23 JAN 2010, Saturday

1. Weekend reading list for those so inclined...
2. Get your geek on people and read this lengthy but crucially critical treatise on what we are truly up against...despite the pleasant respite recently enjoyed with the upward stock market rise.  John Mauldin sums it up pretty well.  Basically, too much debt with excess industrial capacity tends to lead to deflation not inflation.  This conclusion is drawn from a historical analysis of previous overleveraged economies around the world throughout time...despite people wanting to claim "this time is different"...the single most dangerous phrase in finance. 
3. The California Gold Rush has officially ended...CA is Broke!  How did they get here?  Due to under-taxing or overspending???  I know where my vote falls.  They really need to face facts and buckle down or...just shut up, quit looking to the taxpayers of other states to bail them out (who have their own budgetary problems) and enjoy their misery.  Oh, one more thought...the US is fast headed in the same direction.  Will we require our leadership to move toward corrective action soon enough to avoid the outlandish consequences?  History says "No" and that they will merely seek a way to kick the can down the road.  At some point, they will find that the can has been filled with cement and they will stub their toes...painfully so!  I hope "This time is different"...the single most overused phrase in the history of mankind.
4. John Stossel does a wonderful recap on President Obama's campaign promises versus the reality of his first year in office.
5. Dayum!  Three down days and the Fed's are already starting their hunt to kill the shorts...again???  When they did it in SEP 08, it just accelerated the downside because the built-in buying to cover shorts had been eliminated.  Will they never learn?  This is really getting old...but perhaps it gives a little insight to what may lay ahead once all the "propping up" is exhausted.
6. One more just to complete the nonsense...Global Warming news flash...scientist who provided claim, to UN Nobel prize winning global warming report, of Himalayan glaciers to be completely melted by 2035 admitted last night that the supporting data was unverified yet the statement was still put in the report to...wait for it..."put political pressure on world leaders."  And the hits keep coming...email-gate, fraudulent computer modeling, tortured data, complete omissions of "inconvenient" data and now this!!?  Enough already!  Time to open full and complete investigations to get to the bottom of this hoax...identify the people involved, prosecute and punish top to bottom...and don't forget the soon to say "we're horrified" political cronies that have been involved in this fraud!
7. Here's a Global Warming Sanity Check: 2008 & 2009 were coolest years since 1998.  Wait a minute, we evil humans have still been doing our carbon thing non-stop so shouldn't the temperature be "hockey sticking" upward unrelentingly?  Al?  Anyone?  Oh yeah another item tucked in there..."Since 1998, according to NCDC’s own figures, temperatures in the US have been dropping at a rate of more than 10 degrees F per century."  Crap!  Prepare to here about the coming ice age next.  Hmmm...perhaps that is why we're hearing the phrase "climate change" now instead of "global warming."
8. Here's a good one...weren't we supposed to be getting more frequent hurricanes???  And how come we had more hurricanes annually long before the "hottest decade in history"???
9. Psst...remember...the debate is over, the science is settled and there is a consensus...about, er, something or other.