Free kibbles

TAX AND SPEND:

Graph shows the futility of Republican stimulus of tax credits for new home buyers.

FEDERAL RESERVE:

David Stockman is at it again, explaining how the Fed is funding speculators in a fit of crony capitalism that is inflating the biggest bubble ever.

"Someone has to stop the Fed before it crushes what remains of America’s main street economy. Last Friday morning alone it launched two more financial sector pumping operations which will harm the real economy, even as these actions juice Wall Street’s speculative humors.First, joining the central banking cartels’ market rigging operation in support of the yen, the Fed helped bail out carry traders from a savage short-covering squeeze. Then, green lighting the big banks for another go-round of the dividend and share-buyback scam, it handsomely rewarded options traders who had been front-running this announcement for weeks.Indeed, this sort of action is so blatant that the Fed might as well just look for a financial vein in the vicinity of 200 West St. [Goldman Sachs (GS) headquarters], and proceed straight-away to mainline the trading desks located there. In fact, such an action would amount to a POMO [Permanent Open Market Operations] – so it is already doing just that!"

That's why the Fed was created. That's shy it exists.

"In any event, the yen intervention certainly had nothing to do with the evident distress of the Japanese people. What happened is that one of the potent engines of the global carry-trade – the massive use of the yen as a zero cost funding currency – backfired violently in response to the unexpected disasters in Japan."

So this is the real reason the central bankers decided to drive down the price of the yen: to benefit their cronies at the expense of the tsunami victims.

"Is it any wonder, then, that the global economy is being pummeled by one speculative tsunami after the next? Ever since the latest surge was trigged last summer by the Jackson Hole smoke signals about QE2, the violence of the price action in the risk asset flavor of the week – cotton, met coal, sugar, oil, coffee, copper, rice, corn, heating oil and the rest – has been stunning, with moves of 10% a week or more.In the face of these ripping commodity index gains, the Fed’s argument that surging food costs are due to emerging market demand growth is just plain lame. Was there a worldwide fasting ritual going on during the months just before the August QE2 signals when food prices were much lower? And haven’t the EM economies been growing at their present pace for about the last 15 years now, not just the last seven months?"

I made this same case a month or two ago, but I love the way Stockman writes. He takes no prisoners, and he strikes with wit. Here he uses that wit to explain inflation in one great sentence:

"In the meantime, ordinary people around the world will get less food per dollar from Wal-Mart and speculators, basking in the wealth effect, will have even more dollars to spend at Tiffany & Co. (TIF)."

That's a great description of inflation.

"In truth, the Fed’s current money printing spree has no analytical foundation, and amounts to seat-of-the-pants pursuit of a will-o’-wisp – the idea of a perpetual bull market. Like the BOJ, the Fed has thus made itself hostage to the global speculative classes, and must repeatedly inject new forms of stimulus to keep the bubbles rising."

I think he was better off sticking with the crony capitalism focus. I don't think for a second Bernanke is trying to create a perpetual bull market. He's just stealing money from us and funneling it to his bankster cronies.

Cato welcomes Bernanke's new press conferences. Are you kidding me? Bernanke plans to combat the criticism against the Fed with propaganda releases.

EDUCATION:

Judge rules that New Jersey can't cut funding to schools because it's unconstitutional.

GLOBAL WARMING AND ENERGY:

More fraud by the Climategate crew uncovered.

Man-made CO2 continues to power the growth of plants all over the world.

POLICE STATE:

End the contradictory moral life of policemen by privatizing police.

"Specifically, the job of the police officer involves giving orders to strangers and locking them up in cages if they choose not to obey. Unless the police officer is a complete sociopath, he would never consider acting in such a way in his private life. With his blue polyester in the closet, for example, the off-duty police officer would never consider putting his grandpa in a cage if he refuses to obey orders. He would never consider electrocuting his children or his grandmother for refusing to do what he tells them. He would never consider beating up his neighbor if she refused to stop her car and show a picture of herself embossed on government plastic. But he is expected to do precisely these types of things to people he doesn’t even know in his "professional" life if they refuse to do what he and his bosses tell them."

This is an incredibly corrupting contradiction that gets to every cop, no matter how good a person he or she is when he joins the force. And of course the cops to are most corrupt rise to the top.

"The fact that many, many police officers are indeed complete psychopaths should thus not come as a particular surprise. Indeed, the job is tailor made for the psychopath and the sociopath who is comfortable with feelings of cognitive dissonance. People with normally calibrated moral compasses would shudder to think that they would be required to lock people up in cages, electrocute them, or beat them with clubs for not doing as they are told. It would confuse and trouble the normal person to think that by putting on a blue polyester suit, mustache, and riding boots it was suddenly morally acceptable to order people around at the point of a gun (not to mention the icy shudder they would feel at the thought of wearing the ridiculous kit itself). It would horrify the normal person to think that part of his job involved smashing down strange people’s doors, taking their children, shackling them, locking them in cages, stealing their drugs and guns, and shooting them if they happen to resist."

This is why we see a never-ending of police criminality which is only the fraction that manages to leak out from behind the thin, blue line.

WAR:

Another argument that the attack on Libya is designed to extend the war as long as possible: other powers seized Qaddafi's wealth and demanded he stand trial for war crimes. Qaddafi would be more likely to step down into a cushy retirement. NATO takes over war. If you thought NATO exists to defend its members, you were mistaken. Libya holds 143 tons of gold. That can finance a very long war.

There's lots of accusations that an al Qaeda affiliate is part of the rebel force in Libya, but I've seen no proof.

I thought it was obvious since before the 2008 election that Obama was a one-world-government disciple. Newt Gingrich busted for flip-flopping on Libyan intervention.

MISC:

Using violence, i.e. government, to combat racism is counterproductive. The goal of all government action is to loot the people and that includes anti-racism policies.