The Fed announced today at 2:15pm they would not drop interest rates, mentioned little about the mortgage debacle, and said fighting inflation was primary.

As an active options trader, I was watching Bloomberg for the announcement in one window and the real-time Dow Jones average in another. At precisely 2:15pm Bloomberg released a detailed story and the Dow dropped sharply.

Thus, the Bloomberg story had to have been written ahead of time with reporters having advance notice of the Fed decision. So, I wonder, how do they isolate reporters and embargo the story until the release time? Knowing in advance of a closely-watched Fed decision like this one could quite literally make you huge amounts of money in just a few minutes.

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Dave (Buddhagem) from TheBlueVoice comments on our post about the upcoming Sept. 15 March on Washington.

I will be there with you on September 15, but don’t you think it’s time we employed some other tactics? I just had a really interesting conversation with a girl who is here illegally from Indonesia. She said, “Those aren’t protests [talking about our anti-war protests specifically] those are celebrations.” Then I read a really interesting piece on Indymedia LA; and the guy was basically making a similar argument. Saying, “You don’t ask for permission [getting permits and the like] to protest. The ruling elite can accept that all day long.

Now I’m not saying we give up on the large demos. But there seems to be a need to do something more. To ratchet it up a bit. I wonder what your thoughts are.

I agree. Mass protest is important, but more is needed. Sometimes, even at big demonstrations, it feels like the speakers are talking to the already converted. More outreach is always good, but polls show the majority of the public now opposes the war and nearly 50% favor impeachment of Bush, so the outreach is mostly done. Yet Congress ignores the antiwar sentiment of those who elect them.

So, how about we protest pro-war congress members wherever they go, at any public event. Ditto for cabinet members, Cheney, and Bush. Make it uncomfortable for them to appear in public. This could be creatively done, not just angry protesters, but with street theater and massive civil disobedience too.

Work stoppages and walkouts. Sure, this would be hard to organize, but imagine the effect. In 2006, the work stoppages coupled with the historic immigration rights marches sent a clear message - and that’s when the ruling class started paying attention. The antiwar movement needs to do the same.

Unity. The antiwar movement is fractured, often with quite real, hard to resolve differences between the various antiwar organizations. Somehow, we all need to come together under one banner, End The War. Imagine what could be accomplished if we did.

So, those are my thoughts, what are yours? How do we end these insane wars?

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My wife Sue read my Jim Cramer meltdown AKA Armageddon post yesterday and jokingly (I think) said, “Armageddon is coming? We need to stockpile food, head for the hills, and buy gold and sit on it until it hatches.” When I said, maybe things weren’t that bad, she said, “You were the one you mentioned Armageddon!” Hmmm.

Guess I better not tell her what happened today.

Two more mortgage companies announced they will be accepting no new loans, which is polite way of saying they’ve just gone kersplat on the pavement, meanwhile a mortgage REIT seems poised to follow and do a header into the concrete.

The CEO of Bear Stearns has been calling other investment bank CEOs to assure them that, by golly, everything is just peachy keen fine with the Bear and would they, pretty please with sugar on top, not pull their business. This reminds of the old DC dictum, that if a federal agency formally denies something, then the story must be bigger than you think.

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