SAR #9185/Weekender

Is it too late to be honest with ourselves?

The Great Divide: Acknowledge unemployment is near 10%, U-6 nearly 17%, foreclosures are mounting, Wall Street is beating back attempts to protect their customers, and bonuses at Goldman Sachs will set new records this year. Enjoy your hamburger and the bottle rocket. Buy the kid another sparkler.

Not the News: Commodities futures trading is 98.5% speculative gambling. Gambling is heavily taxed everwhere but at the tip of Manhattan Island. It would bee a Good Idea to tax it there, too.

Market Movers: The blogsphere is bemoaning the fact that 25% are bright enough to walk away when their house is more than 15% underwater. It's one of the rare places where the economists conceit of the rational investor actually exists. Would we be better off if everyone walked at the -15% mark?

A Little Warming: Sheep on a Scottish island have responded to global climate change by shrinking.

Compass Heading: We down 8 million jobs and dropping like a rock. The work week is down so that even those who have jobs are making less. State cuts are reducing the social safety net. If we're not headed to the Twilight Zone, why does it smell like the 1930's?

Rolling Stoned: The organic label in the supermarket veggie department has been ajoke since Congress got involved, but did you know that 'organic' baby food contains synthetic additives? Thanks to Bush's FDA, you don't always get whaty you pay for.

Away, Far, Far Away: Turns out there is a placae called 'Away' where you can dispose of stuff like coal ash. It's in Alabama.

Another Quote: "What if they gave a Great Depression but systematically rigged the statistics, manipulated the markets, inflated the currency, and were able to convince the majority that it was not all that bad? Would it still be a Grat Depression? Or a Great Delusion?"

Silly Question: "Why Are Employment Numbers So Bad?" Start with the nail, work you way up to losing the battle.

Boy Scouting: Russia and the Ukraine are not playing well together; European countries are well advised to be prepared and stockup now on gas - before winter and shortages and higher prices return.

Open Book Test: Why should a trader sitting in a carrel someplace be able to gable on commodities? Why do we allow speculators - folks with no interest in or connection to the actual items - manipulate the price the rest of us pay? Points will be deducted for reliance on the myth of efficient markets.

Porn O'Graph: Bad housing market. Down, boy, down.