SAR 9297/Weekender

Lying is proof positive of free will.

Picking Sides: Although those with credit card balances routinely get charged 29% and some credit cards are charging 79% annual rates, Bernanke insists Congress must move slowly and with caution when it comes to regulating an industry that contribute so much to so many PACs.

Without Derisory Comment: Sales of existing houses rose 9.4% m/m and 9.2% y/y in September. May be an artifact of tax rebates and foreclosure sales. May not. Enjoy it while you can.

Systemic Failure: Everybody's running around, searching for someone or something to blame for the Great Recession, looking for what systems broke down, what regulations failed. But it wasn't just part of the system that failed. It was the whole so-called 'market system'. The greed creed. Under the latest version of free-market capitalism everyone was free to serve their own interests with no regard to what might be good or bad for society. And it didn't take too long for the financiers to figure out they got their best returns from investing in politicians. So they bought the government.

Global Warming Defeated: A couple of years ago, 77% of Americans believed in man-made global warming. Now only 57% believe in global warming and fewer than that think it is man-made. The score so far: Scientists are overwhelmingly convinced that global climate change is happening and it is man-made. The public disagrees. There are only a handful of scientists who understand thsis stuff, so they get outvoted: There's to be no global warming. Majority rules.

Where's Waldo? If he's a member of the US Army, he's on his way back to Afghanistan. Or Iraq. Why?

Is Capitalism in Its Death Throes? Some worry that free market capitalism may be ending. Some say no other system has created so much prosperity and it must be saved. It's not capitalism that is ending, it's oil. And it wasn't capitalism that created all that prosperity, it was cheap oil for the last 150 years. What would Wall Street look like if oil had never existed?

Permanent Underclass: Paul Volker says that unemployment in the US will remain high for years. Easy for him to say, he's retired – from the chairmanship of the Fed.

Tea Leaves: Jeff Rubin, former chief economist with CIBC, predicts oil will reach $100 a barrel and gasoline top $4.00 a gallon by next Memorial Day, and that will lead to another meltdown, just as high oil prices caused the current financial meltdown. Australian Nationals Senate Leader Barnaby Joyce predicts a catastrophic economic collapse in the next few years, triggered by the US defaulting on its sovereign debt.

“Signs of Recovery”: In the strange world of CNBC and the stock markets, the fact that new jobless claims rose last week to 531,000 is an inconvenient aberration that can be explained away as American industry becoming leaner and more competitive. What American industry?

Quivering Upper Lip: The British economy shrank 0.4% in 3Q09, a result significantly behind the euro zone and lagging most major economies. The predictions “seem to have been a little over optimistic.”

Put Down the Bottle and Back Away from the Bar: Swedish researchers have determined that even low levels of alcohol consumption have a negative impact on drinkers' overall health. They recommend total abstinence. It's so depressing I think I'll go get a scotch.

Porn O'Graph: Go Healthcare, young man.