Although it may seem an unusual place to begin a daily economic column, there are a couple of things that have come into focus for me as it relates to pending military events this fall.
The first deals with how the timing may work out on the expected Israeli attack on Iran, which I had earlier pegged around October 25th based on my read of the predictive linguistic work from www.halfpasthuman.com. As we have gotten close to the event, it looks now like there will be some kind of a prequel event around October 25th, but then we should go through a week or two of massively building tensions before the actual attack, maybe even as late as late November to early December. The next “Shape of Things To Come” is set for release September 15th and you can do your own read of things.
First week of November oughta to feature busy headlines, though, with economic messes and then the lead-in tension — perhaps we’ll see things like big name political figures flying around trying to personally intercede -that kind of thing.
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With this in mind, we can now see the headlines shaping up to support these projected events. For example, the well-connected Israeli news operation DebkaFile is reporting that the “US Trebles MOP “bunker buster” bombs order, wants more and faster.
We can also see that Iran is not sounding quite so belligerent as the BBC headlines that “Iran ‘has new nuclear proposal.“ Trying to stop the clock,. are they?
This comes after the past few days where the officialdom in Iran has been debating the makeup of the new Iranian cabinet which has been on ME news channels. Are they worried that the West isn’t kidding? Could be.
Same kind of ‘lightening up’ going on with North Korea, too as the NY Times announces that “N. Korea Reopens Border with South.”
Bomb orders increased and in the background Iran and N.K. act a little more conciliatory. Makes sense, I suppose.
Markets Down
As long as the market stays over Dow 9,100, there’s still a chance that we could get one more pop upward before the fall of fall, but it isn’t looking too bright this morning as the US futures are down before the open. Housing and manufacturing data is due out about 10 AM if you want to chase numbers. Rotsa ruck.
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European markets down already today since the EU is at the highest unemployment levels in a decade.
Charring L.A.
The Station fire in L.A. county is over 100,000 acres now with no sign of containment yet.
Sun Quiet: Cold Winter Ahead
Oh-oh. Sun’s still extremely quiet and that seems to tie in to a “Chilly start to autumn 2009” stories that are popping up.
SpaceWeather.com is reporting just a single sunspot today (#1025) after 51-spotless days.
Gets me to wondering if there’s any predictive value to the kind of winter clothes people are buying? You know…a bipedal woolly worm kind of thing.
Million dollar promotion: Weather Channel follows its own forecasters shopping! No? Not a million dollar idea, huh?
OK, Shoot ‘em In the Back?
Suppose for a minute that someone breaks into your house in the middle of the night and you reach into your night stand and whip out your handy Ruger P-85. As you take the safety off, you yell “Who goes?” and there’s a sound from the living room. Going out into the other room, and taking your trigger finger out of indexed and your racing heart reminds you this is scary and you’re in a ‘him or me’ situation. Although the attacker’s back is to you, he begins to turn and you catch the glint of steel in his hand. Knife or gun? You’re not sure….but he looks like he is turning….
Do you shot?
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The answer to this question may have changed a bit in Florida where a “court OKs force against retreating attackers.“
Comical M&A Department
Nothing funny about $4-billion: Disney is buying Marvel Entertainment. I won’t say anything snipe or they might send Spidey over to rough me up, LOL. Where’d I put my Kryptonite?
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Skype is going private after being part of eBay. Guesses run in the $2-billion range.
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Sony is selling off a TV manufacturing plant in Mexico to a Taiwan outfit.
Say, this reminds me – forget which of the foreign channels was reporting it, but word is that the last television picture tube has been produced! Boy, talk about change: Nothing but LCD displays being made any more. Really amazing when I think about it. That old Trinitron might have collector value someday…
Headline of the Day
I like the N Y Post’s headline style. Writing about the ex-Société Générale trader who supposedly went rogue, the Post headlines “FRENCH TOAST: Kerviel Trail is Set“.
Anniversaries
“Ceremonies in Poland mark start of WWII” today while in Russia it’s the fifth anniversary of the Beslan school massacre that killed 331 people.
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This week is also the 40th anniversary of the Carpenter’s recording debut.
Gee, how time flies when you’re working for a living, huh?
