Ron Paul on Glenn Beck, via Lew Rockwell:
“I think that there will be violence,” he explained. “I hope we don’t have to go through, you know, a very violent period of time, but that’s what happens too often when the government runs out of money and runs out of wealth, the people argue over, you know, a shrinking pie and, of course, the people who have to produce are sick and tired of producing.”
I expanded an earlier post into a diatribe:
That’s it folks. Wrap it up. This here recession…er.. correction…er.. depress…oh, whatever..is over. Time to put away your pens and papers, boys and girls.
Professor Bernanke says there’s going to be no test. You hear that? Or maybe, there’ll be one little teeny-weeny take-home. Better yet, you just get to write in and ask for whatever grade you want.
Billy Gross, Bobby Rubin, and Jamie Dimon, you boys get A’s, as usual.
(The rest of you clods better learn to to suck up if you want A’s).
Everyone else gets B’s….
No one fails. Ain’t life great?
Whew. That depression stuff was so, well, depressing. Glad it’s over.
There. That wasn’t so bad, after all, was it, seeing as how it was supposed to be the worst one in half-a-century and the sky was falling and we were all going to live in the Ozarks or Patagonia on canned peas and raw mackerel until we got raptured up… and really all that happened was some green paper got printed and we had to listen to a lot of speeches about schools an’ stuff in Barackistani (not as weird a lingo as Bushlish, but just as daft) and then, bingo, everything’s back to normal again.
Yessir. The economy is healthy. Grade A, certified organic, flu-vaccinated healthy. A bit weak. But wholesome. Except for jobs, that is. No jobs.
What kind of recovery is that, you ask?
What kind? It’s the new deadbeat, can’t-get-a job, rocketing-inflation, trashed-currency, can’t-sell-my-house, can’t-make-my-payments, bankrupt-mafia-government, kazillions-in-debt, trade-warring-with-China recovery – that’s what it is. Glad you asked.
It’s kind of a new thing. No one’s really tried it so far, but they’re doing it in Europe, we hear. And maybe a bit of it in Asia. But it’s back here in the US of A that we’ve got the whole thing down. Right here in Washington. And from now until the economy gets really going, we’ll be getting the full Bernanke on it – at least, that’s the buzz.
Yep. Professor Ben’s all but promised us he’s going to be inflating grades all around this time.
No F’s. No D’s. Heck, no C’s. It’s A’s and B’s all the way. That’s the way they do it in Princeton. It’s a self-esteem thing.
Like that pep talk back on March 16, when Ben first spotted those green shoots. Now it’s September15 (exactly six months later), and Ben says the recession is over.
He says it’s all in the numbers from the National Bureau of Economic Research. The numbers say the recession ended this summer or fall. Man, the things they can predict these days.
Ole Ground Hog Ben. Puts his head out and the sun comes up. Amazing. Who knew you could even keep score of an economy?
Kind of like a lacrosse game at Princeton. Swat. Swat. Swat Take that, Harvard.
Of course, being a Princeton professor and religious and a pretty nice guy from all we’ve heard, Ben couldn’t bring himself to tell an outright whopper. He let the truth out dribble-drabble at the end.
Something about “impaired credit”…. and “head winds”…. and “digging out from personal debt”…. and “ongoing adjustments”….. and “unwinding massive stimulus efforts”…. and “risking igniting inflation”…. and “lingering high unemployment”…. and “sluggish outlook”…. and “higher gas prices” and…. “consumer reluctance”…. and “widespread job insecurity”…. and “significantly impaired credit”…. and “less lending”…. and “higher costs”…. and “deep freeze in credit”…. and “fearing defaults.”
But they put that way down in the report, after paragraph 5 (“Bernanke: Recession is Over,” Kansas City Star, Sept 15, 2009).
Before that, they just had him muttering something about the economy “underperforming”. ‘ Yeah, underperforming. Like the old geezer just needs a shot of Viagra.
But don’t let any of that bad stuff worry your little head, ’cause you know, the numbers say we’re okay. The numbers say the recession…er correction..er depress…oh, whatever…is over.
And numbers don’t lie, you know.
Like August retail sales. That went up by 2.7% over July. (I know, I know, cash-for-clunkers, high gas prices, blah blah blah. Gimme a break. It was still up wasn’t it?)
And the ISM numbers are good too.
August PMI (Purchasing Manufacturers Index) came in at at 52.9, 4 percent points higher than July.
(A number over 50 indicates an expanding economy. Below 50 is a contracting economy. This is the first time since June 2007 that the number’s been over 50).
Oh you don’t say!
And New Orders came in at the highest reading since December 2004. You know what that means. Businesses are stocking up. GDP is on it’s way up.
. Ride that gravy train.Ka-ching! Bada boom!
Hold just a moment though.
What’s this Non-Manufacturing Index stuff here?
Oh, you mean those bozos in medicine and law and teaching and real estate and construction and finance and retail?
Yeah, consumers. You know, guys who consume stuff. That stuff the manufacturing guys are producing. Seems like they still aren’t doing so good. So who’s going to buy all the stuff?
Not consumers. They’re cutting back.
You don’t know? That’s what comes of being a grade-inflated B student.
I bet Bob Rubin knows. And Jamie Dimon. And Bill Gross. And Warren Buffett.
And all their hedge-fund managing, private-equity-directing, leveraged-buying-out, sovereign-wealthy speculator buddies lining up to start the casino all over again.
They know whose money they’re using to do it too.
Note:
The indicators that are looking positive (ISM number, retails sales, the price of copper) are all numbers that could reflect no more than
1. The business cycle restocking of inventories 2. Cash for clunkers 3. The beginning of the school year 4. State purchases/investments being made by China in an effort to get rid of dollars
Portfolio.com has a neat interactive feature, “The Green Miles,” by Jocelyn Hanamirian,that shows you what the government’s debt would look like if it were stretched bill by bill across the solar system.
The Bear Stearns buy-out, at $29 billion, for example, takes us just past the moon.
The 2009 federal budget deficit, at $1.2 trillion, takes us past the sun.
In the news, on September 7, Bloomberg reports that the UN wants a new global currency, ostensibly to protect emerging markets:
“UN countries should agree on the creation of a global reserve bank to issue the currency and to monitor the national exchange rates of its members, the Geneva-based UN Conference on Trade and Development said today in a report.
China, India, Brazil and Russia this year called for a replacement to the dollar as the main reserve currency after the financial crisis sparked by the collapse of the U.S. mortgage market led to the worst global recession since World War II. China, the world’s largest holder of dollar reserves, said a supranational currency such as the International Monetary Fund’s special drawing rights, or SDRs, may add stability. “
My Comment
(coming up)
In the news, gold failed to find a foot-hold above $1000, despite a weakening dollar. A better-than-expected jobs report probably had something to do with that.
From Market Watch via Goldseek:
“Gold futures fell Thursday for a second session, continuing to pull back from the $1,000-an-ounce level as a slightly better than expected U.S. weekly jobless data reduced the metal’s safe-haven appeal.
The number of people filing for initial unemployment benefits fell to a seasonally adjusted 550,000 last week. Economists surveyed by MarketWatch expected claims to stand at 558,000.”
How about a little less grilling of Sarah Palin and a little more of Hank Paulson? Notice how much Paulson stammers..
Here’s a zinger that might explain gold’s sudden spike since yesterday:
“Some of the State Owned Enterprises that stated their potential intentions to default were Air China. China Eastern and Cosco. Mainly in part because they took major derivatives losses over the past year but also, concerns are arising that the derivatives that they were sold by these foreign institutions are garbage, underwater and may never see the light of day. So why continue to pay for them? So the concern in the financial world is that holders of these losing products may just walk away, not unlike a home owner with a $600,000 mortgage on a home valued at $475,000 deciding to just hand in their keys. However, read on…this has nothing to do with morgtgage backed products. This time, the concern may be over Oil.
They (Reuters) cited 6 foreign banks. Where the story gets really intriguing is that among the major derivatives providers according to Reuters but also widely known in the industry, are Goldman Sachs, UBS and JP Morgan.
Here is the looming problem. These products are worth billions. One report that a good friend of mine did showed that if Goldman Sachs for example were to take this one up the rear, they could stand to lose 15 billion dollars. (This number is by no means confirmed)……. I would imagine that China, being the biggest purchaser of US debt, could surely collapse the US institutions that were at one point deemed too big to fail if they decide to go ahead with this plan.
This is why I don’t take tonight’s news that China purchased 50 billion dollars of IMF bonds lightly. In fact, I take it very seriously. This is why I take the buzz on the floor over the past two days very seriously as well as I do the incredible spike in Gold today. Most importantly, I do not take lightly the recent 25% correction we have seen in the Chinese Stock Market. Can all these events be interconnected some how? Is the Chinese stock collapse giving us a hint?”
From Sainath at Counterpunch, an analysis of MPs (Members of Parliament) in the Lok Sabha (the lower house, or House of Commons, as opposed to the Rajya Sabha or House of Lords) in India:
“NEW is a coalition of over 1200 civil society groups working across the country. Their “Analysis of MPs of the 15th Lok Sabha (2009)” makes great reading and is the product of fine research and much hard work.
There were 3,437 candidates in the polls with assets of less than Rs. 1 million, says the report. Of these, just 15 (0.44 per cent) made it past the post. But your chances soar with your assets. Of 1,785 candidates in the Rs. 1 million to Rs. 5 million group, 116 (6 per cent) won. This win-ratio goes up to 19 per cent of candidates for the Rs.5 million to Rs.50 million segment. And of 322 candidates in the Rs.50 million plus or platinum tier, 106 (33 per cent) romped home.
The higher you climb the ladder of lucre, the better your chances. That’s obvious. But what’s striking is how bleak things are for non-millionaires. Even a modest improvement in your wealth helps. Say, you move from the below Rs. 1 million group to the Rs. 1-5 million group — your chances immediately improve at a higher rate than your wealth. (Of course that works only if you are already close to the Rs. 1 million mark.) So it’s not just that wealth has some impact on election outcomes — it influences them heavily and disproportionately as you go up the scale.
All of a piece with a society that only last year had 53 dollar billionaires (pre-meltdown), one that still has 836 million human beings who “get by” on less than Rs. 20 a day and which ranks 66th amongst 88 nations on the Global Hunger Index (just one notch above Zimbabwe). India has plummeted to rank 132 in the United Nations Human Development Index (one slot below Bhutan) as our billionaire count has risen. That wallows below Bolivia, Botswana, the Republic of the Congo and the Occupied Territories of Palestine in the HDI rankings. And never mind being worth billions – 60 per cent of adult rural Indians simply do not have bank accounts….”