The first thing that came to mind this morning was the old Chinese curse: “May you live in interesting times…” Such is life in markets these days with gold up again this morning and the Dow is quickly approaching that 10,500 level I mentioned a while back.
Several readers have chosen to disagree with my assessment of where the global economy is – and there’s something to be seen from this exchange of emails with a reader who began his note to me “the second depression my ass”:
“George,
You keep talking yet the market keeps climbing.
What will it take for you to say ‘ I blew it ‘ ?”
Normally such emails land in the trash since I don’t put my view out for debate. Still, every once in a while a reminder is in order, so my reply was a simple:
“A new high in inflation corrected terms from the 2000 high – which would mean 15,000…”
To which the reader offered this:
“Reaching an all time high in inflation adjusted terms wouldn’t just mean you were wrong George, it would mean you were 100% wrong…
Geithner and Bernanke have to be buying bank stocks with printed money. That is the only way the market would be rising to these earning ratio’s under a crappy recovery. My bet is they also influence the futures markets so that the futures never really look so bad. I think they do this through Goldman. When Whitney said she is more bearish now and that this market makes no sense? It doesn’t to me either, except that since it was the bank stocks which crashed, it is the bank stocks they pump up…
So my take is that if there was no manipulation going on, I think you might be spot on, but when the market isn’t really ‘ free ‘ ? It’s a simply an ad campaign paid for by our tax dollars and the printing press.”
Each of these deserves a ponder. I’d first offer that there is seldom a 100% right or wrong in much of anything – the world is just too damn complex to be reduced to absolutist right/wrong terms. Short of 15,000 on the Dow (without government buying via the offshore proxy accounts), it would simply mean that the Second Depression didn’t really start when American lost trillions in the Dot Com bubble bursting and then the in the Housing Collapse which was contemporary to the Employment Collapse.
Take the predictive linguistics work of HalfPastHuman (where another report is coming in three weeks if current work progresses well) off the table. Go listen to some other forecaster. I’d recommend Gerald Celente of the Trends Institute (recent 11/21 interview here). He’s looking forward to as one reader calls it “Obamageddon” in the not too distance future
But, we need to be quite precise in our thinking on what’s out there: When (not if) the next leg down gets going it will not be something that’s the fault of just Obama; the Bush syndicate had a lot to do with this including the first trillion dollars into the banker bailout system. The rest was just follow-on as the paper-printing was necessitated by imminent collapse. We can disagree with my claim that the Second Depression began in 2001 and that 9/11 was part of a concerted effort by the powers that be to spin public attention and action away from the lack of financial responsibility in the country, but that’s my read of the ‘facts’ as best they’re available to anyone who’s not a member of the club/tribe/cabal that pulls the really BIG strings.
Curiously, we don’t disagree on the Geithner/Bernanke reaction. We should put on the table some of the results of this because – despite the Right/Left bloviating on point, the Obama folks have managed (so far) to paper over the inherited steaming lump of crap that the Republicorps left ticking after they bailed out their bankster buddies:
Fundamentally, what it sounds like the reader is saying is that “There can’t be no Depression because the government is intervening. Yet, the government was intervening like crazy in the first Depression, which happened nonetheless. I’d propose that the Second Depression is doing just fine with (or without) government or reader admission. By reporting only those people that are currently receiving unemployment benefits, the number of unemployed is seriously under-reported and many more knowledgeable analysts than me have pegged real unemployment in the 16-22% range which is what? (Repeat after me!) Depression Levels of Unemployment. Here: Go read the 17.5% rate report from CNBC just last week.
From the Wu-Jo: Time to Read More Jefferson
Where woo-woo meets rigorous thought on the dojo’s mental mat: Every so often, my sparring partner Universe arranges for a little shove this way – or that – in what I should be reading. An example was yesterday I received an email with a quote from John F. Kennedy in it:
“There has never been a greater concentration of intellectual power here at the White House since Thomas Jefferson dined alone.”
Didn’t think too much about it at the time. The way my Dance/Sparring with Universe goes, if Universe wants something to happen – to nudge me along on my path, then IT will supply the necessary materials.
Presto! This morning along comes a whole email full of what? Jefferson quotes!
“A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned – this is the sum of good government.
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Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves are its only safe depositories.
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Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.
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I have recently been examining all the known superstitions of the world, and do not find in our particular superstition (Christianity) one redeeming feature. They are all alike founded on fables and mythology.
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I have no ambition to govern men; it is a painful and thankless office.
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I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them but to inform their discretion.
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I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.
I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than those attending too small a degree of it.
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If the present Congress errs in too much talking, how can it be otherwise in a body to which the people send one hundred and fifty lawyers, whose trade it is to question everything, yield nothing, and talk by the hour?
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It is always better to have no ideas than false ones; to believe nothing, than to believe what is wrong.
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It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.
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It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world.
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Politics is such a torment that I advise everyone I love not to mix with it.
Power is not alluring to pure minds.
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Rightful liberty is unobstructed action according to our will within limits drawn around us by the equal rights of others. I do not add “within the limits of the law” because law is often but the tyrant’s will, and always so when it violates the rights of the individual.
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Sometimes it is said that man cannot be trusted with the government of himself. Can he, then be trusted with the government of others? Or have we found angels in the form of kings to govern him? Let history answer this question.
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That government is best which governs the least, because its people discipline themselves.
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The democracy will cease to exist when you take away from those who are willing to work and give to those who would not.
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The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield and government to gain ground.
The spirit of resistance to government is so valuable on certain occasions that I wish it to be always kept alive.
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Timid men prefer the calm of despotism to the tempestuous sea of liberty.
Whenever a man has cast a longing eye on offices, a rottenness begins in his conduct.
Not sure why Universe is sending me to Jeffersonian government school, but I presume there’s something to it, or it wouldn’t have shown up in such a timely manner; such is the nature of my dance partner.
Flumor
Gotta love this from a male reader:
“I’m not really concerned about swine flu. Here’s my concern.
• 3 years ago, Chinese calendar year of the cow . . . Mad Cow disease.
• 2 years ago, Chinese calendar year of the bird . . . Avian flu.
• This year, Chinese calendar year of the pig . . . Swine flu.
Next year is the year of the cock . . . Anybody else worried?”
Life Without Pie
A pre-Turkey must read: “Pies for Life” reminds us that a Life without Pie is Not a Life Worth Living.”
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Send your comments to george@ure.net
The UrbanSurvival Mall:
Peoplenomics This Week
Increasing Your Personal Efficiency
Without going overboard into the Human Potential Movement, I thought this week I would address a question I get asked with surprising frequency: “How do you get so much done?” The answer is really pretty simple – yet it’s one of those invisible decisions that people generally don’t spend any time thinking through. I have at least 14-weeks a year of productivity (based on 40-hour workweeks) that most people don’t have the sense to reclaim as their own. Since the holiday period is when many people get enough time off work to spend at least a little on introspection, I thought this week I’d share a few thoughts on how we can each increase our ‘personal efficiency’. I don’t claim to be perfect at it – just a little better than average. But thanks to the fact that effort compounds over time almost like interest, it’s a worthwhile study. We then apply this to some disturbing and quite possibly irreversible trends in today’s headlines.
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Maxa-Cookie Manager
Been a while since I’ve updated you on how many cookies and web bugs have been removed from my main computer by the Maxa Cookie Manager from Maxa Tools: 1,602 web bugs and 54,131 cookies so far. It’s amazing.
Take it for a free test drive by downloading it. To upgrade to full functionality will set you back $35 bucks, but Christmas is coming… Is your privacy worth it?
Once you try it out, click the upgrade button (!) on the upper right hand side for the $35 unlock to get it to remove even those nasty and highly intrusive ‘non-browser specific’ cookies. Bonus: You computer may run faster.
Attn: Mac Drivers: MCM does support the Safari Browser, but that does not mean it is compatible with Mac OS. Maxa-Tools only support the Windows world….so far. Given Jens and the other engineers time…
“Live on $10,000″ A Year
With another round of layoffs due to start later this month…a round which will start to axe many of the middle managers who have managed to avoid the HR grenades…might I suggest a preemptive tactical move? Voluntarily dropping your lifestyle back a bit, since we’re all being marched down that road by either circumstances or some out-of-control-PTB types who write checks to Washington lobby and to anti-reformers in California! A good starting point, at least if you’ve still got $10-bucks is my e-book “How to Live on #10,000 a Year…or less!”
It’s an automatic download. It’s written in an information dense style: The whole thing runs about 65 pages, but it gives you a vision of how to not only live on the cheap, but also how to migrate up the economic foodchain if you have a little hustle left… Click here for the index and details.
MyGroPonics
My commodity broker JB Slear and I have written a simple book to get you started on high density hydroponics. It’s an example of how someone with a little creativity, access to a few ‘dollar stores’ and willing to try out some new farming techniques can grow an amazing amount of produce sin a very small space – like even an apartment balcony (if it gets some sunlight). Sound interesting? It’s just $10 bucks here…
Pass It On
The business model of this website is base Simply click here and send a link to this site to everyone on your distro list…Nothing more dangerous than sharp, clear-thinking upstarts who ask a lot of questions, eh? Unless you believe WTC-7 fell over on its own, of course….
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Last week’s report is here. For back issues of this site, click here. (Goes back to 1997!)