Even though the stock market is open, it's a holiday for the common man, hence I will take off today: no post.
Happy New Year!
Friday, December 31, 2010
Thursday, December 30, 2010
We Survived 2010
Despite all the high paid pundits and bloviators, 2010 was NOT a national disaster. Roubini, Meredith Molotova and that ilk were wrong. The stock markets made good gains. The economy stopped going down. Unemployment stopped going up. Massive new defaults have NOT occurred. The corporate bond market rallied hugely. The commercial real estate market stabilized and has rallied some.
Not all is good.
Housing prices are bouncing along the ground: no rebound is in sight, but price levels are rather affordable so further large drops will likely be temporary foreclosure rinses.
Europe is still sorting out possible solutions ... and ignoring the obvious solution, viz. becoming a United States of Europe.
Farmers & miners are making fine profits after decades of suffering; and people are griping about that.
Congress continues to be a comedy show ... or is it a cage match? No serious debate occurs regarding what kind of nation we want to be and become.
Obama is playing in Hawaii; he's now had two years in office and has shown zero ideas or leadership.
The Republicans want to turn the financial and corporate Vikings loose to raid on all of us.
The Democrats wants to turn all of us into government employees.
Neither party talks about a vision - an eschaton - for America in the 21st century.
How can "reform" or "change" be discussed rationally without knowing the end point for our path? How can "reform" or "change" be discussed rationally without knowing where we are now?
Our "leaders" have lost their way. Is any Teddy Roosevelt or Franklin Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan on the horizon? Nope. Those people has visions of where they wanted to lead the nation; they had good understanding of what the problems were in their time.
I will give you two metaphors for a paradigm of what America need to do.
First, from John Bunyan's great book, Pilgrim's Progress. The pilgrim recognized the problems where he was and knew where he wanted to go, viz. to the great city of salvation. He struggled along a path with many, many traps and pitfalls and evildoers. This book was read by the great leaders who created and saved America: Franklin, Washington, Lincoln. Its allegory applies now.
Second, from science and the work of Richard Feynman (cf. the book, A Path Integral Approach to Quantum Mechanics or his seminal paper, Feynman, R. P. (1948). "The Space-Time Formulation of Nonrelativistic Quantum Mechanics". "Reviews of Modern Physics" 20: 367–387. A particle - ANY particle, with its beginning and end states set, combines all possible paths (and I do mean all - over all of space and time) to take the optimal path.
The metaphors here are definitive, spanning faith AND science: The US people - and especially its leaders - must study where we are and have vision where we want to be, and then choose the optimal path. We must combine epistemology - the study of knowledge - with ontology, the study of being - to find our path. True leadership does not come from the technocracy; it's not from technology. It's not from sloganeering. Good Leadership - the adjective is crucial - is really applied metaphysics: it applies knowledge of where we are and where we want to be in the future, then chooses the optimal path.
All these ideas are from the classics of the past 2,000+ years: Aristotle, Bunyan, Feynman. They knew these concepts that drive both the physical world and the world of the minds of men. We don't have to invent them; all we - the people - have to do is read, learn and do. Three little action verbs have the answers.
Read, learn & do.
Next year I will start with a series of posts on reform.
Word of the Day
"Zaftig" - adjective [$100] slang
Zaftig means 1. (of a woman) having a pleasantly plump figure; 2. full bodied, well proportioned. [from Yiddish 1935-40 literally juicy, succulent]
Sentence: That great beauty of the 1950s, Marilyn Monroe, had a zaftig build that modern culture might regard as fat. That's just wrong. Men - heterosexual men - are hard wired to like curves. The modern culture of excessive thinness is learned behavior from the fashion magazines that have been dominated by gay designers, who prefer boyish figures, for decades. That culture needs to be rejected; it harms young women and causes much unhappiness and pain as people try to do the unnatural. Some fat is good.
Not all is good.
Housing prices are bouncing along the ground: no rebound is in sight, but price levels are rather affordable so further large drops will likely be temporary foreclosure rinses.
Europe is still sorting out possible solutions ... and ignoring the obvious solution, viz. becoming a United States of Europe.
Farmers & miners are making fine profits after decades of suffering; and people are griping about that.
Congress continues to be a comedy show ... or is it a cage match? No serious debate occurs regarding what kind of nation we want to be and become.
Obama is playing in Hawaii; he's now had two years in office and has shown zero ideas or leadership.
The Republicans want to turn the financial and corporate Vikings loose to raid on all of us.
The Democrats wants to turn all of us into government employees.
Neither party talks about a vision - an eschaton - for America in the 21st century.
How can "reform" or "change" be discussed rationally without knowing the end point for our path? How can "reform" or "change" be discussed rationally without knowing where we are now?
Our "leaders" have lost their way. Is any Teddy Roosevelt or Franklin Roosevelt or Ronald Reagan on the horizon? Nope. Those people has visions of where they wanted to lead the nation; they had good understanding of what the problems were in their time.
I will give you two metaphors for a paradigm of what America need to do.
First, from John Bunyan's great book, Pilgrim's Progress. The pilgrim recognized the problems where he was and knew where he wanted to go, viz. to the great city of salvation. He struggled along a path with many, many traps and pitfalls and evildoers. This book was read by the great leaders who created and saved America: Franklin, Washington, Lincoln. Its allegory applies now.
Second, from science and the work of Richard Feynman (cf. the book, A Path Integral Approach to Quantum Mechanics or his seminal paper, Feynman, R. P. (1948). "The Space-Time Formulation of Nonrelativistic Quantum Mechanics". "Reviews of Modern Physics" 20: 367–387. A particle - ANY particle, with its beginning and end states set, combines all possible paths (and I do mean all - over all of space and time) to take the optimal path.
The metaphors here are definitive, spanning faith AND science: The US people - and especially its leaders - must study where we are and have vision where we want to be, and then choose the optimal path. We must combine epistemology - the study of knowledge - with ontology, the study of being - to find our path. True leadership does not come from the technocracy; it's not from technology. It's not from sloganeering. Good Leadership - the adjective is crucial - is really applied metaphysics: it applies knowledge of where we are and where we want to be in the future, then chooses the optimal path.
All these ideas are from the classics of the past 2,000+ years: Aristotle, Bunyan, Feynman. They knew these concepts that drive both the physical world and the world of the minds of men. We don't have to invent them; all we - the people - have to do is read, learn and do. Three little action verbs have the answers.
Read, learn & do.
Next year I will start with a series of posts on reform.
Word of the Day
"Zaftig" - adjective [$100] slang
Zaftig means 1. (of a woman) having a pleasantly plump figure; 2. full bodied, well proportioned. [from Yiddish 1935-40 literally juicy, succulent]
Sentence: That great beauty of the 1950s, Marilyn Monroe, had a zaftig build that modern culture might regard as fat. That's just wrong. Men - heterosexual men - are hard wired to like curves. The modern culture of excessive thinness is learned behavior from the fashion magazines that have been dominated by gay designers, who prefer boyish figures, for decades. That culture needs to be rejected; it harms young women and causes much unhappiness and pain as people try to do the unnatural. Some fat is good.
Wednesday, December 29, 2010
Still Moving Snow
The Bunker is not yet cleared of snow, but after today it should be all systems normal. News flow is sloooooooooooooooow. Krypto has no trades. Mrs. B is looking for good buys in municipal bonds.
In short, I have nothing enlightening to write today, so will shut up.
Word of the Day
"Pococurante" - noun, adjective [$100] a T. S. Eliot word, from Italian; plural is "pococuranti". Also, "Pococurantism".
Pococurante means (noun) a careless, indifferent person; (adjective) caring little, indifferent, non-chalant.
Sentence: A pococurante and his money are soon parted.
In short, I have nothing enlightening to write today, so will shut up.
Word of the Day
"Pococurante" - noun, adjective [$100] a T. S. Eliot word, from Italian; plural is "pococuranti". Also, "Pococurantism".
Pococurante means (noun) a careless, indifferent person; (adjective) caring little, indifferent, non-chalant.
Sentence: A pococurante and his money are soon parted.
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Lack of Memory
Most media outlets do disservice to their viewers when putting on "experts" and pundits. Why? They seem to almost never check the track record of predictions and forecasts given by those people in the past. This is particularly true for economists and bears. After the panic of 2008 and the Obama bust in early 2009, we heard endless screeds by pundits like Roubini and Meredith that the markets were going to get worse as another wave of disaster was coming. Hello? It didn't. A huge rally followed.
Similarly, a few years ago when copper prices hit $4, then dropped a lot, Gartman pontificated that we would never see $4 copper prices in our lifetimes. Uh ... copper prices are now about $4.30/lb.
When oil prices were approaching $150/barrel, pundits said it was demand, not hedge funds and pension fund buying. That was demonstrably wrong as US gasoline demand numbers at the time proved, but the bloviators kept on bloviating. And then oil collapsed as the beefers sold.
Facts do matter. And people need to use their memory to calibrate pundits and experts. They are not wizards or seers. There are many Nobel laureate economists. They use that credential to claim some authority, and get paid for giving speeches and writing popular opinion articles and to give interviews. Yet they disagree. That means the credential is either for work unrelated to their opinions OR is meaningless and no value in assessing the quality of their opinions OR BOTH. In both cases, you can recognize that it adds nothing to evaluating the correctness of their opinions.
You've got to do some thinking yourself and read. Get facts - hard facts. just listening to the blatherers and bloviators will lead to terminal ignorance. Don't be a cabbage watching only the Boobatron [aka TV] for your information. Do some work yourself and read. And use your memory to calibrate the pundits.
Word of the Day
"Torpor" - noun [$10]
Torpor means 1. a condition of mental or physical inactivity or insensitivity; 2. lethargy, apathy
Sentence: Don't let you mind wallow in torpor watching the Boobatron for hours - read !
Similarly, a few years ago when copper prices hit $4, then dropped a lot, Gartman pontificated that we would never see $4 copper prices in our lifetimes. Uh ... copper prices are now about $4.30/lb.
When oil prices were approaching $150/barrel, pundits said it was demand, not hedge funds and pension fund buying. That was demonstrably wrong as US gasoline demand numbers at the time proved, but the bloviators kept on bloviating. And then oil collapsed as the beefers sold.
Facts do matter. And people need to use their memory to calibrate pundits and experts. They are not wizards or seers. There are many Nobel laureate economists. They use that credential to claim some authority, and get paid for giving speeches and writing popular opinion articles and to give interviews. Yet they disagree. That means the credential is either for work unrelated to their opinions OR is meaningless and no value in assessing the quality of their opinions OR BOTH. In both cases, you can recognize that it adds nothing to evaluating the correctness of their opinions.
You've got to do some thinking yourself and read. Get facts - hard facts. just listening to the blatherers and bloviators will lead to terminal ignorance. Don't be a cabbage watching only the Boobatron [aka TV] for your information. Do some work yourself and read. And use your memory to calibrate the pundits.
Word of the Day
"Torpor" - noun [$10]
Torpor means 1. a condition of mental or physical inactivity or insensitivity; 2. lethargy, apathy
Sentence: Don't let you mind wallow in torpor watching the Boobatron for hours - read !
Monday, December 27, 2010
Ice Planet
A dimensional warp occurred and I now live on the Ice Planet. Wind, very cold, snow everywhere. Very beautiful in the woods.
One foot down and about 8 hours to come. At least it's fluffy stuff. - light to lift & throw.
Now the work begins ...
First mission: clean a path for the dogs in the backyard.
No word of the day.
One foot down and about 8 hours to come. At least it's fluffy stuff. - light to lift & throw.
Now the work begins ...
First mission: clean a path for the dogs in the backyard.
No word of the day.
Tuesday, December 21, 2010
Signs and Portents
Ancient peoples would probably say that the Lunar Eclipse last night was a sign of ... something. Good or Bad omen?
Hmmm.
Europe is covered with snow & ice. They have shown much hubris for years, thinking their computer models can foretell the future. Is Europe being punished?
Ms. Market continues dancing on the table. Will she tire soon, or keep taking off pieces of clothing, one at a time? All good things must come to an end.
Bunkerman continue to ride that bull elephant to the next waterhole. He's often seen picking fruit off tree as he passed, putting it into storage baskets for the next tough period. You'd expect that from Bunkerman - he has a backup to his backup.
The Street wants to get back to its old antics. I saw an announcement of a new multi-billion private equity fund. Street paymasters are looking for loopholes and winks to go back to the gross pay practices of the past.
The public? Joe & Jane Public seem to want to enjoy a good Christmas.
2011 brings many, many deferred decisions closer. Confusion seems to reign - no one has a clear idea of where to lead the nation. Fragmentation and sloganeering dominate the public debate.
Somehow a vision needs to be elucidated and transmitted to the people, a vision that they will understand and accept as an END POINT for where to lead the nation. The END POINT is an eschaton - the end of all things and time - where we want the nation to BE in a decade or two.
We know where we are now. At least those who look as data and facts do know. A friend sent me a link to an illuminating, fact-filled talk by Elizabeth Warren:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akVL7QY0S8A
I recommend it highly. The nation is troubled.
With the BEGINNING POINT known and the END POINT fixed, our mission is to find the optimum path to get there. Analogous to a Feynman Path Integral in quantum mechanics - yes, that's how Bunkerman thinks - we need to examine all paths to find the optimum. The wave functions of many will cancel out, but some will add up and show us the path to our desired END POINT.
Free Fraternalism is name (lol its most recent name) for the ideology that provides the optimum path to that happier society. With that ideology, the people can work independently, or with some leadership, to cause the nation to enter this optimum path to the desired eschaton.
Think of this a bit like the journey in Pilgrim's Progress. Many lures and dangerous places are on the journey, but with a strong belief in the principles of Free Fraternalism and a bit of help from true leaders, the people can eventually arrive at its eschaton: a freer, happier, more secure nation with ties of fraternity among its people.
Running out of time. I'll write much more on reforms needed and how to get there with Free Fraternalism.
Word of the Day
"Susurrus" - noun [$10] literary, a T. S. Eliot word
Susurrus means a sound of whospering or rustling.
Sentence: Are the winds of change making that susurrus among the people? Let's hope so.
Hmmm.
Europe is covered with snow & ice. They have shown much hubris for years, thinking their computer models can foretell the future. Is Europe being punished?
Ms. Market continues dancing on the table. Will she tire soon, or keep taking off pieces of clothing, one at a time? All good things must come to an end.
Bunkerman continue to ride that bull elephant to the next waterhole. He's often seen picking fruit off tree as he passed, putting it into storage baskets for the next tough period. You'd expect that from Bunkerman - he has a backup to his backup.
The Street wants to get back to its old antics. I saw an announcement of a new multi-billion private equity fund. Street paymasters are looking for loopholes and winks to go back to the gross pay practices of the past.
The public? Joe & Jane Public seem to want to enjoy a good Christmas.
2011 brings many, many deferred decisions closer. Confusion seems to reign - no one has a clear idea of where to lead the nation. Fragmentation and sloganeering dominate the public debate.
Somehow a vision needs to be elucidated and transmitted to the people, a vision that they will understand and accept as an END POINT for where to lead the nation. The END POINT is an eschaton - the end of all things and time - where we want the nation to BE in a decade or two.
We know where we are now. At least those who look as data and facts do know. A friend sent me a link to an illuminating, fact-filled talk by Elizabeth Warren:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akVL7QY0S8A
I recommend it highly. The nation is troubled.
What is our desired END POINT - our national eschaton?
Simply, to be a happier people. What brings more happiness? Peace, prosperity, security, fraternity. Not for one person or a few, but in the aggregate for all. Aristotle (cf. Nichomachean Ethics) would say such aggregate happiness would arise from some optimum midpoint between two extremes. That would be the place of virtue. The extremes to avoid are destitution for some and extreme concentrations of wealth and power for some. The former people suffer with great unhappiness, while the latter embody wasted resources and diminished returns of happiness. A balanced society is the optimum.
A society with maximum freedom for the great majority, a strong safety net for the unlucky or unendowed, and a strong barrier to prevent a few from sucking all the resources of the nation to themselves, like a black hole sucks matter.
A society with maximum freedom for the great majority, a strong safety net for the unlucky or unendowed, and a strong barrier to prevent a few from sucking all the resources of the nation to themselves, like a black hole sucks matter.
With the BEGINNING POINT known and the END POINT fixed, our mission is to find the optimum path to get there. Analogous to a Feynman Path Integral in quantum mechanics - yes, that's how Bunkerman thinks - we need to examine all paths to find the optimum. The wave functions of many will cancel out, but some will add up and show us the path to our desired END POINT.
Free Fraternalism is name (lol its most recent name) for the ideology that provides the optimum path to that happier society. With that ideology, the people can work independently, or with some leadership, to cause the nation to enter this optimum path to the desired eschaton.
Think of this a bit like the journey in Pilgrim's Progress. Many lures and dangerous places are on the journey, but with a strong belief in the principles of Free Fraternalism and a bit of help from true leaders, the people can eventually arrive at its eschaton: a freer, happier, more secure nation with ties of fraternity among its people.
Running out of time. I'll write much more on reforms needed and how to get there with Free Fraternalism.
Word of the Day
"Susurrus" - noun [$10] literary, a T. S. Eliot word
Susurrus means a sound of whospering or rustling.
Sentence: Are the winds of change making that susurrus among the people? Let's hope so.
Monday, December 20, 2010
Slurp, Slurp, Slurp
That's the sound of the CEO hogs feeding at the trough. They are back to their old antics: using the corporate treasury to prop up the value of their stock options & other executive compensation. How?
From the WSJ (Dec. 18 online): "$92 billion: How much companies spent on their own shares in the third quarter of 2010. U.S. companies are finally finding a use for some of the nearly $2 trillion in cash sitting on their balance sheets. In the three months ended September, they spent a seasonally adjusted $92 billion on share buybacks, up 71% from the previous quarter and the highest level since the beginning of 2008, according to the Federal Reserve."
That's $92 billion they are not using to do their jobs, viz. to grow the company and improve its operations. That's $92 billion spent to buy stocks at HIGH prices. In late 2008 & 2009, corporation sold billions in stock to raise money to improve their balance sheets ... at LOW prices. Did any of these CEO-CFO "brains" buy back stock at LOW prices? Nope.
They SELL LOW and BUY HIGH. They refuse to hire good people to improve operations. They (mostly) don't do R&D to create new products.
Stock buybacks don't help the investors in a company; all they do is subsidize the SELLERS - those getting out. This behavior is utterly foolish and stupid, yet the cossetted Boards of Directors approve it. Why? They are part of the same clique in the Ruling Class who think only of their own pay and perks. Use the corporate treasury to pad their compensation? Sure, why not. After all, they all do it.
Compensation policies should SUBTRACT any benefit from stock buybacks from earnings baselines for executive pay.
A reform that could help shareHOLDERS act to improve corporate governance: Mandate secret proxy votes. This would give mutual fund firms the freedom to vote their best interests without extortion threats from corporations to pull 401K business, etc.
We get lousy, corrupt corporate governance because corporate elections are conducted SOVIET style, with the corporation knowing how one votes. Ballot secrecy preserves truly free elections. Give us ballot secrecy in ALL corporate proxy elections.
And we need public pressure to "out" these CEO-CFO hogs and harshly criticize their actions. Free Fraternalism does this. The ideology and practices of Free Fraternalism can bring real change to help the common man and retain his freedom. This is true reform.
A Book Worth Reading
The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women Who Started It: The Memoir of Jo Ann Gibson Robinson, Edited by David J. Garrow [ISBN 978-0-87049-527-4] The University of Tennessee Press: 1987], I purchased this book at the recommendation of the person running the gift shop at the Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery, Alabama. It's a jewel - a diamond - a valuable first hand account of that singular event that propelled Civil Rights onto the national stage. Read it. Learn how a group of intelligent women organized and obtained help to run a bus boycott that led to a Supreme Court decision wiping out segregation laws. Learn how they nonviolently fought State oppression and corruption. And learn the truth behind the legends. This event is extremely poorly portrayed by the modern press.
Tea Parties: read this book. You have more power than you realize, BUT you need to adjust your practices and organize better. You need to get the common man & woman behind you by seeking true reform for ALL. Don't be a tool for the billionaire vikings. Support true reform for ALL.
Word of the Day
"Sectary" - noun [$10]
Sectary means a member of a religious or political sect.
Sentence: Tea Party sectaries need to adopt Free Fraternalism to become a majority party in the US. Modify Libertarian ideas to avoid being a tool for the billionaire vikings; Freedom works, but freedom for the dominant to enserf the common man is one freedom that must be curtailed. Free Fraternalism does that.
From the WSJ (Dec. 18 online): "$92 billion: How much companies spent on their own shares in the third quarter of 2010. U.S. companies are finally finding a use for some of the nearly $2 trillion in cash sitting on their balance sheets. In the three months ended September, they spent a seasonally adjusted $92 billion on share buybacks, up 71% from the previous quarter and the highest level since the beginning of 2008, according to the Federal Reserve."
That's $92 billion they are not using to do their jobs, viz. to grow the company and improve its operations. That's $92 billion spent to buy stocks at HIGH prices. In late 2008 & 2009, corporation sold billions in stock to raise money to improve their balance sheets ... at LOW prices. Did any of these CEO-CFO "brains" buy back stock at LOW prices? Nope.
They SELL LOW and BUY HIGH. They refuse to hire good people to improve operations. They (mostly) don't do R&D to create new products.
Stock buybacks don't help the investors in a company; all they do is subsidize the SELLERS - those getting out. This behavior is utterly foolish and stupid, yet the cossetted Boards of Directors approve it. Why? They are part of the same clique in the Ruling Class who think only of their own pay and perks. Use the corporate treasury to pad their compensation? Sure, why not. After all, they all do it.
Compensation policies should SUBTRACT any benefit from stock buybacks from earnings baselines for executive pay.
A reform that could help shareHOLDERS act to improve corporate governance: Mandate secret proxy votes. This would give mutual fund firms the freedom to vote their best interests without extortion threats from corporations to pull 401K business, etc.
We get lousy, corrupt corporate governance because corporate elections are conducted SOVIET style, with the corporation knowing how one votes. Ballot secrecy preserves truly free elections. Give us ballot secrecy in ALL corporate proxy elections.
And we need public pressure to "out" these CEO-CFO hogs and harshly criticize their actions. Free Fraternalism does this. The ideology and practices of Free Fraternalism can bring real change to help the common man and retain his freedom. This is true reform.
A Book Worth Reading
The Montgomery Bus Boycott and the Women Who Started It: The Memoir of Jo Ann Gibson Robinson, Edited by David J. Garrow [ISBN 978-0-87049-527-4] The University of Tennessee Press: 1987], I purchased this book at the recommendation of the person running the gift shop at the Rosa Parks Museum in Montgomery, Alabama. It's a jewel - a diamond - a valuable first hand account of that singular event that propelled Civil Rights onto the national stage. Read it. Learn how a group of intelligent women organized and obtained help to run a bus boycott that led to a Supreme Court decision wiping out segregation laws. Learn how they nonviolently fought State oppression and corruption. And learn the truth behind the legends. This event is extremely poorly portrayed by the modern press.
Tea Parties: read this book. You have more power than you realize, BUT you need to adjust your practices and organize better. You need to get the common man & woman behind you by seeking true reform for ALL. Don't be a tool for the billionaire vikings. Support true reform for ALL.
Word of the Day
"Sectary" - noun [$10]
Sectary means a member of a religious or political sect.
Sentence: Tea Party sectaries need to adopt Free Fraternalism to become a majority party in the US. Modify Libertarian ideas to avoid being a tool for the billionaire vikings; Freedom works, but freedom for the dominant to enserf the common man is one freedom that must be curtailed. Free Fraternalism does that.
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