...wasn't it Grover Norquist (CFR man behind two of Ron Paul's campaign chiefs) and the "Arnold" who privatized CALPERS a few years back???? Flashbacks of Enron and power deregulation in Cali???
...here's another little look at incestuous cross pollination of libertarian/conservative ideas via the Republican favorite Ronald Reagan -
I don’t believe in a government that protects us from ourselves.
REAGAN: If you analyze it I believe the very heart and soul of conservatism is libertarianism.
REAGAN: Well, the first and most important thing is that government exists to protect us from each other. Government exists, of course, for the defense of the nation, and for the defense of the rights of the individual. Maybe we don’t all agree on some of the other accepted functions of government, such as fire departments and police departments–again the protection of the people.
REASON: Are you suggesting that fire departments would be a necessary and proper function of government?
REAGAN: Yes. I know that there was a time back in history in which fire departments were private and you insured your house and then had an emblem on the front of your house which identified which company was responsible for protecting it against fire. I believe today, because of the manner in which we live, that, you can make a pretty good case for our public fire departments–because there are very few ways that you can handle fire in one particular structure today without it representing a threat to others. SourceOf course that all sounds really good....until you look at Reagan's actual application of ideas....for example the approval of Searle's (CEO Donald Rumsfeld) aspartame (also known as nutrasweet or aminosweet)...that has been the source of over 80% of the complaints to the FDA (out of the thousands of food additives) and has and continues to poison the vast majority of the American population (rest in hell Reagan, Rumsfeld, and associates). Sources 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13.
Anyways while the Who's The Most Stupid (American Idol on political steroids) battles rage amongst ourselves we currently have this -
See a problem??? Bread basket anyone???
Warning bells yet? Anyone? Anyone? Ferris Bueller....
The most incredible spring heat wave in U.S. and Canadian recorded history is finally drawing to a close today, after a ten-day stretch of unprecedented record-smashing intensity. Since record keeping began in the late 1800s, there have never been so many spring temperature records broken, and by such a large margin.
I've never seen a case where the low temperature for the date beat the previous record high. This happened on at least four occasions during "Summer in March, 2012":
The low temperature at Marquette, Michigan hit 52° on March 21, which was 3° warmer than the previous record high for the date.
The low at Mt. Washington, NH on March 21 (44°) beat the previous record high for the date (43°.)
The low temperature for International Falls, Minnesota on March 20 bottomed out at 60°F, tying the previous record high for the date.
The low temperature in Rochester, Minnesota on March 18 was 62°F, which beat the previous record high for the date of 60°.
It is exceptionally rare for a weather station with a 50+ year period of record to break a daily temperature record by more than 10°F. During "Summer in March, 2012", beating daily records by 10° - 20°F was commonplace, and many records were smashed by over 20°. Two stations broke records by more than 30°F, which is truly surreal.
This March, we started with twelve days of April weather, followed by ten days of June and July weather, with nine days of May weather predicted to round out the month. This has been a huge benefit to the economy--vastly reduced heating costs, no snow removal bills, and far fewer traffic accidents due to icy roads. However, there is major downside to the "Summer in March, 2012" heat wave. The growing season is now in full swing, five weeks early. A damaging freeze that will severely impact the fruit industry and other sensitive plants is very likely. Indeed, the forecast calls for lows in the upper 20s in the cherry-growing region of Michigan near Traverse City on Monday night. The exceptional March warmth has also melted all the snow in the northern U.S. and southern Canada, drying out the soils and setting the stage for a much warmer than average summer, and an increased chance of damaging drought conditions. The early loss of snowpack will also likely cause very low flow rates in the major rivers in late summer and early fall, reducing the amount of water needed for irrigation of crops. Low flows may also cause problems for navigation, limiting commercial barge traffic on Midwest rivers. Source
The US Recorded Its Warmest March In History
Large portions of the Midwest U.S. shivered through a hard freeze (temperatures below 28°F ) this morning, and freezing temperatures extended as far south as Tennessee and North Carolina. Though the cold temperatures were not unusual for this time of year, they likely caused widespread damage to flowering plants fooled into blooming by last month's unprecedented "Summer in March" heat wave. Growers of apples, pears, peaches, nectarines, plums, and cherries worked during the night and early morning to minimize the damage by running large fans and propane heaters in their orchards, and some even rented helicopters in an attempts to keep temperatures a few degrees warmer. While freezing temperatures for an extended period will not kill the trees, they will destroy the flowers and fragile buds that are needed to produce fruit later in the year. Temperatures of approximately 28°F will kill about 10% of fruit tree buds and flowers, while temperatures of 25°F will produce a 90% kill rate. Temperatures of 25° were common over Michigan, Wisconsin, and Minnesota this morning, and I expect that this morning's freeze was severe and widespread enough to cause tens of millions of dollars in damage to the fruit industry. There have been numerous freezes and frosts over the Midwest's fruit growing regions since late March, and orchards are definitely taking a major beating from the weather. It will be several weeks before the extent of the damage is known, but I think that so far it is unlikely that the industry has suffered a billion-dollar disaster, such as occurred in 2007. Source
Not to leave out the war drums of this...and this...and this....and this...and this...and this...and this...and this...and this...and this....and this...and this
Not to leave out the debt deflationary spiral and this...and this....and this....and this...and this....and this
The commodity bubble (in my opinion for whatever its worth) is the result of monopoly (the shadowy black box world of Glencore, Trafigura, Vitol, Noble Group, Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, Koch Industries, Cargill, Arcadia, Olam, Hin Leong, Bunge, Mabanaft, ADM - formerly Archer Daniels Midland, Gunvor, Mercuria, Louis Dreyfus, Wilmar International, etc etc etc...and you can trace their collective ownership back to a very very small group of people) not inflation as all the precious metal bugs would have you believe...
All this debt accumulation is going to have a wicked conclusion. See this...
...and now lets discuss a little scenario. Your local municipality takes on a load of debt. It gets called by investors. Right now several municipalities have gone bankrupt or are in the process of going bankrupt. The Day of Reckoning hasn't arrived yet though for the vast majority that are on the edge of the knife.
Now for the little scenario - lets say investors ratchet down and demand the money up front (call the loans). Taxpayers are on the hook via income, property, or corporate taxes and are required by law to pay off the debt. If you can't pay the one time fee they can seize your property and peddle it. How about them apples?
Property taxes are secured debts. The taxing authority, such as the city or county, has a lien on the real estate to which the taxes apply. If you sell the property, the taxes must be paid; and if you do not pay the taxes, the property can go into tax forfeiture. Secured debts such as property taxes are only dischargeable if you surrender the secured property. If you want to keep the real estate on which you owe property taxes, you must repay the taxes. If you surrender your property in bankruptcy, the property taxes are no longer your obligation. If you have a mortgage, the mortgage company will foreclose on the property and pay the property taxes from the sale proceeds. If there is no mortgage and the only debt you owed on the property was property tax debt, then the taxing authority will take action to sell the property to satisfy the tax debt. Any remaining property tax debt after the property is sold will be discharged in your bankruptcy. SourceOne in three Americans paying bills late: survey
Collective government (local and federal) is the #1 investors in the majority of the mortgages. Government does so by being the #1 investor with the banks; mortgage institutions; mortgage security fund pools; etc. We are talking a few trillion-dollars in “collective” totals. Source
And how's this for a depression press release? I quote...
....and a bit more and Ruger isn't the only one getting slammed and firearms/bullets have been hot since Obama (Captain America of the gun industry) came into office in 2008....yet we continue to break records (go Captain America?)...
- Year-to-date, the independent wholesale distributors placed orders with the Company for more than one million Ruger firearms.
- Despite the Company's continuing successful efforts to increase production rates, the incoming order rate exceeds our capacity to rapidly fulfill these orders. Consequently, the Company has temporarily suspended the acceptance of new orders.
- The Company expects to resume the normal acceptance of orders by the end of May 2012.
“They’re also worried that the economy is not getting any better and that they need to protect themselves,” Hanson added.This year’s uptick comes on top of a record 2011, when nearly 11 million firearms were sold in the U.S., according to the National Shooting Sports Foundation, a trade association for the firearms, ammunition, hunting and shooting sports industry. The group notes the $4 billion firearms business has bucked the weak economy, with robust sales since 2008.One of the best indicators of firearms sales is the FBI's National Instant Background Check System, which federally licensed firearm retailers use to conduct the mandatory background check on purchasers of new and used firearms. Statistics through December showed an unprecedented 19th straight month of background check increases when tabulated year over year. "Black Friday," Nov. 25, 2011, saw a record for the most background checks in a single day --129,166.Another strong indicator comes from Wall Street. Smith& Wesson shares are up a whopping 125 percent over the past year, while Sturm, Ruger’s are up about 112 percent. Even Taser, which makes non-lethal weapons, has seen its sales surge.“It’s been a strong cycle. Sales of tactical rifles have been extremely strong,” Bret Jordan, a stock analyst specializing in the firearms market, told FoxNews.com, “Personal handguns have had a steady rise since 2008. The kind of stuff that fits in the waistband for when someone tries to steal your gas can.” Source
...also see this and this
"We're at the top of the roller coaster and we're about to plummet down the side," said DeWayne Irwin, owner of the Cheaper Than Dirt gun store in north Fort Worth, which set a sales record for the month of February. "It's fixing to happen again. I don't know if it will be to the same extent it was before, but I see it coming....of course one way to negate the guns....is lack of ammo...
"Look who the Republicans are trying to put against Obama," he said. "It's the Keystone Kops and people are getting scared. People are terrified he's going to get re-elected and then he won't care about getting votes next time. He'll just pass whatever legislation he wants."
Some say the uptick in sales at gun stores could also be linked to anything from the arrival of tax refunds to a spending spree by fans of the National Geographic Channel's Doomsday Preppers show, which chronicles people preparing for the end of the world.
Nationwide, more people than ever are buying firearms.
Last year, the FBI received more than 16.3 million inquiries from people running criminal background checks on potential gun buyers. That's up from 12.7 million in 2008 and 11.4 million in 2007, FBI records show. Source
It looks like DHS isn’t the only ammunition hog in the United States
...gear up....the ride is about to get real bumpy....for synopsis since Jan 1 see this...
...if you are interested in the only real solution....see this...
...for great daily updates on the global bumps see this...and for my new favorite for the Home(land) Security needs above see this. Of course there is a summary of news feeds in the right hand column from a variety of sources that hopefully if taken together as a whole (bias vs bias) hopefully presents a fairly clear picture of where we are and what is occurring. Anyways I hope its value added...
