Sorry Mark Judge, the original punk rockers of Christendom were Lutherans

Why can't Mark Judge write a decent opener? He starts off, here, with this:

"With the takeover of liberalism and secularism in the West, Catholicism is now a subculture."

What he means is:

"With the takeover of the West by liberalism and secularism, Catholicism is now reduced to a subculture."

And it's too bad, too, because the rest of what he writes is worth reading . . . if only he could imagine a subculture. You know, like Lutherans. The original punk rockers of Christendom, who shouted like Joey Ramone 

I don't like sacraments

I don't like celibates

I don't like priests and nuns

I don't like what the pope has done

Well I'm against it

The truth is Catholics could never be punkers and never have been. Being a punker requires being an individual, and saying no to something, like disco and rap, and instead Catholics have been busy for centuries saying yes to everyone and everything, absorbing every culture and every cult under the aegis of their big tent. It's been the secret to their success.

To take only the latest example, they see illegals coming across the border and immediately want to welcome the stranger, give them a shower, a meal and a place to sleep. The protestants see this and want to kick their asses all the way back to Guatemala.

Catholics aren't really against anything, and never have been.

That's why if they get their way, America is finished.

I'm against it. 

Something about riskier bonds for Bob Brinker listeners to think about

Seen here:

"The sensitivity of a bond to interest rate increases is determined by the time to maturity, not its credit rating."

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Some of Bob Brinker's followers/critics think his recent move away from all bonds with durations beyond one year was a big mistake.

If there's a bond run, which becomes more likely when bonds are overvalued, which they arguably are, selling becomes more difficult than people realize. Steep losses would be almost certain, but it is also likely that the ultra short duration bonds would recover much more quickly, and perhaps not just because they are ultra short. People might actually plow into them as they did with bonds in general in the wake of the financial panic of 2008, boosting prices.

I'll go out on a limb and predict the S&P500 maximum market high for this cycle since 2009

I'll predict 2249.60 for an S&P500 market high before the market begins to revert to mean. From 1977 that's not quite 14% more to go, or 272 more points!

But my money is in cash!

John Hope Bryant is an ignoramus about Jesus and poverty

Seen here:

'The Greek word for poor, as used by Jesus, is poucos, which means non-productivity. To be poor doesn’t mean you don’t have anything; it means you aren’t doing anything. Poverty is cured by hard work. “Lazy hands make a man poor” (Proverbs 10/4). The Bible says, “How long will you lie there, you sluggard? When will you get up from your sleep? A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to rest – and poverty will come on you like a bandit, and scarcity like an armed man.” Proverbs 6/10-11.'

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Actually the Greek word is properly transliterated "ptochos", not "poucos". And Bryant couldn't be more wrong about how the poor behave. The truly poor don't lay about and do nothing. The root of the word signifies that the poor do plenty . . . of crouching and begging.

But the worst thing is trying to baptize Jesus in this enterprise of viewing poverty as an evil, a problem to be solved. Unfortunately in the case of Jesus it's exactly the opposite of what Bryant thinks.

Frankly, Jesus prized poverty and required it as a condition of discipleship: "So likewise, whosoever he be of you that forsaketh not all that he hath, he cannot be my disciple" (Luke 14:33).

John Hope Bryant is all over the place in a media onslaught spreading his silly message about the poor saving capitalism, nevermind they can't save for the next month let alone the system most notably conceptualized by Adam Smith, a man feeble in neither mind nor money.

Expect more of this pap from Bryant and your federal government, through his connection with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, a propaganda project of the Dodd-Frank bill.

The Bureau's current director, by the way, was an unconstitutional recess appointment by the president according to a Supreme Court ruling just in recent days.

GDP less interest payments on the debt 2006-2012 is net positive $44.1 billion, that's all

Nominal GDP, not seasonally adjusted, for the seven years 2006-2012 totals $2,941.8 billion.

Nominal interest payments on the debt for all the same fiscal years totals $2,897.7 billion.

And people wonder why we're not growing when all we've got is a measly $44.1 billion to show for it.

Interest payments on the massive debt of $17,609 billion are gobbling up economic growth.

Think of it this way. The seven year average interest payment on the debt, $414 billion annually, represents a simple interest rate of 2.35% on today's balance. That's what the economic growth rate should look like. Instead, last quarter it was -2.9%, down almost $74 billion seasonally adjusted, and negative $118 billion real.

The huge public debt is the drag on the economy, and would be the knee on the chest of the heart attack victim if the Federal Reserve didn't suppress interest rates the way it is doing. 

For the 1st time in my adult life, I am proud of Joan Rivers

So says Drez Zipper, here.

Presidents ranked by average jobs created Q1 to Q2 since the 1970s

From total nonfarm not seasonally adjusted, average percentage achieved:

1. Clinton +2.22%

2. Reagan +2.07%

3. Bush 1  +1.69% (four years, accepts Profiles in Courage Award for raising taxes)

4. Obama  +1.68% (six years, blames drought, winter weather, hurricanes, earthquakes)

5. Bush 2  +1.38%.

The definition of a jobs boom Q1 to Q2 is not the just reported +2.06%

Best jobs booms for each president Q1 to Q2 since the 1970s, from total non farm employment, not seasonally adjusted:

1. Reagan in 1984: +2.69%

2. Clinton in 1994: +2.56%

3. Bush 2  in 2005: +2.14%

4. Obama  in 2011: +2.09%

5. Bush 1  in 1989: +1.92%.  

Total nonfarm is up 288,000 in June: Why I'm yawning

Unemployment in June falls to 6.1% and total non farm employment is up 288,000, seasonally adjusted, to finish the second quarter. Not seasonally adjusted, the figure is an impressive sounding 582,000 newly employed.

So Q1 GDP at -2.9% is meaningless, right? We're really doing much much better than that number indicates, yes?

That's what fellow traveler Rex Nutting thinks over at MarketWatch in "The payrolls report is right, and GDP isn't". He goes so far as to say that even 2008 negative GDP was meaningless:

"Take, for instance, the first quarter of 2008, just as the Great Recession began. The first estimate of quarterly GDP was 0.6% growth. In mid-2008, that was revised to 0.9%. A year later, however, GDP was revised to a 0.7% decline. The most recent estimate is that the economy shrank 2.7%. It’s madness to think this number means anything."

Spoken like a true believer in the success rate of Soviet 5-year plans. At least "shrank" shows he's educated.

And even John Silvia of Wells Fargo says the jobs report shows "economic growth is far better than the Q1 GDP report indicates".

Oh really? I don't think so. The employment gains aren't telling us anything indicative of a break out to the upside either for jobs or for the economy. To see this you have to stop comparing apples to oranges by comparing monthly change in jobs to GDP which is measured on a quarterly basis.

When you look at the jobs figures on a quarterly basis, you see that total nonfarm always takes a dive in Q1, good economy or bad economy, and it always rebounds in Q2, good economy or bad economy. It tells you almost nothing about the economic trend that in Q2 you always get an increase. So we should expect the jobs numbers to go up in the spring, and they always do. Go all the way back in the not seasonally adjusted data to 1981 and you will see that this is true, in the awful year 1982 when the gain was a lousy 1.0%, and even in the dreadful year of 2009. When 2009 was over there were nearly 30 million first time claims for unemployment, yet between Q1 and Q2 that year total nonfarm went up 138,000, a paltry 0.1% but still completely counter trend. The worst was over. Not.

In 2014 we have just witnessed total nonfarm go up 2.805 million jobs between the end of Q1 and the end of Q2, the most since Obama has been president. But guess what? That's an increase of barely 2.06%. Obama's actually done better, for example in 2011 when the increase was 2.09%, his best Q1 to Q2 gain on record. But we don't point to that number today as a sign of the economy turning around at that time, especially since the measure has been weaker since, and GDP has actually gone negative since.

It's instructive to compare Obama's recent 2.06% quarter on quarter gain with past presidents' records for the same period from winter to spring.

How high was the best record Q1 to Q2 since 1980, for example? You would be surprised that it's barely 29% higher than Obama's best to date. Reagan, of boom fame, holds top spot at just 2.69% in 1984. Clinton comes in second with 2.56% in 1994. George W. Bush comes in third with 2.14% in 2005. Obama comes in fourth in 2011 at 2.09%. And George Herbert Walker Bush brings up the rear in 1989 at 1.92%.

But the best record isn't a very good predictor of economic growth ranking. Best GDP to worst was Clinton, Reagan, Bush I, Bush II, and then Obama (so far), not Reagan, Clinton, Bush II, Obama, Bush I.

The overall jobs record between Q1 and Q2 seems like a better predictor of likely economic growth ranking. Clinton, first for GDP, averaged 2.22% over eight years while Reagan, second, averaged 2.07% for the increase in total nonfarm between the winter and the spring. In third is George Herbert Walker Bush at 1.69% (third also for GDP), followed closely by Obama at 1.68% (last for GDP so far) and George W. Bush bringing up the rear at 1.3% (fourth for GDP).

It's entirely possible that Obama already peaked for jobs increases from winter to spring in 2011. Each of the other four presidents peaked early or mid-term. It would be unusual for Obama to do better this late in his term. And so far he hasn't, and has just two more opportunities to prove me wrong.

Overall Obama has lost his momentum, his aura and his credibility, and his lately shrill tone sounds more like a dying bunny the cat got in the backyard than a statesman presiding over the final years of a successful term. I think that means it's likely Obama's overall jobs performance is going to remain weak, as will his GDP.

Jobless claims now average 326,000 weekly in the first half of 2014, down 7% from 2013

Jobless claims for the first 26 weeks of 2014 now average 326,000 weekly, not seasonally adjusted. For the same period last year the average was 352,000.

The current rate implies 16.95 million claims in 2014. In 2013 actual claims not seasonally adjusted were 17.75 million.

The best years in recent memory were under George W. Bush: 16.2 million claims in 2006, and 16.7 million claims in 2007.

First time claims for unemployment had been as high as 29.5 million in 2009.

Rush Limbaugh whitewashes Republicans' central role in abolishing Glass-Steagall

Are we supposed to believe Rush Limbaugh doesn't know that three Republicans co-sponsored the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act of 1999 which overturned Glass-Steagall? How did their names get on there, by accident? And that both parties overwhelmingly voted for it in the end after 205 House Republicans and 53 Senate Republicans voted to get it to conference in the first place? Were it not for those Republicans the bill never would have seen the light of day, but here's Rush Limbaugh yesterday, boob extraordinaire, spreading the lies, misinformation and stupidity he's ranting against:

[I]f anybody eliminated regulations on the bank, it wasn't the Republicans. It was good old Bill Clinton and Robert Rubin. Those are the two architects. You could even say that the repeal of Glass-Steagall is what led to the so-called financial crisis in 2008, and there's not a Republican fingerprint on it.  It's all Bill Clinton and Robert Rubin. ... [T]his is just insane, the level of lying, the misinformation and the stupidity of people who accept it and buy it, because we have a corrupt media who is willing or unknowing, could well be they're ignorant, too, spreading all this drivel. ... [T]here's not one Republican fingerprint on that. They might have voted for it in the end, but the whole impetus for it was Bill Clinton and Robert Rubin.

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Amazing.

Obama ranked worst president in post-war in Quinnipiac poll

Quinnipiac University

Uh oh: Antarctic sea ice anomaly looks like a . . . hockey stick!

WUWT

US Debt to GDP ratio, nominal, record date 3/31/14 (3rd estimate of GDP 6/25/14)

$17.6 trillion
-----------------------     = 1.035
$17.0 trillion

Impact of a '94-style bond debacle on today's NAVs of popular Vanguard bond index funds

In November and December 1994, the NAVs of some popular Vanguard bond index funds hit their lowest levels in memory during that year's bond market meltdown. What if we revisited those lows today? How much could you lose, both in value and in time?

On the short end, VBISX at 10.53 to start the week would have to fall to 9.50 to match that debacle low from December 1994, wiping out 9.78% of value. With a duration of 2.7 years, presumably you'd have to sit tight almost three years from such a low to recoup your losses as the fund replaced its maturing issues with higher yielding short-term instruments in the new landscape. 

In the intermediate space, VBIIX at 11.46 now would have to fall to 9.16, the November 1994 low, wiping out 20.07% of value. Your duration-implied wait to recoup your losses there is 6.5 years.

VBLTX in the long term space at 13.59 today would have to fall to the November 1994 level of 8.87 to match the November 1994 low, wiping out 34.73% of value. Could you wait 14.5 years to recover from that?

Consider also VBMFX, the total bond index. At 10.82 this week it would have to fall to 9.15 to match the November 1994 meltdown low. That would wipe out 15.43% of value from here. Time to recovery based on duration of the fund? 5.6 years.

Or VFIIX, the Ginnie Mae fund. Current net asset value started the week at 10.73. That would have to fall to 9.54 to match the November 1994 meltdown low, wiping out 11.09% of value. Duration for that fund is 5.5 years.

Many Americans have fled to bond funds for safety in the wake of the financial panic 6 years ago. By doing so, they have driven NAVs to levels in such funds never before seen in their histories, helping to create a bubble. Exiting from such bubbles is not easy when everyone suddenly wants to do so at the same time.

No wonder market timer Bob Brinker of Money Talk Radio Program fame has recently gone ultra short duration for his fixed income investing. He has picked funds which have durations of about one year. That's it.

The wisdom of the move is not yet well appreciated because of what it is not telling you: that a stock market crash is coming, right after the bond market nose dives. He doesn't want to be caught booking huge bond losses in his portfolios when the opportunity to invest new cash will present itself not long after. In other words, I think this is Brinker's way of raising cash now without saying so.

Not advice. Just my humble opinion.  

Brian Wesbury thinks suspension of mark-to-market rules was a fix

Brian Wesbury thinks suspension of mark-to-market rules was a fix, here:

"The financial system returned to normal once mark-to-market accounting was fixed."

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Proving once again that moral absolutes have no meaning to liberals, who routinely deep six the rules when they become inconvenient or too costly should they break them. The rules are fine when one guy here or there goes bankrupt, but when everybody does then it's, well, "We have to abandon free-market principles in order to save the free-market system." One rule for thee, another for me.

That pretty much sums up in one sentence the difference between us and them. While they have been bailed out and gotten filthy rich by shit-canning the rules, the rest of us who have to live by them in the real world of stop signs and pink slips are left to wallow in an economy growing at an average nominal pace under Obama of $383 billion per annum. Brian Wesbury continues to call that a ploughhorse economy even though under George W. Bush we grew on average 45% better than that every year of his presidency.

It was the worst in the post-war, until Obama.

S&P500 is about 71.77 away from the all-time real high

The real high was August 1, 2000 at 2045.09.

El Diablo: Communists and Christians drink from the same well

"I can only say that the communists have stolen our flag. The flag of the poor is Christian. Poverty is at the center of the Gospel. Communists say that all this is communism. Sure, twenty centuries later. So when they speak, one can say to them: 'but then you are Christian'".

The Ramones didn't know how right they were about Burger King

I don't like playin' ping pong

I don't like the Viet Cong

I don't like Burger King

I don't like anything

And I'm against ...

Well I'm against it

I'm against it

Charles Murray proves my point: Libertarians and liberals are birds of a feather together on the left

Here, where he speaks of the good guys on the left, as if there were such a thing:

As a libertarian, I am reluctant to give up the word "liberal." It used to refer to laissez-faire economics and limited government. But since libertarians aren't ever going to be able to retrieve its original meaning, we should start using "liberal" to designate the good guys on the left, reserving "progressive" for those who are enthusiastic about an unrestrained regulatory state, who think it's just fine to subordinate the interests of individuals to large social projects, who cheer the president's abuse of executive power and who have no problem rationalizing the stifling of dissent.

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Simply stated, liberals are free, free from the "superstitions" of religion and its limiting dogmas and moral codes, and consequently happen to seek to be free also from the state which seeks to pay respect to religion. Libertarianism is born of this, not of the right. It pays no respect to religion, placing the individual at its center, not God and the transcendent moral order which permeates existence. There are many libertarians who deny they are atheists, but they are simply insane, suffering from bipolar disorder as do liberals.