Cycles end.
Don't Go Near The Water: Water in Tokyo is too radioactive for children and other living things.
Data: When the economy collapsed, the US applied (half-)massive stimulus spending while the GOP yelled for budget cuts and austerity. Things are looking up, but the GOP is still screaming for more hardship, less pity. In Great Britain they went for the budget cuts and austerity like the GOP wants the US to adopt, and collapsed their economy and have set inflation loose. Does this mean that raving liberal Paul Krugman was right all along about the need for a vast government stimulus to lift us out of recession? Nah. See, we haven't cut spending enough yet and we have to give even more money to the rich and the banks and... Of course it does, you idiots!
Vacation Planning: Now that Japan has been struck from the list, why don't we go to Europe? Start in Portugal, where the forth round of austerity measures brought some 300,000 to the streets, or Ireland, where a handful of bankers brought financial ruin to the country, sticking it with an unpayable sovereign debt. Or Greece, for the street life. Or Italy – I understand there are some really good political parties there. But the exchange rate sucks.
Re-Covering: Another new low in new house sales – an annual rate of 250,000 nationwide. It was, of course, “unexpected”. New house sales fell 16.9% y/y and existing house sales fell 9.6% while the median price fell to $202,000.
Command & Control: In war the enemies 'command and control' centers are the first target. In governing, you are the target of the government's command and control efforts. Remember, to have social order, someone has to give the orders.
Thought Experiment: The US debt is a tad over $14 trillion and this year's budget is $1.7 trillion short. With 97% of House Republicans and 85% of the GOP Senators signing on to Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform — which is a promise to never ever raise taxes, what programs are going to be cut? Not the military, which is busy getting and guarding resources. Right, social programs. That's been the plan all along – to take as much as possible from the people and deliver it to the rich. What's going on in Ohio, Wisconsin, Florida, Michigan and the rest is not about teacher's unions, it is about rolling back the entire 20th Century. And these are just the out-of-town tryouts. Wait until the GOP brings austerity, contract negation, pension looting and the rest to the whole nation.
Price Inflation? How come TARP & Friends, QEI & QEII have not produced massive inflation? Because it has – in the stock markets of the world. You didn't think the last two years of non-stop gains was driven by reality, did you?
Socialism: In Japan, as in the US, corporations do not pay for the damage they do, the damages are socialized. Taxpayers will have to come up with over $300 billion to bail out their nuclear industry and clean up from its mess. Oil and nuclear power are not benign genies, happy to serve us. Nor is coal.
Room With A View: Fox employee Steve Harrigan explained how he earned his Combat Journalism Merit Badge: "I can stand outside on my balcony and report what I see,"
Porn O'Graph: New new home sales.
1 comment:
RE Thought Experiment Just try that one on true believers like my neighbor. He'll trot-out every sound-bite ever heard on FAUX news or talk-radio. He BELIEVES these guys are doing him a favor AND that anything else is UNAMERICAN or an attempt to steal money from his pocketbook. I run into his sort constantly so it's no wonder we're in such deep sh!t.
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