ nears
A clerk counts Chinese currency notes at a bank branch in Huaibei in central China’s Anhui province
The International Monetary Fund says China’s budget deficit topped 10pc of GDP in 2014
Picture: AP
By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard
10:13PM GMT 04 Mar 2015
Unless China changes course, it is set to tighten fiscal policy by 5.5pc of GDP this year, five times Britain’s austerity dose annually since the Lehman crisis
Nobody can fault China’s leaders for lack of bravery. The Politburo has kept its nerve as the world’s most giddy experiment in credit-driven growth faces assault on three major fronts at once.
Real interest rates have rocketed. The trade-weighted rise in the yuan over the past two years has been spectacular. Fiscal policy is about to tighten drastically as the authorities clamp down on big-spending local governments.
Put together, China is pursuing the most contractionary mix of economic policies in the G20, relative to the status quo ante. Collateral damage is already visible in the sliding global prices of iron ore, copper, nickel, lead and zinc over recent months, as well as thermal coal, oil, corn and even sugar.
Zhiwei Zhang, from Deutsche Bank, says China faces a “fiscal cliff” this year as Beijing attempts to rein in spending. “This year, China will likely face the worst fiscal challenge since 1981. This is not well recognised in the market,” he said.
The International Monetary Fund says China’s budget deficit topped 10pc of GDP in 2014 if measured properly, including borrowing by the regions through “financing vehicles” as well as land sales - a patently unsustainable form of funding that makes up 35pc of local government revenue. This is the highest deficit of any major country in the world, and far above safe levels.
A budget squeeze is already emerging as the property slump drags on. Zhiwei Zhang says land revenues fell 21pc in the fourth quarter of last year. “The decline of fiscal revenue is the top risk in China and will lead to a sharp slowdown,” he said.
…
Yes and its new normal is around 7% for 2014 and 2015 just as I predicted.
As enigmatic as their data is, they can make it appear to be anything they want.
But countries like Australia which trade with China and rely on their market confirm much of the data. For example, one country’s exports are another country’s imports and by adding up the claimed imports from China, you should get China’s exports and you do.
“China’s exports…”
Coal and iron miners say you are a cupcake.
I posted an article a few days ago from Australia talking about record exports of iron ore to China. We are talking about expectations, Australia built new mines expecting 10% growth per year in China and it is getting 7%, thus there is a glut but the glut is not because China is not growing.
I have to go for the day but I will be back, well unless Ben decides otherwise.
I think plunging imports and commodity prices are a more accurate indicator of China’s true growth rate.
I think plunging imports and commodity prices are a more accurate indicator of China’s true growth rate.
Absolutely.
OK from Rio Tinto not China, despite the price of the commodity dropping their sales increased in China:
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/business/2015-03/05/content_19723411.htm
Fine so use Rio Tinto’s numbers, increasing sales despite the commodities falling in price, this is my point China’s numbers are consistent with many other sources not connected with the government:
China still accounted for 38 percent of total group revenues at Rinto Tinto Plc last year, despite the country’s slowing pace of economic growth, the world’s second-largest mining company said on Wednesday.
Ren Binyan, head of Rio Tinto China, said the company continued to have strong confidence in the world’s second-largest economy as it continues its economic growth transformation.
According to the company, it had total sales of $19.1 billion in China in 2014, or 38 percent of global sales - a 3 percent increase compared with the previous year.
“China is increasingly important to our business. We will continue to increase our output to supply China,” said Ren.
He said the company plans to increase its annual iron ore output to 330 million metric tons by the end of 2015. Last year it produced 300 million tons of iron ore, about two-thirds of which were supplied to China.
“The Baltic Dry Index, a measure of global freight rates for commodities, fell on Friday to within 0.9 percent of the all-time low in July and August of 1986. China’s seaborne coal imports slid 10 percent in 2014…”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-02-06/shipping-costs-test-new-low-as-china-coal-imports-slide-freight
“With big iron ore miners sticking to their expansion plans, increasing supplies have slashed prices for the steel making raw material at a time when easing economic growth in China is leading to slower demand growth for commodities.”
“Lower-cost iron ore resources overseas have led to surging imports and squeezed higher-cost domestic iron ore miners to shut down, and this trend will continue this year,” said Li Wenjing, an analyst with Industrial Futures in Shanghai.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/13/china-economy-trade-ironore-idUSL3N0US1FP20150113
“China’s apparent crude steel consumption fell for the first time in three decades in 2014, data from an industry association showed, a further indication of how the country’s economic slowdown is hurting industrial demand.
“A decline in the use of steel in China, which is both the top consumer and producer of the alloy, will dent iron ore prices that have already been roiled by a global oversupply.”
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/01/22/us-china-steel-consumption-idUSKBN0KV1FJ20150122
Some signals are up, some down. The overview is that the Chinese economy has rolled over. Not growth slowing by some tenths of a percent, but into contraction.
Oil is over.
http://www.eweek.com/news/lockheed-martin-claims-sustainable-fusion-is-within-its-grasp.html
‘just as i predicted’
do you win something for that?
Yes same as always numerous posts that will try to attack me.
Poor thing.
Po’ baby…
Predicting that China’s communist government will put out the propagandized number of 7% doesn’t require any ESP, but believing that it’s true does require a lot of gullibility.
Is “Polly wants a cracker” a prediction?
“do you win something for that?”
The same prize as for those who predict the sun rises in the east.
Yea like you thought it was going to grow 7% plus last year. Show me your post.
Dan, you are just not original. You predict what the CCP predicts. Over and over and over and………
Dan, you are just not original. You predict what the CCP predicts. Over and over and over and………
Really they picked 7.5% in 2014, I thought that was high. Virtually everyone on this board was predicting a collapsing China in 2014.
“This is the highest deficit of any major country in the world, and far above safe levels.”
That doesn’t sound good. How do we spin that one?
Asia Stocks
China Shares Fall on Beijing’s Lower Growth Target
Shanghai and Hong Kong stocks slip while Shenzhen shares are steady
China’s President Xi Jinping, left, and China’s Premier Li Keqiang arrive for the National People’s Congress in Beijing, China, on March 5
Photo: Bloomberg News
By Chao Deng
Updated March 5, 2015 4:18 a.m. ET
China stocks fell Thursday after the country lowered its growth forecast for the year, bringing concerns about a slowing economy to the fore.
The Hang Seng Index fell 1.1% to 24193.04 and the Shanghai Composite Index was down 1%.
Chinese Premier Li Keqiang said leaders were aiming for about 7% economic growth after a 7.4% expansion last year, the slowest in more than two decades. The fresh target this year was widely expected amid sluggish domestic demand and a slow recovery in the global economy. Leaders had targeted about 7.5% growth for last year.
Despite China’s recent easing, “the sense is that the economy is getting weaker,” said Amit Prakash, head of wealth management products for Asia at BMO Global Asset Management, which manages more than US$279 billion globally. The market is looking for structural changes by China’s leaders, including for sectors that Beijing will bolster, he said.
China’s smaller Shenzhen exchange fared better, with its benchmark Shenzhen A Share Index finishing up 0.3% at 1753.90, buoyed by expectations that China will launch a trial program to connect the Shenzhen and Hong Kong stock exchanges. In prepared comments to parliament Thursday, Premier Li Keqiang said the launch would come at “an appropriate time.”
Investors are looking forward to the new program because an earlier link between Shanghai and Hong Kong helped fuel a rally in mainland stocks in the period leading up to the launch of the program in November. Both programs are part of China’s continuing bid to open its capital markets to global investors.
Monetary easing by India and China pumped up stocks Wednesday, with India’s benchmark hitting an intraday record high after its central bank cut rates, and China shares rising after the People’s Bank of China moved to lower borrowing costs for businesses.
Still, India’s S&P BSE Sensex was down 0.3% at 29290.89 Thursday and stocks in Shanghai are down 1.9% so far this week, the latter reflecting a lack of enthusiasm for Beijing’s efforts to support growth. China cut its interest rates over the weekend for the second time in less than four months. Supply pressure from a number of initial public offerings slated for next week also weighed on Chinese shares.
…
Is U.S. oil storage near capacity at this point?
Forbes
Energy 3/04/2015 @ 11:17AM
U.S. Running Out Of Oil Storage? Blame Canada.
Oil storage tanks are filling up. There’s a concern, highlighted by this AP story yesterday, that sometime in April U.S. storage could hit “tank tops.” With too much oil and not enough places to put it, the natural market response would be for the price of crude to plummet, maybe even down into the $20 range, deepening the nightmare for America’s frackers and possibly catalyzing a round of defaults and bankruptcies.
At first glance the reasons for the buildup in oil storage seems obvious. America’s oil companies are simply fracking out too much light, sweet crude, right? They are. But that’s not the cause of the glut at the storage hub in Cushing, Okla. A report out this week from the Energy Aspects consultancy explains that the issue is more complicated than that. Blame Canada.
…
So the Keystone Pipeline will let the Canadians drive down the price of oil even more? Hmmm, maybe Obama should reconsider…
Nevermind the glut, here comes $200 crude. Ask Albaquirkydan.
Really? My prediction was $80 by the end of 2015 and $100 by 2016.
Outside the Boardroom
Traders can’t ignore oil storage limits much longer
U.S. continues to produce too much oil, inventory levels could crush prices
By Chris Tomlinson
March 4, 2015
More bad news from the tank farms on Wednesday, with the national oil inventory growing 10.3 million barrels in a week, and the main hub at Cushing, Okla. adding 2.3 million barrels.
Quite rightly the price of West Texas Intermediate on the New York Mercantile Exchange dropped 1 percent in about a minute. The growing inventories are a reality check for oil traders who got a little too far ahead of themselves.
… no one is turning off the tap on operating wells and the impact of less spending won’t be felt until the fall. We are still producing more oil than the market can absorb, and much of it is going into storage for sale later.
There are only so many oil storage facilities, though, and they are getting full. In the week ending Feb. 27, inventories rose 10.3 million barrels alone to 444.4 million barrels, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
According to many analysts, the nation’s most important private storage facility in Cushing could be full within the next month. If you think the drop in price today is dramatic, wait until no one can buy oil to sell later because there is no affordable storage available.
For this reason, some analysts are predicting another major drop in oil prices, and that’s probably a fair bet. We have not worked our way through the oil glut yet, and those who think oil prices are out of the woods may be in for a rude awakening.
…
Oil prices could tumble again as storage tanks max out
Mar 4, 2015, 11:56am CST
Crude oil storage topped 444.4 millin barrels, triggering fears that crude oil prices could fall even lower.
U.S. crude oil storage could be hitting critical mass in the next few months, which could trigger another oil price plunge.
Total crude oil inventories topped 444.4 million barrels, said Tom Kloza, oil analyst and founder of Oil Price Information Service.
“That’s not a lucky hand for crude oil producers,” Kloza said.
…
No we are at 60% capacity and the delayed reaction to less drilling will hit within a few months. Thus, the reason oil is rising in price.
Excerpt from the EIA, remember last year’s brutal cold weather left oil in shortage very low and that was one of the reasons for the run up in oil at the beginning of the year despite that we have only moved from 48% filled storage to 60% filled storage. This glut is no glut, just manipulation by the U.S. and Saudi Arabia to punish Russia and Iran and now Saudi Arabia is getting cold feet or is mad at Obama for a really bad deal with Iran, either way they are not pushing down prices anymore:
Crude oil inventory data for the week ending February 20 show that total utilization of crude oil storage capacity in the United States stands at approximately 60%, compared with 48% at the same time last year. Most U.S. crude oil stocks are held in the Midwest and Gulf Coast, where storage tanks were at 69% and 56% of capacity, respectively, as of February 20. This capacity use calculation reflects only crude oil stored in tanks or underground caverns at tank farms and refineries, and excludes some crude oil that is included in commercial inventory data, such as pipeline fill and lease stocks held in production areas.
Capacity is about 67% full in Cushing, Oklahoma (the delivery point for West Texas Intermediate futures contracts), compared with 50% at this point last year. Working capacity in Cushing alone is about 71 million barrels, or more than half of all Midwest (as defined by Petroleum Administration for Defense District 2) working capacity and about 14% of the national total.
Dan,
Remember… falling prices of all types is positively bullish and good for the economy.
That includes fuel prices.
Crude Oil Collapses 50% YoY
http://www.marketwatch.com/investing/future/crude%20oil%20-%20electronic
Don’t forget to add empty office space into your crude storage numbers.
Maybe they can store some of that oil in Chinese ghost cities so their economy can grow at exactly 7% a year.
Supplies have continued to increase, and there has been no slowing in the pumping of wells already tapped. You are clueless. Rig counts mean nothing, production means everything, and it continues to increase. Nobody is going to voluntarily stop selling oil and forego income. That would be stupid. They are going to sell into the market until the price hits zero.
Is the Greece crisis over at this point, or still simmering?
Greece Struggles to Make Debt Math Work in Bailout Standoff
by Nikolaos Chrysoloras
Rebecca Christie
Vassilis Karamanis
2:34 PM PST
March 4, 2015
(Bloomberg) — As talks over the disbursement of bailout funds for Greece drag on into their seventh consecutive month, the deadlock threatens to pull the country back into a recession this quarter, or even a possible default within weeks.
Greece needs to refinance or repay about 6.5 billion euros ($7.2 billion) in debt and interest in the next three weeks, including Treasury bill redemptions, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. To top that, its budget forecasts a 2.1 billion euros cash deficit in March. A tax-revenue shortfall opened a hole of 217 million euros in January, derailing budget targets.
Having lost market access, Greece’s only lifeline is emergency loans extended by euro-area member states and the International Monetary Fund. Failure to secure an agreement with them on the disbursement of funds has triggered a liquidity squeeze, raising doubts about the country’s solvency, as well as the sustainability of its nascent economic recovery.
“There’s no chance the quarrel won’t affect the economy” said Haris Theoharis, a lawmaker for Greece’s River party and a former secretary of public revenue. “Every investment has been put on hold, pending the result of the talks,” he said by phone on Wednesday.
…
“There’s no chance the quarrel won’t affect the economy”
Ah so! Opportunity knocks!
More positive economic news…
“UK Shop Price Deflation Deepens As Food Costs Fall”
http://www.theguardian.com/business/2015/mar/04/uk-shop-price-deflation-deepens-as-food-costs-fall
I ain’t buying no house
Stay the course!
get an auto loan and buy some stocks folks. Get a title loan on your car to buy stocks.
The 23 year old intern I used to work with just bought one with his wife
He is the oldest young person I know, his life is effectively over now
you need to work on your serf skills over spring break.
He is on the property ladder!!!
“I ain’t buying no house”
Did you see the size of that garage? You can do it!!
“But the listing is special, John. You guys can do this!” (Suzanne resarched it).
The infamous Century 21 ad featuring the nastiest wife ever.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=20n-cD8ERgs&spfreload=10
“nastiest wife ever”
Men on Strike: Why Men Are Boycotting Marriage, Fatherhood, and the American Dream - and Why it Matters” by Helen Smith
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/1594036756/ref=pd_aw_sim_b_4?refRID=1HKNM55HTZVCM12NRMNF
Reminds me of the articles that came out a couple of months back in the UK on why young men have NO interest in young women - they see them as nothing but takers who game a system rigged to their advantage - their take - why bother!!!
no young man should go for anything more than a friends with benefits relationship, getting married is so last century
50 percent of marriages end in divorce
and 70 percent of those divorces are initiated by women
70 percent of those divorces are initiated by women
This should be no surprise. Even when you’re dating in high school or college, the girls usually decide when the relationship will end.
Let alpha male .1% wealthy marry as many women as they want, have lots of kids, they can afford it , they deserve it
hahahaha
See also: 70 percent of men age 20 to 34 are not married
http://m.cnsnews.com/news/article/barbara-hollingsworth/bachelor-nation-70-men-aged-20-34-are-not-married
I have seen the future of American womyn, and it is a future of cats and boxed wine and Sex and the City reruns
I have seen the future of American womyn, and it is a future of cats and boxed wine and Sex and the City reruns
Doesn’t have to be that way. They can (as always) get sex any time they want it. It’s just legal claim to someone else’s paycheck that may get more difficult to come by.
Home-Equity Borrowers Face Higher Payments as Loans Reset
by John Gittelsohn
12:01 AM EST
March 5, 2015
(Bloomberg) — Owners of about 3.3 million U.S. homes face higher payments on home-equity lines of credit over the next four years as interest-only periods expire on loans originated during the bubble era, RealtyTrac reported.
Those Heloc loans, worth a total of $158 billion, will begin requiring principal paydowns this year through 2018. Monthly bills will increase by an average of $146, raising the threat of defaults, especially for borrowers who have negative equity in their homes, the Irvine, California-based real estate information service said on Thursday.
“We’re at higher risk of default because you have higher payments on homes that continue to be seriously underwater,” RealtyTrac Vice President Daren Blomquist said in a telephone interview. “That’s a dangerous combination.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/…/home-equity-borrowers-face-higher-payments-as-loans-reset - 111k -
Best page not found ever
Comment by phony scandals
2015-03-05 06:48:59
Home-Equity Borrowers Face Higher Payments as Loans Reset
bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-03-05/home-equity-borrowers-face-higher-payments-as-loans-reset
They are all victims. They all deserve bailouts.
i was ‘employee of the month’ in the sales department at tarp bank in january 2005 for selling heloc’s, we got a catered lunch of ribs and wings to eat with some of the department vp’s
“employee of the month”
Boots on the ground or boot licker?
Ribs AND wings?!?!
I bet you went through a lot of napkins. I’ve been working on my rib recipe. I’ll do some again saturday. Some people do them in the slow cooker, haven’t tried that yet.
“Monthly bills will increase by an average of $146…”
WTF…$146 is going to sink ‘em? LOLZ!
“WTF…$146 is going to sink ‘em? LOLZ!”
I think the term around here 9 or 10 years ago was howmuchamonth to go along with broke @ss tire kickers.
That’s the average. Half of those households will increase by more. Those are the half that will default.
WTF…$146 is going to sink ‘em? LOLZ!
The average family cellphone bill is more than that. And of course, everyone has to have the latest iPhone with an unlimited data plan.
I’ve said it before: the heloc reset tsunami may be real, but it will never happen. My guess is that, after a few resets lead to immediate default, the vast majority of bubble 1.0 helocs will be quietly rolled into another 10 year interest-only period, then another, then another.
Banks get to mark-to-model the house in perpetuity and never have to record a default. Borrowers get near-free money (though it was spent long ago) and massive debt that will never be paid off.
Corrected: The 23 year old intern I used (sic) to work with bought one wife.
He bought the farm.
Prosecutors Mull Charges In Brown Family Attack
March 4, 2015
MARCH 4–Prosecutors are now considering criminal charges against members of Michael Brown’s family in connection with a violent confrontation over the sale of merchandise commemorating the late teenager, who was shot to death last year by a police officer.
The St. Louis County Prosecuting Attorney recently received the results of a months-long investigation by Ferguson Police Department detectives who probed the October 18 beating and robbery of t-shirt vendors, one of whom was hospitalized following the assault.
The decision on whether to pursue charges in connection with the ransacking of the “Justice for Mike Brown” merchandise operation (seen above) is particularly sensitive since Lesley McSpadden, Brown’s mother, is named in a police report as one of the “attackers” who participated in the assault, which cops classified as a felony armed robbery.
As detailed in a Ferguson Police Department report, the fight over the sale of Brown merchandise occurred in the parking lot of a barbecuse restaurant, where three vendors set up tables under a pair of canopy tents. One of the vendors was Pearlie Gordon, 54, the mother-in-law of Michael Brown Sr. (who is divorced from McSpadden).
According to the report, a group of about 20-30 suspects “jumped out of vehicles and rushed” Gordon, Tony Petty, and Matthew Cosey. Gordon told police that McSpadden, 34, approached her tent and said, “You can’t sell this shit.” Gordon replied, according to the report, that “unless McSpadden could produce documentation stating that she had a patent on her son’s name she (Gordon) was going to continue to sell her merchandise.”
At that point, McSpadden’s mother, Desureia Harris, began to rip down t-shirts hanging on a line, Gordon told police. Other members of the group then began “tearing her booth apart,” added Gordon, who said she was knocked to the ground and repeatedly struck in the head.
Gordon told Ferguson police that McSpadden “ran up” and punched her during the melee, while also instructing a cohort to “get her ass.”
In addition to McSpadden and her mother, the raiding party included McSpadden’s husband, according to Gordon. Louis Head, McSpadden’s spouse, is an ex-con best known for urging protesters to “Burn this bitch down” after prosecutors announced that no criminal charges would be filed against Wilson.
A witness cited in the police report told cops that she watched the attack from her car while at a red signal. The woman said she saw several individuals enter the tent from opposite sides and begin “assaulting (punching) the vendors.” In a video provided to TSG by another passing motorist, a man–apparently one of the vendors–is seen being pinned to the pavement by a larger man who is throwing punches. Standing next to the attacker is a woman holding a metal rod
http://www.thesmokinggun.com/…cutors-consider-charges-against-brown-family-members-897543 - 43k -
a) michael brown attacked the cop
b) eric garner was murdered
c) al and jesse need to get PAID
d) all of the above
Eric gardner was murdered by being a moron and daring the cops to arrest him……why didn’t he have a legitimate on the books paying job in a store?
maybe he was functionally illiterate????
Comment by phony scandals
2015-03-05 06:59:45
Prosecutors Mull Charges In Brown Family Attack
thesmokinggun.com/documents/crime/prosecutors-consider-charges-against-brown-family-members-897543
Ferguson is a shakedown city, where the local cops and city officials treat the Constitution like a piece of toilet paper.
“You see the same dynamic with small, discretionary infractions. Ninety-five percent of tickets for jaywalking were against black residents, as were 94 percent of all “failure to comply” charges. Either black people were the only Ferguson citizens to jaywalk, or the department was targeting blacks for enforcement. On the rare occasion when police charged whites with these minor offenses, they were 68 percent more likely to have their cases dismissed. And because supervisors awarded promotions on the basis of officer “productivity,” there was little incentive to stop any of this behavior…
Officers weren’t protecting citizens as much as they were corralling potential offenders and sources of revenue, with a huge assist from the city municipal court. “City and police leadership pressure officers to write citations, independent of any public safety need, and rely on citation productivity to fund the City budget. … Court staff are keenly aware that the City considers revenue generation to be the municipal court’s primary purpose,” the Justice Department writes. Officials imposed huge fines for minor violations, including a total of $1,000 for one 67-year-old woman who failed to pay a trash-removal citation, leading to a warrant and a cascade of new fees.
http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/03/justice_department_report_exposes_ferguson_s_discrimination_against_blacks.single.html
Pigmen gonna pig
someone has to pay for their retirement
Zillow has it as +3% this year
get in now
Idiocracy is now.
http://www.shanghaidaily.com/business/real-estate/Chinese-realtor-ordered-to-sell-Sydney-mansion/shdaily.shtml
‘What a week for Mark Cuban. Fresh off being tapped for the role of the president alongside Ann Coulter in the upcoming blockbuster “Sharknado 3,” the brash billionaire’s bearish forecast has landed him a spot in MarketWatch’s call of the day. “If we thought it was stupid to invest in public Internet websites that had no chance of succeeding back then, it’s worse today,” he wrote in his blog.’
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/mark-cuban-this-tech-bubble-is-far-worse-than-back-in-2000-2015-03-05?siteid=yhoof2
I wouldn’t say its worse. But I would say it is bad.
The determination to prevent the 2000 stock market bubble from fully deflating has led to two echo bubbles. Each, based on actual money made and dividends paid, was not quite as bad as the first. But at this rate, it will take 50 years for the 2000 bubble to deflate.
Moreover, in trying to prevent the full deflation of the dot.com bubble, by flooding the economy with excess liquidity, they have ended up creating bubbles in other assets. First housing, and now bonds.
From Cuban’s Wikipedia page.
“By 1999, Broadcast.com had grown to 330 employees and $13.5 million in revenue for the second quarter.[24] In 1999, during the dot com boom, Broadcast.com was acquired by Yahoo! for $5.7 billion in Yahoo! stock. After the sale of Broadcast.com, Cuban diversified his wealth to avoid exposure to a market crash.”
That’s what I thought. Cuban got rich by selling to the suckers. But at least he sold to other sharks who sold to the suckers, rather than doing a pump and dump IPO and selling to the suckers directly.
Its worse. Far worse by order of magnitude.
“First housing, and now bonds.”
And art, and collectible cars, and housing again, and stocks again, and…and…you name it.
Neil, please pass the popcorn…
“But at this rate, it will take 50 years for the 2000 bubble to deflate.”
Bubble don’t deflate. They pop.
Run deficits is this the new normal for the Post industrial age economy ?
Heh-heh, Alibaba was the biggest con of all, IMO. As this tech bubble bursts, I believe Alibaba will be shown to have been the peak of it.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-03/reason-why-everyone-who-bought-baba-stock-and-held-now-losing-money
I have a buddy who is in the “stuff” business and does fairly well. But even he had drunk the Baba kool-aid. I have come to realize that, like housing, it is fruitless to try and warn others about what is happening and why something might be a fraud or a con. People wanna believe. He kept telling me that Baba was the the #1 ecommerce site on the planet. “Does more business than Amazon and ebay combined”. I kept telling him its numbers were fraudulent.
“People wanna believe.”
BITCOIN!
(Why did that make me think of bitcoin?)
You trying to annoy tj again?
Alibaba.
When someone tells you who they are, pay attention.
it is easier to fool a man than to convince him he has been fooled
article for 2brony about your buttboy scott walker and the goons
http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/03/02/right-to-work-for-less-gov-scott-walker-wants-to-lower-worker-pay-in-wisconsin/
‘you work three jobs? how uniquely american’ — george w. bush
See also:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-03-05/states-are-slashing-college-budgets-and-raising-tuition
The only way for America to prosper is to have an ever growing number of lucky duckies. Soon you’ll need a PhD in a STEM discipline to be middle class.
Or we’ll just redefine middle class. In a way that’s what we’re going already…just waiting for the people who remember how it used to be to die off so that their grandkids can be taught the new normal.
We’ve redefined “middle class” the whole way up, haven’t we? From one car in the driveway to two. To a larger house, to regulary vacations where one flies rather than a roadtrip to the national park….
Standard of living changes, and we’ve re-defined middle-class along the way. This may be a large dislocation, but it’s not like the “middle class” has existed in the exact same way, same definition, for a hundred years…
Yup. But everyone is happy and comfortable when it’s being redefined up. People have a way of acting out a bit when it’s coming down.
My parents would NEVER borrow for a vacation. Not ever!
It looks like the market will be taking care of this all without bigger and bigger government…
—————-
Albertans make too much money, some economists say
CBC News | Mar 05, 2015 | Tracy Johnson
Alberta wages almost 25% higher than Canadian average
Economists, politicians and business leaders seek ways to bring wages down
Springtime is typically oilpatch bonus season. As the grass turns green, car dealerships and upscale stores tend to get busier.
This year is different. Bonuses — if they exist at all — are expected to be small. Wages have been frozen. Oilpatch workers are happy to have a job at all.
And that’s the private sector. Public sector workers, like teachers and nurses, are on high alert as the provincial government makes increasingly loud noises about reopening their contracts to cut pay.
Economists are saying that Albertans have a problem: they make too much money. And not only is it unaffordable, it’s hurting the province’s competitive position in the global marketplace.
The oil patch bust is going to make Alberta one unhappy place.
Who are the most brutal debt collectors that regularly violate the law?
Government debt collectors.
—————-
High fees, scary threats: Lawmakers slam government debt collection
CNNMoney.com - Blake Ellis - 3/5/2015
Lawmakers and consumer advocates are speaking out against the special treatment given to debt collectors hired by government agencies across the country.
A recent CNNMoney investigation found that government debt collectors are rarely held to the same consumer protection laws as the collection firms that go after credit card debt or auto loans. And with the power of state and local governments behind them, these debt collectors can charge steep fees and make scary threats of foreclosure, driver’s license suspension, wage garnishment — even arrest.
CNNMoney found that this is often the case: In Texas, for example, $1.25 in toll charges turned into a nearly $300 bill for one cash-strapped military veteran. Meanwhile, a Kansas man who couldn’t afford the growing bill for his unpaid speeding ticket ended up in jail three times.
“Private debt collectors often have a financial incentive to draw blood from stones, pressuring individuals to make financial commitments they cannot truly afford,” said Meeks.
Just pay your taxes and you got nothing to worry about.
“Who are the most brutal debt collectors?”
Buffalo NY and Minneapolis MN are home to the most ruthless debt collectors in the US other than organized crime. Lately they’ve been setting up call centers in abroad, especially India. These call centers collect for payday loan places. The number of violations of the FDCPA and related state statutes is unbelievable.
Domestic firms at least have some accountability in that the FDCPA, etc. provides for statutory attny fees for violations.
AP tells us not to worry:
AP:WASHINGTON) WASHINGTON (AP) — The number of people seeking unemployment benefits rose last week to the highest level since May, though the pace of applications remains at a level consistent with steady hiring.
Weekly applications rose 7,000 to a seasonally adjusted 320,000, the Labor Department said Thursday. The four-week average, a less volatile measure, increased 10,250 to 304,750, a six-week high.
The number of applications tends to reflect the pace of U.S. layoffs. The four-week average has remained near or below 300,000 since September, a historically low level that typically signals healthy job gains.
More Americans are earning paychecks, and gas prices have plummeted from last summer, thereby boosting consumers’ buying power. Americans also say they are more confident and are spending more, which has encouraged many businesses to hold on to their workers and to add staff.
There are some signs that heavy snow and unseasonably cold weather have played a role in increasing the number of layoffs. Several states said two weeks ago that applications had risen because of bad weather.
Kentucky said applications for unemployment benefits in that state rose nearly 3,000 in the week that ended Feb. 21 because of “inclement weather.”
The state-level information is released with a one-week lag. Massachusetts, which has experienced huge snowfalls this winter, said applications jumped 3,800 two weeks ago, in part because of layoffs at schools.
That likely reflects temporary layoffs of school bus drivers, cafeteria workers and other employees during school system closures. Workers on temporary layoffs can apply for unemployment aid.
Still, the four-week average of applications for benefits is nearly 10 percent lower than it was a year ago. The reduced number of applications has coincided with a big step-up in hiring. Employers added more than 1 million jobs from November through January, the strongest three-month pace since 1997.
That pace of hiring probably won’t be sustained for much longer, economists say. But they foresee healthy job gains for the rest of this year. Economists have predicted that the government’s February jobs report, due Friday, will show that 240,000 jobs were added.
The unemployment rate is expected to dip to 5.6 percent from 5.7 percent.
The strong job gains are showing signs of finally lifting paychecks for more workers. Average hourly pay rose 0.5 percent in January, the most in six years. Economists have forecast that wages ticked up 0.3 percent in February.
Other recent data suggest that the job market remains strong. Payroll processor ADP said Wednesday that businesses added 212,000 jobs in February. That was down from 250,000 in January but still a solid gain.
And a survey of services firms, including hotels, restaurants, insurance agencies and retailers, found that they stepped up hiring last month.
“You work three jobs? How uniquely American” — George W. Bush
National Lampoon’s Vacation (1983) Quotes
Ellen: Gee Cath look’s like you really got your hands full.
Catherine: Oh, it’s not so bad. Eddie says after the baby comes, I can quit one of my night jobs.
“You work four jobs? How uniquely American” — President Jeb Bush, 2017
Later on, Eddie joins the Tea Party.
“Later on, Eddie joins the Tea Party.”
Nope, Eddie can be seen briefly behind Peggy Joseph at this Obama rally.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P36×8rTb3jI - 457k -
Eddie: I got laid off when they closed that asbestos factory, and wouldn’t you know it, the army cuts my disability pension because they said that the plate in my head wasn’t big enough.
Aunt Edna: Why don’t you just ask him for the money, Eddie? He sure as Hell can’t take a hint.
Cousin Eddie: Well, I didn’t want to ask you, Clark, you know, but could you maybe spare a little extra cash?
Clark: Sure, Eddie, how much do you need?
Cousin Eddie: About $52,000.
Dman
I will give you this. I clicked that youtube link to make sure it worked and scrolled down some of the comments. There is some really hateful racist cr@p there.
I always laughed at this for what she was saying not the color of her skin. I’m never going to post that clip again.
This Fed Official Just Perfectly Described Why Student Loans Are a Terrible Investment
Natalie Kitroeff - March 4, 2015 - Bloomsberg
Government student loans are the only type of consumer debt that gets issued without the lender accounting for the possibility that the borrower wont repay the loan. Dudley explains:
“Unlike virtually all other forms of credit, student loans are generally not underwritten: They are frequently offered to young borrowers who have little or no credit history and little to no current income.” (Since it is not getting paid for the risk it takes in the form of superhigh interest rates, the government takes draconian measures to make sure it gets its money back, making it basically illegal to discharge student debt in bankruptcy and reserving the right to extract payment from people’s wages, tax returns, and Social Security income, in some cases.)
Obama has expanded programs that allow students to make payments based on how much they earn, which is good for financially stressed students, but it also means that debtors are paying less back to the government. Dudley notes that people whose student loans became due in 2009 have paid off only 17 percent of what they originally owed.
How much longer can the lying liar financial media ignore the $1.2 trillion (and growing) elephant in the room?
There is no “pent-up demand” for $500,000 starter homes
Not today, not tomorrow, not ever
EVER
There is no “pent-up demand” for $500,000 starter homes
Not today, not tomorrow, not ever
Your intern friend seems to contradict that.
You just don’t live in the right neighborhood. Where I’m at in Microsoft’s back yard, $500K starter homes are the norm and (literally) scores of H1B techies are clamoring to buy them. My neighbor’s home in this exact price range just sold in four days. We had 15-20 cars parked on the street during the entire 2-day open house this past weekend.
Where I’m at in Microsoft’s back yard, $500K starter homes are the norm and (literally) scores of H1B techies are clamoring to buy them.
House down the street from me (not quite MS’s backyard, more like Google’s) just went pending for 1.6M in a few days.
Yet 65 miles away you can buy a 4 bedroom house on 5 acres for under $200k. Micro-pockets of expensive houses.
If it sold in 2 days it was priced TOO LOW.
Hmmm… I just look up your address and there are scores of houses for sale on those streets and the average DOM is 8 months.
Stick with VW’s.
Another neo-con “mission accomplished.”
http://www.newsweek.com/5000-foreign-fighters-flock-libya-isis-call-jihadists-310948?piano_t=1
Does this mean it’s time to “shrink the size of government to where you can drown it in the bathtub” by borrowing more money from communist China to put boots on the ground to launch another trillion dollar war?
We wouldn’t have these problems if they could only get into an obama job program…..
Sad part2 its all gone…..no such thing as job training unless you are a functionally illiterate minority….then they will pay for truck drivers school, or security guard or a home health aide……….and very very little else
The oligarchy’s financial media is trying to lure more retail bagholders into the stock market gambling with leveraged debt before the Ponzi scheme implodes. What could possibly go wrong?
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-05/take-out-7-year-car-loan-buy-stocks-cnbc-experts-advise
Kelly Evans is just really hot.
Kelly Evans is about 60% hair and makeup. But at least she appears to be “real” — unusual for any ladies on TV these days.
In the second clip — with Kelly “Still Real” Evans — the target audience is those people with $50K cash lying around. Should they buy a car at low interest or invest the same cash in the stock market.
Of course, most people buying these vehicles aren’t choosing the NYSE over cash. They are buying on 7-year loans because it’s all they can afford.
Trish Regan is tasty tasty tasty
No, if you want HAWT- Heather Hughes of SunAmerica who is on CNBC as a contributor.
Fail and fail.
Stephanie Ruhle brings da’ hotness.
“They are buying on 7-year loans because it’s all they can afford.”
You signed up for a 30 year stint. What’s that say about you?
California and pensions and the need to keep the stock market soaring:
So, what is the worst-case scenario? It’s that the pension funds make more modest growth, requiring taxpayers to pick up the tab for the gap between projections and reality.
Money manager John Mauldin looked at CalSTRS. Worst case, to be actually solvent he calculated CalSTRS requires an additional $30 billion per year starting now.
That $30 billion also is six times the $4.5 billion more a year CalSTRS concedes it needs to become solvent.
Ed Ring, Executive Director of the California Policy Center, likewise has estimated how much in annual payments it would cost to close his estimated $71 billion funding gap for CalSTRS. Using a 3.5 percent annual rate of return, Ring estimated the payment to fully fund CalSTRS would be $25.3 billion per year (Note: See Ring’s “Table: Impact of Lower Rates of Return on CalSTRS” in the embedded link).
Both Mauldin and Ring believe future CalPERS and CalSTRS pension fund rates of return on their investments are overly optimistic by half due to a stock market bubble and a failure to take economic recessions into account.
link:
http://calwatchdog.com/category/breaking_news/budget_and_finance-breaking_news/
So if the consensus of the board is right, California is running a deficit of about $50 billion a year right now (link to post soon):
If it would take $30 billion per year more to fully fund CalSTRS, how much more would it take to also fund the even bigger CalPERS?
Ring described the problem of estimating the yearly payment to plug CalPERS’ pension funding gap:
“It’s worth noting that for CalPERS, we can’t even get data on how they break out their normal contributions and their unfunded contributions because doing so would require sifting through the financials of every one of their participating entities. But there is nothing uniquely troubling about CalSTRS. … Imagine what would happen if CalSTRS had to pay $25 billion per year … instead of what they actually paid in 2012, $5.8 billion?”
That is, a true accounting would be 4.3 times the current amount. He added, “Replicate these methods with nearly any pension fund in California, and you will almost always get similar results.”
Add them up: $25.3 billion for CalSTRS and $25 billion for CalPERS. Total = $50.2 billion.
That $50.2 billion needed to be fully funded would amount to 44 percent of the $113.3 billion for the state general fund Gov. Jerry Brown proposed in January for fiscal year 2015-16, which begins on July 1.
Again, this is a “worst case” scenario. It probably won’t come to pass. The U.S. and California economies may continue to perform as expected, with stock market and real estate investments continuing to lift up the funds’ bottom lines.
But the opposite also is something at least to keep in mind.
Using a 3.5 percent annual rate of return
Remember many on this board believe a crash is coming, this “worse case scenario” is just a flat market.
Memo: free Chesterfield cigarettes for all CalSTRS members.
actually rms….Ive said that years ago one of the unintended consequences of the non smoking campaigns is people live longer and the pensions payouts never fully reflected that fact. so now they are broke
the 20-30 years and out is a thing of the past. …..or if you want a full pension then you have to be fully retired (prove it each year) or wait till at least 65 (better yet70) to start collecting…
Question, if the executive/financial class can’t deliver the returns political/union class is counting on, then:
1) How does the executive/financial class justify paying itself so much?
2) How does the political/union class expect the serfs to pay for their pensions?
Calwatchdog is a right-wing anti-pension mouthpiece funded by Wall Street interests. Not much credibility. Oh, i see a link to Calwatchdog on Breitbart. That’s all I need to know, thanks.
Stick to MSNBC they will never have any information you do not want to hear. The rate of return being used by CA and other pension funds is a matter of record. Show us how the math is incorrect on this site. You can’t so you attack the messenger, which is so common on this blog.
HBB banner ad:
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http://www.amazon.com/dp/1480284769/ref=dra_a_rv_ss_ho_it_P1400_1000?tag=dradisplay-20&ascsubtag=6bf0a9ac9e6c3eaf9bbe9b53c2f926b0_S
Jim Morrison nailed it 40 years ago, and I’ve taken it to heart:
“I just want to have my kicks before the whole sh*thouse goes up in flames.”
Only when Public Unions have total control in Closed Shop States and democrats have long-term absolute power - will the schools be finally fixed.
More money = it is for the children.
——————–
Taylor Swift’s Bad Investment
Townhall.com | March 5, 2015 | Cal Thomas
Pop star Taylor Swift has donated $50,000 to the New York City public school system. Swift, who was named the world’s sixth most powerful celebrity by Forbes magazine, has commendably performed numerous acts of charity since moving into her $20 million Tribeca residence last year, including visits with sick children at Sloan Kettering Cancer Center.
According to the Huffington Post, citing U.S. Census Bureau data, “New York spent $19,076 per student in the 2011 fiscal year, as compared to the national average of $10,560.” In 90 of the city’s public schools, Families for Excellent Schools found that not a single African-American or Hispanic student received a passing grade on state tests.
If there were a correlation between spending and achievement, it ought to show in grade and graduation performance and state test scores, but it doesn’t.
CSF President Darla Romfo tells me 92 percent of CSF students graduated on time last year, compared to a graduation rate of 64.2 percent for all New York City public schools. Of those CSF students who graduated, Romfo says, “89 percent are enrolled in college, including Columbia, Cornell, Fordham and NYU.” Most students are African-American or Hispanic and would not have had much of a chance at life had they stayed in their public school. Most liberal politicians, often beholden to powerful teachers’ unions that gather votes for them, work in opposition to school choice initiatives, ultimately condemning poor and minority children to substandard, underperforming public schools. Better to retain the votes than reform the system.
CSF New York is currently managing and partially paying for scholarships for more than 8,300 children. Their students (they call them “scholars” because words have power and contribute to self-esteem) live at or below the poverty line (average family income is $31,432). Yet families contribute at least 25 percent of their child’s tuition each year.
Those state tests are racist
There are no right or wrong answers
The best answer is the one that gives you the most self-esteem
Forward
After they graduate they enter the labor force and do wonders for productivity, read towards the bottom:
WASHINGTON, March 5 (Reuters) - The number of Americans filing new claims for unemployment benefits unexpectedly rose last week and nonfarm productivity contracted more sharply than previously thought in the fourth quarter.
Initial claims for state unemployment benefits increased by 7,000 to a seasonally adjusted 320,000 for the week ended Feb. 28, the Labor Department said on Thursday.
Economists polled by Reuters had expected claims to fall to 295,000 last week.
In a second report, the department said productivity fell at a 2.2 percent annual rate in the fourth quarter, instead of the 1.8 percent pace it had reported last month.
we need a War on Ebonics….race is not the problem functional illiteracy is….and it always has been
Ebonics? Hell, people aren’t even speaking English anymore.
Cal Thomas; really?
The same guy who has been dying his hair black for 20 years?
The same guy who believes that Noah really built the Ark?
You guys really post something by this guy?
And the economy keeps rolling along…
——————-
Fears and cheers follow Target’s plan to lay off ’several thousand’ at headquarters
Pioneer Press | 3-5-15 | tom webb
Some senior buyers are already gone. Vice presidents, too. But for 13,000 other Target Corp. employees in Minnesota, there’s fear that the bull’s-eye is on their backs. Target jolted the Twin Cities on Tuesday when it said “several thousand” corporate staffers will be laid off in a cost-cutting move. Executives didn’t say who, when or where — although the buzz is the ax will swing freely next week.
Cratering prices. This is good.
Now that Bibi is over, Drudge, Fox, Breitbart, Weekly Standard, Washington Times are all about Hillary Clinton’s emails
World Net Daily is still fluffing Bibi, gotta “rally the base”
Warmist Warming Thursday, here as reported by Moonie rag the Washington Times
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/mar/5/democrats-continue-witch-hunt-climate-scientists/
if you like your brown cloud, you can keep your brown cloud
http://www.wsj.com/articles/los-angeles-sees-health-benefits-as-its-smog-haze-clears-1425506401
i rolled some coal on a prius this morning, that was my greatest accomplishment in as long as i can remember
It wouldn’t be Denver without the brown cloud in the winter. Real men don’t wet the bed over thermal inversion.
“Democrats press on despite heat over ‘witch hunt’ into climate scientists’ funding”
It would take a lot of funding to come up with a new study every year to explain why your last “settled science” study was so wrong.
Cold Pacific Ocean is offsetting global warming
By Carolyn Gramling
26 February 2015 2:00 pm
Where’s the heat? Greenhouse gases, particularly carbon dioxide, continue to be pumped into the atmosphere, but sometime around 1998, the rise in Earth’s average temperatures slowed, deviating from the rates predicted by models. Scientists have proposed that what some call “the pause” could be the result of a number of factors, including heat storage in deep ocean waters to unexpectedly high amounts of aerosols in the stratosphere helping deflect solar rays back into space. Now, a new study suggests that natural cycles in the Pacific Ocean are the culprit.
Since the late 1990s, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation has been in a cool phase.
news.sciencemag.org/climate/2015/02/cold-pacific-ocean-offsetting-global-warming - Similar pages
—————————————————————————-
There’s no “warming pause” — trade winds are burying heat in the Pacific
By John Upton on 10 Feb 2014
A paper published in the journal Nature Climate Change suggests that the slowdown in surface warming and the acceleration in ocean warming has been largely driven by a phase in a natural ocean cycle called the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO). That’s a frightfully cumbersome name, but it’s easy to break down: It’s a swing (“oscillation”) in Pacific Ocean weather that takes decades (“interdecadal”) to shift from one phase to another. Instead of switching every few years, like El Niño and La Niña, an IPO can last 20 to 30 years before flipping from one extreme to the other.
“Global warming hasn’t stalled at all,” Matthew England, a professor at the University of New South Wales in Australia and lead author of the paper, told Grist. “There’s just more heat going into the oceans at the moment.”
grist.org/…/theres-no-warming-pause-trade-winds-are-burying-heat-in-the-pacific/ - 86k -
Now they’ve done it. Global warming has gone subsurface. completely unverifiable or refutable. Where will this lead? Warming of Earth’s core?
Um, those two studies strengthens the argument for man-made climate change. Just thought you’d like to know.
Memo To Global Warming Alarmists: Science Is Often Wrong
BY KERRY JACKSON
03/03/2015 09:30 AM ET
The global warming debate often degenerates into one side — the alarmists — claiming the other side — skeptics — is anti-science. Believers wrap themselves in science as if it were an impenetrable and absolute defense.
But science is not perfect. As this headline in Wired says, “Scientists Are Wrong All The Time, and That’s Fantastic.”
According to author Marcus Woo, “When a researcher gets proved wrong, that means the scientific method is working. Scientists make progress by redoing each other’s experiments — replicating them to see if they can get the same result. More often than not, they can’t.”
In the case of global warming — or climate change — scientists have replicated the results of each other’s climate models. Almost all of them predict warming. The trouble for these scientists, though, is reality is not consistent with the modeling.
Woo acknowledges that when scientists are proved wrong, “it’s way too hard for people to find out.”
It shouldn’t be that way with global warming. The end-of-times disasters predicted have not occurred, and temperatures have been flat for almost two decades now. These things are obvious.
Woo notes that “scientists don’t like to step on each other’s toes” and quotes Elizabeth Iorns, CEO of Science Exchange, who says researchers “feel a lot of pressure not to contradict each other.”
She adds, “There’s a lot of evidence that if you do that, it’ll be negative for your career.”
That’s a complaint we’ve heard many times in climate science. Skeptical researchers are too often smeared, ostracized and silenced.
If climate science were truly settled, why would the dissenters be treated this way? Wouldn’t it be enough to simply let the man-made warming take its course to prove them wrong?
The way much of the alarmist community continues to behave is further confirmation that the climate change debate is not about science. It’s about politics.
Read More At Investor’s Business Daily: http://news.investors.com/blogs-capital-hill/030315-741667-do-not-trust-climate-science-scientists-wrong-all-the-time.htm#ixzz3TXF0rUvf
I think it’s pretty funny that so many conservatives dump on scientists while they themselves couldn’t make it through basic chemistry without cheating.
That’s a reason that they dump on science. If it’s all a bunch of BS, they didn’t miss anything by not learning any science in high school.
The science is settled yet we still need…
New theory may help explain global warming pause
By Becky Oskin
Livescience.com
August 22, 2014, 11:07 AM
Now, a study published on Aug. 21 in the journal Science suggests a natural climate cycle in the North Atlantic Ocean gobbled Earth’s extra heat. While the study is unlikely to settle the scientific debate, it does support the idea that Earth’s global warming continues in the ocean, even when air temperatures stay flat.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/new-theory-may-help-explain-global-warming-pause/ - 290k -
This is a very weak Segway for discredited settled scientists. If the ocean is saturated with dissolved CO2, and it were to warm, massive amounts of the gas would be released and we would all be immediately doomed. Doomed!
I have talked about both the PDO and Atlantic cycles for years on this blog. You cannot understand the melting of Artic ice without understanding the Atlantic cycle. But here is the deal, when the cycles were in their warming phases the warmists would not acknowledge their role in global warming. Now, that they both seem to have gone in a cooling phase, they want to talk about them. As I have said for years, man has a minor role in global warming but natural cycles: sun, oceans etc. explains about 90% of it or 6/7 of the warming.
You and your boring rants are completely irrelevant. You are nothing.
Today’s Chicago (Region V) forecast - COLD and remaining cold. Tonight - cold with continued cold until the weekend.
New York Times wets the bed about a homeless 40-year-old former concussionball player with Alzheimer’s
http://mobile.nytimes.com/2015/03/08/sports/ncaafootball/ryan-hoffman-a-unc-football-player-two-decades-ago-is-now-homeless.html?_r=0&referrer=
This is an interesting story. I’d say from the article we’re seeing the early results of helicopter parenting.
Also, football is awful. I didn’t play as long as my dad, so hopefully my head is o.k., but my pops stops speaking mid-sentence and has no idea what he was just saying.
I can’t even believe the stuff we used to do… slam our heads against everything. Go to practice early, blast Metallica, sprint into the sleds… if I saw my son do that now, I stop him immediately. I don’t know if you’re using bedwetter ironically, but football truly is awful.
Incidental contact every so often like lacrosse and hockey is probably a realistic limit for the body. Football is crushing.
It’s the New York Times, it’s not yellow journalism, it’s yellow mattress journalism
They have a cultural relativist apology for everything
Football = fraternities = rape culture = patriarchy
Obama = DoublePlusGood
Guns are scary bad scary (especially those scary looking AR-15’s)
War is good when a democrat starts the war
And whenever you’re losing an argument, call your oppenent a racist
Forward
Everything’s a clown show anymore….
Ten Reasons the Real Estate Market WON’T Go Ballistic This Spring
https://smaulgld.com/ten-reasons-real-estate-market-wont-go-ballistic-spring/
“Ten Reasons the Real Estate Market WON’T Go Ballistic This Spring”
But the main reason is that prices are too high.
american exceptionalism
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-03-05/american-economy-has-a-weight-problem-as-costs-of-obesity-mount
put down the fork and go take a walk
Perhaps that is one of the reasons the death rate for white women is rising, a canary in the coal mine for all people in the screwed generations following Generation Greed.
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-03-05/health-what-s-killing-white-women-
“White women in the U.S. have historically enjoyed low mortality rates. But in recent years, the death rate for adult white women 15 to 54 years old has increased even as the rates for black and Hispanic women have declined, according to a new analysis from the Urban Institute.”
“Here’s a closer look at the death rate for white women from 1999 to 2013, drawn by Urban Institute researchers from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s vital-statistics database.”
This trend was first observed for high school dropout white women. Denialists responded that since the share of women who are dropouts has fallen, you are dealing with an increasingly troubled population. But now you see the same thing for all white women.
1) Younger generations are screwed in the wake of Generation Greed. In every way including death and health.
2) Women’s liberation turned into men’s liberation. Family was about women and children, and many people don’t have one anymore.
2) Women’s liberation turned into men’s liberation. Family was about women and children, and many people don’t have one anymore.
Only if you’re an “Alpha Male Bad Boy”. If you’re a “Beta Male Nice Guy” you aren’t getting any, unless you’re willing to marry a single mom with her sprogs from multiple baby daddies. But remember: “A strong man will raise another man’s kids”, so go put a ring on it, champ.
Bad boys get the girls and nice guys get to pay the bills.
sad,,,but hopeful and her legs…….
..
My 600-lb Life star Amber loses more than 250lbs bypass after being crushed in her own wheelchair
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHOXKn_8xD4
“My 600-lb Life star Amber loses more than 250lbs bypass after being crushed in her own wheelchair”
I don’t even need to see or hear anymore. That line is enough for me.
I just ate two boxes of girl scout cookies in two days. If you’re not the solution, you’re the problem.
“The Dietary Guidelines Advisory Committee…”
Mayor Rahm:
“I know I put people off, I talk when I should listen, I hear that.”
Quote on AM 560 talk radio here in Chicago.
Man - he finally realizes he is an a$$ hole!!
But is Chuy any better? Hope he wins the runoff, as there will be lessons to be learned from that.
Chuy = Cheech Marin -
Hey - load up the bong man….
Can Rahm lose? Yes he can…..
http://www.politico.com/story/2015/03/could-rahm-actually-lose-115739.html
Screw oil, that fuel has jumped the shark, and coal is dead. Solar baby, solar. Solar has just reached parity with coal. Leave that dirty crap in the ground where it belongs.
“In markets heavily dependent on coal for electricity generation, the ratio of coal-based wholesale electricity to solar electricity cost was 7:1 four years ago,” the Deutsche Bank report said. “This ratio is now less than 2:1 and could likely approach 1:1 over the next 12-18 months.” …The cost of generating solar power has fallen sharply in recent years, especially as a result of falling solar module prices, and continuing cost reductions would more than offset the impact of lower oil prices, the report forecast.
http://www.rtcc.org/2015/03/05/solar-closing-in-on-cost-of-coal-fired-power-deutsche-bank/
You’ve got alot to learn kiddo. A whole lot to learn.
Just peered at Jesse’s Cafe Americain and saw this tid bit - Can’t think of anything else that describes the mess that Clinton and his ilk made back in the day - remember that this is before dot bomb, Greenspan’s on going - there is no there, there econ analysis or the mother of financical messes brought to you by your friend, Mr. Banker and his housing leeches…. Read on…..
“Currency wars, bitchez.
And almost no one is talking about it. Or the corrosive role of the Banks.
In 1999, on signing Gramm-Leach-Bliley into law, Clinton said, “This is a day we can celebrate as an American day” and that ” the Glass-Steagall law is no longer appropriate for the economy in which we live” and “today what we are doing is modernizing the financial services industry, tearing down these antiquated laws and granting banks significant new authority” and “This is a very good day for the United States.”
Columbia Journalism Review, Bill Clinton on Deregulation”
Reagan
Bush
Clinton
Clinton
Bush
Bush
Obama
No difference in matters oligarch. They’ve all contributed nicely.
Boots on the Ground: US Military Instructors Arrive in Ukraine
US Congress passed a $350-million package to arm Kiev
by Sputnik | March 5, 2015
The US previously announced that they were planning on sending at least 300 military personnel to train Ukrainian soldiers. The American personnel will be stationed at the Yavoriv International Peacekeeping and Security Center (IPSC).
The 300 US Army military personnel deployed to Ukraine to conduct a joint training mission with the Ukrainian army at a peacekeeping center near Lviv from March 5 until October 21 have already arrived, Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs representative Aleksandr Lukashevich announced on Thursday.
“American servicemen have already been transferred to Lviv region to train Ukrainian soldiers.”
The United States has been providing Kiev with economic and non-lethal military support since the beginning of a military operation against independence fighters in Ukraine’s eastern regions of Donetsk and Luhansk last April.Lukashevich added that even though the situation in eastern Ukraine is stabilizing thanks to the Minsk ceasefire agreement, the United States is still discussing delivering weapons to Kiev.
“The continual flow of reports that the United States will begin mass deliveries of weaponry to Ukraine, calls forth serious concern. A special law is even being developed in the [US] Congress that would provide $1 billion for equipping and training Ukrainian troops as if Washington is preparing to take them under their full maintenance.
Washington has been providing Kiev with economic and non-lethal military support since the standoff in eastern Ukraine began last April.
Last December, US Congress passed a $350-million package to arm Kiev, authorizing supplies of weapons, military equipment and training in the three coming years. However, the bill has not been enacted by US President Barack Obama.
How is William Kristol going to get paid from this?
I get it, that a land war with Russia will ‘rally the base’
But more importantly, William Kristol needs to get paid
“US Military Instructors Arrive in Ukraine”
Bwahahahahaha! Considering the US hasn’t won squat militarily since WWII (and even then), if I was a country that wanted to win a military action, I’d sure avoid US “military instructors” like the plague.
And actually, when you look at how it all turned out, we lost WWII, badly.
In one corner we have a trained KGB operative, Putin and in the other we have the community organizer, Obama. Who is going to win this battle? If they both went to prison, within six months Putin would be running the prison and Obama on the first day would be passed around for a pack of cigarettes.
As the debt gets bigger every year americans must sacrafice their interest on their savings so the national debt is servicable. It does not get any simpler than this. Pay your part dan!
Goon is so inside-out, tongue-in-cheek,meme-flipping that I have no idea what he is talking about.
I get that he chides Joe for being metro, and that’s about it.
calling out hypocrisy anywhere i see it
which is pretty much everywhere
put that meme in your pipe and smoke it
“put that meme in your pipe and smoke it”
I wouldn’t do that it could lead to a “No Knock” raid.
Which is why you should move to the Centennial State … except that it’s horrible here, so whatever you do, don’t move here.
For a 1/2 pound of pot?
Cops Bust Into House, Shoot Unarmed Man In The Face
“No Knock” SWAT pot raid ends in death
by Steve Watson | Infowars.com | March 5, 2015
Cops in Florida burst into a house rented by three twenty-something friends this week and immediately shot one of them dead, according to accounts, despite the fact he was unarmed and non-threatening.
Twenty six-year-old Derek Cruice was shot in the face and killed during the botched raid in Deltona. His shocked friends say he did nothing wrong, and described the act as “murder”.
Cruice’s housemates say that the cops smashed down the door with a battering ram at 7am while they were in bed. Cruice, wearing only basketball shorts and no shirt was the first to emerge from his bedroom, and was shot on sight, according to his friend Steven Cochran.
The police have claimed that Cruice “advanced” toward them, but the housemates say this is not true.
“That is completely a lie. I was there; I watched the whole thing. There was no advancement. There was no reaching for anything. The guy was wearing basketball shorts like I am. It’s kind of hard to conceal anything or hide anything when this is all you have on,” a clearly shaken Cochran told reporters.
“As soon as the gunshot happened, I froze,” Cochran added. “Nobody resisted. There was no weapons. Nobody was making any kind of resistance or trying to keep anybody from doing their job.”
“Volusia County Sheriff’s Office narcotics investigators and the Street Crimes Unit were attempting to serve a search warrant at a residence. They were met with resistance and a shooting occurred,” Volusia County Sheriff Ben Johnson said in a statement.
“Cruice’s actions caused the deputy to perceive a threat,” sheriff’s office spokesman Gary Davidson told the Orlando Sentinel, adding “It has since been determined that Cruice wasn’t armed.”
Police claim that Investigators who searched the house found 217 grams of marijuana, and other marijuana related paraphernalia.
The officer who shot Cruice has been placed on administrative leave, pending an investigation by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement, the sheriff’s office said.
Cruice’s friend uniformly described him to reporters as a peaceful and wonderful human being. He had no criminal record.
Police nationwide are increasingly conducting so called “no knock” raids, which have been heavily criticsed as they place both residents and police in great danger.
That’s some really ’small government’ policing right there buddy
Grover Norquist would be so proud
Cops are getting worse.
Amina Amatullah 1 year ago
Oh my gosh!! This is disgusting!! Poor donkeys In a so-called civilised society this is how the behave??!! This is pure animal abuse
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djwi4MHDqJ4 - 362k -
For the most part it looks to me like the donkeys opened a can of whoop @ss.
First in Freedom - ILLANNOY not so good - AZ and CO - pretty good.
http://www.johnlocke.org/acrobat/policyReports/FFI.pdf
Serf training is now in session!
…and serf’s up!
I watched this in pieces over the last few days; it’s very long. Gives good conspiracy; at the start, it’s about the beginnings of our rulers, not just about JFK. I’ve seen some bits in other c-theory films before, other stuff is new for me (body switch, eight shooters in JFK assassination.) I like any article/film that makes “folks” doubt the official version of anything. “History is written by the victors” and all that.
JFK to 911 Everything Is A Rich Man’s Trick
NPR reporting metro Denver average house prices $345,000 a new all time high
Want to collapse prices and demand? Just raise prices.
sure brilliance u really have come a long way.
Data Poet data!
San Francisco, CA Sellers Slash Prices 18%; Demand Plummets As Inventory Billows
http://www.zillow.com/san-francisco-ca-94117/home-values/
Good afternoon serf. Did you flunk econ 101?
Your data has proved nothing for years.
You wont accept the fact that as more currency is created the more assets increase in value to compensate for the diluted currency. It works until it doesn’t.
Lather, rinse , repeat. Don’t fight the trend!
If your cash is so worthless, send it to me Poet.
Well Poet?
All my currency is tied up in hard assets, sorry there is none to send you.
I knew you were screwed.
Why did you do that to yourself?
Dublin, CA Sale Prices Crater 8% YoY As Sellers Dump
http://www.zillow.com/livermore-ca-94568/home-values/
You serfs need to accept the low interest rates on your savings and chase yields in stocks cause that’s the pay campaigns get funded!
With stock buybacks somebodies gonna get paid in 2016!
Global Warming stuck in the snow on Interstate 65
Drivers in Kentucky on move again after hours stranded on interstates
By Eliott C. McLaughlin, CNN
Updated 5:59 PM ET, Thu March 5, 2015
(CNN)Patrick and Sue Ellen Kilgallon knew the storm was coming. They tried to get out of northern Kentucky on Wednesday night. Instead, they got stuck in the snow on Interstate 65.
The Florida couple and their two dogs were still there Thursday morning, more than 14 hours later, unable to get back to the Sunshine State.
“We’re just sitting here praying, hoping to get out,” Patrick Kilgallon told CNN on Thursday.
They were among hundreds of motorists who had been stranded on I-65 near Elizabethtown, Kentucky, and on Interstate 24 near Paducah after a storm so intense that road crews just couldn’t keep up.
Gov. Steve Beshear said Thursday afternoon that some traffic had begun to inch along.
“We have finally cleared some emergency lanes on the sides of the roads, and the traffic now northbound on I-65 is beginning to move slowly and to clear out,” he told CNN. “It will take several hours to clear it out, because it’s backed up so much. But it is moving again, thank goodness.”
The Kentucky National Guard was helping motorists, taking some to nearby warming centers and returning others to their cars where the highways were passable, Lt. Col. Kirk Hilbrecht told CNN.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/03/05/us/kentucky-winter-weather-snowbound-i-65/ - 263k -
Global Warming forces plane off runway
Plane skids off LaGuardia runway, slams into fence near bay
Associated Press
By MEGHAN BARR and SCOTT MAYEROWITZ 2 hours ago
NEW YORK (AP) —A Delta plane from Atlanta skidded off a LaGuardia Airport runway while landing during a snowstorm on Thursday and crashed through a chain-link fence, its nose coming to rest perilously close to the icy waters of a bay.
The nose was leaning on a berm that separates the runway from Flushing Bay. Passengers saddled with bags and bundled up in heavy coats and scarves were helped down from a wing and onto the snowy pavement, just feet from the water. Everyone was silent as the plane slid, but some children started crying after it came to a stop, passengers said.
“If we wouldn’t have hit the snowbank, we’d be in the water right now,” said Charles Runels, a passenger from Atlanta.
Passengers trudged through the snow in an orderly line after climbing off the plane.
news.yahoo.com/…-off-runway-laguardia-no-injuries-reported-163312199–finance.html - 762k - Cached - Similar pages
“Default Monday” looms. Looks like some FBs in Texas and North Dakota may be sending in the jingle mail.
http://wolfstreet.com/2015/03/05/default-monday-oil-gas-companies-face-their-creditors/
“Climate Change” Forces Women into Prostitution”
The Stupidest Things Blamed on “Climate Change”
by Kit Daniels | Infowars.com | March 5, 2015
As the hoax of man-made “climate change” continues to unravel, its proponents are getting more desperate to blame anything on “global warming,” no matter how ridiculous.
Here’s some of the stupidest claims:
1) Study Claims “Global Warming” Will Cause More Rapes – In his study entitled “Crime, Weather and Climate Change,” Michael Ranson, a Senior Associate with Abt Associates, claimed that “global warming” will cause an additional 180,000 cases of rape and 22,000 murders by 2099. Ranson also claimed that “climate change” will lead to a further “1.2 million aggravated assaults, 2.3 million simple assaults, 260,000 robberies, 1.3 million burglaries, 2.2 million cases of larceny and 580,000 cases of vehicle theft in the United States.”
Yet Ranson’s study uses a statistical correlation to make the claim, despite the fact that correlation does not imply causation.
2) “Climate Change” Forces Women into Prostitution – “Climate change could reduce income from farming and fishing, possibly driving some women into sex work and thereby increase HIV infection,” U.N. spokesperson Suneeta Mukherjee claimed.
3) Human-Caused “Warming” Lead to Rise of ISIS – A “study” entitled “Climate change in the Fertile Crescent and implications of the recent Syrian drought” alleged that global warming made Syria’s 2006 to 2010 drought two to three times more likely. “While we’re not saying the drought caused the war,” lead author Dr. Colin Kelley explained. “We are saying that it certainly contributed to other factors — agricultural collapse and mass migration among them — that caused the uprising.”
4) In 1985 Gov’t Scientists Predicted NYC Would Resemble Warm, Snowless Daytona Beach – 30 years ago the New York Times reported that “Federal climate experts have suggested that within a century the greenhouse effect could turn New York City into something with the climate of Daytona Beach, Fla.”
“Beginning in a decade or two, scientists expect the warming of the atmosphere to melt the polar icecaps, raising the level of the seas, flooding coastal areas, eroding the shores and sending salt water far into fresh-water estuaries,” the Times reported. “Storm patterns will change, drying out some areas, swamping others and generally throwing agriculture into turmoil.”
So what’s the temperature of NYC today? Around 21 degrees with snow on the ground.
5) Climate Activists Claim Deep Freeze Due to “Global Warming” – “Global warming could be making parts of the world colder,” an Australian news outlet suggested, even though the phrase “global warming” refers to the entire world getting warmer, not just specific parts of it.
6) “Global Warming” to End Civilization – “If we continue our present growth path we are facing extinction – not in millions of years, or even millennia, but by the end of this century,” Professor Peter Barrett said, a claim he later backed away from.
7) “Global Warming” Causes Suicides – In 2006, the Christian Science Monitor claimed that a six year drought caused by “global warming” was making Australian farmers suicidal.
Experts: Beware of Michigan localities borrowing to pay retiree costs
Lansing — Macomb County intends to sell $263.7 million in bonds next week to finance its unfunded retiree health care bill, making it the 11th local government in Michigan to gamble on investments to help pay for and contain rising legacy costs.
Since 2013, localities as small as Bloomfield Hills and as large as Oakland County have used a little-known state law to float a combined $711 million in bonds to aid retiree health care and pension plans. Macomb County’s sale would bring the total to nearly $1 billion borrowed to infuse cash into retired worker trust funds.
The cities, townships and counties are betting they can make more money in stocks and other investments than by paying fluctuating retiree health care benefits and pension contributions as they go. ..“I think Detroit shows you exactly what can go wrong with these things,” said Eric Scorsone, an economics professor and municipal finance expert at Michigan State University. “There’s no financial instrument out there that’s risk-free.”…Macomb County hopes to sell investors bonds Tuesday at an interest rate of 3.5 percent or lower, Deldin said, meaning its investments will have to exceed that rate over the 24-year life of the bonds for the county to come out ahead.
“We would be foolish not to take advantage of it, especially in today’s bond market with interest rates being so low,” he said. “There’s always risk in anything you do when it comes to that. No one can predict what the stock market is going to do.”
Borrowing money to pour into pension funds dates back 30 years among local and state governments, according to the Center for Retirement Research at Boston College.
But issuing new debt to pay for retiree health care — known as other post-employment benefits — is “very rare” among municipalities across the country, said Matt Fabian, a partner at Municipal Market Analytics, a Concord, Mass.-based bond research firm.
Fabian said he is alarmed by the increasing use of bonds for health care obligations among Michigan communities and counties.
“It’s like paying off one credit card with another,” he said.
I’d be interested to explore this topic further over the coming days:
“The Baltic Dry Index has fallen for 12 consecutive days, and is 5 points from its record low of 554 points.”
phony scandals