Wednesday, December 11, 2024
Tuesday, December 10, 2024
Meanwhile paper tiger Donald Trump is caving, too, can't guarantee anything lol
Trump told the “Meet the Press” host that he would work with Democrats to find a way to preserve Dreamers’ legal status. He said he would not ban abortion medication, fire Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell or order the prosecutions of his political opponents. ...
During the campaign, Trump proposed tariffs of 10-20% on all imports — and 60% on goods from China. Welker asked whether he could “guarantee” that Americans won’t pay higher prices under those tariffs.
“I can’t guarantee anything,” Trump replied.
Senatrix Joni Ernst reportedly caving on opposition to Pete Hegseth
Many, many women have caved to Pete Hegseth.
Here.
Daniel Penny has escaped his unjust prosecution by Alvin Bragg
The vile New York Times says "Jury Acquits Choker" instead of "Jury Acquits Man Who Stopped Subway Threat".
Monday, December 9, 2024
The Buffett Indicator in the news
Some people are paying attention.
The last chart below tracks the average annual valuation from 1920 through last year, based on the S&P 500. The average level for 2024 will depend on the third and final estimate of annual GDP at the end of March 2025. 209% is a real time snapshot using the Wilshire 5000 index.
Sunday, December 8, 2024
Saturday, December 7, 2024
Martial law fails in South Korea, Romania cancels a democratic election whose outcome authorities didn't like, and Syria is about fall to a former al-Qaeda revolutionary
Billionaire Marc Andreessen loves him some plutocracy, which his beloved Thomas Jefferson would have taxed into oblivion
Trump's so-called party of populism has given us a cabinet teeming with billionaires.
Welcome to rule by the rich. We deserve them, good and hard.
Andreessen's hero, Thomas Jefferson, would have taxed them all into oblivion to keep their baneful influence from destroying republican government. Thomas Jefferson was an advocate of what we have known as steeply progressive taxation.
But billionaire Andreessen thinks you are too dumb even to know that.
Hell, he's probably too dumb to know that.
"Exempt all from taxation below a certain point, and tax the higher portions of property in geometrical progression as they rise." |
Friday, December 6, 2024
In March 2016 Pete Hegseth was no different from NeverTrumpers like Erick Erickson, Mark Levin, Charlie Kirk, and Ben Shapiro who all now bend the knee
CNN video here from Dec 3rd, in which Hegseth criticizes Trump for being an arm chair warrior who had the temerity to criticize John McCain while avoiding the draft.
Which is rich coming from Hegseth who was never regular military.
It's Megyn Kelly interviewing him, too, lol, who has been defending Pete The Warrior and his PTSD for his bad behavior with the women.
I keep waiting for someone to ask Hegseth how many firefights he was in in the field in Afghanistan. We'd all like to know in this age of stolen valor. We know that's a fact about his time in Iraq, but everyone keeps talking as if that's what he did in Afghanistan when the only evidence I find is that he taught a course there and that his stay was very brief.
More at Mediaite here.
Bunch of phony, baloney, plastic banana, good time rock 'n rollas.
American whiners generally rate their own healthcare positively but not the country's
Gallup, here.
People are in a bad mood about it since 2020 because of what happened during the pandemic with lock-downs, quarantines, and mask and vaccine mandates, and because the expanded emergency coverage from that year has expired with the expiration of the emergency in 2023.
But 71% still think their own healthcare quality is pretty good, compared with 44% saying the same thing about the quality for the country as a whole.
There's always been that disconnect.
Full time employment as a percentage of civilian population fell to 49.49% in November 2024
Pete Hegseth promises to quit drinking if confirmed as SECDEF lol
Why wait, Pete? Why not stop now?
Hegseth appeared to acknowledge that his relationship with alcohol is a matter of serious concern to GOP senators by pledging Wednesday in meetings on Capitol Hill that he would stop drinking if confirmed to serve as Defense secretary.
The Hill, here.
The bargaining is classic drunk.
Thursday, December 5, 2024
Secular bear Rosie not throwing in the towel . . . again
Rosie was on the wrong side of the trade in April 2011 when the bear went bullish. Is he again now?
He uses the same phrase, too, "not throwing in the towel", lol.
In April 2011 he claimed he wasn't throwing in the bear towel after the S&P 500 had already recovered from the 2008 debacle. Then the market slid 20% all the way to October 3, 2011, with the index falling to 1099 again, right where it was exactly three years earlier on the very same date.
It was . . . spooky!
If you had followed his take that April, you'd have lost 20% again. On top of all your losses in 2008. Ouch. Ouch.
Many of us who had kept our powder dry couldn't believe it in October 2011. We thought we were headed back to the depths of March 2009 again, too, just like the last time the market fell to 1099. I mean, that was a free-fall from there in 2008. TARP got signed in a panic that week to stop it, to no avail.
But October 2011 turned out to be more of a retest than we realized, one of the last great buying opportunities of the period. It was a brutal, crushing period of doubt, which some of us still live with.
Now it's the reverse, with unbelievable euphoria everywhere, with the S&P 500 at 6075.
A period of euphoria seems to me like a damned strange time to throw in the bear towel again, after missing out for two years by his own admission. I have no idea if Rosie is the contrary indicator he appears to be.
But the valuation of the market is pre-1920s crazy right now. It is literally not on the charts of our experience in the post-war, or even from the roaring '20s. We have GDP of $29.354 trillion, meaning a valuation of 207, when fair value has been 81 since the Great Depression.
I'm not in it, and I intend to keep staying out, because I can.
Good luck out there to those of you who go where angels fear to tread.