Bits Bucket for March 24, 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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Region VIII trivia
Did you know that downtown Denver is America’s 2nd largest outdoor public urinal?
As Denver grows up, up, up, more neighborhoods grapple with density:
http://www.denverpost.com/latin/ci_27761905/denver-grows-up-up-up-more-neighborhoods-grapple
What’s your walkscore?
Pipe it to the other side of the continental divide. They need the water.
“Some dispensary operators and at least one broker worry Arizona is on the path toward a marijuana glut. State regulators don’t see a problem if growers substantially increase marijuana supply. The most likely outcome, they say, would be less-expensive pot for consumers who qualify for medical marijuana.”
Let’s see if this works
Yesterday i was in Jury Selection in PB territory, Vista Courts.
the case was a guy got busted for having a pot clinic and i told the judge that i cannot be impartial! I got excused!
I did, however, say I like cops and sheriffs but i am pro defense! Judge said, thank you for your candor!
“Yesterday i was in Jury Selection in PB territory, Vista Courts.”
I’m heading out there this summer.
P.S. So far I have been called up for jury service every year since moving to CA. And I have managed to get myself eliminated from every prospective jury pool in which my name was entered. At some point over the next couple of years, when I am less busy with raising kids and work, I plan to try to act in a manner to increase my chances of getting impaneled. I’ll report on the outcome when this happens.
Most of the gentlemen were from Rancho Bernardo and fallbrook. Everybody was professional at work. Most had powerful friends in the DA and Sheriffs. I am sure they will remember my speech for years to come! Thank you lad insane!
Marijuana needs to be legal the world over. It is absolutely RIDICULOUS that’s human beings are wasting time on something that you literally cannot overdose on.
something that you literally cannot overdose on.
Maybe you can’t—but you sure can think you did!!
Yet housing prices have remained unchanged in oil producing regions?
——————–
Oil-Drop Pain Spreads to Saudi Arabia’s Energy Behemoth
Wall Street Journal | Feb. 19, 2015 | SUMMER SAID and BENOÎT FAUCON
Saudi Arabia’s refusal late last year to rein in oil production helped trigger the price crash that has hurt oil-producing countries and publicly listed energy companies alike. And now even the kingdom’s own oil company is feeling the pain.
As a result, state-owned Saudi Aramco is looking for ways to cut costs everywhere, from pushing contractors for better deals on oil-well services to negotiating discounts on its phone and power bills, according to people familiar with the matter.
The company—the world’s largest oil producer—is also considering slashing its future spending on production and exploration by as much as 25%, much like private oil companies, industry sources said.
The measures demonstrate some of the risks the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries took when it decided in November to forsake its traditional role of cutting production to boost prices. The Saudi-backed decision has hurt big, publicly listed companies, such as Royal Dutch Shell PLC and Chevron Corp., but is now ricocheting and hitting national oil companies.
This is the psychology of a mania. The object that did not move out of your way when the wheels came off your hotrod at 100 mph is entirely to blame for the crash.
The oil price declines are starting to put a chill in Houston’s hot housing market.
Http://bizbeatblog.dallasnews.com/2015/03/houston-home-sales-hit-by-energy-sector-shakeout.html/
Dallas Fort Worth weathering the downturn in oil prices better than most in state.
Give credit to a diversified job base and a steady stream of newcomers that add pop to the growth story.
The Dallas-Plano-Irving area is about average when it comes to jobs in mining, logging and construction; that’s the category that includes oil and gas. But Dallas has a high concentration of workers in two big specialties: professional and business services; and finance, insurance and real estate.
http://www.dallasnews.com/business/columnists/mitchell-schnurman/20150323-schnurman-amid-low-oil-prices-dallas-is-bright-spot.ece
Maybe Saudi Arabia sees the future of oil and wants to sell it while they can.
The Texas Town That Just Quit Fossil Fuels
It wasn’t altruistic. It’s because coal’s getting too pricey—and water’s become too scarce.
by Daniel Gross
Last week Georgetown, Texas, a town of about 50,000 about 30 miles north of Austin (and the home of Nolan Ryan) announced that the utility that it owns, Georgetown Utility Systems, would soon get 100 percent of the electricity it provides from renewables.*
Georgetown Utility Systems doesn’t own power plants; it agrees to buy the output of power plants for fixed prices over long periods of time. But contrary to renewable energy’s reputation as a luxury good, the new deals come at a discount to what Georgetown was paying for fossil fuel electricity. “The new renewable power contracts signed by Georgetown provide electricity at a lower overall cost than its previous wholesale power contracts,” the city notes. That’s a sign that as the wind and solar industries gain scale, one of the biggest arguments against renewables—their higher comparative cost—is evaporating. As the New York Times reported last fall, other utilities in Texas and Oklahoma have reduced costs by signing deals for renewable energy.
snip
What does this have to do with the relative attractiveness of solar and wind compared with natural gas and coal? Well, creating electricity from fossil fuels doesn’t simply require lots of natural gas and coal. It requires a huge amount of water. “Production of electrical power results in one of the largest uses of water in the United States and worldwide,” the U.S. Geological Survey notes in this infographic. At power plants, water is heated to make steam and huge amounts of water are needed to cool the equipment. Producing the fuel that powers these plants—mining coal and fracking natural gas—also consumes a huge amount of water.
But creating electricity from wind turbines and photovoltaic panels requires virtually no water. This 2011 paper by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (see Tables 1 and 2) breaks down the median amount of water used to create a megawatt-hour of electricity through various power generation methods. For photovoltaic solar, the total is 26 gallons. For wind, it is zero. By contrast, generating a megawatt-hour of electricity using coal and natural gas requires several hundred gallons of water.
http://www.slate.com/articles/business/the_juice/2015/03/georgetown_texas_goes_renewable_why_the_town_is_dropping_fossil_fuels_for.html
Maybe Saudi Arabia sees the future of oil and wants to sell it while they can.
+1 Yup.
If the saw the imminent end to oil they would want to maximize their return on the oil even if that would mean more would stay in the ground. Thus, they would immediately cut production by two million barrels a day to drive up the price to $200 a barrel and realize much more money on their 8 million barrels of remaining production, they also would not be spending hundreds of billions to develop new oil fields. That theory has no logic.
The bottom line is what the Saudis are doing makes no economic sense. However, it is exactly what they did with the blessing and encouragement of Reagan during the 1980s when we were bringing down the Soviet Union. Obama tried to run a play from Reagan’s playbook but he is a water boy not a quarterback and he has failed epically. Russia will benefit from this attempt and the shale oil industry will never fully recover from this drop. Its cost of capital will always be higher and shale oil relies on cheap capital to make the economics work.
The bottom line is what the Saudis are doing makes no economic sense.
? When any product wanes in popularity and inventory builds up, producers slash prices. I was in the local Dollar Store the other day I found a name brand quart of motor oil for $1, right next to the Crocs.
When any product wanes in popularity and inventory builds up, producers slash prices.
No, if they are a cartel, they slash production to maintain prices or to increase them further.
It is interesting if you take into consideration that the dollar has appreciated nearly 25% against the Euro, then the Russian Rouble has only fallen about 15% against the Euro, the Russian collapse predicted in the MSM has not happened and the recovery in oil is on its way. Obama’s war on Putin has failed miserably.
MOSCOW, March 24 (Reuters) - The Russian rouble rose strongly on Tuesday ahead of monthly tax payments, continuing a rally since February that has taken it to its highest levels against the dollar and euro since the end of last year.
The Russian currency has now gained 7 percent against the dollar over the last week, reflecting a weaker dollar globally as well as Russian tax payments, although it is still down almost 40 percent since the middle of last year.
Obama’s war on Putin has failed miserably.
I guess the CIA didn’t get your memo.
“What we need to do is to continue to put pressure on Mr. Putin so that the Ukrainian people and the Ukrainian government can have a future that is going to be peaceful and safe and secure”
U.S. Central Intelligence Agency Director John Brennan
Russia ‘Very Unhappy’ at Sanctions Link - WSJ
http://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-very-unhappy-at-sanctions-link-1426870037
4 days ago - BRUSSELS—Russia is “very unhappy” with the European economic sanctions being linked to the full implementation of a peace deal agreed …
Putin unhappy with costs of Ukraine conflict – CIA chief …
http://www.unian.info/…/1058572-putin-unhappy-with-costs-of-ukraine-confli...
2 days ago - Russian President Vladimir Putin is increasingly unhappy with the economic sanctions and other costs of the Ukrainian conflict, according to …
Tumbling Russian Economy Will Cost Putin | The New …
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/…/tumbling-russian-economy-will-cost-pu...
Oct 29, 2014 - The Russian Sanctions Are Working: Putin Can’t Keep Buying Popularity … “Everyone is unhappy with Putin, save perhaps his closest friends.”.
Not being happy is a far cry from collapsing. Putin grows in popularity and we have taken our best shot.
BTW about those overflowing oil storage facilities, like I have been saying:
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/sorry-never-oil-storage-crisis-162957996.html
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/u-f-35-grounded-putin-101500633.html
“Putin unhappy…”
I thought that flexible ballerina could make anyone happy.
Funny - I don’t see community organizer on the list…
Now remember - since he is a minority, any disagreement with him or his policies will be considered RACIST.
——————-
Now That Ted Cruz has Declared His Candidacy- You Ever Seen the Guy’s Resume?
Reaganite Republican | 23 March 2015
Solicitor General of Texas from 2003 - May 2008, Cruz was the first Hispanic Solicitor General in Texas, the youngest Solicitor General in the entire country, not to mention the longest tenure in Texas history.
Partner at the law firm Morgan, Lewis & Bockius, where he led the firm’s U.S. Supreme Court and national appellate litigation practice.
Cruz has authored 80+ SCOTUS briefs and presented 40+ oral arguments before The Court
Cruz served as a law clerk to Chief Justice William Rehnquist. Cruz was the first Hispanic ever to clerk for a Chief Justice of the United States
Described as a ’superb’ constitutional lawyer, the man’s considerable skills and laser-like focus were on display for all when he took oily reptile Eric Holder by the neck and made him answer the damn question.
In the landmark case of District of Columbia v. Heller, Cruz assembled a coalition of 31 states in defense of the principle that the 2nd Amendment guarantees an individual right to keep and bear arms.
Director of the Office of Policy Planning at the Federal Trade Commission
Adjunct Professor of Law at the University of Texas School of Law in Austin, where he taught U.S. Supreme Court litigation
AWARDS: “America’s Leading Lawyers for Business,” Chambers USA (2009 & 2010) “50 Most Influential Minority Lawyers in America,” National Law Journal (2008) “25 Greatest Texas Lawyers of the Past Quarter Century,” Texas Lawyer (2010) “20 Young Hispanic Americans on the Rise,” Newsweek (1999) Traphagen Distinguished Alumnus, Harvard Law School
I saw part of his speech on TeeVee yesterday
“Imagine a president who stands unapologetically with Israel”
Sorry, Raphael, Israel is not America’s 51st state
“We will stand up and defeat radical Islamic terrorism”
How exactly is that “small government” and “lower taxes” Raphael?
The “war on terror” has cost American taxpayers $1.6+ trillion so far
If only he had won a Nobel Peace prize…
They should give one to Bibi for running Rachel Corrie over with a bulldozer
Does Bibi have a drone kill list and is quite good at killing people?
Neither side cares at all about any of this. Nor do the people. I already know who is going to win the election: the .01 percent.
How much is Hillary worth?
How much is Ted Cruz worth?
How much is John McCain worth?
How much is Diane Feinstein worth?
Same as it ever was. Get your pile, forget those losers.
“Does Bibi have a drone kill list and is quite good at killing people?”
Yes.
America’s “only friend and ally in the Middle East” spying on America:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/03/24/report-israel-spied-on-iran-u-s-talks-and-shared-information-with-lawmakers/?hpid=z1
See also:
http://mobile.wnd.com/2015/03/netanyahoo-bibi-rounds-up-knesset-coalition/?cat_orig=world
I was very disappointed in Ted’s speech yesterday. He was pandering to the military industrial complex. Will repeal Ocare but not for himself. He will also means test social security but all the while giving illegals a pass.
Disgusting in my opinion and so is HiTlary. I am hoping that Rand might shine in the polls. These people will go down in history as the most scumbags and the American people will go down in history as the most dum dumbs.
He will also means test social security but all the while giving illegals a pass.
The hallmark of a true patriot. Oh … that’s right … he was born in Canada.
He will also means test social security
So he’ll punish those who were responsible and saved money? I thought he was a Republican.
They are all sucm bags in my opinion.
Described as a ’superb’ constitutional lawyer, the man’s considerable skills and laser-like focus were on display for all when he took oily reptile Eric Holder by the neck and made him answer the damn question.
In short, Cruz has the traits that Obama is lacking but the MSM told us he had.
man’s considerable skills and laser-like focus were on display for all when he took oily reptile Eric Holder by the neck and made him answer the damn question.
What question was that?
high home prices insures almost everyone needs a loan.
Some of you need a loan just to go out for dinner or to buy a bottle of wine.
It ain’t the loan, it’s the price. Are those loans on what people make and can repay and voila problem solved. Or let people borrow more than they can repay and print more and more money.
Personally I’m for the second option. I like better and better lifestyles. Bigger houses, Hummers, European vacations, eating out every night and outdoor TV and barbecue rooms. Just print more money.
That’s only good for you if you are first in line for the printed money. Everyone else takes a loss.
No one ever seems to take a loss. It’s wrose than ever. All time high Dow. Bail outs, bail outs everywhere. Hang on to that crapshack and uncle money will drive the market back up to where you can now liberate more equity.
I’ve been taking big losses for years! Everything is more expensive than it should be, or would have been, without all this credit expansion.
No bubble…yet.
Investing
No bubble trouble for stocks yet: Goldman Sachs
Dhara Ranasinghe | @DharaCNBC
Monday, 23 Mar 2015 | 6:10 AM ETCNBC.com
Risky assets such as equities are not yet in bubble territory, Goldman Sachs Chief Global Equity Strategist Peter Oppenheimer said Monday.
Talking to CNBC Europe’s “Squawk Box” about the risk of asset-price bubbles, Oppenheimer said an inevitable consequence of a having interest rates near zero was that many investors across the world were pushed up the “risk curve.”
“That could result in ultimately risky assets becoming overvalued like probably other asset classes,” he said. “It doesn’t look clear to me that risky assets like equity markets are yet in that bubbly territory.”
…
how many people were calling a top when the last bubble bursted?
Do you remember ben b. saying there was no housing bubble and then sh@t hit the fan? These folks are salesmen.
ft dot com
March 22, 2015 3:53 pm
Global fund managers warn of a bond bubble
David Oakley
A broker works in a trading room of a Portuguese bank in Lisbon, Tuesday, May 7, 2013. Portugal held a sale of its 10-year bonds on Tuesday for the first time since it needed a bailout in 2011, representing a milestone in its efforts to regain investor confidence and prove its contested austerity policies are paying off. (AP Photo/Francisco Seco)©AP
A growing number of professional investors are warning that bonds are overvalued as fears grow that a fixed income bubble will collapse in a disorderly sell-off.
Four out of five fund managers said bonds were overvalued in a survey of 300 global managers by CFA UK. Corporate bonds are more overvalued than ever before, while government bonds are the most overvalued asset class, the group said.
The group, which represents 11,000 investment professionals, says their valuations index, which has been running for three years, is in effect flashing red over the high valuations of bonds.
Brad Crombie, head of fixed income at Aberdeen Asset Management, said: “You only know you’re in a bubble when it pops. But this market could pop. There is more tension and anxiety over valuations than for a long while.”
John Stopford, head of multi-assets at Investec, said: “There could be a bubble as investors have loaded up on high yield and corporate bonds. If we do see a reverse in the market, there could be price dislocation and a messy unwind.”
…
Maybe this is obvious, but in case not: When the bond bubble bursts, the stock market bubble will be soon to follow.
Bulletin
New-home sales in Jan. and Feb. are best back-to-back reports since 2008
Economic Report
Bullard: Worried about ‘violent’ reaction to Fed rate hike
Published: Mar 24, 2015 9:53 a.m. ET
By Sara Sjolin
Markets reporter
LONDON (MarketWatch) — St. Louis Federal Reserve President James Bullard is concerned about the mismatch between the market’s and the central bank’s expectations for the first interest-rate increase, warning it could end with a “violent” reaction in the financial market.
Speaking to reporters after a panel discussion at CityWeek in London on Tuesday, Bullard, one of the Fed’s most hawkish members, stressed that the central bank’s zero-rate interest policy is no longer appropriate and that a rate hike this summer wouldn’t strangle the U.S. economic recovery.
“We’re talking so much about it that I hope it’d be anticlimactic when we get there. But there is this issue about the market expectations of a rate path being different from the committee’s expectations,” he said.
“So if we get all the way to the day we actually make a decision and we end up surprising the markets that day, there’s going to be reconciliation on that day and that could be violent.”
And what is “violent” to the St. Louis Fed chief?
“The taper tantrum in the summer of 2013 was a violent reaction in the market. It came from a misalignment between what the market was thinking the committee was going to do with its QE program and what the committee was thinking it was going to do.”
…
But…….i thought “violence” was counterproductive?
Who is paying for his trip to London???
Who is paying for his trip to London???
I’m sure the Fed just printed some money.
Article for Dannyboy
Colorado drilling rig count down 48% from October
http://www.bizjournals.com/denver/blog/earth_to_power/2015/03/colorado-drilling-rig-count-down-48-from-october.html
Denver - 2banana’s pick for biggest housing bubble in the USA on a per capita basis
While the Denver bubble is bad, there are far worse ones out there. As I mentioned yesterday, my colleagues in Santa Clara think Denver is dirt cheap.
When you have no clue as to the production cost of a SFR, everything looks cheap.
Colorado drilling rig count down 48% from October
They’re gonna be feeling that in Greeley.
Warmist Warming Tuesday
CU study finds climate, not pine beetle, drives western U.S. wildfires
http://www.denverpost.com/environment/ci_27770696/cu-study-finds-climate-not-pine-beetle-drives
And see also:
http://www.businessinsider.com/no-snow-in-tahoe-ski-resorts-closed-photos-2015-3?op=1
It’s time to kick off the 2015 HBB Western U.S. Wildfire Betting Pool
I picked Colorado last year and lost, but I think California cheated by using arsonists
Because the west never had wild fires before the con of global warming….
Says the east coast guy who has probably never seen a wildfire in person or ever wondered if his residence might burn to the ground.
Yes, Mr. Banana, there are far more wildfires than normal, and they’re much bigger too. It was long believed that the pine beetles were the cause, but now the record drought (Hoover Dam is 140 feet below normal) is also considered a cause. You have read about how California is literally running out of water, haven’t you? Or is that not possible because we have “rivers”. I recall you saying a few years ago that water couldn’t be scarce out here because we have “rivers”. That’s how I knew that you’ve never been out this way. You have absolutely no clue of what it’s like out here.
He would probably prefer to watch his house burn to the ground than utilize the services of public union goon firefighters, LOLZ
Do please study some history.
Before the pale face ever came out west - the west burned every year. It was part of the naturally cycle. And it was needed and necessary.
Now we put out fires and have disrupted this cycle. And let people live where they never should live.
And now we get monster fires. And wonder why.
California used to be a desert. Read about the first Spanish explorers and what they found.
It is to bad liberals/progressives have taken over California. Instead of building infrastructure they pander billions to illegals and construct trains to nowhere.
Imagine if all that money went into dozens of nuclear power plants and massive desalination projects. Cheap and affordable electricity and water.
Now, the money is gone. There is a drought (like that never happened before) and the goons in charge want to blame the weather and grow government even more massive in size…
And we wonder how nations fail.
Imagine if all that money went into dozens of nuclear power plants and massive desalination projects….the goons in charge want to blame the weather and grow government even more massive in size…
How could California have built “dozens of nuclear power plants and massive desalination projects” without “growing government even more massive in size?”
The private sector would not have done because the alternatives were way cheaper back in the day. The only thing that could have done it would be “bigger government”.
Your opinions are not jibing with the reality of the times imo.
Before the pale face ever came out west - the west burned every year.
No one is denying that. But the fires are worse than ever, far worse. And there is no relief in sight. Ask any firefighter and they will tell you why: it’s never been this dry and especially not for so long.
It’s become so bad that hardly a summer goes by where I do not directly see the smoke from a wildfire. It didn’t use to be that way. The whole “it’s always been that way” doesn’t pan. Year after year firefighting resources are stretched thin, to breaking points. Tankers constantly fly out of Broomfield airport in the summer. It’s no longer one or two wildfires per summer. It’s one after another.
It didn’t use to be that way
Are you hundreds of years old, decades of wet periods followed by centuries of dry periods has been the norm for hundreds of thousands of years, unfortunately the Colorado Rivers was divided during an extremely wet period in the late 19th century?
Or droughts or changed at all. The Great Salt Lake is an example of a warming and drying climate and it came into existence long before the invention of the SUV.
the con of global warming….
I know. There is no way 7 Billion money-chasing human beings living on a very newly industrialized planet could affect earth’s thin atmosphere (about 80%) which is within 10 miles of the surface of the Earth.
How could earth’s population increasing over 600% in the 150 or so years of Earth’s massive industrialization and fossil-fuel polluting period possibly affect earth’s thin and delicate atmosphere? Like if 2 people fart in an elevator can you even smell it? I didn’t think so.
Even places like China where you can’t see 100 yards in front of you because of pollution doesn’t matter much either because all that pollution eventually just blows away and dissipates in the wind at some point. You can’t even see it by the time it gets to California.
Yup, we have no effect on the atmosphere:
http://www.imagescolorado.com/img/s11/v31/p1042357074-3.jpg
Last week our Chicom colleagues were startled when we told them that Denver has poor air quality by American standards. They were stunned, as we had clear blue skies that day. I’m sure they see our “brown cloud” as a bit of a joke.
“You can’t blame these scientists for sucking up to the fed’s mantra du jour. Scientists live off grants.”
The Fiction Of Climate Science
Gary Sutton
12/04/2009 @ 10:00AM
Many of you are too young to remember, but in 1975 our government pushed “the coming ice age.”
Random House dutifully printed “THE WEATHER CONSPIRACY coming of the New Ice Age.” This may be the only book ever written by 18 authors. All 18 lived just a short sled ride from Washington, D.C. Newsweek fell in line and did a cover issue warning us of global cooling on April 28, 1975. And The New York Times, Aug. 14, 1976, reported “many signs that Earth may be headed for another ice age.”
OK, you say, that’s media. But what did our rational scientists say?
In 1974, the National Science Board announced: “During the last 20 to 30 years, world temperature has fallen, irregularly at first but more sharply over the last decade. Judging from the record of the past interglacial ages, the present time of high temperatures should be drawing to an end leading into the next ice age.”
You can’t blame these scientists for sucking up to the fed’s mantra du jour. Scientists live off grants. Remember how Galileo recanted his preaching about the earth revolving around the sun? He, of course, was about to be barbecued by his leaders. Today’s scientists merely lose their cash flow. Threats work.
In 2002 I stood in a room of the Smithsonian. One entire wall charted the cooling of our globe over the last 60 million years. This was no straight line. The curve had two steep dips followed by leveling. There were no significant warming periods. Smithsonian scientists inscribed it across some 20 feet of plaster, with timelines.
Last year, I went back. That fresco is painted over. The same curve hides behind smoked glass, shrunk to three feet but showing the same cooling trend. Hey, why should the Smithsonian put its tax-free status at risk? If the politicians decide to whip up public fear in a different direction, get with it, oh ye subsidized servants. Downplay that embarrassing old chart and maybe nobody will notice.
Sorry, I noticed.
Al Gore thought he might ride his global warming crusade back toward the White House. If you saw his movie, which opened showing cattle on his farm, you start to understand how shallow this is. The United Nations says that cattle, farting and belching methane, create more global warming than all the SUVs in the world. Even more laughably, Al and his camera crew flew first class for that film, consuming 50% more jet fuel per seat-mile than coach fliers, while his Tennessee mansion sucks as much carbon as 20 average homes.
His PR folks say he’s “carbon neutral” due to some trades. I’m unsure of how that works, but, maybe there’s a tribe in the Sudan that cannot have a campfire for the next hundred years to cover Al’s energy gluttony. I’m just not sophisticated enough to know how that stuff works. But I do understand he flies a private jet when the camera crew is gone.
While scientists march to the drumbeat of grant money, at least trees don’t lie. Their growth rings show what’s happened no matter which philosophy is in power. Tree rings show a mini ice age in Europe about the time Stradivarius crafted his violins. Chilled Alpine Spruce gave him tighter wood so the instruments sang with a new purity. But England had to give up the wines that the Romans cultivated while our globe cooled, switching from grapes to colder weather grains and learning to take comfort with beer, whisky and ales.
http://www.forbes.com/…/12/03/climate-science-gore-intelligent-technology-sutton.html - 62k -
Comment by phony scandals
2015-03-24 08:41:07
The Fiction Of Climate Science
Gary Sutton 12/04/2009
12/03/climate-science-gore-intelligent-technology-sutton.html
Now climate change is wreaking havoc with the gulf stream. A very good video with leading scientists on rapid changes underway in the Atlantic…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L-bXLPLCyek
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/03/24/michael-mann-and-stefan-rahmstorf-claim-the-gulf-stream-is-slowing-due-to-greenland-ice-melt-except-reality-says-otherwise/
Just more B.S. from Mann, he should be tried for fraud and forced to pay back all his government grants.
Aren’t you ashamed at all about your post showing huge gains in Antarctic ice sheets and you calling that continuous loss?
huge gains in Antarctic ice sheets and you calling that continuous loss?
That Ice may look pretty from the top but on the whole, Global Ices is melting and Sea level is rising.
RISING SEAS
http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2013/09/rising-seas/sea-level-chart
Sea level didn’t change much for nearly 2,000 years, judging from sediment cores. It began to rise in the late 19th century, as Earth started to warm. If sea level continues to track temperature, it could rise three feet or more by 2100. The great unknown: the future of the ice sheets. NOAA’s four scenarios, shown here, span the range of possibilities for 2100. The sea will keep rising after that.
Oh, NOAA. I’ll tell you, they cannot even accurately report the weather or the wave height on Lake Ontario, much less predict. I have run into six to eight foot swells when they were reporting waves 1 ft or less so many times that if they tell me the ice is melted, I’ll have to go see for myself!
Back in January I looked at their website after they published a headline about 2014 being hotter than the entire 20th century. Think about that, hotter than the entire previous century! If you dig down a little bit you can see that one year was a tiny bit higher than an hundred year average. Not even statistically significant. This in my mind is an entirely misleading message, not the kind of thing serious (honest) scientists should provide for the mass of unthinking people to consume.
If you dig down a bit further, the data they used as a basis shows most of the 20th century warming happening before 1940. Also rather counter to their message.
If you dig down further, the data set was actually an increase in nightly lows. Nightly lows, not daily highs or 24 hour average temperature, nor global average temperature.
With this kind of lack of credibility, everything they say needs to be audited down to the last detail and then there would still be doubt that the details were honest. Yet the warmer that post here take headlines about stuff they really do not understand and try to beat everyone over the head with it like it was the hammer of truth. It’s not.
“judging from sediment cores…”
I suspect you haven’t thought this through. It’s like the Oyster bars (fossils) in Nebraska. You can tell that something was above water before or below water before, but not how deep the water was or how long ago.
Serious scientists say the Antarctic ice sheet has been growing for as long as they’ve been looking. Also note that they have no idea why. Maybe it was because of hair spray.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/oct/09/why-is-antarctic-sea-ice-at-record-levels-despite-global-warming
from the Guardian article:
“…increasing Antarctic ice does not contradict the general warming trend. Overall the Earth is losing sea ice at a rate of 35,000 sq km per year (13,514 sq miles).”
Aren’t you ashamed at all about your post showing huge gains in Antarctic ice sheets and you calling that continuous loss?
What gains in Antarctic ice? NASA chart shows both Antarctic and Greenland ice is melting:
http://nca2014.globalchange.gov/sites/report/files/images/web-large/Figure-17-hi.jpg
That link does not open for me.
The chart you posted the other day shows massive gains in Greenland and Antarctic ice, starting with declining loss and plunging into massive negative loss. Negative loss = gain in my math. Is this the same chart or something more supportive of your agenda?
The Fiction Of Climate Science
Gary Sutton
12/04/2009 @ 10:00AM
In 2002 I stood in a room of the Smithsonian. One entire wall charted the cooling of our globe over the last 60 million years. This was no straight line. The curve had two steep dips followed by leveling. There were no significant warming periods. Smithsonian scientists inscribed it across some 20 feet of plaster, with timelines.
Last year, I went back. That fresco is painted over. The same curve hides behind smoked glass, shrunk to three feet but showing the same cooling trend. Hey, why should the Smithsonian put its tax-free status at risk? If the politicians decide to whip up public fear in a different direction, get with it, oh ye subsidized servants. Downplay that embarrassing old chart and maybe nobody will notice.
Sorry, I noticed.
More than 1,000 companies, including more than 100 ski resorts and hundreds of businesses in California, have signed the Climate Declaration, which urges the public, policymakers, and business leaders to tackle climate change.
Tackle climate change? At this point? I believe in man-made climate change because of the science not because I think we can do much about it now. This train has sailed. The ship has left the station. Sure we should cut pollutants, however coming up with ways to deal with the ramifications of climate-change is just as important.
Yes because that .02% rise in temperature per decade is just too much to deal with, despite our caveman ancestors being able to deal with rapid change caused by super volcanoes etc.
Yes because that .02% rise in temperature per decade is just too much to deal with,
Whenever I want straight-talk on the housing market, I always ask young and pretty female realtors.
Whenever I want straight-talk on climate-change, I always ask lawyers who work in the energy sector.
Oooh, burn!
When you have nothing you engage in an ad hominem attack and the proponents of CAGW have nothing, the models have been completely wrong and the people that predicted very low to no warming have been correct and now are being attacked as working for the fossil fuel companies. No amount of personal attacks on them or me can change the fact that these scientists have been right and the people like Mann have been wrong.
When you have nothing you engage in an ad hominem attack
Realy? Coming from you Adan who basically calls people pot-heads, druggies, drunks and homophobic slurs when he’s out debated? You have to be kidding me right bigot?
And pointing out that a lawyer working for the energy industry is not an unbiased source for climate-change information is not an ad hominem attack. You’re a lawyer and you don’t understand this? You don’t comprehend the concept?
the models have been completely wrong
Bull.The climate is an extremely complex system - as if computer models are going to 100% nail it every time? You don’t understand science, how it is studied and how trends can be identified without computer models being 100 reflective of climate - an extremely complex system
Bull.The climate is an extremely complex system
Just ten years ago, we were told that we could just ignore all the natural factors because the growth in Co2 was much more significant in the short term that all of them put together. There is no bull to it, Mann claimed he could predict the climate and he and others made claims that Great Britain would be without snow and the globe would be 1 to 2 degrees Celsius warmer by now. Only the people that make their living through government subsidies for solar etc. keep this fraud going with the help of globalists that want an excuse for world government.
BTW, I have never worked for an energy company, it is just some on this board that claimed I have.
The agony is in the anticipation. Just give me the 2 degrees right now, I am tired of waiting.
BTW, I have never worked for an energy company,
Did you not say the other day something like you’ve been in the industry for 35 years when you were describing whats going on in the oil/gas/drilling situation now compared to the past?
You did right? Oh I think you did. Right? Should someone find the quote?
it is just some on this board that claimed I have.
Should someone find the quote? I think 2-4 days ago.
What I told people years ago, is that I regulated the industry. It was at a high level. I cannot give my title without revealing my identity. Since then I have invested in the area and been part of litigation involving the industry but I have not worked for an energy company.
The bottom line is if Obama really took science seriously and was not just misusing it he would not be for amnesty, he would be for deportation. The West in particular does not have the water for new immigrants and with chain migration we are looking at a water crisis, not due to what man has done but just due to the normal climatic patterns:
http://origins.osu.edu/article/west-without-water-what-can-past-droughts-tell-us-about-tomorrow
What I told people years ago, is that I regulated the industry. Since then I have invested in the area and been part of litigation involving the industry but I have not worked for an energy company.
Coming from a lawyer who just the other day said something to the effect that he’d been “in the oil/gas/drilling/energy industry for 35 years” and who totally defends the Koch/BigOil propaganda machine and who might have “regulated” it and now invests in it. Your above “clarification” leads me to believe you’ve been joined at the hip with the Energy Industry for 35 years and partly possibly as a captured regulator now turned investor.
Disclaimer: I’m invested in Energy too but it doesn’t blind me to science.
So.
Whenever I want straight-talk on the housing market, I always ask young and pretty female realtors who’ve worked in real-estate for less than 3 years.
And whenever I want straight-talk on climate-change, I always ask former “regulator” turned investing lawyers who’ve invested and worked in the energy sector for 35 years.
And there is nothing “ad hominem attack” about it. It’s getting a probable understanding of where you are coming from Adan.
Coming from a lawyer who just the other day said something to the effect that he’d been “in the oil/gas/drilling/energy industry for 35 years”
Show me that quote.
Show me that quote.
Are you denying it now hours after I reminded you of it? After you just even described being a regulator in the industry and an investor in the energy industry?
So you deny saying something to the effect you’d been involved in or Associated with “the industry” for 35 years?
I think it was me that said I was a refining engineer 35 years ago.
Realy? Coming from you Adan who basically calls people pot-heads, druggies, drunks and homophobic slurs when he’s out debated
Now that is defamation, you never out debate me. I call you those things because I think your I live in Brazil story is pure B.S., I have always considered you as working for some liberal democrat in the U.S. pretending to be in Brazil to enhance your credibility and so you could point to Brazil as the direction the U.S. should turn when the commodities boom was covering up for their terrible socialist policies. The drug jokes with Goon are just teasing and no different than his calling my Danny Boy hardly an ad hominem attack.
Now that is defamation, you never out debate me.
Of course I do. Watch and learn again “lawyer”.
I call you those things because I think your I live in Brazil story is pure B.S., I have always considered you as working for some liberal democrat in the U.S. pretending to be in Brazil to enhance your credibility and so you could point to Brazil as the direction the U.S. should turn
They call what you just said a “bunny” in basketball - an easy shot. There is zero logic in what you just said above. Why in God’s name would someone coming here in 2008-9 pretend to be in Brazil? To enhance my credibility working for a liberal democrat? What? To “point to Brazil as the direction the USA should go”? Brazil? A country that is decades behind the USA?
Dude, get a grip. If I were fake trying to show the USA the “direction to go” I would have said I was in Denmark, or Sweden or Germany or Canada for heaven’s sake.
You make no sense. You have no logic. My “liberal democrat boss” would tell me to say I live in Brazil? For credibility?
You can’t make this stuff up. You have zero logic on this issue and the lack of intelligence and insight above is mind boggling. “Pretend to live in Brazil?? lol Good grief.
See Mr. “lawyer”, I just out debated you again.
In your own mind perhaps you out debated me. Brazil in 2008 was a BRIC and was growing as fast as China. It is also a country with a large population of people of color so unlike all the other countries on your list, its growth could not be attributed to the growth homogenous white societies achieve. Given your racial statements and your claimed race you would be backing such a country and claiming that our policies were keeping blacks in this country from succeeding. The problem is, it was just China’s bi#ch selling commodities to it. China figured out with a little bit slower growth it did not need to pay inflated prices for commodities. A black liberal pretending to be living in Brazil made perfect sense in 2008, too bad it just proved that concentrating on “equity” instead of growth is the kiss of death for an economy.
Given your racial statements and your claimed race…A black liberal pretending to be living in Brazil…..
Wow. There it is.
Are you losing your mind Adan? You think I’ve ever said I was black? There is nothing wrong with being black but when did I every say I was one? It’s starting to make more sense now. Your visceral hatred and irrationality towards me. You are a classic case of what you and we know you are.
In your own mind perhaps you out debated me
See above:
Since my mind is vastly and apparently more powerful than yours to perceive reality Adan, why would it not be a good judge? See above on you mind’s “power” of perception and your hate’s clouding of it.
Adan, you have serious issues. Sorry.
“…A black liberal pretending…backing such a country……..your claimed race“….not be attributed to the growth homogenous white societies achieve…..”
Unbelievable but it shows what you are in you heart Adan.
Seriously…. I have no joy playing an unintentional part of your disgusting meltdown of obvious rac!sm.
It makes me sick about some people in my country.
Complete bs it is too hard to research something as generic as black but it is your views that I detest not your race
the growth homogenous white societies…..Complete bs it is too hard to research something as generic as black but it is your views that I detest not your race
You- Have- Got- To- Be- Kidding- Me.
What- The- Heck- Was- That??
Too hard to find your statement about your race when 70% of your posts appear to be written by al sharpton including assuming that the Ferguson police officer gunned down a black man for no reason.
Btw, if you are not black why did you not point that out when I questioned why a black man was looking to Jefferson for quotes?
if you are not black why did you not point that out when I questioned why a black man was looking to Jefferson for quotes?
Are you really asking that question Adan? Really? And are you back from your rac!ist meltdown? And still digging?
OK. I “did not point out I was white’ Because of one or all of the following reasons.
1. Maybe I did not really care, because you racist inquiries and insinuations are abhorrent and not very intelligent.
2. Because you thinking I was a black man faking living in Brazil is kind of intellectually weak.
3. Because I did “point it out” but you were too incapable or biased to understand “subtle” English.
See below:
Adan: “I find it interesting that a black man would even try to look to Jefferson for guidance considering his views on race:”
Rio: I don’t understand anything about your post or who you are speaking of. And why would a modern day black man look at Jefferson’s views on progressive taxation any different than a white man?
Too complicated for a biased induced clueless rac!ist I guess.
The obvious answer is amnesty, trains to nowhere and to raise taxes,,
“This train has sailed. The ship has left the station.”
This bottle of Mad Dog 20/20 has been emptied.
“The obvious answer is amnesty, trains to nowhere and to raise taxes,”
“by hook or by crook”
Obama: ‘By Hook or By Crook’ I’m Going to Be a Successful President
9:20 PM, Mar 21, 2015 •
By DANIEL HALPER
President Obama insisted in an interview with the Huffington Post that “by hook or by crook” he’ll be a successful president. He made the comments in answering a question about whether he’d become a “more progressive president over time.”
“No,” Obama said to the question, he had not become more progressive. “I think that what we are constantly doing is looking for opportunities to advance the agenda that I talked about back in 2007 and 2008. I mean, remember, in the first two years of my administration we advanced more progressive legislation than anybody in 50 years.
http://www.weeklystandard.com/…hook-or-crook-im-going-be-successful-president_894599.html - 126k -
Comment by phony scandals
2015-03-24 08:55:39
Obama: ‘By Hook or By Crook’ I’m Going to Be a Successful President
Mar 21, 2015
weeklystandard.com/blogs/obama-hook-or-crook-im-going-be-successful-president_894599.html
Are we in the Village?
Well, these days, it is all about information…information…information.
Public service announcement for the armchair warriors and keyboard commandos
Wall Street Journal - Angry Outbursts Really Do Hurt Your Health, Doctors Find
http://www.wsj.com/articles/angry-outbursts-really-do-hurt-your-health-doctors-find-1427150596
And now back to your regularly scheduled Drudge Report links
From the article:
“Most doctors believe factors such as smoking and obesity pose greater heart risks than anger does.”
and speaking of anger, george zimmerman harbors anger for king obama:
http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-03-23/george-zimmerman-harbors-anger-against-barack-hussein-obama-
got arizona iced tea brand watermelon fruit punch, skittles, and promethazine with codeine?
For small-town America, new immigrants pose linguistic, cultural challenges:
http://m.csmonitor.com/USA/Society/2015/0314/For-small-town-America-new-immigrants-pose-linguistic-cultural-challenges
And a re-post of the 2014 Souper Bowl Coke commercial:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=boicG2puD_4
Permanent Democrat Supermajority
Laws and taxes are for the little people…
We’ve been hearing bi-lingual PA announcements in local stores for a while.
But last week was the first time that I heard them put out the Mexican Spanish version first, before English.
The fact of the matter is that they arent going to send anyone back. And they arent going to discourage/limit immigration, either legal or non legal. Why? Because people who have a lot more pull with government than you or I do find it profitable. While the “costs” are absorbed by Joe Q Public.
Privatize the profits, socialize the losses = The American Way
have any of you serfs ever heard of the buyback blackout period?
Is that when a dozen red roses aren’t going to do the trick?
It’s when you pay fines for things you don’t remember doing.
Tax laws?
“The majority of companies just entered the buyback blackout period leading into the 1Q earnings season, and high valuations in the absence of corporate demand may weigh on stock prices. ”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-24/biggest-threat-sp-500-next-month-biggest-buyer-stocks-2015-enters-blackout-period
It sure is reassuring that corporations are now big players in the casino with company money.
have any of you serfs ever heard of the buyback blackout period?
It’s when corporate America can’t buyback stocks to pump up its stock price:
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-03-23/buyback-blackout-leaves-u-s-stocks-on-their-own-before-earnings
Ask Lola.
Lola’s meltdown clock is about 3 minutes to midnight.
Livin’ in your head rent-free ShillowPicker, Adan and HA
I’ve never had a meltdown in my life but I have cause a few and you HA and Adan have been close. Now, you guys don’t like me because I counter your points on a consistent basis with logic and history. Like your point that you are “100% for the Constitution except sometimes” which is a joke.
And recently Adan’s assertion that Thomas Jefferson would not be for progressive taxation when in fact, he was and proved it.
And HA’s assertion over 2 years ago that USA rents were falling when in fact they have risen the past two years. Or the fact that you can’t “rent an average house for half the cost to buy” in the average of the whole of the USA.
But you guys can’t think of anything concrete that you can prove me wrong on - not even Brazil where I’m on record since 2009 that Brazil house prices could fall and might be in a bubble.
The only thing you guys got is calling people potheads, drunks or drug addicts and since that doesn’t work with me you end up calling me gay. Owwwww that hurts. Not. So you guys are dumb, angry and bigots. Well done.
And recently Adan’s assertion that Thomas Jefferson would not be for progressive taxation when in fact, he was and proved it.
You proved nothing, you claimed he would be for a progressive income tax when he drafted a constitution that prohibited it. You did not prove your point, you proved you knew nothing about the constitution.
BTW, I find it interesting that a black man would even try to look to Jefferson for guidance considering his views on race:
Jefferson, “Whether originally a distinct race or made distinct by time and circumstance, blacks are inferior to whites in the endowments both of body and mind. This unfortunate difference of color and perhaps of faculty is a powerful obstacle to the emancipation of these people.”
Falling prices Lola.
Falling prices Dan.
You proved nothing, you claimed he would be for a progressive income tax
LawyerTalk. You’re twisting your initial, main and false premise - that the founding fathers were not for taxes to redistribute wealth. Which I proved they were for. (Proof Below) I also proved that not only were the founding fathers for taxes, they were for highly progressive taxes substantially for the purpose of redistributing wealth.
I then brought up the income-tax question, not you. I then provided reasoning supporting my opinion the Founders would have been for progressive income taxes as well. Are you really a lawyer? If so, I’m in the wrong profession because I’d love to go against you in court.
Ladies and gentlemen, exhibit A and B proving my assertions above:
Comment by Albuquerquedan
2015-03-21 11:24:32
.….Do I care about Democracy, of course but in the same way as the founding fathers, which people never have the right to vote to take away someone’s wealth just to redistribute it…..people like Jefferson could see it
Comment by RioAmericanInBrasil
2015-03-21 12:03:42
I don’t think you know your founding fathers and the American concept very well Adan.
The founding fathers knew USA was special because there was no real great wealth-inequality, no royalty-and no centuries of landed-gentry dominance. They wrote of such things. And even in the light of a much more egalitarian society, Jefferson himself was totally for progressive taxation.
If Jefferson saw today’s numbers on wealth inequality I think he might raise top marginal rates to 92% as we had in the 50s under Republican Eisenhower.
“Another means of silently lessening the inequality of property is to exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and to tax the higher portions of property in geometric progression as they rise”
~Thomas Jefferson (3rd President of the United States)
Comment by RioAmericanInBrasil
2015-03-21 15:19:38
…..Thomas Jefferson would be for progressive income tax today because the world has changed. …. Thomas Jefferson was for steeply progressive taxes. Thomas Jefferson was for a much more equal playing field. He would be for whatever it would take to lessen gross wealth-inequality in a changing world- thus the amendment processes he helped write allowing income tax in a modern age.
“The farmer will see his government supported, his children educated, and the face of this country made a paradise by the contributions of the rich alone, without his being called on to spend a cent from his earnings.”
Thomas Jefferson on Tariffs (The taxes of that time)
And here from the man who wrote the book on capitalism:
“The necessaries of life occasion the great expense of the poor. They find it difficult to get food, and the greater part of their little revenue is spent in getting it. The luxuries and vanities of life occasion the principal expense of the rich, and a magnificent house embellishes and sets off to the best advantage all the other luxuries and vanities which they possess. A tax upon house-rents, therefore, would in general fall heaviest upon the rich; and in this sort of inequality there would not, perhaps, be anything unreasonable. It is not very unreasonable that the rich should contribute to the public expense, not only in proportion to their revenue, but something more than in that proportion.“
Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations.
BTW, I find it interesting that a black man would even try to look to Jefferson for guidance considering his views on race:
I don’t understand anything about your post or who you are speaking of. And why would a modern day black man look at Jefferson’s views on progressive taxation any different than a white man?
Because Jefferson was a racist? It doesn’t all boil down to race Adan. Are you not capable of compartmentalizing separate issues?
You continue to ignore the very reason, the framers created a democratic republic and not a democracy and limited the functions of government. They wanted to avoid the failures of Rome and Greece. They knew that democracies fail when people vote themselves other people’s money. Jefferson would certainly not be for raising the income tax to provide more entitlement funding or even maintaining the existing entitlement funding. That would be considered an illegitimate function of the federal government. The federal government has more than enough revenue to carry out its constitutional functions. Aid for the poor should be funded by their families, their churches and other charities and local governments that cannot print money, in that order. We have a 18 trillion dollar debt primarily due to unconstitutional entitlement funding, subtract the war of terror and it still would be 16.4 trillion. That is the problem and Jefferson and the framers saw the problem and we are vindicating all their decisions.
Jefferson would certainly not be for raising the income tax to provide more entitlement funding or even maintaining the existing entitlement funding.
You are confused about cause and effect. We have entitlement funding greatly because of the massive inequality of wealth causing a “royal” class that Jefferson would have been totally against. The aristocratic class which has siphoned most the wealth was what Jefferson was against.
Steeply progressive income taxes invested in education, infrastructure, science, training, basic research and tax incentives for higher wages and pensions would greatly reduce our need for “entitlements”. If America’s massive productivity gains were shared much more equally, hundreds of millions of Americans would be much more wealthy.
And just as Jefferson believed in steeply progressive estate taxes to break up the “royal” class of landholders. (Redistribution of Wealth) Jefferson would most assuredly be for a steeply progressive income tax today, because that is a major tool of today to address the gross wealth inequality that stunts advancement and caused the need for more entitlements.
They wanted to avoid the failures of Rome and Greece
Part of the Greece/Roman failures were that they were too slow to change with the times. Thus the founder’s amendment process allowed in The Constitution which allowed the American Republic to institute income taxes.
Income tax is part of the modern world to fund modern governments to compete in a global world. You can’t say the founders would be against income taxes in 2015 based on their world in 1787. Why? because that would make America a much less powerful country than our “competitors”.
The founding fathers believed in the allowance for change, progressive taxes and believed in a much more egalitarian society as it was back then. In today’s world, a steeply progressive income tax would fulfill all of those founding father’s goals.
#CommunistManifesto
#CommunistManifesto
Exactly. And shades of 1984 where people that were for limited government, limited taxes and economic freedom are said to support big government or would support big government, if they were alive. No, they would support Cruz’s view of government. His view’s are rooted in the constitution which he understands. Obama is either ignorant of it or hostile to it or both.
You continue to ignore the very reason, the framers created a democratic republic and not a democracy and limited the functions of government. They wanted to avoid the failures of Rome and Greece.
What’s the difference between a democratic republic and not a democracy? What failures of Greece and Rome can a democratic republic avoid and how does it accomplish that?
#CommunistManifesto
I guess Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Herbert Hoover, and Theodore Roosevelt were “Communists” too.
“In her debate in Delaware yesterday, the Republican Senate candidate Christine O’Donnell asserted that the estate tax is a “tenet of Marxism.” I’m not sure how much Marx she has read, but she might want to read the works of his fellow travelers Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Herbert Hoover, and Theodore Roosevelt before her next debate.”
…If there was one thing the Revolutionary generation agreed on — and those guys who dress up like them at Tea Party conventions most definitely do not — it was the incompatibility of democracy and inherited wealth.
With Thomas Jefferson taking the lead in the Virginia legislature in 1777, every Revolutionary state government abolished the laws of primogeniture and entail that had served to perpetuate the concentration of inherited property. Jefferson cited Adam Smith, the hero of free market capitalists everywhere, as the source of his conviction that (as Smith wrote, and Jefferson closely echoed in his own words), “A power to dispose of estates for ever is manifestly absurd. The earth and the fulness of it belongs to every generation, and the preceding one can have no right to bind it up from posterity. Such extension of property is quite unnatural.” Smith said: “There is no point more difficult to account for than the right we conceive men to have to dispose of their goods after death.”
The states left no doubt that in taking this step they were giving expression to a basic and widely shared philosophical belief that equality of citizenship was impossible in a nation where inequality of wealth remained the rule.
Estate tax and the founding fathers
You can’t take it with you
http://www.economist.com/blogs/lexington/2010/10/estate_tax_and_founding_fathers
This is what I will never understand:
“If America’s massive productivity gains were shared much more equally”
Who is deciding that things are or are not “shared equally”, and what that “correct” proportion is? What is “incorrect” or “unequal” about the current distribution. By every single measure, the median standard of living in the US is today above what it was in 1950. What is unequal about that? For all these people “not sharing in the wealth”, what did they do to deserve “sharing in the wealth”? Is there some thing that the “median person” in the USA is doing differently today than in 1950, that qualifies them to get this bigger share?
People who have built and run companies definitely DO show what they have done. They build products that people choose to buy and give them money for. The only “unfairness” I see is the politicians we give power to de-regulating our import markets and cannibalizing our job market in the rush to offshore production. Well, that and politicians also bailing out the leech class of banking.
Every single “more fair” proposal I see is really about giving more money and power to politicians who have shown time and again, that what they are really doing is making things LESS fair through corrupt deals and payouts from the un-clean - un-american vultures who work to buy their influence to get around the “fair rules” like import tarrifs, and american private sector unions.
What failures of Greece and Rome can a democratic republic avoid and how does it accomplish that?
It limits what government can do and what people can even vote for which includes a prohibition on the entitlement programs. Unfortunately, the depression, largely caused by the Federal Reserve, caused the United States to ignore those limitations by expanding the commerce clause to allow the federal government to do just about anything the voters would vote for. It allowed politicians to really start buying votes and that is what the framers feared the most and correctly predicted would first bankrupt the country and then lead to the end of the democratic republic.
Math:
You’re incoherent.
By every single measure, the median standard of living in the US is today above what it was in 1950. What is unequal about that?
Has anyone stated that a statistic is unequal?
For all these people “not sharing in the wealth”, what did they do to deserve “sharing in the wealth”?
The same question could be asked about the people who have nearly all of the wealth.
I explicitly said, many of them have created businesses, worked long hours as doctors, lawyers, engineers, builders, software developers… Does Bill Gates and team not get credit for building Microsoft, and making windows and ms office, the drivers of the machine that has enabled the biggest productivity gains in the history of mankind?
Who is deciding that things are or are not “shared equally”
Societies and their leaders decide. Just as Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Herbert Hoover, and Theodore Roosevelt “decided” inherited massive wealth was a threat to American Democracy.
and what that “correct” proportion is?
One gauge of “correct” proportion in a country with large productivity gains would be for each generation to do better than their parents’ and with less debt. As USA had but does not have now - while the number of rich have skyrocketed and are way more rich in relative terms than before. Way.
What is “incorrect” or “unequal” about the current distribution
What is inequitable is that most of the productivity gains the past 35 years have pooled most only into the hands of the .1% which doesn’t now allow each new generation to do better than their parents. It also sets up the “aristocratic landed gentry” situation that the founders were so against.
By every single measure, the median standard of living in the US is today above what it was in 1950
TV’s and A/Cs bought on debt are not the measure of a healthy economy and society. However each new generation doing better than their parents is a measure of a healthy economy .
People don’t have cooler “stuff” than their parents because they have more wealth. People have cooler stuff now because of technology and cheaper stuff. The difference is that in the 50s when people had better stuff than their parents’ generation, the people in the 50’s were sharing much more equally in the production and profit of the 50’s new stuff.
Is there some thing that the “median person” in the USA is doing differently today than in 1950, that qualifies them to get this bigger share?
They are not getting a bigger share today. The average American is getting a much smaller share of the country’s increased production. Mostly because of changes in the tax codes and America’s Supply-Side religion of Capital above All.
Does Bill Gates and team not get credit for building Microsoft
Credit? Bill Gates would have done everything he did even if taxes would have made him “only” worth 10 Billion today instead of 60+ Billion.
Would 10 Billion not be enough “credit”? No, a computer geek, who was super intelligent but also lucky to be in the right place at the right time and who ripped off a lot of people deserves that extra 50+ billion dollars. Because 10 Billion isn’t much money for an average lifespan.
With Thomas Jefferson taking the lead in the Virginia legislature in 1777, every Revolutionary state government abolished the laws of primogeniture and entail that had served to perpetuate the concentration of inherited property.
I hope that is not your support for an estate tax because this has nothing to do with taxes. Primogeniture meant that the eldest son would get all the land and entail means that land that was sold could only be sold for the life of the person selling it and then it would revert back to the heirs of the seller. They are interesting property views but say nothing about estate taxes.
Mostly because of changes in the tax codes and America’s Supply-Side religion of Capital above All.
No, mostly because a flood of immigrants has kept labor in surplus and which party is most in favor of open borders?
Regarding Bill Gates and Microsoft, you’re probably aware that the federal government developed the Internet and GPS. You may not know that the government paid for the development of many different types of technologies that are used in a Windows PC. This goes all the way back to the days when computers were made out of vacuum tubes and relays. Unlike private corporations, the government didn’t patent those developments. They were handed over free to business.
It limits what government can do and what people can even vote for which includes a prohibition on the entitlement programs. Unfortunately, the depression, largely caused by the Federal Reserve, caused the United States to ignore those limitations by expanding the commerce clause to allow the federal government to do just about anything the voters would vote for. It allowed politicians to really start buying votes and that is what the framers feared the most and correctly predicted would first bankrupt the country and then lead to the end of the democratic republic.
So Social Security and the rest of the New Deal signified the end of the democratic republic, whatever the hell that is. I guess that things were so much better at the beginning when women couldn’t vote and there was slavery and child labor and so forth.
They were handed over NOT FOR FREE, at the expense of the taxpayer, for all of the citizens of the United States, including Bill Gates. Including YOU. Bill Gates then did something that touched that also. The internet as part of windows is a much later development. By the way, the TAXPAYERS handed over for the government to use, money with which to do this research.
You or any other person at the time were free to potentially use that research to build something. Gates did. You didn’t. If you had, you would have 60 billion, not him. This gives you no extra right to the fruits of what he did, other than you choosing to enter into an agreement with him to use what he developed for an agreed price. Subject to further sales tax potentially by the way, and for his corporation to pay tax, and for him to pay tax on his salary. At extraordinarily high rates (greater than 20%). AFTER he pays salary and the associated income taxes on all of his employees salaries…
And you have the balls to say this is the guy not contributing to the welfare of the country????? That man has done more for humanity than you or probably 50 generations of your offspring ever will.
I’m not going to say everyone is a Bill Gates. But we are talking about Doctors, engineers, construction builders, and product manufacturers also. These are the people that most end up getting caught up in these class warfare diatribes. I also won’t deny that there are business people and investors that press for lower wages to increase profits.
Rio actually gets on his high horse and actually tries to define what is a “correct” distribution of wealth. Nice opinion. Thank goodness that guy isn’t in charge. He can’t even comprehend that “cooler stuff” is actually an increased standard of living. Lower mpg cars. higher power computers. more energy efficient houses. It must have just magically appear from his flying spaghetti monster. Wake up diptard, people made that stuff, and distributed it to you. For profit.
Finally there is this: Who decides? and the answer:
“Societies and their leaders decide.”
Well, how’s that going in Venezuela? The leaders and society decided didn’t they? Must be everyone with an increased standard of living, right? How about your previous bastion of government love, Brazil… how they doing down there?
Don’t get me wrong, I DO understand what you think is fair. That’s not what I don’t understand. What I don’t understand is how you can look at what you think is the right thing to do, see 5000 failed examples of its implementation, then call the richest (one of?) median standard of living on the planet “the wrong way to do things” and claim the people are impoverished. plain diptard is all I see.
Mike
“Math:
You’re incoherent.”
I will no longer bother replying to you in plain english as it is unintelligible to you.
They were handed over NOT FOR FREE, at the expense of the taxpayer, for all of the citizens of the United States, including Bill Gates. Including YOU. Bill Gates then did something that touched that also. The internet as part of windows is a much later development.
What do you mean, NOT FOR FREE. Did Microsoft pay the government a license fee to use the technology developed with taxpayer funds? Also, as I mentioned, it’s more than the just the internet that was developed by the government. It was dozens of different important developments. The whole industry was built on corporate welfare.
And you have the balls to say this is the guy not contributing to the welfare of the country????? That man has done more for humanity than you or probably 50 generations of your offspring ever will.
I didn’t make a statement one way or the other about his contributions to anyone’s welfare.
Finally there is this: Who decides? and the answer:
“Societies and their leaders decide.”
Well, how’s that going in Venezuela?
You revert to straw-man arguments a lot. Venezuela?
So you are comparing Venezuela’s “deciding” to Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Herbert Hoover, and Theodore Roosevelt’s deciding? That makes no sense.
As far as “standard of living”, A kid’s new iphone in 2015 does not equal the advantage of 1950’s cheap education and a job market with well paying jobs.
And Bill Gates would have done everything he did even if taxes would have made him “only” worth 10 Billion today instead of 60+ Billion. Why would he not? He’d go Galt because 10 Billion was not “enough”? No.
Rio actually gets on his high horse and actually tries to define what is a “correct” distribution of wealth. Nice opinion. Thank goodness that guy isn’t in charge.
And in your opinion you might “thank god” Adam Smith, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Herbert Hoover, and Theodore Roosevelt are not in charge either. Because they more closely align with my opinions on this matter than they do towards yours.
Check under timing and you will find your answer, I think:
http://www.thefreelibrary.com/Stock+buybacks%3a+the+rules.-a054636937
Reading this far down, I’m moving the Lola meltdown clock up another minute. 2 minutes to Mango Meltdown.
Reading this far down, I’m moving the Lola meltdown clock up another minute. 2 minutes to Mango Meltdown.
You should move the Adan rac!st meltdown clock up 2 hours. He already did it. Read it and weep. Your “friend” has been unmasked.
How’s that for “irony” ShillowPicker?
Excerpt:
TIMING STOCK PURCHASES
Even if a board of directors authorizes the immediate launch of a buyback program, the rules covering the timing of purchases around major developments within the company may cause the CFO to delay implementing it. “We advise the company not to conduct a program at all if there is any material inside information that the company is aware of that has not been publicly disclosed,” says Jayne M. Donegan, a corporate and securities-law attorney with Brown, Rudnick, Freed & Gesmer in Providence, Rhode Island. “For example, if the company is in merger negotiations or it knows the earnings but those earnings haven’t been released, the company should not be out purchasing its stock.”
To address potential insider trading, many companies inform their brokers that they may be required to suspend on short notice purchases authorized as part of an ongoing repurchase program. In fact, many companies apply the same “blackout period”–forbidding all trades–to corporate repurchases as they do for insider stock purchases by individuals. For example, a company may decide not to trade during a period that extends from 10 days before through two days after any earnings release.
nice dude
You kind of get the feeling the corporations are running a pump and dump scheme.
Got a five-figure bonus this year. Of which, 40% was extracted in Fed/state/local taxes.
Guess that’s the price I get to pay to keep the sales and property tax exemptions on the airplanes I work on.
“America, F##k yeah!”
God forbid that I point out what BS this is. That would make me a “taker”.
And a racist
“Got a five-figure bonus this year.”
Congrats!
Yes, congrats!
A five figure bonus for a working stiff is as rare as a virgin at a frat party.
“A five figure bonus for a working stiff is as rare as a virgin at a frat party.”
I’m afraid I am going to have to throw a flag on that statement because it’s an insult to, well it’s gotta be an insult to somebody from some group that looks for people who insult them.
You should ask In Colorado where former HBB poster Overtaxed is
#TheRedPill
Your money is our money so we could buy more votes - Dumbocrats
Your money is our money so we could give it back to the richmen - Rethugnicans
Nothing will change unless you end the duopoly.
My wife is turning Republican due to the taxes we pay. And this is saying a lot…her mom is a hard-core, teacher’s union-supporting, Maddow-preaching, Bush-hating Democrat.
I guess when a huge percentage of your bonuses get siphoned off, you start to question a bit more where it all goes.
I guess when a huge percentage of your bonuses get siphoned off, you start to question a bit more where it all goes.
A lot of it goes to pay for the tax-cuts for the rich. Voting Repub won’t help unless your wife will exchange a 2% tax cut for her for an additional 10% tax cut for the super rich.
And Obama cut taxes massively in his first term and most of the tax cut went to the middle class. That’s why the Repubs fought them and held them hostage to much greater tax cuts for the rich.
My taxes going to pay for tax cuts? And what tax cuts would those be? LOL What a bunch of sh*t.
My revenues are paying for lack of revenues elsewhere? LOL
If would be funny if it weren’t such a sad representation of the left’s view of the world.
No my taxes are going to pay for the military, Medicare, interest on the debt, discretionary spending, pork in laws, etc., etc., etc.
My wife started out living on a mattress in a barren studio apartment in a complex filled with meth labs. She worked through lawschool while walking through the tenderloin in SF after taking the train. Got a job through this effort at a big firm, busted her *ss as an associate–for perspective on her workload, her last year there, she BILLED 1,900 hours through JULY.
She then went in-house as we started to have children. Busted her *ss again through three pregnancies and maternity leaves in order to maintain her position (because no matter how forward thinking a company is…out of sight, out of mind). She worked from home during her last “leave”. And now, after a couple of decades of busting her *ss after college, she is making very good money. But she is still busting her *ss. Last night she got 2 hours of sleep–took a nap in the middle of the night for a couple of hours and had a conference call on another continent at 6:00am.
And ignoring 20 years of effort that put her in this position, the government (state PLUS fed PLUS extras) feels fit to tax her over 50% for any bonus she makes for her last 12 months of work.
And it pisses her off. Rightfully so.
And you try to give me some line about it being all the rich folks’ fault because they are getting all the tax breaks.
Newsflash: Because of my wife’s tireless efforts, we are fortunate enough to be in the camp that you say are getting all the tax breaks. I’d sure love to see some of those breaks–because from what I see, those tax breaks are an illusion made up by people like you as a way to justify your ignorance of what the tax code really means for hard work and success.
According to the tax whores, that is all a figment of your imagination. You don’t exist. First, no one can “pull themselves up by their bootstraps”. It was your imagination that actual hard work occurred. No one can do that. It’s impossible. If it actually happened, it wasn’t you, the government fairy actually did everything, and you just rode a lucky current.
Plus, just imagine it did happen (which it didn’t). We live in a utopia where none of our government actions have negative or unintended consequences. To say otherwise must make you a conservative, and therefore you think the earth is 6000 years old, and you hate science, and we can’t listen to what you say because of that.
Finally, since you claim to be making money in our highest tax bracket, it doesn’t matter if its hard work or inheritance, or investing, or any other thing making you the income. Your work should go to society, not to your family. You need to pay for the bad decisions of generations who squandered their futures on booze, drugs, bad choices, overpriced housing, out of wedlock babies, and any other general poor life choices. Because they didn’t save to pay for it and someone has to. You look like a mule we can harness, so get back in your rut, and keep plowing our field.
The grand irony of it all is that I credit my wife’s work ethic to her Maddow-praising mother, who taught my wife that above all, she needed to make sure that she was self-sufficient…because she should never find herself in a position where she needed to rely upon anyone else for anything.
My taxes going to pay for tax cuts? And what tax cuts would those be
Middle-class taxes subsidize the rich’s greatly declining percentage of tax they pay on income and wealth, and subsidize multiple corporate tax breaks that subsidize the profits in companies which give massive stock-option, lessor taxed capital gains to said rich. The right refusing to see reality is actually your “bunch of sh*t”.
American Families Are Bearing the Tax Burden
http://www.forbes.com/sites/moneywisewomen/2011/11/16/american-families-are-bearing-the-tax-burden/
…..the middle class is suffering from bearing the brunt of the tax burden. In an ideal situation, people and business would pay taxes proportional to their earnings and tax bracket. The scales however, are not balanced in the country’s tax practices.
No wonder the middle class is shrinking. At the same time more people are falling into the ranks of the poor, painful budget cuts make life harder for those in need. One budget cut took $375 million from jobs under the Senior Community Service Employment Program (SCSEP). Another took $425 million from low income housing under the Section 202 Supportive Housing for the Elderly program. There simply isn’t enough federal revenue to help all of the people in need.
The Corporate Tax Rate
As of today the corporate tax rate is between 15 and 39 percent, which sound like fair enough figures. Close studies by Citizens for Tax Justice and the Institute on Taxation and Economic Policy however, show that of 280 of the nation’s biggest companies have slithered their way around the corporate tax rate. They really pay only about 18.5 percent. These studies confirm what many long suspected; that the tax code benefits corporate taxpayers through loopholes often influenced by special interests.
The 280-business study consisted of only Fortune 500 companies and they were all profitable between the economic crash of 2008 and 2010. The number crunching revealed that 111 of those companies paid less than 17.5 percent of their taxes, 98 of them paid between 17.5 and 30 percent, 71 paid over 30 percent, but 30 companies paid nothing at all.
Another 2008 study, this from the Government Accountability Office, showed that 55 percent of US companies found a way to avoid paying taxes altogether in at least one out of seven years examined.
We live in a utopia where none of our government actions have negative or unintended consequences.
A post mostly filled mostly with buzzwords (utopia etc.) and straw-man false arguments. No?
such a sad representation of the left’s view of the world.
There is nothing “left-wing” about progressive taxation. Nothing. It is an American concept going back to Jefferson and the founding fathers.
Progressive taxation is not “left”. Progressive taxation is a centrist, basic foundation of American fairness. It’s only now that massive right-wing propaganda has made you think progressive taxation is “left-wing”. It’s not and never was.
“Middle-class taxes subsidize the rich’s greatly declining percentage of tax they pay on income and wealth, and subsidize multiple corporate tax breaks that subsidize the profits in companies which give massive stock-option, lessor taxed capital gains to said rich. The right refusing to see reality is actually your “bunch of sh*t”.”
Your facts are plain wrong rio. Please refrain from posting lies. Here is a straight forward source on taxes paid by income quitile:
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxtopics/currentdistribution.cfm
Dispute it if you want, but do it with facts, because my sources show you are plain lying.
“such a sad representation” -
“There is nothing “left-wing” about progressive taxation. ”
yet another reading comprehension fail. You misattribute the quote to a a diatribe against progressive taxation? Learn to read if you want to argue against what someone is writing.
He was clearly talking about the spin buzzwords “paying for tax cuts”. If you think you can connect the dots to some other gibberish you want to spout, at least try to do so (connect the dots). Otherwise, lying is just really pathetic…
Your facts are plain wrong rio.
Not even. My facts are not wrong. The rich’s wealth has skyrocketed in real terms while the percentage of tax they pay on their skyrocketing wealth has declined. The middle-class is subsidizing taxes that used to be collected from the rich. It’s history and fact.
http://cloudfront.mediamatters.org/static/uploader/image/2014/04/15/4.15_income_tax_reduction_for_wealthy.png
You misattribute the quote to a a diatribe against progressive taxation
Dang. My point is that if the rich paid the same percentage in income tax on their income and wealth as they did historically, then the middle and upper-middle class could be taxed less. And the middle-class taxes are “paying for tax cuts” for the rich. It’s math mathguy.
yet another reading comprehension fail
From you.
“subsidize multiple corporate tax breaks that subsidize the profits in companies which give massive stock-option, lessor taxed capital gains to said rich. The right refusing to see reality is actually your “bunch of sh*t”.”
Your “reality” is BS and shows you don’t know what you are talking about.
While some options may be taxed at capital gains rates (ISOs), the vast majority of stock options are taxed at ordinary rates. ISOs have substantial limitations, and so they are infrequently used. The two big problems with ISOs are:
1. For the corporation, when the ISO is exercised, there is no deduction for compensation expense for the “spread”; and
2. For the individual, when the ISO is exercised, the “spread” is included in that individual’s AMT calculation.
Mostly, NQOs (non-qualified options) are issued, which are taxed at ordinary rates upon exercise and are deducted as a comp expense, making them more beneficial to companies as a way of compensation.
Are you going to give me any examples of “tax breaks” that corporations get are not expenses of the business?
And where did I say that your “view of the world” was about progressive taxation? Your “view of the world” is that the level government spending is “fixed”, and what you are solving for is simply who pays the bill.
This is behind the whole world view behind your very first statement that I’m paying more because someone else is paying less.
No. I’m paying more because the government isn’t spending less. And to pay the bill, Obama didn’t want to make everyone pay more–even at the same rates that he said were in place “when our economy created nearly 23 million new jobs, the biggest surplus in history and a whole lot of millionaires to boot.” He wanted to borrow some, and take some out of the highest earning families.
The left seems to think that we have a taxing problem (not taxing people enough–the rich need to pay MORE to keep paying for sh*t). The right thinks that we have a spending problem.
If you ever get a thoughtful Democrat NOT on the campaign trail, they will tell you that there are not enough rich to tax to solve our spending problem.
And that’s the sad reality.
While some options may be taxed at capital gains rates (ISOs), the vast majority of stock options are taxed at ordinary rates.
But that does not matter in the context of historically low tax rates on the highest incomes. Not including capital gains, the percentage tax rates on higher incomes are at an historical low. (Amost 80 year lows)
The left seems to think that we have a taxing problem
Because we do. Look. If the tax percentage rates on the rich are at an historical low while their real income is off the charts and while the middle-class is subsidizing that, well, then how can we not have a taxing problem?
This is behind the whole world view behind your very first statement that I’m paying more because someone else is paying less.
You are paying more than you should and the USA is borrowing more than it should because the rich are paying an historic low percentage of their skyrocketing income in taxes.
And they control and hoard more capital than at most other points in American history.
“My point is that if the rich paid the same percentage in income tax on their income and wealth as they did historically, then the middle and upper-middle class could be taxed less.”
Except to my understanding, there never has been a “wealth tax” in the US.
Income is not the same as wealth.
And so if you are trying to make up the tax/wealth disparity by continuing to increase taxes on income, you will never get there.
To think otherwise is a math fail.
And if you think creating a wealth tax is the solution, ask people in Paris what has been happening to real estate values in the nice parts of town. Values are falling as the wealth leaves the country.
“Not including capital gains, the percentage tax rates on higher incomes are at an historical low.”
Really?
Seems like they are higher today than during the 90’s (Obamacare PLUS highest rate equal to Clinton era).
What kind of math are you using?
if you are trying to make up the tax/wealth disparity by continuing to increase taxes on income, you will never get there.
You miss the point. The tax “deciders” should have no interest in increasing someone’s income tax like yours. You are subsidizing the very rich.
there never has been a “wealth tax” in the US.
Yes there was for decades-The Estate Tax, before it was gutted in 2003’s Jobs and Growth Tax Relief and Reconciliation Act.
What kind of math are you using?
The math that is talking about the very rich. Not you.
“You miss the point. The tax “deciders” should have no interest in increasing someone’s income tax like yours. You are subsidizing the very rich.”
No, you are missing the point. There are two sides to the equation, revenues, and spending. Your whole line of reasoning presupposes that our level of spending is just fine. It is not. Government spending as a percentage of GDP is the highest in history.
The top 10% are subsidizing the over-spending of the 90%.
Define “very rich”.
Define “very rich”
That’s a common, right-wing deflection to make people wary about talking about raising taxes on the rich to historic levels.
But, I’m not actually making or influencing laws. So you define it.
Hint: It’s a club and you’re not in it.
Your whole line of reasoning presupposes that our level of spending is just fine.
No it does not. I have not addressed spending. Do you want to start with military spending? And Corporate welfare?
The top 10% are subsidizing the over-spending of the 90%.
Which is a classic symptom of gross wealth and income inequality.
Cause and effect.
I need to cook dinner, but here’s my point:
The US unfunded liabilities is well over $50T (based on current entitlements, etc.). I’ve seen some people put the estimate of over $100T.
The entire Wealth of the top 20% of households (23 million households) is $34 Trillion as of 2011.
If you put the “ultra wealthy” in the category of $100MM and above, you could take every penny of their wealth and not fill the hole we have with current laws.
We spend too much, and there aren’t enough ultra-wealthy to tax.
Your whole line of reasoning presupposes that our level of spending is just fine.
You care about “spending”? But don’t acknowledge the implications that The USA spends 18% of GDP on health-care but has worse results than countries’ spending 10%? (And a lot of USA’s is government spending.)
Going to single-payer could very well save USA 7-8% of GDP. That is so huge but the right ignores it and lies about it.
That’s why the right’s concern about “spending” is suspect.
If you put the “ultra wealthy” in the category of $100MM and above, you could take every penny of their wealth and not fill the hole we have with current laws.
That reasoning holds no weight. My income isn’t squat compared to what the USA “owes” and my income won’t make any difference in the debt.
But that does not mean that I should not be subject to American income tax as I have historically been required to pay.
Look, Lola is a moron. Time and again it is obvious he does not know what he is talking about and just goes and Googles for some ancient article or out of context quote to cut and paste. Seriously he is a waste of effort, except for poking fun.
Time and again it is obvious (Rio) does not know what he is talking about
OK.
Name one thing that I don’t know what I’m talking about.
“But that does not mean that I should not be subject to American income tax as I have historically been required to pay.”
There you are again. Income tax? or Wealth tax?
And with respect to spending, the unfunded liabilities are pretty much Social Security and Medicare. And so while I welcome cutting defense (why do we need all the overseas bases now?), that’s not the problem.
“Name one thing that I don’t know what I’m talking about.”
Tax treatment of corporate option grants.
That was easy.
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/taxfacts/displayafact.cfm?Docid=456
And you keep talking about the top 1% paying the lowest in history. The rate by the top 1% is not too far out of whack from the past 35 years.
There you are again. Income tax? or Wealth tax?
Yes again. In aggregate, I have addressed both more than once here. The income tax and the wealth (inheritance tax).
Both. Why is this so hard to comprehend?
Tax treatment of corporate option grants.
I already addressed the similarity between ultra-low capital gains taxes and ultra-low top marginal income tax rates.
But I was was addressing the angry ShillowPicker.
“Name one thing that I don’t know what I’m talking about.”
The rate by the top 1% is not too far out of whack from the past 35 years.
I was addressing the effective tax rates of the .1% and the .01%, not the 1%.
The 1% as you seem to claim to be, does not really seem to factor in American’s current and new inequity imo.
I cheer for the bottom 90% of America’s top 1%. They actually create jobs.
Congratulations on the bonus! That rocks.
Beats working for tips huh Lola.
Cratortown USA.
People with mortgages are a bunch of sad, old loosers.
Imagine no payments - now imagine immeasurable freedom.
this is what i want to be when i grow up:
http://vandogtraveller.com/
Kreightorsburg USA.
Nasty tax surprise for Obamacare customers
Dan Mangan
CNBC
1 Hour Ago
For millions of people this tax season, Obamacare won’t be quite a “50-50″ proposition, but it will sure come close.
Half of the households that received federal subsidies to help pay for their health insurance in 2014 will have to repay some money back to the government when they file their tax returns, a new analysis released Tuesday estimates.
The average repayment owed by those people will be $794, the Kaiser Family Foundation study found. The repayments will be owed because those households’ actual incomes ended up being higher for the year than what they had estimated when they applied for the subsidies.
For millions of people this tax season, Obamacare won’t be quite a “50-50″ proposition, but it will sure come close.
Half of the households that received federal subsidies to help pay for their health insurance in 2014 will have to repay some money back to the government when they file their tax returns, a new analysis released Tuesday estimates.
The average repayment owed by those people will be $794, the Kaiser Family Foundation study found. The repayments will be owed because those households’ actual incomes ended up being higher for the year than what they had estimated when they applied for the subsidies.
Read More Uninsured opt for Obamacare fine?
Another 45 percent of households that received such subsidies will be owed a refund, because they should have received more of those tax credits last year based on their final annual incomes. Their estimated average refund will be $773, Kaiser said.
But the Kaiser study also found that a relatively small group of households will owe back a lot more than the average when it comes to refunds, after their actual incomes ended up being too high to qualify for the subsidies they got.
That group of people will have an average repayment of between $2,306 and $3,837—and some could owe much more. Unlike people who earn below 400 percent of the federal poverty line, higher earners have no limit on the subsidies they must pay back if they were not entitled to them.
And those amounts will come as a surprise to many Obamacare customers, who may not have understood that their subsidies have to be reconciled with their taxes, and as a result will offset the amount of tax refunds they were expecting, or lead to them actually cutting a check to the Internal Revenue Service.
“Some people are not going to know this was coming,” Claxton said.
“In the first year, many people did not even realize they were receiving subsidies,” the Kaiser study noted.
Claxton said, “I think over time, people who use this program will come to realize the importance of making the adjustments through the year.”
Half of the households that received federal subsidies to help pay for their health insurance in 2014 will have to repay some money back to the government when they file their tax returns, a new analysis released Tuesday estimates.
And repaying undeserved subsidies is bad because?
Because Obama is a Marxist and was born in Africa?
“What the large print giveth, the small print taketh away” — Tom Waits
And repaying undeserved subsidies is bad because?
To combine both your posts, because if a private company has engaged in practices similar to Obamacare we would have newspapers filled with stories about how they acted fraudulently. How many stories did we hear about homeowners that did not understand that their 2% interest on their mortgages only lasted two years? So was it too much to ask for the government to be more clear and Obama in particular. Should he not have told people they can keep their doctors, their health plans, the plans would actually be cheaper? These practices and statements would be fraud if done by a private entity shouldn’t we expect a higher standard from government.
by Infowars.com | March 24, 2015
As Infowars reported last week, a “realistic” military training exercise involving Navy Seals, the Green Berets and the 82nd Airborne Division known as “Jade Helm 15″ will be conducted throughout Texas, Arizona, California, New Mexico, Utah, Nevada and Colorado from July 15 to September 15.
The exercise, which will include role-players “wearing civilian clothes and driving civilian vehicles,” lists both Texas and Utah as “hostile” territory.
USASOC spokesman Lt. Col. Mark Lastoria responded Monday by labeling Infowars’ reporting as “alarmist” while failing to mention the disturbing designation placed on Texas and Utah.
The exercise is one of many in recent years that not only attempts to acclimate the public to seeing military personnel on American streets, but to also condition troops to feel comfortable operating domestically.
If you are in a Jade Helm 15 state, is your state…
Red: Hostile
Blue: Permissive
Brown: Uncertain (Leaning Hostile)
Light Blue: Uncertain (Leaning Friendly)
Texas and Utah as “hostile” territory
Texas and Utah are hostile to Obama.
California is (Blue: Permissive) but it does look to have an insurgent pocket.
DoD Plans Exercises in Civilian Areas in Western US => May …
http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/…/ - 140k - Cached - Similar pages
4 days ago … Map Infowars … “Jade Helm is a challenging eight-week joint military and … the training drill, which runs from July 15 through September 15.
Where exactly did that map come from? Did infowars just make it up?
They have a link to it. Could be Ukraine practice.
More States Added to ‘Jade Helm’ Military Exercise
‘Realistic Military Training’ exercise expands to as many as ten states
by Adan Salazar & Mikael Thalen | Infowars.com | March 24, 2015
The US military has quietly added more states to its eight-week Jade Helm joint training drill, originally designated to take place in seven southwestern states.
Speaking of the exercise at the Brazos County Commissioners Court in Texas last month, Jade Helm Operations Planner and retired Green Beret Thomas Mead told an audience that the drill, which will run from July 15 to September 15, will now include the states Mississippi and Florida.
“The exercise is actually an eight-week exercise taking place across seven states,” Mead explains. “As you can see right there, it spans the whole southwest of the United States. We’ve also added Mississippi and we have a group also working out of Florida.”
“We’ll have Navy Seals that’ll be conducting targets and training down in the Mississippi area,” Mead also says.
The interagency, unconventional warfare exercise, lasting eight weeks, will utilize 1,200 special forces personnel from multiple branches of the US military, including Army Green Berets, Navy Seals, Marine Special Operations Command and the 82nd Airborne Division, according to a Powerpoint presentation regarding the exercise.
Jade Helm Military Exercise
Operations Planner Francisco Oquendo Jr. also says “specific apparatuses” in the Brazos County area will be targeted for “surgical strikes” during a special extraction mission involving helicopters flying in from Louisiana.
A local Standard-Times report also lists “Louisiana” as one of the participating states.
The exercise serves to hone troops’ advanced skills in “large areas of undeveloped land with low population densities,” and will allow them to work alongside “civilians to gain their trust and an understanding of the issues.”
“This allows our soldiers to get a better training environment,” Mead said in an interview with news outlet MySouTex.com last year.
“We’re getting these guys back into the woods,” said Mead.
“We’re getting them back into the field to make it hard for them.”
Additionally, two states – Texas and Utah – appear highlighted as “hostile” territory, according to the slideshow, leading to fears that traditionally conservative areas may be a simulated target for future domestic operations.
The U.S. Army has even built a mock American city in Virginia, complete with subway carriages carrying the exact same logo as those seen in Washington DC, to practice occupying urban areas.
U.S. Army Special Operations Command spokesman Lt. Col. Mark Lastoria has attempted to tamp down concerns over the drills, claiming they are “Just a regular training exercise,” and adding that more information on the drills would be released later today.
Although similar drills have been carried out domestically in the past, such exercises are increasingly being conducted among civilian populations, suggesting an attempt to acclimate and condition the public to a persistent military presence.
In the past few years alone, the US Army has carried out numerous drills in American cities, with low flying “black helicopters” disturbing residents of Minnesota, buzzing residents of Dallas and frightening Miami residents with simulated gunfire.
http://www.infowars.com/more-states-added-to-jade-helm-military-exercise/ - 100k -
Federal court rejects Third Amendment claim against police officers
Nevada family claimed local police violated Amendment by forcibly occupying their home in order to gain a “tactical advantage” against suspected criminals
Image Credits: Jamelle Bouie / Wiki
by Ilya Somin | Washington Post | March 24, 2015
Back in 2013, a lot of attention focused on a Third Amendment claim against Henderson, Nevada police officers. I wrote about the case here. The Third Amendment, which forbids the “quartering” of “soldiers” in private homes without the owner’s consent, is often the butt of jokes because it is so rarely litigated. But in this case, a Nevada family claimed that local police had violated the Amendment by forcibly occupying their home in order to gain a “tactical advantage” against suspected criminals in the neighboring house.
In this recent ruling, federal district court Judge Andrew Gordon dismissed the Third Amendment claim [HT: VC reader Sean Flaim]. Although it occurred several weeks ago, the ruling seems to have gotten very little attention from either the media or legal commentators outside Nevada. That is unfortunate, because the ruling raises important issues about the scope of the Third Amendment, and its applicability against state and local governments. A Here are the key passages from the opinion:
In the present case, various officers of the HPD and NLVPD entered into and occupied Linda’s and Michael’s home for an unspecified amount of time (seemingly nine hours), but certainly for less than twenty-four hours. The relevant questions are thus whether municipal police should be considered soldiers, and whether the time they spent in the house could be considered quartering. To both questions, the answer must be no.
I hold that a municipal police officer is not a soldier for purposes of the Third Amendment. This squares with the purpose of the Third Amendment because this was not a military intrusion into a private home, and thus the intrusion is more effectively protected by the Fourth Amendment. Because I hold that municipal officers are not soldiers for the purposes of this question, I need not reach the question of whether the occupation at issue in this case constitutes quartering, though I suspect it would not.
pigmen gonna pig
That’s the problem with the Constitution, it means whatever the Supremes say it means, no matter how illogical their rulings.
you serfs need to sacrafice interest on your savings so corporations can keep borrowing at zero and buying stock so they can cash out options.
Oh goody!!! I get to go to a one-day seminar. But which one?
The one in Chicago, next to ORD, or
The one in Dallas, near DFW
Dallas is ALWAY a Charlie-Foxtrot, and gets worse all of the time. But if I go there, I can have dinner with my cuzzin, which is always a riot. (We don’t get out much…..)
Haven’t been to Chi-Town lately. If I go there, I’ll try to go by Waukegan, and see my buddy from school I haven’t seen for 30 years.
Decisions, decisions……….
Go to Chicago.
It is going to implode soon for all the same insane progressive reasons as Detroit imploded.
At least you will be able to say “I remember Chicago when…”
What $100,000 in student debt feels like
CNNMoney.com - 3/24/2015
It’s a choke-hold on young people starting their lives — It means putting off getting married, having children, and buying that first home.
William Wayne Bowles, 27 years old. $114,000 in student debt
Despite being neck deep in debt, Bowles is back in school getting a graduate degree. That means he’s taking on more debt even as he’s putting other big life decisions on hold. His life goals are to start a family, have kids and buy a home.
“That seems pretty far off right now with student loan debts staring me in the eyes,” Bowles said.
But he’s optimistic that a graduate degree from Columbia University, where he is enrolled currently, will help him pay off $50,000 in the next three years. How?
“Lots of ramen.”
Bowles muses he could also work for a nonprofit or the government, where he has a chance of his loans being forgiven after 10 years.
—
Shannon works as a production assistant at a television channel. Her payment on her student loan is $350 a month, which is about half of her weekly paycheck. She said she regularly misses payments and dodges calls from creditors.
If she could do it over again, Shannon said she wouldn’t take out so much money.
“I probably would have taken one or 2 loans, and then I would have hustled. I would have picked up groceries in college, I would have babysat everybody, because they guarantee you a degree, but they don’t guarantee you a job, and they still want their money.”
Good point, Clinton and Bush should have to answer this question today!!
http://peakoil.com/publicpolicy/using-iraq-and-libya-as-a-lens
“But here’s the thing. We have a yawning gap here. After sell-side analysts got done tracing their all-seasons hockey sticks several quarters into the future and finished deleting any expected charges to earnings that might plausibly be dismissed as “non-recurring”, the implied forward ex-items EPS for the Russell 2000 disseminated by Wall Street was exactly $63.87 per share.
By contrast, the actual 4-quarter GAAP result through December 2014 reported to the SEC was $14.18 per share. Needless to say, to blithely ignore this blinding difference—as surely Yellen did—-is an egregious dereliction of duty.
And the reason is this: The Fed has caused two thundering stock market bubbles and crashes already this century—–which resulted in $8 trillion and $10 trillion of devastating losses, respectively. Moreover, these cliff-diving crashes happened suddenly and were consummated within a matter of months, meaning that the Wall Street insiders and fast money traders got out and then returned to scavenge the bottom, while the main street homegamers took it in the chin twice.”
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-03-24/why-yellen-feds-are-bubble-blind-they-apparently-believe-wall-streets-eps-scam
Documents Show DHS Released 165,900 Convicted Criminal Aliens within Last Year
Government purposely floods country with convicted criminals
by Judicial Watch | March 24, 2015
Judicial Watch today released 76 pages of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) documents revealing that as of April 26, 2014, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) had released 165,900 convicted criminal aliens throughout the United States, including many convicted of such violent crimes as homicide, sexual assault, kidnapping, and aggravated assault. (Reports recently detailed that ICE released another 30,000 in the most recent fiscal year, which brings the grand total of known criminals released by the Obama administration to 195,900.)
The documents were released through a July 21, 2014, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of Homeland Security (No. 1:14-cv-01237)) filed by Judicial Watch after DHS failed to respond to a May 15 FOIA request seeking:
Any and all records of communications including, but not limited to, emails and memoranda, to or from personnel in the office of the Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (including its component offices, such as the Office of Public Affairs), from May 1 to May 15, 2014, concerning, regarding, or related to the report published by the Center for Immigrations Studies concerning the release of 36,000 criminal aliens.
The ICE documents confirm a May 2014 Center Immigration Studies (CIS) report showing that in 2013 ICE freed 36,007 convicted criminal aliens, who had nearly 88,000 convictions, including 193 homicide convictions, 426 sexual assault convictions, and 303 kidnapping convictions.
As has been previously reported, and is evidenced in these documents, the 36,007 criminal aliens freed by ICE in 2013 were just the tip of the iceberg. In a DHS “Overview of ICE” document marked “FOR OFFICIAL USE ONLY,” the following figures are reported through April 26, 2014 [NOTE: “Final Order” indicates the illegal aliens were ordered to leave the country, but have not done so and remain free]:
Egypt: Groom fractures bride’s skull at his mother’s request
http://www.jihadwatch.org/2015/03/egypt-groom-fractures-brides-skull-at-his-mothers-request
“Scientists live off grants.”
“get with it, oh ye subsidized servants.”
The Fiction Of Climate Science
Gary Sutton
12/04/2009 @ 10:00AM
You can’t blame these scientists for sucking up to the fed’s mantra du jour. Scientists live off grants.
In 2002 I stood in a room of the Smithsonian. One entire wall charted the cooling of our globe over the last 60 million years. This was no straight line. The curve had two steep dips followed by leveling. There were no significant warming periods. Smithsonian scientists inscribed it across some 20 feet of plaster, with timelines.
Last year, I went back. That fresco is painted over. The same curve hides behind smoked glass, shrunk to three feet but showing the same cooling trend. Hey, why should the Smithsonian put its tax-free status at risk? If the politicians decide to whip up public fear in a different direction, get with it, oh ye subsidized servants. Downplay that embarrassing old chart and maybe nobody will notice.
Sorry, I noticed.
“Sorry, I noticed.”
I’ve noticed that every scientist that denies global warming, also gets funding from the oil industry.
Mute the 30 second ad and watch the vid
Guns & Roses - One In A Million:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s9B7hgSztA0
Mute ad on this one too and go to the vid (can’t believe this song is 20 years old)
De La Soul - Stakes Is High
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sj-vPcCfQ6k
Re-post of a modern masterpiece, my favorite line from the album “if you think that hip-hop got its start out in Queensbridge, pop that junk up in the Bronx and you might not live”
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f1OhaXQ0Tcc
Cypress Hill - (self-titled album) 1991:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQ7DOkfbgpQ
Dig the first song: Pigs
http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/03/24/the-gops-10-commandments-on-climate-change/
Happy Birthday Ben!!
Sorry I’m not organized enough to post it so that you might actually see it today and I suspect you’re done for the night. Your gift will be delivered via Pay Pal (since I’m not organized enough to actually get a card out either.)
I hope you have a wonderful year full of capitalistic opportunities! Thanks for another year of the HBB!
Everything is for sale. Everything. But there are no buyers.
If Ted Cruz gets the Republican nomination, is a Hillary Clinton presidency in the bag?
A couple of hours ago I heard an NPR story about Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac where a guy who was interviewed offered the opinion that the reason the government hasn’t divested is because doing so would result in “another Great Depression.”
I can’t find the story after a couple of rounds of Google searches; if anyone locates this story, please post.
Late post I know.
Love my new work assignment - with people I knew for years, just like my current company, except these people are not snobs. The work is very familiar and I can jump right in and start confirming requirements, coding, maybe rapid prototyping, “getting my hands dirty” with JTAG / probes and testing concepts.
The pay is c-r-a-p but I still can “throw money away” - maximum - to a Roth 401k with catchup for over 50 and another $6,000 or so to a traditional IRA that can be legally converted every year to a Roth IRA - the principle converted is tax-free. Any gains are taxed.
Slam dunk.
Good. You seem to optimize the American worker’s situation as well as anyone. Congratulations and keep up the good work and good fight!
thanks. Anyone can do it (optimize). That is done over time - throw away techniques that do not work and keep the techniques that work.
ft dot com > GlobalEconomy >
US Economy
March 24, 2015 12:57 pm
Supreme Court to rule on underwater loans
Demetri Sevastopulo in Washington
A foreclosed home. Miami, Florida©Getty
When George Long lost his job in 2010, he faced the threat of losing his Florida home. But he managed to save his house after a court allowed him to erase the second mortgage on his property.
“It was enough stress and aggravation to have to go through this,” says Mr Long, using a pseudonym. “But being able to maintain some stability for our children . . . and not relocate was a big relief.”
Florida, Georgia and Alabama are the only states where following a 2012 appeals court ruling, someone in Chapter 7 bankruptcy can void a second mortgage — such as a home-equity loan — when the value of the property falls below the outstanding primary mortgage.
On Tuesday, the Supreme Court heard a case called Bank of America v Caulkett that has big implications for the US housing market. When it rules this year, it could prohibit the debt-stripping mechanism, or pave the way for courts across the country to allow the practice.
The outcome will be important in Florida where house prices plummeted after the financial crisis. Daren Blomquist, a property expert at RealtyTrac, says one in four mortgages in Florida remains “seriously underwater”, meaning the owner owes at least 25 per cent more than the value of the property.
Florida has 1.4m homes with negative equity — the biggest number in the US and 19 per cent of the nationwide total — and just under one quarter of those have a second mortgage, according to RealtyTrac.
Bank of America has asked the court to overturn two mortgage cancellations made possible by the 2012 ruling in a case called McNeal. Proponents of the debt-voiding mechanism argue that it facilitates debt-restructuring deals that save banks from costly foreclosures. They say such arrangements are harder to reach when a second-mortgage provider is lurking in the background.
Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics, says second mortgages were a “critical issue in the teeth of the housing crash” that “created havoc in the effort to work through all these troubles”.
…
Guess who is about to sign up for Obamacare?
4 reasons to sell your home now
CNNMoney.com - Kathryn Vasel - 3/25/2015
Attention potential sellers sitting on the fence: It could be time to make a move.
Mid-March to mid-April is the best time to hang the sale sign nationally, with homes selling 15% faster and for 2% more than the average sale, according to Zillow. The window tends to be a little earlier for sellers in warmer climates and a little later in colder climates.
“It’s still predominately a seller’s market, but less so than the last year or two,” said Stan Humphries, Zillow’s chief economist. “Some advantages are moving back to buyers; but largely and broadly … it’s still favoring the sellers.”
Here are four reasons you might want to list your home:
1. Low housing supply: Tight inventory is a main reason the ball is still in the sellers’ court.
2. Fewer cash buyers: All-cash and investment buyers helped buoy home sales in the last couple years. And while the acceleration of home prices has slowed from its recent double-digit growth, experts still expect modest gains this year, but with fewer cash buyers.
All-cash offers made up nearly 31% of sales in 2014, according to RealtyTrac, a 13% drop from 2013 and the lowest level in four years.
3. Higher interest rates: While mortgage rates remain low, experts predict more buyers will enter the market in the coming months.
“When interest rates are thought to be escalating, we see a wave up activity with people getting off the sidelines,” said Budge Huskey, president and CEO of Coldwell Banker Real Estate.
4. Rising rents: Rising rental prices could motivate tenants to make the leap into home ownership. Rent prices have risen 15% nationwide in the past five years in 70 metro areas across the U.S. and income growth hasn’t kept up, according to NAR.