"Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it" -Winston Churchill, George Santayana among many others- There is an economic catastrophe that is coming our way. We are facing a depression, and those in the halls of power and the media are either too scared, too incompetent, or too selfish to let the people really know about it until it's too late. Yes, this problem is in part caused by the subprime housing bust but only in part and it goes much deeper than that.&...
With all this talk of faux-environmentalism (carbon credits being one of the worst offenders) Here's a step in the right direction- the Tesla Roadster. 100% electric, 0-60 in 4 seconds, approx 220 miles per charge, zero emmisions. Doesn't look half bad either. Unfortunately it's a tad expensive for someone of my modest means ( $ 98,000.0!) But what's important is that the technology is there. It is feasible, and it is marketable. Admittedly not too many people will be able to afford a 98K c...
During my travels throughout north America I've come to a rather depressing conclusion. Before I share it with you, a disclaimer; I lay no claim to being a well seasoned traveller or any such nonsense, nor have I visited every single state or lived for a prolonged period in any of the places I have visited. So you are well within your rights to call me an uninformed know-it-all gasbag and I won't take offense. So what is this dastardly scheme I have stumbled across? Everywhere I've ...
So now restaurants in New York have to post the calorie counts of the food they're selling. As of friday, if they don't post these counts, they face a $ 2,000.0 fine. While many folks cry foul on the part of the evil government interfering with private business, I personally think this is absolutely wonderful! Why? Because as a consumer, you should have the RIGHT to know what you're getting, especially when you're consuming it. Food isn't some consumer bauble that you buy for kicks, you ...
Chrysler's closing another auto plant. This time, the St. Louis South Plant which makes minivans is shutting down for good. In the fall, the St. Louis North Plant which makes pickup trucks is cutting back from 2 shifts to 1. As I've droned on about before, this is not a unique situation. All of the big autos are going through a major downturn and it's not going to get any better with the cost of gas. The recent announcement from Chrysler will cut about 2400 jobs. Plants in Ohio and Delaw...
It's been 19 years since the Exxon Valdez struck the Bligh Reef and spilled over 11 million gallons of crude oil into Prince William Sound. This devastated the marine ecology in the area, killed many local fisheries industries, and caused a disruption in the foodchain that many estimate will still take decades to recover in some areas. In 1994 a federal court ordered Exxon to pay approx 5 billion in damages to 30,000 fishermen, natives and local businesses that suffered&n...
Sunday night, 8 pm. I've gotta couple of free hours to fart around. Girlfriend's sick and doped up on anti-histamines on the couch, watching her shows (well only sort of watching as she's drifting in and outta la-la land) So I figure I'm gonna do something I haven't done in a looooong time. I'm gonna nerd it up and play some computer games! Back in January I got a new PC. Nothing fancy, an off the shelf deal that's got better processor, memory, RAM, video card than my old ri...
Well folks, it looks like things are going to get a whole lot worse before they start getting any better- Today the largest corporate loss in U.S history was reported by AIG. In 4th quarter of 2008 (that's only three months!) they lost over 62 billion dollars. The Dow Jones dropped below 7000 today. In just a little over a year it has lost more than 50% of it's value. Big corp. USA stocks appear to be in a race to the bottom with Citigroup and Bank of America stocks in...
We've all heard an endless amount of rhetoric about the economy. An infininite number of well-paid pompous talking heads have poured forth from the media machine to pontificate, analyze, scold, and explain to us the sheeple about why exactly it is that we're being kicked in the teeth, and why exactly it's really all our fault. "Gol' dang poor people borrowed more money than they could from the well to do banks and now everything's in the crapper because of it" At least that...
Methinks '09 is going to be a terrible year for the economy. Recent items of interest in the news: Circuit City has officially gone tits up. They're closing all their stores and firing all 30,000 employees lock stock and barrel. No restructuring, or re-branding or what have you. Just going out of business, remember to get the lights and don't let the door hit your ass on the way out. On the plus side, since it's a complete liquidation I'm sure some of the newly unemployed will manage to swi...
"Banking institutions are more dangerous to our liberties than standing armies" (Thomas Jefferson) "The TARP is the most expensive boondoggle in history. No one even knows what the banks are doing with the money. There's neither accountability nor transparency. As a result, investor confidence has deteriorated and stocks have continued to fall. No one trusts Paulson to do the right thing anymore; it's that simple." (Mike Whitney) There's a funny lesson most folks learn at some point...
Let's do a quick summary of how the 'bailout' situation is unfolding: Back in October Hank Paulson, Ben Bernanke and Greenberg put a gun to congress head and said "give us 700 billion now or the economy dies!!!! Don't think about it, we're only a few days away from the acopalypse, do it, do it now you idiots!!!" (imagine an Arnold Schwarzeneger accent for extra emphasis) We do seem to buy that 'end of the world' bait hook, line and sinker everytime don't we? The last time...
Let's take a quick look at the day in recap; Circuit City filed for bankruptcy, with guaranteed massive job losses on the way.... HAW HAW!!!! DHL is cutting 9,500 jobs in the U.S.... HAW HAW!!!!! GM is burning through cash and anounced today 5000 more cuts.... HAW HAW!!!! Nortel..... HAW HAW!!!! Sorry, had to get that out of the way first... Nortel is cutting 1200 more jobs Motorola recently anounced 3,000 job cuts... HAW HAW!!!! Fannie May posted a 29 ...
The CEO of a capital management company in L.A is quitting his job. He's walking away with a ton of money (made legitimately, and his company is doing fine) but he's decided he's made his coin and it's time to go. He sent a farewell letter that you've gotta read- http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2008/oct/18/banking-useconomy And I quote; "The boss of a successful US hedge fund has quit the industry with an extraordinary farewell letter dismissing his ...
The Deep Water Horizon catastrophe is a clear-cut case of criminal negligence on the part of BP, Haliburton and Transocean. All 3 companies are responsible and so is the U.S government for years of lax enforcement of regulations. But this disaster goes far, far beyond that- the manner in which it happened and more importantly, our reaction to it is a damning indictment of our entire civilization. Let's go over a few details surrounding the accident and why this serves as a microcosm...