Herr Schäuble Sprechen

Großbritannien hat höheren Staatsschulden, als der Eurozone Durchschnitt und ich nicht einmal die Vereinigten Staaten von Amerika erwähnen möchten,“ Schaeuble sagte.
{Britain has a higher state debt than the eurozone average and I don't even want to mention the United States of America," Schaeuble said.}
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/economics/9809154/Britain-has-more-debt-than-the-eurozone-says-Germanys-Wolfgang-Schaeuble.html

Grease

Electricity bills for most Greek consumers will go up 9 percent retroactively to Jan. 1, while a 100 percent property tax surcharge is still being tacked on to utility bills under the threat of power being disconnected, although state agencies that owe 170 million euros ($227 million) haven’t paid and have not lost their electricity.
http://greece.greekreporter.com/2013/01/13/electric-bills-up-9-government-agencies-wont-pay/

Three Card Monti

Monti pictured at the unveiling of his campaign logo

Monti one month ago: "ROME—Premier Mario Monti on Tuesday defended his government's austerity measures as necessary to restore confidence in Italy's financial future, and warned voters to beware "magic solutions" promised by candidates in coming elections."

http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2019872680_apeuitalypolitics.html

"[M]ario Monti, the outgoing prime minister now heading a centrist coalition against the main parties that supported his technocrat government last year, says he doesn’t want to be remembered as just a tax man, and now says it’s possible to reduce the IMU property tax, even though late last month he warned catastrophe would befall.

http://blogs.wsj.com/eurocrisis/2013/01/11/italys-military-cuts-highlight-an-austerity-paradox/

we got to fulfill the book...

Criminogenic-Producing or Intended to Produce Crime and Criminality

 

[T]he official said Holder, who leads the Justice Department, and HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius and VA Secretary Eric Shinseki will remain with the administration amid changes to the Cabinet as President Barack Obama moves into his second term.

http://news.yahoo.com/white-house-official-ag-hhs-va-heads-stay-214245302--politics.html

 

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder is aware prosecutors and elected officials were bribed and otherwise compromised, but has not held anyone accountable.
http://fatboysez.blogspot.com/2012/02/criminogenic-producing-or-intended-to.html

 

U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and Lanny Breuer, head of the Justice Department's criminal division, were partners for years at a Washington law firm that represented a Who's Who of big banks and other companies at the center of alleged foreclosure fraud, a Reuters inquiry shows.

http://fatboysez.blogspot.com/2012/01/criminogenic-producing-or-intended-to.html

 

"Gun Runner and another operation called Fast and Furious were designed to dismantle the gun-smuggling routes that drug cartels use to ferry high-powered assault rifles from the U.S. into Mexico. By allowing people to illegally purchase large quantities of the weapons from gun dealers, officials hoped to trace the firearms to the drug cartel members and prosecute them. But ATF whistleblowers allege that officials lost track of the guns."

http://fatboysez.blogspot.com/2011/05/atf-sells-thousands-of-assault-rifles.html

Decapitations in Kashmir

 

RAJOURI/NEW DELHI: The Indian Army on Wednesday said both the soldiers killed during an attack by Pakistani troops across the Line of Control (LoC) in Jammu and Kashmir were decapitated and that one severed head was yet to be recovered.
http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2013-01-09/india/36236792_1_pakistani-troops-area-in-poonch-sector-indian-army

 

Message to all World Leaders:

If you are involved in tense negotiations with Sec. Clinton, ask her what her husband's position on the matter at hand is, she will snap, blow a gasket and be defeated:

...[A]pparently the translator made a mistake and the student had wanted to know what President Obama thought of the deal.
http://www.outsidethebeltway.com/hillary_clintons_congo_blow-up/



 

Heck of a Job Brownie

Japan’s Cleanup After a Nuclear Accident Is Denounced - NY Times
January 7, 2013
"More than a year and a half since the nuclear crisis, much of Japan’s post-Fukushima cleanup remains primitive, slapdash and bereft of the cleanup methods lauded by government scientists as effective in removing harmful radioactive cesium from the environment.
Recent reports in the local media of cleanup crews dumping contaminated soil and leaves into rivers has focused attention on the sloppiness of the cleanup.
... both the central and local governments have handed over much of the 1 trillion yen decontamination effort to Japan’s largest construction companies. The politically connected companies have little radiological cleanup expertise and critics say they have cut corners to employ primitive — even potentially hazardous — techniques".

CITI Never Sleeps

Obama to nominate Jacob Lew as Treasury Secretary
http://www.businessinsider.com/jack-lew-treasury-secretary-nomination-obama-tim-geithner-debt-ceiling-2013-1

In June 2006, Lew was named chief operating officer of Citigroup's Alternative Investments unit, a proprietary trading group. The unit he oversaw invested in a hedge fund "that bet on the housing market to collapse
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jacob_Lew

The Bernanke Put

[c]onsumers should brace themselves for "massive" hikes in some commodities this year...
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/retailandconsumer/9779693/Waitrose-boss-Britons-should-brace-themselves-for-massive-food-price-hikes.html

 

Obama Saves U.S. From Fiscal Cliff

Fiscal Cliff Save Adds $4 Trillion to U.S. Debt

"In other words, the tax deal that Congress just agreed to will raise $125 billion from increased payroll taxes from all working Americans (poor and middle class alike), while saving the richest Americans at least $20 billion in dividend taxes."
The Wealthiest 400 American Tax Payers Receive $20 Billion Tax Break From Obama's Fiscal Cliff Deal

But, the downtrodden and suffering folks at NASCAR, Goldman Sachs, railroads, mining companies, GE and Hollywood were spared:
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2013/01/eight-corporate-subsidies-in-the-fiscal-cliff-bill-from-goldman-sachs-to-disney-to-nascar.html

 

Energy Drinks in Afghanistan

In Afghanistan, there is little government regulation and no national standards for imported drinks, food, or medicines. That has meant the Afghan market has been flooded by outdated, low-quality energy drinks deemed unfit for sale in other countries.

Abdullah, an assistant shopkeeper, says Afghan distributors for foreign beverage companies sell expired products for discounted prices and that some shopkeepers readily buy the inferior products and sell them for a quick profit.

"Some of the drinks are past their expiry dates or have gone bad. They pose a health risk to people and shouldn't be sold. Only those that are legal, with expiry dates, and in good condition should be sold," he says. "The Public Health Ministry must regulate the market and take the necessary steps to stop this."
http://www.rferl.org/content/afghanistan-energy-drinks/24812249.html

The Bernanke Put

French food aid NGO reports ‘explosion’ in demand
http://www.france24.com/en/20121229-france-poverty-restos-du-coeur

[a]fter an increase in duty has seen the price of heating oil double in two years.
Smog hits Athens as cash-strapped residents choose fire over fuel

Some 300,000 Brits had to choose between heat or food this Christmas season, while 9 million more are at risk of falling into 'fuel poverty' by 2016, a government advisory group has warned, calling on the PM for swift action.
http://rt.com/news/fuel-poverty-uk-rise-179/

Austerity Britain is experiencing a nutritional recession, with rising food prices and shrinking incomes driving up consumption of fatty foods, reducing the amount of fruit and vegetables we buy, and condeming people on the lowest incomes to an increasingly unhealthy diet.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2012/nov/18/breadline-britain-nutritional-recession-austerity

 

New Home Sales Surge

New Home Sales Climb to Highest Rate Since April 2010

But wait...

New Home Circa 1963

 

 

What About Food Inflation, Bernanke?

[B]ut while the Fed moves on with its bond bonanza assuming rapidly rising prices won't be a problem, or at least not any time soon, it will be hard to convince shoppers at the grocery aisle.
/
Producer food prices are up 2.6% from a year earlier, compared with an annual gain of just 1.5% for all goods. In particular, chicken prices have surged 14.3% during the last year and wholesale beef and veal prices rose 8.2% in November, the biggest monthly gain since 2008.
/
For months, the US Department of Agriculture has warned about higher food prices. Next year, U.S. consumers may pay 3% to 4% more for food, the agency forecasts. The price of beef may rise as much as 5% amid tighter supplies of corn, which is used to feed cattle. Since June, the price of grain, the country's biggest crop, rose by more than 50%.
What About Food Inflation Bernanke?

[T]he study showed British families are buying up to 20 percent less fruit and vegetables in order to cut costs since 2007, saying that households are buying less food but paying far more for it.
http://www.presstv.ir/detail/2012/12/14/278015/households/

 

Re-Post from 11/02/10

Twas the night before QE2, when all through the house
Not a creature was stirring, not even a Wall St banker louse

The stockings were hung by the chimney with care
In hopes that Ben Shalom soon would be there

Blankfein and Dimon were nestled all snug in their beds
While visions of free money danced in their heads

Twitter#AGhettoSantaWould

first have to talk to his Probation officer about traveling out of state

not come down the chimney cuz' he aint trying to scuff his new J's.

have pitbulls pulling the sleigh instead of reindeer

Show up December 28th

wrap your presents up in aluminum foil

check to see if the police was in the neighborhood before he stopped at you house

fly with a suspended license

pick the lock instead of going down the chimney

give you food stamps instead of toys

give you the gift of life. His condom broke and he ain't paying no child support. Merry Christmas.                 

turn down the radio when he parallel park his sleigh"
http://twitter.com/search?q=%23AGhettoSantaWould&src=tren

Hashtag belongs to a black man. No racist intent.

 

168 Pakistan Children Killed by U.S. Drone Strikes over the Last Seven Years

This count as of August 2011
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/pakistan/8695679/168-children-killed-in-drone-strikes-in-Pakistan-since-start-of-campaign.html

"Just one in 50 victims of America’s deadly drone strikes in Pakistan are terrorists – while the rest are innocent civilians, a new report claimed today.
/

And the authors lay much of the blame on the use of the ‘double-tap’ strike where a drone fires one missile – and then a second as rescuers try to drag victims from the rubble
/

 Investigators also discovered that communities living in fear of the drones were suffering severe stress and related illnesses. Many parents had taken their children out of school because they were so afraid of a missile-strike.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2208307/Americas-deadly-double-tap-drone-attacks-killing-49-people-known-terrorist-Pakistan.html

Every reported U.S. drone strike from 2002-2012

"I've been tweeting for 12 hours and we're only at March 2010."
https://twitter.com/dronestream

Barrosso Channels Clemenceau

"The next elections must not serve as a pretext for putting in doubt how indispensable these measures are,"

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/financialcrisis/9732586/Barroso-Italy-elections-must-not-stop-reform-drive.html
 

"The graveyards are full of indispensable men."

"The graveyards are full of indispensable men."

 

Retail Sales Rebound and Initial Claims Decrease?

“We’re off to a fairly strong holiday-spending season,” said Millan Mulraine, senior U.S. strategist for TD Securities in New York.
Bloomberg Pumps a Whole Lot of Nothing

Covered employment, those employed that are eligible to file for unemployment benefits:
7/7/2001:     128,116,562
11/17/2012: 128,066,082
http://workforcesecurity.doleta.gov/unemploy/claims.asp

Eleven years later and there are less employed that are eligible to file for unemployment insurance. Widely stated estimates for new entrants into the US workforce put that number at 1.8 million per year. 1.8 million times 11 = 19.8 million workers unaccounted for and missing.
 

Red Hot Chili Peppers - Stadion Slaski, Chorzów, Poland Full Concert 2007.07.03

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XhrCbZBAC7M

Red Hot Chili peppers Live at Slane Castle Full Concert

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XWRgh1eIdfg

Alice in Chains - MTV Unplugged Full Show

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0dVz2D1xS-0

Gérard Depardieu

has fled France's 75% income tax and moved to the bucolic tax shelter Belgian border town of Néchin. In 2011, Mr. Depardieu urinated in the aisle of an Air France flight forcing the plane to turn back.
http://www.france24.com/en/20121210-gerard-depardieu-tax-shelter-belgium-france-wealth-hollande-nechin

The State Department's Top Pick for Cultural Ambassador to Bahrain

"[H]e had said earlier that the State Department had asked him to be a cultural ambassador to Bahrain, a religiously conservative Muslim country, “promoting music, freedom and positive party power.” "


 [Warning: the longest 2 minutes and 29 seconds of your life]
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8xxFegl6JvY
 

Initial Impression - a Vague Idea in Which Some Confidence is Placed Based on a First Look, a Cursory Glance

Change You Can Believe In

MEXICO CITY (AP) - Enrique Pena Nieto took the oath of office as Mexico's new president Saturday vowing to restore peace and security and take on the vested interests that have hindered economic prosperity.
/
Pena Nieto marked the return of the Institutional Revolutionary Party, or PRI.
/
"Mexico has not achieved the advances that the population demands or deserves," Pena Nieto said in an inaugural speech
http://apnews.myway.com/article/20121202/DA2TC0Q02.html

Newly elected President Nieto's party, the PRI, held power from 1929 until 2000.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Institutional_Revolutionary_Party

基督。 7年的大学付诸东流。不如加入和平队该死的。

Christ. Seven Years of College Down the Drain. Might as Well Join the Fucking Peace Corps.

 

 

 

"[D]oes this mean that the prospects for student loan delinquencies are similar to those for the household debt in general, and thus no special attention is warranted? Unfortunately, this is not the case—some special accounting used for student loans, not applicable to other types of consumer debt, makes it likely that the delinquency rates for student loans are understated.
/
From this exercise, we find that as many as 47 percent of student loan borrowers appear to be in deferral or forbearance periods, and thus did not have to make payments as of third-quarter 2011. Specifically, 17.6 percent of borrowers had exactly the same balance in the third quarter as in the second quarter of this year, and 29.1 percent increased their overall student loan balance by taking on new originations or accruing interest to the balance.

We then recalculate the proportion of borrowers with a past due balance excluding this group of borrowers. We find that 27 percent of the borrowers have past due balances, while the adjusted proportion of outstanding student loan balances that is delinquent is 21 percent—much higher than the unadjusted rates of 14.4 percent and 10 percent, respectively
http://libertystreeteconomics.newyorkfed.org/2012/03/grading-student-loans.html

Who Shot First?

[G]eneral Dayan interrupted: ''Never mind that. After all, I know how at least 80 percent of the clashes there started. In my opinion, more than 80 percent, but let's talk about 80 percent. It went this way: We would send a tractor to plow some area where it wasn't possible to do anything, in the demilitarized area, and knew in advance that the Syrians would start to shoot. If they didn't shoot, we would tell the tractor to advance farther, until in the end the Syrians would get annoyed and shoot. And then we would use artillery and later the air force also, and that's how it was.''
http://www.nytimes.com/1997/05/11/world/general-s-words-shed-a-new-light-on-the-golan.html

Nobel Peace Prize Winner Speaks

Speaking in Thailand Sunday, President Obama defended Israel's counter-assault on Hamas in the Gaza Strip by saying, "There's no country on Earth that would tolerate missiles raining down on its citizens from outside its borders.
/
That is a very interesting thing to say at a time when the U.S. is regularly raining missiles down on Pakistan and Yemen.
http://reason.com/blog/2012/11/19/no-country-on-earth-would-tolerate-missi

Lloyd Continues Doing God's Work

BLANKFEIN: You're going to have to undoubtedly do something to lower people's expectations -- the entitlements and what people think that they're going to get, because it's not going to -- they're not going to get it.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-18563_162-57552173/goldman-sachs-ceo-entitlements-must-be-contained/



Income inequality in the US is higher than Russia and equal to China

Wages paid as percent of GDP

 

Marc Faber

"I keep in my toilet a picture of Mr. Bernanke. And every time I think about selling my gold,
I look at it and I know better!"

From the link below:

"Our analysis leads us to believe that recovery is sound only if it does come of itself. For any revival which is merely due to artificial stimulus leaves part of the work of the depressions undone and adds, to an undigested remnant of maladjustments, new maladjustments of its own."
oseph Schumpeter

"There are two ways to conquer and enslave a nation. One is by the sword. The other is by debt."
John Adams

Marc Faber

Amman Jordan

— Thousands of Jordanians took to the streets on Friday
/
The unrest began late on Tuesday after the government raised prices for cooking and heating gas by 54 percent and some oil derivatives by up to 28 percent. In response, thousands of Jordanians poured into the streets, pelting riot police with stones and torching police cars, government offices and private banks in the largest and most sustained protests to hit the country since the start of the region's uprisings nearly two years ago.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/world/2012/11/16/jordan-king-rally/1708985/

 

No Love für Deutschland

The protests began peacefully enough in Brussels, but the situation deteriorated as eggs were thrown at the Geman embassy in the Belgian capital.
http://www.euronews.com/2012/11/15/demonstrations-turn-to-disorder-in-europe/

In Thessaloniki:


Protesters heckled and threw coffee at Germany's consul to Thessaloniki over civil service layoffs, local officials said on Thursday, forcing riot police to intervene.
The protesters flung water and coffee at consul Wolfgang Hoelscher-Obermaier on the sidelines of a conference on Greek-German trade initiatives, police said.
"Stand united to kick out the Nazis," some of the protesters chanted.
Other members of the German delegation were pelted with eggs by the group that numbered around 300 people, according to police.
Officers moved in to extricate the consul from the crowd, but nobody was injured and no arrests were made, the police said
http://www.france24.com/en/20121115-greek-protesters-throw-coffee-german-consul

Silvio chimes in: "The data after a year of technocratic government is disastrous and so I think there absolutely has to be a change in this economic policy imposed on us by Europe and above all by the hegemony of Germany." Berlusconi told reporters
http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/11/16/us-italy-monti-poll-idUSBRE8AF0YK20121116

Banned in Germany...for some reason

Five minute video produced by two Portuguese citizens intended for public view in Germany and released to coincide with Merkel's Portugal visit is banned for "political reasons."

 

Food Inflation To Surge, Goldman Warns

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2012-10-10/food-inflation-surge-goldman-warns

Dominique Strauss-Kahn: I was Naive to Think I Could Get Away with Orgies

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/dominique-strauss-kahn/9599236/Dominique-Strauss-Kahn-I-was-naive-to-think-I-could-get-away-with-orgies.html

Surge in Part Time Jobs Creation Due to Obamacare?

In hopes of reducing the impact of Obamacare, Olive Garden and Red Lobster are reducing hours and studying the impact
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com/2012/10/prepping-for-obamacare-olive-garden-and.html

 

Two Suicides of Those on the "Lagarde List"

Greek Government "Loses" List of Tax Evaders

"[T]he parliament has ordered a full inquiry into how the list slipped through their fingers. It was supplied two years ago by the-then French finance minister Christine Lagarde who, as IMF boss today, is one of Greece’s lead creditors."
Can't Fool the Fatman

 

Greek government chief found hanged

(UKPA)–4 days ago

A former government official has been found hanged at his home in central Greece.
Leonidas Tzanis, 57, a former socialist politician and deputy interior minister from 1999 to 2001, was found dead by his wife in the town of Volos, said a police official.
The official said Mr Tzanis's death is being treated as suicide but no suicide note has been found.
Mr Tzanis was on a list of 36 politicians that a local website claimed were allegedly under investigation by Greece's financial police.
An official with knowledge of the probe said Mr Tzanis had been under investigation following an anonymous tip-off but no indication of wrongdoing has emerged.
http://www.google.com/hostednews/ukpress/article/ALeqM5gAF6YVg7ntOD4VB1aM02k4ecUn6w?docId=N0051191349379242557A

A Greek businessman who had been accused of being part of the bribery and money laundering network involving former Defense Minister Akis Tsochatzopoulos, who is in jail on charges of stealing as much as $1.29 billion from defense contracts has been found dead in a hotel room in Jakarta, Indonesia.
http://greece.greekreporter.com/2012/10/08/businessman-in-tsochatzopoulos-case-found-dead/

Ben & Barry's Funky Chunky Monkey Recovery

...[f]oodstamp usage for both persons and households, has jumped to a new all time record.
/
More disturbing is that in the same month, the number of US households reliant on foodstamps rose by a whopping 99,493 to 22,541,744.
/
Finally, and putting it all into perspective, since December 2007, or the start of the Great Depression ver 2.0, the number of jobs lost is 4.5 million, while those added to foodstamps and disability rolls, has increased by a unprecedented 21 million.

Ben and Barry's Chunky Monkey Recovery

http://www.johnlohman.com/WTF16/imag009.jpg

Greek Government "Loses" List of Tax Evaders

"[T]he parliament has ordered a full inquiry into how the list slipped through their fingers. It was supplied two years ago by the-then French finance minister Christine Lagarde who, as IMF boss today, is one of Greece’s lead creditors."
Can't Fool the Fatman


 

World Food Prices at 2008 Crisis Levels

FAO's index is below a peak of 238 points hit in February 2011, when high food prices helped drive the Arab Spring uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa, but current levels are very close to those seen in 2008 which sparked riots in poor countries.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/world-food-prices-edge-sept-082921488.html?l=1


Thanks Bernanke.

 

Q&A With Neil Barofsky

[A]nd, as we started discussing it, he gave me a warning. He said that I was doing myself real harm for my ”future prospects,” in his words. And by that, he explained that I had a very harsh tone. I was very critical of Wall Street and very critical of the Obama Administration as I was carrying out my job as SIGTARP and providing oversight. And he warned me that if I didn’t change my tone, it was going to hurt my ability to get a job after SIGTARP when I left the government, presumably to go get a job on Wall Street, that I was doing myself real harm. When I explained to him I wasn’t really interested in that, he then said, ”Well, even within the administration.” But then if I changed my tone, became a little bit more upbeat and positive, good things could happen to me. He mentioned even perhaps an Obama appointment as a -- as a federal judge, if only I would change my tone.
/
I was once told by an IG pointblank that he wished he could do what I was doing, but he was afraid for his job, that he had kids in college and he had -- he couldn’t afford to lose his job. And that’s one of the problems. They live in fear of being fired if they’re too aggressive in carrying out their duties.
/
Geithner was much more dismissive. I didn’t really meet with him all that often. Maybe a couple of meetings at times is very combative, at times very aggressive, at times profane.
/
They kept their jobs. They kept their bonuses. They kept their rich compensation they received prior to their bailouts. They kept -- those bonuses were soon restored for those executives.
  http://www.c-spanvideo.org/program/307720-1

"[A]nother factor in maintaining balance involves the element of time. As we peer into society's future, we -- you and I, and our government -- must avoid the impulse to live only for today, plundering, for our own ease and convenience, the precious resources of tomorrow. We cannot mortgage the material assets of our grandchildren without risking the loss also of their political and spiritual heritage. We want democracy to survive for all generations to come, not to become the insolvent phantom of tomorrow."

"Down the long lane of the history yet to be written America knows that this world of ours, ever growing smaller, must avoid becoming a community of dreadful fear and hate, and be instead, a proud confederation of mutual trust and respect."

Spain's Banking Sector is Rock Solid. No, Really. Oliver Wyman Says It's So

From The NY Times:
[T]he number was within the range of previous estimates and well below the potential 100 billion euros, or $128.8 billion, in bailout money Spain negotiated with the other members of the euro zone union in June.

And of the 14 banks assessed by the consulting firm Oliver Wyman, half are not in need of any emergency funds, including Santander, BBVA and La Caixa — the country’s three largest financial institutions.

/

and the European Commission both issued statements Friday, applauding the audit and expressing support for Spain. “This is a major step in implementing the financial assistance program and toward strengthening the viability of and confidence in the Spanish banking sector,” the commission, the administrative arm of the European Union, said in a statement.

/

The independent report, which Oliver Wyman based on its own work...

 

But wait. Let's check out some other results from Oliver Wyman:

Re-Post From 11/13/2010

Today We Are All Spaniards In Support of Liberty

Democracy.. is two wolves and a lamb voting on what to have for lunch. Liberty ... is a well-armed lamb contesting the vote. -- Benjamin Franklin

 

 

 

A protester holds a sign that reads 'Without fighting, neither bread nor freedom'
Picture: Reuters