Funny how so many people truly believe things are close to getting better..

really?

TV psychology rules. They think if they say it enough times it will create a self fulfilling prophesy. Unfortunately, reality doesn't really work like that.

Quick, TARP the kid.

"Nemo writes:
Not many bloggers have a personal cartoonist."

I do my own 'cartoons' ('photoshops'), occasionally.

I referenced spx 915 earlier. I think 887 is a better number. I'm stopped out at 885.

If I take profits in a series of short runs, my bet is that it will be a profitable year.

God Shammgod(Unrated) writes:
Things will get better somewhere someday. Therefore, it's a good tme to buy everything everywhere right now. After all, we changed the calendar, so things must be different.

I saw this gem in Bloomberg this morning.:

Treasuries to Post 1st Loss in 10 Years, Dealers Say (Update3) - Bloomberg.com

“We could start to see stability sooner than the market would otherwise expect,” said William O’Donnell, a U.S. government bond strategist at UBS Securities LLC in Stamford, Connecticut, one of the dealers and a unit of Switzerland’s biggest bank. “As the pendulum swings from risk aversion to risk seeking that will reduce Treasury demand.”

Did I mention I am looking at a new rental ?? Same price as current but a 4 year old,3/2/3 with a pool on 1/2 an acre...A whopping 600/month.
The builder is paying 230-240/month just in taxes. He mentioned he paid 240k cash for the place...He knows he is screwed for years. - Chris
Cobradriver?

$600/mo is an imputed value of what, $90,000? If his taxes are $230 then his insurance where you live has got to be at least $140. I guess bleeding to death is better than decapitation.

a 4 year old,3/2/3 with a pool on 1/2 an acre...A whopping 600/month.

Safe neighborhood? I spent years in Fl and neighborhood is very important, safety wise.

A Final Report Card on the Reagan Years? | OurFuture.org

CBO take on how "well" we all did in last 30 years. Look for that to get worse (*or better depending on one's perspective) over the next 10 years.

If these figures are to be believed (and I have some doubts) then we have truly gone through the looking glass.

*not many of us are in the positive frame of mind that this may present

Ciao
MS

Cobra,
Are we talking extreme west end north of the Tamiami? If so, my mom is 8 miles away on the coast.

[Markel writes:
I'm not encouraged by Obama's obsessive need to compromise with Senate Republicans, because it suggests 2009 won't bring any more intelligence to policy making than 2008 did]

The chosen one is a centrist, unlikely to satisfy the hard core socialists on the left nor the trickle-downers on the right. His approval ratings have nowhere to go but DOWN from here.

How long into 2009 before Obama becomes a lame duck president ?

Mock,
In the belief that things will get a little better before they get much worse, I'm already in.

Market's down today. Thus it's clear we're in the Great Depression, natch.

Tomorrow, when it rises, the Whole Recession is over and the economy is booming.

Tha TV tells me so.

Anyone familiar with what it takes to come into a failing organization and make changes understands that the leader may be alot of things, but one thing he isn't is popular.

Politics is about doing what people want. Politics is about being popular.

Obama wants to BE President....He doesn't want to do what a good president will have to do.

The fact that he is appointing people who are already in power means that there is no way what SHOULD be done will be.

Look for anytime an organization looked to an INSIDER to do the hard work of painful change and you will find something that is truely rare.

My guess is you won't find it.

How long into 2009 before Obama becomes a lame duck president ?

8 years. Rightists in America are totally discredited by the past 8 years; true leftists are behind the eight-ball of 60 years of negative propaganda. A politically skilled centrist with powerful symbolic significance like Obama is almost unbeatable in the current climate.

There's a very slim chance if things go really, really sour that a true socialist movement might displace him. But I very much doubt it. I think we'll see some real socialists in the states that get hit worst by the coming adjustments (prob MI, OH, NV, and AZ) but I don't think a substantial national movement is very likely. And I think if we saw that kind of shift in American public opinion Obama would tack left to absorb it much as FDR did.

Cobradriver:

"total cost is insanely low..."

Define this please.

Compared to what?

If prices drop from here, can today's prices be "insanely low"?

insanely low is by definition a relative statement. Since you are buying today then tomorrow's prices are more relevant than yesterday's.

Think about what happens if mortgage rates rise, rents fall, or both.

My guess is that tomorrow's prices will be insanely lower.

Popeye wrote 12:06 pm

In the belief that things will get a little better before they get much worse, I'm already in.

ah yes, you may well be right

fits the pattern two steps backward, one step forward

if your that good at timing markets... i wont get in your way

as for me, im stupid, so i only play the bigger trend line

There's a very slim chance if things go really, really sour that a true socialist movement might displace him. But I very much doubt it. I think we'll see some real socialists in the states that get hit worst by the coming adjustments (prob MI, OH, NV, and AZ) but I don't think a substantial national movement is very likely. And I think if we saw that kind of shift in American public opinion Obama would tack left to absorb it much as FDR did.
\t Fair Economist | \t \t \tHomepage | \t01.05.09 - 12:15 pm | # 

I completely agree, with my own spin.  If (or as I believe, when) Obama's moderate stimulus plans prove ineffective, he'll tack left.  Or rather, he'll drag the center to the left -- just as Repubs dragged it to the right over the past couple of decades.

I think Obama's tax cut may be the only way he can do the intended stimulus in the time necessary. 700 billion is a lot of money. If you want to get it into the economy quickly and honestly (not have it diverted to the crooks like with the TARP) options are limited. There probably aren't enough infrastructure projects ready to go. WPA is not on the table (yet). So how else to "spend" that much money?

Remember Obama's personal skills are as a politician and community organizer, not in economics. In economics he's following conventional wisdom, which is that we need an enormous stimulus, and we need it immediately. So that's what he's doing.

There's a very slim chance if things go really, really sour that a true socialist movement might displace him. But I very much doubt it. I think we'll see some real socialists in the states that get hit worst by the coming adjustments (prob MI, OH, NV, and AZ) but I don't think a substantial national movement is very likely. And I think if we saw that kind of shift in American public opinion Obama would tack left to absorb it much as FDR did.
\t Fair Economist | \t \t \tHomepage | \t01.05.09 - 12:15 pm | #

I completely agree, with my own spin.  If (or as I believe, when) Obama's moderate stimulus plans prove ineffective, he'll tack left.  Or rather, he'll drag the center to the left -- just as Repubs dragged it to the right over the past couple of decades.
Bob Dobbs | Homepage | 01.05.09 - 12:20 pm | #

I wouldn't put 'real socialist' out of the realm of possibility. I have been saying since the Berlin Wall went down the next big thing will be 'the Nouveau Marxists'... and it won't just be in some Banana Republic or Sweden.

Everything that was old will be new again.

dryfly @ 12:19 above

i know you dont need my approval

but if i may say so

well said

It didn't work when Bush did it. Why would it work now?
Eric

Keynesian economics doesn't work when the political right does it. But when the political left does it that's totally different.

Cobradriver,

Ok, to you it's cheap.

I'm just saying...unless your selling it to yourself (i.e. gonna live in it) then what it is to you doesn't matter. It must be cheap to someone else tomorrow.

You may be right...just putting things in perspective.

Is DOW 9000 cheap?

It was very cheap in June of 07.
It was sorta cheap in May of 08.
It was very overprices Oct of 08.
It was Just right in 1998 and January of 2009.

massive deficits and massive debt, coupled with tax cuts... when in history has this worked before?

USA circa 2001-2007
.

But when the political left does it that's totally different.
ac | 01.05.09 - 12:29 pm | #

Thanks for clearing that up. 

Obama once insulated in the ivory towers of DC with his ranging cabinet of experts, America's problems become but a daily set Cliffs Notes

Keynesian economics doesn't work when the political right does it. But when the political left does it that's totally different. - ac

Classic, a keeper for the coming events. This is also why the Republicans won't be reaching across the aisle. They are exercizing their political perogative to place any credit/blame on the majority. I think it is telling that they have decided it will be blame and not credit.

conceptual level
bgates | 01.05.09 - 12:34 pm | #

Human concepts are also 'arbitrary' & more artificial construct. But if it makes your rationalization of bigotry easier - drink deep - there is more where that came from...

Classic, a keeper for the coming events. This is also why the Republicans won't be reaching across the aisle. They are exercizing their political perogative to place any credit/blame on the majority. I think it is telling that they have decided it will be blame and not credit.
\t Rob Dawg | \t \t \tHomepage  | \t01.05.09 - 12:39 pm | #

They're ideologues with safe districts.  Just as withthe  California legislature, which we both know so well.  There was no deciding; they just did what they do, what has always gotten them reelected.  And they'll keep doing it until it doesn't work any more.

Don't give them too much credit for anything but kneejerk thinking.  I certainly don't for most Democrats.

Govt Stimulous is an Oxymoron.

It's like saying eating your way to weight loss, or smoke your way to health.

The answer to weight loss is the same today as it was since the beggining of time...eat less, move more.

This simple truth has not prevented the endless parade of miracle diet programs sold to those ever hopefull that something can come for nothing.

No one ever sold a book that said..."There is no magic solution. Stop eating so much and exercise."

And yet it's the only book that would work if followed.

America's capitalism has worked not because of its government's power, but because of its limits on power.

We are going backward.

Capitalism worked because it inflicts pain on failure. Therefore you can't succeed by avoiding pain.

Anyone who thinks that Obama will be willing to allow pain would be better off thinking that the one-sentence book that says eat less, move more will top the best seller list for most effective diet book.

[Fair Economist writes:
I think Obama's tax cut may be the only way he can do the intended stimulus in the time necessary. 700 billion is a lot of money. If you want to get it into the economy quickly and honestly (not have it diverted to the crooks like with the TARP) options are limited. There probably aren't enough infrastructure projects ready to go. WPA is not on the table (yet). So how else to "spend" that much money?]

Our elected officials are a disgrace. What will a tax rebate achieve? Even less this time than last. It's a total waste of money. Many will pay down debt or save and the rest will spend on cheap crap at WalMart from China.

A China/WalMart stimulus. Why now offer tax incentives to pay down debt instead, to accelerate necessary deleveraging.

dryfly(Excellent) writes:
Human concepts are also 'arbitrary' & more artificial construct.

All human cultural constructs are artificial and reductionist -- just like history, they have to be lies to be parsimonious enough for use.

That doesn't mean they don't have any utility or foundation in reality.

My argument is that while people busting on the boomers might or might not be aiming precisely at the right people, seeing a problem in that age bracket's behavior and world view are on to something. Bigotry is when the allegations aren't true. The truck is most assuredly in the ditch, and it didn't just drive itself there.

Yes yes, everyone needs to push so nobody is going to be left on the side of the road in the rainstorm, but we are definitely sorting out anew who rides in the cab and who rides in the bed.

My argument is that while people busting on the boomers might or might not be aiming precisely at the right people, seeing a problem in that age bracket's behavior and world view are on to something. Bigotry is when the allegations aren't true. The truck is most assuredly in the ditch, and it didn't just drive itself there.
Comrade Byzantine_Ruins | Homepage | 01.05.09 - 12:53 pm | #

But who do you blame? Whites? Men? Boomers? All are 'constructs' just as artificial. And what is the implied 'remedy'?

Believe me there is more than just intellectual laziness here.

randian philosophy will never sell to the masses

It's fun to read, though. The Randos are almost like D&D players -

"My Randian armor has +8 strength"

"I swing the Flaming Sword of Objectivism at my enemy"

"My hat of Epistology deflects your blade! I parry with my Dagger of Deduction!"
.

...at some point Wal-mart will be a screaming short.

YES. When the dollar takes the inevitable nosedive Wal-Mart will be full of EXPENSIVE and low quality items. I wouldn't be surprised that we start to make our own clothing again. Wow, what a concept!

think of the boomer icons - clinton, w, hank, dimon, delay, bernanke etc etc. did they lead a culture of responsibility and sober leadership? or did they mindlessly cheerlead all of the worst trends and/or turn a blind eye to them?
bgates | 01.05.09 - 12:57 pm | #

Find an example and attribute to all to make your 'case'. Nice work - I'm sure there is something in latin to describe it. Also notice they are all white - that would work just as well.

Broward Horne....nice prediction !

Don't forget long memories. The '94 revolution included a huge set of procedural reforms that undid decades of Democrat marginalization of the minority party. That kindness has been repaid with a return to the old rules once the Ds got back in power. And don't forget the hit they took following Bush with education early on. A gift that was never repaid with anything except obstructionism on other issues.
\t Rob Dawg | \t \t \tHomepage  | \t01.05.09 - 12:52 pm | #

I don't get you on most of this.  I remember articles (and interviews) about Dems not even  being told when or where some committee meetings were being held, during the Bush years. 

But even if that's crap -- what possible incentive do the Repub senators have to help? If they do, they make the Dems and Obama look good? If they don't, they can still raise enough of a smokescreen with their own people to look good.  And if Obama's plan fails -- especially if watered down to win Repub approval -- all the better.

"Good of the people" has little to do with it.  I will quote the esteemed Sono Bono, a man who understood conniving if nothing else, from an interview soon after he made it to Congress.  "I knew they had played some games around here; I didn't know the games were the only things that mattered."

Well, at least the boomer/non-boomer argument is more tolerable than the Israeli/Palestinian argument. Altho the inflation/deflation is one of my favorite memes to follow.

Also notice they are all white

Clinton is a maybe here.

Heck, none of those guys are icons to me. What the hell is bgates saying here?

Someone please answer this question!

Who in there life has benefited and become better by AVOIDING pain?

Anyone?

Does the guy who is in excellent shape get that way by avoiding pain? (ever hear of no pain, no gain?).

Does the successful Doctor get that way without painful, tedious studying and work?

Are the good parents the ones that never insisted on sacrifice? (this hurts me more than it hurts you)

Working to avoid pain ensures mediocrity. Capitalism embraces pain.

Somehow we became the World's superpower in 200 years without Govt bailouts and pain avoidance. Those calling for a bailout cite govt's past failures to alleviate pain and thus we need to something different. Apparently letting things run their natural course is what got us but now we "aint gonna dance with the one that brung us".

By definition you CANNOT improve without doing the hard work.

Any effort to stop the necessary recession will ensure the pain of mediocrity.

If you think I'm wrong...then you probably believe that the "secret" to weight loss is out there somewhere. You're not alone. Take comfort in your large company.

There is no secret system. There is no painfree solution. It's not out there.

So by definition Government can't come up with it. Get out of the way.
Yes we will have a recession or depression. We've had them before...did we become the world's superpower inspite of them? or because of them?

Give me an example in life where success comes without sacrifice and I might agree that Govt can devise a pain-free path to success.

Those who say, we can't do nothing, I say, who is going to do nothing? Certainly the American people won't do nothing. They'll do something..they always have.

When people in this country say 'socialism', they usually mean some form of welfare capitalism. Real socialism is so radically different in state structure and mind-set from capitalism, that only some extraordinary catastrophe - difficult to imagine - could move a western country in that direction, and even then the result would most probably be dictatorship without the socialist administrative apparatus and political structure necessary to socilaism. I find it impossible to imagine a western counterpart to Gosplan and the Central Committee CPSU in the US. There is no tradition, culture or intellectual counterpart in the West to organs of these kinds.
Pavel Chichikov | 01.05.09 - 1:03 pm | #

I doubt it would be identical to the past - that doesn't happen... more like Twain's rhyming not repeating. And nothing there yet to suggest it is imminent but I would not put 'systemic failure' out of the realm of possibility. With that everything becomes possible. It really depends on how bad it gets and the persuasiveness of the arguments of the demagogues who pull it off. 

.....the fussing & fighting of the Dems vs. Repubs reminds me of my two brothers rolling around in the dirt when we were kids. They didn't accomplish much except to get their clothes dirty.

Obama says the "No. 1 goal of my plan ... is to create three million new jobs, more than 80 percent of them in the private sector. (That's 600,000 new gov workers?)”

I'm glad I'm out of THIS tournament.

Heck, those guys don't look like boomers, they look more lik the Gen-X-ers here in Seattle.

Well, then what are we arguing about. We're really all the same after all.

I find it impossible to imagine a western counterpart to Gosplan and the Central Committee CPSU in the US. There is no tradition, culture or intellectual counterpart in the West to organs of these kinds.
Pavel Chichikov

But Pavel, we've got SUPER COMPUTERS now that can model ANYTHING!

Somehow we became the World's superpower in 200 years

then maybe we shouldn't be the world's superpower?
.

Come on, it's the credit cycle. It's the 70-year-old pyramid scheme executed mostly through stocks, bonds and real estate.

If you're in the first 25% of players, you win big. If you're on the trailing end, you lose!

I have to say, the Gen-X-ers I've seen are far better at scamming and lying and many have passed me career-wise over the past seven years.
.

Victims of improved anagathic technology and subversion of the mechanisms of power rotation by vested interests.

I am feeling stupider by the minute. I better go take my vitamins.

anagathic - sorry

Comrade Byzantine ruins wrote

(that those younger are)
Victims of improved anagathic technology and subversion of the mechanisms of power rotation by vested interests.
Comrade Byzantine_Ruins | Homepage | 01.05.09 - 1:20 pm |

CBR i think you make a cogent point that power brokers have lived longer and longer lives and thus held onto the reigns of power

but the geriatrict pols...people like thurmond, reagan, byrd born 1917 !!!)
i would hardly call them boomers

more-over, the two guys i hold most responsible for the demise of half of glass steagall ( clinton and gramm) were born in 46 and 42 respectively...hardly mainstream boomers

additionally clinton had little choice, the senate had voted 92 to 2 for glass steagall while clinton was being tried in the senate for lying about sex with monica lewinsky...he was hardly in a position to sustain a veeto

and what were the ages of the 92 senators, dems and repubs who murdered the firewall between investment banks and S & Ls

i just find the age argument to be pernicious

the people who invested the paradigms for exotic securitization were mostly quants recently graduated from MIT and ivy league schoo;ls they were young and techy

i dont blame their generation either

there are dupes and dopes all round us and i agree with you that our country is corrupt way down deep

we are in very serious trouble...like ancient rome trouble

Is it ok if I lay down in front of the mailman instead of a tank? We only have an AF and Navy base here so tanks are in short supply...Besides the mailman only brings bills and bad news anyway..

Comrade Kristina

i dont know if the blocking the mailman thing is as powerful a statement as before a tank

but you said there was navy in your town

if you swim in front of an aircraft carrier i think that earns double bonus

The rantings of the kid in the cartoon reminds me of a young person who used to lecture us here all the time with his wisdom.

@ Comrade Byzantine_Ruins | Homepage | 01.05.09 - 1:45 pm | #

Like I said - spin - it's a wonderful thing.

Comrade Kristina

yeah that works

btw i use to fish for salmon in the mouth of the columbia river

will never forget seeing a huge container cargo ship pass by our little 26 foot boat...maybe 100 yards off

a terrifying experience...it was mammoth and we were tiny

cant imagine what it must be like to be in the water as a flat-top goes by

Yeah mock, like one of the barges passing on the Mississippi. I used to live in St. Louis and go boating out there, all the little boats would scramble when a barge would come through or the wake would swamp them...
Comrade Kristina | 01.05.09 - 1:55 pm | #

Been there done that & the barges up 'here' in the 'Upper Miss' are smaller than down at St. Louis...

mock turtle writes:
just remember
the
"we dont need no stinkin regulation"
mantra
was born of the reagan era
he he was no boomer
and his vp bush 1 (not a gen Xer) called reganomics for what it was...voodoo

Silent Gens --as a cohort-- are just about as bad as Boomers.

And why the hypersensitivity, dryfly? Did you "tune in, turn on and drop out" during the 60s? If the Boomer stereotype doesn't apply to you, relax...

I'm solidly Gen-X, but rarely wear flannel, bathe regularly, and have never cared for Pearl Jam or Nirvana.

Oh, and don't trust any over 50!

mock turtle(Excellent) writes:
i just find the age argument to be pernicious

Oh I do too, but I think dryfly is engaging in the sport of spreading the blame so thin nobody has to wear it. I just think we've done a little too much "we're all to blame so nobody has to suffer." I'm just pointing out that leaders of a certain age and above are in fact terrible failures, and that's pretty undeniable.

Maybe the younger ones just haven't had a chance to fail yet. That's fine, maybe they'll be educated by the spectacular public destruction of their elders.

dryfly(Excellent) writes:
Like I said - spin - it's a wonderful thing.

I never give up no good vibes,
and I never give up no truth.
Never trade my sanity
for living in Babylon crew.
Vanity will never drive this man insane.
This man will walk alongside Jah again.
We see all the pressure to conform today,
And I may sometimes bend, but only as not to break.
Cause a life of iniquity for laziness' sake
Is a deal with the devil Rasta just can't make.

mock turtle(Excellent) writes:
just think hes saying target the criticism at each and every individual who played a significant part in this crisis without regard to their membership in any group

I think he is too, but I think as HARM says he's a little overly sensitive about it and so I don't really mind giving him a chance to articulate it.

the funny thing... in debating your point is
that i half agree with your scathing criticism of the system and many of the power broker groups within...

Well thank you, I'm flattered.

I think the analysis is fairly tight, so far I have gotten quite better results than the quantitative economist types seeing it through the lens of a policy establishment crisis.

I wish I couldn't apply this to the country I love so much. On the other hand, at least I'm not working at the State Dept. or DoD applying it to other people's countries with Kissingerian intent.

Perversely? Ironically? Nettlingly? I have learned a lot from watching it. I sacrificed probably a whole lot of revenue to have the time to follow this but as someone with an academic interest in it, you could not have a better learning model.

i wish obama weell, ( and those who tout "change" hope they are sincere)...the odds are against them more than 10 to 1

I hope they are too! My patron saint, Zhuge Liang, died in his 50s, confined to a wheelchair from exhaustion, martyr to his efforts to rectify a dying Dynasty.

Really, I'd rather die a senile and forgotten little old man at 90, you know?

I think Obama's problem is, as dryfly points out, this wasn't a revolution. Things will have to get worse before they can get better.

I think his big crisis will be getting caught between the millstones of debt service and necessary spending. (Assuming he doesn't turn out to be a sham like Bush -- I'm gonna assume he's a true brother until I hear otherwise.)

And why the hypersensitivity, dryfly? Did you "tune in, turn on and drop out" during the 60s? If the Boomer stereotype doesn't apply to you, relax...
HARM | Homepage | 01.05.09 - 2:11 pm | #

I always get hypersensitive w/ bigotry. I'm just as hostile to boomers who rip Xers as being 'slackers' or whites ripping blacks (or vise versa)... it is not only intellectually lazy - something we don't do here - it is also 'immoral'. People are individuals - make individual decisions & need to take individual responsibility for individual actions. Blame the individual actions & individuals making them not the whole class UNLESS you can prove all really are the same - good luck with that in ANY group or class.

No one here believes more strongly than I do that a great many boomers made catastrophic errors - personally and publicly - but they were done by individuals NOT by the class as a whole or as part of some 'conspiracy'. It makes it far too easy on everyone (boomers and Xers alike) to blame (or defend) the whole class when in reality people need to look in the mirror and ask what have I done to help/hurt the betterment of our society? What have others done in the same predicament? My belief is Xers aren't any better or worse and many would have been as stupid had they been older & in power already. They will get their chance soon enough and I believe they will make very similar errors. I have seen plenty myself who already have [deep in debt already and no hope of digging out].

The real irony is the exact same (unjust) claims were made by many boomers against their elders when at the same age - 'never trust anyone over thirty' was the cry in 1968 - idiot then as now but what can ya do? Every generation has their idiots.

BTW - I was constantly reminded by my father that the greatest generation was full of bozos too. He knew them well - they were his litter mates.

Nothing really changes much in the human condition generation to generation - including bigotry & scapegoating - it is all subtle variations on the same theme - including the stupidity & friction BETWEEN generations.