So maybe we nudged them over the edge??

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/02/25/AR2010022502183.html

"Probe: Did big U.S. banks contribute to the financial crisis in Greece?

By Neil Irwin and Zachary A. Goldfarb
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, February 26, 2010
The financial tumult now unsettling Europe came to Washington on Thursday, as Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke said that the federal government is looking into the role U.S. banks may have played in the Greek fiscal crisis."

I have been wondering if this was the case......Manipulation to strengthen the Dollar.

FDIC wants you to save!

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/desperate-fdic-begs-americans-open-saving-accounts-during-america-saves-week

Check out the latest TD post.

I think we all need to start being counter intuitive with our investments and wealth building strategies. Tying up more money in a bank, or 401K, or IRA, or any traditional investment, may not be the smartest thing to do right now.

I think everyone should have some precious metals and cash in their hands right now. I think we should all be adopting a general philosophy of greater independence and self-sufficiency. This does not mean we should all become survivalists. I mean it in a more general way. Think of ways to improve your independence in financial and physical terms.

A small farm could be a great way to achieve all of these things, while also improving your health and lifestyle. Furthermore, you don't have to stop being a part of modern society either. It isn't about being a hermit. It is about greater general self-sufficiency and also returning to value the small things in life.

All for now.

Charlie Munger of Berkshire Hathaway: The Investment Casino undermines the USA

"Basically, It's Over
A parable about how one nation came to financial ruin."
http://www.slate.com/id/2245328/pagenum/all/

Very interesting.

When the second in charge at Berkshire sounds the alarm, it might pay to listen.

Paul Farrel provides some analysis of Charlie's Article.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/death-of-us-capitalism-the-final-10-scenes-2010-02-23?pagenumber=1

After reading these two articles I find myself wondering why I put any money in the financial markets? As it appears to just be feeding the beast whose brain is Goldman Sach's.

Threats grow against IRS

http://news.yahoo.com/video/politics-15749652/18288285


I wonder why? Maybe because we all feel that we have lost control of our government and its financial policies. Also, throw in the Greatest Depression since the 1930s. Everyone told their congressman no bailouts and they did it anyway. Now people don't feel much like funding the mess. No big surprises here.

Canadian Peak Oil Stocks

http://www.forbes.com/2010/02/22/maxwell-suncor-cenovus-intelligent-investing-energy.html

Good discussion of Peak Oil and some stock recommendations

Sort of interesting Podcast from Foreign Affairs

www.foreignaffairs.com/files/attachments/20100219_TWNW.mp3

Actually boring in some ways! But, if you want to get the latest worldview per Foreign Affairs, maybe it is worth it!

Niall Ferguson: US Empire in jeopardy

http://www.businessinsider.com/ferguson-were-one-write-down-away-from-the-end-of-american-empire-2010-2

Rolling Stone Matt Taibbi strikes again!

http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/story/32255149/wall_streets_bailout_hustle

Simon Johnson - "The Quiet Coup"

http://www.theatlantic.com/doc/200905/imf-advice

excerpt "The crash has laid bare many unpleasant truths about the United States. One of the most alarming, says a former chief economist of the International Monetary Fund, is that the finance industry has effectively captured our government—a state of affairs that more typically describes emerging markets, and is at the center of many emerging-market crises. If the IMF’s staff could speak freely about the U.S., it would tell us what it tells all countries in this situation: recovery will fail unless we break the financial oligarchy that is blocking essential reform. And if we are to prevent a true depression, we’re running out of time."
by Simon Johnson

It seems that we were once a Republic, but we have become a Corporation. Corporate Fascism, a new political model?

More about GS comes to light.

http://jessescrossroadscafe.blogspot.com/2010/02/simon-johnson-goldman-faces-special.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+JessesCafeAmericain+%28Jesse%27s+Café+Américain%29

As we see this picture unfold, we see a more and more complex situation that appears destined to fail.

Sir Ken Robinson: Do schools kill creativity?

The modern education system and how it hurts creativity.

Goldman Sach's = Dr Evil? Specter?

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/02/14/greece-crisis-wall-st-hel_n_461852.html
Greece Crisis: Wall St. Helped To Mask Debt Fueling Europe's Shake-Up

Like a James Bond movie almost....

Kunstler's Latest

http://kunstler.com/blog/2010/02/euroland-the-horror-movie.html#comments

Kunstler's latest.

I think the US is lucky that we dealt with our initial crisis in 2008. Now Europe is up to bat, and it faces huge issues. For the time being, their loss is our gain. Once Europe gets it's house in order, we will be front and center. I think it gives the USD several months of safety.

How Goldman Sachs Helped Greece to Mask its True Debt

http://www.spiegel.de/international/europe/a-676634.html

"Goldman Sachs helped the Greek government to mask the true extent of its deficit with the help of a derivatives deal that legally circumvented the EU Maastricht deficit rules. At some point the so-called cross currency swaps will mature, and swell the country's already bloated deficit."

Greece: The Ghost of Christmas Yet to Come to the USA

Greece is an example of what we face if don't reign in our spending and financial corruption. Germany is going to be the country that dictates the fate of Greece, and if we continue as we are we will see our fate dictated by China.

We need to: Force Daylight into the Financial System, Stop buying everything from a country that threatens us with dumping our bonds if we don't behave as they wish, Become a Productive country again, and embrace an alternative energy future so that we are not left behind.

Is our country capable of this? We will see.

Sovereign Default - It's coming to visit.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/just-how-ugly-sovereign-default-truth-how-self-delusions-prevent-recognition-reality

Another fantastic Zerohedge Post! Go Tyler Durden!

Greece is going to kick off a wave of debt defaults that will wash up on every shore in the world.
I am not sure how this will play out exactly, but times are getting more interesting. The European Financial crisis is going to effect all of us. I recommend being very conservative. I am shorting the Euro myself. I would not be surprised to see a return to the Deutsch Mark in the next few months/years. If you are long the market right now I think you will get spanked going forwards. Cash and Precious Metals will be the winners as this plays out imho.

Excellent Zerohedge Commentary

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/coming-america-greek-sovereign-debt-crisis#comment-225910

My Wild Speculation: Euro, USD and China

The chess game as I see it:

Ok, spent yesterday reading the news breaking out on Zerohedge regarding Europe. Most interesting to me were the allegations that US Banks were somehow doing things to increase the magnitude of problems there in order to facilitate more people running to the USD away from the Euro. That is what I gathered anyway. I am curious if others here see the same thing. It has me thinking that the Fed/Treas are at work through GS by proxy, and that this is their way of getting the USD support they needed. They are just taking advantage of the Europeans poor finances to their advantage. But, some aspects of this story look pretty manipulative to me: like we needed a victim to secure the USD's position, we found it. Also, if true, maybe they have found a way to engineer support for the USD without withdrawing liquidity from the US Markets.

So, into this news stumbles China with threats to dump various US Debt instruments/Bonds, etc with the complaint that we are selling arms to Taiwan. The nuclear threat of dumping our debt is sprung over Helicopters and Missiles to Taiwan? Doesn't add up. I think there is more to this story:

Zerohedge: http://www.zerohedge.com/article/china-d....
"It appears that this time China's posturing is for real. Following up on our earlier post that Chinese military officials want to "punish" America by selling Treasuries, Asia Times Online is reporting that an explicit directive by the Chinese government has notified reserve managers to sell all risky US assets, including asset backed and corporates, and just hold on to explicitly guaranteed Treasuries and Agency debt." Tyler Durden

My view is that an economic war has begun. The chinese seeing us seeming to help the demise of the Euro in order to prop up the USD, have decided that it is time for them to start dumping some of our debt in an attempt to mitigate some of the gains we are achieving in the USD. I am not sure of their motive exaclty, but if they see us getting ahead in a way that hurts Europe, they might perceive it against their interests. Maybe someone else can flesh out their motives better.

What emerges to me is that we are seeing economic war breaking out. With the goal being to be the last man standing, because whoever remains will be much better off than the others. So, the last man standing in this economic gunfight looks to be the US, Good! I speculate that the Chinese have been building up the potential to blackmail us with the threat of dumping our debt for a long time and waiting to use it at the right time. Now they see us getting away with tanking the Euro, and they begin to unload our debt in an effort to prevent us from winning the game. They may realize that their leverage over the US will disappear if once again the USD is confirmed King.

I know there are a lot of holes in my logic, but this is what my gut instinct is telling me.

Europe, China, the USD and the Euro.

There is a lot afoot over these issues right now. In particular, Zerohedge has revealed a lot of very interesting news about both the European Debt Crisis and now China's threats to starting dumping our debt. It seems as though there may be an economic war going on underneath the headlines.

Several worthwhile Zerohedge and Market Ticker posts:

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/china-dumping-begins-reserve-managers-notified-any-non-usg-guaranteed-securities-must-be-div

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/what-country-next-coming-pan-european-sovereign-debt-crisis

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/ever-increasing-parallels-between-aig-and-greece-and-cds-puppetmaster-behind-it-all

http://market-ticker.org/archives/1950-Is-That-A-Bailout-Or-A-Lit-Fuse.html

Real job losses a lot worse than reported on the news.

http://www.businessinsider.com/trimtabs-heres-why-the-real-jobs-loss-number-was-5x-worse-than-what-the-bls-reported-2010-2

Yeah sure the recovery is real.....

Davos Economic Forum Risk Tool- It's worth a look.

http://www.weforum.org/documents/riskbrowser2010/risks/#

Check out this link. It allows you to see investment risks as different events occur. It is a model that was presented at the Davos Economic Forum. Pretty neat tool.

Geitner Says US Credit Rating is safe...

When asked will we ever lose our AAA credit rating?

“Absolutely not,” Geithner said, when asked in an ABC News interview broadcast yesterday whether a downgrade is a concern. “That will never happen to this country.”"

What did we hear about all the failed banks on Wall Street from Bankers before they all fell apart? "Oh, we will all be ok".... As I see it there are two options, either we default on debt and see our credit rating decline, or we will never lose our credit rating because we will print money and quantitatively ease forever. Those are the only two real options if you accept that the US faces long term declines in tax revenue combined with long term deficit spending. We can only change the outcome if we stop spending. But, if the government stops spending right now with continuing declines in private sector spending, we will see continued decline in our GDP and economy. The only really politically acceptable option is to print money and inflate our way out of debt.

I think the Euro crisis right now is providing Treasury with a chance to issue more debt at low rates as investors flee the sovereign default risks in Europe. This will last until Europe stabilizes, then Treasury will again be faced with problems to find buyers. So, for the time being they can continue pushing the problem to the side.

Worst Recession since the Great Depression in terms of Jobs.

Great Zerohedge post. Shows charts from the Minneapolis Federal Reserve Bank.

http://www.zerohedge.com/article/charting-worst-and-soon-be-shortest-economic-recovery-ever

Good article about improving engine efficiency technologies

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=better-mileage-now

Housing Price Recovery? Don't hold your breath.

Innovation

Take a look at this interesting article, and consider how it dovetails with the recent Wired Magazine article. Consider also the growth in government worker compensation and numbers. Our government is a huge leech that is slowly killing its host.

My sentiments exactly:

http://www.financialsense.com/fsu/editorials/gtlong/2010/0203.html

"The US is no longer a Manufacturing driven economy, or even a global Service economy. The US has sustained itself since the dot.com bubble implosion as a Financial Economy which is now seriously impaled and faces potentially years of ‘rehab’ efforts. Future jobs are not going to come from the old “Corporate America” but rather from a new “Small Business America” - new innovation’ - creating new types of work. Ten years ago there was no such thing as a ‘web master’ or an ‘E-Bay business’. America must maintain & even challenge itself to step up the pace of innovation. The frank reality is we are falling behind." Gordon T Long

The Phoney War

After the Germans invaded Poland in 1939 there was a time called the Phoney War, where the forces of the West faced off against the Germans to the East. The French sat behind their Maginot Line and assumed they were safe....until one day the Blitzkrieg happened.

I feel that the economic situation today is not much different. We experienced the crisis in 2008 and the ensuing market collapse. That was Poland. If the Allies had stomached the courage to attack Hitler at that point, they could have won or at least controlled events somewhat. If we had forced the "Too Big to Fails" to Fail at that point we could have begun the real recovery then, but instead it has all been an act to try to keep the good times rolling. Since March 2009 all we have heard is how recovery has begun. Yet where is the recovery? Jobs? Nope. Housing? Nope. Goldman Sachs and AIG bonuses? Sure! My gut instinct is that the real crisis lies ahead, and we are in the duldrums of the "Phoney Recovery". When the winds start blowing, it will not be bringing the spring of recovery. We are stuck with waiting to see how it all plays out. But, I fear for the "Blitzkrieg" that might wait in shadows behind our Maginot Line of the Fed, Treasury, and conventional economic theories made obsolete by manipulation, fraud, and corruption.

What we need is Daylight!

TARP Watchdog's Dismal Report

Interesting Blog at Gregor.US about Energy relationship to US Treasuries

http://gregor.us/coal/coal-and-treasuries/

I recommend taking a look at this article on this Peak Oil Blog. It is a thought provoking post about the relationships between energy demand and US Treasury debt. I am not sure I agree with the relationships being related. I agree that we are issuing debt in an out of control fashion, and we are monetizing it. I am not sure there is a relationship with energy prices. In any case it is something worth considering.

Are you prepared to see the Government take over your IRA and 401Ks?

In the past few weeks both Market Ticker and Zerohedge have said that in an attempt to force us to buy up more government debt and fund the spending in Washington, there will be a move to force us to do this with our IRAs/401Ks. Consider the implications of this? 3-4% yields in Treasuries while Treasury prints $$$$ via Quantitative Easing and thereby undercuts the value of the US Dollar. It equates to a slow theft with the appearance of a helping hand.

Here it is at ZH with a link to the proposal at Treasury:
http://www.zerohedge.com/article/treasury-soliciting-your-feedback-regarding-proposed-annuitization-401k

Karl Denninger discusses this at length in his weekly podcast radio show about halfway into the playback:
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/marketticker/2010/02/01/paulson-barney-frank-budgets-and-more

Another link:
http://moneymorning.com/2010/01/27/retirement-plans/

In the Next Industrial Revolution, Atoms Are the New Bits

In the Next Industrial Revolution, Atoms Are the New Bits

Posted using ShareThis

This the kind of Indy American I am talking about. We need to have more Americans doing exactly what this article discusses. Interesting to see what people are doing out there.

Americans can still be a productive people! It is the path we have to follow!

Daily Reckoning: Economic Recovery Period: When the Stock Market Notices the Depression

http://dailyreckoning.com/economic-recovery-period-when-the-stock-market-notices-the-depression/

"If we’re right, the economy is in a multi-year period of correction, de-leveraging and depression. The stock market has to notice, sooner or later. And it is bound to get a little gloomy when it realizes what is going on. That should take the Dow down to about 3,000-5,000 on the Dow index. It could be much lower…" Bill Bonner

iBama - CharlotteObserver.com

iBama - CharlotteObserver.com

Kunstler's Monday Blog - Obama Reality

From a former advocate of Obama.

"the intelligent minority of this nation lacks the one thing that animates intelligence in the service of reality, and that is the courage to tell the truth. I suppose this is what galls so many former Obama boosters: that the "hope" vested in him would be enacted in truth-telling, which would lead to "change" in the choices we make about doing things. What we ended up with seems to be something like a false champion with a good line of talk. Mr. Obama may yet be pushed into a recognition of the reality he did not personally create, and this may occur as the US economy heads much more drastically south in the months ahead." James Howard Kunstler

http://kunstler.com/blog/2010/02/the-jive-economy.html

I don't agree with a lot of things he says, but Kunstler is very enjoyable to read. He will challenge your viewpoints no matter what perspective you bring to the discussion. I think that we may see a less aggressive version of the future than he portrays.

Is the economy Improving?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MYvUSw51QKg



Good Video.