Thursday, December 31, 2009

Once you've seen a UFO........

Your no longer a believer, but a "knower."


Ronald Reagan’s UFO sightings and alien “Fantasy” speeches | Openminds.tv
I was one of the first to publish several articles about Reagan’s many references to what became a persistent theme in his speeches: that an alien threat would unite the nations of the world. I also interviewed Nancy Reagan’s astrologer, Joan Quigley, for the premier issue of the Spanish magazine Año Cero. In the early 90s I even hoped to meet the former president (through a close friend of the Reagan family who knew a good friend of mine in Hollywood circles), and ask him about his UFO experiences and the source of his alien speeches. That hope was quashed when news of his Alzheimer’s was released.

Of Reagan’s two known UFO sightings, one is fairly well documented and dramatic, the other just a second-hand sketch without date or exact location. It was disclosed in 1988 by comedian and radio host Steve Allen, who commented that a very well known personality in the entertainment industry had confided to him that many years ago, Ron and Nancy arrived half an hour late at a dinner party in Hollywood. The first thing they said is that they had just spotted a UFO coming down the coast.

The second incident is more dramatic and better documented. It occurred in the summer of 1974 when Reagan was governor of California and was flying on the governor’s Cessna Citation aircraft. We have the first-hand testimony of the pilot, Bill Paynter, who years later explained in a TV program they were at 35,000 feet in the vicinity of Modesto, when he was alerted by Reagan that a big light was following them. “The governor said, ‘well, let’s see if we can get a little closer to it,’ so we started moving towards it,” said Paynter. “It followed us just of—from the wing-tip probably a half a mile or a mile—and when we started turning towards it, it paralleled our flight, and…just took off.”

Ronald and Nancy Reagan in California in 1964

Ronald and Nancy Reagan in California in 1964

The following quote from Reagan about the incident comes from Norman C. Miller, who was then Washington Bureau chief for the Wall Street Journal and later became editor of the Los Angeles Times. “I was in a plane last week when I looked out the window and saw this white light,” Reagan told Miller. “It was zigzagging around. I went up to the pilot and said, ‘Have you seen anything like that before?’ He was shocked and said, ‘Nope.’ And I said to him: ‘Let’s follow it!’ We followed it for several minutes… to Bakersfield, and all of a sudden to our utter amazement it went straight up into the heavens.”


Wednesday, December 30, 2009

At first this seems counter-intuitive.......

But we, the American consumer, have to go bust and start over in order to straighten out the national financial debacle that hasn't ended yet. After going through it I can only tell you that is the scariest thing for most people to even think about. That's why we vote for Big Government to put off the reckoning that will arrive.

Be ready for the boom. Clean up your credit. Save and pay off "junk" debts. In 5 to 10 years the next bust hits and everything becomes dirt cheap for people with cash and good credit. Happens after every deflationary bust.

In the forties if you had a couple of thousand you could have bought a mansion in the city, 5 0r 6 new cars, a lifetime supply of booze.... Whatever. This is history. 

I just bought $250 more in food. Wait til you see the prices this summer. Expect oil to rise because production has been cut and foreign countries are using American money to buy.

There is no reason for them to hold a dying empire's cash. Check this out......

The recession is over but the depression has just begun | The Big Picture
So, what does this mean for the American and global economy?

1. The private sector (particularly households) is overly indebted. The level of debt households now carry cannot be supported by income at the present levels of consumption. The natural tendency, therefore, is toward more saving and less spending in the private sector (although asset price appreciation can attenuate this through the Wealth Effect). That necessarily means the public sector must run a deficit or the import-export sector must run a surplus.
2. Most countries are in a state of economic weakness. That means consumption demand is constrained globally. There is no chance that the U.S. can export its way out of recession without a collapse in the value of the U.S. dollar. That leaves the government as the sole way to pick up the slack.
3. Since state and local governments are constrained by falling tax revenue (see WSJ article) and the inability to print money, only the Federal Government can run large deficits.
4. Deficit spending on this scale is politically unacceptable and will come to an end as soon as the economy shows any signs of life (say 2 to 3% growth for one year). Therefore, at the first sign of economic strength, the Federal Government will raise taxes and/or cut spending. The result will be a deep recession with higher unemployment and lower stock prices.
5. Meanwhile, all countries which issue the vast majority of debt in their own currency (U.S, Eurozone, U.K., Switzerland, Japan) will inflate. They will print as much money as they can reasonably get away with. While the economy is in an upswing, this will create a false boom, predicated on asset price increases. This will be a huge bonus for hard assets like gold, platinum or silver. However, when the prop of government spending is taken away, the global economy will relapse into recession.
6. I believe this dynamic will induce a Scylla and Charybdis of inflationary and deflationary forces, forcing central bankers to add and withdraw liquidity in a manic way. The likely volatility in government spending and taxation gives you the makings of a depression shaped like a series of W’s consisting of short and uneven business cycles. The secular force is the D-process and the deleveraging, so I expect deflation to be the resulting secular trend more than inflation.
7. Needless to say, this kind of volatility will induce a wave of populist sentiment, leading to an unpredictable and violent geopolitical climate and the likelihood of more muscular forms of government.
8. From an investing standpoint, consider this a secular bear market for stocks then. Play the rallies, but be cognizant that the secular trend for the time being is down. The Japanese example which we are now tracking is a best case scenario.

That’s my thesis. What’s your view?
PERMALINK

*
* De.li.cious


Tuesday, December 29, 2009

What does it tell us when states go bust.....

Huh..... Maybe they should cut back and live within their means. I mean, why do state governments have to spend billions when the feds are paying for the same things. Wait til interest rates go up big time and we can't buy all that junk,  let alone big ticket items that generate sales and property taxes.

Somebody has to pay for all this debt. I think we know who. This leads to a lower standard of living. Expect interest rates to go up in 2010 and scare the fuck out of the big shot gangsters who's stooges in office will be thrown out big time. China, India, and Russia are now is buying gold and will stop buying our debt. As I've warned befor, that's when the shit hits the fan. Then....

Surprise! Need to raise interest rates to pay for trillion dollar deficits. You get it in the ass. Not exactly rocket science.

On the home front, insurance company is paying off my totaled Suzuki and I just bought a 2004 Suzuki to replace it. Looks new and I paid $10000 out the door. I went to the credit union and picked up a check for $9350 and put $650 on my credit card. i got 4.5 % on the loan and $200 a month for 5 years. I'll pay it off in two  or three and borrow more even though interest rate will probably be too high, for my retirement RV.

By the way, no money down is back. The secret is having your financing in hand before you shop. Pay off your loans and borrow a little more. Pay them off then borrow more, doing it over and over. And stay away from running credit card balances as that lowers your score. Just bank your paychecks and use your credit card for immediate expenses then pay your card off in full that improves your credit.

 Patti and I have 12 more payments on the mobile home and then we only pay $190 a month plus electric. I think we'll do fine even with the extra couple of thousand in doctor bills from her operation. At least she goes back to work next week and I can make plans to start another business and generate some tax losses.

Being in business is the only way we can practice tax avoidance since real estate is such a long term mess. A married couple generating $50,000 a year pay through the nose to the gangsters in Washington.

More on this later.

I still would like to get to Florida and start my mobile home investing program for my retirement. I've already found a few bargains on the internet. Which only covers a fraction of the opportunities. People have to live somewhere, even broke dicks. heh heh.


States Scramble to Close New Budget Gaps - WSJ.com
The patches used by states on their ailing budgets just months ago are now failing.

Ohio lawmakers were expected late Thursday to vote on a compromise reached with Gov. Ted Strickland to avoid cutting education budgets an average of 10% on Jan. 1. In Arizona, lawmakers met in a special session Thursday -- their fourth on the budget this year -- to grapple with a new deficit. And in New York, Democratic Gov. David Paterson said Sunday he would postpone paying $750 million of state bills to avert a cash crunch.
[cutting deeper]

Many states eliminated expected deficits earlier this year with budget cuts, tax increases, short-term borrowing, accounting moves and planned gambling expansions.

But despite a slight improvement in the U.S. economy, states are now finding those measures didn't go far enough. Tax collections continue to trail projections in some states, and court rulings and political battles have blocked some gap-filling moves.

Plus, some legislatures didn't fully deal with the deficits, leaving the toughest decisions to governors. All states, except Vermont, have at least a limited requirement of a balanced budget.

Only a few states now have cash-flow problems. But if revenues continue to fall below expectations, the list could grow, said Scott Pattison, executive director of the National Association of State Budget Officers.


Sunday, December 27, 2009

Ready to start a new country yet?'''''

Give it time. 7 million more mortgages go up this coming 18 months. We need the Fed to really pour on the printing presses just to break even. 25 million jobs have to be created to get back to even. Auto and house prices have stabilized for now but not for long. How much more welfare can we give these guys?

Time will tell. Without stimulus these prices  slide back. With it inflation looms directly ahead. 

The Jobless Recovery, So Called
The biggest problem I see is not fiat money (which is collapsing from its own lack of substance), or the purported “global” economy, which is composed of numerous countries none of whom are doing well. (Prosperity in China? Oh, my, tell me another one.) The big problem, which is being exacerbated, is that something like 40% of all “jobs” are in government. Yup. Four out of every ten “workers” are paid lavishly (in general, twice what counterparts in business make for similar tasks) are engaged primarily in the business of making our lives more difficult, our businesses less profitable, and our ability to plan for the future almost impossible. This country has grown bureaucracy and chased manufacturing jobs off shore. It has increased regulation and deleterious “services” at the expense of freedom and capital to create real business which include real jobs and genuine products which can be sold instead of buying shoddy merchandise from China. We’ve seen the cycle…from Taiwan to Japan to Sri Lanka, and now to China. We have sent our money overseas for many decades rather than fight to reduce regulation, reduce taxes, and reduce costs. A fork lift operator simply isn’t worth $86,000 a year, even if he works for the ci devant “Big Three.” Not many of them do any more, and it serves them right. Greed at all levels of the unions made American products too expensive to buy. Manufacturers–whom, I will remind you again, are not in business to employ “workers,” but to make profits–picked up their blueprints and went elsewhere. We cannot blame them. We would do the same if we were able.

No, friends, there will be no “jobless” recovery. There will be no recovery at all until we are so much farther down that October of 2009 looks like “the good old days.” The “green shoots” are the slime growing up the North wall of government, the bacteria of corruption, and of parasites such as governmental Spanish Moss and Pharma and Agribiz mistletoe.

What is to be done? You’ve got your choice. Destroy Carthage, or opt out. Pull back into your own perimeter. Produce nothing that can be taxed or regulated.


Monday, December 21, 2009

The Feds control our very lives now.......

The feds control our money, our houses,children,transportation,health care, you name it. But when they control carbon, they control all. This is from people who would screw up a wet dream.

I think they get theirs  by guys with towels on their heads. The big question is which side do we take?

Pajamas Media » The Socialist Revolution Has Come to America
1. The government moved to take greater control of medical care and thus one-sixth of our entire economy. The excuse? Some people don’t have insurance, don’t you know? What are the details? Good question: specifics hatched in back rooms behind closed doors, utterly incomprehensible bills that may as well be carved in hieroglyphics. What will it mean for you? Why, whatever they want it to mean, of course.

2. Efforts to criminalize a particular naturally occurring compound, CO2, picked up pace. Why have they so singled out this substance? Because it is a byproduct of work and, indeed, life itself — every time you turn on your heater, every time you drive to work, every time you sit down to eat: don’t you know these sinful behaviors must be curbed, because you are “poisoning the planet” with your every move?

Success in this double strategy would amount to nothing less than a socialist revolution. A revolution of legislative opacity and bureaucratic fiat, to be sure, but a revolution just the same, for there is literally no part of your existence they couldn’t justify controlling under the cover of “health care” and “emissions” reform. Resistance would be met at first with peaceable punishments, fines and such. But the history of such revolutions shows that, sooner or later, they enforce their dictates with bars and boots.

Think it can’t happen here? History is littered with the wreckage of free states that gave way, sometimes with a scream, often with a whimper, to autocracy and absolutism. The city that gave birth to the world’s first and greatest republic was also home to Caesar and Mussolini.

America is not immune to these forces. The tides of history are inexorable and sooner or later pull every edifice into the sea.


Sunday, December 20, 2009

Still sounds like a religeous arguement to me.....

We confuse, for various reasons, God is responsible for DNA and some kind of magic did it. Think about it. No rational explanation can explain how DNA came into existence without some kind of help. No wonder this pisses so many people off. Easier to make sneering pronunciation than admit "I haven't a clue."

Happy birthday, Patti.

Dissent on Darwinism by David Gordon
Although he does not accept Intelligent Design, Nagel refuses to dismiss the movement as merely religious. Critics claim that design cannot be a legitimate scientific hypothesis; but at the same time, they maintain that the theory can be shown to be false. Nagel pertinently asks, how can both of these assertions be true together? Further, Nagel sees no constitutional obstacle to teaching Intelligent Design.

Nagel's opinions on this issue have led to a remarkable episode. Brian Leiter runs a blog, Leiter Reports, which is read by philosophers, owing to detailed accounts of promotions, jobs, and other news about philosophy departments. Leiter's comparative rankings of philosophy departments also attract much attention. Leiter obtrudes his own political and social views on his audience; were he to present these in a separate venue, it is a safe bet that his audience would vastly diminish. Among Leiter's many aversions, the Intelligent Design movement ranks among the foremost: he often attacks what he calls the "Texas Taliban."

When Nagel's article on Intelligent Design appeared, Leiter could not contain his rage (see here and here). We were presented with the unedifying spectacle of Leiter's speaking in abusive and condescending terms about one of the foremost philosophers of the past half-century. Nagel's The Possibility of Altruism, The View From Nowhere, and the essays collected in Mortal Questions are classics of contemporary philosophy.


Friday, December 18, 2009

Dem's rule.....

Poor morons. Oba mama in Denmark trying to sell the country down the river. Congress fighting over how quickly they can bankrupt the citizens. Republicans hanging tough as Reid and gang won't include their participation. Dem's backbiting as their money men demand more goodies for their constituents but can't get 60 Dems to agree.

Sounds like good old gridlock to me.

Hopefully it will continue for the foreseeable future. Then we get rid of most of the criminals and find a new bunch. Heh heh

Thursday, December 17, 2009

Totaled my car this morning....

Black ice got me. Time to go shopping as soon as the insurance pays off.

Shit happens!

Tuesday, December 15, 2009

Won't be long now....

Expect inflation statistics to scare the shit out of everyone.

Already for trillions of dollars are sloshing around the world's  economy. Printed up to save the gangsters asses. No likely to save them, I believe, but time will tell. This money first chases stocks, bonds, currencies and especially commodities. Gold, silver, oil and soon food. Then we get beat up with consumer price inflation as oil prices catch up to pay for all those Arab schemes rebuilding the middle East into Nirvana. This massive wall of debt will bite us in the ass.

Re-inflating the bubble though is not going to be easy as something like 7 million houses are on the cusp of foreclosure. Businesses hooked on cheap credit are coming up short.Now the gang in Washington is playing with medical cost which is always dangerous for politicians as they need to keep so many unhappy people together to save the system which is collapsing around their ears.

So far, we "consumers" are bust and can't save the system from itself. We need healthy incomes to keep the debts current let alone, pay it down. With most people on reduced hours, unemployment, disability, or not working to start with, doesn't leave much else the government can do to generate the taxes to pay for services. Only borrowing from our ideological enemies, the Chinese.

What happens if the Chinese go bust over the next couple years? We can't buy their trinkets. We actually need little from them. Oil? nope. Food? Nope. Toys? Really?

Only their money. Which we gave them in the first place.f You get the idea? They are tied to us until the end.

What ever that end is.

Monday, December 14, 2009

Think we ought to wake them up?....

The left swallowed the bullshit hook line and sinker. "Change we can believe in" simply means a rearranging the chairs on the Titanic . The system is too rigged to reform. It must crash completely. Until then, expect a new bubble to be created.

There is nothing else the gang in charge can do.

Politically there is no place to cut budget wise. No criminals (they are in charge) can be punished . Military spending must be maintained or the vets destroy the party in charge. Education is so corrupt that no cuts there or the unions stay home. The states , the Democrat bases on the whole,are  in disaster and need massive infusions of cash.

Can't tax us much more as we are broke. The whole fucking bunch of us are flat busted. We owe more than we are worth. Try and sell something at a profit. Your house? yea, right. Your used car? how about your 401k, must be a lot of profit there..... good luck.

Only thing left is blood.

But not is all lost. Get out of debt. (Pay bills in full every month over the next couple years.) Save as much possible so you can participate in the next inflationary boom.

Will the gang be able to do it again? Why not? Who's going to stop them? Banks borrow from the Fed for free. Lend it to speculators for commodity and Wall Street speculation. Profits trickle in to the business side. They hire and retool. Then borrowing of all kinds take off and prices explode.

Might as well prepare for it as it is inevitable with these guys in charge.But it's really a lot of fun to listen to the Left bitch about it, right?

Obama's Big Sellout : Rolling Stone
Barack Obama ran for president as a man of the people, standing up to Wall Street as the global economy melted down in that fateful fall of 2008. He pushed a tax plan to soak the rich, ripped NAFTA for hurting the middle class and tore into John McCain for supporting a bankruptcy bill that sided with wealthy bankers "at the expense of hardworking Americans." Obama may not have run to the left of Samuel Gompers or Cesar Chavez, but it's not like you saw him on the campaign trail flanked by bankers from Citigroup and Goldman Sachs. What inspired supporters who pushed him to his historic win was the sense that a genuine outsider was finally breaking into an exclusive club, that walls were being torn down, that things were, for lack of a better or more specific term, changing.

Then he got elected.

What's taken place in the year since Obama won the presidency has turned out to be one of the most dramatic political about-faces in our history.


Friday, December 11, 2009

Watched an interview onTV today.......

Senator Conrade. Seems we can't cut spending... or raise taxes, during a recession. I guess we just bitch about it. These are the Dems who have complete control of the government. His solution: get the Republicans to make a 'bi-partisan' commission and make a solution that way. {More finger pointing}

These guys can't be real!

Let's dissolve Congress. Fire everybody in charge. Prosecute the bank big shots and all their Washington cronies. Outlaw lobbyist. Make elections open to all parties with free TV time. (we could advertise cigarettes and beer to pay for it)

Completely do away with income taxes using excise taxes to protect us from fraud, waste and abuse. Then  watch the economy take off.

There's a few more things to be done, but that's a start.

A guy can dream, can't he?

Here's a real solution: get a government job or disappear with a little business of your own.

Tell the fuckers nothing!

Thursday, December 10, 2009

Only Repubs managed to beat the left at it's old game.....

Makes you wonder. Why do we even care? We definitely need a change but the criminals own both parties now. After NAFTA, there has been little the working stiff can do about improving his station other than supporting the status quo. Anyone who fucks with the powers that be has the I.R.S or Homeland Security come after them. 

Now they've engineered another boom to save their sorry asses and life goes on for them. Just look at the joke going on in Copenhagen. We can prove the globe is cooling but the fascist will make us pay anyway to reduce a harmless gas, CO2, from a infinitesimal amount in our atmosphere to practically zero.

Follow the money and we will find the same handful of gangsters in on it.

I expect more of the same in the future as more and more people jump on the band wagon. After all, most people figured their house was worth at least 3 times what they paid for it after a couple of years. Must be some free money here somewhere.

And Oba Mama  did promise fiscal responsibility to return to Washington and we would be out of Iraq and Afghanistan in his first year. Black people would have lots more money and whitey would get bitch-slapped into next week. All liberals would get special medals for honesty.....

And tooth fairies would be dancing in the streets as the government outlawed dentists. unicorns would be butt fucking pigs, rainbow stew would be assured to all God's children, Republicans would quit lying and do what they promised and....

How are all these wonders  working out for you?


The Future of the Republicans by Llewellyn H. Rockwell, Jr.
Now, pointing this out is akin to mentioning the elephant in the living room, the one which some of the guests welcome and some have decided to ignore. For the latter group, here is a partial litany of what the Bush administration has done by way of using and expanding government power: the Patriot Act, the Patriot Act II (as part of Intelligence Reform), No Child Left Behind, Medicare drug benefits, the Transportation Safety Administration, and the Department of Homeland Security, not to mention two major wars that have cost hundreds of billions, and left only destruction and chaos in their wake. Government spending in Bush's first term soared more than 29%, twice Clinton's average.

The second term will bring more of the same, or worse. Bush is going to try to install the country’s first-ever peacetime program of forced savings. Though it is being sold as privatization, it is a huge step-up in statism, and also prepares the way for controls on consumption spending, as seen in World War I and II. There could be more wars in the Gulf region, with Syria, Iran, and others tossed on the chopping block. As regards the invasions of individual liberty, there are no limits. Already proposed is a national ID, fingerprints on passports, more intrusions into bank accounts, more travel restrictions, more surveillance, and even the draft and national service.


Wednesday, December 09, 2009

Hmmm...... I'm still skepitical....

Viruses adapt to their ever changing surrounding environment. O.k. But how does this show us evolution? They are still viruses.

These changes can be explained simply by pointing out that this adaptability is  "built in" to the DNA. Still no explanations are ever given for evolution as fact, just the assumption that it's obvious to the discerning observer.

Or do we mean believer?


Skeptic » Lectures » past-lectures''
H1N1 — The Evolution of a Deadly Virus
What Diseases Tell Us About Evolution

Carl Zimmer, an award-winning science writer for the New York Times, Discover magazine, Scientific American, and others takes readers on a frightening tour of the H1N1 flu virus, how it evolved, and what deadly diseases tell us about how evolution works. Reviewing the history of influenza going back over a century, including a complete analysis of the 1918 influenza outbreak that killed tens of millions of people around the world, Zimmer includes remarkable graphics demonstrating exactly what happens from the moment a virus enters a body to the death of its human host. Along the way Zimmer reveals how vital evolution is to all branches of modern biology — from the fight against deadly antibiotic-resistant bacteria to the analysis of the human genome.


Tuesday, December 08, 2009

Only the government can punish the dead......

I love this. You work. You die. Uncle Sammy gets his cut over your dead body.

Tell me again why anyone votes for these fuckers.


Agora Financial's 5 Minute Forecast
The U.S. House of Representatives voted to extend the estate tax late last week -- indefinitely. In a time when everyone could use an extra dollar -- and, in fact, hundreds of billions of dollars are being handed out while trillions more are being printed -- the state opted to extend the “death tax,” which was set for a one-year repeal in 2010. Instead of a year of tax leniency, for every dollar beyond $3.5 million that you bestow upon your departure, the government will take 45 cents (should this bill become law).

Why start today’s forecast with this news? We couldn’t think of a more fitting sign of the times… punish those who found success (and already paid their taxes once) and reward the weak (in this case the U.S. government, arguably the greatest spendthrift in history).

Here’s the best part: They’ll spin it so it sounds like Uncle Sam is doing you a favor. “This bill gives our nation's wealthiest families the ability to know exactly what their obligation to the nation that fostered their wealth will be,” Rep. Jared Polis so eloquently noted. You see, you not only have some kind of “obligation” to give the state nearly half of your life’s work, but by keeping this tax continuous, Rep. Polis will offer that sleep-easy assurance that the estate tax will surely outlive you. What a relief.


Monday, December 07, 2009

Colder than a witch's tit......

Been in the teens here in Northern Idaho. Too bad global warming is a fraud. But we knew that years ago. Still the gangsters in Washington will run cap and trade down our throats. Need to keep the scam going or the politicians will be replaced.

I'm collecting Patti's share of the doctor bills after insurance pays their part and it aint pretty. Probably 3 or 4 grand. Hard to get ahead that way. But better than no insurance at all. They paid close to 30 grand.

Try and collect that much from me, hah hah.

12 more payments on the mobile and we only have to worry about 200 a month lot rent. I'll be looking for another then. Buy and sell for income comes next. Debt free is the key.

Time will tell how bad the next bust will be, but there will be another.

And maybe another. Until we get a new country any ways.

Hey, one can hope.

Friday, December 04, 2009

Unemployment down...

Good thing the government changed those bad numbers from October as Oba mama went to a "job summit" with rich fat cats who don't create any jobs, right?

Next thing you know a new boom, as I have telling everybody, will happen and we start over again with the country borrowing from foreigners and we will have to buy their junk. We've already lost our industries, next we lose our food production. Then we take over a small oil producing country. (Iran?) How else are we going to pay for all these fuck ups.

The Commies were right when they said we would sell them the rope used to hang us.

In the meantime,I'm trying to get ready for the next inflationary boom. I'm getting out of personal debt and have already built up a $5000 line of credit with my credit union. I hope to get it up to $20000 in a year or so then I'll be able  buy another mobile or two to resell. I expect to make 300 or 400 a month on each one

Might head for Florida and get one for a winter home. With a line of credit all you do is write a check and then move in or resell. Pretty easy to do as long as you buy cheap. Which means cash. Without any personal debts this becomes entirely feasible.

Also, I'm thinking of selling food at the fairs during the winter to get extra money coming in. Hard to believe  that Patti and I can draw Soc.Sec  (partial) in 3 years so we have to get busy.

Should be an interesting retirement.

Thursday, December 03, 2009

First climategate, then.....

Need to work on that evolution theory. falling apart day by day. ofcourse until a new explanation comes along this is it.

Trying to explain how DNA evolved from nothing is a bitch.

I'm listening.


The Two-Minute Hate « LewRockwell.com Blog
The Darwinites are very angry at NYU philosopher Thomas Nagel’s book recommendation in the London Times:

Stephen C. Meyer’s Signature in the Cell: DNA and the Evidence for Intelligent Design (HarperCollins) is a detailed account of the problem of how life came into existence from lifeless matter – something that had to happen before the process of biological evolution could begin. The controversy over Intelligent Design has so far focused mainly on whether the evolution of life since its beginnings can be explained entirely by natural selection and other non-purposive causes. Meyer takes up the prior question of how the immensely complex and exquisitely functional chemical structure of DNA, which cannot be explained by natural selection because it makes natural selection possible, could have originated without an intentional cause. He examines the history and present state of research on non-purposive chemical explanations of the origin of life, and argues that the available evidence offers no prospect of a credible naturalistic alternative to the hypothesis of an intentional cause. Meyer is a Christian, but atheists, and theists who believe God never intervenes in the natural world, will be instructed by his careful presentation of this fiendishly difficult problem.


Wednesday, December 02, 2009

Hat in hand....

Oba mama crawls to China, the new super power, and grovels. We can't survive financially without their buying our debt  and selling us everything we used to make. And we can't make  perpetual war against guys wearing towels on their heads without Chinese permission. Our treasury is buying stocks, houses, car companies, and God knows what's next.

I guess the people in charge will just have to reelect him as he is "change we can believe in". (Yes we are collectively stupid and but at least we  are politically correct).

Empires come, empires go, all fall down.


The Hidden Costs of Too Much Government Debt | Money and Markets: Free Investment Email Newsletter
But you know what Obama came home with? Not much of anything. A joint statement here. A stiff, “no questions asked” press conference there. Substantive progress was nowhere to be found.
Obama's trip to China was all smiles but no substance.
Obama’s trip to China was all smiles but no substance.

That’s disturbing — and it reflects a very uncomfortable fact: The balance of power between the U.S. and China has shifted largely in China’s favor because of our overreliance on China to fund our profligacy. In fact, I believe that this shift is one of the single biggest “hidden” costs of our massive government debt load.

Debt Costs Keep Rising,
With No End in Sight!

You don’t need me to tell you that our public debt is enormous. As of this week, it came to $12,031,299,186,290.07. That’s more than $12 TRILLION in case you have trouble grasping a number that big. In just the past decade, it’s up more than 111 percent.

Things are only going to get worse, too, because Washington has completely abandoned any semblance of fiscal discipline! We’re running ever-larger budget deficits, including $1.42 trillion in fiscal 2009 alone.

The interest cost alone on our debt last year was $202 billion. That’s enough to send every man, woman, and child in this country a $656 check. Keep in mind that those costs were artificially low because of the lowest short-term rates in history due to the Fed’s rate cuts. Moreover, the flight-to-quality rally in government bonds helped keep longer-term rates low.

As bond prices fall, rates rise, and absolute debt levels climb ever-higher. That number is going to spiral upward. In plain English, we’re going to be dedicating a larger and larger share of the U.S. budget just to pay interest on our debt. Forget about defense, health care, Social Security or anything else.


Monday, November 30, 2009

We need to let the first stimulus run it's course....

Most of the it occurs starting mid 2010-2011. Huge construction make overs hit the economy and will drive the next boom. Housing and stocks sky rocket again. The next bust will make the 2008-2009 look like a fart in the wind storm.

The geezers are broke and will retire over the next 10-15 years and sell their stocks and houses to eat. No way the younger generations are going to afford 100,000 to 1 million in debt a piece.  We will inflate until there is no way out. That's to protect the gangsters running the system.

Printing press money always ends badly. Empires need to war for assets as their citizens no longer produce anything of value the world can afford. Therefor the printing presses go full blast just to keep up with promises to keep the elites in power.

Then the the rich and powerful  get murdered.

Of course that can't happen here. We only have a couple hundred million guns, right?


Op-Ed Columnist - The Phantom Menace - NYTimes.com
Now, it’s politically difficult for the Obama administration to enact a full-scale second stimulus. Still, he should be trying to push through as much aid to the economy as possible. And remember, Mr. Obama has the bully pulpit; it’s his job to persuade America to do what needs to be done.

Instead, however, Mr. Obama is lending his voice to those who say that we can’t create more jobs. And a report on Politico.com suggests that deficit reduction, not job creation, will be the centerpiece of his first State of the Union address. What happened?

It took me a while to puzzle this out. But the concerns Mr. Obama expressed become comprehensible if you suppose that he’s getting his views, directly or indirectly, from Wall Street.

Ever since the Great Recession began economic analysts at some (not all) major Wall Street firms have warned that efforts to fight the slump will produce even worse economic evils. In particular, they say, never mind the current ability of the U.S. government to borrow long term at remarkably low interest rates — any day now, budget deficits will lead to a collapse in investor confidence, and rates will soar.


Sunday, November 29, 2009

Hell yes!!!.....

Hot Air » Blog Archive » Should there be a tax break for pet expenses?
Should there be a tax break for pet expenses?
posted at 8:48 by Ed Morrissey

Last night, I received an interesting e-mail from a publicist looking to schedule interviews as part of a push for a new bill — the HAPPY Act. No, that’s not some new twist on Hope and Change; in fact, it’s a bill introduced by Republican Congressman Thaddeus McCotter from Michigan, a reliable conservative. McCotter and actor Robert Davi want people to get HAPPY over tax-deductible … pet expenses?

ACTON, CA – PetExemption.com founders Leo Grillo and Robert Davi are pleased that the Humanity and Pets Partnered Through the Years (“HAPPY”) Act was introduced last week in the U.S. House of Representative. The legislation introduced by Rep. Thaddeus McCotter (R-MI) is a federal bill that would reward pet owners by allowing them to deduct up to $3,500 for pet care costs, including veterinary services.

Leo Grillo has been at the forefront of animal welfare for more than 30 years, and his sanctuary, D.E.L.T.A. Rescue, has more animals than the American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals and the Humane Society of the United States combined. It is the largest animal sanctuary in the world and the first no-kill, care-for-life sanctuary.

Actor-Director Robert Davi, best known for his roles in “Die Hard,” “License to Kill,” “The Goonies,” and “Profiler,” and directing the award-winning movie “The Dukes.” Davi first wrote about the Pet Exemption in the Washington Times in April 2009. “Every city in America spends tens of millions of taxpayer dollars on programs for abandoned animals. Like many government-funded programs, they overspend and underperform. By contrast, a tax exemption for pets would add to the education and rescue efforts and bring an added incentive to responsible prospective pet owners… Let’s begin a national dialogue on this issue.”


Our sales down 10%......

Not bad in the Obama "Depression." Without a lot more stimulus we'll fall even further behind. Once you get people hooked on welfare, they stay hooked.

More cash for shit coming up.


Black Friday or Dead Friday? « LewRockwell.com Blog
Was Black Friday actually Dead Friday? By the looks of it, retail executives may go into shock during this upcoming holiday season. I think my experience in shopping this Friday may be similar to what a whole lot of folks witnessed yesterday.

This year I did something I haven’t done very often — I joined the throngs of people in line at 4am to try and swipe up a super deal on something I really needed to buy. I have been squeezing every last bit of life from my washer and dryer for a couple of years now, that is, until the dryer decided it had its own mind in regards to temperature, and the washer started destroying my clothes. So I waited months for Black Friday, betting on those annual appliance super deals. And the exact set I had my eyes on since last year appeared as a Black Friday Doorbuster SuperDeal at Sears. The pair sells for about $1,900, with past sale prices never getting better than about $1,500. The Doorbuster price was $850 – no strings attached. Now that’s a savings worth the hassle.

I arrived at 3:45 am, and all entrances seemed to have a line of 50+ people. I thought, “Wow, is this what it’s like?” The bulk of the crowd ended up in the appliance and electronic sections, looking to save $$ on big-cost items, just as I suspected. What I discovered was that the huge mass of shoppers were only there for the early-bird super-duper deals. By 5:15, they had processed all of our purchases, the store emptied, and the whole place was eerily quiet. There was no one around, at all. I talked to a small group of salespeople who were standing around with nothing to do, and they told me the scene was “highly unusual.” They seemed to be very perplexed.

The rest of the day that mall, which is close to me, was about as busy as a normal weeknight outside of the holidays. I noticed the only places with packed parking lots were the discount-cheap retailers — Target, Walmart, Meijers, etc. Everything else was barely business as usual. In years past, I would refuse to leave the house on Black Friday to avoid the crush. Today, which is usually another heavy shopping day, that mall parking lot was consistently 10% filled.

My view of this holiday shopping season – based on a host of personal experiences, observations, and following the news – is that people are buckling down and holding on to their money, partially because they have no choice due to home foreclosure, job loss, and the credit crackdown. Shoppers are going to gravitate to items of necessity, and they will be drawn to stuff they want (but admit don’t need) only when the incentives are huge. Look for retailers to get desperate this holiday season and possibly offer up some mega-discounts.


Saturday, November 28, 2009

Back to the "Afordability Index"......

My point is that without government gimmicks broke dicks can't afford a house.

Period.

Subsidize interest rates, free money for down payments, tax rebates, and various other schemes just to keep the crooked elites in power and rich eventually comes to a screeching halt.

When everybody throws in the towel and demands this shit stops.

Good luck!


How much does the Average American Make? Breaking Down the U.S. Household Income Numbers.
I ran the numbers for a state with no state income taxes, Texas. A family at this level is only bringing in $3,215 a month. The national median home price peaked around $200,000. So let us assume this family purchased the median home:

5% down payment: $10,000

Mortgage 30-year fixed (6.5%): $1,200

Taxes and Insurance: $333

PITI: $1,533

Right off the bat, this family is spending 47% of their net pay on a median priced home. We didn’t even account for any pre-tax retirement account investing. Given the recent stock market performance and the loss of $50 trillion in global wealth, maybe that wasn’t such a bad idea. The bottom line is the average American family is being squeezed from every angle. What we need is a focus on jobs and our economy, not bailing out banks. That defeats the entire purpose. The average American family is struggling getting by and when they hear about these billion dollar handouts, they can’t help but to feel left out.


Thursday, November 26, 2009

Walmart workers are in the same boat......

They, on the whole, are broke every payday. Lining up for their paychecks so they can buy smokes and gas to get home. I guess we have to buy more Chinese trinkets to get these broke dicks through the week. After all, Clinton and the Republican gangsters gave our manufacturing base away years ago.

Wealth comes from making things not selling other peoples junk. But I've been warning people about NAFTA for over 15 years.

I hate being right but we haven't sen anything yet.


Lining up at Midnight at Wal-Mart to buy Food is part of the new Recovery. Banks offering Mattress Interest Rates. The Invisible Recovery Outside of Wall Street.
The fact that you have people lining up at midnight just waiting to have their paychecks or government checks clear for food is probably something you are not going to see on CNBC but it is happening. This recession is really creating a split and is also flaming the fires of class warfare. Average Americans and working class Americans are still dealing with what is known as the Great Recession.

Wal-Mart is looking to meet the new market reality by offering items that meet the new austerity demanded by millions of American families:

“Among the steps Wal-Mart is taking to address the changes in shopping habits, Mr. Quinn listed an overhaul of the retailer’s private-label brand, Great Value, which is promoted in commercials describing how families can fix dinners with Great Value products “for less than $2 a serving.”

For less than $2 a serving means millions of families are now needing to stretch their dollar. So as you might have guessed, having the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve go on a path of dollar weakness actually hurts those at the bottom and middle class the most. Yet they are concerned more about the financial sector and the chips may fall where they may for the remaining group of Americans.

Punishing the Prudent Saver

Those that save and are cautious with their money, are now being forced to make difficult decisions. Even holding on to U.S. dollars is not a good move with the way the Fed is systematically devaluing the dollar. The Fed is artificially keeping rates at record lows so putting your money in a savings account amounts to stuffing it into your mattress. Take a look at three of the too big to fail (TBTF) banks and


Wednesday, November 25, 2009

Amen......

People believe anything. Next thing you know they'll be tellining us that Oba mama is going to get us out of our oil wars.......wait that's what he campaigned on.

Suckers!


The Charade of Left and Right by Jacob G. Hornberger
Recently Republican Senator Arlen Specter shocked the Republican-Democratic world by shifting to the Democrats. Yawn! What’s the big deal? With the exception of Ron Paul, every Republican and Democratic member of Congress could switch back and forth and it wouldn’t make any difference philosophically because they all share the same statist philosophy. The only difference it would make is with respect to control, which is what it’s all about.

Look at Barack Obama. Have you noticed any fundamental differences between his economic philosophy and foreign-policy philosophy and that of his predecessor George W. Bush? There’s not a dime’s worth of difference between them. Obama has embraced every one of Bush’s foreign-policy programs and his infringements on civil liberties. He is also borrowing, spending, and printing as much money as Bush, if not more.

And why not? Like Bush, Obama believes in the socialistic welfare state and the planned economy. And like Bush, he believes in the empire and its right to impose its will on everyone else in the world.

The real ideological, moral, and economic battle in this country is between the lovers of liberty, on the one hand, and the lovers of statism, on the other hand. The lovers of liberty are the libertarians. The lovers of statism are the conservatives and liberals. Unlike the statists, who support and defend all those socialist, interventionist, and imperial programs, libertarians are committed to abolishing and repealing every single one of them. For libertarians, liberty and moral principles, not tax loot and political power, are the highest priority.


Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Government will save money.....

Over your old lady's body, that is. All you have to do is stop paying for cancer screenings. Early detection is expensive, I guess. Of course, you pay more if the cancer is detected too late. But everybody will have to stand in line behind all the illegals who clean the rich people' s toilets, right?


Thoughts On The New CDC Recommendations « LewRockwell.com Blog
All weekend, there was talk and analysis of the new recommendations put out by the CDC, which state that tests such as mammograms and pap smears should be delayed and done less frequently. The GOP is pointing out that this should be a warning about the kind of rationing that will come with socialized medicine. I agree, but as always, the politicians have selective reasoning; this is no more dangerous than the previous recommendations of more screening, which could be turned into totalitarian mandates.

It is noteworthy that radiologists oppose the mammogram recommendation. So, on the one hand, the old schedule was supported by a group that stands to profit directly. On the other hand, the new schedule would cut healthcare costs and was announced at a time when the GAO is crunching numbers for public plans backed by the current administration. That the White House denies any such connection only lends credibility to the GOP’s theory in my eyes.

Both the old and new recommendations are suspect, and this is the inherent problem wit centralized anything, including the mere existance of the CDC. Remember that the CDC’s stated goal is to protect public health first, not individual health. Even if the CDC was immune to politics and corruption, it would still be unwise to follow its recommendations blindly. Only you are concerned about your own individual health as a first priority.


Monday, November 23, 2009

Only the government can control your privacy......

You have none.

It will only get worse as the thugs scramble to maintain power. The voters have to be fooled or, better yet, bought, and kept under thumb so none of your money escapes their grasp. All financial, medical, legal, etc. records will have to be accessible.

Staying off the books by using cash is the only alternative. If you dare.


Why government cares about your bank account
Harry Browne
© 2009 WorldNetDaily.com

"Know Your Customer" is a proposed government regulation by which banks will be required to develop a customer profile that details your banking habits -- your pattern of deposits, withdrawals, cash transactions, and the like. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) wants your banker to have this profile so he can tell the government whenever your financial transactions deviate from your established pattern.

This isn't a new approach. Since 1970 the misnamed "Bank Secrecy Act" has forced banks to tell the government anytime you use a bank wire or cashier's check to pay someone $10,000 or more. Treasury agents pressure banks to ignore the $10,000 threshold and report ever-smaller transactions -- so today the government is likely to be told if you spend even $3,000 in an unusual way.

"Know Your Customer" is just one more step toward giving the government complete access to your financial affairs -- to assure that you don't deal drugs and enjoy your profits, even if you have no interest in drugs.

Four reasons cause government to intrude ever more deeply into your private affairs:

First, it's human nature for any bureaucrat to expand his empire. So if you give government the power to regulate someone's life, you shouldn't be shocked when the bureaucrats use the power to regulate your life.

Second, congressmen have to prove they are tougher on crime than their opponents. Thus they continually hand the bureaucracy new policies to appear to be fighting crime.

Third, government programs never accomplish their stated objectives. So when a program like the Bank Secrecy Act fails to stop the drug trade, it is continually expanded -- with more penalties, more surveillance, more reporting, more requirements of all kinds -- to try to make the program work.

Why do such programs fail? Because those at whom it is aimed make it their business to know the regulations and circumvent them. A drug dealer won't keep his money in the bank -- to have his transactions reported to the government and his assets seized by zealous DEA or Treasury agents.

But you -- secure in the knowledge that you're doing nothing wrong -- feel no need to know about new laws and regulations. So you do nothing to protect yourself from snooping in your bank account, from asset-forfeiture programs that can confiscate your bank account because of suspicious transactions, from informants making up stories about you, or from any of the other legal inanities. When the drug warriors swoop down on you, you're unprepared, vulnerable, and completely overwhelmed. As a result, you may lose much of your property or even go to prison.

This, of course, contradicts the politicians' standard reassurance: "If you're not guilty, you have nothing to fear." It is the innocent -- not the guilty -- who have the most to fear from the avalanche of laws and regulations.


Sunday, November 22, 2009

I'm on the same page with this guy....

Takes time for government fiat money to flow through the system. Pretty soon prices skyrocket. Watch gas, food and real estate. Not your house, though. Only government financed companies. Bought and paid for, of course.

After all no such thing as a free lunch from this gang.

Commodity Bull Market: Inflaton Isn't Here Yet - Here's When You Can Expect It
This time around, should we expect things to move more rapidly or more slowly than average? My bet is on slow, which would push the peak inflation rate out toward the end of 2012. One reason for slow is that the government's rescue packages are delaying the process. Rescuing banks that are choking on bad loans postpones the day of reckoning for both the banks and the loan customers. It retards the pace of foreclosure sales (whether of real estate or other collateral) and puts the deleveraging that has been going on since last fall into slow motion. A wilting of the recent stock market rally would confirm this.

Investment Implications

The big plus about the Mayan calendar is that, right or wrong, it is very definite about things. Human civilization will come to an end, I'm told, on Dec. 21, 2012 – not on the 20th and not on the 22nd. There was no room for monetarists in those step-sided pyramids, but there still are few what-to-do implications from the monetarist findings.


Saturday, November 21, 2009

Who needs tarp.....

This program is political suicide for too many Dems. Imagine these rich bastards bailing out these fat cat crooks again.

Not labeled TARP, of course.

Expect more 0 interest "loans", tax gimmicks, globalony carbon tax credits, and other rip offs to hide the fact that the system is set up to rob us like an auto repair joint.


The debate over extending TARP steps onto center stage -- DailyFinance
If all these economists question the effectiveness of TARP, their voices will just add to the chorus already singing in Congress that this program needs to end. Rep. John Larson (D-Conn.), Chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, thinks leftover TARP money should be redirected to pay for road and bridge projects that would create jobs. Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.) wants to end the bailout program completely to keep if from becoming a "political slush fund," according to the Post.

The Obama administration is thinking about using most of the leftover funds to reduce the national debt, but it wants to leave TARP in place in case of future financial problems. About $139 billion in original TARP funds remain unallocated and available to the Treasury Department for spending. Banks have paid back $71 billion, and $10 billion has been collected in interest and dividends.

TARP by Any Other Name

In the program's early days, Treasury was collecting only about 66 cents on the dollar on the repurchase of warrants, according to the Congressional Oversight Panel. Thomas Seay, told me by email this morning that "their more recent repurchases of stock warrants, since the release that report, have been significantly closer to our estimates." So, at least the banks are repurchasing the warrants at a price fairer to the taxpayer.

TARP remains unpopular with the public because of the perception that it bails out Wall Street and leaves out Main Street. The public remains angry about the generous compensation packages that Wall Street firms continue to pay their executives.


Friday, November 20, 2009

Even CNN can't pass the buck......

Economy has nothing to do with government budgets in the long run. But governments budgets take money from productive activities and gives the money to pay  for votes. But voters have short memories and refuse to stay bought.

Need to educate your children? Government has money for that. Need a loan for a house..... Yep got that. Pay for your insurance for your smoking habit, no problem. Baby sitter, free food, right on. Lose your job, hate Moslems, want to control the seven seas? You name it, we got it.

As long as we can borrow the money . As long as the taxes come in. But what happens if everybody says....Fuck it, stick it up your ass.

Maybe we'll find out. Nah!!

 CNN Political Ticker: All politics, all the time Blog Archive - CNN Poll: Blame for recession shifting from GOP to Democrats « - Blogs from CNN.com
Washington (CNN) - Nearly two years into the recession, opinion about which political party is responsible for the severe economic downturn is shifting, according to a new national poll.

A CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Friday morning indicates that 38 percent of the public blames Republicans for the country's current economic problems. That's down 15 points from May, when 53 percent blamed the GOP. According to the poll 27 percent now blame the Democrats for the recession, up 6 points from May. Twenty-seven percent now say both parties are responsible for the economic mess.

"The bad news for the Democrats is that the number of Americans who hold the GOP exclusively responsible for the recession has been steadily falling by about two to three points per month," says CNN Polling Director Keating Holland. "At that rate, only a handful of voters will blame the economy on the Republicans by the time next year's midterm elections roll around."

Thirty-six percent of people questioned say that President Barack Obama's policies have improved economic conditions, with 28 percent feeling that the president's programs have made things worse, and 35 percent saying what he's done has had no effect on the economy.


One reason for that, says Holland, may be the growing federal budget deficit: Two-thirds say that the government should balance the budget even in a time of war and recession.

The survey indicates that only 18 percent say the economic conditions in the country today are good, down 3 points from August. Eighty-two percent say economic conditions are poor.

"Some economic indicators may suggest that the economy has turned the corner - but try telling that to the American people," adds Holland. The number of Americans who say that the economy is in good shape - a number that grew steadily through the spring and summer - has now stalled, with fewer than one in five expressing a positive view of current conditions. More than eight in 10 say that economic conditions are in poor shape, with 43 percent calling them very poor.


Thursday, November 19, 2009

Here's some good news......

Sears-K-mart only lost 127 million.

Go Sears!

Other than that Patti had her operation and both vehicles are in the shop. Patti fine, cars not. Oh well, shit happens.

DailyFinance
An improvement in sales at Kmart and cost-cutting overall helped Sears Holdings Corp. (SHLD) show better results in the third quarter.

The parent of Sears and Kmart stores posted a net loss of $127 million, less than the $146 million it posted the same time last year. That translates to $1.09 per share, or 80 cents per share after factoring out some one-time items, beating Wall Street's forecast of $1.09 per share.

The company's comparable store sales in the U.S. dropped 2.3%, with sales up 0.5% at Kmart, but down 4.6% at Sears. Kmart's sales rose thanks to better sales of toys and home items, while Sears was hurt by slow sales of appliances, lawn and garden items, tools and electronics.


Thursday, November 12, 2009

Close the fuckers down......

You have to love the word "hubris". It fits everything we know about the gang that runs our financial-government system. (our gang is so important we don't know what to do with out them)

Shooting works.

Burtynsky - Daily Digest - November 12 - Nov. 12, 2009 | Blogs at Chris Martenson - Burtynsky, Daily Digest, Economy, Energy, environment, Maass, Oil, Peak Gold, Peak Oil
Yes, of course every country needs a basic financial system to function effectively with letters of credit, deposits, and check writing facilities, etc. But as you move beyond that it is worth remembering that every valued job created by financial complexity is paid for by the rest of the real economy, and talent is displaced from real production, as symbolized by all of the nuclear physicists on prop trading desks. Viewed from the perspective of the long-term well-being of the whole economy, the drastic expansion of the U.S. financial system as a percentage of total GDP in the last 20 years has been a drain on the health and cost structure of the balance of the real economy. To illustrate this point, in 1965 the financial sector of the economy took up 3% of the GDP pie. The 1960s were probably the high water mark (or one of them) of America’s capitalism. They clearly had adequate financial tools. Innovation could obviously have occurred continuously in all aspects of finance, without necessarily moving its share of the economy materially over 3%. Yet by 2007 the share had risen to 7.5% of GDP!

The financial world was reaching into the GDP pie and taking an unnecessary extra 4%. Every year! This extra rent is enough to lower the savings and investment potential of the rest of the economy. And it shows. As mentioned earlier, the growth rate of the GDP had been 3.5% a year for a hundred years. It had proven to be remarkably robust. Even the Great Depression bounced off it, and soon GDP growth was back on the original trend as if the Depression had never occurred. But after 1965, the growth of the non-financial slice, formerly 3.4%, slowed to 3.2%. After 1982 it dropped to 3.1% and after 2000 fell to well under 3%, all measured to the end of 2007, before the recent troubles. These are big declines. It is as if a runner has a growing and already heavy blood sucker on him that is, not surprisingly, slowing him down. In the short term, I realize that job creation in the financialindustry looked like a growth driver, as did the surge in financial profits (which we now realize were ludicrously overstated). But in the long term, like a sugar high, thisstimulus was temporary and unhealthy.


Wednesday, November 11, 2009

The Stock market is a fairy tale.....

We make very little now. We sell Chinese trinkets and Jap cars to one another. Our children belong to the state and are fat, dumb, and ignorant of the way the world works. Our safety net is being bankrupted by fast buck artist and their whores in the political system. The elites buy Manhattan penthouses and complain about the lousy service they get from the cities.

No one seems to have a clue how to fix the rot.

keeping our heads down and saving our cash, ramping up our credit, and preparing for inflation to march on in the near future, is a the only protection we have. Big booms lead to big bust, lead back to big booms. Once the government gets to printing money in fear  not much else they can do but ride it out.

Expect a repeat of the 2003-2007 in houses and stocks as all these gangsters ramp up and reinflate the bubble. Then we'll see an even bigger bust..... about the same same time we boomers retire in droves and sell our assets to eat.

I'm going to have a business on the side to tide me over. Why give the fuckers my tax money?

How about you?


Guest Post: One Reason that the Stock Market is Rising While Unemployment is Soaring « naked capitalism
Don’t American Workers Win?

The fact that companies based in America are raking in profits from sales abroad is good for American workers, right?

No.

Gross points out that American workers don’t benefit because a lot of the goods sold abroad by American multinationals are made abroad:

If companies participated in foreign markets primarily by exporting U.S.-made goods, this shift would be good news for the U.S. economy and workers. But that’s not how it works. In fact, in the months after the global credit meltdown, U.S. exports plummeted. They bottomed in April, at $120.6 billion, and though they have been rising, the August 2009 total is still 20 percent below the August 2008 total. Globalization is changing the way we do business. It’s not a matter of U.S. companies exporting goods—burgers, soda, cars, software—made in the United States to Beijing but rather, making goods overseas and selling them overseas…



Tuesday, November 10, 2009

Ain't welfare wonderful......

These people would have to get real jobs instead of selling "real" estate. But as long as the gov can print money and the crooks can bribe the rulers this is what we get. pretty soon we all have to get in on the action just to survive.

This is what happens when empires collapse. A slow drawn out fizzle as every con artist gets in the action. Pretty soon they'll have to give everybody gas money and food stamps until they get run out of town.

Probably not in our lifetime. So kick back and watch or jump in and get yours.

Save some cash, pay your debts off, and apply for more and more loans until your credit is around 800. A few thousand at a time from local credit unions and small banks consolidating any loans you have into one payment.

 Make timely payments and pay them off over the next couple of years until you can buy anything you want unsecured. Using limited liability companies, for instance,  you can buy and sell real estate with no personal exposure.

Better yet, I suggest buying used mobile homes  and selling them on time to working stiffs for the price of rent. For example, paying $5000 cash, borrowed at $90 a month or so, and reselling for $10,000 at 10% interest, payments of $320 a month, for 3 years for a profit of $6500.

Of course, if you get into the middle  of the used mobile market, say $30,000, at 10%, the payments to your new buyer, would be $500 a month for 7 years. Paying $10,000 or so, including repairs,  you make $42000 in payments minus $ 10,000 equals $32,000  total profit after 7 years.

My landlord sold me the one I have currently for $20,000 furnished, $500 a month for 3 years. I'm betting he paid less than 10 for it and remodeled it.

He's 84. Including the one he's living in, He's done it 5 more times in the last 2 years that I know of.

Did I tell you he's 84!!! His wife helps him.

She's 86!!!

Depending on your finances and guts, there's room to make plenty of money in the Depression.

Considering everyone needs to live somewhere used mobiles are available everywhere without the hassles and expense of real estate . Also, no banks or finance companies loan on these anymore. The rip off artists got in then out because they couldn't sell the loans on the secondary market. Depreciating assets in inflationary times lose their profitability after several years which means we sell for 2 or 3 times our cost and collect the payments personally. With out big overhead we can out do most banks and finance companies in this niche. I can hire everything done under the table at half the cost and with complete anonymity. Not so with Bank of America. Putting it simply, it's the income stream that counts with me not reselling the paper.

Anyways, why sell the loans? Collect the payments and hope your buyers move out and gives you a chance to resell every 2 or 3 years. Collect down payments to make any repairs and live off the interest. After all, banks have been doing it for centuries. And as for the buyer?

Beats living in your car.

After all owning the roof over your head is better than renting or sleeping under a bridge, right? Just don't remind them that in this world you can't really own anything but must make a payment to someone or other for the rest of your lives.

Home sales hit 26-year high in September | Philadelphia Inquirer | 10/24/2009
Motivated first-time buyers racing toward the Nov. 30 deadline for an $8,000 tax credit propelled sales of previously owned homes in September to the highest monthly gain in 26 years.

Sales rose 9.2 percent over the same month in 2008 and 9.4 percent from August, the National Association of Realtors reported yesterday.

Since February, more than 340,000 qualified first-time buyers have taken advantage of the credit, which is retroactive to Jan. 1.

Recognizing how critical the tax credit has been to a market on life support since the end of the national real estate boom in 2006, the housing industry has been pressuring Congress to extend it for another year and make it available to all buyers except investors and second-home purchasers.

"We are hopeful the tax credit will be extended and possibly expanded to more buyers, at least through the middle of next year, because the rising sales momentum needs to continue for a few additional quarters, until we reach a point of a self-sustaining recovery," said Lawrence Yun, chief economist for the Realtors' group.

Economists agree that continuing the tax credit - estimated to cost the government an additional $1 billion - is key to a housing recovery, now forecast for the second half of 2010.

The Realtors' group report "raises almost as many questions as it answers," said Joel L. Naroff of Naroff Economic Advisers in Bucks County. "Clearly, the housing market is in much better shape than six months ago, when demand hit rock bottom. But aid from government incentives is disappearing, and how much demand will fall is somewhat unclear."

Unless the tax credit is both extended and expanded, economist Patrick Newport of IHS Global Insight said, sales will take a hit and "house prices, which have stabilized recently, will start falling again."

Newport says he expects the credit also will have boosted new-home sales when the September data are released by the Commerce Department on Wednesday.


Monday, November 09, 2009

Why is anyone surprised......

The government owns your kids, .....just try to discipline them.

They get taken away. Read what happened to this poor bastard.


7 Year Old Boy Removed from Father and Placed in State Custody Over mistaken Order of Hard Lemonade - Don't Tase Me, Bro!
7 Year Old Boy Removed from Father and Placed in State Custody Over mistaken Order of Hard Lemonade
By
Phil Leggiere
on April 29, 2008 5:04 PM | Permalink | Comments (93) | TrackBacks (2)
U of Michigan professor unfamiliar with Mike's Hard Lemonade orders his son a lemonade at baseball game. After boy is discovered by a security guard sipping the bottle police and child protective services remove boy to foster home.

Detroit Free-Press reports:

If you watch much television, you've probably heard of a product called Mike's Hard Lemonade.

And if you ask Christopher Ratte and his wife how they lost custody of their 7-year-old son, the short version is that nobody in the Ratte family watches much television.

The way police and child protection workers figure it, Ratte should have known that what a Comerica Park vendor handed over when Ratte ordered a lemonade for his boy three Saturdays ago contained alcohol, and Ratte's ignorance justified placing young Leo in foster care until his dad got up to speed on the commercial beverage industry.

Even if, in hindsight, that decision seems a bit, um, idiotic.

Ratte is a tenured professor of classical archaeology at the University of Michigan, which means that, on a given day, he's more likely to be excavating ancient burial sites in Turkey than watching "Dancing with the Stars" -- or even the History Channel, for that matter.

The 47-year-old academic says he wasn't even aware alcoholic lemonade existed when he and Leo stopped at a concession stand on the way to their seats in Section 114.

"I'd never drunk it, never purchased it, never heard of it," Ratte of Ann Arbor told me sheepishly last week. "And it's certainly not what I expected when I ordered a lemonade for my 7-year-old."

But it wasn't until the top of the ninth inning that a Comerica Park security guard noticed the bottle in young Leo's hand.

"You know this is an alcoholic beverage?" the guard asked the professor.

"You've got to be kidding," Ratte replied. He asked for the bottle, but the security guard snatched it before Ratte could examine the label.
Mistake or child neglect?

An hour later, Ratte was being interviewed by a Detroit police officer at Children's Hospital, where a physician at the Comerica Park clinic had dispatched Leo -- by ambulance! -- after a cursory exam.

Leo betrayed no symptoms of inebriation. But the physician and a police officer from the Comerica substation suggested the ER visit after the boy admitted he was feeling a little nauseated.

The Comerica cop estimated that Leo had drunk about 12 ounces of the hard lemonade, which is 5% alcohol. But an ER resident who drew Leo's blood less than 90 minutes after he and his father were escorted from their seats detected no trace of alcohol.

"Completely normal appearing," the resident wrote in his report, "... he is cleared to go home."

But it would be two days before the state of Michigan allowed Ratte's wife, U-M architecture professor Claire Zimmerman, to take their son home, and nearly a week before Ratte was permitted to move back into his own house.


Sunday, November 08, 2009

Crooks still in charge......

Until Obamama rounds up the bad guys and jails them it will be business as usual. The economy will phase in and out recession until we run out of foreign suckers to prop up the deficit spending.

No change so far. No change in sight. And no change allowed.


The Coming Economic Depression: Historic Collapse of Consumer Credit
Note: A chart example of what else we are up against: A Return of OIL Prices
Banks, given trillions stolen from the taxpayer, are using their ill-gotten fiat to speculate in markets using quant computers and insider information, neither of which the taxpayer has access. Nor do they have access to national level politicians, their contributions simply are not as large. Thus, the banks hoard their trillions while cutting off lines of credit to the very taxpayers who bailed them out. What lines are not cut are charged 30% or more, rates that the Godfather could only dream of.
The consumer knows that credit is tighter than it was before. I’ve been saying all along that total money and credit are contracting, that the world of derivatives and leverage is contracting despite our government’s best efforts to flood the system with money. While it’s difficult to see the overall shape of the shadow banking world, clues can be found when digging. Again, I point to the OCC reports showing that JPM notional derivatives have shrunk by some $10 TRILLION in the past two years despite acquisitions. The OCC reports overall growth in derivatives, but that is only because investment banks, speculators like Goldman Sachs, applied for and were granted status as a commercial bank (to gain access to taxpayer money).
So, we have the money supply increasing, governme


Saturday, November 07, 2009

Just in time.......

Since we can't afford to retire anyways, might as well come up with a justification. right? If we become welfare recipients who's going to pay for all those government handouts. After all we have millions of deadbeats depending on us. Hell, the government has millions getting ready to draw "guaranteed "payoffs.



BBC NEWS | Health | Complete retirement 'bad for you'
Giving up work completely on retirement could be bad for your health, US research suggests.

The study of 12,189 people found retirees who take on temporary or part-time work have fewer major diseases, and function better day to day.

The findings were significant even after considering people's physical and mental health before retirement.

The University of Maryland study appears in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology.

The researchers examined data on 12,189 people, who were aged 51-61 at the beginning of the study.

All the evidence suggests that if your mental wellbeing is depleted it will affect you physically
Professor Cary Cooper
University of Lancaster

The participants were interviewed every two years over a six-year period beginning in 1992 about their health, finances, employment history and work or retirement life.

The researchers registered only medical conditions which had been clinically diagnosed, and took account of factors such as sex, education level and financial wealth


Friday, November 06, 2009

Ta da.....

Broke dicks don't need loans. They need to clear the decks and start over. Many of us have done it and have done just fine. House expense, as I and anyone who has sold real estate will tell you, is very easy to formulate:

3 times your yearly salary with payments totaling about 25 % of your monthly gross for your mortgage payment. Such as if you make 4000 a month you can afford 1000 a month.

Which means you can afford a house for around 150,000-175,000. Same with everyone else in the market. If average household income is 50,000 then the average family can afford a new home built for 150,000.

Not 300,000, 500,000, or 2222 million for God's sake. This is econ 101 in every college that I know of.

Since speculation generated by "free" money handed out by the Fed leads to "gambling" which leads to bankruptcy which leads to enormous poverty which leads to desperate solutions which always leads to ...

Guns!


The Warning Shot Fired Yesterday - The Market Ticker
Yes, this means interest rates will rise to a market rate.

We have spent more than two years trying to avoid recognition of fundamental mathematical facts - average home prices cannot exceed 3x average incomes, and on balance home prices cannot rise faster than income over long periods of time.

Mean-reversion isn't a suggestion, it is a mathematical reality. As a homeowner with a fully-paid-off house, bought with cash, I certainly would prefer my home to have a value closer to 2005's price than 1995's.

But what I prefer has nothing to do with what is mathematically sustainable or what can be supported by the broader economy, and my personal desire to be able to "flip" my house or use phantom "wealth" to extract a lifestyle I cannot afford does not and cannot change the reality of what stability in the economy, on balance, requires over the intermediate and longer term.

Property prices must contract to sustainable values. If this causes banks to fail, so be it. If this causes consumer bankruptcies for those who used their homes as ATM machines, so be it. If this causes me to lose half of the "value" in my home, so be it.

I believe The Fed sent a message to Congress yesterday in recognition that the wall is fast approaching at 120mph: do the right thing and do it now - or else.


Thursday, November 05, 2009

Pretty obvious to me.....

As I ave beeen saying for years, Big foot, UFO's, Gnomes, Fairies, et al don't make "sense." Thousands of sightings suggests that we are over run with literally thousands of bizarre entities.

Which means everybody is lying, drugged, nuts, or a practical joker .

Or telling the truth as they see it. I'm betting many are only reporting the facts as they see them. They just don't make sense. Maybe this guy is on to something.

The Heavy Stuff » Blog Archive » Gnomes - A Sustainable Population?
Gnomes - A Sustainable Population?

One of the purposes of my posts on The Heavy Stuff (THS) is to provoke thought and critical thinking on any number of `issues’ of esoterica. And, in that regard, today’s post beckons the examination of the ludicrous - to be applied to what others would say is an `explanation’ of a viable sustainable `Bigfoot’ population out there `in the American Woodland’.

Yes, I know I’m already making enemies with a certain segment of my regular `heavy stuff’ readership by being a curmudgeon by doubting `first person’ accounts by `credible’ folks of all persuasions. BUT, I’m not doubting those accounts for one second - let me explain. You see, I think `Bigfoots’ in nearly all or perhaps all situations - are `temporary entities’.

To me, one must favor the overwhelming evidence that not one creature has ever been found dead or brought fourth alive - EVER. Nor have any `artifacts’ of this creature. Not even scat. Not in the last 10 years, not in the last 50 years, not in the last 500 years - not EVER. Never ever.

It’s something that those who have seen the creatures with their own two eyes will have to live with


Wednesday, November 04, 2009

Got my first credit card offer in over 6 months.......

 $39 yearly fee and variable rate, of course. So I threw it in the garbage and went to the credit union and borrowed two thousand on my free and clear car.
4.4 %.

On a 9 year old car as collateral. I also Have a free and clear truck  if I need more money.


Took 10 minutes and had the money in my savings account to tide us over while Patti is on leave for her surgery. If I ever get desperate I can borrow on my free and clear mobile home.

Maybe 20 grand at 200 a month.  Might be able to buy another and resell on contract like my landlord does.

Beats working for Walmart. Having a credit union on your side means:

 FUCK THESE BANK GANGSTERS.



The Coming Economic Depression: Insiders, Banks, Credit Card Companies Do Not Believe in a Recovery
Direct mail credit card offers peaked in Q3 of 2006 with approximately 2.1 billion being sent out. In Q3 of 2009 only 391 million have been sent out. In other words, credit card companies definitely don’t believe in the recovery and they certainly don’t believe in the American consumer. On top of this drop, credit card companies are now jacking up fees on good standing customers, adding annual fees for inactivity, and basically acting like your local loan shark. At times they are even charging 79.99 percent interest rates that would make Tony Soprano blush. If we really look at the data, the economy is doing anything but recovering. Actually, it is recovering but for those on Wall Street and the banks. The average American is merely subsidizing their party. By the way, the banks are largely the reason for the decade long housing bubble.
If you really want to see how much insiders believe in this rally, let us look at some details from last week. Insiders for the week with data from Thomson Reuters bought 8.2 million dollars worth of stock during last week. How much was sold? 184 million dollars. This pattern has been occurring the entire rally. Now wouldn’t you think insiders would have a better sense of the true nature of this economic recovery?


Monday, November 02, 2009

O.k the fat guy wins....



William Shatner on Gun Control - It's How Well You Aim the Gun

Sunday, November 01, 2009

In other words........

We are broke. You and me. Us. And broke dicks can't buy anything until we are no longer broke dicks. Giving us credit at below or at par with inflation only prolongs the coming misery. Printing money does not generate any real wealth. Only making stuff and selling it to others who are not broke will change things around.

Scrap Nafta and start building shit again that the world wants.


The recession is over but the depression has just begun « naked capitalism
So, what does this mean for the American and global economy?

1. The private sector (particularly households) is overly indebted. The level of debt households now carry cannot be supported by income at the present levels of consumption. The natural tendency, therefore, is toward more saving and less spending in the private sector (although asset price appreciation can attenuate this through the Wealth Effect). That necessarily means the public sector must run a deficit or the import-export sector must run a surplus.
2. Most countries are in a state of economic weakness. That means consumption demand is constrained globally. There is no chance that the U.S. can export its way out of recession without a collapse in the value of the U.S. dollar. That leaves the government as the sole way to pick up the slack.
3. Since state and local governments are constrained by falling tax revenue (see WSJ article) and the inability to print money, only the Federal Government can run large deficits.
4. Deficit spending on this scale is politically unacceptable and will come to an end as soon as the economy shows any signs of life (say 2 to 3% growth for one year). Therefore, at the first sign of economic strength, the Federal Government will raise taxes and/or cut spending. The result will be a deep recession with higher unemployment and lower stock prices.
5. Meanwhile, all countries which issue the vast majority of debt in their own currency (U.S, Eurozone, U.K., Switzerland, Japan) will inflate. They will print as much money as they can reasonably get away with. While the economy is in an upswing, this will create a false boom, predicated on asset price increases. This will be a huge bonus for hard assets like gold, platinum or silver. However, when the prop of government spending is taken away, the global economy will relapse into recession.
6. As a result there will be a Scylla and Charybdis of inflationary and deflationary forces, which will force the hands of central bankers in adding and withdrawing liquidity. Add in the likely volatility in government spending and taxation and you have the makings of a depression shaped like a series of W’s consisting of short and uneven business cycles. The secular force is the D-process and the deleveraging, so I expect deflation to be the resulting secular trend more than inflation.
7. Needless to say, this kind of volatility will induce a wave of populist sentiment, leading to an unpredictable and violent geopolitical climate and the likelihood of more muscular forms of government.
8. From an investing standpoint, consider this a secular bear market for stocks then. Play the rallies, but be cognizant that the secular trend for the time being is down. The Japanese example which we are now tracking is a best case scenario.

Not particularly uplifting, but hopefully well-documented. Your comments are very greatly appreciate