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July 9, 2011 05:25 AM CDT
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Ginning Up Jobs, Piece of Cake Hand me my statistical sledge hammer, wouldja? While the Obama administration tries to counter reports - like the charge that Stimulus Jobs cost $278,000 per - and there's a thoughtful comment in the WaPo this morning on this showing how that can be argued and predicting this will float around in many forms, we have the much less debatable Labor Department monthly jobs report to sink our teeth into first thing.
Unfortunately, our monthly drill-down into the numbers raises more questions than it answers.
For example here, in Table A, we find the non-institutionalized population was up 176,000. But, so sayeth the data, the Labor Force dropped. In fact 272,000 workers worth of drop.
"If the population is up 176K and workers is down 272K then WTF, how does the rate stay at 9.2%?" you wonder.
Simple! You go to the CES Birth/Death Model and create 131,000 jobs including 21,000 new construction jobs and 76,000 in leisure and hospitality.
Then, in Table 15 (Alternative measures of Labor Under Utilization), we see the U-6 rate popped from 15.8% in may to 16.2% in June, seasonally adjusted.
"Still, shouldn't the rate have gone up?"
Nope: The icing on this statistical cake is revealed on Line 8, Table A where the Labor Department dropped more than 2-million Americans as not in the labor force, compared with June 2010. Most don't have jobs, but they don't count. Capiche?
Piece of cake. Or was that "The cake is a lie"?
In Our Debt Of course, this weekend, we'll see just how far the economic party mood will go as budget talks drag on with the Big Deal could whack $4-trillion from the debt over the next 10-years.
This is all a time-waster/ fairytale anyway since don't want to burst the bubble here, but the next congress and prez will muff that one and we'll slide down the slope anyway. Pass the popcorn, it's a rerun we've seen since birth. --- War on Terror is a $6-trillion rack and has cost more than WW II says a recent report which is making the rounds again.
Paper with numbers on it versus the defense lobby? You kidding me? no chance.
Hatchling Then there's Orrin Hatch of Utah who thinks the rich shouldn't pay any more in taxes earning him the new moniker Orrin Hood, or Robin Hatch, depending on what you read about this.
All of which would be fine if small businessmen could pay all taxes at the stupidly low long-term gains rate, or better still, could have offshore accounts and load all profits into least tax havens.
This will no doubt get be slammed with emails from RF's (rich figure it out) who claim to be patriotic Americans but still bitch and moan about a 20% long term gain rate while small time humans (you and me, likely) get bent over with a 28% tax on gold/silver gains and I'm in the well over 25% rate. Where's my BP meds?
I know why I couldn't Hatch such a dumb idea as no more taxes on the rich: I'm not pandering for contributions from the (Quick! Who has any money left?).
Damn, you're smart. You gonna vote? Primary votes matter most!
Rewriting Mortgages by Decree Say, I'm all about trying to help people when they are down, but there's a fundamental question implied by the story "Mortgage Aid for Unemployed Expanded."
Here's the thing (and more on this in the Coping section this morning): If government wants to give people money to make mortgage payments - or pay off the mortgages, or make X months of payments, that's one thing.
But to decree a change in mortgage terms specifying a 12 month forbearance period seems to me is an outright attack on contract law.
Maybe a good lawyer could explain how I'm wrong? Seems to me the sanctity of contracts is now on the block. And without contract law what's going on? Executive fiat run wild?
Feeding Banksters Good story in the NY Post this morning about how now that the feds are looking at bankster bone-usses, plans are being cobbled up to work arounds.
Form versus substance - Zen-like, is it not?
Erupting So would it be a right write to pen a headline like "Icelandic volcano getting its rocks off"?
News to Us Britain's Sky News acquisition by Rupe is off while the government ponders the News of the World hack case. And, we're coming to wonder, was there some kind of government-level involvement?
Data Wall Daily OK, Ex-CIA type says a new internet could avoid some of the threats of new cybersecurity worries. Oh, I can't give you the link because either the page has a Java coding error, or our super-hardened computer system is right when it flagged a Trojan exploit in bezen.min.js. Hmmm, odd coincidence?
Yeah, sure, right...'course it is.
Catastrophic Climate Change Snow in a south American desert?
How Now on Chow? The annual "F as in Fat" report came out on Thursday from the Trust for America's Health. State rankings are (chubby to the front, please):
When you look at the fastest growing girths since 1995, the big pounders are (top 10 only here): 1. Oklahoma; 2. Alabama; 3. Tennessee; 4. Kansas; 5. Mississippi; 6. (tie) Georgia; and Kentucky; 8. (tie) Louisiana; and West Virginia; 10. South Carolina.
More here....but. come to think of it, more is what got us to where we are.
(more after this...)
Coping: With The Break Up of America I decided, somewhere between the third and sixth sip of wake-up juice this morning, that I needed a new system of dealing with cognitive dissonance. Which is, as we've talked about before, the state of mental anguish that accompanies being told one thing while the evidence of something different is starting you in the face.
And example might be looking up at what you are told is a shooting star. But, the more you watch it, the more you stare in disbelief as it becomes apparent and you're gobsmacked, that the 'shooting star' was a brightly lit space giraffe, some 900-feet tall and it's about to land on you.
SMASH! Another example of normalcy bias, paralysis from shock and awe, and too bad for you. We'll send flowers. --- America rewriting mortgage company contracts, by decree, written about above, means the whole system of contract law is in process of being breached. That, coupled with other evidence, should give any patriotic America cause to fear for our future as a nation. --- As a trader/investor/gamble-holic, the past few weeks have been terribly difficult.
We can argue about the Big Picture, or we can quibble over the details. --- A friend of mine and I go round and round on gun control all the time. He argues, for example, that the 'death rate by guns is lower in Mexico by a fraction of a percent.' I don't believe it and I've countered with my belief the statistics are crooked.
For one, an estimated 10% of Mexico's population is in America. Bet me the murder stats down south are based on the purported population total? They grow dramatically with the corrected divisor.
The statistic held up was likely based on the larger claimed population, not the actual/real population which would be claimed less the 10% inside the US and more, those hundreds of women killed/snuffed in Cuidad Juarez aren't in the count nor, likely, are all those bodies found buried around the Mexico, in places like Acapulco as part of the drug war.
But, as I tried to suggest to my esteemed colleague, in our most recent tangle on this - which is one of the few issues where we disagree - the mass murder in Acapulco also involved 15 beheadings so what we really need to look at is human-against-human violence and stop blaming guns. They are just extension of death by other means which encompasses blades, axes, drowning, and so forth.
Yep, even cars. I think we all need Federal Background checks to buy extended cabs, for example. And special licenses to drive anything under 2,000 gross vehicle weight - the concealed weapons on the highway as any 18-wheeler will tell you.
You may rest assured that absent guns, people would still find occasion to kill one another and hot emotional labels like "they kill kids" or calling hungers "Bambi-killers" clouds the issue and swap emotions for cold analysis.
That comes down to freedom to pursue without interfering with the rights of others or control by people you may not even elect. --- The Big Picture is America is in decline. Wages are coming down, Housing is coming down, Standard of Living is coming down, and the engorged Nanny State hasn't built new infrastructure or energized an economic recovery as much as it's fed itself seconds - and maybe thirds - of taxpayer misery and has gone crazy prosecuting wars based on Big Lies which has come at the expense of innovation and non-destructive economic growth. --- Moreover, the globalistas are pressing on World Government's agenda via the recently signed executive mandate (EO 13575 - Establishment of the White House Rural Council).
Sure looks benign on the surface, but some writers appropriately note that it means more intervention out here in the sticks, where we've gotten along for 235+ years without it. But as long as we're on point, WTF is this high-minded newly appointed group doing about China's plan to build a huge city & economic zone in Idaho?
Protectionism isn't all bad. Ask Poland about 1939. Corporate appeasement's gone wild and we the people don't get to vote as often or as lavishly as the non-human entities who have supra-human powers. Oh, and aren't limited in spending on politics, so says the USCorpCourt.
And you saw where a lady up in Michigan has run afoul city building code soldiers for planting a garden in her front yard? I can't make this stuff up. --- In case this morning's ramble isn't clear enough, the point is that there's a certain way of looking at things which suggests that we're witnessing the early moves to break up America.
All of which doesn't make me anti-Government, anti-Mexican, anti-Chinese, anti-Environment, or any other 'anti' labels you have handy.
I'm just a watcher of economic history and current trends rhyme at breakfast with "toast."
Like you, I'm a nonviolent, patient sort. And while I can't speak anyone else, my patience is running low.
The vision of 'more of the same crap' is not acceptable. We need a national vision, goal, and purpose and above all, leaders who can fix the roads, build the infrastructure, respect privacy and hold to the great things 'the melting pot' has delivered.
And do it like Kennedy: specific, actionable, and measurable.
The modern version of "We're going to the moon."
No, wait. A few years in a 're-education camp' and maybe I could say this without laughing - since it's the new politick:
"Let's as a nation all work hard to be at - or below - average."
Send Ure comments to george@ure.net Reader Action Department: Visit: The UrbanSurvival Amazon store. Books, computers & S/w and outdoor gear.
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any Joseph Tainter ("The Collapse of Complex Societies (New Studies in Archaeology)
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Thursday July 7, 2011 As the World Churns: ECB Raises Rates 25 Bips! If you had nothing better to do than stare into trading monitors, this might be an interesting period, this window between now and Friday's close. The main reason being we have something that to my eye could be labeled a 'systemic discontinuity' in that the dollar is up, markets are up, and the price of metals is up. Something's gotta give, near as I can figure it. And the ECB rate hike today just might be it.
The foreplay: Gold which popped up tdo the $1,525 level overnight was trying to convince the fearful that it was heading for a new all-time high. It's $25 bucks, or more, short of that.
When you drill-down, you see the recent moves from a high of $1,552.50 down to $1,483, you'll see that gold dropped $69.50 overall and that a 'normal' (whatever the hell that is anymore) retracement of either 61.8% or 75% would place gold's bounce here in $1,525.95 (61.8%) or $1,535.13 (75%). So until that - and the 80% retracement level around $1,538.60 are surpassed, my label of gold as being in the "summer doldrums" stands as accurate, but nevertheless ready to flip over into "Warning! Warning! Everyone run from street!" should $1,483 not hold, since that would mean deflation is piling on and time to fall out of love with that class of investment for a while.
Not that we've sold a farthing, of course, or if you're not old enough to have run into the term farthing, it's about a quarter of a penny in the oldie-moldy (not to mention incomprehensible) British currency system. Where were we? Ah... --- The dollar - despite reports of largish increases for White House staffers with more than one year of service while the rest of us got next to zilch - has gone Lazarus again and is knocking on the 0.70 Euro area.
Oh, not so much because America's in great shape but because the Euro sucks.
And that's what drove the European Central Bank to issue this press release: What's to talk about? Dollar is soaring, this will drive down the US markets today, I may make back some of my triple bear fund losses and....maybe most important: It will weigh heavily on our US Fed which has its own problems with debt-logged paper. --- And the commoditization of stock markets, which has been driven if not outright caused by HF trading which accounts for nearly 90% of the 'action' now, has led to exaggerated fifth waves, instead of big third waves, since stocks are nothing more than a commodity anymore, which is a real change.
Unless, of course, you're a small retail investor who is buying companies paying 12-17% dividends as the nearest thing to 'free money' you'll see for a while. But even here, danger lurks because many of those current high dividend players are only paying because money is so cheap presently. Again, look to Ben. --- After a week of pull-back maybe ahead, a major blow-off rally over August is not out of the picture since that would nicely set up a Fall Collapse which would dance nicely with the web bot run.
But in the meantime, program trading numbers - a key statistic for those trying to make a non-HF buck - are now available on subscription only. Reminiscent of the Fed's hiding the sausage when St. Al axed the public M3 reports.
Main thing to remember as the data hits over the next 12-trading hours?
1. Upwards of 90% of trading is machines. Machines that are programmed to take your money and move at least a portion of it to someone else.
2. Logic is twisted in markets now such that a drop in the US unemployment rate would likely be good for the dollar and that could in turn (counter intuitively) be bad for US markets.
So while the program trading churns, we understand pretzel logic is the new reality and with that, plus a large hit of caffeine and tranks, we're ready to open our eyes to the first data of the morning....
More Jobs Data Tomrorow's US Labor Department report is going to be anti-climatic, since the Challenge report was out yesterday and the ADP report is just out this morning:
Toss in the weekly Labor department numbers, too, while we're at it:
All of which means the pressure is on the US Fed to do the right thing, but whatever that might be is seriously out of focus, or, it's all Greek to us.
JobJacks See the article in Mother Jones about "My Summer at an Indian Call Center"?
MSM Collapse Say, here's a dandy recipe for disaster. Take one part phone hack scandal, toss in a supportive boss, adds four shakes of declining ad revenue to the sector.
Shake, twist, and serve small bits daily till everyone dies of boredom. Best served with cheese...which gets us to...
Holes Eating Modelspace Dept. While our ability to look into the future using the fledgling science of predictive linguistics (our rickety time machine) is threatening to implode as the limits on the internet are emplaced, readers keep sending more evidence of how the "holes are gonna eat the cheese" by mid 2013...
We stand, or rather sit since standing is too much work, by our earlier call for an end to social media as it's too easily leverages into social action.
Them Twits Dept. Unless, of course, you're trying to tweet yourself into reelection. Where, we read, president O has a tough time with the 140 character limit.
Not that a basic thought can't be conveyed in Districtese in that length. But it's the caveats, conditions, restraints, definitions, legal outs, political weasel-words, and such that ramble on, I figure.
How about if everyone tweeting from Washington had a special one character Tweet-limit: Y for Yes and N for No. OK, W for waffle, then. F for certain members of congress. What a plan...where my IP lawyer?
Food Dilution Say, here's a serious ponder for you: With word leaking out that "As commodity prices soar, so does demand for Wood Pulp - as a "Food Extender" linguistic implications are bothersome.
For example, would "getting a woody" possibly become a reference to a bakery product, for example, rather than the former sexual reference?
Still, food-grade cellulose is a potential economic boon: HR Departments will need overtime and larger employee guidelines, just to encompass the wealth of new double entendres that will accompany public recognition, I'm just certain of it.
And would that mean citizens shouldn't purchasing from those who (this is bad, but it's early) ply wood?
Saw that one coming, did you?
Coping: With the Shaky-Quaky World Say, not to make you any more paranoid than pink slips flying at the office, government surveillance expansion, or putting poisons in our water where a couple of million years of Ma Nature's work managed to keep our teeth from falling out of our heads previously, will make you. But, the trend in global earthquake frequency and magnitudes is one more item that should be on your list.
Most recently, the 7.6 (first reported as a 7.8) shaker in the Kermadec Islands Region of the south Pacific Wednesday (US time) 736 miles nor'east of Auckland (where the Auks presumably still live) NZ has gotten our attention:
"And why would you be worried about this little speck of what's-it in the middle of who-cares?"
Let's start with the USGS assessment:
Couple of points. First it's interesting in that magma, so say the scientists, rises from the Eastern Pacific area and then works its way West over a few eons, until it runs into either Japan (remember that one?) or into other abutments from Asia. So, in a sense, it's possible this actually has something to do with Japan's mess.
Second thing is to look at reader Tony Ring's latest earthquake data crunching which looks at USGS database data and in which you can see a distinct recent, starting in about 2004, around the time of Banda Aceh...
Always - and ever-ready - to take indecent statistical liberties - I've projected out 24-months in this latest (through June 30) chart which suggests that 2-3 years out (5th order polynomial, forecast mode; period=24 ahead) implies that we might be in a world where 25 (or more) quakes of 6.0+ magnitude per month could be happening.
Again, applying some statistical indecencies, the 5th order polynomial forecast out 24-months raises the possibility that we could be seeing about 4.25 quakes of 7+ magnitude per month come this time in 2013.
Always looking for ways to connect the dots here, it does strike me as at least interesting that that the four major quakes per month seems to come along about the same time that Clif's got the internet being inaccessible to our spiders.
Second is that on some of the discussion boards there had been speculation about a 7/7 quake (Elenin related?) and this south seas jobby is certainly close enough to be called a hit.
Since I'm always looking for slow ways to make a fast buck, maybe there's something to be considered here: My flimsy statistical perversion suggests that we could be having one land 7.0+ and thee or more offshore within two years each month. 73% of the world's surface being water, but you remembered, that, right?
Gotta be a way to turn this into a quickly growing business of some kind. thinking quake recovery, quake-resistant buildings good for a 10.0 or bigger, or simply in gardening, since the accompanying volcanism would certainly imply a lot more crap in the atmosphere, which in turn might trigger a nuclear winter-like Ice Age.
I wonder if we could make Texas' Best Dog Sleds out in the shop....hmmm...a dog sled, musher's manual, a team of Sgt. Preston's best huskies, and dried fish has got to be a new niche market for preppers.
Yukon dogs or Yukon Golds...everyone gets to guess what's coming.
High Hopes for a Great Book On our recent road trip to Detroit for the National Society of Newspaper Columnists conference, I met a very well-respected literary agent and hooked up my co-author Howard Hill with him.
Think I mentioned Howard's got the best book I've seen about how the whole housing collapse happened with names, dates, players, basis points, and the behind the scenes dynamics behind it.
Keep your fingers crossed. --- Also in the mail yesterday, speaking of convention follow-up, a nice picture of Elaine and me at one of the dinners arrived, sent by columnist Stu Bykofsky of the Philadelphia Inquirer. He'd put a sticky-note on on the pic to the effect that
"Elaine's better looking than you...but that's understandable..."
He's right. I get that a lot.
Stu's column today - "One nation, divided in thought" - is a pretty good read if you have time.
Fine reminder of the hidden word in the name of the United States.
Differentiation and segmentation of population substrates into manipulable persuasion blocks for concentrated economic exploitation of corporate elitists wasn't quite what the Founders had in mind, I'm sure.
But here we is.
Wednesday July 6, 2011 A Word from the Weatherman Normally on a Big Number Day, we'd launch right in to the latest gov't data and go on about how it's impacting markets. But not this morning. Today is comes in second place to the food story. Everyone gets sick of economics, anyway. Food is a different deal. Google shows 25.1 million hits under "cook books" while "economics books" returns 3.27 million.; shows where the appetite is, huh?
More than six months ago, I was writing to you about how putting in a garden and/or rounding up a good long-range food plan would become more and more critical as global climate change (note: not necessarily heating) would likely be along. And since then, we've had it in spades in the upper Midwest. Which got a reader of ours to thinking...
But only if you eat regularly.
Which gets me to the USDA Crop Progress report that popped into the I-Ching Inbox - presumably because I was hungry at that moment - where what did I find?
No, the food supply is not in serious peril, unless you got used to $6.99 steak specials and cheap oatmeal. Just keeping you posted on this because your lead time to get in a crop of almost anything is 120-days and if the weather doesn't stay pretty darn good, your wallet's going to suffer.
One other weather note: Good MSNBC coverage of the dust storm in Phoenix.
On to the Data Although the "offishul" unemployment data doesn't come out until Friday, the Challenger job numbers are out this morning.
The ADP numbers due tomorrow, but sorting out the impact on the markets gets complicated, though it may go something like this:
Of course, onto this logical linguini, we need to spoon on several helpings of China is raising rates and then wonder "What will the ECB do?" Smart money says they will raise tomorrow. And then we can leapfrog on to "What will that force the Fed to do?"
Answer: Fed will either raise 25-bips (basis points, 25 basis points = 1/4 of one percent) at their next meeting (stake through heart of recovery) OR they will just yammer and talk tough. Which will crash bonds, and send gold and the market to new highs.
Or not.
The P in PIIGS Portugal has had a Moody's downgrade to Ba2 with a negative outlook from Baa1. Quick: Dump your gazillion dollar holdings in P-bonds! Italy in trouble next? "Bets? Bet's? Coming out....." - a phrase that only makes sense if you play craps a bit. Who me? When I have Level II on my desk?
Petty Bureaucrats Arise Dept. The case of a NYC resident, accused of living somewhere in Gotham and putting day old newspapers in a trash receptacle meant for passing pedestrians is the most absurd thing I've noticed so far today.
Didn't Carlos Castaneda mention "petty demons" in the Don Juan series?
Earth-Quakery Presumably, you know as a long-time reader, that both Clif and I have been eyeing the movement of the Earth's crust lately with a lot of suspicion. He's been looking at that rip developing in Northeast Africa's Great Rift Valley which is possibly a long-term new inland sea developing, while I, on the other hand, have been much more interested in watching what will happen to the Imperial Valley when the 50-60 feet, or so, of land rise around Mexicali sinks into the Baja and the sea turns one of American's billion-dollar agricultural areas into a huge bass-fishing Mecca. Now's the time to be building the El Centro Island Marina, I figure.
Nutjobs?
Well, not quite. Go read the LA Times article "Scientists tie Colorado River flooding to San Andreas quakes" since, I've told you before that SoCal quakes seem to follow huge rainfalls by about two years and this could set up a...well, just let's say I won't be taking the I-10/8 freeways much. My distaste for the checkpoints aside.
The Data Wall Want more evidence of how we're running out of data sources for the web bot project? Sample this.
Op-Ed: Straight Talk MSM: Back in the Hot Seat I usually don't comment on day to day gore/celeb kind of news items, except as comic relief, but it's worth noting the comments of the attorney in the Casey Anthony Trial.
The term "media assassination" seems an accurate phrase, and as a matter of policy around here, we never question the outcome of a jury trial, since that's the cornerstone of American justice. If you weren't on it, you don't have the facts as permitted by a court of competent jurisdiction.
What's significant, however, is the term "media assassination" can be applied to a large number of seriously-hyped stories, such as DSK, the hotel maid, Weiner, and so forth.
What's meaningful -but usually missing - is the larger framing and context: PR "hit men" are real and there are many well-paid shills on many subjects from climate to politics to various social causes.
Media tends to focus not on what's important, only those items which have highly emotional reactive substrates which draw readers and viewers in to artificial drama accentuated by shallow reporting. Helped along by the shills, which is a whole industry in itself. --- The most important thing any of us owns is our consciousness and there's a high level of manipulation of it by mass media aimed at ensnaring as many people as possible in an artificial reality where the cult of personality is shamelessly promoted by self-appointed media "experts." All about ratings and revenue. "Right?" Ha! Not in the equation.
If we fail to guard the approaches to consciousness, involvement at an emotional level - usually toward no productive ends - results. When it does, circulation and ratings rise, you lose time, participate in group-think, and become easier to manipulate in the future. You are, in Pavlovian terms, being trained as a stimulus-response money. Ring bell, see monkey spend on useless crap. See revenue grow. See media ownership consolidate to the bell-ringers. --- We have, as a nation in decline, sold our focus on inventiveness, enterprise, creativity, and enlightenment; and all for ratings points.
In its place we've substituted everything from shock-jocks to vidiots. "Stories" about masturbation? GMAFB. Shill-provided textbooks and curriculum? You betcha. --- Next time you find yourself being drawn into one of these "artificial dramas" ask yourself this: "Is the news story I'm watching a potential tool to improve my life, or will it offer me a way to restructure my life for the better? Will it make me healthier? More independent? More self-reliant and resilient?"
It's a tough question to ask, and hard to remember, but it circles back to one of the cornerstones of UrbanSurvival Philosophy: If you are not in charge of your life - which means exercising 100% ownership and access control to your own thinking at all times - who is?
More important: Can they be trusted?
No one in their right mind would trust the vidiots. So they don't ask. They purport to report not disclosing that if you're hearing the hype, you're already in the clutches of The Machine.
If it ain't actionable, I ain't worth watching. But that's me. But seems to me if you were glued to the tube for this one, you have an ownership question to go think about.
Coping: With Cabbage, the Miracle Drug A reader who's a bit more awake than me sent the following note just as soon as he'd finished my notes on cabbage and thyroid in yesterday's column (here).
I let the "famous typos" line slide and immediately shot back:
My pretzel logic in medicine could explain why I haven't passed my medical boards yet (despite a couple of stays in Holiday Inns): As a doctor (were I one) I'd just be way too liberal in prescribing historical beverages and herbages. Oh sure, they might work fine. But how does one do an IPO ands patent them?
I'll still get the panel done next lube, oil, and filter stop at the doc's, of course. --- BTW, as the Frank/Paul herb law comes along, we're hearing rumbles that the GMO companies are planning to be players. Better living through what?
Uh,....pyramid building? --- My new personal "super-diet" with the cabbage and 1.5 miles of b4risk walking, use of diatomaceous earth (food grade) and some other things has now lost just about 7 pounds of road fat in 6 days. Haven't even been hungry on it, either.
Seems that while the conventional wisdom is that hyperthyroidism should keep weight off, there may be conditions under which it doesn't prevent weight gain such that a return to more normal thyroid ranges (aided and abetted by fresh cabbage, for example) won't reduce weight dramatically and quickly.
Which is not to say that hyperthyroidism is why anyone else has a few more pounds than they should. Just saying that so far, in my personal experience, protein and cabbage and the basic Ferris diet have been amazing.
The Usual Disclaimer: This is NOT medical advice. Before engaging in any change of diet be sure and consult an appropriately qualified medical professional. --- Speaking of Medical Thingies: A colleague in Europe at the moment (a doc) tells me of an amazing electronics based device that detects cancer using radio waves - and has found itself up against a powerful medical lobby including the x-ray, NMR, and imaging lobby groups. My contention is concern is an industry and is not interested in low-cost alternatives, even though the technology is being described places like this.
"But research takes money!" And the more dead, the more dough?
To my way of thinking, the FDA should ban all drugs for which there is a viable natural alternative.
I mentioned how the effects of Red Rice Yeast - a natural statin type drug - was gutted by the FDA which is not enforcing on purely medical grounds, in my view, and has stepped over the line into industrial protectionism, or at least so the evidence argues.
Of course, acknowledging that the planet worked fine for several millions of years before industrial chemists and currents of death came along, flies in the face of job creation, and tax-exploitation, and elitist control.
So there you go: The End of Empire Economic Conundrum in a Nutshell (by a nutjob). Although Joseph Tainter and Jared Diamond research certainly points along the same general direction when looking at end states.
Reader's Writes Here's a good one:
Yeah, Nexus is a fine publication.
BTW, in keeping with this morning's medical vein (sorry, couldn't resist) while the MSM was still pimping artificial fats which were in many cases hydrogenated, Nexus was way out front in December 1998 with the groundbreaking article "The Oiling of America" by Dr. Mary Enig which questions the promotion of hydrogenated veg oils and specifically cites risks.
So yeah, every so often, mention of Nexus is due because they really have some excellent content from time to time, even if it flies in the face of "conventional wisdom" which is underneath, a buzz-term for "corralled humans managed bounded thoughts."
But, of course, we can't having too many people be free thinkers can we?
Brain Food This post on RMN under the heading "The Incredible Magdeburg Water Bridge in Germany." Neat engineering.
Dream School I've mentioned every so often that when I sleep at night, I awaken as though from a classroom with a new idea stuck in my head.
This was the most amazing thing ever last night.
I was there in "dream school" and I was working on my book ("Victims of Process: How unwritten recipes run your life...") and the proper ending for the book appeared.
Turns out the book will culminate in a new concept called lepto-learning. Don't have time to even begin to cover it in, but turns out this book, which has been sitting around as a first draft for six years, suddenly has a very significant - and powerful ending - which slotted into reality between pop culture and knowledge engineering.
To borrow a Clif'ism: Tres cool. --- Since we're seeing the net start to close up - in dribs and drabs- around us, I'm actually thinking of writing the definitive book on the rickety time machine which would, as series of appendices, include most of the previous data runs and describe the work fully so it's not lost to history. I'd write from the voice of Dr. John Watson, sidekick to Sherlock Holmes; except I bumble more, of course.
Clif's been muttering about writing a book, too. Depends on how the hole-eat-net over the next month or three...
But first things first; gotta finish the econ book with Howard.
Tuesday July 5, 2011 Rallying on L.I.I.T. Seasonal rallies on Wall Street are a wonder to behold when they dig in, and I've been left 'beholding the bag' a lot being on the wrong side of this one. Still, while I wait for the market to drop (later this week, I hope, so I can exit with a smaller loss than I'm holding now) there's no denying that the market is showing how perverse investors are.
The both of them that are left, that is, since estimates of high frequency trading run as much as 80% (or more) of market volume anymore, now that most retail investors have been sheared a good bit since the 2007 highs. Pour yourself a Long Island Ice Tea (booze-free at this hour, natch) and let's dig into this a bit. --- The concept of "rallying on average" will be revealed to the aware person when the factory orders come out later on this morning. While many economystics are forecasting around a 0.9% gain, it will come on the heels of a 1.2 percent loss in April.
Now, think about this: If March was 100, then April's 1.2% loss would put a hypothetical index at 98.8. And this morning - if the number comes in at the bull rallying 9-10th's of one percent gain, then we'd have to multiply that 98.8 from April by 1.009 which would give us an index reading of 99.6892.
Need another example? OK, then, you've come to the right place. The Friday ISM numbers reveal that while the PMI (purchasing managers index) was up to 55.3 from the May 53.5 level, that's still a fair bit lower than April's 60.4, the March 61.2, or the February 61.4 readings. Trank me.
In other words, no progress. Just hype and sheep herding. So, just for the halibut, we go back to the March Dow figures. We discover (look surprised) that the closing high for the Dow in March was 12,350.61 on the 30th.
Yet here we open from the Friday close at 12,583? Don't know about you, but for me ViseGrips are in order.
Housing prices have moved about the thickness of a matchbook cover. Gold - even on this morning's rally is barely hanging on to $1,500, and silver has dropped from nearly $48 down to $34 and change.
The only explanation I can come up with is the Long Island Iced Tea Syndrome. Which is where the market, in a drunken state of bullishness, goes to a summer excess of financial debauchery - which, turns out, is a fairly predictable annual event.
Unfortunately, what is L.I.I.T. for the bulls is grape Kool-Aid for us bears. But we'll just bide our time. The hangover will arrive. But my YTD return is down to just over 33% YTD. We'll somehow suffer through, but it's a big whack on the backside from a 67% YTD, fo sho.
Failing Paper-Overs While the market may get a tiny bit of rally-on this week, the serious people of S&P have warned of something buzzed as "selective default."
For now, the ECB is continuing to support Greece, and the austerity measures seemingly are in place, but at some point does the confidence in the papering over fail? (Yes) And, when it does, who else in the world will be in the crapper this fall? (Everyone) But we'll just consider the L.I.I.T Syndrome could be a global phenom.
DSK: Back from the Sexicide My suspicion continues that former IMF boss Dominique Strauss-Kahn who was "alleged" out of office at the IMF 'rape claims' was possibly 'set up' because he was not going to be a "yes man" for the PowersThatBe. And so, it comes as no surprise this morning to see that he is turning tables and is threatening to countersue a French writer who has made similar claims.
Interesting to watch how "information" (headlines/allegations) is such a high level tool of control high-level in politics around the world. The only thing that varies is the underlying data set, such that there is actually something of a design pattern. Whether it's sexual conduct in the French case, or transcripts in the US, this information warfare stuff is complicated! Be nice if the MSM was more on it...
The Developing Data Gap Several readers have sought clarification about the long term data sets in the Shape of Things to Come report (predictive linguistics/rickety time machine) which paint a picture of a world with no internet by mid 2013.
As an example, you do know that Google has turned off some of its Google Realtime features since their deal to sniff the Twitter 'pipe' has expired?
And yet another example of how the Internet is now developing the "holes that eat the cheese" later on comes in the report that Belarus has decided to block access to Facebook and Twitter.
I continue to stand by my earlier prediction that not only will social media turn into a big passing fad - like CB radio - but along the way it will provide a reason for the federal government to assert licensing both on content origination and on use/access to the internet within two years. --- When the next leg down of the Second Depression comes along, government will have no choice. Molotov's and Tweets can both be weapons in the wrong hands. (Don't ask what the right hands are for the Molotov, please...)
To be sure, some governmental efforts seem high-minded enough. Take Australia, where net filtering started to diminish our spidering capability more than a year ago. Forget that it doesn't work, or at least very well amid reports that "Testra, Optus net filters 'trivial' to bypass."
The problem for the web bot project is that we simply don't have the resource to go around building workarounds for every country on earth and there will be no international standards on this kind of thing.
So whether the 'end of the data' in mid 2013 is really the End of Civilization as discussed in this week's Peoplenomics report (a real possibility when the global derivatives paper-overs fail) or whether the net is simply licensed, filtered, and dumbed-down to death doesn't really matter.
The brief flash of global consciousness is under attack and the evidence is in the headlines to the aware reader.
HuffPo/AOL Deal Points? The recent Huffington post/ AOL deal comes to mind when WorldNetDaily does a story about how "Arrianna's AOL urges men to 'masturbate.'
Say, you don't think that a sudden bet toward controversial content in order to hype page views in order to hit deal point numbers has anything to do with story collection, do you?
So Much for Crankin' Bankin' Reuters story about how Big Banks are planning layoffs is making small waves now. The State Government layoffs this fall will be a bigger deal, since the flywheel effect of government employment to carry us into economic recovery is in the process of being 'blown.' Bigtime.
Florida's layoff of 1,300 workers is just a taste... and a bitter one at that. Connecticut is in the wings, along with Washington (the state) and many others.
And I may skip a visit to Coney Island where workers are now rationing toilet paper says NBC out of NYC.
Have I told you Truth or what? The economy really is in the crapper.
New Words Need Dept. From time to time you may henceforth see me refer to a different flavor of the word 'truth'. It's pronounced Trute. Trute is what you get on the street. "I shit you not bro, trute!"
Truth, the archaic form, is what comes from the old paradigm's defenders and is true but only within the paradigm confines.
We can exchange sly nods when I post a government press release and refer to it as "truth' and then we discuss the trute. Thus we acknowledge the normalcy bias and at the same time keep looking for the trute.
Coping: With 7 SP1 I have survived the installation of Windows 7 Service Pack 1. But, if you haven't done it yet - a word of advice: Don't be a nervous columnist/analyst on a deadline on blood pressure meds. It takes a few minutes.
Most 7 updates have been pretty simple on the user side: You click 'update" when prompted and go on about your work. Not so with SP1.
Things begin deceptively smoothly; the requisite agreeing to some license terms which may include references to first born male child, or whatever - I've given up trying to understand what lawyerland has cooked up in the EULA's anymore.
Next, the "Don't turn off your computer" warning and then you wait. My computer had a lot of thinking to do at 15% and 30% of Stage 1 of 2. Then, it restarted.
Then - I got a bit nervous to tell the truth of it - because it went through the whole sequence again with stops at 15% and 30%, which were long enough for me to build a pyramid in the front yard.
This time, however, SP1 install decided - after another restart - to continue on. After what I can only assume to be some additional serious thinking, 25-45% simply flew by and eventually after a couple of more restarts, we got into Stage 2. Which was fine by me, since it gave me time to lay a nice covering layer of highly polished granite on the sides of my pyramid, which by now had draw quite a crowd of neighbors.
"No worries" said I "Just thought I'd try to get some real work done while 7 updates my system..." The commander of the SWAT Team didn't seem too amused. "We know about people like you who won't consider Linux...damn troublemakers..."
I stammered something about "Clients are all on Microsoft platforms and....." but he clearly wasn't buying it. "You look at Apple stock lately a**hole?"
Holding both hands up - which was easy with all the guns pointed at me - I withdrew to the office to see how things had progressed in the previous 13-hours.
"Windows 7 Service Pack 1 Successfully Installed." Hallelujah. --- In all seriousness, or some anyway, W7 SP1 wasn't too much of an ordeal. 35 minutes.
And I have to hand it to Microsoft for getting it right, since at least my computer works for now. Doing a major update on the vast array of systems out there is clearly a non-trivial task.
So much so, that it would be like taking a Boeing 747, in flight on its way from LAX to Honolulu and trying to fit a new version of port engine #2 onto the plane which you snuck past TSA as carry-on and doing the engine change oute cruising along at flight level 380 and 800 NM off the coast.
(So what if my example is little high for the 747 max economy flight profile, I'm trying to illustrate complexity, now a flight fuel economy profile discussion, OK? Flight level 280 then...)
Still, the update took longer than expected - and it would be cool if when "updates" were involved there could be a little flag that says something like "This update may take X Minutes (hours, days, years, centuries?) to complete..." "Are you felling lucky, Punk?" would be nice, too.
Is this asking too much? A look at the processor, speed, ram, memory, disk space, humidity, and position of Uranus should be able to drive some kind of estimated time to install, yah think?
On the other hand, if you're a spontaneous pyramid builder like I am, you might have time to put a golden cap on yours. Mine will have to await SP2.
The older I've gotten, I notice, the more interested in maintaining physical
health I've become. Keeping weight off isn't so much the issue - I've
shed 5 pounds of "road fat" since we returned from Detroit and the lessons in
Tim Ferris' book The 4-Hour Body: An Uncommon Guide to Rapid Fat-Loss, Incredible Sex, and Becoming Superhuman --- So, how is it that I can lose a pound a day? May have something to do with the new 'secret ingredient' which I tripped over thanks to the renown eye doc up in Oak Ridge. He noticed while doing the a most thorough eye in years that my eye-lids had a movement that was typical of people who have something just the tiniest bit off with their thyroid.
"People often overlook thyroid related issues," he explained. "Next time you go in for a checkup, have your doc run a thyroid panel."
Hmmm... vewwee intewesting.... (sic) So the next step was to find out how to tweak the thyroid a bit just using a small change in diet. Turns out, a simple one to experiment with is cabbage.
Now, I'm not offering you medical advice - you go find a doc for that. I'm just saying that since I added raw cabbage to my everyday diet a few days back, the pounds have been flying off.
So whether it's living on Ferris' diet (three meals of antipasto ain't so bad) or whether it's the cabbage, doesn't much matter to me.
One of the lesser known symptoms of hypothyroidism is hyperactivity and this can sometimes be missed since many GP's don't look at causes when looking at kids with ADD/ADHD. There's growing evidence of a link between hypothyroidism and hyperactivity which most people aren't aware of.
Sure, Adderall (the ADD drug) is fine and all, but do you think fresh cabbage (cole slaw's fine) for kids a few days a week might have something in the way of naturally management to offer? Particularly if the subject (like me) has a northern European (think: Big cabbage eaters, eh?) and that missing the key chemicals in fresh cabbage, a person may become slightly nuts.
Not saying it will make a difference, but it seems to have helped me a bit.
Take for example my front yard pyramid-building. In the past, I would have only gotten the first layer down, called it a patio, and wandered off to my next task.
Instead, thanks to cabbage, I'm able to focus long enough to design various golden caps and all-seeing eye topping pieces for the now glistening pyramid.
Oh, one other thing. The farts are a bonus.
Enlightenment by Jeff One of myt ham radio friends was over yesterday - dropped off a copy of Tainter's "Collapse of Complex Societies" I'd lent him.
While here, he showed off his latest survival skill: Take a piece of char cloth, then disassemble your LED flashlight and pull the reflector out of it. That's the shiny part, eh?
Insert the char cloth far enough into the reflector so it's at the focal point. Aim the flashlight reflector at the sun. Presto! Portable fire without matches, rubbing sticks, tearing off shoelaces to make bows, or any of the hard stuff.
No, of course it doesn't work at night, fool. You mean you actually wondered?
Monday July 4, 2011 The War With Mexico, Redux Some Independence Day, huh? My war count is Libya, Iraq, 'Stan, and Mexico, plus a bunch of other little ones with 'advisors' and such. Do your own tally. Prize me.
I'm not sure why no one wants to talk about the ongoing narco-war with Mexico. Especially no one in politics, like Bill Clinton, Bush, and now Obama want to be called out on what's up with Agenda 21... Where's that fence, doggoneit...seem to have misplaced it...
But here's the lay of the land thumbnail style: In military terms, this is a war of the specialty type called low-level conflict or an LIC (low intensity conflict) in the lingo of War Collegese.
The reason you and I get groped at airports but the coyote traffic continues unabated on the southern border is we don't need cheap labor and we don't have drug money to push upstream. And American OTR truckers may be about to lose ground to SOB (South of Border) labor. Thanks congress, thanks O.
Meantime, we fast forward to today's headlines and notice that the Texas Department of Public Safety has issued a press release advising:
And in response, gangs in Mexico are threatening to behead DEA agents.
Which is why the Barney Frank/Ron Paul bill which would end the national marijuana prohibition would be beneficial - since it would take the high dollars off the table and cut the financial legs out from under the SA gangs.
Even though we're hearing about major corps getting land and equipment together for 100,000 sf grow buildings, we're not too confident of this actually happening, however. For one thing, there's a cut of the trade that may be influencing near-border (and possibly national) politics.
Remember, the the drug cartels wield enormous power here in del Norte, and Wall Street's hands are dirty, but where did you think all the money for a rally was coming from. I mean, besides QE's 1-X?
Will the Other Shoe Drop? The continued rally last week going into the holiday comes up for renewal tomorrow and while it may persist a bit longer, the broader question of what's ahead will be answered this coming week (at least in part) by fresh economic data.
The biggest underplay last week, while the Bulls were serving punch on the Street, was the drop in Consumer Confidence. The reason this is so big should be obvious: If people are spending more than they did, say, a year ago, then life is grand, the Bull case makes sense and "Hallelujah, brother, good times are here fo sho..."
The Truth Detector gets wheeled out late Friday when the Fed unveils the latest Consumer Debt (they call it credit, but you know how bankster are...).
Hold on while I slip into the changing room...Here's where I put on my Mr. Bubble Buster outfit (complete with tights) and notice that the Year-on-Year change in total consumer debt was running about 2.4061 in Q2 2010 and the most recent preliminary (April, preliminary) data for this year showed Consumer Debt was running 2.4282 trillion.
Any damn fool (I'll play the part, sure) can figure that means consumer spending was up only 9-10th's of one freaking percent.
And that is before you toss in the huge increase in M1 - a whopping 13.4% increase in the measure of cash circulating - which is shown over in a different report, perhaps because it's not the Fed's job to point out things like this and economists generally don't question the Kool-Aid.
On the other hand, a broader measure of money, M2 is up a slightly more sane 5 percent YoY, so make mine grape and here's looking at you.
While retired Fedster St. Al hid the sausage by taking away the M3 report, we still track Trader Bart's M-3 Reconstructed which says M3 is up to almost 5 percent now, so shortly we should see "Fed in the Box" with deflation afoot and pressure to raise rates coming from the last half dozen buyers of US Bonds.
(I'll just change out of these tights now. The costume looks ridiculous.) --- Europe, which doesn't have the common decency to observe our holiday, is generally up a tad this morning, particularly those Brits who ain't got no respect, near as I can figure.
I'm expecting gold to play a little bounce-back here, but when we get into next week, I'll be eyeing selling our lone coin. The run from $265-$300 to here has been a marvelous thing. Only problem is where to park cash. Except, of course when we consider Cash is King in deflationary times and those are here again with many states looking at layoffs over the balance of summer to stay afloat.
Oh - you did notice that 13-counties in SoCal are looking at succession from Sacramento's fold?
Wonder how many of the out of state bond gnomes of Connecticut are pushing money west so they can make another killing on California bankruptcy talk?
Ladies on Top New in the job is Yingluck Shinwatra, who wasn't even in politics a few months back.
We'll be watching her exploits carefully, since there's such a large sex industry in Thailand. Seems to me there's a lot of personal risk to a new leader who rocks the boat too much and upsets cashflows of the PTB. We shall see.
Noticing a pattern of heads of state not being able to deliver and wonder why? --- Chris Lagarde will have her first day on the job at the IMF this week, too. Another not-too-easy gig, but at least the PTB all have buy-in on the agenda. --- And speaking of sliding Lagarde in, even more questions are being raised about DSK's accuser in NYC with rumors of perjury charges being heard.
In France there's talk of DSK for prez, but I look for the street creds of the accuser to be played by the PTB to control that. Watch and pass the popcorn.
Double Standards Dept. While we have been getting lots of reports about how private citizens and even some property holders (Hoh River, WA state) are being keep off ostensibly public lands, we notice that corporate exploitation is permitted.
And at a price, as the oil spill this weekend on the Yellowstone River from a pipeline rupture demonstrates in a messy way.
Minnesota Shutdown Been reading about how government is still shut down up in Minnesota - budget driven, of course, and an interesting thought comes to mind.
At what point could volunteer citizens go in and take over various government functions, since the existing government has abdicated? You see the point, of course? How much time elapses between state officials hitting and impasse and the rational people (perhaps all six in Minnesota) say "Enough...we are the government and we're going to keep this state running!"
If government is unfunded does it require new elections? Seems to me there's a breach of franchise in there somewhere, eh?
It's like if the US government shut down. If it did, then would there be a US government? Hence, could there even be crime when the government is unfunded?
Oh, my head hurts thinking of these kinds of questions....oh well, dream on.
America continues just as elusive as a dream when founded. But doesn't it feel on some Fourths like we're not making progress to windward?
Monday at the WuJo: Coping: 'Bout them Archons If you're sitting around with a few minutes on your hands, or more like 15 to be precise, you might want to listen to the interview with Dr. Richard Sauder over on the Time Monk Radio Network here.
One clarification, though. In the beginning of the interview, which gets into the nasties/grays which be the "archons" there's a reference to Clif thinking these are the 'PowersThatBe/Were". Almost, but not quite. The 'archons' operate' through a level of humans - and those are the PowersThatBe/Were; not necessarily the grays...which if you're into a heavy religious view, are highly correlated to 'demons' and where exactly did you think the "guarding" gargoyles on all those buildings of the PTB were doing? Stopping by for brews? Ha! Hardly....but then clues are always hidden in plain sight for the aware. --- Most people don't spend much time mulling the actual composition of Universe. There's an implicit, well-socialized assumption in uniform Western reductionist thought that what's real is only and exclusively what you're able to touch right here, right now. Otherwise, you're nuts.
Fewer still set about the difficult task of actually trying to sort the many things of High Strangeness to reveal a cohesive view encompassing the different levels of existence into whole fabric.
There may (or may not) be actual densities that are different from ours; but if there really are differences of density ion Universe, then it may account for various phenomena such as Electronic Voice Phenomena which claims communication with dead humans and those phenomena in the night sky by the 'light ships' which are only visible using night vision equipment. Here's a short YouTube video from out of the South Bay area in 2008.
But wait! Is it all an artifact of DMT produced by red light in the brain? Nope. Nightvision is now green for this reason and what are those triangles of regular shape? Sure as hell not high flying bugs, if you've seen enough of them. No way. --- So the Monday Ponder is this: Does what we call "reality" have multiple higher dimensions than we conventionally acknowledge beyond the "big four" - height, width, breath, and duration at a place in space-time?
Watching this unfold is like going to the supreme martial arts championship. Just when the PTB/Reductionism seems like it's about to rule, in comes the Jackie Chan character in the form of new research and POP! WHAM! The match is suddenly squared up.
Example? Sure. Confronted with an interesting tale like the Philadelphia Experiment, a person diligent in research may conclude it all comes back to a single source (or two) and has blossomed as netlore and legend ever since as a cornerstone of Woo-Woo.
But then along come some more facts - like the Montauk Project - and suddenly, there's a whole new layer of questions demanding investigation.
And how did/does it all work; I mean technically? If at all? Aha! Now we're into the realm of shifty reality and being able (or not) to pierce the veil of obvious physical boundaries.
Which leads - in turn - to a different set of questions; how do chemtrails figure into the mix, or the underground bases, and who escaped to South America after WW II and what are they (still) up to? Damn gaping rabbit hole and no sign of Alice. --- Most Americans won't spend any of their precious holiday time on such topics; there's simply too much bread and circuses out there. Too many distractions like mowing the lawn, a ball game, firecrackers, or going water skiing.
Still, holidays provide space for serious thinking by serious seekers who know there's much to be done. Many hard questions and time is running out for each of us for this time around. Aging or the End of Civilization (more in Peoplenomics this week) are gonna get us for sure. The only question is "Which one?"
It's here we're confronted with the first real test of the day: What's our personal agenda, our Life Plan, and how do we go about 'getting there'? Is there more than snapping good mental images? Is there some clue in plain sight just waiting to be picked up? --- Holidays are a bitch for me. Lawn could use a whacking, ham radio calls, two more hours of IFR in the simulator, shop for a boat, plane, or how about all those emails to be returned, and oh, what about research into what's ahead for the economy? It's all a jumbled buzz just on the fringes of condensing thought.
600 books in our home library scream for attention to return since many have been 'power read' only and demand closer study and a few, deep contemplation. Like Jung's Red Book. --- Comes down to time management: What's the outcome I'm working toward, what's the time required? What's the critical path with least labor?
And here is where Life circles around back to the the archons, their local puppets who're the PTB/W, then down to the PTB/W minions below them, the and the fires of reductionism and soaring complexity of The Machine. Call it NewHive; or call it what you will. It's not about personal freedom. It's about controllers and boundaries to corral human thought and expression of freedom.
Even WuJo is in some sense a distraction: Its a billion-dollar industry nowadays and in a curious way it serves the reductionists well. More sparklies, more blind alleys of thought, more wasted effort, but more profits and employment. Damn curious mix.
Which leads me to think sitting by a river, standing in the woods, or feeling a breeze come across a field and listening to the trees is even more important than all the 'research' and 'entertainment' possible on a 'free' day.
Appreciating the Universe being profoundly simple, yet unspeakably complex is what a lot of people purport to do on Sundays. But maybe that's where holidays come in - to remind us every day should be like Sunday.
And the trees have much to offer.
So does the lawnmower. Damn it.
Before the chart, a little background: Once upon a time, a long while ago, I observed during my quest for 'truth' in economics, that the PowersThatBe, the talking heads on the teeve, and the other information sources that actively engage in the programming of humans not to think, had conveniently swept several trillions of dollars that disappeared in the Internet Bubble's bursting (since spring 2000) under the rug. Surely, it wasn't unnoticed by the thousands of people who called brokers and said "Where is my money?" "Gone, but hang in there as you're a long term investor!" was about all they heard back.
So one of our charts for Peoplenomics subscribers oughta be widely circulated - it shows that if you line up the peak of the Dow in January 2000 with the peak in early September of 1929, we're on a very very close replay track. Much closer than even the chart shows if you were to back out inflation, and put in the effects of 1929 deflation, but that'd be real work, and I'm sort of lazy if the truth be told.
No, it's not a perfect replay of 1929, but history doesn't repeat exactly, it only rhymes. So think of this as the rhymes and the crimes chart:
"George, that's only a coincidence!" your monkey-mind will protest.
Why sure it is...you bet. A 11-year long coincidence...yessir....just a coincidence, we're like SO sure... (Shhh...don't tell anyone that major Depressions are two-part coupled affairs like the linkage between 1920-21 and 1929, OK? Damn, dude...don't spoil it for the sheep...)
Oh...don't forget to "Write when you get rich!"
George Ure, The People's Economist |
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") or Jared Diamond's "
."
Oh, yeah: The problem may be closer than you think. And we've been "mapt"
(sic) along the way.
taking off a few pounds at will has become one of those "T'ain't no big thang.."
events. I feel pretty good around 198-203 and this morning, after hitting
215 post the road run, I'm back to 209 and quickly falling.
