Ah…so this is what a ’summer of hell’ linguistically builds to, eh? Headlines like turncoat congressman Arlen Specter says “Protests not ‘representative of America’. But, as one reader in West Virginia noted, those from the Hill that are seeming to hold protest-free meetings may be stacking the deck a bit for appearances sake:
“I just saw on the evening news that West Virginia Senator Jay Rockefeller presided over a local Town Hall meeting on the proposed Health Care Reform bill. There were no protests, shouting, pushing or disruption in any form! Are Mountain State residents more civilized than in other states? Perhaps more inclined toward thoughtful debate than our fellow Americans? Nooooo… The meeting was by invitation only, with all questions pre-screened. I had not even heard that this event was going to happen, until just now, after the fact. My invitation must been lost in the mail.”
Not surprisingly, “Officials see rise in militia groups across the US“, another data point worth noticing. Remember linguistically, we’ve been waiting for rioting in the UK to show up as a temporal marker that the upswing in people versus their government would be getting into the nonlinear portion of the tension building? And it was supposed to be concurrent with rioting in France?
Then there’s the swastika that was painted on the office sign of a Georgia congressman.
So here’s how the linguistics are really starting to fill out the ’summer of hell’ descriptor set now:
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Britain: “Racial tension rises in Britain“ Also, “‘Patriot” league plots more clashes with anti-fascist activists” hints that civil disruption in the UK is building much as expected.
Cliff, who runs the predictive linguistics project sent a note earlier this week reiterating why we aren’t trying to forecast each of the multiple earthquakes in this period. “yet another 7.6…just as the data suggested, pretty soon we will get to nearly daily at that level, so why comment on it? “ And less than 13-minutes later, a 6.4 in Japan: the story in the NY Times from Tuesday headlines: ”Second Japanese earthquake in days injures 100″. More coming. Seat belts?
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Your continued skepticism of our project is welcome…but this sequence is moving over to the ‘web bot hit’ column, don’tcha think? Won’t even mention the 80″ of rain stories, OK?
Buying Love?
The story in the NY Daily News about how George Soros is giving out $175-million to aid the neediest students in the Empire State is interesting. Wonder if he hasn’t heard the pitchforks being sharpened?
Losing How Much?
Oh-oh. Here goes a huge REIT problem as “Maguire Properties to default on 7 prime office buildings“. Yes, a loss reported at $375.7 million is one third of a billion plus a few beers and a used Gulfstream left over.
Fed Decision
Look for an update when the Fed decision comes out this afternoon. Not that their no move decision itself will be worth nothing – it’s baked in the cake already. But, how they word the accompanying statement may give us some insight into their thinking going forward, which is what the market will focus on. FedSpeak on the upside is my bet.
Trade Loss: $27-billion
From the Census Bureau this morning:
Goods and Services
The U.S. Census Bureau and the U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, through the Department of Commerce, announced today that total June exports of $125.8 billion and imports of $152.8 billion resulted in a goods and services deficit of $27.0 billion, up from $26.0 billion in May, revised. June exports were $2.4 billon more than May exports of $123.4 billion. June imports were $3.5 billion more than May imports of $149.3 billion. In June, the goods deficit increased $1.2 billion from May to $38.4 billion, and the services surplus increased $0.1 billion to $11.4 billion. Exports of goods increased $1.9 billion to $84.0 billion, and imports of goods increased $3.0 billion to $122.4 billion. Exports of services increased $0.5 billion to $41.8 billion, and imports of services increased $0.4 billion to $30.4 billion.
In June, the goods and services deficit decreased $33.2 billion from June 2008. Exports were down $35.8 billion, or 22.2 percent, and imports were down $69.0 billion, or 31.1 percent.
Goods
The May to June increase in exports of goods reflected increases in industrial supplies and materials ($1.2 billion); capital goods ($0.4 billion); foods, feeds, and beverages ($0.3 billion); and automotive vehicles, parts, and engines ($0.1 billion). Consumer goods and other goods were virtually unchanged.
The May to June increase in imports of goods reflected increases in industrial supplies and materials ($3.9 billion); automotive vehicles, parts, and engines ($0.9 billion); foods, feeds, and beverages ($0.1 billion); and other goods ($0.1 billion). Decreases occurred in consumer goods ($1.7 billion) and capital goods ($0.1 billion).
I expect when we see numbers for July (next month) there will be a good-sized pop UP in the deficit. Thank the foreign made car sales which boomed during the cash-for-clunkers spike for that, eh? This is interesting data only if you are a fan of rear-view economics. Care to guess what my stance on it is?
Outlook Says….
We should get our next update on Maxa-Tools Cookie Manager (v. 3.5) tomorrow – free upgrade for people using the Pro version – Should have a new free demo version up.
As usual, we have been way ahead of the curve on this: But notice if you will Jeremy Kirk’s article in PC World “Study: Adobe Flash Cookies Pose Vexing Privacy Questions.” MSM can’t be too far behind…
See how comfortable it can be out on the bleeding edge?