Is the dollar terminal?

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 13th, 2010, 11:27 am

Bank Failure #146: Copper Star Bank, Scottsdale, AZ
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

....the march continues....

Unofficial Problem Bank list increases to 898 Institutions

Despite failures, the Unofficial Problem Bank List continued its rise to the 900 level. This week the list count finished at 898 after six additions and two removals. Assets total $418.5 billion, up from $416.5 billion last week.

After three down trending weeks in October, some readers wondered if the list had peaked. After this pause, the Unofficial Problem Bank List has added a net 27 institutions and $16.4 billion of assets since October 22nd.

Removals are two of this week’s failures -- Darby Bank & Trust Co., Vidalia, GA ($690 million) and Copper Star Bank, Scottsdale, AZ ($204 million).

Additions include Atlantic Coast Bank, Waycross, GA ($901 million Ticker: ACFC); The Leaders Bank, Oak Brook, IL ($659 million); NewDominion Bank, Charlotte, NC ($535 million); Middlesex Federal Savings, F.A., Somerville, MA ($389 million); Community Bank of Oak Park River Forest, Oak Park, IL ($364 million); and First Federal Savings and Loan Association of Pekin, Pekin, IL ($28 million).

We applaud the Illinois State Banking Department for the timely disclosure of its enforcement actions. Next week, we anticipate the OCC will release its actions for October, which will likely push the list count over 900.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

sbsion · Post by **sbsion** » November 13th, 2010, 11:30 am

can't wait until "Zions" bank has it's day

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 13th, 2010, 12:44 pm

sbsion wrote:can't wait until "Zions" bank has it's day

LOL....had a non-member friend that resides in gated community up in Park City (upper half of that area) who had invested a bit with Zions thinking that the church would bail them out.

They made a ton of crappy housing & CRE investments throughout Nevada, Arizona, Utah bubble areas.....

Teacher Pensions: $500 Billion Shortfall and Growing
http://news.yahoo.com/s/time/20101112/u ... hlcnBlbnNp

Dear Senator/Representative part 2
http://www.angrybearblog.com/2010/11/re ... ry+Bear%29

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 14th, 2010, 7:33 pm

Interactive Map of Global Debt
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

....more bits of truth. They make China look great but China is one massive fraud that can only be successfully perpetrated by cooperative involvement of all the other global partners. For example allowing them to peg their currency to the US dollar (world's reserve currency) thus gaining a competitive advantage no one can beat....and that can only be accomplished by the willing participation in the scam of all the world's leaders. (Secret global combination)

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 15th, 2010, 10:14 am

Federal Reserve Bank of New York Shadow Banking System Research Report
http://info.publicintelligence.net/ShadowBanking.pdf

In the wake of S.510 Fake food safety….it won’t be a matter of what’s for dinner….but will we have dinner?

No country in the history of the world has survived for long without a strong and independent agricultural sector. Take that away, and the fall of the country soon follows. No nation that cannot, or will not, feed its own people, ever survives. Independent agriculture is and always has been the backbone and the underlying support for economic stability and security. It is this support and security that S.510 seeks to destroy.

S.510 is not about food safety; it is however the last lynchpin in the seizure of food production and supply that was begun under Bush the Lesser. Control the food; control the people.

This same model envisioned in S.510 was used in recent years in Poland. An estimated 60% of Polish farms are now gone. In India, more than 8 million farmers have left their farms as a result of similar systems implemented by the World Trade Organization on behalf of bio-pirates of all kinds. Here in the US an estimated 1/3 of all farms that existed in 2000, have now vanished. We are, according to farmaid.org , losing 3-500 farms and ranches every week as the industrialized corporate machine being driven by congress and its agencies rolls across our land. Food safety never was the issue. Food as a Weapon is another story.

http://ppjg.wordpress.com/2010/11/14/in ... more-13536

Land Becomes Cash Crop in Farm Belt
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 69184.html

....consolidation into the corporate structure!

American Hypocrisy: Destruction of the Constitution, Collapse of the Rule of Law
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=21922

Misc: NY Manufacturing conditions "deteriorate", Business Inventories Increase
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Retail Sales Ex-Autos In Line With Expectations, As Empire Index Plunges: New Orders Drop Largest Since September 2001
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/retail ... st-septemb

The Empire State Manufacturing Index just produced a major league miss, crashing from its prior level of 15.73 all the way down to -11.1 when the consensus was +15! My oh my, the disconnect between reality and fantasy has never been larger. That’s the first negative print in that index in well over a year. Here’s Econoday:

Highlights
Empire State data for November are surprisingly weak showing a major month-to-month decline in new orders, at minus 24.38, together with an equally major decline for unfilled orders, at minus 24.68. Contraction in unfilled orders has been ongoing since April, keeping a lid on production needs. Shipments a very steep 25 points to minus 6.13 in the month, the workweek fell to minus 12.99 with delivery times, at minus 9.09, improving for a fifth month in a row.

The employment index continues to show strength, at plus 9.09, as do readings on the six-month outlook. But as an indication for November's manufacturing data on the national level, this report points to trouble. Watch for trouble in Thursday's Philadelphia Fed report, a report that has been trending significantly lower than Empire State.

Those are some hugely negative moves. So new orders are way down yet employment is up over the same time period? What does that tell you about margins? Yet more evidence of businesses who were led astray, and whose margins are getting crushed with QE2 rescue. Good luck.

Speaking of fantasy, the Retail Sales Report came out at positive 1.2% growth month over month, and at .4% year over year. This report is riddled with error and I can guarantee you that the real year over year figure is substantially negative. This is due to substitution bias as this report fails to account for stores that close, and also due to the falling purchasing power of the dollar as sales are measured in dollars. Still, the consensus for this drivel was .7%, here’s Econoday:

Highlights
The consumer sector continued to strengthen in October with sales topping expectations. Overall retail sales in October jumped 1.2 percent after gaining 0.7 percent in September. The latest number sharply topped analysts' projection for a 0.7 percent increase. Excluding autos, sales posted a more moderate but still healthy 0.4 percent increase, following a 0.5 percent advance in September and coming in a little higher than the median market forecast for a 0.4 percent boost. Sales excluding autos and gasoline increased 0.4 percent, matching the increase in September.

The good news is that the consumer sector is continuing to prop up the recovery-maybe even given it a modest strengthening. October gains were mixed but notably more on the positive side. Motor vehicles & parts led the way, jumping 5.0 percent. And apparently, even though housing is sluggish, households are fixing up homes as building materials & garden equipment posted a 1.9 percent boost. Gains were also seen in food & beverage, gasoline stations, clothing, sporting goods & hobby, general merchandise, nonstore retailers, and food services & drinking places.

Furniture dipped but after several strong gains. Declines were also seen in electronics (likely price cutting), health & personal care stores, and in miscellaneous store retailers.

Equity futures eased slightly but on a much weaker than expected Empire State manufacturing number released at the same time.

Business Inventories are released at 10 Eastern. This week is fairly busy for economic reports, but nothing that’s so important that it will freeze the markets. Friday is options expiration and there are no reports that day.

I have to report on the following bizarre incident in Kansas City where police shot at a passing by van that backfired thinking they were being fired upon (ht Ron):

Backfires from broken-down van draw bullets from KC police

Phillip Ransom thought he had trouble Thursday night when his old van broke down on the side of the road, booming out backfires.

But that was when his troubles really began.

Two Kansas City police officers, mistaking the van’s backfires for gunshots, began firing at it.
It was a terrifying moment for the Kansas City man, who was unarmed and said he did not own a gun.
“I’m just an ordinary guy,” he said. “I go to work every day.”

Fortunately he was not hit. At least three bullets hit the van. Ransom said he did not know how many shots were fired.

“I wasn’t counting,” he said. “But it sounded like a lot.”

A department spokesman confirmed that Ransom was unarmed and said the officers have been placed on administrative leave while the incident is investigated.

The incident occurred just before 6 p.m. Thursday on Gregory Boulevard near Interstate 435. Ransom, who owns a janitorial service, said he was on his way home from work.

Besides the damage to Ransom’s van, windows of the patrol car were also shot out — apparently by the officers as they got out of the patrol car.

Police and media reports initially described the incident as the police car being hit by a bullet fired from a suspect in the van.

Why do I think this idiocy is important? I think it shows just how jumpy the population is, there is tension in the air. That tension was also very evident in the reaction to the “missile” contrail last week. Who else has an itchy trigger finger? My point here is that the spring seems to be wound tight, a triggering event could occur at any time, and the equity markets are grossly overvalued.

And the bad math of debt has certainly produced massive tension around the globe. I could cite article after article as evidence of that, but there’s so much of it, I can’t possibly discuss it all. In flying circles when talking about safety we talk about the Swiss cheese analogy. If your slices of Swiss cheese have a lot of holes, then sooner or later as you stack the layers of cheese those holes will eventually align and cause an accident. If, however, you are operating in the center of the envelope and trapping errors, then you lessen the number of holes and thus decrease the odds of the holes aligning into an accident. It would seem to me to be impossible to keep an economic and market accident at bay as the number of holes I see is staggering.

There are reports out that the Obama Administration may be working with the banksters to cover up the foreclosuregate FRAUD by retroactively sanctioning the fraudulent activity of MERS (Are Obama and Congress Set To Screw American Counties, Homeowners and Give Wall Street Mortgage Banksters a Retroactive Immunity Bailout?). This, in my opinion, would make the Administration accessories to the crime and frankly traitors to their own country. They better not. And the people need to get active NOW to prevent this from being the biggest cover-up in history.

The jump in the ten year Treasury rates this morning is very large, about .15%! Rate moves like that in one day may scare people out of debt instruments. That can have very distortive effects in other asset classes as money moves around the globe, and higher interest rates will not be a positive for the Fed who is trying to force rates down, nor for the economy that is saturated in debt. Housing recovery? Don’t bet your life on it.

The Yen is finally moving back down. That correlation is generally good for the Japanese, but it has not been so good for the equity markets as it forces our dollar up. The Euro is weak, and as far as I can see, it’s simply a race to see which countries implode first as every country who comprises the dollar basket is nothing but a basket case full of debt that can never possibly be serviced. The pretend part can and will only go so long.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... -1115.html

A Look From The Florida "Rocket-Docket" Frontlines: "One Foreclosure Every Two Minutes"
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/look-f ... to+zero%29

Since so many of you have asked: These funds are getting mangled on expectations of — All Aboard! Munis and California joining Ireland on the default train.
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2010/11/ca ... ellacking/

....very interesting that muni bonds cracked at the precise time that QE#2 was announced????

FDIC Bank Failures (chart)
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2010/11/fd ... ailures-9/

There are two reasons why their predictions are not coming through. First, the whole "inflationary" theme was dissolved even before last Thursday: an asset-for-asset swap like QE2 is, is by definition not inflationary. And investors may run with the expert pack for a while, but they're not all completely silly.

Second, Europe has seen Bernanke's latest act as the ultimate and final move -well, for the moment- from Washington to devalue the dollar; not the first or worst as some would have you think. Cue the stories about Ireland's demise, renewed Portuguese and Greek troubled waters, and France following Germany in its hard-line stance against further EU bail-outs.

The USD lost 15% of its value vs the euro over the summer, and while the highly export-dependent richer nations in Western Europe may have patiently waited for the US to lose its devaluation drive, their goals haven't changed a bit in the meantime. They may not aim for US dollar-euro parity, but a €1 to $1,10 exchange rate would suit them just fine.

And then it all becomes a question of power and control. In my view, the American financial press continues to assume far too easily that the US has the tightest grip on those. There are advantages to having so many foreigners use your currency for international transactions, but those show mostly in times of growth and prosperity. In times of contraction, significant disadvantages may appear.

It's all been pretty well scripted, wouldn't you agree? And as I was saying, I simply don't believe that the rest of the world sees a measure such as QE2 as a sign that the US can prolong its "beggar-thy-dollar" politics. I think it's widely perceived as a sign that the US has lost control of its currency policies, not gained more control. And that inevitably will lead to attempts, or even a concerted effort, by just about anyone but the US to revalue the dollar upward.

Even China may chime in, and even if that means, because of the peg, that the yuan will go up too. China's foreign reserves have lost a lot of value the past half year, and this might well be seen as a way to get some of it back. And then sell it off to the Fed in QE3.

This whole notion of devaluing the dollar (don't you just love the way Tim Geithner denies any such notion even exists in his neck of the woods) has many facets. Bring it down long enough, for instance, and the reserve currency status is at peril. Now you can ask ten economists what that would mean, and get eleven different answers, but one thing that's certain is that even simply questioning that status will lead to a huge surge in uncertainty.

The G-20 thingy in Seoul will, if you read through the official and subsequent media blah, serve to make one thing very clear. There is no possibility of any sort of any international agreement or even plan anymore. The knives are on the table, and they've been sharpened far too well to be put back into the respective pockets around the table. It's game-on time. And since there is no reason to believe that the US is stronger than all the rest of the world combined, there is a solid probability that the US dollar will increase in value, despite Q2, Q3, or Q826. A question of control.

Down the line all major currencies that exist in the world today will be toast, since they're all fiat, and they all represent economies about to implode inward on themselves. That does not, however, justify the claim that the US will fall vs the others while the process of implosion takes hold for real. Betting against the US dollar is a very risky wager from here on in, one that I for one won't take.

http://theautomaticearth.blogspot.com/2 ... -bets.html

A Closer Look at the Grocery Cart
http://www.ritholtz.com/blog/2010/11/a- ... cery-cart/

America's real mortgage rate
http://finance.fortune.cnn.com/2010/11/ ... gage-rate/

The NYT's Apocalypse: $1 Trillion a Year in Interest on the National Debt
http://seekingalpha.com/article/236642- ... ource=feed

EGYPT: Hepatitis C infection reaches alarming figures
http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/babylon ... gures.html

As We Have Clearly Anticipated Since Early 2010, Ireland is About to Go
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/we-hav ... d-about-go

Portugal Reminds World That It, Too, Is On The Bailout Wagon
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/portug ... lout-wagon

Sinister Sites: The Georgia Guidestones
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=5496

The NGO Army of George Soros & Maurice Strong
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... Itemid=122

Bush: “I’d have endorsed Obama if they’d asked me”
http://www.thenewamerican.com/index.php ... d-asked-me

How It All Began…On the Trail of the New American DrugLords
http://www.danielhopsicker.tv/2010/10/2 ... all-began/

Exclusive: Afghanistan - behind enemy lines
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 33667.html

....pay'n them lots of good money....good thing we are getting good bang for the buck!

Cocaine, the perfect drug for a brittle and anxious Britain
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree ... or-britain

NIA President: Beware of Massive Food Inflation (courtesy of Fox Business News)
http://video.foxbusiness.com/v/4416855/ ... t_id=87185

....let's dive into the NIA for a moment since they are getting all this Prime Time AND Alternative media coverage (very interesting isn't it)...this 2nd video has a clip from an older episode of Fox Business News (obviously times have changed)....

warning....ends on very poor vernacular (f-bomb)

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 15th, 2010, 2:26 pm

Revealed: Texas officials covered up dangerously radioactive tap water for years
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/texa ... ests-find/

CDC and ADA Now Advise to Avoid Using Fluoride
http://articles.mercola.com/sites/artic ... oride.aspx

North American Union – “U.S. Super Spy Center” Uncovered in Mexico
http://deadlinelive.info/2010/11/15/nor ... in-mexico/

Making Ads That Whisper to the Brain
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/14/busin ... tream.html

If you want to know what happens when the IMF come in, look at the Baltic Tiger...
http://www.tribune.ie/article/2010/nov/ ... -imf-come/

Environmental disaster hits eastern Syria
http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6AE2BT20101115

The Revolt Against Naked Body Scanners And Enhanced Pat-Downs Continues To Grow
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... es-to-grow

GE Plans to Create 1,000 Jobs in China
http://www.economyincrisis.org/content/ ... jobs-china

The Establishment Media Is Already Trying To Blame The Tea Party And Opponents Of The Federal Reserve For The Coming Economic Collapse
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archiv ... c-collapse

Mortgage-Bond Yields That Guide Home-Loan Rates Advance to Four-Month High
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-1 ... -high.html

Munis Continue Collapsing
http://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?singlepost=2264991

NY Fed Manufacturing Survey: New Orders Index Plummets 37 Points to -24.4, Sharpest Drop Since September 2001; Prices Received Negative
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

The 8-K that Google (GOOG) filed on Friday evening may not have been the last of the day — that honor belongs to tiny InoLife Technologies (INOL). But it was certainly one of the juicier filings in the Friday night dump.

That’s because in the filing, Google disclosed that four of its top executives — CFO Patrick Pichette, President of Global Sales Nikesh Arora, Senior VP for Engineering and Research Alan Eustace and Senior VP for Product Management Jonathan Rosenberg — were all getting hefty raises next year. The filing noted that the base salaries of each of the four men were $500K last year and would be raised to $650K in 2011. Google’s top three executives — CEO Eric Schmidt and Co-Founders Sergey Brin and and Larry Page will continue to make $1 a year next year.

Just last week, Google caused a bit of a stir when the WSJ broke this news that Google planned to give staffers a 10% raise, which seemed pretty generous, until you realize that these top four executives are getting 30% raises.

That wasn’t the only interesting thing in the 8-K. The filing also noted that target bonuses for top executives would be increasing from 150% of base pay to 250% of base pay. So between the higher pay and the higher bonus, that brings a maximum bonus of $750K up to $1.6 million.

But, wait…there’s more. The filing also noted that Messrs. Pichette and Arora would get $20 million each of Google shares under the company’s equity awards program. Eustace gets $10 million and Rosenberg gets $5 million.

Given this, 10% across-the-board raises doesn’t sound quite as generous. No wonder this 8-K was filed late on a Friday.

http://www.footnoted.com/my-big-fat-dea ... ted.com%29

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 15th, 2010, 4:53 pm

Ireland told: Take EU bailout or trigger crisis

Dublin warned it has 24 hours to make decision as EU emergency talks loom amid fears Irish banks' contagion may spread to other eurozone countries

An increasingly isolated Irish government was coming under mounting pressure tonight to seek a European or International Monetary Fund bailout within 24 hours amid fears that contagion from its crippled banking sector might spread through the weaker eurozone countries.

Portugal, Spain, the European Central Bank and opposition parties all urged Brian Cowen's coalition government to remove the threat of a second crisis in six months by putting a firewall between Ireland and its partners in the 16-nation single currency.

Noonan said a bailout could lead to Ireland being suspended from the bond markets for three or four years.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2010 ... ebt-crisis

Real IRA threatens to attack British bankers
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/ ... nkers.html

...sound familiar?

In 2000, Supreme Court Justice Ruth Ginsburg did something unprecedented. In her dissenting opinion in the Bush v. Gore case (which threw the election to Bush), Ginsburg ended her opinion with the words "I dissent". Believe it or not, this is a big deal. The standard etiquette for a judge - especially a supreme court justice - writing a dissenting opinion is to end with the phrase, "I respectfully dissent". By leaving out the word "respectfully", Ginsburg dropped normal judicial etiquette to protest an unconstitutional decision, more or less quietly declaring that a coup had occurred.

Supreme court justice Antonin Scalia said that he doesn't care what the legislature intended when it passes a law. This is contrary to hundreds of years of American law, as legislative intent is supposed to be examined whenever legislation is ambiguous, or does not appear to directly or adequately address a particular issue, or when there appears to have been a legislative drafting error.

Scalia also went duck-hunting with Dick Cheney, even though the judicial and executive branches are supposed to keep their distance as part of the separation of powers.

Scalia and fellow high court justice Clarence Thomas also went to a secretive Koch brothers political event, where high-level republican political operatives planned out their plan of attack.

Supreme court justice Samuel Alito is also fundraising for republicans, which appears to conflict with the Code of Conduct for United States Judges. (I'm not picking on Republicans, as I think both parties currently serve the powers-that-be. These were just the most readily available examples of political shenanigans by supreme court justices).

And there are many judicial decisions which have sided with the powers-that-be at the expense of the little guy.

The Supreme Court's ruling in Citizens United means that - under the guise of "free speech" - big corporations and wealthy individuals can basically buy politicians as well as judges. Similarly, the Florida Court of Appeals agreed with an assertion by FOX News that there is no rule against distorting or falsifying the news in the United States. And political candidates are largely free to lie during their campaigns. See this and this.

And "rocket docket" judges are trampling on homeowners' legal rights:

http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2010/11/ ... to-be.html

Just When You Thought You Knew Something About Mortgage Securitizations
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/just-w ... itizations

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 16th, 2010, 10:13 am

9/11 Heroin Pilot's 10-Year Crime Spree Ends
http://www.madcowprod.com/11162010.htm

Prophetic Art in Bank of America
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... Itemid=119

Contagion hits Portugal as Ireland dithers on rescue
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/econ ... escue.html

Euro under siege after Portugal hits panic button
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldne ... utton.html

EU President Admits That Europe Is Fighting For Survival, Invokes M.A.D. Card
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/eu-pre ... s-mad-card

Major spy scandal as five Scandinavian governments catch the U.S. watching their citizens
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article ... z15Pxx66El

DHS Expands If You See Something Say Something Campaign
http://www.nationalterroralert.com/2010 ... +Center%29

NYPD Commences Use Of Iris Scans Of Suspects
http://newyork.cbslocal.com/2010/11/15/ ... -suspects/

Flashback: Military Industrial Complex Prepares Mass Graves for U.S. Citizens
http://theintelhubradio.com/2010/11/16/ ... -citizens/

TSA Targets Tyner In Effort To Chill Nationwide Backlash
http://www.infowars.com/tsa-targets-tyn ... -backlash/

TSA to investigate body scan resister
http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/2010 ... -resistor/

Rand Paul: Thought Crime USA
http://www.infowars.com/rand-paul-thought-crime-usa-2/

Preparing For The "Civil War" Propaganda Blitz
http://www.cakewalkblogs.com/antiestabl ... blitz.aspx

An Upcoming 30% Price Increase For Cotton Products And Defaulting Chinese Clothing Manufacturers May Soon Test The "Deflation" Thesis
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/upcomi ... turers-may

The rise in cotton prices has been 'terrifying' and could force U.S. retailers like Gap (GPS), J.C. Penney (JCP) and Wal-Mart (WMT) to pay their Chinese suppliers as much as 30% more for clothes. The price hikes, unsurprisingly, will probably be passed along to consumers.
http://seekingalpha.com/news/market_cur ... ource=feed

S&P predicts house prices to fall another 7% to 10% through 2011
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

CME Raises Gold Futures Margins By 6%, Hikes Silver Margins For Second Time In Under A Week
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/cme-ra ... under-week

October PPI Rises 0.4%, ex-Food And Energy Down 0.6% On Expectations Of 0.1% Rise
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/octobe ... ns-01-rise

Industrial Production, Capacity Utilization Flat in October
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

TIC Update: In September Foreign Central Banks Dumped The Biggest Amount Of US Agencies On Record
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/tic-up ... ies-record

Let’s recap the situation in Ireland… the country, encouraged by the big banks to borrow more than they could possibly hope to repay, falls under attack by those same banks and hedge funds thus spiking their bond borrowing costs. Yet Ireland claims it has enough money to operate through the end of their next fiscal year, what’s the hurry?

In comes the IMF and European banks – the very same banksters as above – DEMANDING that they BORROW MORE MONEY in order to “RESCUE” them! Yesterday the threat became real when Ireland was, “warned it has 24 hours to make decision as EU emergency talks loom amid fears Irish banks' contagion may spread to other eurozone countries.”

And here is the very same threat used by bankers time and time again throughout history!!! DO THIS OR ELSE WE CRASH THE MARKETS AND THE ECONOMY!

And that’s what you get and what you deserve for GIVING THE POWER OF MONEY CREATION to the banks in the first place! This is exactly why what’s MOST IMPORTANT IS WHO CONTROLS THAT POWER.

And yet it is being reported that Ireland is in talks again this morning:

Nov. 16 (Bloomberg) -- Ireland is in talks with European and International Monetary Fund officials about a bailout that would shore up the state’s finances as well as enable it to inject capital into the country’s banks, said a European official with direct knowledge of the talks.

The two-part funding package would mean Ireland wouldn’t have to tap the bond market for an extended period as it tries to cut the budget deficit, said the person, who spoke on condition of anonymity. It would also give the government capital to help banks if necessary. Ireland says it’s fully funded into mid-2011.

I can only hope that they resist this “two part funding package.” But that doesn’t sound so bad does it? LOL, their “funding package” is just a euphemism for DEBT. While it’s true that Ireland represents just 1% of the EU economy, it is requiring 15% of the bailout proceeds. But this is just like the subprime borrower – WHO is most responsible, those who borrowed more than can be repaid, or the debt pusher who knew when he was lending money from nothing, then selling it across the globe despite the fact that they KNEW it could never be repaid?! I say the bankers get what they deserve – bring the system down and start over! Change the equation of WHO is in control!

There is only one true escape for the people of Ireland, that is to tell the bankers to pound sand! They, and all countries should exit the Euro and be producing their own currency (with quantity controls of course)! They should DEFAULT on current debts and let the holders of their debts go broke as they deserve.

Rumors are flying that Portugal is threatening to leave the Euro, again, there is strength in numbers and they should do so.

Meanwhile, back in the states we learn its pump and dump as usual, the headline says that Uncle Warren Buffett (hopefully soon to be called prisoner #669) dumped all his shares in Home Depot. Gee, I just happened to catch the shills on CNBC advising people to buy HD. The people are being robbed, it is blatant.

And the biggest robbery of them all is now UNDERWAY IN THE BOND MARKET. Nearly two years ago I was warning that eventually even muni bonds would be hit, and now they are in spades. You had a tech bubble, turned into a housing bubble, turned into another stock bubble, that turned into yet another stock bubble, and all the while the mother of all bubbles in bonds was growing and growing. Of all those bubbles, the bond bubble is the biggest and it just now may be starting to unwind.

This will massively harm most retirement accounts – IF YOU HAVE BOND FUNDS UNDER YOUR CONTROL, YOU HAVE BEEN WARNED. The people have been herded like cattle from one bubble to the next, only to have the bubble pulled out from under them. House prices never go down, and bonds are the most safe investment there is. Okay, take a look at these “safe investments,” one year charts:

Make no mistake, this means that the cost of funding debt for municipalities just got more expensive, and that is not a good thing for the economy, nor is it a good thing for your retirement plan.

PCK… that is the PIMCO California Municipal Income Fund. All the gains of the past year, GONE in about 3 days. How many real people in the herd do you figure made an exit before this occurred to their accounts? Not many I’m willing to wager… the majority will figure it out and sell just as the carnage is concluding – bankers will be long gone, far away from the crap they generated.

And those inflation expectations that QE2 is going to “save us” all and produce massive hyperinflation? Well, not exactly yet.

The PPI just came in flat month to month at .4% which is half of expectations that were looking for a .8% rise. And, excluding food and energy, the PPI FELL .6% which is opposite the direction of expectations. Gee, could that mean that what we need is QE3??? LOL, here’s Econoday:

Highlights
Inflation at the producer was more moderate than expected in September with the core tugged down by discounts in motor vehicle prices. The overall PPI inflation rate held steady at 0.4 percent in October, coming in significantly below the consensus forecast for a 0.8 percent increase. At the core level, the PPI surprisingly fell 0.1 percent, down from a 0.1 percent gain in September and coming in lower than the median forecast for a 0.1 percent uptick. The core was led down by a 3.0 percent drop in passenger car prices and a 4.3 percent decrease in light truck prices

For the latest month, food slipped 0.1 percent after jumping 1.2 percent in September. The energy component spiked 3.7 percent, following a 0.5 percent increase in September. Gasoline surged a monthly 9.8 percent in October, following a 1.8 percent dip the prior month. For the food component, a majority of this decrease is due to an 8.1 percent drop for fresh and dry vegetables.

For the overall PPI, the year-on-year rate increased to 4.3 percent from 4.0 percent in September (seasonally adjusted). The core rate softened to 1.4 percent from 1.5 the previous month. On a not seasonally adjusted basis for October, the year-ago the headline PPI was up 4.3 percent while the core was up 1.5 percent.

However, producer price inflation is strengthening in earlier stages of production. Intermediate goods prices rose 1.2 percent in October following a 0.5 percent increase in September. Crude goods surged 4.3 percent, following a 0.5 percent decline the month before. On a year-ago basis, intermediate is up 6.4 percent (not seasonally adjusted) while crude is up 17.0 percent.

So, what do you figure this reading would be had the hot money not run up the cost of energy so severely? The sad fact is that the people are being sold a bill of banker goods. Inflation is NOT good for the vast majority of people, in fact DEFLATION is exactly what is necessary and good for most people! Houses, cars, food, tuition, medical care, etc. should all cost less! In fact, if you really want future prosperity without having the guts to throw the bankers out on their [hind parts], then deflation is what you want.

Of course I say throw the bankers out on their [hind parts]! Prison for the ones at the very top – start yesterday. In the mean time, enjoy the ride, it’s getting real interesting.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... -1116.html

....of course deflation also means falling wages, loss of jobs, etc.....that despite lowered prices....doesn't change the impact much (except for the debt free with some savings - as happened to be the counsel given for the past century).....and for awhile we will get squeezed at both ends since the banks are gaming food and essential commodities.

Report questions safety of planned biodefense lab
http://www.businessweek.com/ap/financia ... GMG100.htm

Staged Government Terror: An Open Admission Within The British House of Lords
http://deadlinelive.info/2010/11/16/sta ... -of-lords/

George W. Bush Confronted on 9/11 & war crimes in Florida!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X3ZmJvms ... r_embedded

Fish stocks dwindle as trawlers empty Asia's seas
http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Fish_ ... s_999.html

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 16th, 2010, 1:26 pm

One in 7 US households hit by hunger issues in 2009
http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/N15275630.htm

We've Lost 8 Million Jobs. Here's A Closer Look.
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2010/10/ ... c=fb&cc=fp

Jeremy Grantham: "The Fed Has Spent Most of the Last 15, 20 Years Manipulating the Stock Market"
http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2 ... st-of.html

One Hundred Naked Citizens: One Hundred Leaked Body Scans
http://gizmodo.com/5690749/

MEDIA FAIL: CNN's Jeffrey Toobin (Lawyer) says you must comply with TSA or you can't fly
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RoQErhbqO3o

US to EU – Drop Dead?
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/us-eu- ... -drop-dead

Update on Ireland Bailout Talks
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Living cost mounts in China as cotton, food prices surge
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2 ... 535684.htm

One of the arguments made about quantitative easing is that it will somehow cause strong inflation and thus cause home prices to move up. Why? The argument follows the logic that the roundabout way the Federal Reserve is printing money will somehow result in consumer inflation and thus push home values up as well. To that, we can point to quantitative easing part one (QEI) and see that U.S. property values clearly did not appreciate with $1.75 trillion of Fed intervention. Why are we to believe another $600 billion will do anything different from the first round? People will say that all this money had to go somewhere and that is true. Much of it went to repair the balance sheet of insolvent banks but has also become hot money around the world. Just because the housing bubble has popped here doesn’t mean it isn’t raging elsewhere in the world. The housing bubbles of Japan in the 1980s and the current China housing bubble give us an interesting look at the aftermath of bursting bubbles, currency intervention, and quantitative easing.

How can this be? With global currency markets banks can use certain currencies (i.e., the Yen) to speculate in other markets (i.e., U.S. tech bubble in the 1990s). So inflation doesn’t necessarily mean it will be domestic. Are we seeing wages surge up? And with Japan, wages at the time were more in line with those in the U.S. but how do you compete with a country where workers make one tenth of what they would in the U.S.? No amount of quantitative easing can fix that imbalance without serious pain somewhere. That is why when we look at the China housing bubble there is a good sense of where the U.S. quantitative easing is heading:

“Many of our Chinese friends who live in Shanghai and Beijing are telling us that the property inflation rate exceeds 50% – and 100% in some areas. Available housing for a young couple is far from downtown, closer to one-hour commuting distance, and still more than ten times the average salary. There are also reports that the state government is borrowing with “protected” forest land as collateral (Dyer 2010). However, these stories do not match the Chinese official data (National Bureau of Statistics of China 2010a). The Chinese official statistics say that the average increase (year-on-year) in property prices was 10.7% in February. The increase is accelerating from a year-on-year rise of 9.5% in January.”

There is no doubt that China is experiencing a housing bubble. The question of course is how badly will it end when it bursts? It seems however that China is looking to Japan’s experiencing as a way of moving forward:

“Many Chinese officials tell us that they believe the origin of Japan’s 20-year stagnation after its housing bubble burst lies in its failure to stand up to US pressure for the yen to appreciate. They cite this presumption as one of the reasons why they resist US pressure to allow the renminbi to appreciate. What is the logic behind this?

* The US pressure to appreciate the yen made the bubble size bigger;

* The US pressure to appreciate the yen made economic slump from bursting bubble worse; and

* The US pressure to appreciate the yen made the Japanese export sector to lose competitiveness that caused the 20-year decline.”

Now this seems to be the arguments put on China at the moment by the U.S. Treasury and Federal Reserve. There is no doubt that the first and ultimate goal of the Federal Reserve is to smack the dollar lower. In other words, your standard of living will fall. Each dollar you are paid with is going to be worth less and less if the Fed gets its way. As Japan realized, quantitative easing did not revive their national economy and it definitely did not bring their housing bubble back. Just look around your own home and see where most of the items you buy come from. If your dollar has less purchasing power abroad, what will that do? It would seem that inflation will happen but what if other countries also devalue their currencies at the same time? At the moment, that seems to be the path many countries are going.

Now the Fed has already embarked on nearly $2 trillion of quantitative easing. What has this done to inflation since the recession hit in 2007?

It looks like the Fed intervention has taken some of the edge off of the deflation caused by asset price destruction. But where is the massive spike up in inflation because of QEI and QEII? The issue of course is that people are looking domestically while all these funds have shifted into the hands of big banks that are now chasing hot money around the world. One location is in China real estate. I’m sure there are many markets like this but they are not here domestically. Why? Well how are Americans who are paid in U.S. dollars (a currency being pushed lower by our own central bank) going to pay for homes with a depreciating currency? The logical thing would be to expect that home prices would move lower as the standard of living in the U.S. falls. This is actually the case when we look at U.S. housing values:

Doesn’t seem like QEI did much to getting us close to peak prices. In fact, the moderation that we recently saw was fueled by loan modification programs, forced low interest rates, ignoring delinquent borrowers, and additional tax breaks. But now that the market has priced that in, home values are moving lower again although not as quickly to reflect the weak buying power that many are now feeling.

Game theory offers a few good explanations as to why things are not going to get easier any time soon. China is overheating and housing bubbles are a manifestation of this just like Japan experienced. Yet China at the moment has very little reason to allow its currency to appreciate. Why? This would make their products less competitive in the global marketplace and will cause domestic instability with rising unemployment (not exactly a good political move). The Federal Reserve is calling this bluff and moving forward with QEI which has clearly not pleased Chinese policy makers:

“(MarketWatch) People like Geithner would argue that China should raise the currency to force American companies to move production back to the U.S. I suppose that that is how the whole yuan-appreciation idea may work. But, at what exchange rate would the American companies want to do it? American wages are 10 times China’s. Should China increase its currency value 10 times?

Of course, the American pundits wouldn’t put it that way. They would talk about China’s trade or current-account surplus and the rising forex reserves, the prima facie evidence of currency manipulation. I don’t want to deny that the rising forex reserves are a problem that China must tackle with. But, it is a separate issue from the U.S. economy. The solution isn’t yuan appreciation either.

Everybody knows China has a massive savings rate of around half of its GDP. It’s a simple equation that the current-account surplus is equal to savings minus investment. If the current-account surplus is a problem, it is either insufficient investment or excessive frugality. China’s investment is over 40% of GDP. Even casual observers would find China’s investment too much. Are Chinese people too frugal? The household income is probably under 40% of GDP. How could they be the source of the gigantic savings?”

It is a challenging situation for many nations. Yet when I see what is going on currently (i.e., low inflation in the U.S. while real estate bubbles rage in China) you can see clearly where the hot money is going. The money is certainly not flowing into U.S. real estate. Ultimately people in the immediate markets need to be able to afford their local housing and rents are always a good indicator regarding the actual monthly amount people can carry (rents have been falling or stagnant over the last few years). The global contagion is hitting again and Ireland is at the center for the past few weeks but an interesting article sheds a little light on the uniformity of how real estate bubbles burst:

“(Irish Times) Banks have been relying on two dams to block the torrent of defaults – house prices and social stigma – but both have started to crumble alarmingly.

People are going to extraordinary lengths – not paying other bills and borrowing heavily from their parents – to meet mortgage repayments, both out of fear of losing their homes and to avoid the stigma of admitting that they are broke. In a society like ours, where a person’s moral worth is judged – by themselves as much as by others – by the car they drive and the house they own, the idea of admitting that you cannot afford your mortgage is unspeakably shameful.

That will change. The perception growing among borrowers is that while they played by the rules, the banks certainly did not, cynically persuading them into mortgages that they had no hope of affording. Facing a choice between obligations to the banks and to their families – mortgage or food – growing numbers are choosing the latter.

In the last year, America has seen a rising number of “strategic defaults”. People choose to stop repaying their mortgages, realising they can live rent-free in their house for several years before eviction, and then rent a better house for less than the interest on their current mortgage. The prospect of being sued by banks is not credible – the State of Florida allows banks full recourse to the assets of delinquent borrowers just like here, but it has the highest default rate in the US – because there is no point pursuing someone who has no assets.

If one family defaults on its mortgage, they are pariahs: if 200,000 default they are a powerful political constituency. There is no shame in admitting that you too were mauled by the Celtic Tiger after being conned into taking out an unaffordable mortgage, when everyone around you is admitting the same.”

This kind of brinkmanship always ends badly. So where are things heading? It is Japan redux except with China. The early 1980s saw the U.S. in another bad recession. This time however, countries are more tuned into what happened and many are racing to the bottom. This puts bigger issues for the global economy on the table but with a nearly 10 percent unemployment rate (17 if we combine underemployment and unemployment), a declining currency, and the Fed exporting bubbles how housing values blast upwards in the U.S. is a mystery and clearly not reflected in the data. Housing is the least of the worries for the economy and future job growth as usual is issue number one.

http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com/expo ... e+SoCal%29

California facing $20 billion budget deficits deep into 2016 – $25 billion budget deficit starring California in the face for the next fiscal year and overly optimistic economic predictions.

This is going to balloon in 2011-12 when expenditures explode by $10 billion. Where is the money going to come from? California had two decades marked with extraordinary bubbles in technology and then real estate. So far no other bubble is knocking. The current unemployment rate in California is 12.4 percent with an underemployment rate upwards of 23 percent. Unlike the Federal Reserve California doesn’t have a printing machine so they will either need to raise taxes or make drastic cuts. It is unfortunate that cronyism in state government is a mirror image of what occurs in Wall Street. They are cutting services and squeezing the middle class by raising tuitions for education for example which is actually a benefit to the future economy. Instead of going after Cadillac retirement plans where the real money is they go after the future job base of the state. Is it any wonder problems are so deep in the state?

http://www.mybudget360.com/california-f ... -the-face/

Ambac, CDS and Geithner: It's AIG All Over Again

More important, the actions of the State of Wisconsin with respect to AAC are, to us, a transparent effort to sidestep the insurance commitments to RMBS holders in favor of honoring contracts to guarantee CDS that flow through some well-connected global banks. This is AIG all over again and we think that the Court and the State of Wisconsin need to understand if Mr. Dilweg has become, wittingly or no, the puppet of Timothy Geithner, his political master and former C director Robert Rubin, and all of the large banks involved.

All of the above serves to show just how exposed the big banks remain to any issues relating to the $47 trillion OTC swap market. Why do the banks need everything to break their way? Are they not just market makers in the OTC marketplace? Or is the AFC mess once again exposing the "daisy chain" effect whereby breaking one OTC contract takes down the entire rancid system? Where is Oliver Stone?

http://us1.irabankratings.com/pub/IRAMain.asp

Read Gov’t Report Showing 1 in 7 Hospitalized Medicare Beneficiaries Harmed by Care

One out of every seven hospitalized Medicare beneficiaries experiences an “adverse event,” which means the patient is harmed as a result of medical care. That’s according to a study released today [1] by the Department of Health and Human Services’ inspector general.

The “adverse events” contribute to an estimated 15,000 patient deaths [2] each month and add at least $4.4 billion [3] to the government’s annual Medicare expenses, the report projected. These findings were based on a nationally representative random sample taken from the nearly 1 million Medicare beneficiaries discharged from hospitals in October 2008.

The report’s findings were “consistent with previous studies” but “nonetheless disturbing [4],” Carolyn Clancy, director of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality, said in a written response to the report.

http://www.propublica.org/blog/item/rea ... es-harmed-

4closureFraud Action Alert – It’s Back! H.R. 3808 Interstate Recognition of Notarization Act of 2010
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/4closu ... to+zero%29

30-Year Fixed Mortgage Rates Up 27 Basis Points To Four-Month High
http://www.zillow.com/blog/30-year-fixe ... 010/11/16/

15 Percent of All Internet Traffic Secretly Rerouted Through China
http://defensetech.org/2010/11/16/15-pe ... ugh-china/

CNBC's Diana Olick reports that the investigation into the biggest financial fraud in recent history is about to be shelved: the reason, state AGs are nearing a settlement with banks, which will slap a few wrists, will see banks put some lunch money in a settlement fund, will result in some principal reductions, and everything will be well again, as banker bonuses surpass 2009 levels (as noted previously). Retroactively in perpetuity. In other news, state sponsored fraud in America is alive and well.

Update: don't spend that bonus money on the January edition Perfect 10s just yet. In what seems to be a day of relentless newsflow, we have just learned via Charlie Gasparino and Fox Biz, that Phil Angelides is launching his own probe into the mortgage market. Then again, all this means is that BofA will need to spend a few million extra dollars to bribe the key people in this latest development, and then everything shall be well again.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/state- ... settlement

Bush Tax Cut Extension: DOA?
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/bush-t ... ension-doa

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 16th, 2010, 4:10 pm

Hamtramck seeks state permission to file for bankruptcy

The city of Hamtramck, desperate for cash, has asked the state for permission to take an unprecedented step: filing for bankruptcy.

City Manager Bill Cooper said the city of roughly 20,000 people is staring at a $3 million deficit, fueled by a dispute with Detroit. Unless Hamtramck files for bankruptcy, it won't be able to pay its nearly 100 employees or 153 retirees, he said.

The city sent a letter to the state Department of Treasury last week asking for approval to seek bankruptcy protection. It has not received a reply, Cooper said.

"I'm going to run out of money Jan. 31," Cooper said. Bankruptcy would allow the city wants to stave off creditors and force its unions to consider concessions.

Many Michigan municipalities are under severe financial pressure following a crippling recession that has seen tax revenues plummet. The Detroit Public Schools considered bankruptcy last year but opted against it.

"I'd much rather find another way," Cooper said. "It's not Option 1."

A spokesman for the Department of Treasury said, under state law, a municipality can't file for bankruptcy without first having an emergency financial manager appointed.

Caleb Buhs, a Department of Treasury spokesman, said the department received the letter Monday and officials are studying it. Under a 1990 law, only an emergency financial manager appointed by the state can take a city into bankruptcy, he said. No Michigan municipality has declared bankruptcy before or since the law was passed, he said.

The city of Hamtramck has an annual budget of just under $18 million. A substantial portion of its revenues come from a tax-sharing agreement with Detroit that centers on General Motors' Poletown plant. Detroit has withheld payment for a number of months, arguing that it had overpaid previously. Hamtramck has sued its bigger neighbor, but a court resolution could take months or even longer — not soon enough, Cooper said.

http://detroitnews.com/article/20101116 ... bankruptcy

Starting shots being fired as we enter the next phase......the taxable revenue squeeze (mad dash scramble for cash). Big cities steal from little cities, counties steal from all the cities, states steal from counties, states fight states for resources, etc.

The food chain begins with the little burgs at the bottom.....

Yields on top-rated tax-exempt bonds due in 10 years climbed to a four-month high as the market absorbed the highest weekly issuance of municipal debt in at least seven years.

Ten-year AAA general obligations jumped 0.04 percentage point to 2.67 percent at 11:07 a.m. in New York, the highest since July 9, according to a BVAL municipal benchmark index. States and local governments are selling $16.3 billion in debt this week, the most on record, according to data compiled by Bloomberg dating to 2003.

“We’re going to need a bigger boat,” Tony Shields, a principal in the public-finance department at Williams Capital Group in New York, said in an e-mail. “New supply is close to unmanageable.”

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-1 ... onths.html

Col. Flagg · Post by **Col. Flagg** » November 16th, 2010, 4:32 pm

Mummy wrote:
Hamtramck seeks state permission to file for bankruptcy

The city of Hamtramck, desperate for cash, has asked the state for permission to take an unprecedented step: filing for bankruptcy.

City Manager Bill Cooper said the city of roughly 20,000 people is staring at a $3 million deficit, fueled by a dispute with Detroit. Unless Hamtramck files for bankruptcy, it won't be able to pay its nearly 100 employees or 153 retirees, he said.

The city sent a letter to the state Department of Treasury last week asking for approval to seek bankruptcy protection. It has not received a reply, Cooper said.

"I'm going to run out of money Jan. 31," Cooper said. Bankruptcy would allow the city wants to stave off creditors and force its unions to consider concessions.

Many Michigan municipalities are under severe financial pressure following a crippling recession that has seen tax revenues plummet. The Detroit Public Schools considered bankruptcy last year but opted against it.

"I'd much rather find another way," Cooper said. "It's not Option 1."

A spokesman for the Department of Treasury said, under state law, a municipality can't file for bankruptcy without first having an emergency financial manager appointed.

Caleb Buhs, a Department of Treasury spokesman, said the department received the letter Monday and officials are studying it. Under a 1990 law, only an emergency financial manager appointed by the state can take a city into bankruptcy, he said. No Michigan municipality has declared bankruptcy before or since the law was passed, he said.

The city of Hamtramck has an annual budget of just under $18 million. A substantial portion of its revenues come from a tax-sharing agreement with Detroit that centers on General Motors' Poletown plant. Detroit has withheld payment for a number of months, arguing that it had overpaid previously. Hamtramck has sued its bigger neighbor, but a court resolution could take months or even longer — not soon enough, Cooper said.
http://detroitnews.com/article/20101116 ... bankruptcy

Starting shots being fired as we enter the next phase......the taxable revenue squeeze (mad dash scramble for cash). Big cities steal from little cities, counties steal from all the cities, states steal from counties, states fight states for resources, etc.

The food chain begins with the little burgs at the bottom.....

Yields on top-rated tax-exempt bonds due in 10 years climbed to a four-month high as the market absorbed the highest weekly issuance of municipal debt in at least seven years.

Ten-year AAA general obligations jumped 0.04 percentage point to 2.67 percent at 11:07 a.m. in New York, the highest since July 9, according to a BVAL municipal benchmark index. States and local governments are selling $16.3 billion in debt this week, the most on record, according to data compiled by Bloomberg dating to 2003.

“We’re going to need a bigger boat,” Tony Shields, a principal in the public-finance department at Williams Capital Group in New York, said in an e-mail. “New supply is close to unmanageable.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-1 ... onths.html

Boy, you can sure see how this whole unwind evolves into city against city, state against state, etc.

Original_Intent · Post by **Original_Intent** » November 16th, 2010, 4:52 pm

Col. Flagg wrote:
Mummy wrote:
Hamtramck seeks state permission to file for bankruptcy

The city of Hamtramck, desperate for cash, has asked the state for permission to take an unprecedented step: filing for bankruptcy.

City Manager Bill Cooper said the city of roughly 20,000 people is staring at a $3 million deficit, fueled by a dispute with Detroit. Unless Hamtramck files for bankruptcy, it won't be able to pay its nearly 100 employees or 153 retirees, he said.

The city sent a letter to the state Department of Treasury last week asking for approval to seek bankruptcy protection. It has not received a reply, Cooper said.

"I'm going to run out of money Jan. 31," Cooper said. Bankruptcy would allow the city wants to stave off creditors and force its unions to consider concessions.

Many Michigan municipalities are under severe financial pressure following a crippling recession that has seen tax revenues plummet. The Detroit Public Schools considered bankruptcy last year but opted against it.

"I'd much rather find another way," Cooper said. "It's not Option 1."

A spokesman for the Department of Treasury said, under state law, a municipality can't file for bankruptcy without first having an emergency financial manager appointed.

Caleb Buhs, a Department of Treasury spokesman, said the department received the letter Monday and officials are studying it. Under a 1990 law, only an emergency financial manager appointed by the state can take a city into bankruptcy, he said. No Michigan municipality has declared bankruptcy before or since the law was passed, he said.

The city of Hamtramck has an annual budget of just under $18 million. A substantial portion of its revenues come from a tax-sharing agreement with Detroit that centers on General Motors' Poletown plant. Detroit has withheld payment for a number of months, arguing that it had overpaid previously. Hamtramck has sued its bigger neighbor, but a court resolution could take months or even longer — not soon enough, Cooper said.
http://detroitnews.com/article/20101116 ... bankruptcy

Starting shots being fired as we enter the next phase......the taxable revenue squeeze (mad dash scramble for cash). Big cities steal from little cities, counties steal from all the cities, states steal from counties, states fight states for resources, etc.

The food chain begins with the little burgs at the bottom.....

Yields on top-rated tax-exempt bonds due in 10 years climbed to a four-month high as the market absorbed the highest weekly issuance of municipal debt in at least seven years.

Ten-year AAA general obligations jumped 0.04 percentage point to 2.67 percent at 11:07 a.m. in New York, the highest since July 9, according to a BVAL municipal benchmark index. States and local governments are selling $16.3 billion in debt this week, the most on record, according to data compiled by Bloomberg dating to 2003.

“We’re going to need a bigger boat,” Tony Shields, a principal in the public-finance department at Williams Capital Group in New York, said in an e-mail. “New supply is close to unmanageable.”
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-1 ... onths.html
Boy, you can sure see how this whole unwind evolves into city against city, state against state, etc.

Imagine the uproar when California gets bailed out with Federal dollars so that they can continue to give resident tuition to illegal aliens (among other things.)

That's right, your tax dollars are going to go to subsidize illegal aliens attending California Universities at a better price than you could (assuming you do not live in California, of course.)

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 17th, 2010, 11:11 am

FDIC conducting 50 investigations at failed banks: report
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/FDIC-cond ... et=&ccode=

European officials to lift lid on Irish banks - EU, IMF officials to pore over Irish banking system, hope to find solution to debt crisis
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/European- ... et=&ccode=

California Delays Issuance Of $10 Billion In RANs, Reason Unknown (However, Insolvency May Have Something To Do With It)
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/califo ... ave-someth

Mexico's $80M boom industry: Bulletproof cars
http://www.usatoday.com/news/world/2010 ... 5_ST_N.htm

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 17th, 2010, 12:48 pm

World of Worry Wednesday - The China Syndrome
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/world- ... a-syndrome

U.S. Sets 50 Bank Probes - FDIC Steps Up Investigations at Failed Lenders; 'These Numbers Will Increase'
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 73686.html?

Bank Failures in Slow Motion, Part II
http://dailyreckoning.com/bank-failures ... n-part-ii/

Well, Would You Look at That: Elizabeth Warren Might Be Replaced by a Bank Lobbyist
http://mandelman.ml-implode.com/2010/11 ... -lobbyist/

TODAY Congress Will Try - By Secret Vote - to Retroactively Legalize Foreclosure Fraud and Forgery By the Big Banks ... Call Congress and Say NO
http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2 ... ecret.html

ERIC CANTONA "KILL THE BANKS" (A MUST SEE)!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-Uop5R7E314

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 17th, 2010, 1:22 pm

CSPAN3 11 16 2010 16 05 39
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9M_0UtLC ... r_embedded#!

NACA's Bruce Marks Goes Postal At JPM Crony During Yesterday's Fraudclosure Hearing
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/nacas- ... re-hearing

28 Consecutive Weeks Of Domestic Equity Fund Outflows
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/28-seq ... d-outflows

4closureFraud H.R. 3808 Alert - Disposing of the President’s Veto of H.R. 3808- Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act of 2010

Confirmed with Adelholt's office that vote is taking place tonight sometime in the next two hours. This morning was a discussion and agreement to limit discussion to 10mins.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/4closu ... ion-notari

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 17th, 2010, 7:58 pm

First Philadelphia, now San Francisco, and all in the same day. Fasten your seatbelts ladies, the muni maul is going mainstream.

The downgrade primarily reflects the city's very narrow financial position and the minimal prospect of material improvement in the near term. The city ended fiscal 2009 with a balance sheet that was weaker than at any time in the prior ten years and extremely weak by comparison with other similarly rated local governments. Its fiscal 2010 and 2011 budgets both relied heavily on one-time solutions, including draws on reserves, to close sizable projected budget gaps, suggesting that final audited results will show little balance sheet improvement. The lackluster economy cannot be expected to provide substantial relief in the near term. Recent reports from the state confirm that its fiscal challenges continue to loom large, which in turn injects revenue risk into the city's current and next year budgets. The defeat in the election earlier this month of a local pension and health care cost control measure suggests that little near-term fiscal improvement is likely to result from external political pressure.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/moodys ... mainstream

Expect this to really pick up steam and get ugly over the next 6 months....and stay that way!

The 2011-2012 budget battles will make this years look tame!

So these three measures: core CPI, median CPI and trimmed-mean CPI, all increased less than 1% over the last 12 months. The indexes for rent and owners' equivalent rent both increased in October (some analysts blamed the disinflation trend on these measures of rent, but that wasn't true in October).

For the core CPI, the BLS noted:

Over the last 12 months, the index for all items less food and energy has risen 0.6 percent, the smallest 12-month increase in the history of the index, which dates to 1957.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

CoreLogic: House Prices declined 1.8% in September

The index is 3.9% above the low set in March 2009, and I expect to see a new post-bubble low for this index later this year or early in 2011. As Fleming noted, prices are falling in most areas now.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Housing Starts decline in October
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

The housing market can only recover with a healthy employment market yet the banks have dominated the dialogue in terms of guiding bailout policy. In the month of July of 2007 Southern California reached its median price peak of $505,000. In that same month, year over year home sales fell by 27 percent. Our latest figure for October of 2010 shows that sales fell by 24 percent year over year. What does that mean going forward?

There is a strong seasonal side to housing so we need to take that into account when measuring trends. This last information shows the second weakest October in the last ten years. The slowest month above was in 2007 when the median price was at $444,000. A year later the median price was at $300,000.

Sales have fallen by 24 percent from last October even though the median price is only up by $3,000 in that same timeframe. We are going to see yet another year over year nominal median price drop in the next few months. On the record, January and February are typically the slowest sales months but we won’t see that data until February and March. Yet this leading indicator is telling us that we are going to see price declines coming up. Sales have been declining strongly since June and we are now into our fourth consecutive month where less than 20,000 homes have sold (and we have yet to hit the weaker two months in the winter).

http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com/the- ... e+SoCal%29

6 Million Benefit-Paying Jobs Vanish in One Year!

Analysis of weekly unemployment data and covered employees shows that 5,977,844 benefit-paying jobs have been lost in the last year.

By the above intrepretation, it is safe to conclude that 5,977,844 jobs totally vanished (not just benefit paying jobs).

The only way that cannot be true is if there was a sudden shocking increase in the number of real estate agents, church hiring, or close to 6 million people all of a sudden decided to go into business for themselves.

All of those possibilities are highly unlikely to say the least.

http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

Is America In Danger Of Turning Into One Gigantic Hellhole?
http://endoftheamericandream.com/archiv ... c-hellhole

Ambac files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy
http://www.forbes.com/2010/11/09/ambac- ... video.html

Best Buy (BBY) takes its cue from Wal-Mart (WMT), offering free shipping on "hundreds of thousands" of items through Dec. 21. The offers are meant to make the retailers more competitive against rivals like Target (TGT) and Amazon.com (AMZN).

http://seekingalpha.com/news/market_cur ... ource=feed

Is Ireland On The Verge Of A Financial Collapse?
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... l-collapse

Ireland: Debt Crisis team arrives Thursday

Irish bank customers have withdrawn an estimated 11% of deposits over just a few weeks.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Codex Alimentarius, Control over the Food Supply and World Government
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=21960

Global Warfare: After NATO Summit, U.S. To Intensify Military Drive Into Asia
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=21977

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 18th, 2010, 10:33 am

Mortgage rates jump to 4.39 pct. as Treasurys rise

The recent jump in rates rippled through the mortgage market. The number of people filling out mortgage applications slumped last week, the Mortgage Bankers Association said Wednesday. Purchase applications dropped by 5 percent from the previous week, while refinance applications tumbled 16.5 percent.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Mortgage- ... et=&ccode=

House prices fell by 0.8% during September as the property market continued to slow down, figures showed today.

The drop, which wiped out the 0.7% increase seen during the previous month, left the average UK home costing £211,815, according to Communities and Local Government.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/busin ... 35367.html

The horrible truth starts to dawn on Europe's leaders
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/finance/am ... s-leaders/

India Microcredit Faces Collapse From Defaults

MADOOR, India — India’s rapidly growing private microcredit industry faces imminent collapse as almost all borrowers in one of India’s largest states have stopped repaying their loans, egged on by politicians who accuse the industry of earning outsize profits on the backs of the poor.

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/18/world ... ro.html?hp

Economic crash to drive 100,000 out of Ireland
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world ... 37109.html

China's Cabinet May Impose Temporary Price Controls to Counter Inflation
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-1 ... urges.html

Bernanke Claims QE II will Create 700,000 to 1 Million Jobs; Where? Mexico, Peru, China
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

Full Year of Muni Gains Wiped Out in 2 Weeks; California in Shambles, Philadelphia Downgraded; Issuance Soars; Horrid Muni Risk-Reward Setup
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

The Oil Price Is Bound To Stay Higher Than US$80 A Barrel For The Rest Of 2010 The US Energy Department Believes
http://www.oilbarrel.com/nc/news/displa ... /1209.html

The GM IPO, as if you can refer to it as “initial,” is nothing but more criminal behavior. The offering wasn’t even made available to the public, the same public who spent billions inappropriately bailing out the wrecked FINANCIAL institution that GM became. Automobiles? Forget it! And even the poor workers didn’t understand that it was GMAC that sunk GM while their bosses and the media attacked the unions. And nothing has changed – they are back into the same risk filled financial gambling that they were in before. It’s not about the cars people, it’s only about the money. And GM through GMAC was PRINTING MONEY! They PRINTED far more money (from nothing) than they made cars! Still do!

That’s right, GMAC was making all kinds of loans from subprime homes to automobiles and they were making money from thin air every time they originated a loan. Of course they buried GMAC, but then THIS JULY GM bought subprime lender AmeriCredit in order to crank up their printing presses yet again. Oh, and that was financed on YOUR nickel. LOL, and people are talking about cars and unions as if they are important to this company – not even.

And where did the money for the IPO come from? Gee, the “Fed” is pouring $8 billion a day into the market… thus the “largest offering in history” only absorbed 2.5 days of POMO!

And cars are most certainly a bubble themselves. Run up to completely unbelievable prices on the back of longer financing terms and artificially low interest rates. This too shall pass as wage arbitraged Americans who earn $10 an hour are not going to be able to afford $30,000 autos forever.

Weekly Jobless Claims were reported for the prior week at 439,000, that is up from the prior week’s 435k which was revised up to 437k. Here’s Econoday, and then we can discuss reality:

Highlights
Jobless claims held onto the big improvement of the prior week, rising only 2,000 to a lower-than-expected level of 439,000 in the November 13 week (prior week revised 2,000 higher to 437,000). The four-week average, at 443,000 and down more than 15,000 from a month ago, is signaling solid improvement for November payrolls.

Continuing claims have also been coming down, falling 48,000 in the November 6 week to 4.295 million. The four-week average of 4.353 million is down 133,000 from its month-ago comparison. The unemployment rate for insured workers fell one tenth to 3.4 percent.

Special factors aren't a factor in the improvement underway though the November 13 week does include Veterans Day. Jobless claims remain one of the brightest spots on the economic calendar.

Reality. Last week had Veteran’s Day in it and government offices were closed. Despite that, the unadjusted actual number of claims increased by 28,808 people during the week. There were 3.8 million people who made Emergency Unemployment Claims during that week. Thousands are falling off those rolls every week as they have simply been out of work for too long. And all 3.8 million are going to lose their benefits by the end of the month unless those benefits are extended yet again.

Any number greater than 350k reflects a loss of jobs – period. And as Mish’s article I linked yesterday shows, the number of people truly unemployed is far greater than what’s being reported – 6 million in the past year.

I think the action of the week belongs to the municipal bond market where rates are skyrocketing and prices got pummeled. They did recover some, but so far just a fraction. And yesterday the city of Philadelphia’s debt got downgraded as did San Francisco’s. Of course this occurs AFTER the market has pummeled their bonds – the rating agencies are again WORSE THAN WORTHLESS as their conflicted and corrupt business models cause great distortion and harm to our economy.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... -1118.html

Obama to honor Buffett with medal of freedom
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/obama- ... iteid=bnbh

The US government may require cars to include scrambling tech that would disable mobile-phone use by drivers, and perhaps passengers.

"I think it will be done," US Secretary of Transportation Ray LaHood said on Wednesday morning, according to The Daily Caller. "I think the technology is there and I think you're going to see the technology become adaptable in automobiles to disable these cell phones."

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/11/17 ... f_in_cars/

FBI pressuring Google, Facebook to allow ‘back doors’ for wiretapping
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/fbi- ... retapping/

...FBI and CIA never have got along very well with each other

Bill Gates Wants All New Borns to Be Registrated for Vaccines
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=5648

The TSA is Out of Control (shocking video)
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=5652

Two months of hell: State tries to take couple's 'miracle baby'
http://www.noonehastodietomorrow.com//i ... &Itemid=33

In a much-criticized move, Acting DEA administrator Michele Leonhart spent more than $123,000 to charter a private jet, instead of one of the DEA’s own 106 planes, to fly to Colombia two years ago.

The level of disapproval would have been even higher if it had been known that the DEA chartered the jet from a contractor with a major investment in a shell company in Florida that owned a DC9 caught carrying 5.5 tons of cocaine in Mexico.

“Just as the nation was reeling from the worst economic crisis in decades, with the national debt climbing toward $10 trillion, Leonhart chose an expensive outside jet charter company instead of one of the DEA’s own 106 planes for her trip to Bogotá, Colombia last fall,” reported Marisa Taylor of McClatchy Newspapers.

In a Feb 16, 2009 story headlined “DEA official's private charter cost $123,000,” Taylor reported that the DEA chartered the jet for Leonhart's trip from L-3 Communications, which bills itself as the nation's sixth largest defense contractor, and which made more than $32 million from the DEA in 2008 for transportation services, while the company's largest subsidiary, "Titan Group of L-3 Communications," had a $70,000 investment in a shell company in Miami with no employees, no earnings and no prospects, but which somehow wound up as the true and legal owner of a DC9 carrying a cargo of 5.5 tons of cocaine.

Some might suggest that had been the purpose of the investment all along.

http://www.madcowprod.com/11182010.htm

FTR #728 Interview with Daniel Hopsicker: Tricky Treats
http://spitfirelist.com/for-the-record/ ... cord%27%29

Fading fish stocks driving Asian sea rivalries
http://www.physorg.com/news/2010-11-fis ... lries.html

Haiti cholera clashes: UN troops shoot man dead
http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2010/no ... pers-nepal

Four in 10 say marriage is becoming obsolete
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/10-m ... -obsolete/

Hollywood publicist Ronni Chasen shot dead in car
http://vigilantcitizen.com/?p=5654

F-22 Wreckage Found in Alaska, Pilot Still Missing
http://defensetech.org/2010/11/17/f-22- ... l-missing/

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 18th, 2010, 1:21 pm

A last minute attempt by Democrats to pass a 90 day extension of jobless benefit just failed to pass in Congress. Before the vote, which only sought a 3 month extension instead of a year long one, Steny Hoyer said: "I think every Democrat will vote for it. I'm hopeful that the Republicans will vote for it." However, since democrats brought the measure up as a "suspension" bill, meaning that it required the approval of two-thirds of the House to pass, instead of under normal house rules which would have allowedthe vote to pass, the extension failed. Therefore just like the last time this extension failed, look for up to 4-5 million unemployed to fall off EUC and extended claims over the next few months, with a hit of up to 2 million by the first/second week of December. To be sure, there was also a political flavor: as NBC reports "But with suspension bill now coming to the floor on the last day of votes before the Thanksgiving vacation, the vote will give House Democrats the opportunity to argue that the GOP blocked unemployment benefits for the jobless during the holiday season."

The bottom line is that billions in disposable income courtesy of Uncle Scam are about to be taken out of circulation. Now add the possibility that the Bush tax cuts may not be extended, and the economic picture could suddenly be turned upside down.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/jobles ... erpetual-e

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 19th, 2010, 9:53 am

Watching $17 million go up in smoke
http://xa.yimg.com/kq/groups/8911239/35 ... arrier.wmv

Hamtramck's Chapter 9 woes: The top 5 municipal bankruptcy stories
http://blog.mlive.com/news/detroit_impa ... s_the.html

Governor Warns Cities May Go Bankrupt
http://www.wlns.com/Global/story.asp?S=13531921

Europe’s Dirty Secret: Financial Elite Looting Public Treasuries
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=22005

Some thoughts on the muni market

I have been somewhat hesitant to write about the recent sharp correction in the muni market, mainly because I do not like wasting my time.
...
My opinion, for whatever it is worth to you, is that there are a handful of factors – mostly unrelated to the relative creditworthiness of muni issuers – that have provoked this correction. These factors are related, and they will likely contribute to volatility going into next year. The first, obviously, is a supply glut. The pending expiration of the Build America Bond (BAB) program has pulled supply forward, and this is going to seesaw over the next several weeks. Since the BAB program was initiated, most issuers have structured their new issues with the sense that they will go to either the tax-exempt or taxable market, whichever is more advantageous at the time. It has been almost completely a supply management game since the market for these bonds was established and munis became truly bifurcated.
...
By allowing muni issuers to sell taxable bonds, the BAB program opened the market up to investors like pensions and foreign investors, who otherwise would not benefit from a tax exemption on the interest income on the bonds and would find tax-exempt yields unappetizing. This program has relieved the supply pressure on the market for essentially two years now, keeping interest rates low.

What is going on now is that muni issuers are scrambling to get deals done to take advantage of the program before it expires, and this is pulling the number of new issues that would ordinarily be coming to market forward. So the looming expiration of the BAB program is creating the very conditions it was created to alleviate. Issuers are very conscious of this fact, and that is why a large number of deals are getting pulled. As more issues get pulled and supply is reduced, there will be some relief on rates, which I think is what happened today. But you can expect that muni issuers will be dancing around this until the program expires at the end of the year, so there will likely be significant volatility. There is also considerable uncertainty as to how supply issues will play out in the first quarter of 2011.

https://self-evident.org/?p=870

Prime U.S. Mortgage Foreclosures Hit Record as Unemployment Hurts Finances
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-1 ... ssure.html

Stocks dip as China forces banks to raise reserves
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Stock-fut ... et=&ccode=

And the bankers are doing a full-court-press on Ireland to accept a bailout. The people of Ireland are just flat out pissed, as they should be. The leadership is trying to negotiate terms in trying to keep their corporate tax rate low, but ultimately any “bailout” would simply put the people on the hook for money to bail the banks out of their problems. Of course after Ireland comes Portugal, then Spain, then Italy, then all the rest of Europe. It really is the theatre of the absurd as all the developed world is bankrupt as are all the large banks – and thus it is the bankrupt offering to bailout the bankrupt, but again it all comes down to power, control, and the using of other people’s productive efforts on behalf of the few.

The municipal bond funds took another hit yesterday, and the media is not talking about it yet. This is very significant in that it means small government is going to have more trouble raising funds going forward, not to mention the direct havoc it will raise within people’s investment accounts if it continues.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... 18_19.html

US Deploying Heavy Tanks to Afghanistan
http://www.military.com/news/article/us ... istan.html

Bill Gates: Register Every Birth by Cellphone To Ensure Vaccination, Control Population Growth
http://www.infowars.com/bill-gates-regi ... on-growth/

Senate panel approves website shut-down bill
http://www.itworld.com/internet/128208/ ... -down-bill

Insurers Test Data Profiles to Identify Risky Clients
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... TopStories

Glenn Beck bashing
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/maher-v ... -his-poop/
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2010/11/jon- ... n-lunatic/

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 22nd, 2010, 8:40 am

The top US military officer, Adm Mike Mullen, said North Korea was "continuing on a path which is destabilising for the region".

A US scientist said he had seen "more than 1,000 centrifuges" for enriching uranium on a visit to North Korea.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11806957

North Korea Announces A New, Highly Sophisticated Uranium Enrichment Facility
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... t-facility

China's New Drones Raise Eyebrows
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000142 ... 00556.html

The New Politics Of Starvation And Weaponized Food
http://www.blacklistednews.com/index.php?news_id=11592

The History of Health Tyranny: Codex Alimentarius, part 1
http://www.activistpost.com/2010/11/his ... codex.html

WHICH SENATORS GOT PAID OFF TO SUPPORT S.510 - THE 'FOOD SAFETY MODERNIZATION ACT'?

Robert Bennett - R UT - Bribe For: $105,530 - Against: $10,000
Michael Crapo - R ID - Bribe For: $64,199 - Against: $14,350
Orrin Hatch - R UT - Bribe For: $102,215 - Against: $11,600

http://www.libertynewsonline.com/article_301_29693.php

If you’ve checked out our Dollars for Docs coverage [1], you’ll know that drug companies often pay doctors to consult and give speeches about their products to other doctors. Since 2009, as we’ve noted, seven major pharmaceutical companies have paid $282 million in such payments to health professionals.

But doctors aren’t the only ones who got paid to speak at company events, according to the Washington Times.

From 2006 to 2009, one company, Novartis, took a creative approach to boost doctor attendance and spent $3.6 million paying 150 top athletes and coaches [2] to make appearances, give speeches, answer questions about their careers, and pose for photos with attendees. The payments ranged from $8,000 to $35,000 per appearance, according to the Times:

http://www.propublica.org/blog/item/for ... ct-doctors

Lawsuit Over Flawed CIA Drone Code Is Deep Sixed by Settlement
http://narcosphere.narconews.com/notebo ... settlement

Economic Implosion Sets The Blame Game In Motion
http://neithercorp.us/npress/?p=926

Irish Bailout approved by EU and IMF
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Irish Citizens Sold Down the River in "Firepower of Stupidity"
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

Ireland About To Turn Violent? Sinn Fein Protesters Try To Enter Irish Government Buildings
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/irelan ... -buildings

Poverty is an anomaly to rich people: it is very difficult to make out why people who want dinner do not ring the bell.
–Walter Bagehot

Over the weekend it was leaked that US authorities were gearing up to bring insider trading charges against investment banks, consultants, and a wide net of Wall Street players. We’ve gone down this road a few times since the crisis started and many of the crony banking institutions merely settled out of court paying the government off with taxpayer money. It’ll be interesting to see that going on our fourth year of the crisis whether anyone will be charged criminally for what has become the biggest Ponzi apparatus known to humankind. Wall Street simply doesn’t understand how so many people can be angry about their record profits as they push people out of their homes through rocket dockets like those in Florida. If you are poor or middle class then not paying your bills is sufficient for you to be “thrown out on the street with prejudice” but for the big banking system it merely means more generous bailouts. And those being thrown out are also selected with bias; for example how is it that many non-payers in expensive California homes have more leeway to ignore paying their mortgage while a person in Florida with a $90,000 loan is ushered out in a McDonalds like court system? If you can rewind to 2007 when the proverbial debt hit the fan, most of the bailouts were pushed with the pretext of “saving” the housing market. If that was the mission, it has been an abject failure.

I bring this up under the context of the problems now facing Ireland. This weekend rumors were making the rounds of the price tag to bailout the nation. From $100 to $164 billion dollars. For the size of the country and GDP, this would be like the US getting a $9 to $10 trillion bailout. Why do this? Because many of the big banks from Germany, Spain, and the US have hundreds of billions of dollars connected to Irish debt. We’ve seen this story play out because we are living a similar bailout shell game. The extremely high price tag is being floated in the media so when the lower incredibly expensive price tag comes out, they can play psychological mind games with the public (“see, it wasn’t that bad.”) The Federal Reserve is claiming that QE2 is to save the US consumer but really it is only a method of allowing banks to gamble with cheap funds while they figure out where to stash the nuclear debt waste. The reason many people can’t benefit from the lower funds is because so many homeowners are underwater and can’t refinance. Also, you have 17 percent of the nation unemployed or underemployed so they are out of the game to purchase housing. This is how the numbers break down regarding mortgage rates:

http://www.doctorhousingbubble.com/why- ... e+SoCal%29

Martin Armstrong – The Rising Frustration with the Debt Crisis…
http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... ation.html

6 New Governors Seek to Kill Defined Benefit Plans; 8 of 9 CA Cities Vote to Reduce Benefits; Fraudulent Promises (and what to do about them)
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

LONDON (Reuters) - The new Basel III banking rules will leave the biggest U.S. banks short of between $100 billion and $150 billion in equity capital, with 90 per cent of the shortfall concentrated in the top six banks, the Financial Times said, citing research from Barclays Capital.

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Top-banks ... et=&ccode=

When peak credit implodes on the consumer balance sheet – $1 trillion in consumer debt has been removed from the market since 2008. Only consumer debt category growing is student loan debt.

The U.S. insatiable consumer machine has reached a peak debt scenario. Household balance sheets are simply unable to take on more debt on their already financially sore shoulders. At the core of the Federal Reserve quantitative easing actions is the mission to lower the interest rate since consumers simply are unable to borrow more. By lowering interest rates, it provides a shadow boost to purchasing power. The way this occurs is through allowing borrowers to pay more for assets yet keep their monthly payments low enough to coincide to their now lower standard of living and stagnant wages. Being in a position like this is troubling to most Americans who hold very dearly the idea that the core mission of their government and financial institutions is to grow a healthy middle class. Many are starting to painfully realize that the government and banks are primarily looking out for their bottom line and this translates to exporting the U.S. middle class standard of living. As you will see with the chart below, consumer debt peaked early in 2008.

The banking system has no faith in the people that unwillingly bailed them out.

The one category that has grown is student loan debt. It is now the case (as of summer of 2010) that student loan debt is larger than all outstanding credit card debt. At least with credit card debt, someone can file for bankruptcy and have the debt discharged. Student loan debt sticks with you no matter the circumstances and for-profit schools are using the economic calamity to lure in tens of thousands of students into expensive paper mill operations over promising future job prospects and healthy income.

Credit cards are the life blood of many consumers for better or for worse but default rates are surging and banks have tightened up lending standards. You might have noticed this with the decrease in credit card offers in your mailbox.

This is the most severe correction in revolving credit in record keeping history dating back to the early 1970s. This has also parlayed into the new austerity that has swept the nation. We already know through human nature that people will spend if you give them access to unlimited amounts of debt. That was virtually the headline of the last decade. Debt equaled wealth and credit in the minds of many people but what was easily forgotten is that you have to pay the debt eventually. Unlike the Federal Reserve with the ability to print money, a household balance sheet needs to be repaid or defaulted on. Banks wouldn’t mind taking back an expensive home or a nice luxury car assuming the balance is lower than the value of the item. This way, they can turn a profit. The problem is the collateral isn’t anywhere close to the value of what banks have on their balance sheets.

The massive contraction of peak debt isn’t only happening with revolving credit, it is also happening with commercial and industrial loans. Many of these are tied to the massive $3 trillion in outstanding commercial real estate out in the market. The commercial side of the market is a good indicator at the health of mom and pop shops. A small business needs a loan to get off the ground so a commercial builder will need a loan to build a shopping center to provide a store front. Yet the below chart shows nothing of that sort:

http://www.mybudget360.com/when-peak-cr ... he-market/

...also called debt saturation...and its a deflationary spiral from there!

In Entitlement America, The Head Of A Household Of Four Making Minimum Wage Has More Disposable Income Than A Family Making $60,000 A Year
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/entitl ... family-mak

The US Federal Reserve will slash its growth forecasts and predict higher unemployment when it releases updated economic projections this week.

The Fed will release the latest forecasts made by members of its rate-setting open market committee on Tuesday, alongside the minutes of their November meeting, giving a complete picture of why they launched a new $600bn round of asset purchases.

When the FOMC published its last forecasts in June most members thought that 2011 growth would be between 3.5 and 4.2 per cent, but many now think growth will be between 3 and 3.5 per cent, and some expect less than that.

FOMC members have made particularly aggressive upward revisions to their unemployment forecasts, with a large number now predicting that it will still be 8 per cent or above at the end of 2012, compared to the 7.1 to 7.5 per cent that they forecast in June.

“Because I expect hiring to strengthen only gradually, the unemployment rate is likely to remain elevated for quite some time. In fact, I do not expect it to fall below 8 per cent before 2013,” Sandra Pianalto, president of the Cleveland Fed, said in a speech last week.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/b92ecb0c-f596 ... z161avOg9s

If the break down of the China-Asia supply chain doesn’t blow the US economy apart, the ungovernability issue will guarantee it. For example, Congress is playing brinksmanship with medicare care payments to doctors....

With deep cuts in Medicare looming on one side and steep insurance hikes on the other, Fairfield County physicians are feeling the pinch.

An initial 23-percent reduction in Medicare reimbursement will hit if the 112th Congress doesn't act by Jan. 1. That could prompt some local doctors to refuse new Medicare patients. In addition, Anthem proposed 20-percent hikes on insurance premiums.

"This is a recipe for disaster," said Mark Thompson, executive director for the Trumbull-based Fairfield County Medical Association. "It's no secret that Medicare and commercial reimbursement rates over the past several years are dropping and not keeping pace with inflation. That makes it extremely difficult."

To help remedy the situation, medical groups across the country are taking action. On Nov. 17, physicians across the country participated in "White Coat Wednesday." They called their senators to urge passage of a bill preventing Medicare cuts for at least 13 months.

Though stuck in the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House of Representatives twice passed legislation to fix the Medicare reimbursement formula. The formula, based on sustainable growth rate, or SGR, is tied to Gross Domestic National Product and is designed to factor in inflation rates.

However, many in the medical field criticize the SGR. Implemented more than a decade ago, the formula is nothing more than reverse engineering, said Dr. David S. Katz, a general surgeon in Milford and president of the Connecticut State Medical Society.

"It's to ensure the government spends no more than a predetermined number. So on paper it's balancing the budget," Katz said.

http://fairfield.patch.com/articles/med ... th-rates-7

At any rate, this is an interesting read, it will make you more aware by reading it, but I would caution anyone about taking his predictions too seriously. Remember, predicting the future is pretty much a fool’s errand unless there is mathematical certainty involved – and in this case there most certainly is, the debt is completely mathematically impossible to ever repay and thus you know that events are coming. When predicting market events, the easiest thing to predict (which is not easy) is direction, the next hardest to predict is the depth, and the hardest to predict is timing. Thus you should always take people’s read of the future with a many grains of salt.

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... money.html

"Countrywide Routinely Failed to Send Key Docs to MBS Trustees"
http://economistsview.typepad.com/econo ... ahoo!+Mail

Countrywide Never Sent Mortgages to Trust, Now With Helpful Chart.
http://rortybomb.wordpress.com/2010/11/ ... ful-chart/

Debt, Deleveraging, and the Liquidity Trap:
http://www.princeton.edu/~pkrugman/debt ... _ge_pk.pdf

There Will Be Blood
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/22/opini ... ef=opinion

Sheriff Who Refused To Evict Foreclosed Homeowners Forced To Resume
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/1 ... 86325.html

When the rich abandoned America -- and what that has to do with defense
http://ricks.foreignpolicy.com/posts/20 ... th_defense

Testimony: New Orleans Police Investigator Knew About Police Involvement in Post-Katrina Shooting
http://www.propublica.org/nola/story/te ... ement-in-/

In Post-Katrina Police Shooting, Photographer and Cop Witnessed Key Events, Didn’t Come Forward
http://www.propublica.org/nola/story/in ... -events-d/

DoD Manual for Civil Emergencies
http://info.publicintelligence.net/DoD- ... encies.pdf

"War Without Borders": NATO Proclaims Itself Global Military Force
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=22036

Plagues of roaches, rats, and bedbugs sweep Britain
http://www.independent.co.uk/environmen ... 39732.html

Uzbekistan warns of 'disaster' over Tajik plant
http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Uzbek ... t_999.html

Hong Kong's Property Sales Tumble, Shares Slide as Curbs Deter Homebuyers
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2010-11-2 ... uyers.html

“All Elements of Society Are Participating” – Impressions of Cap Haitien’s Movement Against the UN
http://www.mediahacker.org/2010/11/all- ... st-the-un/

History Channel, After Armageddon .. 1/9
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8r97xoSO ... playnext=1

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 23rd, 2010, 6:24 pm

S Korea warns North after clash
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-11823474

F-16s scramble as private plane violates D.C. airspace
http://news.blogs.cnn.com/2010/11/22/f- ... ce/?hpt=T2

Korean War Crisis: Brought To You By Uncle Sam
http://www.infowars.com/korean-war-cris ... uncle-sam/

Ron Paul: Korea Conflict May Be Orchestrated Crisis To Boost Dollar
http://www.infowars.com/ron-paul-korea- ... st-dollar/

Breaking: South Korea Threatens Retaliation Against North Korea
http://www.infowars.com/south-korea-thr ... rth-korea/

The End Of The Dollar Carry Trade? Presenting The Dollar Short Panic In A Burning Theater
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/end-do ... ng-theater

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 24th, 2010, 1:50 pm

US launches giant eavesdropping satellite
http://www.google.com/hostednews/afp/ar ... fd9eca.101

South Korea Fired the First Shot
http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2 ... shots.html

South Korea Admits to Firing Shells at North Korea
http://tv.globalresearch.ca/2010/11/sou ... orth-korea

The Mysterious "Laptop Documents". Using Fake Intelligence to Justify a Pre-emptive War against Iran
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=22085

New Home Sales decline in October

In October 2010, 23 thousand new homes were sold (NSA). This is a new record low for October.

The previous record low for the month of October was 29 thousand in 1981; the record high was 105 thousand in October 2005.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

This graph shows the MBA Purchase Index and four week moving average since 1990.

Even with the increase in applications (seasonally adjusted), the four-week moving average of the purchase index is about 22% below the levels of April 2010.

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

Freddie Hikes Mortgage Fees .25 Points; Fed Report shows Mortgage Borrowers Deleverage; Mortgage Spreads Highest in Year
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

US Foreclosure Inventories 7.4 Times Normal and Rising; In OZ 'Low-Doc' Home Owners Hit by Rising Rates; US vs. Australia Progression of Rot
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

The Two-Party Oligarchy Vs. The People
http://ampedstatus.com/the-two-party-ol ... the-people

29 Consecutive Equity Mutual Fund Outflows
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/29-con ... d-outflows

Median New Home Price Drops To Lowest Since Start Of Depression
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/median ... depression

Durable Goods Massacre: Plunge To -3.3% From A Revised 5.0% On Expectations Of 0.1%, Inventories Grow For 10 Consecutive Months
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/durabl ... nsecutive-

Durable Goods Orders fell sharply in October from last month’s report on September. If you remember, that was spiked higher by a surge in aircraft orders. Well, not this month. The prior report was +3.3%, this report was looking for -.1%, but the actual came in at -3.3%:

Highlights
While the consumer sector looks good today from personal income and jobless claims, manufacturing has taken a step back. Durables orders in October fell 3.3, following a 5.0 spike the month before. The October figure came in notably below the median market forecast for a 0.1 percent decline. Weakness was broad based but led by transportation. Excluding transportation, durables declined 2.7 percent after rising 1.3 percent in September.

By major industries, transportation fell 5.2 percent in October after surging 16.5 percent the month before. The drop was mainly in defense aircraft but nondefense aircraft and also motor vehicles orders eased. Other industries generally declined but mostly after a moderate gain in September.

Orders for equipment investment are showing notable volatility. Nondefense capital goods orders excluding aircraft in October declined 4.5 percent after rising 1.9 percent the previous month. Shipments for this series slipped 1.5 percent, following a 1.0 percent gain in September.

Today's durables report is a disappointment but should be viewed in the context of being one of the most volatile monthly series for a major indicator produced by the government. Also, a weaker dollar points to likely improvement ahead for durables orders and manufacturing.

What a joke! “One of the most volatile monthly series…” Didn’t used to be. Nice to see them admit that this data (and all data based upon measuring in dollars) is influenced by the direction of the dollar. When the dollar falls, it has the ILLUSION of increasing everything – growth in sales, growth in imports and exports, growth in GDP… but when that is from a falling dollar, it is not real. Well, guess what, the dollar is way UP for the month of November, not down, so these figures may not be coming in as good as thought over the next few months. Fourth Quarter GDP, how’s that going to look with a rising dollar? What would Q3 have been had the dollar not been plunging during that timeframe? Guess what, it can’t fall forever.

Meanwhile Personal Income and Expenditures are also bending reality. A 4.1% year over year increase in income? I highly doubt it:

Highlights
The consumer is making a moderately strong comeback in October in both income and spending. Meanwhile, core inflation is subdued and still too low for Fed comfort. Personal income in October posted a healthy 0.5 percent gain, following no change in September. Income growth topped analysts' forecast for 0.4 percent increase. Importantly, the wages & salaries component jumped 0.6 percent, following a 0.1 percent improvement the month before.

Household spending also showed strength. Personal consumption expenditures rose 0.4 percent, following a 0.3 percent increase in September. For the latest month, strength was led by a 1.9 percent monthly spike in durables. Nondurables advanced 0.8 percent while services edged up 0.1 percent.

Year on year, personal income for October came in at up 4.1 percent, compared to 3.7 percent in September. PCEs growth slipped to 3.6 percent in October from 3.8 percent in September.
PCE inflation nudged up at the headline level but the core remained anemic. The PCE price index increased 0.2 percent in October, following a 0.1 percent uptick in September. The core rate was flat for the second month in row. On a year-ago basis, the headline number in October was 1.3 percent, down from 1.4 percent in September. Meanwhile the core was 0.9 percent, down from 1.2 percent the prior month.

Relative to typical recoveries, the rebound in income in income and spending is still sub-par but at least we are seeing some strengthening. Retailers and policy makers should be happy that the trend is up.

Again, all these figures are measured in dollars which were falling in value ahead of and during this timeframe. Furthermore I simply do not believe the supposed increases in income and there is likely tampering with that data by using a working population size that is shrinking – the same distortion used by the BLS to artificially lower the unemployment rate. Despite a growing population, they claim the size of the workforce is shrinking considerably.

And speaking of fudging the numbers – something that I am sick of having to report – the Weekly Jobless Claims came in at 407,000, a drop of 32,000 from last week’s reported 439k (revised higher of course). The problem with this drop? IT DIDN’T HAPPEN! When we look at the unadjusted numbers, they ROSE by 52,490! In the DOL’s own words, “The advance number of actual initial claims under state programs, unadjusted, totaled 462,027 in the week ending Nov. 20, an increase of 52,490 from the previous week.”

And here’s more on the unadjusted data, “The advance unadjusted insured unemployment rate was 3.1 percent during the week ending Nov. 13, an increase of 0.1 percentage point from the prior week. The advance unadjusted number for persons claiming UI benefits in state programs totaled 3,839,033, an increase of 103,105 from the preceding week.” My, that’s a lot of increases for a week that reported a large decrease.

And there you have it. I can see the news headlines already, “BIG DROP in unemployment claims shows you should go out and spend, spend, spend like a drunken sailor in front of Christmas because never ending growth is what Christmas is all about!”

Last week’s data was similarly fudged with the unadjusted figures way higher while the adjusted and reported number was way lower.

Again, I will remind everyone that readings above 350k are job losing weeks – we have been losing jobs despite a growing population for a very extended time – sad, but manipulation of the data like this is not sad, it is sick.

North Korea says they are on the brink of war. Does the market have a global conflict priced in? Oh, that’s right, war is a profit center for the oligarchs who manufacture our money and own the military industrial complex. Must keep growth going at any cost?

The “other” events worry me far more than market events. That’s because history shows repeatedly that those other events follow economic upheaval. Right now we’re seeing lies and manipulation. We’re seeing a public that is being conditioned and repressed. I don’t like being lied to and I don’t like the general sense I’m getting…

http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... 4-opt.html

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 24th, 2010, 7:15 pm

A little Thanksgiving humor...
http://economicedge.blogspot.com/2010/1 ... hread.html

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 26th, 2010, 11:32 am

The Franklin Cover-up
http://www.whale.to/b/franklin.html

http://www.prisonplanet.com/articles/ju ... decamp.htm

http://educate-yourself.org/cn/franklin ... erpt.shtml

http://www.amazon.com/Franklin-Cover-Up ... 0963215809

Jason · Post by **Jason** » November 26th, 2010, 4:43 pm

List of Problem Banks Grows Despite Solid Net Income
http://www.cnbc.com/id/40335296

2010-11-17 Foreclosure Hearing.mp4
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EjTZOeka ... r_embedded

Loss Given Default: From Madrid to Los Angeles Foreclosures Set to Crest in 2011-2012
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/loss-g ... -2011-2012

China's Economic Treadmill to Hell; Shadow Over Asia; What happen WHEN China Slows?
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot. ... nalysis%29

Accelerated Timetable for Ireland Bailout Details
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2010/ ... ed+Risk%29

A Majority Of Americans Believe The US Government No Longer Operates Within The Constitution
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/majori ... nstitution

Possible 400 Dead as UK Government Betrays Parents to Push Six Vaccines in One Day
http://vactruth.com/2010/11/24/possible ... n-one-day/

North Korea Warns South Korea That It May Launch Additional Attacks
http://themostimportantnews.com/archive ... al-attacks

Pentagon flexes muscles in Korea: US Threatens China and North Korea
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php? ... leId=22122

Putin proposes Russia-EU union
http://euobserver.com/9/31361

Syrian FM warns of war with Israel
http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340 ... 11,00.html

CHINA TELLS AMERICA: Turn Around The USS George Washington
http://www.businessinsider.com/china-us ... ll-2010-11

Is the dollar terminal?

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