Climbing In A Blizzard To The Death

July 16, 2008

Elaine Meinel Supkis

This weekend, some racers running up an Alpine mountain perished in a summer blizzard. The story is remarkable because it shows clearly how bizarre people think when they lose all sight of reality and limitations imposed by natural forces. The financial mess, obvious to anyone with half a brain some time ago, continues to worsen. But stocks go up because one bank is raking in profits via late payment fees! Whoopee. For several years now, bad news drives up stocks which hope to see big profits from lay offs, outsourcing and punishing fees due to looming bankruptcies. In reality, there has been precious little honest good news for years now.

Snowstorm turns Alpine race into battle for survival

Survivors of a disastrous Alpine race which ended with the deaths of two runners have spoken of how participants crawled through a snowstorm on their hands and knees and wept with exhaustion during the run up Germany's highest mountain.

State prosecutors in Bavaria are investigating the organisers of the 10-mile race almost to the top of the 9,500ft-high Zugspitze mountain after two men, aged 45 and 41, collapsed and died from exposure and exhaustion when the race was hit by the violent storm at the weekend. Survivors have accused the organisers of failing to call off the race in time to avert the tragedy which also resulted in more than 30 of the race's other 585 competitors being taken to hospital by helicopter or cable car suffering from exposure.
*snip*
"It was obvious that the weather was deteriorating fast," he said. "I had assumed that the race would be called off. That would have been normal. In the end I was utterly exhausted and literally crawling on my hands and knees when I reached the finish line."

Mr Schürig said that behind him, hundreds of other runners were still fighting their way up the mountain and into the storm.

"The rescue teams were hopelessly over burdened," he added. "There were no blankets or warm drinks at the finish. We were shaking so much we couldn't get our clothes off. Some were crying and others were just incapable of saying anything."

Let's pause a moment and think about the total insanity of this race to the death: the weather reports made it clear, there would be storms. Alpine storms are very dangerous. Obviously, lightning is one element that comes to mind. And they can be very cold storms. As a person who used to do high mountain climbing, a climber has to be very aware of the weather. Secondly, hundreds of runners could see with their own eyeballs that the weather was dangerous. Yet, even as some came staggering out of the murk, others rushed into it, mindlessly. And lastly: people had to risk their lives and it cost a tremendous amount of money to save these fools from their own mindless follies.

Humans have this habit of ignoring obvious dangers. I was taught to never turn my back on the ocean because of tsunamis. Yet people sleep on the beach or totally ignore the actions of this very capricious body of mass water. Once, for example, I sensed a violent thunderstorm coming rapidly while I was sitting on the beach in NYC. I ran for shelter, yelling to everyone to run as fast as they could to escape this. People stared at me like I was crazy. I barely made it to shelter when the first bolts of lightning shot overhead and the wind began to scream.

Another time, a man walking past my home in Tucson in a thunderstorm ignored me when I said, 'You will be hit by lightning, you can come inside, if you want.' He told me to go to hell, walked down the block to Broadway and was killed by a lightning bolt. Over and over again, I have warned people about danger and was ignored. Once, during a flood, I told a lady to not drive into a depression that was filled with raging water. 'Little girl, you don't know anything and you can't stop me,' she said. Luckily, I was on Socksie, my horse and had a stout rope so I fished her out.

Why do people do this? Perhaps it is due to living safe lives overall and so the ability to judge danger collapses. So it is with our finances: for the last 60 years we were protected by all the rules, regulations and laws set up during the Great Depression. On every level, we are protected from our own follies. But collectively, we can overturn these barriers to being stupid. And one by one, we did so. We wanted money for wars. We wanted money for social systems. We wanted money for fun. And we wanted money for political global power. All we had to do was sign various IOU instruments. No one ever said, 'Sorry, you can't borrow any more money.' So we kept on borrowing. Since no one demanded that we balance any of our books, we ran all our systems from top to bottom, in the red.

The obvious storms this was generating was ignored. We ran straight into this tsunami/hurricane/blizzard half naked, drunk on power. If no one rescues us, we die.

THE FINANCIAL TSUNAMI The Next Big Wave is Breaking, Fannie Mae Freddic Mac and US Mortgage Debt

by F. William Engdahl

The announcement by US Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson together with Federal Reserve chief Bernanke, that the US Government will bailout the two largest guarantors of housing mortgage debt—the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac—far from calming financial markets, has confirmed what we have said repeatedly in this space: The Financial Tsunami which began in August 2007 in the relatively small “sub-prime” high risk US mortgage securitization market, far from being over, is only gathering momentum. As with the Tsunami which devastated Asia in wave after terrifying wave in December 2004, the financial Tsunami we are witnessing is a low-amplitude, long-wave phenomenon of trillions of dollars of financial securities being unwound, defaulted on, dumped on the market. But the scale of the latest wave to hit, the collapse of confidence in the two Government-Sponsored Entities, Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, is a harbinger of worse to come in what will be the most devastating financial and economic catastrophe in United States history. The impact will be felt globally.

I do many charts and graphs. It is painfully obvious that this tsunami began not last summer but in the summer of 1971. As each wave crashes ashore, we pick ourselves up and create MORE red ink to fix things and then another wave slams on shore and we do this again and again. Each wave is more destructive than the last. When the first wave hit, we still had a trade surplus. It vanished in 1971, never to return. Swept to sea. Lost in the blizzard like that Ice Age man's frozen corpse that was discovered last year.

When the hyper-inflation wave hit, the US fixed it by electing Reagan and refusing to pay taxes. This increased the government debts which then took off like a rocket. Deeper and deeper into the red we plunged. Only one year, did this reverse. One year out of 25 years is terrible. The Savings and Loan crash was yet another, bigger wave. But cheap oil and cheap lending via the Japanese carry trade saved us. Add into this the mass outsourcing of nearly all possible manufacturing and office staff jobs and voila! The red ink flow increased ten-fold! Things were now ten times worse in just ten years. Then the Dot Com bubble tsunami hit. This was fixed with epic red ink production: interest rates plunged to 1% while the trade deficit went totally insane, deep, deep, deep in the red, running up over $4 trillion in red ink! And to top it off, the government overspent by nearly the same amount. US government debts shot up to $10 trillion. In 1971, it was several billion. In 1981, a trillion. In 1991, $2 trillion. This arc of destructive debt growth isn't vanishing. It is growing...very fast.

Engdahl's diatribe is correct in many ways but as always, most people cannot visualize the entire landscape, they can't do this because it is too painful, it fills one with despair. Could things have been this wrong for so long?

The answer is 'Yes.' Like all great historical forces, the red-inking of the American empire is a long story that involves many people doing very stupid things. The temptation to run an empire on red ink is tremendous. Might makes right! So damn the torpedoes, steam straight ahead! Let's look at today's news:

Fannie, Freddie Need Policy Clarity, Not `Bailout,' Raines Says

U.S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson this week began seeking authority from Congress to make unlimited capital injections and loans to the companies if necessary, seeking to restore confidence. Raines wrote that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac ``have more than enough capital to meet their cash obligations when those become due, which is the most basic definition of solvency.''

What they don't have is ``policy clarity'' about their status that would help them to tap markets for new capital and lower their financing costs, said Raines.

``Paulson appears to be trying to make such a declaration, but the silence from the Fed and the White House on whether the companies have a future is deafening,'' he wrote.

Raines is wrong. There is no 'new capital markets' where we can peddle our debts. The problem isn't a lack of markets, there is 'money' out there, profits from the grossly lopsided trade with the US. The problem is, no one is going to lend it to us for housing because our housing is now priced out of sight and the people buying these houses can't afford to pay off the mortgages. Ergo: no one is interested in buying our bonds based on the probability of paying things off over the next 30 years.

Here are today's rates for people wishing to park cash in a bank:

All, well below the rate of inflation! Gah.

What 'policy clarity' can we have? The policies of the US government, social systems and banking system has been 'CHARGE IT!' as Wilma Flintstone and Betty Rubble used to shout when waving their credit cards as they rushed out the door. Whatever the problem, we 'charge it' to the future. We ask for more loans. The cheaper, the better. The cheapest so far have been from Japan. Which is now unwinding its 'carry trade' really fast. The yen was supposed to be at least 120 to the dollar by now. For the last year, the Japanese have struggled for this goal and failed for the dollar dies faster than they can kill the yen.

So they have stopped buying our bonds! Now, all we have left is Russia, China and OPEC. All of whom hate our guts, nay, want us dead as doornails. Now, this is like running up an Alpine mountain into a blizzard with lightning and an avalanche roaring down on us. With meteorites striking the mountain. Run away! Run away! There will be no rescuers when any of us stagger out of this disaster. No warm blankets. No drinks.

Wachovia Faces Shallow Reserves but Says It Is Raising More Capital

Wachovia's stock fell to a 17-year low yesterday after an analyst warned that the commercial bank, which holds more deposits than any other in the Washington region, will face two years of losses arising from the credit crisis and a dramatic restatement of troubled assets on its books.

The amount of the bank's bad loans is growing faster than what the company is stashing away, and its reserves are markedly lower than the industry average, according to bank officials and regulators. Wachovia has enough money to cover about 84 percent of its non-performing loans, the bank said yesterday.

As fears mount over the health of the nation's banking system, Wachovia will have to take exceptional steps to raise enough capital to meet its obligations, analysts said. This does not mean that the bank will fail anytime soon or that depositors face imminent danger.

Welcome to the Wachovia Death March up the Mountain of Debts. When bad loans grow faster than dollars coming in from savings, there is only ONE CURE: higher interest rates. Then, money pours into banks. Got that? GOT THAT? Everyone repeat after me: if banks offer good rates for attracting dollars, they attract dollars. Give stinky rates below the real rate of inflation, all money vanishes! All of it! And the debts pile up and the bank goes bankrupt.

So what is the tricky cure here? Eh? I go across the web seeking someone, anyone willing to tell this truth! Just like the race organizers refused to stop the deadly, mad race, the people who supposedly protect us are refusing to say the obvious: we MUST raise interest rates. We have to do this to attract money into our banking system. THERE IS NO OTHER SOLUTION. None. Period. End of story. It will kill the CONSUMER culture but this is KILLING US. We can't consume and consume. We have to pay the Pied Piper. Or he runs off with all our children and we are left bereft.

Right now, inflation is eating savings up. The collapse of the bond markets is eating up savings, too. And the dying dollar is eating up savings which are denominated in dollars. All of this can be stopped with only one tool: raising interest rates! And no one wants to do this because it kills our consumer society which as driven the US deep into debt on EVERY LEVEL. This is the trade deficit, the overbuilding of suburbia with worthless living units, the dumping of more debts on all housing everywhere. It is killing our industrial base and bankrupting our government. WHY KEEP IT RUNNING?

Changing course will be hard, very hard. But not changing course is FATAL. Alas, Obama seemed to have understood this last year but this year, to get elected, he is choosing the 'Santa Claus' solutions. McCain is totally insane and has Phil Gramm, a vicious, stupid man, as his economic chief. Nearly as bad as Karl Rove, one of the most gnomic but also stupidest advisors in history.

Washington Post reports:

The S&P banking index was down 5.4 percent yesterday and 14 percent since Friday. "There continues to be a number of people who are worried about the health of the financial system, and they are putting pressure on financial stocks," said Andy Brooks, head of stock trading at T. Rowe Price.
*snip*
The current environment is risky for financial firms. Rumors and false reports can trigger a run on a bank even if it is well-capitalized. Two institutions have been sunk by such panics this year, the 85-year-old brokerage house Bear Stearns and IndyMac.

Notice how the story is now morphing: Bear Stearns and Indymac were in good shape but the gnomes undermined them and they collapsed! HAHAHA. Fake! Fake! Both were in deep, deep red ink trouble. Both were fatally compromised. Both went under when the shark attacks, attracted by the blood in the streets that Cramer was screaming about, successfully took down dying organizations. There are many such in similar state of disrepair! The SEC and the government want dearly to attack us 'rumor mongers' who tell the truth. The hope that there is really no problems, just small details wrong, must be projected! People have to believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy. The Easter Bunny will come hop, hop, hopping along, not all of us dying and then trying to come back to life!

So far, I have detected NO 'false reports' online! NONE. The British group that accused me of rumor-mongering when I reported, via Bloomberg, that they were considering not paying out their funds to investors last summer turned out to be TRUE! And these pirates did declare bankruptcy! I didn't lie. They were the liars! And will the SEC arrest Mozilo or the heads of Bear Stearns or IndyMac which was launched by Mozilo? Are these people being arrested? Gads!

No, they are trying to scare off everyone from reporting accurately about all these matters. They wish dearly to prevent us from knowing the truth so everything can run in the red and we be totally ignorant of the process and its deadly results. But the internet is big and this tiny news service here is read across the entire planet. So anyone who wishes to know the truth, gets it. With cartoons!

Wachovia is dying:

Reserves have grown at a much slower rate At the beginning of 2007, Wachovia had enough money to cover more than twice the amount of its loan losses. At the end of the first quarter, the bank could pay only 84 cents for every dollar lost. The industry average has also fallen and is now about 89 cents on the dollar, according to the FDIC.
*snip*
Company officials said that they were aggressively building up reserves and that they had access to up to $150 billion if the bank needed it. Bank officials did not elaborate.

This magical $150 billion is from where? What dark hole? China? HAHAHA. Russia? OPEC's Muslim sheiks? There is only one place: the Federal Reserve and the Treasury. This is why the bankers couldn't tell the damn truth! They want trust? TELL THE TRUTH. Trust and truth are concepts coming from tree trunks with runes cut in them, the runes cut by Wotan as a contract with the Giants who built Valhalla and wanted to get paid back! The Nazis, deranged by WWI and the hyperinflation of Weimar Germany, got all big on the business of the spear of Wotan and how it was all connected with magical money via the Cave of Death. This was made fairly clear by the famous 'Ring Der Nibelungen' opera cycle by Richard Wagner.

I just saw ABC noon news and the humans there made it totally clear, from top to bottom, from Bernanke to Congress to the President: they all want INFLATION. They all want more RED INK. I detect no push for ending this nightmare correctly. Wachovia wants free Funny Money™ from the Fed's new secret windows to infinite inflation. They don't want to attract savings at all! Isn't this totally pathetic?

Wells Fargo Profit Exceeds Estimates; Shares Jump

(Bloomberg) -- Wells Fargo & Co., the biggest bank on the U.S. West Coast, rose the most in more than 25 years after reporting better-than-expected second-quarter profit and raising its dividend.

Wells Fargo advanced $4.09 to $24.56 in 10:29 a.m. New York Stock Exchange composite trading, and jumped as high as $24.74 after the bank said net income dropped 23 percent to $1.75 billion, or 53 cents a share, from $2.28 billion, or 67 cents, a year earlier. That beat the 50-cent average estimate of analysts surveyed by Bloomberg. Revenue rose 16 percent to a record $11.5 billion.

Stocks rose on what is really VERY bad news! Because of raging inflation coupled with the collapse of asset values of all the things US consumers bought this last decade, more and more people are using their credit cards to their upper limits and are in danger of bankruptcy! This bankruptcy is obvious: late fees and other punishing things like raising the interest rates on people who are overextended: these are good for the bottom line of the bottom feeders in the banking systems! And this is a BAD sign of impending BANKRUPTCIES. The bankers knew this would happen! This is why they pushed like crazy to get our treasonous Congress and President to change the bankruptcy laws so debtors can't escape their debts. Of course, this ends with no one able to take on more debt. Which kills the banks.

Stock Bear Markets Seen Deepening on Credit Concern

(Bloomberg) -- The global bear market in equities will deepen from New York to London to Tokyo in the next six months as credit losses prolong the economy's slump and inflation erodes profits, a survey of Bloomberg users showed.

The Standard & Poor's 500 Index, the U.K.'s FTSE 100 Index, Japan's Nikkei 225 Stock Average, Spain's IBEX 35 Index, the Swiss Market Index, France's CAC 40 Index, Italy's S&P/MIB Index and Germany's DAX Index will decline, according to the Bloomberg Professional Global Confidence Survey of 4,232 users taken July 7 to 11. In Brazil, the only market where investors predict gains, optimism dropped to a five-month low, the survey showed.

The MSCI World Index retreated 17 percent this year, the most since 1970, and entered a bear market last week as oil rose to a record, losses and writedowns at banks exceeded $416 billion and mortgage delinquencies prompted the U.S. Treasury to shore up Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. If history is a guide, the benchmark index may fall another 12 percent, based on the average decline of seven bear markets since 1969, according to data compiled by Birinyi Associates Inc. and Bloomberg.

The economic collapse is spreading. High energy costs was the dagger that slit the throat of the global economy. But the problem is really the debt addictions in the US and England. Together, these two nations are really one giant empire and just as the collapse of the English empire caused the Great Depression, so will the collapse of the US/UK empire.

Bankruptcy fears hit Spanish building stocks

(MarketWatch) - Companies connected to the Spanish property market fell sharply on Tuesday, with investors spooked by the sector's first likely high-profile bankruptcy.

Property developer Martinsa-Fadesa said on Monday that it would seek credit protection after it couldn't raise a 150 million euro loan.

Classic bubble graph. All the real estate graphs across the planet will end up looking the same. Why is this? Why are all the countries in the G7 West seeing the exact same graphs? Why are they in the same fix?

The US empire is really all of Europe, Japan and various parts and pieces of South America and Africa which slip from control far too often. China is busy picking up the pieces of these two continents as the US loses its financial grip. The latest scheme of using the International Criminal Courts to drag back into the control of the West, various nations with resources we desire to hold. As the EU/US/Japan mega empire struggles in vain to dominate and control the Muslims, this is bankrupting us all, especially the US. This epic struggle for power will end with the US/EU/Japanese defeat. From bankruptcy.

To pay for this imperium, the central bankers in the EU, Japan and the US all kept interest rates far below the real rate of inflation with Europe taking the biggest stab at not doing this...but failing. Interest rates are now at over 4% but inflation has taken off. Japan and the US have totally fake interest rates that feed inflation. This, in turn, caused all real estate markets to shoot upwards as everyone rushed the bank windows to also get some of this free money being lent below the rate of inflation.

Now, it is over. The assets that are the basis of this lending can't rise in price anymore because they outstripped future potential incomes. So the prices fall and like dominos, all other instruments crash alongside this. So the collapse of the US property markets is being mirrored in Europe. The UK is falling rapidly. Now, Spain and Italy are too. Then comes all of Eastern Europe, Greece, then finally, Germany and France. The EU will fall apart. This is why the French are frantic to pass the new EU constitution that usurps sovereignty. But the Irish threw this out the door and now there is nothing but looming debts that unite Europe. Russia will pick up the pieces in the East when the housing bubble collapses there, just for example. 'I be Banksky,' says the Russian Bear.

GM Suspends Dividend, Cuts Payroll to Raise Cash

(Bloomberg) -- General Motors Corp., buffeted by a U.S. sales collapse and three years of losses, will suspend its dividend for the first time since 1922, cut the management payroll by 20 percent and sell assets to raise at least $15 billion in the next 18 months.

Eliminating the 25-cent quarterly dividend and an unspecified number of salaried jobs will help save $10 billion a year, the biggest U.S. automaker said today. GM plans to generate $4 billion to $7 billion by selling as yet unidentified assets, borrowing from banks and paring benefits to retirees.

Volkswagen and other mainland European auto makers are moving production to the US because of the weak dollar. US industries continue to die. I notice in the news, more and more stocks are eliminating dividends. This is a bad sign. It is a real killer. People holding stocks won't hold if they don't pay up. If the stocks are soaring, people don't care if there is no dividend. But in bad markets, this is often the only thing between, 'Heck, sell the stupid stocks' and 'OK, I'll hold a while longer.' This causes the dynamics of a down market to worsen. Of course.

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Comments

[Ralph]

From Bernankes testimony you are 100% correct. All the clowns on Capitaline Hill want INFLATION!!!(besides Ron Paul).We truly are so doomed. Hyperinflation is just a year or so away. I know you hate gold, and silver as refuges from govt inflation and destruction. Where can one put money than? As you point out, why park $ in a bank @ 3% taxable, when they are dying by the day? Not only are you incurring counterparty risk by doing this, but by holding your savings in dollars you assume payment risk, because the Congress all wants HYPERINFLATION. Please help me. I have some inheritance and dont trust any of these clown financial advisors, who tell me Buy Mutual Funds! Save $ by investing in stocks! I trust you. You know the game better than all these clowns.

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

Gold and silver are just fine. But they also are used to kill off excess dollars. The guys running this show wait to the last minute to raise rates and voila! The price of silver and gold drops along with oil and other things and THIS CASH VANISHES.

See? They control this dynamic. They know the game. Gold hits $2000, this sucks up a lot of loot and bang! They raise interest rates, the price of gold collapses along with oil, etc. And the money is 'washed out of the system'.

If the rich were buying gold, then we buy gold. But they are NOT. Not at all. The third world is buying gold because of domestic inflation. We, on the other hand, won't be allowed to function with this back door exit to protect our funds.

I have lost huge sums of money thanks to the inflation/interest rate games. I learned the HARD WAY. This is why I remember what happened 30 years ago, 25 years ago. Even 18 years ago! OUCH.

See? There are no real safe havens to protect wealth, all we can do is MOVE things around to dodge the counter attacks which are set up to separate us from our savings! Two years ago, gold was an excellent exit. Today: a lot dicier.

All this talk about inflation is important. IF our government insists on this in the next three months, we will see gold shoot up and riding that pony one more lap might work. But be prepared for having to jump off it again!

Key to watch: interest rates vis a vis inflation rates. All I can say is, good luck. Everyone's savings should be protected. This is a high priority. But not in modern America, alas.

[Royal Dutch Paper]

Just a question. Does anyone here believe their vote actually counts?

[calvino]

I read only half way, however, so far so good. Today's fake rally is coming on the back of the Swiss bank and the chf. A deal is made to protect the tax cheats at UBS and muzzle the irs, in return for overnight chf repos. The cable is also in , or the volume would overwhem the usd/chf cross. For some reason, the manipulators feel the need to maintain appearances. Sell the usd/chf and the gbp/chf. This is not investment advice. Just some random musings, not to be taken as investment advice.

[calvino]

Tales from the Tanned One (he was buying off judges…who would have thunk it?):

In January 2004, Richard Aldrich, a California state appeals court judge, decided to refinance his 8,200-square-foot house next to a Jack Nicklaus-designed golf course at the Sherwood Country Club in Westlake Village. He turned to a prominent Sherwood member: Countrywide Financial chief executive Angelo Mozilo.

Aldrich’s application was assigned to a loan officer named Robert Feinberg; the judge was seeking a $1 million loan and a $900,000 line of credit. By email, Feinberg alerted Mozilo that the credit line was “above what guidelines allow.” Mozilo responded, “Go ahead and approve the loan, and close it as soon as possible. Don’t worry about this deal, it’s golden.” Countrywide further waived half a point, or $5,000 on the million-dollar loan. (Homebuyers can reduce their interest rates by paying points, which are equal to 1 percent of the value of a loan.)

That wasn’t Aldrich’s only contact with Countrywide. At the time he refinanced, a class action lawsuit against Countrywide was pending before the appellate court, brought by borrowers contending that the company offered an inadequate payment to settle allegations that it charged excessive fees for credit reports. That August, Aldrich was part of a three-judge panel that unanimously rejected the borrowers’ appeal.

http://www.portfolio.com/news-markets/national-news/portfolio/2008/07/16/Countrywide-Deals-Exposed

[p boone wickets]

There won't be massive commodity deflation: China is building out all of Africa's infrastructure in exchange for natural resource concessions.

I've seen it myself first-hand!

[Buffalo Ken]

joyride on the so-called street of walls today, but my bet is that a dead cat is bouncing somewhere.....then it will come to a rest and truly be dead.

True story: About two years ago I pulled a dead cat out of Providence Rd - that cat had been there for over a year. It was nothing but skin, hair, and bones. Somebody had to do it, so I did.

Peace,
Ken

[Buffalo Ken]

I mean I walked by that spot several times a month at least to mail letters or buy some tea.

That damn dead cat just stayed there forever. I was tired of smelling it at first and then just plum tired of seeing it after that (after awhile the smell stops). Anyhow, I'm glad a pulled the carcass of the road.

Now that spot is much more pleasant. And to think it was on Providence Rd. I'm embarrassed to live in a city that leaves carcasses all over the place. We could do so much better.

Later,
Ken

[Buffalo Ken]

I'm glad "I" pulled it off the road....not "a". Oh well.

So calvino I was thinking perhaps your name means "calvin" & "no". If so, I agree. I can't stand the idea of "predestiny" as if it has all been planned in advance. Give me a break - there is no such thing as predestiny in "reality" that excludes imagination! If not, no harm between you and I.

Peace,
Ken

[Buffalo Ken]

I think Henry Blodgett (or whatever his name was) used to cover Fuel Cell Energy. If so, I wonder what he really knew versus what he said publically.

He seemed like a big-time bull-scheister (shitter) to me from the get go.

[Buffalo Ken]

By the way - last post for the day, but I took the dead cat to the dumpster. I didn't know where else to put it. It was double-bagged so I think it was safely disposed. As the boy scouts would say: Be prepared. As the unitarians would say: Have a big heart? Or maybe it is the universalists who would say that. I suspect so. Regardless, that dead cat is long gone.

[PLovering]

Quote from Nakedcapitalism:

"The real answer is to nationalize the Federal Reserve and allow the Treasury to print money without debt. You can't get out of debt by creating more of it. It is time to reclaim our right to create money. The Banks have abused their money creating monopoly beyond repair. The answer is the government reclaiming what is under law their responsibility ... the creation of money without interest. Without injection of debt free currency the whole economy comes screeching to a halt."

[don]

Thailand raised their interest rate today
to 3.50. Maybe the boys on the hill
could learn something from a 3rd world
country.................................
My vote Royal..not its all money...
Ask the guys on K-street....right Elaine..

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

Many Asian nations except for the very important exception of Japan, are raising their interest rates and reserve requirements.

[klintock]

"So anyone who wishes to know the truth, gets it. With cartoons!"

Hahahahha I love it!

Great as always, thank you!

Btw, if the bankers lose their grip on society(which they might) we'll actually get a second renaissance. :)

[ergo_sum]

This is a snow-job by the gov to boost the banks/market.

I bought puts on most financials today: fire-sale!

The bankers will never lose their grip on society: the people will just continue to
suffer.

The most important thing to note is that while the US wastes money it doesn't have on useless imperial wars, China is securing more and more resources in Africa. The CFR and Rockefeller cabal are LOSING to the Chinese and Russians.

I am not voting: it's pointless.

Finally, the FFR will eventually go up, but does it matter? Will anyone care anymore? If the FFR is 3% and inflation is 12%, does it mean anything?

Remember, the worst inflation occured even when FFR was double-digits during the 70's. We've a LONG way to go.

[Buffalo Ken]

Hey Elaine is this just like it was when all the boys were clamoring.....

Now all these boys are doing the same thing for my two sweet and lovely daughters....

imagine that....

one day, i would love to go to berlin, ny.

one day this may happen.

one day in my dreams....

[Buffalo Ken]

7 + 9 = 16.

Numbers especially for the supposed 33rd are very

very

tricky....

keep an eye out.

[Gary]

Happy Daze will be here again soon, muchachos !

I heard KIRO news yesterday reporting that the feds are thinking
of stimulating us yet again with another check. Ma and Pa Kettles
may take that RV out of the stable again if this happens and do
a cross town road trip to the nearest Resorts America "Preserve"
(they call their citified campgrounds "preserves" believe it or
not !)

As a sign of desperation on my part, about the only thing I can be happy about economically is my smugness about having been
suspicious of all the bandwagon rah-rah news since the reign of Saint Reagan and his son, Pope Greenspan.

What I want to know is where they buried Saint Milton Friedman of the fabled Chicago School of Economic Despots and Fundamentalists.
I'd like to go to the liquor store, buy a good bottle of 25yr Jamesons and let him have a little after passing it through my kidneys.

[Bear of Little Brain]

Correct me if I'm wrong:

My premise is that the US is no longer capable of paying off its debt. OK:

The US debt is too great to ever be paid off, unless it is with an ever-increasing rate of increasingly worthless dollars, or just plain defaulted on.

The first option requires an inflationary policy and a devaluing currency. This also makes savings pointless, but hard assets attractive. People will become poorer but, with luck, they continue to see bigger pay cheques, even though it buys less. If all goes well, the foreigners are never quite frightened enough to pull out of the dollar, and the peasants are never quite impoverished so quickly that they rebel. Finally, come one glorious dawn, the country has become poor enough to compete with the Asians, who have been becoming wealthier in the meantime. Things stop getting worse.

The default option has a certain "F*** you, and what are you going to do about it?" quality, that I find attractive in a nihilistic, we-paid-for-these-nukes-now-you'll-see-why kind of way, but I doubt if the Rothschilds would approve of that one.

So what of Elaine's higher interest rates? They would strengthen the dollar, making the debt even more difficult to ever pay down but, perversely, more attractive to own (being defined in appreciating dollars). Unfortunately, the other likely outcome is an all-out collapse of the hollowed-out US economy, which would at least have the positive effect of reducing or even putting a stop to the rate of increase in the national debt; a debt which is now even more difficult to pay down, because of the economic depression. Saving would indeed become attractive, but only the rich will have the excess cash to save. Everyone else will be in the soup queue. Social unrest will be almost certain. (Ironically, the way out of this will be massive government deficit spending, thus rendering all the previous suffering pointless, since we're back to the inflate-our-way-out-of-it option.)

The inflate-and-hope-we-don't-overdo-it option looks like the least bad to me. It's way too late for higher interest rates. The Rubicon was crossed some time ago. It really is "Full steam ahead, and damn the torpedoes".

If there is any consolation in this for Americans, it is that the UK is likely to be in a worse state, unless that nice M. Sarkozy and all his Anglophile friends welcome us into the bosom of the USSE. I'm sure they love us really. They just like to tease.

[Buffalo Ken]

i play mean....texas mean

i will take a special instrument....

i will use said instrument to tear into U....

the instrument will be born of recourse from that...

of which you your lonely unitary self do. How Ironic is that.....

the instrument will disembowel...what other way is there for there to be remedy...

I'm not sure, but what the heck, why not, i'll post this...i will...

[Paul S]

Phil Gramm. Just what the world needs: another slimy Texan who wants to get rich under the disguise of public service. Gramm points to a key problem to solve corruption in DC. These politicians do NOT go away after they leave office. They take their inside connections and get rich working in the private sector.

[Bear of Little Brain]

Hmm…

' The Rubicon was crossed some time ago. It really is "Full steam ahead, and damn the torpedoes".'

Nasty mixing of metaphors there.

Should read:

"Full Rubicon ahead, steam the torpedoes." That's better.

[Bear of Little Brain]

"Full Rubicon ahead. Steam the damned torpedoes".

By George, I've got it!

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

The Rain In Spain Falls Mainly In The Rubicon!

Sing the song together!

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

About evading the destruction of savings: we try and try and we must outwit these guys. Simple interest rate hikes are the best tool they can use to kill gold and they will use this even if only for a few months, long enough to do the total destruction.

Look at how oil falls a mere 9 dollars and the stock market shoots to the moon! There is a sloshing tub full of inflation dollars seeking desperately to make more than the inflation rate.

So the guys conspiring to run things into the ground look at this and say, 'Hmmm....we have lots of room left.' And they will continue this see-saw game.

Sawing things means you go back and forth, cutting deeper and deeper.

[Buffalo Ken]

Yeah, but there are other realities out there and they are rapidly coming to the forefront....they are undeniable...they stem from deep origins...

they stem from the mother herself and she has had enough....or so it seems to a little me looking in upon from the outside...

Peace,
Ken

[Bear of Little Brain]

Elaine:

Why do you think they want to kill gold?

What if "they" have been accumulating gold? Who bought all the gold the central banks have been selling off for so long? All the Central Bank gold, "leased" but sold into the market, perhaps never to be returned? What if "they" intend to destroy their own creations - the fiat currencies and replace them with a gold-backed currency system again?

A dynasty doesn't think in years, but decades, and centuries.

Now, where'd I put the tin foil?

[Buffalo Ken]

But, I don't think they want us to go away...they know how much we can contribute....

they know that our brains are amazing....

we have much to offer if we can only sense how to fit in...

Really - I think humanity is amazing and we are all about life to the extreme...life needs us and vice versa...don't

U

think

?

[Buffalo Ken]

gold, platinum, silver, etc....

there is a reason why they are in the chart the way they are....

but even so, we don't really need em...

but silver has so much going for it....in my opinion....

[Buffalo Ken]

One time a roman general went too far into germany...this general learned a hard lesson...a lesson apparently not properly learned...well time is of the essence...and some lessons are eternal...

[Bear of Little Brain]

Nicely spotted on the "By George…", my fair lady. ;-)

[Buffalo Ken]

good-bye, good-night, and if I knew how to say it in arabic I would....i wish we were totally out of the middle east...why, why, why.....

why is the us of a a broke and borken country hanging aroudn where no-one wants us. Why? What and who are we trying to hold onto. It is a foolish dream and now we need to all let go. It is time to let go of ego. Let go and all will be well.

Let go and we might have some peace.

There is plenty to go around. Plenty for all of us smart human beings who in just one generation can make a huge difference. You know. Do you know what I mean?

Peace is what I mean and peace is what we need.

Peace,
Ken

[yo yo]

The arabs and russians are buying up gold deposits globally.

China is the world's largest gold miner in the world.

This isn't a coincidence...

[PLovering]

Bear of Little Brains has it right.

Central bankers own 2/3 of the world's gold.

Quoting from Protocol #20:

"The gold standard has been the ruin of States which adopted it, for it has not been able to satisfy the demands for money, the more so as we have removed gold from circulation as far as possible."

[calvino]

Unwind the long chf position to take profits, or stay in the trade to chance more on the overnight. Be careful the witching hour when Europe opens.

[Carli]

Ralph, read about the coming Hyperinflation here: http://www.shadowstats.com/article/292

Calvino, read about he tax cheats here:
http://www.abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=5378080&page=1

The chances that some insignificant clerk in LGT could do this kind of damage is highly unlikely, for two reasons, 1.) the bank is owned by a member of the European elite, and 2.) the affected parties are members of both the European and American elite.

Looks like someone is sending a very serious message to both sides of the Atlantic. A message that spells, "We know where you live."

Enjoy it. If the lot of you feel that the elite in your neck of the woods keep screwing you, and that they stand in the way of change then take heart with this one simple thought, "The enemy of my enemy is my friend."

Peace.

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

About gold: the confusion over central banks holding for nations compared to a host of individuals is easy to get mixed up. India: has lots of small people frantically buying gold. Ditto, Vietnam. China also has lots of both little people and the government buying or making gold.

China has ALWAYS been very pro-gold going back many centuries to ancient Rome. Rome sent little to China but gold. China sent silk, fine pottery, fine wares of various sorts. It was very much one-way trade. When England came blasting in during the 18th century, the Chinese said, 'You may buy from us but we want no barbarian goods.' One way trade.

The US used to be pro-gold because we produced gold. Today, it is strictly for the masses, the masters are ignoring gold. Note that they went into the opium business again in Afghanistan and then there is the cocaine business: better than gold, far better.

Figuring out their secret plans is very difficult. But I would suggest that simple gold holding is not a major factor IN THE WEST. But it is, IN THE EAST. Serious weird problems will stem from this. Very curious problems.

[Anthony]

I wonder how much money they spend pumping up the market today. That was pretty impressive actually, DOW/oil.

But I don't think they can afford doing it again, since market sense they are handing out money and will suck it dry.

btw, anybody know what is the hurricane prediction for the gulf this season?

[Richard]

Elaine, thanks for the F. William Engdahl article.

A systemic risk event is indeed coming soon.

Bible prophecy foretells of such a thing in Revelation Chapter 13, Verses 1 through 4.

The ten horns are the ten regions of global governance; and the seven heads are mankind’s seven institutions:
1)Education,
2)Finance, Commerce and Trade,
3)Body Politic
4)Military
5)Religion
6)Media
7)Science & Technology

The head of finance commerce and trade is going to experience a mortal wound -- a fatal blow -- a massive systemic risk event -- a global financial meltdown -- a world wide stock market crash, yet it will somehow recover. And as God's word relates the people will "marvel and follow after the beast".

[A peace lover]

Lehman recently got rid of its glamorous lawyer, Alpha female and short lived CFO Ms. Erin Callan for doing such a piss poor job, horror of horrors Credit Suisse today announced that Erin Callan will be joining the Bank as a Managing Director and Head of its Global Hedge Fund Business. In this newly created position, Ms. Callan will join the Investment Bank Management Committee and the Global Client Steering Committee. Her appointment is effective September 2, 2008 and she will be based in New York.

[GK]

Hi Elaine, have you seen the plight of your NYC blogger compatriots? HAHAHA!

Imagine if they had blogs back when you were there in the 1970's!!!

http://www.r8ny.com/

"DO NOT DISCLOSE THE EXISTENCE OF THIS REQUEST.

The subpoena came in the mail in January from Bronx District Attorney Robert Johnson. It demanded information about one of the bloggers and a dozen commenters on Room Eight, a group political blog where political insiders and junkies from all over the city write about - and often criticize - the city's politicians."

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

I heard of that business. Back when I was a mover and shaker in NYC, my favorite function was to collect gossip. I knew who was sleeping with whom or what. Lots of sex gossip. My friends were mostly gay people in the arts, ballet, etc. And fashion models and female opera singers, etc.

They were all 'goddesses' so to speak. They got all the front row seat sex gossip. We used this information as well as information from angry spouses. There are lots of angry spouses.

But publish this? Heaven forbid. Then, it is out in the open and useless. Ahem. We used it to twist arms to make people do good things for the Community. This included getting them to be honest about gays and to stop persecuting gays.

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

The hypocritical behavior towards gays by closeted males and females was something that particularly irked me. For example, Mayor Ed Koch was gay. One of the earliest women to run the City Council was a lesbian. Our Congressman in Brooklyn was gay.

Yet they all persecuted gays! Refused to meet with the gay political community that was openly gay! They refused to fight AIDs! I knew the very first AIDs victims who were ballet dancers with the Joffery Ballet.

Very sad, so very sad.

Well, we 'outed' them one by one. It had to be done. The GOP is full of closet gays who to this day, refuse to fight for the civil rights of gays and indeed, fight AGAINST it for demented reasons. I suspect, they enjoy being in the dark dank closet.

GRRR.

[GK]

I have been thinking about how people harness this enormous primeval force.

When I was young, I read this book:

Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill
http://tinyurl.com/6omfd2

It basically taught you to harness your sexual energy to imagine your future and make lots of money. It works. Scary.

Then I studied and tried the philosophy of the church to harness it for creating life and that worked very well indeed.

Here is the Pope reinforcing that.

http://larvatusprodeo.net/2008/07/14/world-youth-day-08/

“There is a crisis in the Western world. No Western country is producing enough babies to keep the population stable, no Western country,” he said.

The I was studying the history of Satanism, not with any interest whatsoever in trying it (!), but in attempting to understand the threat matrix.

It seems to involve slowing redirecting that energy at doing evil and eventually violence. That must be frighteningly powerful.

http://www.rense.com/general61/satanism.htm

"Crime is no longer motivated by the impulse to employ cruel means for personal gain. Instead, the pleasure of the sense of power realized in employing viciously cruel means, becomes an end in itself. This form of criminal pleasure becomes a blend of rage and sexuality. Jaded appetites create the mental state in that man, that he must do something more monstrous than he has done before, to realize the desired level of orgiastic pleasure from the evil deed. Evil for the purpose of doing evil, has become for him, a goal in and of itself. This man has become a beast, a virtual Satanist."

Finally, it seems as though in homosexuality, since it is not used for money or violence, it is simply directed into pleasure.

It seems like there is a similar decision a nation must face on how to direct their combined energy.

Towards making money, making families, making violence or making pleasure.

Here are some stabs at the dark at our national priorities by decade.

1940: Violence, Family, Money, Pleasure
1950: Family, Money, Pleasure, Violence
1960: Pleasure, Violence, Money, Family
1970: Money, Pleasure, Violence, Family
1980: Money, Pleasure, Family, Violence
1990: Money, Pleasure, Family, Violence
2000: Violence, Money, Pleasure, Family
2010: ???

[JSmith]

"'I had assumed that the race would be called off. That would have been normal.'"

How very German of him: always waiting for orders from someone else.

'Normal' (for me) is saying, "Guys, this situation is deteriorating rapidly. Forget the damn race - I'm getting out of here."

[RobG]

Go figure, a former wrestler and Gov of Minnesota can figure it out (link):

The former Minnesota Governor identified two key factors behind dollar devaluation - the war in Iraq and the ballooning national debt.

“It’s the exact two things that I’ve been harping on for the last 2 months and a half….we must do something about the $9 trillion dollars plus of debt we owe throughout the world,” said Ventura, adding that most people in America were unconcerned about the greenback’s spectacular plummet.

[Bear of Little Brain]

Off topic, but George Ure just put up this scary link on mortgage foreclosures. I hope it's a false rumour; if not, it looks like da Boyz is playin' rough:

http://www.puredoxyk.com/index.php/2008/07/16/black-monday-2008-foreclosure-apocalypse/

or

http://tinyurl.com/57qplu

[Elaine Meinel Supkis]

Yes, Bear of Little Brain, I went to it. If true, it is pure blackmail.

[Paul S]

J Edgar Hoover. Hoover persecuted gays, although Hoover was a cross-dressing gay himself. Of course, the reason Hoover denied there was Organized Crime for so many years is because the Mob had incriminating info on Hoover. The Nazis also had a strong gay presence, such as Ernst Roehm. But there were others. The Nazis persecuted gays as well.