SAR #9036

The economy is powered by energy, not money.

Politics is powered by money.

Nostrum: The holy grail is a political solution to a structural economic problem. The best solution - seen from The Hill - must maintain the economic status quo, reinflate the housing bubble, lower taxes on the rich, hide the poor and re-establish the GOP as God's Optimal People. Hard to do with all these Democrats trying to help folks who make less than $50k.

Anger Management: Today's failures at holding their tounges: Yves at Naked Capitalism, Chris Hedges at Truthdig. Any day, Ilargi and Dan W. & thank you one and all.

Country W/O a Profit: Remember how the taxpayers were going to get rich off the 'assets' picked up when riding to the rescue? So far they've lost the whole farm on Bear Sterns' $30 billion - or so outsider's say. The Fed still carries them at par, which is par for the course.

Team Sports: Iceland, China, Latvia, Greece, France, Great Britain, Russia - citizens around the world are rising up against the looting by their financial leaders. But not in America. Americans are waiting until the jackpot is bigger.

Intimidation: When Sammy the Smasher comes around and threatens to harm your family if you testify, it's called witness tampering. When the US threatens Great Britain harm if it testifies to US torture, it's called diplomacy.

Plot Summary: Markopolos testimony in L'affair Madoff can't be true; it's the plot from 47 bad crime novels and more than a few political thrillers. Ah, the very flower of capitalism - corruption R US.

Summary Judgment: Globalization never happened. It wasn't trade; trade involves goods. The US shipped jobs to China and the Chinese sent their people's savings to the US. It was not trade, it was stupidity. Still is.

Headline Only: "IBM Offers To Move Laid Off Workers To India"

Cash Crops: Amid global economic collapse, 900 million undernourished people and mass starvation in parts of Africa, Archer Daniels Midland boosted its earnings 24% by raising its prices "through improved product prices."

Mortgage Slavery: Preventing foreclosures has become a top priority of politicians, economists and regulators. The intent is to find some level of mortgage at which the rich can continue to take 30% of the workers' incomes.

Reality Check: The house is on fire. The Dems want to call the fire department, get the kids out of danger and use the garden hose. The Repubs don't believe in fire departments or fighting fires - they just want to cut taxes.

Identity Theft: For about $250 you can legally get a setup that allows you to drive around filching personal information from passports, driver's licenses, and similar documents with information coded on RFID tags. Ah, improved security, they promised.

The Green : One day soon - a few years at best - oil depletion will scuttle our economies. And if it doesn't, global warming will. But today there are hundreds of thousands of newly unemployed each month. Guess which wheel will get the green grease?

Just As You Thought: Wall Street's new boy at the Treasury: "“We have a financial system that is run by private shareholders, managed by private institutions, and we’d like to do our best to preserve that system.” Who's "we", Kimosabe?

Down So Long, Looks Like Up: Don't be fooled. Pretty soon car sales & house sales will stop falling - negative sales just ain't gonna happen. Doesn't mean 'UP" is next. The next up is still unemployment.

Privacy Smivacy: You're shopping at the mall and your cellphone rings, or you're at the airport and your boss calls, or you're on vacation in Vegas and the babysitter calls. So, isn't that neat? If the phone company knows where to find you, 24/7, and Google knows where to find you, do you think NSA doesn't?

Porn O'Graph: In for a penny, in for a Pound ha'penny.