Friday, January 17, 2025
In Gavin Newsom's anti-capitalist Hotel California, you can never sell your damaged land and leave
There are thousands of destroyed lots as far as the eye can see.
Who wants to pay the former full price for one?
The tax base has been gutted.
Thursday, January 16, 2025
Jimmy Carter's legacy: The only president ever to pardon a disgusting piece of trash who was convicted of sexually molesting a child
Peter Yarrow, of Peter Paul and Mary fame, made a 14-year old girl wank his weenie in a hotel room in 1970. He served three months for his crime.
WaPo in 2021 wondered if there were other victims.
Jimmy Carter pardoned Peter Yarrow at the last second in 1981, while we were distracted with the release of the Iran hostages and the inauguration of Ronald Reagan.
Both disgusting wankers have now died, just days apart: Jimmy on Dec 29th. Peter on Jan 7th.
Wednesday, January 15, 2025
I track average prices for over 40 basic foods in the U.S. city average: Just four made new all time highs in December 2024
Round roast $7.486/lb
All uncooked beef roasts category $7.719/lb
Table wine, red and white $13.985/liter
Beer $1.812/pint
Core cpi inflation in December 2024 yoy was 3.2%, annual average 3.43%, which was 75% worse than 2017-2020
The 2017-2020 average annual rate was 1.96%.
The four year average annual rate 2021-2024 under Joe Biden clocks in at 4.48%, almost 129% worse than under Trump I.
During 2024 the year over year measure has been at 3.3% or 3.2% every month from June inclusive, but stonks are soaring today as if something has changed.
Nothing's changed.
FBI failed to investigate Pete Hegseth, GOP Senators afraid of being primaried just fine with it
A gross dereliction of duty on the part of the Republican-controlled Senate and the Trump-directed FBI. That is a harsh but unavoidable assessment of the confirmation hearing for Pete Hegseth to serve as Donald Trump’s defense secretary. ...
Only [Senators] Wicker and Reed were permitted to review an FBI report that Reed described as “insufficient.” The FBI failed to question Hegseth’s second wife, despite her expressed interest in being interviewed. It didn’t speak to the woman who accused Hegseth of sexually assaulting her — and was paid by him in exchange for executing a nondisclosure agreement. It didn’t obtain the forensic audit of a veteran’s organization Hegseth ran that found “evidence of gross financial mismanagement.”
Mayer reported that “the F.B.I.’s background investigation also failed to interview Fox News personnel who had described Hegseth to NBC News as smelling of alcohol on the job as recently as last fall. Instead, sources say that the Bureau settled for an interview with a public-relations official at Fox.”
The FBI’s role here is troubling, because the bureau is supposed to serve as the Senate’s chief source of reported and reliable information about the individuals whose nominations it is considering. ...
The bureau has argued that the scope of its inquiries is limited by the directions it is given, in this case by the Trump transition team. But the Trump team’s goal is to win confirmation, not to get to the truth of the matter — which makes a Trump-directed FBI investigation worse than meaningless; it makes it effectively a coverup.
More.
Tuesday, January 14, 2025
I don't care what you think of Senator Tim Kaine, D-VA, he nailed Pete Hegseth's unrepentant ass to the canvass
Pete Hegseth is no repentant Christian. He's a phony baloney plastic banana good time rock 'n rolla.
This man represents a new low for the GOP.
From the story here:
“I want to return to the incident that you referenced a minute ago that occurred in Monterey, California, in October 2017,” Kaine opened. “At that time, you were still married to your second wife, correct?”
After Hegseth agreed that he believed so, Kaine followed with “And you had just fathered a child by a woman who would later become your third wife, correct?”
“Senator, I was falsely charged and I fully. investigated and completely cleared,” Hegseth said of the sexual assault allegation, but Kaine pressed.
“So you think you are completely cleared because you committed no crime? That’s your definition of cleared?” Kaine pressed. “You had just fathered a child two months before by a woman that was not your wife. I am shocked that you would stand here and say you are completely cleared. Can you so casually cheat on a second wife and cheat on the mother of a child who had been born two months before? And you tell us you are completely cleared. So how is that completely cleared?”
“Senator, her child’s name is Gwendolyn Hope Hegseth, and she’s a child of God, and she’s seven years old,” Hegseth replied.
“I mean, you cheated on the mother of that child less than two months after that daughter was born, didn’t you?” Kaine pressed.
“Those were false charges. Well, no, totally investigated. And I was completely cleared. And I’m so grateful for the marriage I have to this day,” Hegseth answered.
“So you’ve admitted that you had sex at that hotel in October 2017. You said it was consensual. Isn’t that correct?” Kaine continued. “You’ve admitted that it was consensual, and you were still married, and you just had a child by another woman again. How do you explain yourself?”
“Completely false charges against me,” Hegseth insisted, even though he agreed to a non-disclosure agreement and financial settlement with his accuser.
A jag off is someone who pulls out just in time, like Pete
Although there were at least seven times that he didn't, that we know of anyway.
Senator Jack Reed, D-RI, West Point graduate, US Army Ranger, paratrooper 82nd Airborne, drops the hammer on Pete Hegseth in the opening, speaks for the America we once knew and loved
But the committee’s ranking Democrat, Sen. Jack Reed of Rhode Island, bluntly told Hegseth, “I do not believe that you are qualified to meet the overwhelming demands of this job.”
Reed said he finds the allegations against Hegseth “extremely alarming.”
“I vote in favor of all your predecessors, including those in the first Trump administration. Unfortunately, you lack the character and composure and competence to hold the position of Secretary of Defense,” Reed said.
More.
Jack is a patriotic liberal, ticking almost every box, in the mold of George McGovern, a B-24 Liberator pilot during WWII who won the Distinguished Flying Cross.
Meanwhile, speaking of wholesale prices, you are paying $9+ a dozen for eggs in some places because producer prices averaged $4.62 in December
That would be 75-cents for an egg that cost the producer about 19-cents.
I got a $1 off 18 eggs yesterday at a nearby health food store and paid $6.99, 39-cents each.
Why eggs are selling for over $9 a dozen in some places—and when prices are expected to drop
The biggest factor pushing up egg prices is a wave of avian flu, which began in early 2022 and led to the culling of millions of egg-laying hens. With demand remaining steady, the reduced supply has caused prices to rise.
This is the second time egg prices have surged since 2022, following a previous wave of avian flu that wiped out large numbers of egg-laying hens and caused supply shortages that year. Avian flu has wiped out over 100 million chickens since a major outbreak began in early 2022.
You would think chicken prices would go up, too, but I consistently get chicken thighs in bulk at Sam's for $1.38/lb, and have done so right through the pandemic.
And the rotisserie chicken remains $4.98, too.
We'll get December consumer prices tomorrow. Here's November's chart for eggs:
Ignore the expectations game, wholesale prices were up year over year 3.3% overall, and core prices up 3.5%
Three consecutive months of increases measured year over year for overall producer prices, FIVE for core.
But the stock market cheerleaders always play it this way:
Inflation watch: Wholesale prices rose 0.2% in December, less than expected.
Yeah, only half of the people we expected to be destroyed were. Good news!
The charts:
Monday, January 13, 2025
COVID-19 in the US is at an historic low for this time of year
COVID-19 in national US wastewater analysis:
12/28/24: 04.75
12/30/23: 13.28
12/31/22: 10.99
1/1/22: 17.17
California's prison inmates tasked with doing the job Governor Gavin Beavis Newsom won't do: Removing the timber and brush ahead of the wildfires but after it's too late
Absolute lol.
Gavin Newsom faced a recall election, but survived to prove in this new case that he more than deserved it. Just incredible stuff there in California.
28 paragraphs in.
Los Angeles wildfire deaths rise to 24 as more fierce winds are forecast
Along with crews from other states and Mexico, hundreds of inmates from California’s prison system were also helping fight the fires. Nearly 950 prison firefighters were removing timber and brush ahead of the fires to slow their spread, according to the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation.
The practice is controversial as the inmates are paid little for dangerous and difficult work: $10.24 each day, with more for 24-hour shifts, according to the corrections department.
Sunday, January 12, 2025
Neither of these guys won a tectonic election: I can't believe we're still talking about this
 |
| 49.71% |
 |
| 50.73% |
 |
| Oh, we'll have to wait . . . for pigs to fly |
US Treasury yields are steepening and by duration are normalizing
This is actually a good thing.
Longer dated securities should pay more than shorter, unlike most of 2024 when Bills paid far more.
Bills yields on average on Friday match the Daily Federal Funds rate exactly, falling in tandem with it in 2024 from the 5.33 range to 4.33 now. They've been pretty stable at this level for five weeks now.
The fall in Bills yields actually ran in front of the Fed decision to make the first rate cut in September by many months.
The fall commenced after May when the Fed announced it would institute a slight decrease to its tighter money policy through balance sheet operations involving UST beginning in June.
Bills yields fell hard for four months into September even as core inflation year over year remained flat at 2.7% over the period. Investors locked in higher but rapidly disappearing return.
Yields on Notes and Bonds also plunged, but against most predictions they rebounded in the face of the Fed rate cuts, which is quite amusing. Longs got their lunch eaten.
The simplest explanation is that longer dated securities anticipate more inflation, and the Fed simply pushes on a string. Bond vigilantes demanded more return for the rising risk.
People who didn't appreciate fixed income turning into a casino like the stock market hid out in cash and did just fine. VMRXX returned 5.24% last year.
There are over $6 trillion in T-bills outstanding at the end of 2024 vs. $2 trillion to start 2018, out of a total of approximately $28 trillion total UST outstanding.
Unfortunately for buyers of houses and cars, long money is going to cost you more, as yields on Notes and Bonds climb again in anticipation of recalcitrant inflation and increased deficit spending under Trump.
The average four year new auto loan was 9.36% and the 30-year mortgage 6.93% last week.
Juan Merchan releases another convicted felon onto the streets of New York
Stay away from 5th Avenue people.
What is the world coming to?
Saturday, January 11, 2025
Friday, January 10, 2025
Full time employment as a percentage of population fell to 49.33% in December 2024 and 49.65% for full year 2024
It's been a five month slide in 2024 from the peak of 50.26% in July.
Peak annual for this cycle was in 2023 at 50.21%.
The Trump I annual peak was in 2019 at 50.38%.
Previous to that, full time as a percentage of population peaked in 2006 under Bush 43 at 52.3%, and the mother of all peaks was under Bill Clinton in the year 2000 at 53.55%.
Somebody needs to fix this.
I don't think it will be Trump II.
Sad!
 |
| 49.33% December 2024 |
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| 49.65% Full Year 2024 |
Your reminder that average real return from stonks sux
S&P 500
August 2000 -- August 2024
4.90% per annum
August 1976 -- August 2000
10.49% per annum
Thursday, January 9, 2025
Well of course LOL: New Apostolic Reformation wackos supporting Trump may be evolving into pro-immigrationistas
Christianity has always meant liberalism. It is one of the religion's many bastard children.
This is from an Atlantic story reproduced here:
On the day after the election, I went to Life Center, the NAR church where Elon Musk had spoken a couple of weeks earlier. The mood was jubilant. A pastor spoke of “years of oppression” and said that “we are at a time on the other side of a victory for our nation that God alone—that God alone—orchestrated for us.”
The music pounded, and people cheered, and after that, a prominent prophet named Joseph Garlington delivered a sermon. He was a guest speaker, and he offered what sounded like the first hint of dissent I’d heard in a long time. He talked about undocumented immigrants and asked people to consider whether it might be possible that God was sending them to the U.S. so they could build the Kingdom.
“What if they are part of the harvest?” he said. “He didn’t send us to them; maybe he’s sending them to us.”
It was a striking moment. Life Center, Mercy Culture, and many other churches in the movement have large numbers of Latinos in their congregations.
Stocks markets are closed and mail won't be delivered today in honor of Jimmy Carter, because everything came to a halt under him, too
OK, bond markets are open today, because SOMEONE has to pay for the 44% increase in the national debt which was racked up under Jimmy Carter.
Stonks soared, nominally, under Jimmy at 11.81% per annum on average January 1977 to January 1981, but because inflation was so terrible, 10.43%, real return for the S&P 500 clocked in at only 1.25% per annum during his presidency.
Wednesday, January 8, 2025
Drudge's poorly paid help calls one of the most destructive firestorms in memory from the LA Times story "the most distructive in history" lol
The LA Times doesn't lose its cool when reporting the news, but Drudge does.
More than 1,100 homes, businesses and other buildings have burned and at least five people are dead in wildfires scorching communities across Los Angeles County, making this one of the most destructive firestorms to hit the region in memory.
Always, always, always read the sources.
Anarcho-tyranny in Pacific Palisades Fire: No water in some fire hydrants
From the Los Angeles Times here:
“There’s no water in the fire hydrants,” Caruso said. “The firefighters are there [in the neighborhood], and there’s nothing they can do — we’ve got neighborhoods burning, homes burning, and businesses burning. ... It should never happen.”
A spokesman for the Department of Water and Power acknowledged reports of diminished water flow from hydrants but did not have details on the number of hydrants without water or the scale of the issue.
In a statement, the DWP said water crews were working in the neighborhood “to ensure the availability of water supplies.”
“This area is served by water tanks and close coordination is underway to continue supplying the area,” the DWP said in its statement.
Providing basic fire fighting resources is a bare minimum function of local government, at which this very wealthy community is obviously failing, mirroring California government's overall statewide failure to reduce wildfires.
State Farm stopped insuring roughly 30,000 homes in California in the summer of 2024, in part due to the danger to its business there from catastrophic fires in communities where multi-million dollar homes are common, and too commonly go up in smoke.
You'd cut your losses, too, if you suspected the locals had become as hopelessly bad as the one party state under Gavin Newsom.
Tuesday, January 7, 2025
Batya Ungar-Sargon: Musk changed the subject to 10-year old UK grooming gangs scandal on X to change the subject from his unpopular H-1B visas stance
Look! Over there! A deer!
Story here.
Britain, Starmer, England: 14, 15, 20. H-1B nowhere to be found.
This headline would have been written whether Kamala Harris won or Donald Trump
Experts say high food prices are here to stay. Here’s why
“Once food price goes up, it tends to stay up,” said Claudia Sahm, a chief economist at New Century Advisors. “The inflation may come back down, so you don’t see the big price increases. But outside of widespread depression, we don’t tend to see prices falling across the board.”
Sahm exaggerates because she knows there is almost no likelihood of real food price declines coming, but it wouldn't take a depression.
The last time we had actual food price deflation, on a sustained basis, was in the 1950s, with 1959 being the last time at -1.6%.
But yes, the biggest declines come during depressions, which are hardly desirable for the overall damage they do.
In 1921 this index hit -24%; in 1931 -17.5% and 1932 -16.8%.
But what good are low prices when you don't have a job? You'll still have to make those lard and dandelion sandwiches to get by because bologna will still be too expensive.
Monday, January 6, 2025
Idiot Trump doesn't realize that the same liberal fools who voted in Trudeau would vote in Democrats here
They'd vote liberal like most of the northern and northeastern United States.
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