Sage advice from Central Bank of Jamaica
Bob Morris @ Oct 10th 2008 21:56 - Category: Credit crisis ;
Archive for October 10th, 2008
McCain-Palin and the hatred they encourage
Bob Morris @ Oct 10th 2008 17:48 - Category: Election 2008 ;
John Kerry: McCain-Palin’s “hate filled” campaign should disqualify them.
Former Michigan Gov. William Milliken: “He is not the McCain I endorsed”
McCain might be stepping back from the abyss (or maybe this is just one more abrupt change in an increasingly bizarre campaign)
McCain booed for telling audience to be respectful of Obama.
In stark contrast to his last town hall meeting yesterday, John McCain dramatically toned down his attacks on Barack Obama, even after many in the audience were asking him to go on the offensive. McCain was even booed when he told the audience to be respectful and that “you don’t have to be scared” of Obama.
and
RNC may be pulling the plug on joint ads for McCain (and use the money to try and save Republican senators at risk)
Quote of the day. 10/10/08
Bob Morris @ Oct 10th 2008 17:03 - Category: Unfiled ;
H.L. Mencken said this in 1920:
“The larger the mob, the harder the test. In small areas, before small electorates, a first-rate man occasionally fights his way through, carrying even the mob with him by force of his personality. But when the field is nationwide, and the fight must be waged chiefly at second and third hand, and the force of personality cannot so readily make itself felt, then all the odds are on the man who is, intrinsically, the most devious and mediocre — the man who can most easily adeptly disperse the notion that his mind is a virtual vacuum.
“The Presidency tends, year by year, to go to such men. As democracy is perfected, the office represents, more and more closely, the inner soul of the people. We move toward a lofty ideal. On some great and glorious day the plain folks of the land will reach their heart’s desire at last, and the White House will be adorned by a downright moron.” (Baltimore Evening Sun, July 26, 1920)
Tip: Melanie
New poll finds shallow support for climate action
Bob Morris @ Oct 10th 2008 13:44 - Category: Climate change, Renewable energy ;
A relatively small percentage of Americans strongly believe that climate change requires urgent action, according to a comprehensive survey conducted by a coalition of environmental groups, and opinion is strongly split along party lines.
That’s why this needs to be framed differently. Instead of scaring people with dire global warming scenarios, tell them how creating renewable energy is cost-effective and will create a zillion new jobs in the process.
That’s the Google approach. It works.
Dodged a bullet
Bob Morris @ Oct 10th 2008 13:39 - Category: Credit crisis ;
The Dow was down 800 today at one point, then rallied to close down about 125. This could be the beginnings of a bottom. That would most definitely be a good thing.
The G7 meets this weekend in DC to come up with a coordinated worldwide plan to end the financial crisis and unfreeze the dangerously locked-up credit markets. This is another good thing.
I just listened to Doug Henwood’s latest “Behind the News” podcast (on iTunes.) He’s an economist, and analyst with sufficient expertise that he frequently gets quoted in the lofty realms of Alan Abelson’s column in Barrons.
He also edits the excellent Left Business Observer and moderates the LBO-Talk listserv, a central place for lefties and socialists of all stripes to hang out and talk.
On the podcast he refutes what some on the left are saying - let the financial system fail, then we can build a better world. He says people who say that do not understand finance or economics. There was 25% unemployment in the Great Depression. For those who say they want that he says, “that’s not socialism, that’s nihilism.”
As for the Naomi Klein’s who insist it’s all a conspiracy, he says, yes, Paulson et al did try to grab billions (and now probably won’t be able to because it will be a recapitalization and not buying junk at inflated prices) but the crisis is real. Too real.
The left can play a huge role here, and advance its causes as well. But cheering for millions to be unemployed or saying the entire thing is a monstrous hoax will only be self-defeating.
Regulators clamp down on naked longs
Bob Morris @ Oct 10th 2008 10:30 - Category: Credit crisis ;
From the Economist
A cautionary tale from the future
This newspaper story has just come to light after falling through a gap in the space-time continuum
Sept. 26, 2021
Financial authorities in America and Europe took sweeping powers yesterday to avert a financial crisis by imposing restrictions on markets. In their sights are a peculiar brand of speculators known as “long-buyers” who buy assets not to live off the income they generate but to profit from rising prices.
Apparently these evildoers so destabilized the markets that house prices soared, prompting the former Hank Paulson (now King Henry I of America) to institute capital gains taxes on home sales as a way to drive those prices back down.
Industry analysts said that some of the damage done by long-buyers might have been prevented had a now defunct practice called “short-selling” been permitted. By speculating on falling prices, short-sellers could in theory prevent bubbles from being formed. However, their scope to trade was always limited by regulations and the tactic was killed off during the crisis year of 2008. “It drove us out of business,” recalled George Soros, a former hedge-fund manager, speaking in Central Park yesterday, before adding, “Do you want some ketchup with that?”
Mayor Daley of Chicago has praised Ayers
Bob Morris @ Oct 10th 2008 05:30 - Category: Election 2008 Tags: Bill Ayers;
WaPo. The quotes speak for themselves. Whoever Bill Ayers was then, he is not now. Like many of us forty years later.
Ayers is an informal adviser to Mayor Richard M. Daley and has been awarded more than $50 million in charitable grants for his promotion of small schools as a solution to a crisis in education.
In Chicago, however, Ayers is considered so mainstream that Daley issued a statement on Thursday praising him as a “distinguished professor of education” and a “valued member of the Chicago community.”
“I don’t condone what he did 40 years ago, but I remember that period well,” said Daley, an Obama supporter whose father, Richard J. Daley, was a favorite target of the antiwar movement when he was mayor in the ’60s. “It was a difficult time, but those days are long over. I believe we have too many challenges in Chicago and our country to keep refighting 40-year-old battles.”
“Judges who were lifelong ardent conservatives had no trouble recognizing that the work that Bernadine and Bill are now doing is completely divorced from anything in their background” [said a law professor]
