02/22/2012

Goldman Sachs Rules The World | Economic Crisis Like A Cancer

09/27/2011 By

goldman sachs rules the worldLondon-based independent trader named Alessio Rastani told the BBC on Monday that we need to get ready for a crash in a very frank interview that went viral.

His most startling statement came when he was asked about the latest government efforts to strengthen the Eurozone

“Governments don’t rule the world, Goldman Sachs rules the world.”

His timeframe for a crash?

“In less than 12 months we’ll see a crash.”

His prediction?

“The savings of millions of people will vanish.”

See the interview below:

Rastani’s advice for all of us?

  • Get prepared and act now
  • Protect your assets, don’t fall into wishful thinking
  • Learn how to make money in a falling market
  • The biggest risk people can take right now is not acting

 

 

Filed Under: Business Tagged With: , , ,

Obama Dines With Sheryl Sandberg At $35,800 A Plate | Let Them Eat Spam

09/26/2011 By

Obama Let them eat spamIn a world where Politicians continue to lose touch with reality, President Obama attended a fundraising dinner yesterday at the home of Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg where donors got to dine with the President for $35,800 a plate. Oh yeah, they also got to see Lady Gaga.

I would bet this is not your typical Sunday evening event for most Americans. In fact, I don’t think the unemployed factory worker in Ohio, the unemployed teacher from Florida. or the unemployed computer programmer in California gets invited to attend these type of dinners.

I also don’t believe the dinner conversation had anything to do with helping any of them. They probably didn’t dwell on the fact that the unemployment rate is presently at 9.1% in Ohio, 10.7% in Florida, and 12.1% in California. Too depressing for an upbeat fundraiser.

This whole Sandberg affair reminds me of the famous quotation attributed to Queen Marie Antoinette upon learning that the peasants didn’t have enough to eat. “Let them eat cake,” she replied. The irony of that quote was that she really said “let them eat brioche” not knowing that peasants ate less expensive, plain bread.

At $35,800 a plate, I doubt if President Obama or his friends know what we have to eat everyday.

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , , , ,

Obamacare Appears Headed For Supreme Court

09/26/2011 By

supreme courtIt looks like it will come down to the Supremes as Obamacare appears headed for the Supreme Court.

The Obama administration chose not to ask the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals to re-hear a pivotal health reform case Monday, signaling that it’s going to ask the Supreme Court to decide whether President Barack Obama’s health reform law is constitutional.

The Justice Department is expected to ask the court to overturn an August decision by a panel of three judges in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals that found the law’s requirement to buy insurance is unconstitutional. The suit was brought by 26 states, the National Federation of Independent Business, and several individuals.

It will be interesting to see if the Supreme Court picks up the case (most likely it will). This means the Court would likely hear the case in its 2011-2012 session, or right in the middle of the next Presidential campaign.
This poses significant risk to both parties, but should provide us with lots of soulful entertainment.
Filed Under: Health Tagged With: , ,

Einstein Rules – Don’t Bet On The Neutrino

09/26/2011 By

albert einsteinYou may have heard the news that the latest experiments at the largest particle accelerator in the world, based at CERN, outside Geneva have indicated that Einstein’s General Theory Of Relativity may be wrong.

Scientists at CERN fired a beam of neutrinos from Switzerland to Italy, a distance of 454 miles. Much to their surprise, after studying 15,000 neutrinos, they found that they traveled faster than the speed of light (over 60 nanoseconds faster!), something not allowed by Einstein’s theory.

So what does it mean? If proven correct, this means that Einstein’s theory is wrong and physicists have to go back to the drawing board and modify it to account for the neutrino’s speed. Today, modern physics is based on two theories, relativity and the quantum theory, so half of modern physics would have to be replaced by a new theory.

Its important to point out, however, that challenges to Einstein’s theory occur every few years and have always been proven wrong. The truth is that people measuring unfathomably small particles traveling over 450 miles, and arriving 60 billionths of a second faster than they should, tend to make errors.

Albert Einstein’s work is incomplete (he wanted one theory that explained everything) but I doubt it is incorrect. In the case of the latest CERN discovery, I’d say Einstein rules, don’t bet on the neutrino.

 

 

Filed Under: Technology Tagged With: , ,

Is Rick Perry Dead Or Just A Little Left?

09/23/2011 By

Rick Perry LosesWell, we knew there was something that bothered us about Rick Perry. Maybe he was a little too slick, maybe his chest jutted out a bit too much, or maybe he brought back memories of the worse days of George W.

Yesterday’s debate seems to have solidified something in the minds of voters: Perry leans left. We know he switched parties, but his ideas may be mired in between.

Perry has supported providing discounted in-state tuition at Texas public colleges and universities to children of illegal immigrants. And although we are aware of the human side of issue, we got very disturbed as Perry tried to cement his position by saying, “If you say that we should not educate children who have come into our state for no other reason than they’ve been brought there by no fault of their own, I don’t think you have a heart.”

Excuse me?

How about the thousands of LEGAL school children in Texas and around the country who can’t afford a decent education? Has Rick looked at the recent rise in state funded school tuitions? Does he have any clue as to what is happening to our public universities?

The University of California, Berkeley now has over 30% of its school population coming from outside the US and California Governor Jerry Brown has just signed a similar bill to Perry’s, providing for discounted in-state tuition to children of illegal immigrants. Not only that, of course all of the illegal immigrants children are all eligible for need based scholarships and grants.

Everyone in America has gotten the austerity message except these two left leaning politicians. With funds drying up and programs getting canceled, higher education in America is becoming a dream for the average family. This is the same average who pays for those universities through taxes.

Two year colleges in California are limiting enrollment due to finances and the Board of Regents has floated the idea of doubling tuition over the next few years as a way of paying for the universities.

A better idea

The Chief Executive of the University of California made $783,103 last year and was only 29th on the list of highest paid university executives.

Rick Perry’s U of Texas chief made $750,000 and the U of Texas, Austin chief made $746,738 last year.

Both of these pale in comparison to the top man at Ohio State University who pulled in a whopping $1,323,911 last year.

Of course these numbers are not the whole story as these execs have bonuses, deferred compensation, retirement contributions, car allowances, and even residences.

The full list of university’s President and Provost data can be seen here.

Is Rick Perry dead?

Well, he may not be dead, but he is politically wounded. Maybe he, and the other Presidential candidates, should focus on cutting costs at public institutions as a way of making a university education affordable for every American. That is something the public can rally around.

Take the top 30% of public university wage earners and cut their earnings (salary plus benefits) in half and see what it does for tuition costs and student enrollment.

 

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , , ,

Do You Know Who Your Friends Are?

09/23/2011 By

Pakistan support for terroristsWell, evidently Pakistan does not.

Rumors of Pakistani involvement in terrorist activities have always been widespread, but this week’s activity really brings it to the forefront.

Do not use the lack of American deaths as a measure of seriousness, 16 people died that day  and two days before the attack on the U.S. Embassy, a large truck bomb went off at an American combat outpost, wounding 77 U.S. soldiers. That truck bomb originated in Pakistan.

The insurgents who attacked the U.S. Embassy in Kabul last week were killed but their cell phones left a trail.

The phones had been used to call Pakistani intelligence operatives before and during the assault. This evidence lies behind the charge made by Adm. Mike Mullen, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, that the Haqqani network is a “veritable arm” of Pakistani intelligence, CBS News national security correspondent David Martin reports.

The attack on the U.S. Embassy and NATO’s Afghan headquarters resulted in a 22-hour firefight – with American troops pinned down on roof tops.

What makes this even more remarkable is the defense (read offense) that Pakistani Foreign Minister Hina Rabbani Khar used today.

“We are part of the solution,” Khar told CBS Evening News anchor Scott Pelley. “We are not part of the problem. And if you continue to drive us in the other direction, unfortunately you will not only alienate the government of Pakistan, which is reaching out to you, which has been a worthy ally. I’m more concerned you will [alienate] the 180 million Pakistanis that your government always talks about reaching out to.”

Read more here

Someone ought to explain to Ms. Khar what kind of place Pakistan will be without American support.

At a cost to the American taxpayer of over $2 billion per year in aid to Pakistan, are these really the kind of “friends” we need?

 

 

Filed Under: World News Tagged With: , , ,

Has Facebook Peaked? The Timeline Disaster

09/23/2011 By

mark zuckerberg facebookFacebook introduced Timeline this week because they felt their website wasn’t quite overwhelming enough and that adding more complexity and confusion was in order.

This change represents the difference between having Mark Zuckerberg run a company instead of Steve Jobs. Because you can, doesn’t always mean you do.

Social network giant Facebook has unveiled new changes recently, including your “Timeline,” what CEO Mark Zuckerberg called “the story of your life,” otherwise known as “the return of old photos you thought you had erased of people holding your hair while you puke, which will render you un-hirable for the rest of your life.”

Your new, improved profile will include all your stories and all you apps in a beautifully designed new page. It’s really a sight to behold, especially the part where people are laughing at you on that puking photo.

Needless to say, there are many privacy and logistical questions that people want answered. Seriously, Facebook, how dare you change a free service nobody is forced to use?

Read more here

I think we’re all familiar with Zuckerberg’s vision of Facebook everywhere and everything, but this latest Timeline change makes us a bit nauseous.

What ever happened to the quaint little service that lets me chat with friends and share photos, videos, and more. When did it turn into an FBI investigation.

For those of us concerned with privacy, we see the combination of Facebook and Google as the technological beginnings of a police state.

Did I mentioned I watched the premiere of “Person of Interest” last night?

Filed Under: Technology Tagged With:

Tea Party Republicans Catch Blame For Congressional Impotence

09/23/2011 By

Tea PartyAs another budget deadline approaches, Republicans and Democrats are finding themselves at an impasse as they try and run with “politics as usual.”

On Friday, the Democratic-controlled Senate blocked a Republican House bill that would provide stopgap federal spending, plus aid for people battered by hurricanes, tornadoes and other natural disasters.

The legislation also calls for $1.6 billion in spending cuts to help defray the disaster costs. Let me repeat that, the legislation also calls for $1.6 billion in spending cuts to help defray the disaster costs. In other words, cutting $1.6 billion out of $3.7 trillion (or cutting 0.04% of the budget) being spent this year.

Democratic leaders would have none of it. Television networks buzzed with congressional leaders calling it “Tea Party 2.0″ as well as several other well orchestrated phrases chose to implicate “radical” Republicans.

White House spokesman Jay Carney blamed House Republicans for the deadlock. He said they passed legislation that was certain to die in the Senate, just as they did during last summer’s fight over extending the federal debt limit.

“The fever hasn’t broken,” Carney said. “The behavior that we saw this summer that really repelled Americans continues.”

What Mr. Carney fails to comprehend, and what most Democratic leaders have yet to grasp, is that average Americans were not “repelled” by a group of freshman Republicans trying to get our country to stop spending money that we don’t have. We were relieved.

We were relieved at the attempt to bring sanity to this fiscal mess, but disgusted with both parties’ inability to cut spending. All the finger pointing and name calling will not bode well for any incumbents as we head into elections.

The Democratic strategy of resisting every spending cut and then trying to blame the impass on Republicans will fail, and it will fail miserably.

The Democrats fail to see that the Tea Party is not an extremist fringe group. At its core is sound government and fiscal responsibility. We expect the people that we send to Washington to govern intelligently and responsibly. It appears they cannot.

The politicians need to learn that the Tea Party is not a “radical” minority, they are my father, my mother, my sister, and my brother. They are me, they are you, they are all of us.

Filed Under: Politics Tagged With: , ,

Gold Bugs Beware! Gold Is Broken And is Now In Freefall

09/23/2011 By

gold bullionToday, the price of gold for December delivery dropped $101 an ounce, finishing today at $1,639.80 an ounce.

Many factors are being blamed for this with the latest being the strength of the US dollar.

In case you’re wondering, gold has lost almost 10% of its value over the past two days, even with an pathetic stock market.

We think you’re looking at a classical “run up and crash” scenario with gold. Just look at any 5 year chart and you’ll see the meteoric rise in price, along with a dramatic burst upwards, and then a “pop” as another bubble breaks.

The chart is definitely broken and gold bugs should take care. If they are lucky, they’ll find support in the $1500-$1600 range.

Gold is a hedge, but you can’t eat it. The buyers will dry up as we head into recession 2.0.

If gold breaks through $1500, it could be $900 an ounce in no time.

Filed Under: Business Tagged With: , , ,

Dow Drops 391 Points Ignoring “Operation Twist”

09/22/2011 By

Stock market dropThe Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 391 points today after being down as much as 500 points during the day. I believe this can be seen as a negative vote of confidence on the Fed’s latest move to lower rates on long-term loans. Since the Fed’s announcement, the market has dropped 675 points in 2 days.

The Federal Reserve announced yesterday that, as a way of reducing yields further, they will be selling bonds at the short-end of their portfolio and buying bonds at the long end of their portfolio. In other words, they are “trading” $400 billion dollars of short term debt for long term debt, or taking the long term debt off the market in what has been called “Operation Twist.”

Perhaps “Helicopter” Ben should get his head out of the banks’ backsides and start focusing on a plan with Congressional leaders to create long term jobs.

That is a solution that would be a real twist.


Filed Under: Business Tagged With: ,
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