Are you taking profits?

Some people are selling off their investments right now, taking profits. Investment touts point to the fact that the recent stock market run up has taken place independently of any fundamental underpinnings. Neither sales nor profit margins are rising. Markets are not expanding. There is no shortage of energy, raw materials or labor. Real Estate is in chaos. The conventional wisdom is that markets were oversold and since the rebound last Spring, now swing the other way. If you believe this you are likely to be taking profits now too.

Nobody is sure what is happening. My own personal explanation is that we are experiencing asset inflation relative to the huge amount of liquidity at negative real interest rates, that central banks have pumped into financial institutions all over the World. A lot of this money has found it's way into equities and commodities, diluting the price. This inflation is not necessarily accompanied by consumer inflation, at least not yet. The thing to remember about this asset inflation is that it is more likely to be permanent than not. The central banks cannot easily afford to pull the rug out from under all the liquidity that they have injected. It's not clear they could do it even if they wanted to. The second thing to remember about this asset inflation is that it is by no means over, will likely continue and may accelerate. If markets fall and I'm not saying they won't, it will be for a different reason. I'm not sure what it would be. Do you have any ideas? I'd like to hear them.

I'm not taking profits yet. Don't take that as any kind of sage advice. It's coming from a guy who lives in a shack and never made a dime that didn't involve a shitty, non union job with no benefits and a paltry hourly wage.

I'm not getting out of the market because I think it's inflated, not oversold. Oversold conditions lead to sell offs. Inflation leads to more inflation. If the market was going to sell off, it would have by now.

A Chance For A New Life In A New Land

You want a solution to our economic woes? Stop subsidizing failure and unemployment. Cut off entitlement benefits to the poor. Let people start to sink or swim.

When people start to starve, when they start to freeze in the winter, when the children cry out from hunger in the night, start offering cheap, subsidized transport to places where there is employment. Brazil, China, Nigeria, India, it doesn't matter where or what the standard of living is in these places. It doesn't matter what the pay there is. It doesn't even matter if there are really jobs there. People will embrace hope. It's a chance for a new start. Besides, what choice will they really have? Kind of like those nice relocation camps in Poland for the Jews and Gypsies.

How the fuck do you think people got to America in the first place? The movers and shakers of Europe needed to get rid of useless, excess population that were a drag on their economy. The dregs, the scum, the malcontent, the troublemakers, the diseased, the uneducated, the religious fanatics.

It's been a nice respite for these people and their descendants here in America but it's time for them to move on. No hard feelings. You never know, things might work out great in your new homes.

More Banks Failing

As of yesterday, so far this year, one hundred twenty four banks in this country have failed and their assets taken over and sold off by the FDIC. It will probably get to one hundred and fifty by the end of the year. The rate at which banks fail has been increasing. Sometimes it's as many as four or five a week. Several of the banks that I do business with have gone under this year. It's becoming quite a consolidation.

It's not good.

Milk Money

When I was a kid, the schools that I went to had hot lunch programs. They started out at a quarter and eventually went up to thirty five cents or maybe a little more by the time I was in junior high. I never got the hot lunch. It cost too much. I just brought a sandwich, an apple and maybe a couple of cookies in a paper bag. When I was done I'd fold the bag up and put it in my back pocket for the next day.

I always got a carton of milk. You'd bring a quarter to school on Monday morning and get a carton of milk at lunch each day of the week. Nobody ever checked whether or not you had paid, you just took the carton of milk from the box as you filed into the cafeteria.

I realize I could have just taken the milk and never given them my quarter on Monday. Never even occurred to me at the time and a quarter was big money.

Senor Wheezer becomes senior wheezer

One of my cats is twelve years old now. When we got him, we took him to a vet and had some parts of him cut off. It didn't really help him at all. It was entirely for our benefit. Still, he was about a day away from the decompression chamber, so it turned out to be a pretty good deal for him, I think. The vet we went to was highly recommended, nationally known and has a cats only practice. She did a good job. The cat healed up fine and didn't experience much pain. He's been a pretty happy cat. I don't take cats to the vet as a general rule. A couple times a year I put flea medicine on them. Every couple of years I pick up the standard feline triple vaccine and give them a jab. They don't smoke or drink and get plenty of sleep. They do all right.

The vet sent us a letter the other day, reminding us that Wheezer is an older cat now, needs a "senior plan" and we should bring him in. You know, cats don't live as long as people and it's sad. I really get attached to my cats. I'd be happy if they could be around forever but it's not happening. If he gets diabetes or kitty cancer, we'll make sure he doesn't suffer but he's not going to get diabetic management or kitty chemo. He's a cat. It would be cruel. It would be expensive. It would make everybody sad and that is not the purpose of a kitty. Hopefully he'll live many more years, get arthritic and senile and die in his sleep.

I know this veterinarian is just providing the services that a lot of her clientele want but it's stupid.

Washington Times Faces

The Washington Times, a conservative newspaper owned by the Reverend Sun Myung Moon, widely believed to be the second coming of Christ, by the members of his World Unification Church, is probably going under soon. It's always been subsidized. No newspaper makes a profit anymore, this one even less than most. Reverend Moon is extremely old and losing control of his fortune to members of his family, many of whom do not believe he is the Christ and object to the huge expense of maintaining his religious and political empire.

I'll miss the Times when it's gone. If you really want to know what the wing nuts are thinking, it's the paper to read. We have Rupert Murdoch's Wall Street Journal now. It's a pretty good replacement. Except he doesn't want free access to it on the Internet.

White Flight Of Fancy

It isn't just Sarah Palin. The Republican base continues to follow the directions of and personally lionize a collection of leaders that most of America will never take seriously. Michelle Bachman, Glenn Beck, Rush Limbaugh, Tim Pawlenty, Rick Perry are all members of this group. There have always been people like this out there, on both sides of the political fence but I don't remember when they were so at the forefront of a major party, even one as far out of power as the Republicans are now.

Though the Republican spinners would portray it otherwise, the Obama administration and the Democratic Congress are straddling the middle of the road and even making deep concessions to conservatives on issues as diverse as health care and the Middle Eastern wars. Republicans are too blind to see but their opponents are spending a lot of time cultivating the middle.

I have said before that I think the Democrats are riding a demographic wave that should see them in the majority for a couple decades to come, unless a new party, even more progressive and hopefully less corrupt, rises to oppose them but demographics change slowly. The tables haven't turned so much that the Republicans can't take back control of Congress and the Presidency if they play it smart.

I don't think that pandering to the farthest reaches of the social conservative Right is playing it smart. The more they talk about conspiracy theories as if they are not only true but being played out by the party currently in power, the more securely they seal their doom. It's as if a death panel has judged them, found them undeserving and decreed a potassium bolus.

Republicans respond that what they are doing is no different than what the Democrats did during the Presidency of George W Bush. Do you think that's true? I don't.

I think the Republicans are guaranteeing democratic control of the federal government for years to come.

Dick Hearts Kay

Dick Cheney has endorsed Kay Bailey in the hotly contested primary election for the Governorship of Texas over incumbent Rick Perry. Cheney is a neocon who doesn't flinch at big government spending and in the context of his leadership position within the Republican Party incrowd, could even be characterized, these days, as a social liberal. Perry is a nakedly ambitious dickhead, who's proven he will say or do whatever it takes to get ahead.

What surprises me is that Cheney would endorse anybody, especially against an incumbent who is riding high in the polls, even if it's someone like Perry. It's going to set him against Dick Armey, Sarah Palin and the social conservative block. He's no Texan. He could have stayed out of it and nobody would have thought worse of him. He must really like Kay.

I'm no big fan of Hutchison but she's a pretty cool head as far as conservative Republicans go and more of a fiscal conservative and old fashioned, Texas libertarian than anything else, although she isn't against plenty of good, honest, federal pork for the Texican table. Makes me wonder, why exactly, Dick is endorsing her. Another issue is that the Governor of Texas is a pretty toothless office, more a beauty contest than anything else. Kay is a strong, respected and influential Republican presence in the Senate. Her absence will be a big loss to her party while sitting in the governor's mansion. If she were to be replaced in the Senate by another hysterical, socon carpet chewer, it would be a shame. It really makes me wonder why she wants to be governor so damn bad. What the Hell is going on in Texas? Somebody enlighten me. Maybe she's just old, tired and wants to do a victory lap before she settles into the rocking chair with a lap robe but she never impressed me as that kind. Who knows, maybe she wants to be President and thinks a turn in the State House will round out her resume. She's a little long in the tooth for that but she could be just what the doctor ordered for the Republicans in 2012. Maybe that's what Dick has in mind.

I guess this is just another example of the current disarray and lack of cohesiveness in the hierarchy of the National Republican Party organization. Free for all.

Inappropriate?

Do you think this photo is inappropriate? I think she looks pretty good. I'm not a big fan of the panty hose with shorts look but that's just me or maybe she doesn't have panty hose on, in which case she has great legs. Judging from the lede, I think the article was likely a smear job on Sarah but that's another story and Sarah really has no defense against smear jobs. It's pretty much all she ever does.

If the outfit was skimpy or spandex, with a lot of nip and camel toe, that would be a different matter.

News From Around The World

Russia-

Assault with intent to grill-

Punishment: 15 years in prison.

Pope Believes In Space Men

The Catholic Church is covering its bases as far as alien life forms are concerned. I hope this works out for them. I have my doubts.

What if the Aliens land and it turns out that they're all big homos?

Happy Days Are Here Again

Good news, folks, that turkey dinner with all the trimmings is a couple bucks cheaper this year and just when I thought everything was looking so bleak. I'm starting to feel better already.

Things aren't so bad after all. There's still enough in my 401K to put a down payment on a little single wide Fleetwood in Yuma. It may not be the retirement home we've always wanted but what the fuck. You gotta look on the bright side. It's closer to the beach than Las Cruces. I hear the WalMart Super Center there is a Duesey. They got work there too. Fetching carts in from the parking lot. Says so right on this flyer I got. We're in Hog Heaven.

Get Rose o' Sharon and the boys together Ma! We're a gonna load up the truck and head out East on 66 for that Promised Land. If only they'd let Tom out'a prison. Then all us Joads could be together again.

It May Not Be The Time

I had been wondering who would have to start the third party, the social conservatives or the fiscal conservatives. I think the verdict is in. The fiscal conservatives will have to leave the Republicans and either modify the current Libertarian Party to suit their needs or start a new one. The social conservatives are now firmly in control of the Republican Party. After next years elections, I think there will be no doubt.

The success of a third party will depend on their ability to pick up substantial support from Democrats and Democrat leaning independents. The question is, how do they do that? There are several scenarios but none seem very realistic to me.

Where do they come down on abortion, Gay rights, the wars, immigration? These things will make a huge difference in how much support they get and where it comes from. Should they unearth and shine up a hot potato that is currently quiescent, like the legalization of marijuana? That would be fun but dangerous. One of the places that they could pick up a lot of support would be in the Hispanic community. Hispanics are natural fiscal conservatives. In the countries they come from, the governments don't do shit for people. They just want to work hard and be left alone. They want good public education though and probably would like better public health care. That's a problem. They also favor a pathway to citizenship for illegals. How do they deal with that?

If they really slap the fundies down hard and are serious about fiscal austerity I would join up but I'm an aberrant character. Most people shy away at the shriveling of the governmental tit.

I don't see how they can pull it off. They may just have to bite the bullet and ride along in the back of the pick up, next to the little boy with the banjo, until they reach a more hospitable place and time. Man up, it ain't so bad. I'm ridin' in the back of the bus over here. I get a hit of that good malt liquor when the 40 passes around and I kinda like Hip Hop.

Even If There Is No Move On Health Care, The Dems Can Still Stick A Knife in The Republicans And Give It A Twist

The Republican members of Congress have made it clear that they aren't going to vote for a national health bill no matter what form it takes but were eager to insert an amendment into it that would ban any provision for coverage of elective abortion.

I think the Democrats should go ahead and pass a Senate bill that retains the abortion exclusion and send it back to the House. If it fails, so be it but it will be very clear that the failure of the bill was not about abortion.

In this way, the Democrats remain a big tent party, not strictly for or against abortion. Democrats will never be the party of hard line pro lifers but they will garner significant support from those who believe that the emphasis should be in placing further limits on abortion and decreasing it's frequency.

The Republicans will be the Party that supports criminalization of abortion in all circumstances. That will be their litmus test of acceptability for party members and office holders alike. I doubt they will ever garner many votes from pro choicers.

It's the smart move for the Democrats. It's in keeping with the way the party has been moving. I think the liberal wing will go along. They won't be sorry in the long run or maybe they will but if you're out there on the fringes, you have to learn to live with disappointment. I know I have.

Good Night Mrs Calabash, Where Ever You Are

Talk Radio is one of the primary piling posts of conservative politics in America today. 90% of it's listeners are White and over 35. Two thirds of the listeners are over 50. Almost half of the listeners are over sixty five years of age. These numbers are for all of talk radio, sports, love lines and cooking included. Rush Limbaugh's listener demographics are probably even whiter and older.

You have to ask yourself two things. Where is this audience headed? What does the rest of America think about the opinions expressed on talk radio? Rush is my age. In ten years he could still be talking. Probably will be. Who's going to be listening?

An Informed Electorate

Take your pick of big urban States, California, New York, Massachusetts, Pennsylvania or any other. People there want budget cuts and tax relief. The problem is that in States like this about 40% of people are government employees. Another 20-30% receive extensive entitlement benefits of some kind. Most of the others depend on the cash flow these people provide. Nobody wants the tap turned down, most want it turned up.

How can you reconcile this? Easy. The people are dumb as fuckin' doorknobs.

Do You Use Your Land Line?

When I was young, you could still send a telegram. I don't think you can anymore. I'm sure nobody does. Western Union exists for the sole purpose of draining money out of the United States by illegal immigrants, who send it to their families in Bug Fuck, Egypt or where ever else they come from and need a reliable transfer.

Phone companies are going the same way as Western Union. They have peripheral businesses that may keep them around forever but I don't know anybody under forty that still has a land line or anybody under sixty that still uses one. My parents are in their eighties and are considering getting rid of their phone. Face it. You really don't want or need to talk to anybody you don't trust with your cell number. You never answer that land line. You don't even listen to the messages on it anymore. Get rid of it.

I'm fifty eight, I don't have any kind of phone. I talk to people over the interwebs, they never know the difference.

Don't buy phone company stock.

New Day Commin'

Michael Steele, the chairman of the Republican National Committee says that secular, moderate Republicans and religious, social conservatives within the Party are united now. He says that the Republicans will sweep to victory in the 2010 election, with large numbers of new supporters, including women, racial and cultural minorities, young people and those possessing higher education. He is confident that the GOP's platform of homophobia, foreign military adventurism, xenophobia both domestically and abroad, coupled with a deep distrust of science, disregard for ecological concerns and dependence on a near moronic brand of fundamentalist Christianity are an unbeatable combination for the revitalization of the Republican Party.

Jesus is Lord! Praise his Name! Glory! Glory!

Burma Road

I got a hit from Bagan, Myanmar yesterday. Never had a hit from Myanmar before. I don't think they have too much Interwebs there. There's tourist hotels in Bagan. Probably came from one of them. Maybe one of my regular readers, doing a little travel. They are an affluent and adventurous lot.

Fellow Travelers Find Smaller Tent Uncomfortable

Have you heard that abortion is a paid benefit on the RNC's employee health insurance plan? It's true. They're fixing it now so that the benefit is removed.

Cracks me up.

Next, they're going to make all RNC staffers attend church every week, home school their kids and donate money to Operation Rescue.

This is the Party that's going to sweep the elections next year. Yowza!