Dec 2, 2009
A Question
According to "Conservative Doctrine" over the the last 30 years or so, when Americans hear somebody say, "Hi, I'm from the government - I'm here to help you", we run screaming into the night. How come we expect the Iraqis and Afghans to do exactly the opposite? Just wonderin'.
Dec 1, 2009
A Nation Of Whiny-Butt Pussies
The security breach at the White House state dinner the other night has the whole village in an uproar. The pundits are falling all over themselves in what looks to me like a contest to see who can make it sound the worst. I've heard better conversation from a bus load of average 8th graders.
What if they were trained assassins!?!
What if they had grabbed a knife from one of the dining tables!?!
What if they'd had a vial of anthrax!?!
What if they were ninjas!?!
Yeah; wow; what if... hey, I've got it: What if monkeys flew outa your ass!?!
This is straight out of 'The Power of Nightmares' (a BBC documentary - available on Netflix). The guy with the darkest imagination wins.
I'm not saying it was nothing. Any time somebody gets thru the protective circle, it's a major fuckup, and corrections have to be made, but c'mon guys. We have to stop losing our shit every time something scary happens. We'll never get anwhere this way.
What if they were trained assassins!?!
What if they had grabbed a knife from one of the dining tables!?!
What if they'd had a vial of anthrax!?!
What if they were ninjas!?!
Yeah; wow; what if... hey, I've got it: What if monkeys flew outa your ass!?!
This is straight out of 'The Power of Nightmares' (a BBC documentary - available on Netflix). The guy with the darkest imagination wins.
I'm not saying it was nothing. Any time somebody gets thru the protective circle, it's a major fuckup, and corrections have to be made, but c'mon guys. We have to stop losing our shit every time something scary happens. We'll never get anwhere this way.
Nov 28, 2009
Cluster Fox Strikes Again
Maybe they're not all that stupid; and maybe they don't think we're all that stupid; maybe there're a few sane ones who know it's mostly bullshit, and they're trying to let us know they're there(?). Dunno.
Nov 27, 2009
Old Men Talkin' And Young Men Dyin'
At Parris Island, Marine Corps recruits finish boot camp with an arduous multi-day field exercise on half rations, then do a long overnight march to a stadium to receive their Eagle, Globe & Anchor insignia and officially become Marines. They are promised a breakfast of steak and eggs. I marched in with them one year. We slogged in at dawn to find a band playing, flags waving and a stadium full of cheering parents and retired Marines and orating politicians. The fanfare wasn't for the young Marines, I realized, but rather it was for the benefit of the older generation who would send them to war.
Politics Daily
Politics Daily
Nov 26, 2009
Debt vs GDP
A snapshot. For no particular reason - sometimes I just need a place to park this kind of stuff.
Nov 25, 2009
10 Years Of Hell
For you brave souls who can actually endure it (and might understand it), read the Open Markets Committee minutes here. I get about 15% of it on my own, so I rely heavily on Bill McBride at Calculated Risk.
Here's a snippet from the minutes:
Most participants now viewed the risks to their growth forecasts as being roughly balanced rather than tilted to the downside, but uncertainty surrounding these forecasts was still viewed as quite elevated. Downside risks to growth included the continued weakness in the labor market and its implications for income growth and consumer confidence, as well as the potential for credit availability to remain relatively tight for consumers and some businesses. In this regard, some participants noted the difficulty that smaller, bank-dependent firms were having in securing financing. The CRE sector was also considered a downside risk to the forecast and a possible source of increased pressure on banks. On the other hand, consumer spending on items other than autos had been stronger than expected, which might be signaling more underlying momentum in the recovery and some chance that the step-up in spending would be sustained going forward. In addition, growth abroad had exceeded expectations for some time, potentially providing more support to U.S. exports and domestic growth than anticipated.
I think the plan at this point is to keep pushing the stimulus bucks out the door (as of Oct 31, just a bit over 30% of the money had been delivered), and hope that the pent-up consumer demand is released over the holidays to a sufficient degree that it carries us thru the January Slump and gives us a little jump start come spring. I guess the kicker is that we don't know what most people are going to use to finance their spending*, so it's likely we're not going to see big numbers.
*studies are coming out now that strongly suggest that the housing bubble enabled an awful lot of people simply to postpone their money problems - they were drawing out their home equity in order to pay their credit card bills, but got caught up in the belief that real estate never goes down, and so they could just inflate their problems away. Sound familiar?
Anyway, we're stuck in the classic dilemma - we have to spend something, but it appears we have nothing to spend.
Here's a snippet from the minutes:
Most participants now viewed the risks to their growth forecasts as being roughly balanced rather than tilted to the downside, but uncertainty surrounding these forecasts was still viewed as quite elevated. Downside risks to growth included the continued weakness in the labor market and its implications for income growth and consumer confidence, as well as the potential for credit availability to remain relatively tight for consumers and some businesses. In this regard, some participants noted the difficulty that smaller, bank-dependent firms were having in securing financing. The CRE sector was also considered a downside risk to the forecast and a possible source of increased pressure on banks. On the other hand, consumer spending on items other than autos had been stronger than expected, which might be signaling more underlying momentum in the recovery and some chance that the step-up in spending would be sustained going forward. In addition, growth abroad had exceeded expectations for some time, potentially providing more support to U.S. exports and domestic growth than anticipated.
I think the plan at this point is to keep pushing the stimulus bucks out the door (as of Oct 31, just a bit over 30% of the money had been delivered), and hope that the pent-up consumer demand is released over the holidays to a sufficient degree that it carries us thru the January Slump and gives us a little jump start come spring. I guess the kicker is that we don't know what most people are going to use to finance their spending*, so it's likely we're not going to see big numbers.
*studies are coming out now that strongly suggest that the housing bubble enabled an awful lot of people simply to postpone their money problems - they were drawing out their home equity in order to pay their credit card bills, but got caught up in the belief that real estate never goes down, and so they could just inflate their problems away. Sound familiar?
Anyway, we're stuck in the classic dilemma - we have to spend something, but it appears we have nothing to spend.
Nov 24, 2009
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