Financial topics

[xakzen]

Okay, I apologize, enough lecturing on something I'm sure you already know. It's just that careless usage of words bothers me, probably my training in semantics peeking through.

Cheers, seriously informative (especially the part about pirates) and I concur completely prerequisite to any informed civil discussion.

[OLD1953]

Thanks for the kind words. I did do a small edit, it's seriously difficult to find a complete copy of Mussolini's doctrine, because he recalled the dratted thing not long after it was published. He probably decided that a complete exposition of his beliefs was giving ammunition to his enemies. Anyhow, worldfuturefund.org claims to have a complete copy, and it looks accurate, so I put that link in.

[aedens]

http://mises.org/daily/4085

I agree that words are the bricks on a foundation. This is the corner stone of the master builders dilema Mises alluded to.
The link above posits a intellectuals view on the role of Government to the people. To unmask the fallacy words are just intent of tool's.
I remember JFK of what you can do, and not the other way around. The good fight is the seal in the mind and not the seal upon it
as we are reminded in the 66 books. The concept's we hold are older precept's we ignore IMO and are the elements of GD we trend
to these logical conclusions.
Acton did also mention also, very clearly the innovation's and turbulance of priority's of said subject's and liberty.
Time is always the issue and the lack of regard to its current bent of mind to consider a Generational view instilled of avarice
and the wake we see of it. We have much to endure until the sleeper's awake...

@ Fortune.com
Meanwhile,
The votes, which broke down largely along party lines, come one week after the Senate approved both measures.
The legislation, which is expected to be signed by President Obama, will raise the debt ceiling to $14.294 trillion.
The debt limit hike is expected to cover the Treasury's borrowing needs past the November mid-term elections and into 2011. That means lawmakers up for re-election won't need to take another politically sensitive vote before the polls open.
If the ceiling were ever breached, the country would effectively be in default. That would slam bonds, the dollar and creditors' portfolios.

Metal looking better all the time.

[reviresco]

A long video presentation of their talk at the end of the article but perhaps worth your time.

http://www.omaha.com/article/20100209/N ... 79/0/MONEY

[Higgenbotham]

A long video presentation of their talk at the end of the article but perhaps worth your time.

http://www.omaha.com/article/20100209/N ... 79/0/MONEY

Thanks for the reminder. After seeing your reminder, I read the local Omaha coverage. More interesting to me than the coverage were the reader comments at the end of the articles. Here are the comments so far:

http://www.wowt.com/home/headlines/8395 ... n=comments

Posted by: Ripped Off on Feb 9, 2010 at 04:36 PM

Mr. Paulsen, how convenient that one of the beneficiaries of the TARP program was your former employer, Goldman-Sachs. Bonuses for all with no limits is how they operate. Nothing should ever be considered too big to fail.

http://www.ketv.com/money/22513860/deta ... COMMENTTOP

What a complete joke,Buffet and his clown should be publicly flogged............

Feb. 9, 2010 5:43pm CST | from ALPHAOMEGA

Good for the banks = bad for me. High interest, high taxes, high medical bills, and hardly any work to do. I've lost my home, credit, I now owe the Gov. . The bank wants to sue for losing the house, my wife is disabled, and we get huge gap-bills from our CHIP insurance policy that costs 650 dollars a month. "It could have been worse". My parents have always said that, whether they meant it,or not. The system has failed, and these people didn't even flinch. I have lost my faith in many things recently, and this doesn't make me feel any better.

Feb. 9, 2010 5:56pm CST | from Flatlander67

These are just a couple of Obama's court jesters. They speak the same language as their god, Obama, that being the Lie. And here's ABC advertising for the anti-American, non-citizen president-- AGAIN!!

Feb. 9, 2010 6:47pm CST | from citizen

The public isn't buying their claims. This reminds me of a quote I posted a few months back from Dmitry Orlov, who witnessed the demise of the Soviet Union:

In the Soviet Union, as this thing called normalcy wore thin due to the stalemate in Afghanistan, the Chernobyl disaster, and general economic stagnation, it continued to be enforced through careful management of mass media. In the United States, as the economy fails to create enough jobs for several years in a row, and the entire economy leans towards bankruptcy, business as usual continues to be a topselling product, or so we are led to believe. American normalcy circa 2005 seems as impregnable as Soviet normalcy circa 1985 once seemed...

In spite of this small difference in how normalcy is or was enforced, it was, and is being brought down, in the late Soviet Union as in contemporary United States, through almost identical means, though with different technology. In the Soviet Union, there was something called samizdat, or self-publishing: with the help of manual typewriters and carbon paper, Russian dissidents managed to circulate enough material to neutralize the effects of enforced normalcy. In contemporary United States, we have web sites and bloggers: different technology, same difference. These are writings for which enforced normalcy is no longer the norm; it is the truth - or at least someone's earnest approximation of it.

[OLD1953]

The current public is very much like a spoiled 5 year old crying for a stuffed animal, who, when they are handed the animal, throws it away and starts crying for another.

A simple reading of polls over the last six months shows expectations that amount to lower taxes coupled with balancing the budget while spending more for job creation and helping states while regulating bankers and reducing the size of government. Oh, and we should win the war against terrorism without fighting.

Now, in any semblance of a real world, that's just impossible. Those are inherently conflicting goals. And that's what the masses want, conflicting goals accomplished without compromise and without increased taxes.

Nobody can be elected now without plighting their troth to some or all of this nonsense. Nobody wants to hear facts, and the facts we do hear are partial or incomplete at best, because fact must match spin, not the other way around. (Here's a cute one I hear constantly it goes like 5% of the people pay 57% of the taxes, or some such numbers. Ok, what percentage of the national income do that 5% represent? What percentage over the poverty level? What percentage of that group is actually paying the most taxes, and what's their effective income tax rate? How does that compare to the TOTAL taxes paid by each quintile of income nationally? And you'll never hear that last one discussed, and if you look it up at BES, you'll figure out why in about 30 seconds.) Facts in isolation, even when accurate have little meaning if any. Especially statistics. I actually had a very intelligent person tell me he was afraid to quit smoking because the death rate among those who quit is higher than smokers over the first several years. I stared at him for a second, then I asked if he'd considered that many quit smoking because of a stroke, heart attack or cancer diagnosis? MiGawd.

The US is becoming ungovernable, because the public is fighting anyone making any hard decisions. The people want it all, they want it now, and anyone who actually says we need strong medicine to fix our problems will be attacked as unAmerican or loose their primary to someone who will prescribe soothing syrup and tell us we can spend more, cut government, pay off the debt and never raise taxes.

Yes, it's part of the generational cycle, but it doesn't make it any prettier.

[freddyv]

I find this site very interesting. I think many of the points are valid. However, I am not a pessimistic person by nature but I am a realistic person. I keep reading about the impending crash but I do not think we will have a crash as it is being described. My two cents, which is about what it is worth, is that you will see and are seeing a seperation from "wallstreet" and main street. In that I mean you can have companies in the S&P do well even though we have high un-employement, structural problems, etc. Earnings are starting to come back from the brink and if you look at ex-financials they are not that bad. The market has two main factors, time and price. I think instead of having a spectacular crash in terms of downside price, what you will see if a long period, maybe several years where the market trades in a range basically sideways as the time factor works off the excesses. Much like Japan. If you look back to the seventies, the decade was basically flat. However, if you are looking in real terms and take into consideration inflation, then yes I beleive the market will be a bad place to be for the next several years. Much like it has been the last 10. This is my first post so I thought I would keep it brief and not talk about some of the real issues in soviern debt and how I believe that will play out but I would very much like some thoughts on my post. In conclusion, I believ what you will see if the stock market trade up to 1100 on good news and down to say 900 on bad but to stay in that range for years as a function of time rather then price. Thoughts

I mainly agree with your conclusion except that the 1970's were much different in many respects. For one, the stock market in unadjusted terms was simply not all that overpriced heading into the 70's and I see that period from 1966 to 1982 as a consolidation period in a greater bull market that only ended in 2007. BTW, It started in 1932, IMO. All the quick, dramatic runups were followed by corrections or longer periods of consolidation.

The 1970's in America was a time of growth and struggle. The period we have just entered is a period of decline as those boomers who were entering the job market are now exiting and creating a drag on the economy. Anyone who doesn't keep this fact in the back of their minds when making investing decisions missing out on THE major force in our economy, IMO.

Last but not least, a clear look at history shows that valuations are still extremely high and that the trend average of the DJIA has yet to reach even fair-value, much less fall significantly below, as it should be expected to do. History also shows the DOW always 'closing the gap' from previous periods. This suggests that the DJIA will revisit the 1,000 level prior to starting a new bull market. I predict around 1,200 - 1,500 or an equivalent of 150 on the S&P 500. I can easily see this happening with a double-dip recession into a full blown depression or a severe recession in a few years, which would bring the reported earnings of the S&P to $10 or $20 for a year or two. A historical low P/E ratio of 6 with $20 of earnings gives a price of 120 for the S&P 500. This all fits with history and certainly those earnings are not out-of-line given the shape of the global economy. Best of all, nobody believes it can happen.

Fred
http://www.acclaiminvesting.com/

[freddyv]

I think America may open their gates to the rest of world to come and live there which will in fact reduce the American normal day to day expenses without reducing the facilities they are enjoying now. What I meant is you may see millions of Indians( may be Asians ) ready to come America and buy the excess houses and would like to live there. These millions for sure will bring trillions of $ and cheap work force to America which is the only naturally way to restart the economy.They may even live in america and work in gulf or else where .

This is the type of thing that makes sense but won't happen due to the fear factor present in America at this time. Americans are fearful that their own government is stealing from them (more than they usually do) and they are not about to let in a bunch of outsiders to share what 'little' they are left with.

I believe that your idea would help our economy greatly and invigorate our society but I do not believe it has a chance of happening.

Fred
http://www.acclaiminvesting.com/

[sadhic]

"sadhic wrote:
I think America may open their gates to the rest of world to come and live there which will in fact reduce the American normal day to day expenses without reducing the facilities they are enjoying now. What I meant is you may see millions of Indians( may be Asians ) ready to come America and buy the excess houses and would like to live there. These millions for sure will bring trillions of $ and cheap work force to America which is the only naturally way to restart the economy.They may even live in america and work in gulf or else where .


This is the type of thing that makes sense but won't happen due to the fear factor present in America at this time. Americans are fearful that their own government is stealing from them (more than they usually do) and they are not about to let in a bunch of outsiders to share what 'little' they are left with.

I believe that your idea would help our economy greatly and invigorate our society but I do not believe it has a chance of happening.

fred,
but what US govt will do may be exactly the oposite inline to the GD principles....

[sadhic]

"sadhic wrote:
I think America may open their gates to the rest of world to come and live there which will in fact reduce the American normal day to day expenses without reducing the facilities they are enjoying now. What I meant is you may see millions of Indians( may be Asians ) ready to come America and buy the excess houses and would like to live there. These millions for sure will bring trillions of $ and cheap work force to America which is the only naturally way to restart the economy.They may even live in america and work in gulf or else where .

" Fred wrote:
This is the type of thing that makes sense but won't happen due to the fear factor present in America at this time. Americans are fearful that their own government is stealing from them (more than they usually do) and they are not about to let in a bunch of outsiders to share what 'little' they are left with.

I believe that your idea would help our economy greatly and invigorate our society but I do not believe it has a chance of happening.....

fred,
but what US govt will do may be exactly the oposite inline to the GD principles...