lucky old sun

i did the bike ride yesterday. i rode 60 miles. and today i feel great. except for being burned to a crisp on my arms and legs. i put sunscreen on my face because my nose always burns, but i neglected my arms and legs and i am paying for it today. i'm going to take an oatmeal bath tonight and soak out of the heat. this is intense. but the ride was great. i had a blast and i think i did pretty well considering how little i actually ride. it was seriously a tour of houston. i mean we went back and forth and saw the same area like two/three times. there's another ride coming up out at nasa that i think i might participate in also. i love bike-riding. plus the bike i used was pretty sweet. i was clocked around 20 mph, at some points a little faster. the wind man. i was like the wind.

all things to do with the bank bailout today. first, what the hell was TARP? we basically gave the banks $700 billion and now we have to buy their toxic assets for $1 trillion? what is going on here?

breakdown of the plan.

analysis from businessweek.

mish's take.

krugman's take.

frontline will air a program entitled "ten trillion and counting" this tuesday. check local listings for airtime.

here is a quick history of the federal reserve. check it out.

bicycle race

tomorrow i'll be riding in the tour de houston. i haven't rode in it since '06 when i rode a mountain bike and was easily passed by grandmas and their fat, overweight grandchildren. but somehow i got through 40 miles and i'm going to do 40 again, unless anyone else wants to do 70. i'm pretty sure i can do the 70. a friend is going to hook me with a sweet bike, so hopefully i'll be gliding through the air, my wheels barely touching the ground.

has anyone listened to the new u2 album? what a bunch of crap. i kinda of liked their last album. but this thing....wow. "get on your boots" is terrible. it's a total hunk of pro tools vomit. the rest is slow-paced and lyrically abysmal. i expect a lot from u2. "the joshua tree," "achtung baby," and "zooropa" are great, great records. since "pop" they really don't seem to know their way. or something like that.

here is an exerpt from another wildly outrageous, but ultimately entertaining and truth-laden rolling stone article:

"It's over — we're officially, royally fucked. no empire can survive being rendered a permanent laughingstock, which is what happened as of a few weeks ago, when the buffoons who have been running things in this country finally went one step too far. It happened when Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner was forced to admit that he was once again going to have to stuff billions of taxpayer dollars into a dying insurance giant called AIG, itself a profound symbol of our national decline — a corporation that got rich insuring the concrete and steel of American industry in the country's heyday, only to destroy itself chasing phantom fortunes at the Wall Street card tables, like a dissolute nobleman gambling away the family estate in the waning days of the British Empire."

the rest is here.

upstairs at eric's

i don't know why that album title cracks me up, but it does. "if you want me, i'll be upstairs at eric's." i'm laughing typing that line. i am in a slightly abandoned part of a building. the cleaning lady is the only person i have seen all day unless i ventured out on my own. so i'm in this old abandoned office and i keep hitting my foot on this giant computer tower. so i'm checking it out and i notice a stack of cds on top of it. here are the cds i found:

1. yaz- upstairs at erics
2. inxs- kick
3. erasure- the innocents
4. just say yo- a volume II of just say yes (some kind of remix compilation)
5. inxs- X
6. the church- starfish
7. concrete blonde- bloodletting
8. zz top- greatest hits
9. the outfield- play deep
10. pat green- dancehall dreamer

so by the looks of these cds, this office has been abandoned since 1986. i love the 80's theme with zz top and pat green mixed in there. and what is the outfield? and why do they have an album called, "play deep"? that is so funny. i already listened to inxs "kick" and yaz "upstairs at eric's." i'm currently listening to erasure. i can turn this up as loud as i want and no one will be bothered because i'm in the center of nowhere.

dude, "ship of fools." erasure, yes!

we came along this road

systemic risk. is AIG a systemic risk? they sure think so. here's an internal letter from those great civil patrons at AIG.

seems obama is going to try and undo the bonuses at AIG.

here's a list/story of who's on AIG's bankroll.

AIG's latest disclosure from footnoted.

i'm a little obsessed with this story. not because they gave out bonus money from our tax money, as asinine as that is, but because someone actually believes bonuses are deserved! what the hell? you have a company on the bubble accepting government money to continue operations. does that sound like someone is doing a good job? anybody? are these bonuses going to the guys who clean the floor or empty the garbage? because those guys probably are doing a good job even when the company almost doesn't exist. it's amazing. corporate america is amazing.

in other news.....

the avclub has a great list of television shows that changed characters/plots/entire stories. most of the ones from the 80's i remember, like charles in charge and valerie and the facts of life. even though i was young, i was like, "who are these people? what happenend here?"

finished the watchmen book this past weekend. i also saw the movie. i actually saw the movie before i finished the book, which usually wouldn't be a big deal because the movie never follows the book. but this movie followed it to the letter. i mean whole passages of dialogue were the same. plus, you ever watch a movie and think it's pretty good, but the further you get away from it, the more you think it wasn't very good. that's how i feel about this movie.

bob dylan's going to be releasing a new album soon.

i'm so vain

"i'm so vain, i probably think this song is about me!"

videos:

nick cave and the bad seeds: "more news from nowhere"
nick cave and the bad seeds: "dig, lazarus, dig"
nick cave and the bad seeds: "night of the lotus eaters"

radiohead: "house of cards"
radiohead: "pyramid song"

leatherbag: "on down the line"

carly simon: "you're so vain" w/chinese captions

paul mccartney/wings: "too many people/big barn bed"

the strokes: "last nite"

spoon: "the underdog"
spoon: "i turn my camera on"

the truth

holy shit. i am currently watching/listening to the john stewart interview with jim cramer. i am hearing exactly what i've been thinking in my head out of the mouth of john stewart.

you don't generate profit by blowing up the house. that's the bubble mentality. don't buy into it. recognize it for what is and play by those rules. play by the rules of the shadow banking system and hopefully you won't get burned. either that, or invest your money in yogurt stands. those things are gold.

your redneck past

i missed it. i don't have cable and apparently i missed the undressing of the new century. jim cramer, who i was obsessed with early on in my education of stocks/finance, was on the daily show last night. now although john stewart is a funny man, he has a knack for pinpointing hypocracy within the media. he did it with crossfire, which was subsequently cancelled, and now he's doing with CNBC as a whole. i agree with his assessment to a point. yes- CNBC is not for the average investor who watches it for stock information. yes- CNBC was so far up the ass of corporate america that they could not see the fall coming and it brings their journalistic integrity into question.

but....come on. if you are watching jim cramer and following his advice to a tee without doing your due diligence and investigating where you're putting your money, you're an idiot. john stewart's right: this isn't a game. this is real. these losses are real. that's why i cannot understand for the life of me why people put their money in these stocks/mutual funds/hedge funds and never look at it again. or investigate who is in charge. who makes the calls. who handles the checks. information is power. you have to know where your money is and what is happening with it.

i have since recognized that jim cramer is an idiot. the person i listen to for stock advice now is the tiny man who lives in my sock drawer. his name is ted and i found him paddling on a bar of soap on buffalo bayou during a rainstorm. we started talking and he was looking for a place to stay. i suggested my sock drawer and he was fine with that as long as i fed him honey nut cheerios. he actually wades in the bowl of milk to eat the cheerios. it's really funny. but he's got great stock advice. like one time he told me: "i would never fetch a reindeer if i wasn't sure which way was north." brilliant. made thousands of dollars that day. another time he said: "it's not called bluffing if you're not wearing underwear." another thousand dollars. sometimes he talks of travelling and wants to get out, but i put a lock on the sock drawer so he's not going anyway. ah, ted.

more news from nowhere

"then a black girl with no clothes on danced across the room, we charted the progress of the planets around that boogie-wongie moon, i called her my nubian princess, i gave her some sweet-back bad-ass jive, i spent the next seven years between her legs pining for my wife."

-nick cave, "more news from nowhere," dig, lazarus, dig

the fact that i am getting into this album as much as i am is starting to tell me something. i feel like i've entered into the second phase of my life. this second phase didn't have a definitive beginning and i'm sure the next one won't either. it just happens. you wake up and see the world a little different. you have different opinions and your concerns are different as well. songs like "more news from nowhere" ring around in your head. leonard cohen's music. the concern for what is new and exciting (in the way of music, fashion, etc.) gives way to exploration of your own personality, your faults, your desires, your relationships. there's a calmness that is taking over me. the edges are sharper, but only used on rare occasions.

it's not something i can truly discuss within the text of this blog because it's not something i completely have a handle on yet. it's emerging and it's not even considered true fact yet. but i like it.

great little article/conversation about george lucas and steven spielberg discussing the raiders of the lost ark. lawrence kasdan is there too, but, really, who cares?

citi claims they made a profit and the market vomits happiness. let's see what happens through the rest of the week.

these are some really awful poses, but the morning show on 1560 the game is the best in houston. john and lance are freakin' hilarious. lance doing his uncle drayton impersonation and john calling people out. it's the best. i was listening this morning to them talking about sheriff blaylocks nachos at minute maid and uncle drayton giving away free foul balls. it was great.

seriously

no more auction block

there's no better feeling than doing something nice for someone you love. that's how i spent my weekend. well saturday, i worked all day. sunday i spent all day doing something nice. but saturday night was interesting. i was alone. my wife is out of town for the week and i had nothing to do. i didn't want to drink at all. so i drove down to get some coffee and decided to check out the bookstore over off of shepard and walabama. i saw some good stuff, but nothing i decided to buy. the new mojo magazine had a cover of nick cave and my mind got to thinking about his music.

but before i decided to expand on that, i thought i would look for cheaper books at the half price bookstore near montrose. i found a pretty good book by roger lowestein called origins of the crash. he's the same guy who wrote when genius failed about the spectacular death of long-term capital. so i got that book and looked around their used cd section for nick cave albums. didn't find any, so i went to soundwaves on montrose to find them there. didn't find them there either and that place has gotten way expensive. so i trucked it over to the new cactus records to look there and they didn't have any either. so i decided to call it a night, but before i went home, i went by target to see what i could find there. they had a sale on the john adams miniseries and i also got the watchmen book. but that's where i got the grand idea about what i wanted to do for my wife.

i won't divulge the details, but it's pretty sweet. i think she's going to love it when she gets home. to close up the nick cave story, i found my way to a website called secondspin.com and they had them there. i got let love in and nocturama.

anyway, pretty unusual weekend.

monkberry moon delight

paul mccartney's early stuff is pretty weird/good. they're strange little musical ideas that he doesn't always expand on, he just kind of introduces them and throws some crazy words around them and then that's it. his self titled and ram are great albums. and there's one track called big barn bed. nice.

all these amazon links, i need to charge them advertising.

lots of people have lost their jobs in the past few months. if you have a job, feel fortunate. i know three people who have been laid off. if you don't have a job and you don't mind getting sunburned, there are still a few corners left in houston to work. or just stand next to an atm. you know those people have money.

here's a review of the watchmen.

you know, sometimes rules are good. so they're trying to reinstitute a law that was in place like 80 years or something and then they dropped it and it took 10 years to have a depression. correlations do exist between responsibility and financial stability.

i actually have a link to this act from way back when. i can't find it, but it's back there somewhere. here's a new link to it.

i cannot believe there is a video for this song.

talkin' bout the smiling deathporn immortality blues

wow.

working 10 and 12 hour days gets a little tiring after a week. actually two weeks. here are some quick hits:

the arcade fire versus the flaming lips

i can't believe i was in iceland in may and now the entire country is bankrupt. here's the story of how it happened.

this will surely be a book i'm going to check out. and don't call me shirley. had to.

you realize that if stocks/the market is at 1996 levels, we have lost an entire decade of earnings. of course, those earnings were based on air/mirrors/smoke whatever. but an entire decade. wow.

anyway, got tons to do. seriously.

one horse town

this is an open letter to my body:

that's it body. you and me are finally on the same team. i know i've nurtured you and taken care of you. i took you to the beach and to the gym, where we turned you into something pretty sweet. but you know what i'm really talking about. it's not about those times to the beach or to the gym. it's about those times where i try to destroy you. you know those times, don't you? those times where i think i'm having fun and i think you can handle it, but then you and my brain get together and punish me like medieval times? those times?

well, that's it. no more. no mas. i'm turning in. throwin' in the white towel. laying down the flag. putting my sock in the air. that last one was an original of mine. that's right. i can't compete anymore. i finally realize that the last 9 years are finally over. the behavior i cherished and looked forward to is finally over. and the best part is, i'm ready. it should be over. it's time. i can't yell in people's faces anymore and expect them to be okay with it. i can't steal random objects from bars or people's houses and expect them to be okay with it. i certainly can't call people and speak in one unrecognizable syllable and expect them to understand me. but most of all, i can't get out of control and still be able to control the situation. that's the rub. the loss of control was the point from the very beginning. that's what it was about. losing control. not being responsible for what happened. not wanting to remember what happened. that was the main event. that's really why the whole thing started. you remember? you wanted to lose control. you wanted to do things you knew you shouldn't, but you sure wanted to, so you figured out a way to do them and feel okay about them. that was great. it was honestly, the most brilliant thing ever done on the planet. ever. and it worked. for a long time, it worked to perfection.

the thing is, though, it doesn't work anymore. and the reason it doesn't work anymore, is because i don't want to lose control. i don't want to do things that i shouldn't. i want to feel in control of everything. be responsible for the things i say and do. and no, it's not because i'm getting older and i'm married and all that crap. it's because i did it. and now, i'm done with it.

the best part of the weekend for me is sunday breakfast. i'll get up or my wife will, and we'll make breakfast and talk and watch our political shows. and then we'll go for a walk or go bike-riding. those things are why i work so hard during the week. it's to get to that moment. to experience a bowl of oatmeal with my wife on sunday morning. that's the whole thing. if i destroy myself, i don't get that moment. i don't the walk. i don't get the bike-ride. those things are robbed from me. and why are they robbed? because i thought it was more important to talk to someone about why the original star wars movie is better than empire strikes back until four in the morning. and it is by the way. look it up.

now body, i expect you to back me on this. i'm doing this for you. and my brain too, i guess. because his revenge is awful as well. but there will be times when i think the best way to relieve stress is whiskey and smoke. it's going to happen. so i'm going to need you to kick yourself whenever you feel that it's too strong. go ahead and kick yourself right in the ass. i won't mind. i'll then remember what's going on and right the ship.

but i'm writing this down today, so i can read it anytime i want. i can remember that this is what i want and this is what i need. this time, they're the same. it's going to be hard. but the reward will be more than enough. it's time to enjoy the whole thing in a different way.

i can't wait until sunday morning.

wilco, the album

june can't get here soon enough.

some days are better than others

today is not one of those days. are you ever convinced that you didn't sleep at all the night before? you know you did a little because you had a dream or something, but the rest of the night you remember lying there and thinking about why you can't sleep and how impossible it will be to ever go to sleep again? i had one of those nights.

the dow is having a great day too. it's getting close to buying season on the market. i still think we're in for 5,000 territory. i really think it's going to happen. that will be the signal to me that the market has bottomed out. i mean you could argue that we're there right now and i wouldn't tell you you were wrong. when the market loses half it's value in a year and a half, the bottom isn' too hard to see.

here are the world's most admired companies. not one of them is located on the island of grenada. i'm very disappointed in grenada. come on!

here's a history of our savings in the form of a graph.

it's liddy versus greenberg in the battle of most short-sighted incompetent ceo. AIG was basically supposed to insure the entire financial sector against a major economic downturn. turns out, they didn't deliver.

pitchfork reviews u2's new album. when i say "review" i should actually say destroys. that's probably more appropriate. i think u2 is just about done as far as being a cutting-edge band. in all honestly, i liked their last album, but it wasn't amazing. when you go back and listen to "the joshua tree," "achtung baby" and "zooropa" those albums are amazing. and then they stumbled big with "pop" and they really haven't recovered. it's time to pass the mantle to the next biggest band in the world: flight of the conchords.

here's the walkmen's website. check it out.

here come the astros

not really. this is going to be a long year for the home team. since it seems manny is going to sign with the dodgers, he's the last big piece to fall. and i watched an astros spring training game yesterday versus the braves and it was the greatest hour of the year thus far. so with all that being said, it's time for the 2009 baseball predictions. let's go:

National League
Central
1. Chicago Cubs
2. Cincinnati Reds
3. St. Louis Cardinals
4. Houston Astros
5. Milwaukee Brewers
6. Pittsburgh Pirates

East
1. New York Mets
2. Philadelphia Phillies*
3. Florida Marlins
4. Atlanta Braves
5. Washington Nationals

West
1. Arizona Diamondbacks
2. Los Angeles Dodgers
3. San Francisco Giants
4. Colorado Rockies
5. San Diego Padres

American League
Central
1. Minnesota Twins
2. Cleveland Indians
3. Detroit Tigers
4. Kansas City Royals
5. Chicago White Sox

East
1. Tampa Bay Rays
2. Boston Red Sox*
3. New York Yankees
4. Baltimore Orioles
5. Toronto Blue Jays

West
1. Anaheim Angels
2. Oakland Atheletics
3. Texas Rangers
4. Seattle Mariners

*denotes wild card selection

so that's it. yes, the reds will surprise some people this year. yes, the yankees will surprise everyone and finish third. c.c. is not big time. burnett will get hurt and a-roid is in for a long year. also, the twins will continue to mystify everyone and continue winning the central, while in the national league west, manny isn't enough to get the dodgers past the diamondbacks. i think those young kids are finally going to put it together this year. and the home team, well, fourth place isn't that bad when you look at the pitching staff. the only way the astros move up this year and finish second or third is if mike hampton and russ ortiz both become comeback players of the year, kaz matsui is actually healthy and michael bourn can get on base. otherwise, look for bogusevic, sutton and johnson to get a call-up later in the year.

162 games. i'm ready.

frosted ambassador

this is from mish:

"Dear Mr. President, With All Due Respect ....

Dear Mr. President, I read your New Era $3.6 Trillion Budget Proposal. I also listened to your speech Tuesday night. You made a great campaign speech. However, the campaign is over. You won. And the reason you won is you offered hope as well as a promise of change.
With all due respect Mr. President, Tim Geithner and Ben Bernanke are offering the same policies as President Bush and Secretary Paulson. Those policies are to bail out banks regardless of cost to taxpayers. Mr. President, it's hard enough to overlook Geithner's tax indiscretions. Mr. President, it is harder still. if not impossible, to ignore the fact that neither Geithner nor Bernanke saw this coming. Yet amazingly they are both cock sure of the solution. Even more amazing is the fact that solution changes every day.
With all due respect Mr. President, Geithner and Bernanke are a huge part of the problem, and no part of the solution and the sooner you realize that the better off this nation will be.
With all due respect Mr. President, your budget proposal is the same big government spending as we saw under President Bush. The only difference is you promised more spending and bigger government, while President Bush promised less government and less spending and failed to deliver on either count.With all due respect Mr. President, it is impossible to spend one's way out of a problem, when the problem is reckless spending.
With all due respect Mr. President, you and Congress want to force banks to lend when banks (by not lending) are acting responsibly for the first time in a decade. Mr, President can you please tell us who banks are supposed to lend to? Do we need any more Home Depots? Pizza Huts? Strip malls? Nail salons? Auto dealerships? What Mr. President? What? And why should banks be lending when unemployment is rising and lending risks right along with it?
With all due respect Mr. President, we were hoping your administration would not carry on the war mongering policies of your predecessor. Instead we see amazingly that you Seek $75.5 Billion More for Wars in 2009. Mr. President, do we really need another $75 billion for wars? Was there nothing in the military budget that could be cut?
With all due respect Mr. President, The United States spends more on its military budget than the next 45 highest spending countries in the world combined; The United States accounts for 48 percent of the world's total military spending; The United States spends on its military 5.8 times more than China, 10.2 times more than Russia, and 98.6 times more than Iran. Isn't that enough Mr. President?
With all due respect Mr. President, the downfall of every great nation in history has been unsustainable military expansion. Mr. President, the US can no longer afford to be the world's policeman. You act as if we can. Mr. President, can you please tell us how we can afford this spending?
With all due respect Mr. President, Fannie Mae Reported A Fourth Quarter Loss Of $25.2 Billion. Can you please tell us where you draw the line on taxpayer bailouts of Fannie Mae? Freddie Mac? AIG? Mr. President is there a line anywhere, on anything? If there is, we would appreciate knowing where it is.
With all due respect Mr. President, how can you talk about reducing the budget deficit while proposing the biggest budget in history?
With all due respect Mr. President, how is it possible to talk about reducing health care costs while proposing to increase the health care budget?
With all due respect Mr. President, you have talked about "hard choices". Can you please tell us what hard choices you have made other than to throw money at every problem? Sure a few programs have changed but Bush orchestrated the biggest Medicaid/Medicare package in history and you upped it. You upped military spending. You criticized McCain for cutting programs that amount to peanuts, and all you can find to cut out of the budget is peanuts.
With all due respect Mr. President, your "Era of New Responsibility" is nothing more than a continuation of the Bush administration Era of Irresponsibility. Mr. President, we hoped for more and deserved more. Yet, behind the charade of campaign messages of hope and change, we essentially see the same fiscal irresponsibility and misguided policies as before. Oh sure Mr. President, your budget priorities have shifted a bit, sadly the irresponsible spending did not."

it covers the hillside

i don't watch a lot of movies, but the ones i do, i select carefully. you won't find me watching eddie murphy in "daddy day care 11: the return of the fishsticks." i know that movie sucks and i'm not going to waste my time watching it. but even the ones i select carefully can be let downs, like the darjeeling limited. i was so excited to see it and it was awful. or the good shepherd. i actually saw that a long time ago and don't know why i thought of it, but i'm glad i did because it was awful too.

so it's great when you see a movie and the credits are running and you don't want to talk. you don't to say a word because that means it's over. this thing that you were experiencing is over and you have to let it go when you don't want to. we watched "into the wild" this past friday night and i could not leave that movie alone. it's the story of christopher mccandless a.k.a. "alexander supertramp." he's a young kid who's just graduated from college and he goes off on this adventure to find truth and meaning. the film is extremely inspiring and heartfelt. the kid really has no idea what he's doing, but everywhere he goes, he influences people in a positive way.

there's one quote that sticks with me from the movie: "happiness is only real when shared."

if you get a chance and you're watching the dark knight for the fourth time, put this movie on instead.

shelter from the storm

president obama gave a speech last night. here is the transcript. i've read through most of it and i agree with the assessment that recent ideological visions have favored short-term profits over long-term development. this is an american phenomenom. it wasn't just the goverment. it was all of us. but how do we fix our debt as people? we stop spending, we cut back. we try to earn more money from our employer, either through working overtime or getting an extra job. these same rules will have to apply to our government. they'll have to scale back spending or reallocate to satisfy spending needs. they'll have to raise more money, that means taxes. either that or print more money and debase the currency, which i don't think they'll do unless they have to. so i agree with obama about long-term planning, it's needed, it's necessary. but i don't understand how he's going to cut the decifit and give people a tax cut. i hope he can. i hope he's got something up his sleeve and is able to pull this off. i want to live in a country that has a plan again. that has a vision.

businessweek has a write-up of the speak and the main points and analysis. here it is.

charlie rose is at it again. here he is with morgan stanley's john mack.

ukraine's ratings cut by S&P.

mish on bernanke's hide and seek.

top 10 brands to invest in from yahoo finance.

michael cera is apparently on board for the arrested development movie. my dream is coming true.

here's a concert review of blitzen trapper in chicago. i love furr but it's slightly scattered. if those guys can focus on one sound, they're going to make some freakin' amazing albums. hopefully they come to texas, other than SXSW.

banking on a myth

risk. that's the measure. that's the key. how risky is something? if i make this bet, what are the chances of x,y,z happening? they have models for these things. but as i've said before, the outcome of a model is not always based in reality. the outcome could very well be logical, but practical, no. these models were behind the fall of long-term capital and they've been the reason so many people were surprised when their CDOs started falling. people actually think they can quantify risk. it's impossible. risk can be measured given all known inputs, but therein lies the fallacy, you cannot possibly include all unknown inputs. they're unknown! it's not impossible. so risk can be squeezed down to make you sleep better at night, but it's still there because you didn't factor in what would happen when these CDOs failed on top of all the credit default swaps that were lingering with them. i'm going off on this tangent because of this article. read it here. it's great.

so what is a credit default swap? real quick: let's say you want to bet on the yankees to win the world series but you're not sure they're going to win. so you bet five on the yankees and four on the astros. so i've collected nine dollars from you. now the yankees win. you want your five dollars. well i don't have it. because i took that nine dollars and only kept one. i invested the eight dollars in mortgage securities, which i can't sell now to cover the bet because they're worthless. on top of that, i used the mortgage securities to obtain loans using the mortgage securities as collateral. now the banks are calling in their loans because my collateral is worthless. so i owe for the yankees, i owe to the banks and the worst part is i took this bet for every person i know. i'm over-leveraged and have no means to pay back the credit default swap or the loans. that's what happened to AIG, Lehmans and Bear Stearns.

bill gross of pimco has some power. here he is answering questions.

apparently american express is paying people to pay off their balances.

the paths to repudiation.

a daily show clip is always worth mentioning.

robert smith is hating on radiohead. i've got two words for robert smith: less is more. dude, you're fifty. let's cut the pancake and teenage angst and let's start singing about early dinners and the weather channel. please.

murder in the city

"always remember there is nothing worth sharing like the love that let us share our name."
-the avett brothers

ditty diego

from the article yesterday by james quinn: here are the main points from the article, excellent, read the whole thing if you have the time.

We know that Congress is corrupt and in the pocket of lobbyists. They show no courage to make necessary unpopular decisions because they won’t be re-elected. The founding fathers envisioned representatives who did their civic duty for a short time and then went back to their real profession. Almost 200 out of 535 members of Congress are lawyers and lifetime politicians. This explains much about our predicament. Term limits would inject our leaders with a dose of courage. Maybe they would do what was best for the country if they knew that they would only be in Washington for six years.

Outlawing lobbyists and PACs would remove the buying and selling of votes in Congress. We must remove the corruption from Washington DC.

The PAYGO rules that were allowed to expire in 2002 must be reinstituted. These rules would not allow new spending initiatives without an equal cut in other spending. These rules allow Congressmen to pretend to have a backbone and say no to constituent demands.

The banks that are insolvent will need to be nationalized, investors wiped out, and good assets sold off to good banks. Nouriel Roubini lays out a logical scenario. The sooner we purge the system of its bad debt, the sooner we can get this economy on a positive track.

Dr. John Hussman has a solution for the foreclosure disaster that would not stick the U.S. taxpayer with the bill. Banks could write down the mortgage balance but receive a PAR (property appreciation right) back from the homeowner. The idea is discussed in more detail here.

The U.S. carmakers need to be restructured within a pre-packaged bankruptcy. They want another $39 billion of your tax dollars. No more taxpayer funds can be wasted on these bloated pigs.

A truly non-partisan commission appointed by the President with the power to put forth a comprehensive plan to restructure Medicare, Medicaid, and Social Security for an up or down vote by Congress is the only way to create a viable future. Congress must be forced to confront this issue.

John McCain’s moderate approach of allowing a path to citizenship seems like the best immigration plan. Most came here to try and live a better life. If they have committed crimes or don’t follow the prescribed path to citizenship, then they need to be expelled from our country. We need to encourage foreign professionals to immigrate to America with incentives, if necessary.

If 50% of the $1.4 trillion annual military related budget was redirected to debt reduction, energy independence, and infrastructure rebuilding, we would actually get a positive return on our tax contribution. Our military is supposed to defend our country, not invade sovereign nations.

A “Manhattan Project” to develop new energy sources which would eliminate the $400 billion per year that we send overseas for foreign oil. The number of high paying jobs that could be created by building nuclear power plants, wind farms, and converting vehicles to natural gas would be in the hundreds of thousands.

A tax system that eliminated all the preferences and loopholes for corporations and individuals while lowering rates would be fairer. Maybe even our Treasury Secretary could do his taxes correctly. Congress and lobbyists use the tax system to push their agendas. A flat tax or replacing the income tax with a national sales tax are other possible options.

The Federal Reserve needs to be abolished. A currency backed by gold or a basket of precious metals would restrict what Congress could spend. This would save us from ourselves. The dollar has lost 93% of its purchasing power since Nixon closed the gold window in 1971 and the National Debt has gone from $389 billion to $10.8 trillion, a 2,800% increase in 38 years. Politicians will spend your money if they are given the chance. Let’s not give them the chance.

night of the lotus eaters

"get ready to shield yourself." - nick cave, "night of the lotus eaters" dig, lazarus, dig

i've got some goodies today. it's lucky friday. have you noticed people starting to say, "happy friday!" like it's a holiday? what is that? friday is not a holiday. it's a freaking day of the week. let's not start turning ordinary, mundane events, like a day, into a holiday. let's calm down people. the weekend isn't that great that we have to kick it off every week with a holiday.

anyway, check it. here is a great article by james quinn, former comptroller general of the united states. he says our current levels of asset acquisition by debt is not sustainable. who knew? "hey i'd like a new car, house, cell phone, television, i'm going to have four kids and my husband and i both make $15,000 a year with no college education. and i'd like that now!" see people, that's the definition of unsustainable. look to your left, now look to your right, you see it all around you.

here is nouriel roubini and mark zandi on charlie rose.

and finally, here's mish's take on nationalization.

what is everyone's opinion on nationalization? does everyone understand that nationalization does not have to be a permanent thing? you can nationalize a bank, re-organize, kick out the idiots who were in control, make it profitable again and sell it. that can happen. also, for everyone who keeps complaining that obama is going to turn this country into a socialistic society needs to freakin' wake up. this is a democracy. obama is not king. we can elect a new president in less than four years. he's not a freakin' dictator that can change our entire democratic system without our say-so. so freakin' wake up!

let me hear it all three or four of you that read this.

under pressure

i'm out on engagement for the next two months practically, so my entries will be brief and infrequent.

mish has some good stuff on the nationalization train.

roubini likes the idea of nationalization.

here are the details on obama's mortgage fix plan from marketwatch.

oil near $35.00.

that's all for today.

like dylan in the movies

i haven't finished my last batch of books, but i'm already ready to get moving on the next group. here are the ones in my sights:

1. the black swan: the impact of the highly improbably by: nassim taleb
2. origin of wealth: evolution, complexity and the radical remaking of economics by: eric beinhocker
3. stabilizing an unstable economy by: hyman minsky
4. the general theory of employment, interest and money by: john maynard keynes
5. short history of financial euphoria by: john kenneth galbraith

that's my short list.

here's the top 10 most forgettable presidents.

after visiting iceland on the honeymoon, i think norway would be where i want to go next.

i'm excited about the watchmen movie. don't know why. but here's a free video game online.

favorite waste of time

the great st. valentine race for love is over. we had dinner at bistro don camillo and then we went to a show at radio music theatre. i first went to radio music theatre with the youth group from ort. that must have been at least 12 years ago and i loved it then and it was great again. if you live in houston, you should really check this place out. funny, funny stuff.

bill moyers always has excellent interviews. here's one on the emerging banking oligarchy.

little bit of re-learning needed for the nationalization of banks.

don't eat the peanut butter.

sing another song, boys

phase two is underway. finally. month long funk is officially funked. hear the good news.

in other news: bologna is still gross.

halloweenhead

"it leads me through the streets at night,

that's alright, i just watch, i don't go inside.

it's all the same old shit again,

i've got a halloweenhead!"

-ryan adams

pretty weak lyric, right? hear it in the context of the song and you'll dig it. enough to type it at night on your blog. what? only i do that? whatever.

sound of silver

i ate an apple today for breakfast. my teeth are aching. is that normal? it's like a good ache though, like the skin of the apple cleaned my mouth. what's that old saying, an apple a day keeps the dentist away? right? yep, that's it.

"merging two zombie banks is like have two drunks trying to help each other to stand up."- Nouriel Roubini

speaking of roubini, here's what he has to say about nationalization:

"So why is the US government temporizing and avoiding doing the right thing, i.e. take over the insolvent banks? There are two reasons. First, there is still some small hope and a small probability that the economy will recover sooner than expected, that expected credit losses will be smaller than expected and that the current approach of recapping the banks and somehow working out the bad assets will work in due time. Second, taking over the banks – call is nationalization or, in a more politically correct way, “receivership” – is a radical action that requires most banks be clearly beyond pale and insolvent to be undertaken. Today Citi and Bank of America clearly look like near-insolvent and ready to be taken over but JPMorgan and Wells Fargo do not yet. But with the sharp rise in delinquencies and charge-off rates that we are experiencing now on mortgages, commercial real estate and consumer credit in a matter of six to twelve months even JPMorgan and Wells will likely look as near-insolvent …

…So while Plan A is now underway today’s very negative market response to this Treasury plan suggest that it will not fly. Markets were expecting a more clear plan but also a plan that would bail out shareholders and creditors of insolvent banks. Unfortunately that is not politically and fiscally feasible. It is thus time to start to think and plan ahead for for Plan N (“nationalization” of insolvent banks)."

so the stimulus was passed in the senate, soon to be ratified again in the house. here is how to know if it is actually working.

mish is not happy with bernanke.

if your a muppets fan, this article is like christmas dinner. what? check it out.

always something there to remind me

it's all stimulus talk, all the time. great graphical breakdown in the washington post. amazing graph. check it out here.

mish has got an breakdown and analysis.

geitner wants to bring in private investment as part of his financial rescue plan. it was supposed to be announced today, but was delayed until tomorrow.

i had a greatly successful weekend. i acquired four harry nilsson albums including: pandemonium shawdow show, aerial ballet, pussycats and knnillssonn. thanks to randy for pointing me in the right direction on those. i plan on acquiring three more tonight and tomorrow night.

i was eating crab last night and i tried breaking into this crab leg, like full on force and i ended up stabbing the underneath part of my thumbnail and it's really sore. seriously, those crabs are well protected. we have to bang a freakin' hammer on them to open them up. and then slather them with butter and eat them. what eats crabs besides us? can bears open them up? i know birds have no shot. and sharks might just swallow it whole. i don't know.

the grammys were last night. i taped it and then fast forwarded (yeah, VHS baby!) through the entire thing to see radiohead play. it was pretty cool. it was just thom and johnny playing with the entire USC marching band. my wife and i had the same thought at the same time, "you know each one of those band nerds (i was one) is creaming their pants playing with radiohead right now." when a husband and wife both generate that thought at the exact same time, "wow" is all you can say.

ballroom blitz

it's getting deep in here people. as milhouse would say, "we're through the looking glass." i've been doing some reading on fractional reserve banking and i've found some serious stuff. here is a great article on the topic.

pay particular attention to the multiplier affect shown towards the bottom. here is gist:

"Let's assume that the Fed buys $10,000,000 of U.S. Treasury bills from some "approved" government bond dealer (a small group), say Shearson, Lehman on Wall Street. The Fed writes out a check for $10,000,000, which it gives to Shearson, Lehman in exchange for $10,000,000 in U.S. securities. Where does the Fed get the $10,000,000 to pay Shearson, Lehman? It creates the money out of thin air. Shearson, Lehman can do only one thing with the check: deposit it in its checking account at a commercial bank, say Chase Manhattan. The "money supply" of the country has already increased by $10,000,000; no one else's checking account has decreased at all. There has been a net increase of $10,000,000.

But this is only the beginning of the inflationary, counterfeiting process. For Chase Manhattan is delighted to get a check on the Fed, and rushes down to deposit it in its own checking account at the Fed, which now increases by $10,000,000. But this checking account constitutes the "reserves" of the banks, which have now increased across the nation by $10,000,000. But this means that Chase Manhattan can create deposits based on these reserves, and that, as checks and reserves seep out to other banks (much as the Rothbard Bank deposits did), each one can add its inflationary mite, until the banking system as a whole has increased its demand deposits by $100,000,000, ten times the original purchase of assets by the Fed. The banking system is allowed to keep reserves amounting to 10 percent of its deposits, which means that the "money multiplier" – the amount of deposits the banks can expand on top of reserves – is 10. A purchase of assets of $10 million by the Fed has generated very quickly a tenfold, $100,000,000 increase in the money supply of the banking system as a whole."

that is brilliant.

alan's psychedelic breakfast

i'm so late to this. but i found this at mish and the whole thing is right here. but if you don't have time for that, here is an excerpt from the piece by ron paul in speech delivered in november of 2008:

Before the U.S. House of Representatives, November 20, 2008

Madame Speaker, many Americans are hoping the new administration will solve the economic problems we face. That’s not likely to happen, because the economic advisors to the new President have no more understanding of how to get us out of this mess than previous administrations and Congresses understood how the crisis was brought about in the first place.

Today, a major economic crisis is unfolding. New government programs are started daily, and future plans are being made for even more. All are based on the belief that we’re in this mess because free-market capitalism and sound money failed. The obsession is with more spending, bailouts of bad investments, more debt, and further dollar debasement. Many are saying we need an international answer to our problems with the establishment of a world central bank and a single fiat reserve currency. These suggestions are merely more of the same policies that created our mess and are doomed to fail.

At least 90% of the cause for the financial crisis can be laid at the doorstep of the Federal Reserve. It is the manipulation of credit, the money supply, and interest rates that caused the various bubbles to form. Congress added fuel to the fire by various programs and institutions like the Community Reinvestment Act, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, FDIC, and HUD mandates, which were all backed up by aggressive court rulings.

The Federal Reserve created our problem, yet it manages to gain even more power in the socialization of the entire financial system. The whole bailout process this past year was characterized by no oversight, no limits, no concerns, no understanding, and no common sense.

Similar mistakes were made in the 1930s and ushered in the age of the New Deal, the Fair Deal, the Great Society and the supply-siders who convinced conservatives that deficits didn’t really matter after all, since they were anxious to finance a very expensive deficit-financed American empire.

All the programs since the Depression were meant to prevent recessions and depressions. Yet all that was done was to plant the seeds of the greatest financial bubble in all history. Because of this lack of understanding, the stage is now set for massive nationalization of the financial system and quite likely the means of production.

Although it is obvious that the Keynesians were all wrong and interventionism and central economic planning don’t work, whom are we listening to for advice on getting us out of this mess? Unfortunately, it’s the Keynesians, the socialists, and big-government proponents.

Who’s being ignored? The Austrian free-market economists – the very ones who predicted not only the Great Depression, but the calamity we’re dealing with today.

dayton, ohio 1903

yesterday, i was making a purchase for a three year old whose birthday is this weekend. and i found something amazing to get them and in my excitement, i somehow ordered two. now being that these kids are twins, you'd think that i would give them both one. but that is silly and i will not do that. so i now have an extra copy of this item. everyone knows my love for harry nilsson. he once did an album called the point, which was actually a cartoon that he provided the soundtrack for. it's about a boy named oblio and his dog arrow. "me and my arrow, taking the high road." i've actually made the committment that when i get a dog, i will call him arrow because of this song.

anyway, i got them the point. and i know they'll love it. but like i said, i bought two by accident. so i guess i'll keep one or i can give it to my mom and she can watch it with her grandson. that might be better. i watched it last night. it's good. and the music is great. harry nilsson is the man. i still think "nilsson sings newman" is one of the best albums i've ever heard. ever.

i wrote a little skit yesterday called peanut-butter shakes. it wasn't great, but i miss writing those conversations like i used to. so you'll probably be seeing those more often. i had a whole notebook full of conversations i had written. some were pretty good. i actually looked over the book i wrote and it was good. i need to polish that thing up and send it around again.

"would you like to come over for tea? with the missus and me? it's a real nice way to spend the day in Dayton Ohio on a lazy Sunday afternoon in 1903"

i got two more books yesterday. "the panic of 1907: lessons learned from the market's perfect storm" and "panic: the story of modern financial insanity." i like how both books have the word "panic" in them. i'm not in a panic. but i believe i have much to learn from these books.

i was thinking last night that every since i was able to comprehend the stock market and markets in general, they've been completely favorable. starting around 1995, i started slightly paying attention and then through high school and college and into my early adult life. of course, we had a couple hiccups like in 1999 and 2001, but reading the book about 1907, it was extremely common to have massive disruptions in the market. i'm talking on an annual basis. i didn't know that and it makes me start to look at the market as something different. i'm not sure buy and hold is the way to go anymore. i want to be able to recognize the market for what is and when it is. examples include asset bubbles. i want to be able to recognize an asset bubble, buy into it and sell before it bursts. now you say, well dude, everybody does. that's true. but most people get so wrapped up in the hysteria of it, they lose their objectivity. they start to think things are permanent, that prices go up indefinately, which they don't.

anyway, i'm enjoying reading these books. i'm learning about. i read a quote somewhere that poor people have lots of stuff while rich people have lots of books. i'm hoping i'll be getting rich off of these books. and if i don't, then at least i'll have plenty of books to use around the house. maybe as a ladder. or doorstop. or maybe to hide things in.

monkey burger

this is a scene from the newly created show: peanut-butter shakes. it stars the two main characters: felix and henry. both are sitting in the car as they drive down the street to the local coffee shop arpeggios.

felix: look at that dude over there. he's eating a burger and talking on the phone. that's what i like. when people call me with a mouth full of burger.

henry: probably calling the guy who made the burger. tell him how good it is. or maybe what he did wrong. forgot the pickles or something. probably.

felix: maybe. i always wondered who was the first person to kill a cow, skin it and then cook the flesh and eat it as meat. that guy was a genius.

henry: he was probably publicly scorned and wasn't allowed to own land. cause that was a big deal, owning land. if you didn't own land, you were a loser. cause there was lots of land. i mean compared to people, there was way more land than people. and trees too. probably more trees than people, but i don't think people were very interested in owning trees. maybe if they had fruit or a creature living in them. maybe then.

felix: makes sense. i don't have any trees. but i have lots of batteries.

henry: (tapping his foot to the music on the cd player)

felix: if you feel around down there and feel some batteries, let me know. there's a guy i know who collects them. he collects batteries and old postcards. from anybody. he doesn't have to know them or anything. just likes reading them.

henry: i once got a postcard from myself from the future telling me about this awesome vacation i had gone on. the card featured a monkey wearing a captain's hat. pretty authoratative figure. he was smiling and holding a drink that was in a coconut. the monkey had a shirt on, but no pants. and his nametag said "ralph." so that's how i knew it wasn't me that was writing the postcard.

felix: you thought you turned into a monkey named ralph?

henry: why would i change my name to ralph? obviously, this insidious monkey was trying to make a quick buck or something and forgot to take off his nametag. his mistake. that's why primates didn't succeed, where we did.

felix: glad we figured that one out. you think you can order a monkey burger somewhere?

let's pretend we're bunny rabbits

if you know the rest of the lyrics to this song, you are smiling right now. if you don't, then you probably hate yourself.

do we ever really know who we elect? this article, op-ed, whatever, from the nyt shows our favorite whipping boy rich milhouse nixon as a man bringing the country together. but the facade worn thin pretty quick and his true intentions were shown. my favorite part was this:

“When Dick was finally elected president he attained eighty percent of all goals in his life,” Bryce Harlow, one of his longtime closest friends and advisors, confided to an associate before the inauguration. “He has no idea of what he will do after he is sworn in.”

the goal in life was merely to be president, not to do anything upon arrival. that's great.

don't have much else today on the way of politics.

been in quite the nick cave mood lately. he's got an album called "the boatman's call" which is an amazing album of somber resolution. the first track is stunning, naked beauty. i want to cry everytime i hear it. here is their (nick cave and the bad seeds) website.

here is a website with all the lyrics from boatman's call. check out the first three and if you disagree with me, you probably hate yourself.

my friend randy found a blog containing nothing but stuff about the great harry nilsson. check it out. it's brilliant.

everybody wants to rule the world

how about that! i no more than question the obama administration's committment to integrity and change and they do it. daschle is out as nominee for health and human safety. are the two connected? who knows. does president obama read my blog? maybe. could happen. i've heard a few little lines here and there that sound familiar. regardless, this is the 2nd obama appointee to pull out due to tax problems. geithner didn't pull out, he was still approved as treasury secretary and bill richardson left due to an investigation in his administration. obama was very proud of his vetting process, but it seems to have failed him in several, high-profile instances.

executive pay is coming under major fire. obama wants to cap it at $500,000 for companies that receive federal bailout loans (hopefully these are loans). i don't like the number. i want it to be $501,721.23. that seems more appropriate, doesn't it?

here is a different take on getting toxic assets off of the bank's balance sheet.

judd gregg, a republican, replaces nominee bill richardson as commerce secretary. get to know him.

in an economy like this, people constantly discuss what stocks/bonds/whatever to buy. i like this idea. keep it with stock dividends. reinvest your dividends and buy more of the stock.

mish doesn't like geithner's ideas for asset purchases.

an interview with three people from the state. not the state, as in government state, but the sketch comedy show the state.

"he said everything is messed up round here, everything is banal and jejune, there is a planetary conspiracy against the likes of you and me, in this idiot constituency of the moon (well, he knew exactly who to blame) and we call upon the author to explain!"- nick cave, dig, lazurus dig, "call upon the author to explain"

winds of change (sorry)

sleep when i'm dead

new day in washington, right president obama? cause it's starting to feel like the new boss is the same as the old boss.

"everybody knows, everybody knows, everybody knows, you only live a day, but it's brilliant anyway." - elliott smith, x/o, "independence day"

so we've got some ethics decisions to make right. we'll think about those in a minute because the stimulus bill is being ramrodded through the house and soon the senate. what's in it? do you agree with what's in it? are there enough egregious items to halt the bill entirely? look at it.

here are some bailout questions answered. some are stupid, some make you wonder.

mish had a good little bit on wells fargo balance sheet yesterday.

"oh, what'll you do now, my blue-eyed son?
oh, what'll you do now, my darling young one?
i'm a-goin' back out 'fore the rain starts a-fallin',
i'll walk to the depths of the deepest black forest,
where the people are many and their hands are all empty,
where the pellets of poison are flooding their waters,
where the home in the valley meets the damp dirty prison,
where the executioner's face is always well hidden,
where hunger is ugly, where souls are forgotten,
where black is the color, where none is the number,
and I'll tell it and think it and speak it and breathe it,
and reflect it from the mountain so all souls can see it,
then I'll stand on the ocean until I start sinkin',
but I'll know my song well before I start singin',
and it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard, it's a hard,
it's a hard rain's a-gonna fall."

-bob dylan, "a hard rain's a-gonna fall"

stockholm syndrome

the superbowl is over. is that one word or two? on this blog, it's one word. the steelers beat the cardinals in a freakin' entertaining game. when fitzgerald blasted up the middle in the 4th, i really thought the cardinals had pulled off the amazing upset. but the steelers had one drive left in them and they won.

observations:
- commercials were lame. didn't see one that sticks in my memory. i changed the channel several times to watch the simpsons or american dad on the breaks.
- bogus calls. how can the superbowl end on a call like that? he did not fumble the ball. it should have been reviewed. arizona deserved one last chance to win that game. also, the roughing the passer call was totally lame.
- bruce springsteen was actually fun to watch. i don't like his music, don't own a single album. but he got in the spirit of the game and delivered a great performance. but, the only thing that bugged me was his moves. the dude was struggling to get around that stage. but he kept insisting on jumping on the piano and running and sliding around the stage. it looked painful for the guy. but, his wife is hot.
- joe namath seemed like he was never going to get to that podium. everyone kept touching the trophy and grabbing at it. i felt bad for the old guy. i mean he's like 60. give him some space.
- the office episode after the superbowl was great. the roast was perfect. "now dwight knows not to cut off the face of a real person."

so now we sit around until baseball season. i believe february is the worst month of the year. football is over. spring training doesn't start for another month. it just sucks. but thankfully, it's the shortest.

i already have my preliminary world series pick: arizona vs. new york. that could change if the dodgers sign manny and some of these other free agents find a home. the astros i have as finishing fourth in the central.

now back to reality:
consumers usually save during boom and spend during bust. now, we're doing the opposite. why is that?

she's hot. she's smart. she's meredith whitney. here's her idea on how banks can get back in the game.

rock and roll suicide

i just wrote the greatest little bit about america being a rock and roll suicide. and i went to publish the post and i received an error. i lost it all. it was beautiful what i wrote. i said how we were young and we were a rebel and then we went corporate and died a bloated rock and roll death. it was great. sorry you didn't get to read it.

and i had a bunch a links with funny stuff, but i'm not going to write it again. here are the links:

mish's global economics: bailout to hit $4 trillion.

msn money: why the bank bailouts are doomed.

bloomberg: US economy shrank by 3.8% last quarter.

avclub: possible arrested development movie.

the amazing sounds of orgy

"the day the banks collapse on us." - radiohead

so the banks are still failing. the original idea was to buy these troubled assets under the TARP program. that didn't happen. so now instead, there is an idea being floated of creating a "bad bank" that will buy these assets and get them off the banks balance sheet. here's the scoop.

here is a great blog that contains major breakdown on the possible nationalization of the banking industry.

"privatize the gains and socialize the losses."

great blog out there that actually reads through company's 10K filings and picks out really interesting stuff buried within the filing. it's footnoted.org. check it out.

great conversation with niall ferguson over canceling the US debt. he describes the various stages of a bubble: Displacement, Euphoria, Mania, Distress and finally Panic. that's where we are now is Panic.

i remember that shirt on the fence

he knows what he's waiting for
he's been shown the door
it's happened to him before

there is no circumstance
no unjust romance
there's only sudden happenstance

making his way through fenced-in fields
marking time, his cloak and his shield
always weighed more than they could yield

he'll rule the day away
from a back room delivery bay
it was always meant to be this way

let it bleed

we have a new treasury secretary. he name is timothy geithner. he forgets to pay self-employment taxes, but we're hoping he can turn a stealth hand unlike hank paulson. there are suggestions of how he should handle part 2 of the TARP plan.

"panic in detroit." i love david bowie's aladdin sane more and more every day. "he looked a lot like che guevara, drove a diesel van. kept his gun in quiet seclusion, such an honorable man. the only survivor of the national people's gang, panic in detroit, i asked for an autograph, he wanted to stay home, i wish someone would phone, panic in detroit." great song.

these companies are not firing people.

cameras processing real time decisions.

FDIC might run bad bank that gobbles up bad assets.

why dealing with indebtedness is so hard.

the kids don't stand a chance

i recently saw sam donaldson make a case for expanding credit and allowing the taxpayer the ability to be able to continue to borrow money. he claimed that would fix the mess we are in. if his solution sounds familiar, it's because that's the reason we got into this mess. cheap money. excessive borrowing. leveraging debt. it's not time to borrow more money, it's time to pay it back.

they also mentioned something called the paradox of thrift. this is a theory put forth by john maynard keynes. this theory says that during times of economic depression, people save their money, thus compounding the situation by a fall in demand and stifling ecomonic growth, thus lowering the real amount of savings for all involved.

keynes magnum opus is a book called "the general theory of employment, interest and money." i've never read it, but i intend to this year.

anyway back to what i was saying earlier, the consensus seems to be that a massive stimulus package will start to grease the gears of this economy. i'm not sure that is going to help. lots of this goes over my head, but it seems to resemble a person who you first thought had a cold and it turns out they're much sicker than you thought. and not only are they much sicker, they were a closer to end than anyone imagined. that's how i'm feeling right now about our situation. hopefully it's just a cold.

lots of new albums out this year already:

ac newman
franz ferdinand
animal collective
andrew bird

the super bowl is this weekend. whoo!

rebel side of heaven

man, it's good to be back on the grid. i've been living in a solitary office with no connection the world outside. they only thing i knew or was able to tell was the weather. that was it.

the top 25 paying companies.

there is a new marketing blog on the street. go here to get an insider's perspective on the marketing scene. i have no idea what he's talking about, but it's quite interesting.

here are the 25 best financial blogs going. i do not appear on the list.

i had a friend recently tell me that only 20% of women actually experience their water breaking before pregnancy. if you watch television/movies, not only does every woman's water break, but it creates a tidal wave, like a splash from a bucket of water three stories high. when in reality, a woman is probably wearing pants, or something, and that will soak up the prenatal bath water. so yeah, apparently 80% of women do not have their water break. which means, they are standing/sitting/jumping one minute, the next minute, there's a baby. that's how it works, or at least that's my understanding anyway.

today has been a good day. i hope tomorrow is too.

prank calls

i've been gone a while.

i'm back.

but now i'm gone again.

beyond belief

the arizona cardinals will face the pittsburgh steelers in the super bowl. wow. pittsburgh's schedule was ridiculous this year. i thought no way they even make the playoffs. but brady goes down, cleveland is, well, cleveland and dallas lays down when smacked around. they showed exactly what it takes to win in the NFL. now, the cardinals. i would go on record as saying they are the most unlikely super bowl team ever. ever!! when has there ever been a team like the cardinals go to the super bowl? huh? they defeated a run happy atlanta team, a what i thought was tough carolina team and finally upending a hot philly team to go to the super bowl. i was rooting for them too. i like kurt warner. i like to see that guy win. it makes me smile.

i went to church with my mom today. i like doing that. i got to see a lot of people i don't get to see regularly. and they always are happy to see me. makes me smile.

i ate a lot of pizza this weekend. too much. i also did a lot of laundry. it was great.

lady grinning soul

weird day man. i feel unmotivated. i feel astray. i have no classes. this is what i dreamed about for so long. but really, was it? probably not. i never disliked school. i disliked the stress. but man, i miss the stress. i miss the deadlines. i miss the decisions, the quick-thinking. i stopped by a local pub and grabbed a beer after work. i just sat there and wondered what am i doing? i have so much more to do, but i have no energy. i have no drive. my goals are right there. i have to think it's only a momentary thing. i know it is. i'm just getting accustomed to new routines. i have to make myself go, no more chapters to be read. no more tests/quizzes/exams. man, those were great. it's fine. i'll get out of it. i wish it warm.

man, i wish it was warm.

when i was at the pub, i scrolled through my phone and realized i literally have no friends in this town. they all live somewhere else. no one to grab a beer with. i've lived here for practically all my life and i have no one to grab a beer with. that's amazing. i need a new phone. with new people's names.

i'm either going to do two things tonight: 1) go to the gym or, 2) get some tostida chips and eat tamales and watch crap tv. i should probably sit here and polish my resume.

i think i'll do that.

watch that man!!

simon smith and the amazing dancing bear

man this office is lame. nice, lame people.

here is a great interview with niall ferguson.

here is the link for the entire series of "the ascent of money."

i hope people are still paying attention to our economy. obama will be here in less than a week. but it's not looking good right now.

i just ate three just-a-burgers from what-a-burger for lunch. i feel like i want to take a nap, but i'm assuming my coworkers will become uneasy if i strip down bare and cuddle under my desk to take a little nap. i should take this up with HR.

i just purchased another book called "when genius failed."

i'm currently reading three books, one of which i'm reading for the second time. the first one is "the origins of financial crisis." that's the one for the second time and the two are called something and something about something. you can look it up.

tonight is top chef. i will firmly planted on the couch at 9:00 p.m. i would wager that carla is going home tonight. either her or a surprise pick like fabio. by the way, padma is smoking hot. my goodness.

don't let me down

the beatles playing on the roof at abbey road studios would easily get my vote as the coolest moment in rock and roll. imagine your favorite band, collecting their gear and setting up on the roof of a nearby building in downtown somewhere and they start playing new material. not only that, but look at the footage. they look cool as shit. they have beards and awesome british clothes with coats. and it looks cold and dreary and they're rocking out. it literally gives chills every time i see it.

"get back, get back, get back to where you once belonged."

stolen shoes and a rifle

"and a giant waking bird shakes the trees above my head
stolen shoes and a rifle, i just can't seem to stay dead."

phantom limb

i have extremely cracked knuckles right now. ever had cracked knuckles? makes like a little less fun. i also have droopy eyes. that's caused by lack of sleep. i have a lack of sleep because my wife chose to put her ice block feet against my leg last night and i woke up and jumped out of bed. droopy eyes is often the result of that situation.

nice piece on 60 minutes about oil speculation.

here's 44 places to go in 2009 from the nyt. if i could pick a place to go in 2009, it would be someplace warm. probably new zealand or austrailia.

i've been reading an excellent book: the origin of financial crises. i've already read it, i'm actually reading it again. i want all the ideas to soak in. i want to be able to justify these talking points or speak out against if i disagree with them. when people start asking questions and you don't really know the answer or even have a clue, it makes you look like a parrot. a lot of people my age are parrots.

here are some of the top accounting firms to work for in 2008. there's one on there from bellaire that my friend lindsey was working at until she failed two accounting classes and they had to let her go. that sucks.

bono's talking with the nyt.

to my friend who texted me the other day: congratulations!! i was unable to return the message. i will fill you in on the details in a more appropriate location, like skywriting.

cats in the cradle

this is in the top 10 of greatest pictures ever. makes me think of lil benjamin. he threw up the night before. his love of plastic will continue to haunt him. if there was a rehab center for cats with addictions to plastic, i'd take him there. but no such thing exists, because, it's stupid.

put me in coach

there are certain cliches in sports that i live by. "pitching/defense wins championships." that is true. even though they didn't win the world series, look back at the houston astros 2005 lineup. it absolutely blows, but their pitching/defense was amazing. so cliches sometimes are true, so they don't bug me.

short-sighted projections, however, really bug me. i like to say, "just because it's true today, doesn't make it true tomorrow." i try to live by that. a friend might hate me today, but love me tomorrow. nothing is set in stone. behaviors/thoughts change. people change. so that's why it's hard to write what i'm about to write. because it's new. it's amazingly new and i'm already judging it, trying to change it, but i can't help it.

post-graduate life sucks. i'm already sick of it. i have so much free time. i'm accomplishing nothing. i feel sluggish and without motivation. i'm laying around watching horrible television and i don't even have cable!! that's how horrible it is people.

i'm ready for something new. i'm thinking of voluteering. maybe downtown at a homeless shelter or some political group. or maybe a church group working with younger people. i have to do something with my time because wasting it is not an option. i've gone three years scheduling a million little things into a finite amount of time and i was amazing. i have to start doing that again. soon.

interview with darryl from the office.

scrubs is back. it was on ABC last night. i actually enjoyed it. they had succumbed to what many sitcoms succumb to which is the death of relateability with the characters. they become unreal, just cartoons. they were real last night and it was nice. i enjoy these people. fictional people.

trillion dollar deficits are now a reality.

i hear the song teenagers from department of eagles and i love it.

that's alright mama

cassandra was the daughter of king priam and queen hecuba of troy. apollo was enchanted by her beauty, so he gave her a gift: the gift of prophecy. she, however, did not return the love shown by apollo. so he rendered her prophecies useless by making her unbelievable. she can see the future, but no one believes her. that would be rough.

i just recently started drinking coffee and while i find it to be a refreshing pick-me-up, i cannot say the same about the small, coffee straws that can be found in offices and gas stations. these straws are dangerous. if you don't completely wrap your lips around the straw, there is a tendency to suck it down your throat causing massive neurological trauma and possible hypoxia. yes, these little straws need to be put up high away on a shelf so adults cannot reach them and hurt themselves. it's a public safety issue and i hope the obama administration gets to work on this issue right away.

pitchfork took about three weeks off and now they're catching up, calling it "while we were out." there's an entry in there about wilco and it includes jeff's sons blog. it's a pretty good read.

mcdonalds has a 401K plan.

speaking of fast food, here is a jack-in-the-box dietery breakdown of their food. take a moment and see how much fat and calories make up just one jumbo jack or ultimate cheeseburger. you will forever swear off this shit. you can do this for each fast food restaurant you've eaten at.

as far as my football picks go, it was a tale of two weekends. saturday: 0-2. sunday: 2-0. so my AFC superbowl pick is out. i have replaced the colts with the ravens. my NFC superbowl pick is still alive, mostly because they didn't play this weekend. they had a bye. so giants-ravens is where i'm putting my money now.

meebo.

as time goes by

2008 is over. history. in the books. what a year, right? wow. that was something. what am i looking forward to 2009? a couple things.

1. adventure- i'm ready to change my environment. my current environment is starting to weigh me down. i'm ready to see something new. to live in a new area, to experience new people and new ways of doing things. i'm ready to hike, to bike, to take the bus/train. i'm ready to get out of the endless loop of eating out and drinking.

2. new president, new ideas- i certainly hope mr. obama and the brain trust he has assembled will come up with new, invigorating ways of salvaging our way of life. our current means of living is fouled up. it's over leveraged. it's outdated and it's obscene.

3. wilco's new album- nuff said right?

4. 30 years- i will turn 30 in 2009. i accomplished many things before turning 30 and several took me by surprise. so that milestone will not be one of regret and self-loating for being lazy. it will be one of celebration and motivation to continue.

5. health- 2009 will be all about health. mental health. physical health. the ideas i started putting into action in the latter part of 2008 will be heavily implemented in 2009. it's time to start living life to enjoy it, not to defeat it.

so those are a few things i'm looking forward to in 2009. obviously, i'm really excited still about being married and living my life with my wife. she has been such a positive influence on me. i look forward to continuing to live our lives together and laughing and enjoying our lives.

one of my close friends is having a baby in january of '09. i wish her the best in her endeavor. i wish all my friends and family the best of luck. i know some of you have huge things in play for 2009. and the rest has no idea, which is good too. leave it open. you never know when success/love/joy will come along and knock you in the throat.

i really cannot wait for obama to take office so i can start posting articles again. happy new year.