Wednesday, August 29, 2012

The Price

Greetings good citizen,

Um, the markets are ‘up’ a tiny bit although that tells us nothing. Markets around the globe are a ‘mixed bag’ all up or down, but not significantly in either direction.

As one might expect in an election year, our first headline announces:
Second-Quarter Growth Revised Up to 1.7 Percent Rate
By NELSON D. SCHWARTZ 52 minutes ago

The American economy fared slightly better than initially estimated in the second quarter, the government reported in its first revision of gross domestic product.

Like a lot of things ‘statistical’ the variation on display here isn’t ‘significant’. The only reason you’re hearing about it is because it’s ‘up’, if it were down it would remain obscure if not unknown.

This is one of those ‘it should piss you off’ sort of things! Here’s our economy, sucking pond water due largely to ‘gross mismanagement’ and who has to brave streets filled with starvation crazed rioters?

YOU WILL!

Yet here are the Twinkies crowing about abysmal economic growth like you were ‘saved’.

Hallelujah, the rapture came after all!

Fucking twits!

It’s ‘the other shoe’, always.

Speaking of ‘pipe dreams’:
Mario Draghi of the European Central Bank says there can be no return to the many currencies that preceded the euro.

Central Banker Facing a Test
By LANDON THOMAS Jr.

Mario Draghi, the president of the European Central Bank, will be under pressure to provide details of his plan to shore up the euro zone’s weaker member nations by buying their bonds.
Dunno how it will play in Peoria but it seems asshole’s mouth cut a check his ass is unable to cover.

Like two wrongs don’t make a right, two lies don’t suddenly make it true!

But politicians have a, er, ‘difficult time’ comprehending that concept…

Especially when ‘the truth’ jumps up and takes a big bite out of your backside, like we see here:
Shut Out of the Debt Markets, Catalonia Asks Madrid for Emergency Aid
By RAPHAEL MINDER

The request from the most economically important region of Spain underscores a growing regional debt burden as the country struggles to pull out of its economic tailspin.

As many observers have pointed out, where are the Euros supposed to come from to bail out all of these mismanaged economies?

Looks to me like they’re going to borrow them from Bob Mugabee! (What the hell, he has trillions!)

It’s what Zimbabwe Ben is doing…and it might be a good time to remind everyone that our ‘apolitical’ Fed Chief, like his predecessor, is A FUCKING REPUBLICAN!

But THAT doesn’t matter, and coincidentally, neither does this:
Germany and Italy to Meet on Euro Crisis
By MELISSA EDDY and RACHEL DONADIO

Prime Minister Mario Monti of Italy is hoping to persuade his European partners to let the European Central Bank buy more government debt to help keep borrowing costs lower.

We can appreciate that the ‘Prime Minister’ of Italy really NEEDS to pull a rabbit out of his hat (and not just any rabbit, a ‘credible rabbit’!)

Funny thing about ‘funny money’, it requires a lot of faith that its worth something…a difficult task indeed when the thieves in the stock markets keep jumping their price, thereby ‘devaluing’ the purchasing power of money (regardless of whose it is!)

Naturally, when there’s only ‘one source’ for everything we will all be compelled to pay whatever they demand…or their private army will shoot us.

Again I ‘project’ but I suspect we are closer to that day rather than farther:
E.U. Widens Probe of Ryanair Bid for Aer Lingus
By REUTERS 30 minutes ago

Regulators began an in-depth review of Ryanair’s latest bid for its Irish rival, signaling the budget airline may have to make big concessions to ease competition concerns or face failure.
Don’t be deceived good citizen, this airline thing is but one of many often hidden ‘mergers’ that have been providing the economic data with a false ‘positive spin’.

Company ‘A’ gobbles up company ‘B’ cementing a near monopoly in a given market sector, the price goes up to pay the cost of the take-over (as well as to line the pockets of the out-going executives being made ‘redundant’.)

And viola! We now have profits were we once had ‘stagnation’!

(It’s Magic, fuck you!)

Speaking of ‘magic’, it appears not everybody is gullible enough to take the ads for electric cars seriously: Sure you don’t have to buy gas that often but the last time I checked, nobody was giving away ‘free electricity!’:
A Chevrolet Volt electric vehicle, front. Consumers so far have been slow to buy electric cars.
U.S. Sets Higher Fuel Efficiency Standards
By BILL VLASIC

The rules, first proposed last year, would require new cars and trucks to average 54.5 miles per gallon in combined city and highway driving by 2025.
The real question being put to you here good citizen is ‘will you be driving anything ‘inorganic’ come 2025?’

You will be considered ‘crazy well-to-do’ if you have a horse or some other form of ‘drayage’ (like oxen.)

Only the extremely wealthy will have ‘motor vehicles’ (and they will expect us to keep up the road network for them!)

The job title ‘mechanic’ will be preceded by the word ‘personal’ because if you can afford a car, you can afford a mechanic and you probably won’t want to risk going to a garage (that regularly has its tools stolen.) So you’ll keep the tools and the mechanic safe behind your gated walls, guarded by your security team of private merc’s.

But again, I project.

Just as this somewhat disturbing ‘sign of the times’ bodes poorly for the, er, ‘less than affluent’.
The Patriot-News, which won a Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the Penn State sex scandal, intends to print three days a week.

Newspapers in Syracuse and Harrisburg, Pa., to End Daily Distribution
By CHRISTINE HAUGHNEY

The decision by Newhouse Newspapers follows its similar move in New Orleans and is set to take effect in January.

Many have given up the physical delivery of newspapers because the Internet tells them what they need to know.

Naturally, there’s a downside to this as well. Under capitalism, information is a commodity and thus for sale.

If you can’t afford the asking price then it gets added to the ever growing list of things you ‘do without’.

You might have noticed that I limit myself to the ‘headlines’ of the NY Times stories because the ‘free’ edition limits me to actually clicking through to read a mere ten articles a month.

That’s not even one a day. (But you knew that!)

The headlines, on the other hand, remain ‘free.’

And with a little luck, so will we.

Thanks for letting me inside your head,

Gegner


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