OMG...They're Price Gouging!

We've been inundated with stories and reports of the devastation caused by the Frankenstorm, by Sandy, on the east coast.  Specifically, New Jersey and New York were hit pretty hard and experienced the destruction many have already in states farther south and along the Gulf of Mexico.  This storm is called a 'once in a lifetime' event.  The drumbeat of 'global warming' is louder and louder to explain the causes for this seemingly freak event.  But, if one actually engages in research, looking into the past to see any trends, one finds that this is not a real unusual event.  Check out the records for that area in the 1950s and 60s.  We have had a period of a few decades run together of relative calm, and we assumed that was the long-run normal.  Ooops.

Now, to the real cause for my diatribe, the powers that be are up in arms over price gouging.  From rental cars' prices rising almost a 1000% to generator prices, the cry of unfairness reaches our ears from many in the media who actually have finally experienced a hurricane disaster first-hand.  Instead of preying like peeping toms, like prurient vultures upon others in Red States, they claim a special status as 'real' victims, as if their sufferings are worse than those in Mississippi, or South Carolina after their severe hurricane experiences.  Gasoline shortages, public transportation failings, electricity outages affecting millions, all of this the antecedents set in place by those who would do good using the government's powers.  Limiting the generating plants because of environmental concerns (on the absolute edge of marginal benefit compared to the all-too real marginal costs they now know personally) to refineries, that megalopolis of the northeast was living at the edge of capacity in normal times, no excess capacity to carry them in times of need.

Into this fray, storming in like the cavalry come entrepreneurs who have access to semi-trucks and means of conveyance to bring in goods in high demand.  They bring generators, chain saws, food, vehicles, tarps, and other items that are oh so wanted after a tree smashes one's house and car.  These individuals labeled 'jackals' by the media offer their goods at prices well above those found a week ago in stores in the area.  This is so heinous, most of the jurisdictions have passed laws forbidding such increases in prices to a limit of 10% above normal.  The governments have imposed a price ceiling.  Guess what results from price ceilings? Chronic shortages.  People who would voluntarily pay a much higher price than is normal are limited in their options by a do-good gov't who only has their 'best' interests in mind.  Families that would have a generator now do not.  Households that would have lumber and tarps to cover the damage from further incursions of weather, now do not.  Is the beneficent gov't helping them?  Not really.  In fact, that same gov't is hampering recovery efforts in the way FEMA, EPA, OSHA, etc. are regulating each and every aspect of activity.  We wouldn't want an individual to get injured using a chain saw to cut a tree apart that blocks a road, so we prohibit that activity unless done to a strict standard.  (I bet the individual wielding the chain saw doesn't want to be injured either, but he also wants his road open days faster than the gov't would accomplish.  Wanna bet he is a bit careful in his use of the chain saw absent any safety regulations?  To assume otherwise is to assume him an idiot.)

When demand shifts to the right, increasing beyond previous levels, prices rise in market economies.  Price is a data point loaded with so much information for both consumers and suppliers.  When that information is corrupted by a do-good gov't, by a beneficent, paternalistic power, a disjointedness ensues.  We call this chaos, as if the storm did not do enough by itself but requires more 'assistance' by that oh-so-caring organization.  When prices rise, suppliers notice an opportunity to benefit and work in ways they did not before.  Suppliers supply, they take risks and efforts to move demanded goods to the area.  They incur sometimes great costs in these efforts, and must be rewarded above those costs.  (See my other blog post about charitable activity in disaster areas being a totally different thing, in no way opposing the efforts stated here.)  When a gov't limits this reward, guess what?  Families have a much lower standard of living in these transitionary times between before, and after recovery.

Lastly, one must wonder at the justice (oh so hated and reviled in its application now) of a paternalistic government's 'home turf' of fanboys experiencing the real effects of that same nanny-state.

Sometimes, you just have to say...Whattup, Barack?

To quote...

Real average weekly earnings was unchanged over the month due to the decrease in real average hourly earnings combined with a 0.3 percent increase in the average workweek. Since reaching a peak in October 2010, real average weekly earnings hasfallen 1.3 percent.

Nice.

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/realer.nr0.htmBureau of Labor 'Statistics'

Obama, smart guy, eh?

This explains the reason our country may not be what it could be...THE DEMOCRATS ARE STUPID. They schedule a National Convention in North Carolina, and plan on an OUTSIDE ceremony to have Barack Hussein Obama give his speech. Climatology says that North Carolina typically has diurnal (afternoon) thunderstorms or thundershowers this time of year. So...that explains this, too:
The following are 25 horrible statistics about the U.S. economy that Barack Obama does not want you to know....

#1 The percentage of Americans that own homes is dropping rapidly. According to Gallup, the current level of homeownership in the United States is the lowest that Gallup has ever measured.http://www.gallup.com/poll/154124/U.S.-Homeownership-Hits-Decade-Low.aspx

#2 Home prices in the U.S. continue to fall like a rock as well. They have declined for six months in a row and are now down a total of 35 percent from the peak of the housing bubble. The last time that home prices in the United States were this low was back in 2002. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/us-home-prices-drop-6th-130235133.html

#3 Last year, an astounding 53 percent of all U.S. college graduates under the age of 25 were either unemployed or underemployed. http://www.cnbc.com/id/47133762

#4 Back in 2007, about 10 percent of all unemployed Americans had been out of work for 52 weeks or longer. Today, that number is above 30 percent. http://www.financialarmageddon.com/2012/02/one-ugly-picture-a-few-sad-words.html

#5 When Barack Obama first became president, the number of "long-term unemployed workers" in the United States was 2.6 million. Today, it is 5.3 million. http://www.bls.gov/news.release/pdf/empsit.pdf

#6 The average duration of unemployment in the United States is about three times as long as it was back in the year 2000. http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/UEMPMEAN

#7 Despite what the mainstream media would have us to believe, the truth is that the percentage of working age Americans that are employed is not increasing. Back in March 2010, 58.5 percent of all working age Americans were employed. In March 2011, 58.5 percent of all working age Americans were employed. In March 2012, 58.5 percent of all working age Americans were employed. So how can Barack Obama and the mainstream media claim that the employment situation in the United States is getting better? The employment rate is still essentially exactly where it was when the last recession supposedly ended. http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS12300000

#8 Back in 1950, more than 80 percent of all men in the United States had jobs. Today, less than 65 percent of all men in the United States have jobs.http://research.stlouisfed.org/fred2/series/LNS12300001

#9 In 1962, 28 percent of all jobs in America were manufacturing jobs. In 2011, only 9 percent of all jobs in America were manufacturing jobs. http://finance.yahoo.com/news/farewell-u-factories-021022422.html

#10 In some areas of Detroit, Michigan you can buy a three bedroom home for just $500.http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2134705/After-bargain-Own-bedroom-home-Detroit-JUST-500--city-revealed-cheapest-housing-U-S.html?ITO=1490

#11 According to one recent survey, approximately one-third of all Americans are not paying their bills on time at this point. http://heraldnews.suntimes.com/business/11698828-420/one-in-three-americans-paying-bills-late-survey.html

#12 Since Barack Obama entered the White House, the price of gasoline has risen by more than 100 percent. http://www.republican.senate.gov/public/index.cfm/our-view?ID=e33a7a58-66d2-4491-91f6-aae703cdb370

#13 The student loan debt bubble continues to expand at a very frightening pace. Recently it was announced that total student loan debt in the United States has passed the one trillion dollar mark.http://www.consumerfinance.gov/blog/too-big-to-fail-student-debt-hits-a-trillion/

#14 Incredibly, one out of every four jobs in the United States pays $10 an hour or less at this point.http://www.mybudget360.com/low-wage-america-middle-class-incomes-and-employment-fields-income-growth-average-incomes/

#15 Household incomes all over the United States continue to fall. After adjusting for inflation, median household income in America has declined by 7.8 percent since December 2007.http://economy.money.cnn.com/2012/03/06/economy-improves-incomes-dont/

#16 Over the past several decades, government dependence has risen to unprecedented heights in the United States. The following is how I described the explosive growth of social welfare benefits in one recent article.... http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/25-signs-that-middle-class-families-have-been-targeted-for-extinction

Back in 1960, social welfare benefits made up approximately 10 percent of all salaries and wages. In the year 2000, social welfare benefits made up approximately 21 percent of all salaries and wages. Today, social welfare benefits make up approximately 35 percent of all salaries and wages.http://www.fns.usda.gov/pd/34snapmonthly.htm

#17 In November 2008, 30.8 million Americans were on food stamps. Today, more than 46 million Americans are on food stamps. http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/45-signs-that-america-will-soon-be-a-nation-with-a-very-tiny-elite-and-the-rest-of-us-will-be-poor

#18 Right now, more than 25 percent of all American children are on food stamps.http://news.investors.com/business/012612-598993-entitlements-soar-under-president-obama.htm

#19 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, today 49 percent of all Americans live in a home that receives some form of benefits from the federal government.http://cnsnews.com/news/article/medicare-faces-unfunded-liability-386t-or-328404-each-us-household

#20 Over the next 75 years, Medicare is facing unfunded liabilities of more than 38 trillion dollars. That comes to $328,404 for each and every household in the United States.http://www.zerohedge.com/news/chart-day-change-q1-american-debt-and-gdp

#21 During the first quarter of 2012, U.S. public debt rose by 359.1 billion dollars. U.S. GDP only rose by 142.4 billion dollars. http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/barack-obama-lets-steal-150-million-dollars-an-hour-from-our-children

#22 At this point, the U.S. national debt is rising by more than 2 million dollars every single minute.http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np

#23 The U.S. national debt has risen by more than 5 trillion dollars since the day that Barack Obama first took office. In a little more than 3 years Obama has added more to the national debt than the first 41 presidents combined. http://www.moneynews.com/Headline/fed-debt-Treasury/2012/03/28/id/434106

#24 The Federal Reserve bought up approximately 61 percent of all government debt issued by the U.S. Treasury Department during 2011. http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/archives/inflation-is-a-tax-and-the-federal-reserve-is-taxing-the-living-daylights-out-of-us

#25 The Federal Reserve continues to systematically destroy the value of the U.S. dollar. Since 1970, the U.S. dollar has lost more than 83 percent of its value.http://endoftheamericandream.com/archives/25-horrible-statistics-about-the-u-s-economy-that-barack-obama-does-not-want-you-to-know

U.S. Homeownership Hits Decade Low

www.gallup.com

The 62% of Americans who tell Gallup they own their own home is the lowest in more than a decade. Just over half of homeowners (53%) say their house is worth more than when they bought it, down from 80% in 2008.

Competition, lower prices, ARE BAD?!? Yes, in Oregon.

As one studies market forces of competition, of consumer competing with consumer, which forces the price contrary to their 'best' interests is off-set by competition between suppliers, which ALSO pushes the price downward contrary to their 'best' interests...  So, the government steps in and 'fixes' this (which the beneficent, all-knowing government planners deem to be bad) by not allowing competing companies to voluntarily lower their prices.  Amazing!  Hubris and arrogance is right at home in ANY level of government.

• TownCar.com owner Mike Porter near the Hawthorne Bridge in Portland, OR (2012 IJ.org)

A Groupon deal almost forced a couple of Portland, Ore., limousine companies to drive right out of business.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/04/30/towncar-cabbies-file-suit-against-city-portland-after-being-forced-to-issue/#ixzz1uVKLJoyP

http://www.foxnews.com/us/2012/04/30/towncar-cabbies-file-suit-against-city-portland-after-being-forced-to-issue/

Obama...hmmm...clueless.

I'M BITING THE BULLET, ALSO

 The President had ordered the cabinet to cut $100,000,000.00 ($100 million) 
 from the $3,500,000,000,000.00 ($3.5 trillion) federal budget.

 I'm so impressed by this sacrifice that I have decided to do the same 
 thing with my personal budget. I spend about $2,000 a month on groceries, 
 household expenses, medicine, utilities, etc., but it's time to get out 
 the budget cutting axe, go through my expenses, and cut back.

 I'm going to cut my spending at exactly the same ratio, 1/35,000 of my 
 total budget. After doing the math, it looks like instead of spending 
 $2,000 a month; I'm going to have to cut that number by six cents. Yes, 
 I'm going to have to get by with $1999.94, but that's what sacrifice is 
 all about.

 I'll just have to do without some things, that are, frankly, luxuries - 
 six cents worth.

 Did this President actually think no one would do the math? Please send 
 this to everyone on your list so people understand how idiotic a $100 
 million cut is in a $3,500,000,000,000.00 budget - ludicrous.

Two Governors, Two States...

California:

The Governor of California is jogging with his dog along a nature trail. A coyote jumps out and attacks the Governor's dog, then bites theGovernor.

1. The Governor starts to intervene, but reflects upon the movie "Bambi" and then realizes he should stop because the coyote is only doing what is natural.

2. He calls animal control . Animal Control captures the coyote and bills the State $200 testing it for diseases and $500 for relocating it.

3. He calls a veterinarian. The vet collects the dead dog and
bills the State $200 testing it for diseases.

4. The Governor goes to hospital and spends $3,500 getting checked for diseases from the coyote and on getting his bite wound bandaged.

5. The running trail gets shut down for 6 months while Fish & Game conducts a $100,000 survey to make sure the area is now free ofdangerous animals.

6. The Governor spends $50,000 in state funds implementing a "coyote awareness program" for residents of the area.

7. The State Legislature spends $2 million to study how to better treat rabies and how to permanently eradicate the disease throughout theworld.

8. The Governor's security agent is fired for not stopping the
attack. The State spends $150,000 to hire and train a new agent with additional special training regarding the nature of coyotes.

9. PETA protests the coyote's relocation and files a $5 million suit against the State.

Tennessee:

The Governor of Tennessee is jogging with his dog along a nature trail. A Coyote jumps out and attacks his dog.

1. The Governor shoots the coyote with his concealed-carry pistol and keeps jogging. The Governor has spent $0.50 on a .45 ACP hollow point cartridge.

2. The Buzzards eat the dead coyote.

And that, my friends, is why California is broke and Tennessee is not.

Our Glorious Leader sets another Great Record in History!

It was announced that our Glorious Leader has set another Great Record in History during His beneficent Reign.

Longest period of unemployment, real GDP hasn't been above pop growth, lost 10,000,000 jobs but have only added 2,000,000 back...nice.

http://news.investors.com/article/603791/201203090838/jobs-recession-is-longest-since-depression.htm?fb_ref=top&fb_source=home_multiline

Pop quiz, hot shot.

Listen to Daniel Hannan's speech.  Find three things 'wrong' with it.

Post them.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=BujuEpGmKMg

Questions for an elected representative...

If I could ask (and actually get honest replies) an elected politician these questions...whoa.

• Once upon a time (actually seems like a fairy tale) an individual could develop a good or service, go forth and sell it to those who were willing and able to buy it.  It was effectively stream-lined, fast, uncomplicated.  TODAY, an individual to do the same must apply for a license, or a permit at multiple levels of gov't, be worried about the EPA and any environmental issues (even if he is a sole proprietor house painter), has to worry about unfair labor practices and NLRB if he had to fire a lazy or absent employee, and state equivalent, has to worry about safety issues and fines from OSHA and MIOSHA even if it is only him up on the ladder expecting no one else to be responsible for him...  WHY DO WE MAKE IT SO HARD TO DO ECONOMIC ACTIVITY?  Study after study indicates these 'hurdles' of national, state and local gov'ts place before those who wish to buy and sell, limits this activity, and INCREASES structural unemployment.  If the State of Michigan's gov't really wanted the employment rate to increase, for economic activity to swell, wouldn't it reduce these requirements all too many businesses are not even aware that they're in violation of?
• Why do you deny students a better education?  How can you deny the fact that there is a vast surplus of teachers, implying that their salaries are way higher than what the market can bear?  Isn't it true that the cost of education would be much less and students would have more choices of classes and courses?  That class sizes would be smaller and there would be more teachers to teach?
• Why do you make children go to school, thereby absolving them of any responsibility for their own lives as it seems you are telling them what to do at every turn? (truancy)
• Why do you perpetuate an education system that squashes like a bug, any shred of curiosity about stuff (used to be that was what fueled 'science')?  
• Why cannot parents choose for themselves what to study and for how long?  If homeschooling is your answer, then why do families have to pay for schools they don't use?  Every two cents on the dollar spent in Michigan goes to the sales tax supporting schools.  Why do you make the childless widow next-door pay for schools?
• It used to be I could save $ and take out deposits without worry.  Now the bank and I are required to report to several bureaucracies.  Why?
• How can you deny the fact that an income tax violates the privacy and business of the individual?  This tax makes for one's privacy to be forcefully exposed to any gov't auditor, and for the individual being audited to be assumed guilty and having to prove one's own innocence.  Is this consistent with the freedoms fought for in the Revolutionary War and 'guaranteed' in the U.S. Constitution?
• Isn't it true that you are an elected representative, basically equivalent to one of us winning a vote to be homecoming king?  How are you as an individual, more qualified to pass judgment and make laws that apply to us?  
• Our election system does not bring the cream to the top, in that it doesn't provide that the representatives have an extra measure of wisdom or experience than any other individual lucky enough to use propaganda to persuade others to vote for him.  How is it that you feel more qualified to govern me than an individual who believes he was placed in power by God (Divine Right of Kings) and is thereby responsible to Him for governing the people?  Wouldn't a man responsible to God do a more compassionate job than a man beholden to simply getting the most votes every two years?
• Why can't people be allowed by our nanny-state to be more responsible for themselves, and make their own decisions?  A man riding a snowmobile recently had an accident, but a very minor one.  He refused any assistance, yet others called 911, and the cop determined that the person was drinking.  He damaged nothing other than his own sled, so what crime has he actually committed against others?  
• If one's potential to commit a crime is a crime, where is the end?  What limits this incursion into freedom?  Will we all be subjects in a "Minority Report" society?
• Why can't motorcyclists be allowed to ride without a helmet?  Why cannot drivers and passengers be allowed not to wear seatbelts?  Who said society is responsible for them?  Can't they be responsible for themselves, and be allowed to pay for their own decisions, or reap the rewards of taking risks (entrepreneurship)?
• Who says you are my keeper?  Will I ever be allowed to grow up and take care of myself?  Who says the gov't knows best about me eating french fries or red meat?  If I want to smoke, and the smoke doesn't bother anyone else, why does the gov't feel it necessary to insert itself telling me where I can, or have to pay a 'sin' tax?  
• Will I be a Toys-r-Us kid all my life because of the cradle-to-grave nanny state?  When do I get to grow up and be an adult?  LEAVE ME ALONE!

Here are some 'vanilla' queries...

• Is it true that it is a great accomplishment to sponsor a bill that becomes a law?
• What is necessary (cutting deals with other reps, etc.) to get that sponsored bill moving along?
• Are committee chairs truly more powerful than most other reps?  
• How do you 'reach across the aisle' to gain more support for your bill?
• How do you gather support for your bill in the other house/chamber?
• In your experience, how many bills with three or fewer sponsors do in the legislative process? 
• Are you familiar with the State Constitution?  When was the current Constitution made?  (answer is 1963)
• Are you familiar with the U.S. Constitution?  How applicable is it to Michigan or local gov'ts?
• Do the Bill of Rights apply to local and state gov'ts?
• If so, do all Bill of Rights apply equally?  Why not?  Which amendment is more important?
• Regarding the Constitution of the State of Michigan, why is it so detailed compared to the US Constitution?
• Does it imply a lack of trust on the part of the voter toward the legislature and governor's office?
• Then (because he'll deny it) why is it so detailed and limiting the power of the state gov't?
• Why does the Michigan Constitution allow for referenda?  Isn't that a method for the citizen to bypass a tyrannical legislature, like the example of the implementation of the Concealed Carry Pistol law?

Fairness, 'fair share' and other myths...

Reading this article brings to mind Freidrich A. Hayek, wonder what he'd say about this push by the leader of the gov't on 'fairness'...

Stephen Moore does a nice job listing the way 'fairness' is defined by deeds, by actions, by 'doing'.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204369404577206980068367936.html?mod=googlenews_wsj

Baseline Budgeting and YOU and the Feds and the Media and the...

Rush is right.  In so many ways... http://download.premiereradio.net/guest/rushlimb/pdf/baselinebudgeting2.pdf

Baseline Services Budgeting process is a very slick manner of pulling the wool over well intentioned Americans.  When the CBO has to 'score' a bill on an assumed increase of a given % every year, anytime the projected expenditures fall below that assumed %, it is called a CUT even though it is a REAL INCREASE in spending.

Example, say that the HHS baseline is an increase of 10% a year, regardless of how much is actually spent or how much is brought into the national gov't by taxes and such.  Totally an arbitrary number.  IF the 'wascawy wepubwicans' (we won't miss you much, Barney Frank!) were to propose a budget for HHS of an increase of 4%, it would be deemed a 6% cut.  Spending would increase by 4% over what is spend THIS year, but the media, a certain political party and other liberal leaning types would scream about 'cuts'.

WHAT CAN WE DO?!?  Guess what?  The House of Representatives actually DID pass a bill to eliminate this monkey-business.  Care to bet what will happen to it in the Senate with Harry Reid et al? http://thehill.com/blogs/floor-action/house/208527-house-passes-second-gop-budget-reform-bill

"Marriage, What is Ma..." Whoops, meant, "Unemployment, What is Unemployment?"

Everyone is crooning and swaying over the 'great' unemployment numbers released Friday by BLS.  Apparently we had a net gain in jobs by 243,000.  Wow, a quarter million more people are working than the month before!

Wait...whoa...hmmm...  If one looks at the B-1 table, it would appear that we actually LOST over two and a half million jobs, that's 2,689,000 fewer people working.  I guess to the gov't, they are just retail schlubs and get swept under the carpet of 'seasonally adjusted'.  Wonder if they get unemployment checks when they're not unemployed?

So mathematically, Two Million, Nine Hundred and Thirty Two Thousand people are out of work from December to January.  Nice.  All Hail the Supreme Leader, Barack Hussein Obama!


http://www.bls.gov/news.release/empsit.t17.htm

The Genocide of Black/African-Americans continues unabashed...

When most of the babies aborted are 'black' or 'African-American' by %, what are we to conclude when the freakin' Mayor of New York City also contributes major buckage to the destruction of 'unwanted' black babies?!?

There will be a reckoning.

http://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-komen-backlash-20120203,0,693195.story

Whattup when costs exceed benefits?

OK...the awesome, totally unbiased BLS has released the productivity v labor unit costs...(see below)  

4th quarter productivity increased at an annualized 0.7%, while unit labor costs increased at 1.2% 4th quarter.

For the increases between 4th 2010 and 4th 2011, productivity increased only 0.5% (lower!) and costs 1.3% (higher).

So, the 4th quarter trended toward a smaller gap between a small increase in productivity (benefit) and unit labor costs (cost).  So...MB is less than MC.  Will that help or hurt the increase in real GDP?  Will that hurt or help the increase in our real economy?  Will employment increase faster than the rate of inflation?

http://www.bls.gov/news.release/prod2.nr0.htm

Congressional Budget Office, more than a gaggle of pocket-protected, pointy-headed economists?

The CBO, the 'unbiased' pen of predictors, the corral of brainiacs that predict the future economy thereby allowing for the anticipation of tax revenues and fiscal expenditures of the National (excuse me, you likely know it as 'Federal') government, paint a rosy scenario.  Economic troubles are past us.  Hoorah!  Huzzuh!

Wait...

This is only true based on the assumptions they make.  When you dig deeper (as Tyler Durden and others listed below demonstrate) you discover that what the CBO foists upon us may be closer to the 'product' hauled out of corrals and pens with front-loading Bobcats than to the actual truth.  "Unbiased" yet politically advantageous for a certain political party and its candidate seeking re-election?  Hmmm...

In economic forecasting, as with meteorology (weather) forecasting, models are made based on past observations.  The model 'crunches' the past data to see if the predicted result matches the actual weather experienced.  Economic models also are 'vetted' in this manner.  Guess what?  Take predictions and the assumptions used by the CBO over the past decade on economic growth, and...dang.  Not too good.

IF the CBO were bookies at the casinos in Vegas, they'd likely be 'disappeared' in the desert for being so wrong.

http://www.cbo.gov/  All the truth that's fit to print...not.

http://cnsnews.com/news/article/cbo-taxes-will-shoot-more-30-percent-over-next-2-years

http://blogs.wsj.com/economics/2012/01/31/economic-projections-and-key-numbers-from-cbo-budget-report/?mod=google_news_blog

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/latest-congressional-budget-outlook-2012-2022-released

LOOK OUT! TVs will be dropping like a rock...their prices anyway! WHY?!?

OK folks, supply and demand time.  Why is there such a drop in HDTV prices this week?

http://www.tigerdirect.com/email/WEM2983.asp?SRCCODE=WEM2983BY&cm_mmc=email-_-Main-_-WEM2983-_-tigeremail2983&utm_source=EML&utm_medium=main&utm_campaign=WEM2983

Hard Drives...GETTIN' PRICIER! Why?!?

Once again, the prices of those ever-so-desireable hard drives (in the 2TB range) refuse to not go up...why?  International-trade-and-you is why.  The floods in Bangkok, Thailand...

Anyone else feeling the crimp?  Anyone else bumping up to max on storage, and wants MORE?

And then, there's NVIDIA and AMD who are ever so much more smacked by this flooding.  How would they feel the crunch?  Read the article!


http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/print/9223696/Impact_of_Thailand_floods_continues_to_bite_tech_industry?taxonomyName=Hardware&taxonomyId=12

Can you say, "Price or availability of complementary goods"?

NY Times story reported, "How the U.S. Lost Out on iPhone Work"

So...WHY are jobs 'leaving' the U.S.?  Answer?  We force them to.  Our society/gov't/culture has set up such an arcane rigmarole to go through to make things that people want, that businesses cannot compete with the additional costs and delays.

Steve Jobs himself provides a great example of this, APPLE itself, that liberal bastion of campaign $ donations, that his company could not make the iPhone in the U.S.  (Some would now point out the amazing hypocrisy on the part of Steve Jobs, and by logical extension, the other billionaire libs...like Oprah, Zuckerberg, etc.)

From the article, "Not long ago, Apple boasted that its products were made in America. Today, few are. Almost all of the 70 million iPhones, 30 million iPads and 59 million other products Apple sold last year were manufactured overseas.

Why can’t that work come home? Mr. Obama asked.

Mr. Jobs’s reply was unambiguous. “Those jobs aren’t coming back,” he said, according to another dinner guest.

The president’s question touched upon a central conviction at Apple. It isn’t just that workers are cheaper abroad. Rather, Apple’s executives believe the vast scale of overseas factories as well as the flexibility, diligence and industrial skills of foreign workers have so outpaced their American counterparts that “Made in the U.S.A.” is no longer a viable option for most Apple products."

Or, "Another critical advantage for Apple was that China provided engineers at a scale the United States could not match. Apple’s executives had estimated that about 8,700 industrial engineers were needed to oversee and guide the 200,000 assembly-line workers eventually involved in manufacturing iPhones. The company’s analysts had forecast it would take as long as nine months to find that many qualified engineers in the United States.

In China, it took 15 days."

Obviously that demonstrates a surplus of skilled, educated labor that the U.S. does not have.  WHY?  Some blame this or that, like the public school system...but it more likely is due to the choices students coming through our fine institutions are making for themselves.  "Why take math when I can take a goofy movie class?"  

Check it out.  Gorilla glass and YOU (or Steve Job's car keys scratching the plastic iPhone's surface...) and CHINA.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/01/22/business/apple-america-and-a-squeezed-middle-class.html?_r=1&pagewanted=all

Single parent of three, or family making $60,000 a year...which has more money to spend?

Wrong.  According to Tyler Durden, those making $15,000 with three kids, has MORE disposable income than a family making $60,000.  

WOW!

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

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 11/22/2010 00:18 -0400

Tonight's stunning financial piece de resistance comes from Wyatt Emerich of The Cleveland Current. In what is sure to inspire some serious ire among all those who once believed Ronald Reagan that it was the USSR that was the "Evil Empire", Emmerich analyzes disposable income and economic benefits among several key income classes and comes to the stunning (and verifiable) conclusion that "a one-parent family of three making $14,500 a year (minimum wage) has more disposable income than a family making $60,000 a year." And that excludes benefits from Supplemental Security Income disability checks. America is now a country which punishes those middle-class people who not only try to work hard, but avoid scamming the system. Not surprisingly, it is not only the richest and most audacious thieves that prosper - it is also the penny scammers at the very bottom of the economic ladder that rip off the middle class each and every day, courtesy of the world's most generous entitlement system. Perhaps if Reagan were alive today, he would wish to modify the object of his once legendary remark.   

Cultural Winners and Losers, 2011

"Culture" is as much a social construct as law or economic activity. However, is it as 'democratic' as most believe? The old saw of 'playing to the lowest common denominator' is a winning formula for the player, but then one must ponder, "For how long?" We are familiar with diminishing marginal utility, and its impact on consumption, to include entertainment. Unfortunately, this phenomenon may lead us to places we really may not want to go...

AND...the real query, what is the actual opportunity cost?

Bozell Column: Cultural Winners and Losers, 2011 | NewsBusters.org

A great book that makes one think great thoughts.

"When you accept money in payment for your effort, you do so only on the conviction that you will exchange it for the product of the effort of others.  Not an ocean of tears nor all the guns in the world can  transform those pieces of paper in your wallet into the bread you will need to survive tomorrow.  Your wallet is your statement of hope that somewhere in the world around you there are men who will not default on that moral principle which is the root of money."

"Try to obtain your food my by means of nothing but physical motions -  and you'll learn that man's mind is the root of all the goods and services produced and of all the wealth that has ever existed on earth."

"To trade by means of money is the code of the men of good will.  Money rests on the axiom that every man is the owner of his mind and his effort.  Money allows no power to prescribe the value of your effort except the voluntary choice of the man who is willing to trade you his effort in return.  Money permits no deals except those who mutual benefit by the unforced judgment of the individuals involved.  Money demands you recognize that men are not beasts of burden, born to carry the weight of your misery - that you must offer them values, not wounds,  that the common bond among men is not the exchange of suffering, but the exchange of goods and services.  Money demands that you sell, not your weakness to men's stupidity, but your talent to their reason.  It demands that you buy, not the shoddiest they offer, but the best that your money can find.  And when men live by trade - with reason, not force as their final arbiter - it is the best product that wins, the best performance, the man of best judgment and highest ability - and the degree of a man's productiveness is the degree of his reward."

Money will not purchase happiness for the man who has no concept of what he wants.  Money will not buy intelligence for the fool, or admiration for the coward, or respect for the incompetent.  The man who attempts to purchase the brains of his superiors to serve him, with his money replacing his judgment, ends up by becoming the victim of his inferiors.  The men of intelligence desert him, but the cheats and the frauds come flocking to him, drawn the law which he has not discovered:  That no man may be smaller than his money."

"Be it a highwayman who confronts a traveler with the ultimatum: "Your money or your life," or a politician who confronts a country with the ultimatum: "Your children's education or your life," the meaning of that ultimatum is: "Your mind or your life" - and neither is possible to man without the other.  I do not enter discussions with neighbors who think they can forbid me to think.  I do not place my moral sanction upon a murderer's wish to kill me.  When a man attempts to deal with me by force, I answer him - by force.  It is only as retaliation that force may be used and only against the man who starts its use.  No, I do not share his evil or sink to his concept of morality:  I merely grant him his choice, destruction, the only destruction he had the right o choose:  his own.  A holdup man seeks to gain wealth by killing me, I do not grow richer by killing a holdup man.  I seek no values by means of evil, nor do I surrender my values to evil"

"If you wish to save the last of your dignity, do not call your best actions a 'sacrifice': that term brands you as immoral.  If a mother buys food for her hungry child rather than a hat for herself, it is NOT a sacrifice:  she values the child higher than the hat; but it is a sacrifice to the kind of mother whose higher value is the hat, who would prefer her child to starve and feeds him only from a sense of duty.  If a man dies fighting for his own freedom, it is NOT a sacrifice:  he is not willing to live as a slave; but it IS a sacrifice to the kind of man who is willing.  If a man refuses to sell his convictions, it is NOT a sacrifice, unless he is the sort of man who has no convictions."

"Sacrifice could be proper only for those who have nothing to sacrifice - no values, no standards, no judgment - those whose desires are irrational whims, blindly conceived and lightly surrendered.  For a man of moral stature, whose desires are born of rational values, sacrifice is the surrender of the right to the wrong, of the good to the evil."

"Do you wonder why you live without dignity, love without fire and die without resistance?  Do you wonder why, wherever you look, you see nothing but unanswerable questions, why your life is torn by impossible conflicts, why you spend it straddling irrational fences to evade artificial choices, such as soul or body, mind or heart, security or freedom, private profit or public good?  Do you cry that you find no answers?  By what means did you hope to find them?  You reject your tool of perception - your mind - then complain that the universe is a mystery.  You discard your key, then wail that all doors are locked against you.  You start out in pursuit of the irrationals, then damn existence for making no sense."

"The fence you have been straddling is the coward's formula contained in the sentence": "But we don't have to go to extremes!"  The extreme you have always struggled to avoid is the recognition that reality is final that A is A and that the truth is true.  A moral code impossible to dissolve all ideas in fog, to permit no firm definitions, to regard any concept as approximate and any rule of conduct as elastic, to hedge on any principle, to compromise on any value, to take the middle of any road.  By making moral judgments impossible, it has made you incapable of rational judgment."

"The man who refuses to judge, who neither agrees nor disagrees, who declares that there are no absolutes and believes that he escapes responsibility, is the man responsible for all the blood that is now spilled in the world.  Reality is an absolute, existence is an absolute, a speck of dust in an absolute and so is a human life.  Whether you live or die is an absolute.  Either you have a piece of bread or not, is an absolute.  Whether you eat your bread or see it vanish in a tax collector's stomach is an absolute."

"There are two sides to every issue:  one side is right and the other is wrong, but the middle is always evil.  The man who is wrong still retains some respect for the truth, if only by accepting the responsibility of choice.  But the man in the middle is the knave who blanks out the truth in order to pretend that no choice or values exist, who is willing to sit out the course of any battle, willing to cash in on the blood of the innocent or to crawl on his belly to the guilty, who dispenses justice by condemning both the robber and the robbed to jail, who solves conflicts by ordering the thinker and the fool to meet each other halfway.  In any compromise between food and poison, it is only death that can win.  In any compromise between good and evil, it is only evil that can profit.  In that transfusion of blood which drains the good to feed the evil the compromiser is the transmitting rubber tube."

"You, who are half-rational, half-coward, have been playing a con game with reality, but the victim you have conned is yourself.  When men reduce their virtues to the approximate, then evil acquires the force of an absolute, when loyalty to an unyielding purpose is dropped by the virtuous, it's picked up by scoundrels - an you get the indecent spectacle of a cringing, bargaining, traitorous good and a self-righteously uncompromising evil.  When they yell that it is selfish to be certain that you are right, you hasten to assure them that you're certain of nothing.  When they shout that it's immoral to stand on your convictions, you assure them that you have no convictions whatever.  When the thugs of the State snarl that you are guilty of intolerance, because you don't treat your desire to live and their desire to kill you as a difference of opinion - you cringe and hasten to assure them that you are not intolerant of any horror.  When some barefoot bum in some pesthole yells at you: How dare you be rich - you apologize and beg him to be patient and promise him you'll give it all away."  You have then reached the blind alley of the treason you committed when you agreed that you had no right to exist.  Once you believed it was 'only a compromise' you conceded it was evil to live for yourself, but moral to live for the sake of your children.  Then you conceded that it was selfish to live for your children, but moral to live for your community.  Then you conceded that it was selfish to live for your community, but moral to live for your country.  Now you are letting this greatest of countries be devoured by any scum from any corner of the earth, while you concede that it is selfish to live for your country and that your moral duty is to live for the globe.  A man who has no right to life, has no right to values and will not keep them."

The sacrosanct Bureau of Labor Statistics...not anymore.

So the governess of N.C. has bee getting the embargoed, Top Secret data before the public, a violation of federal law...

Is this another example of a nation of men versus a nation of laws?  Is James Harrington rolling over in his grave, again?  And...if the other political party were to have been caught in this activity, would there be a great sense of outrage in the main-stream media?  (As appropriate as it should be now.)

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=48259

Are we to be Bush-whacked...again?

Can a tiger change its stripes?  Can a Leopard change its spots?  Can a Bush change its core values?

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203893404577100330414585006.html