Pee Party

AITOOW who loves these economic crisis to reveal who around us has a spine and who does not? I love the panic stricken looks from all the Fox talking heads as the try and cajole the serious minded reformers to just kick the can down the road again (preferably until after they live out their lives or turn their equity into cash). I also love that our GDP just happened to be exaggerated by the "gubment" for the last two quarters. I'm sure it was an honest mistake.

Patriotism Has Its Price

AITOOW thinks it's pathetic that the guy who sold the AWOL soldier all the ordinance he wanted seems to want a pat on the back for reporting him AFTER he took his money for the goods? What a selfless act. It's not like he was protecting himself from liability or bad publicity or anything like that. Love those tough ATF rules. Thank god the buyer paid in cash or we might have had to wait until the check cleared.

Risky Business

AITOOW doesn't understand why an individuals credit risk has to have any correlation with the government's? They are totally independent. Just because the creditworthiness of the country one lives in decreases does not mean that any other borrowers credit risk in that country increases. It is a historical rule that never made any sense and makes less sense now.

The Price Of Perfection

AITOOW thinks there are no surprises left in life because everything is analyzed and exploited to its fullest extent?

Payback

AITOOW thinks businesses in America will continue to lay people off and refrain from hiring as a means of swinging the election to the Republicans?

Frankenstein's Monster

AITOOW loves the market's reaction to the first domino (the threat of a downgrade) in the debt ceiling crisis - yawn (not you Geitner and OBrahmin probably)? Told you! The market is (now more than ever) moved by manipulation by speculators playing with leveraged fractions of their own or rich peoples disposable income. They have (in concert with the Fed) created another artificial bubble in the equities market to help themselves (speculators) offset liabilities and provide the public with the illusion of economic improvement. We all know they didn't create jobs or lend. (As a unit) they are not going to upset this paradigm. It is too profitable and too easy. They will absorb/ignore all negative news. Any tailspin will only be caused by a few contrarians with enough force to cause enough leveraged positions to be unwound like last time. I'm not saying that the longs won't be squeezed. I'm not saying that we won't see a day or a week of panic. I'm not even saying that someone will not press the right pressure points and we see a repeat of 2007. I'm just saying that the a debt default in itself will not be the "real" cause. It will be the cover story for high stakes manipulation that is increasingly inevitable because of the behavior of our "longs" (increased risk and leverage with no cover). The administration's use of this "cover story" narrative only makes it more potent. So the message from the central government shouldn't be "default will ruin the economy". It should be "default (or any bad news) may be used by manipulators to cause an unwarranted collapse in stock prices". Put the blame on the speculators. Limit the potential impact to the market. Unless you really want the market to collapse so you can say I told you so. In either case I advise the other political party to run with that message if your opponents don't.

Happy Endings

AITOOW finds it convenient that owners in two major sports opted to renegotiate new long term collective bargaining agreements during a period of economic malaise? No need to massage these numbers. I hope the players realize this and don't sign up through the recovery.