Putin

Does anyone in the MSM understand what it means to run the KGB for years?

Anyone?  This isn't some piker we are dealing with.

Putin was a player long before anyone knew the pot-head from Harvard who became President was and Putin will be a player long after Obama is retired to a golf course in Hawaii and forgotten.

I say we leave the land of sand pronto.

It's only about oil after all.  

Federal Reserve Bank of the United States of America

I wouldn't allow these clueless bums to run my kids lemonade stand let alone fiddle with interest rates in what is known as the United States of America.

They know not what they are doing.

Socializing losses, privatizing profits and letting the 1% run roughshod.  For how many years?

Between the Congress critters, the lame brains at the Fed and the clueless Senate what on earth have we become? 

And now we have to listen to the greatest nacissist of all time run for President.

I will sit back and take it all in.  It's better than HS football.    Blue label anyone? 

Boehner

John Boehner, the Orange man, is shutting down the tanning bed for good.

I think he must have hit his head against the DEBT CEILING!

A true poster boy for GOP dysfunction.

Lesson in Government

THE FOOD STAMP PROGRAM IS ADMINISTERED BY THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. THEY PROUDLY REPORT THAT "THEY DISTRIBUTE FREE MEALS AND FOOD STAMPS TO OVER 46 MILLION PEOPLE ON AN ANNUAL BASIS." 

MEANWHILE, THE NATIONAL PARK SERVICE, RUN BY THE U.S. DEPARTMENT OF THE INTERIOR, ASKS US "PLEASE DO NOT FEED THE ANIMALS".  THEIR STATED REASON FOR THIS POLICY BEING THAT  "THE ANIMALS WILL GROW DEPENDENT ON THE HANDOUTS AND THEN THEY WILL NEVER LEARN TO TAKE CARE OF THEMSELVES."

 

Bears don't vote. 

 

Life is about incentives.

 

Here, BUTTER UP your INFLATION!

Butter prices hit $3.10 per pound today in Chicago trading, a record high.

Just leave the Democrats in charge..........

You know it's bad when you log on and see that "Chicago 53 shootings" is trending on the internet.  Obama has time to worry about things like in Texas when a Muslim kid brings a clock to school that looks like a bomb but he turns a blind eye to Chicago every weekend.

Eight people were killed at at least 45 were wounded in Chicago between Friday evening and early this morning making it the second most violent weekend in Chicago this year.

Forty or more where shot every weekend from late July to late August.  Stunning huh?

Since March, the number of gunshot victims has reached double digits every single weekend and since April, the number has always been 25 or more.

This weekends shootings bring the total for 2015 to at least 2,213.  Dam, that is alot of ammo and an increase of more than 350 over last year.  So far, 365 have died.

If you have ever shot a pistol you will understand how many people have to get shot AT to have hit 53 (thank God only 8 died out of the 53).  

Just imagine how many shots were taken by these thugs to hit 53 over the weekend.

War zones are alive and well in America.

Inflation and the FED

Change you can believe in!   With 100,000 low IQ (probably very similiar to Crossville TN) migrants coming to fix things in America there is room for "growth"!  This FED is all about big money, big banks, big jobs, big bags of wind, big expense vouchers, big salaries, big waste, big gobs of narcissism.   When President Teleprompter calls Janet to let her know to keep rates unchanged to guarantee her a big time job in government down the road you know all is not well.

Inflation in America is up how much according to government economists?

Despite soaring food, utilities and healthcare costs to say nothing about housing is  making the American SCAM-O-METER hit new highs daily.    

Atlanta Feds Lockhart...............

Why does the media take such bullshit artists like Dennis Lockhart  seriously?

Borrowing and reckless spending is modeled by our bloated government.  They know that austerity now equals a crash.  There is NO WAY BACK.  When the Fed raises, it comes apart.

The game is about over.

 

Be very careful when you speak to your children!

My wife hosted a dinner party for all our friends, some of whom we hadn't seen for ages, and everyone was encouraged to bring their children along as well. 

All throughout dinner my wife's best friend's four-year-old daughter stared at me as I sat opposite her. The girl could hardly eat her food for staring. 
 

I checked my shirt for spots, felt my face for food, and patted my hair in place; but nothing stopped her from staring at me. I tried my best to just ignore her, but finally it was too much for me. 
 

I asked her, "Why are you staring at me?" 

Everyone at the table had noticed her behavior, and the table went quiet, waiting for her response. 

The little girl said, "I'm just waiting to see how you drink like a fish." 

GOP debate last night...........

I don't have a clue who "won" last night but I can tell you who lost.  Ben Carson got taken to the woodshed and the American people lost big.

Is this really the best group of Presidential hopefuls in a country of 320,000,000? 

I weep for our future.  So should you.

As an investment manager I thought it rather lame that  QE, ZIRP, federal debt, global debt, corporate debt, debt funded stock buy-backs, deflation, inflation, crude prices (after all what are middle eastern wars being fought for?), commodity prices and global trade crashing were topics that were NOT addressed.  Amazing isn't it?  Think about it.  $19 trillion in the hole and not a shred of discussion.  Winning!!!    Bend over America!

Aren't you glad we could listen to the gay marriage debate and  discuss who should be on the $10 bill?  Jeb Bush have a MJ buzzkill going with that Margaret Thatcher response regarding the $10 bill?  What the hell is up with that Jeb?   Get off the pipe pal, geesh.........

Nobody in America gives a shit about who is on the $10 bill.  Nobody.  NO ONE!

What a circus!

Who makes it to President?

Hopefully ANYONE who is not an attorney or a professional politician.

About that fabled Morgan Stanley research.........

Seven years ago today, Lehman Brothers failed. But it is what took place just over two weeks prior that is of interest for the scope of this article.

On August 27, less than 20 days before the failure of Lehman, Morgan Stanley analyst Patrick Pinschmidt revised his forecast on Lehman's Q3 earnings from an 8 cent profit to a Q3 loss of $2.80 a share.

Patrick cautioned: "For the franchise and shares to turn the corner, we think management needs to announce a significant bulk asset sale or framework for investors to evaluate the structure or pricing of likely asset disposals."

Also he wasn't very far off when he said that "we believe a key question for investors is not the size of the writedown, but how remaining illiquid asset exposure squares with capital cushion."

And yet, despite his clear concerns about the longevity of Lehman, did the then-Morgan Stanley analyst cut his rating on Lehman? As Reuters reminds us, the answer was a resounding no:

"The analyst maintained his "overweight" rating on shares of Lehman and Goldman."

One month later Lehman did not exist, and Goldman would have followed into the abyss had it not been bailed out first by Buffett and then by the FDIC and the Fed.

Why is this episode relevant? After all virtually everyone was saying Lehman is fine and that there is no risk for the longevity of the bank, at least until the very end, when it was revealed that Goldman's alumnus at the US Treasury had decided to sacrifice Lehman (in the process eliminating Goldman's biggest fixed income trading competitor).

Patrick Pinschmidt is now one of the top-placed people in charge of the US Treasury's FSOC. Yes, the same person who 2 weeks before Lehman failed, had an "overweight" rating on the Lehman stock, is not in charge of financial stability.

Is there any doubt why nobody has any faith that without the perpetual backing of the central money printer, US capital markets can no longer exist?

Listening to Hillary Clinton campaign on TV

.....reminds me of when I had a bad case of hemorrhoids.........the pain just won't go away.........

the class warfare, the bullshit,  the promises,  the war on women,  ad nauseum...........

would somebody just whack that criminal syndicate sooner rather than later?

I swear America needs muck boots to listen to this nag............. and to think she is wanting to take the place of a President who was supposedly a professor of constitutional law.

GMAFB.......

Just a matter of time boys and girls...........

Coming to a shore near you.  Europe's refugee crisis is getting worse by the day. Less than 24 hours after Germany announced it would impose border controls with Austria, followed promptly by the Czech Republic, Slovenia and now the Netherlands, German vice chancellor Sigmar Gabriel predicted that as many as 1 million refugees may arrive by the end of the year as other nations moved to fortify their frontiers. In the meantime, however, Europe is dramatically escalating measures to halt the influx and as AFP reported earlier today, the European Union has now approved military action against human traffickers in the Mediterranean Sea.

Peyton Barber, Auburn running back

Five very short years ago I had the opportunity to watch Peyton Barber as a Junior in high school when he played for the Milton Georgia high school program.  My son, Jordan Parisian, was in his first year at Milton playing football as a freshman and it was Coach DeCristofaro's first year in bringing the Milton program up to where it needed to be.  Coach D got the Milton players to buy into the hard work year 'round.  The off-season weight training was special.

It took me all of about 3 plays watching the fall practice to see this Barber kid was special.  It took watching him about 6 plays to see he was going to be a hell of a college running back.  It took a game to see that he could play at whatever college he wanted whether he was recruited or not. 

In football, cream still rises to the top.

I can't believe it took Peyton this long to garner a starting spot but hey, the Auburn coaches finally figured it out.

They couldn't have a better running back and person on the field to represent their University.

What a nice young man.  Humble, hard-working and gifted with the ball.

I hope he signs a massive professional contract some day.  The kid is a winner.

10,000 Syrians headed to America.......

How do you define a country?

Borders, language and culture.

Refugees flooding Europe,  Europe will disappear as we know it.

Why must America be invaded from within?

Met some interesting people today. It takes all kinds.

Don't judge the majority by yourself or those you associate with.

To quote Carlin, “Just think of how stupid the average person is, and then realize half of them are even stupider!” 

We didn't get to this point via an intelligent voting public.

Perfect summation of Native American higher education today............

Dr. Dean Chavers is director of Catching the Dream, a national scholarship program for Native college students. He invites students to contact him at CTD4DeanChavers@aol.com. They do not have enough applicants.

 

Indian Country, Your weekend primer on INFLATION

Happy Labor Day to one and all............

Submitted by Simon Black via SovereignMan.com,

In an article that first appeared in Fortune magazine on December 10, 2001, Warren Buffett penned a great letter about falling prices:

“When hamburgers go down in price, we sing the ‘Hallelujah Chorus’ in the Buffett household. When hamburgers go up in price, we weep. For most people, it’s the same with everything in life they will be buying– except stocks. When stocks go down and you can get more for your money, people don’t like them anymore.”

He’s right. Any rational human being actually LIKES falling prices.

We enjoy getting a great deal, and we like it when our money goes further.

To Buffett’s point, investors are a major exception and prefer investing when prices go up, i.e. their money buys less of a high quality asset.

But there’s one more giant exception that Buffett didn’t mention: economists.

Economists quiver in fear at the prospect of falling prices.

They call it ‘deflation’, and it’s a force so dreaded that central bankers have threatened to drop bricks of cash from helicopters in order to prevent it.

Instead, economists prefer INFLATION, i.e. that the things you buy become more expensive.

We can look at official statistics to get a sense of inflation, but these numbers are totally meaningless.

When I was a kid, my father earned enough money to support his family with a single salary.

We had a house, a car, an occasional vacation, and we never missed a meal. All on one income.

But those days are long gone. Now it’s almost obligatory to live in a dual-income household just to make ends meet.

The official statistics never paint this picture.

They focus on some palatable number, telling us the inflation rate is 2%, and then adjust their computational methods to derive that figure.

In fact, the US federal government has changed the way it calculates inflation at least twenty times since the mid 1980s.

And it’s obvious that they have a huge incentive to do so.

The #1 expense of the federal government today is the mandatory entitlement programs that are paid out to seniors in the US– primarily Social Security.

It’s nearing $1 trillion annually and eats up a third of all tax revenue.

The government is required by law to increase the amount of money paid to Social Security recipients each year through what’s called a COLA, or cost of living adjustment.

Essentially they’re adjusting your monthly Social Security payment to keep up with inflation. Or at least, the inflation that they’re willing to admit.

This is where they have a huge incentive to fudge the numbers.

If the real rate of inflation is 5%, but they only give a 2% COLA, the government saves 3%. That’s almost $30 billion.

(Ironically this is 3x the size of the annual budget for the Department of Labor, which is responsible for calculating the inflation statistics.)

But by doing this the government is effectively stealing from seniors.

There’s actually been a new law proposed in Congress to prevent this from happening anymore.

It’s known as HR 3074, and it was written “for the purpose of establishing an accurate Social Security COLA. . .”

So even the government admits that their inflation numbers are a bunch of baloney.

But sadly, according to the legislative watchdog GovTrack.us, this bill has a 0% chance of being passed. So I wouldn’t expect a solution anytime soon.

In fact, this problem will likely get worse given how transfixed economists are on the deflation threat.

Their concern is that the Chinese economic slowdown and currency devaluation will cause a wave of falling prices around the world.

But there’s a very curious effect at work here that most people forget:

It’s entirely possible (and now very likely) to have BOTH inflation AND deflation. At the same time.

Assets and investments can fall, while at the same time the prices of retail goods and services rise.

In other words, the value of your investment portfolio goes down, but your grocery bill goes up.

It’s also important to point out that not all prices rise and fall equally.

Gas prices may be down from a year ago in the US. But as the recently-released Hotels.com Hotel Price Index shows, hotel prices are up sharply.

Salt Lake City: 8%. Raleigh: 5%. Portland: 9%. Washington DC: 5%. Los Angeles: 8%.

I’ve seen the effects of this dual inflation/deflation phenomenon as I’ve traveled around the world in places like Argentina, Greece, and Indonesia.

It is a very real threat. And it may now be coming to US shores.

But everyone is focused exclusively on the deflation side.

You’ll get laughed at in financial circles if you mention the word ‘inflation’ anymore. It’s being completely ignored… even denied.

They’re pretending like half the problem doesn’t even exist, which is seriously foolish.

Inflation is a long-term disease. Quarter by quarter the numbers may change. But over the long run it’s like a cancer, slowly eating away at your lifestyle.

It’s not a question of either/or. It’s not a debate over inflation VS. deflation.It’s only a matter of WHEN we’ll end up with BOTH. And how well you’re prepared for it.

U.S. Iran Treaty

The spineless gutless Senate of the United States doesn't attempt to stop this deal.

Fully bought and paid for.

100 losers. 

From Joe Saluzzi, institutional broker at THEMIS TRADING

Below is a letter that we think the stock exchanges should be sending to investors:

Dear Investors,

The last few weeks have exposed that our equity markets are not as liquid as we have long claimed mainly due to market fragmentation and the lack of diverse liquidity pools.

Mini flash crashes and larger events like the ETF flash crash of August 24th are proof that our current stock exchange model which has formed in the wake of Reg NMS has been a failure.  High speed traders have been able to game this model largely with our assistance.  We have developed a two tier market and have given special advantages to those that are willing to pay for services like colocation, private gateways and proprietary data feeds.  We have also given out billions of dollars in rebates over the past few years to entice more high speed volume.  Essentially, we have courted speed at the expense of price discovery.

The rise of dark pools is another sign that our model has failed. Institutional investors who have sought alternatives to our visible markets (which have become infested with predators looking for any signal to pick off an institutional or even retail order) have been led into a much murkier and even more predatory market.   Recent record setting, multi-million dollar fines against brokers and banks who run these dark pools have proven that they are far from the safe alternative.

The August 24th ETF flash crash was a dramatic liquidity event that shocked many investors.  Unfortunately, we’ll continue to have these type of events until regulators realize that we have a market design problem.  On August 24th, there were numerous trades which received inferior prices and were not broken.  Most likely many of these were caused by market orders that might have been activated by stop-loss orders placed by retail investors.  Since most brokers didn’t file a clearly erroneous trade report within thirty minutes of the trade, many investors were stuck with fills that were far away from the implied value of the ETF.  We didn’t break any of these trades because we didn’t know where to draw the line like we arbitrarily did after the May 6, 2010 Flash Crash. We also didn’t want to leave our market makers with a one sided position that was unhedged.  Sorry about that.

We think many of today’s market structure problems were actually caused by poorly designed regulations, most notably Reg NMS.  Prior to Reg NMS, the NYSE relied on specialists to provide a fair and orderly market in return for the right to have a franchise for a particular stock at the exchange.  Reg NMS made this model obsolete and a new competing DMM model was developed. This DMM model does not rely on customer orders and has very few obligations leaving the market vulnerable in times of stress.  To make matters worse, on the recent volatile days of the past few weeks, the NYSE has chosen to invoke Rule 48 since they do not have enough employees to effectively handle the opening process which is one of their most important functions.

Signs of stress are also building within our own stock exchange community.  Just like when the SIP crashed a few years ago, we in the exchange community are once again pointing fingers at each other.  Chris Conacannon, CEO of BATS, is not a fan of the quasi-human model that NYSE employs and told the WSJ  that “NYSE Group’s process for opening trading on stocks listed at the exchange was “broken” and that major changes needed to be made to protect investors from future problems.  He said:

“No one on the planet operates that way, and no one should operate that way,” he said in an interview, adding that he sees “very limited value” in the use of humans on the trading floor. 

NYSE shot back and reminded everybody that BATS couldn’t even trade their own IPO:

“As BATS experienced with its IPO, relying exclusively on technology for opening stocks and IPOs can have disastrous consequences,” she said, referring to BATS’ decision to cancel its IPO in 2012 because of a glitch in its trading system.”

So what do we do now?  We’re really not sure.  We’ve already tried the “Grand Bargain” but that seems to be a bust now since so many dark pools are being fined by the SEC.  We doubt the regulators are going to help much since, to borrow a phrase from Bloomberg’s Mike Regan, they are more akin to “mall cops on Segways trying to chase after high speed Maserati’s”.  We wish we could offer an alternative but our short-term, for-profit model leads us to support the status quo.

In the meantime, try not to enter any market orders and be sure to file that clearly erroneous trade report within 30 minutes of the next liquidity event.

Sincerely,

The Stock Exchanges

Gutless Republican Alert...........

You fat cats need to figure out what you're going to do about these classified Clinton emails on her private server.  Are you going to hold Clinton accountable or not? 

How are you going to explain to the public that she is above the law?

America wants to know. 

Bend Over America and Pony Up

Total Cost of Wars Since 2001

 

Every hour, taxpayers in United States are paying $8.36 million for Total Cost of Wars' Since 2001.

$1,636,507,355,079

https://www.nationalpriorities.org/cost-of/war/