SAR #13052

People always want a story, one with a happy ending.

Keeping Track: Caterpillar's rolling 3-month sales are down 12% in Asia and 11% in North America. Not really constructive.

Either/Or: Morgan Stanley reports supertanker charters to haul oil from the Middle East to China are down 30% y/y, Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries already cut output for five months, while Saudi Arabia says it expects to increase petroleum production to meet Chinese demand.

Clarification: Someone should tell Ghana's Cardinal Turkson that homosexuality is about sex and pedophilia (and the priesthood) is about power.

Delusional:Republicans are increasingly acting as if there's no way they won't be in the majority at least through the end of this decade, which means that they think they are in the driver's seat and will – deliberately and with great pleasure – let the sequester take effect and then they will shut down the government. And expect applause.

Unclear On The Concept: A Republican lawmaker in Missouri wants to make it a felony for any of his colleagues to introduce gun control legislation, because guns protect our freedom of speech.

Quoted: "If one machine can cut necessary human labor by half, why make half of the workforce redundant, rather than employing the same number for half the time? Why not take advantage of automation to reduce the average working week from 40 hours to 30, and then to 20, and then to ten, with each diminishing block of labor time counting as a full time job? This would be possible if the gains from automation were not mostly seized by the rich and powerful, but were distributed fairly instead."

Good Old Days? What Good Old Days? Median income has consistently under performed economic growth for the past forty years.

Gone, Fishing: Starting this May, the limit on the cod catch off New England will be steeply reduced in a last-ditch attempt to save some small remnant of the industry. The take from the Gulf of Maine will be cut 77% and that from the Georges Bank 61%. While a serious blow to New England fishermen, this will not affect US customers much; only 9% of the fish eaten in the US is domestically caught.

Good Intentions: There is a growing possibility that the efforts to slow foreclosures may result in simply postponing the inevitable and setting the market up for another peak of foreclosures in the future, driving down prices, etc. etc. etc.

Even Stopped Clocks: One-time presidential candidate Herman Cain says that American has a “severe ignorance problem.” Right on.

Coming Attraction: The video 'Death of an Imam' depicts what may be the prototypical assassination of a US citizen by his government. Warning: watching this video may cause the government to start tracking you. Oh, well, the government is already tracking you, so you might as well watch the video.

Too Much Information: Last year the Japanese bought more diapers for adults than for babies.

No Exit And Other Stories: Given the serious damage done to the peasantry in Greece, Portugal and Spain (and the serious damage the peasants are starting to do) the question are 'Why do they put up with the austerity' and 'Why don't they just leave the euro?' The answers are: Nobody cares what the peasants think. And the political leaders are doing just fine, as are their owners.

Porn O'Graph: Inequality is not news.