Fed Chairman's Messge Breeds Unwarrented Concern

This is Friday June 21, 2013 and yesterday the stock market threw a hissy fit and went down 350 points on top of a 150 point drop on Monday.  However the concern is based on raw emotion rather than reality.  Fed Chairman Vernanke on Monday said that the economic recovery was coming along so well that soon it would no longer be necessary artificially depress interest rates but allow rates to rise, as they have already done in Real Estate.  However in Real Estate – sales and prices are also up at a healthy rate which makes it good for home owner’s equity value.  Also people with IRA’s and the like will now find a little more change in their pockets.  It’s only the right wing owned media that sees bad news when its actually good news. Judy actually asked me for my investment advice and I said “oil still looks good” and Mom still has all that Chevron stock.  I told Judy then “The market will most likely dip, but I see no reason why in the long term it won’t go a lot higher as the economy gains momentum”.    In other good news - - you have the report that Health Insurance rates are either dropping or the health providers are providing on an average of hundred dollar rebates to customers.  However in some cases this will go to the employer and not you.  It seems as if another Republican – in this case Lisa Marcusky (who I thought was a right winger) has come out in favor of gay marriage.  Maybe in places like Alaska where morals are more free and easy, that gay marriage is a more pallitable concept.  Although one person on the Stephanie Miller show pointed out that in the Bible that women were considered property.  So technically marriage is not a contract between a man and a woman, any more than slaver is a contract “between a White Master and a negro employee”.  In another news item it seems six whistle blowers have flagged Bank of America in the Boston area.  Because B of A was running these scams where they would pretend to help you get into some government program, but then lose the forms and stall you- - and then they would offer their own program to tap you for a lot of extra money.  At any rate they have been found out and are now up on criminal charges, which is a rarity in this day.

Now the Republican House members are saying they won't vote for any immigration bill until the budget on border security is doubled.  They say "we must secure the borders" knowing all the while that the effective immigration rate - - in terms of net in-flow and out flow, is Zero.  Why can't they be happy with Zero?  Now they want that border fence built and a border agent every few thousand feet all along the Mexican border, before they even Begin to consider the idea of giving people green cards.  Were I the President I'd announce in a speech exactly what the Republicans want as a possible prelude tword vetoing the bill.  It seems clear to me that the Republicans don't EVER want to "bring people out of the shadows, and in their minds there will NEVER be enough border security.  I'd veto the bill and remind the people that this President has already spent more on border security than any other President, and it's worked.  The Republicans say they hate spending money but now they want to double the budget on something completely  unnecessary.  By the way, just as an aside, this is one photograph that I'm not the one responsible for doctoring.
 

The Miami Heat was victorious in game seven over the SA Spurs in a tightly and spiritedly fought contest.  Miami said after games six and seven that “We left everything on the court; we gave it one hundred percent”.  And that’s what it took to win.  The Heat won at about a quarter to nine winning 95 to 88.  They got up six points and the announcer said “The Spurs will not fowl” as Miami, in white continued to dribble out the ball as the seconds ticked down to zero.  As you know before the game on EWN they were talking to some nuns from San Antonio saying that they were playing for the Spurs to win.  I guess it’s that adage I was telling you about that Satan picks his battles, but he wins the battles that he wants to.  (Selah)  I went out about ten to nine with twilight still in the sky and even at that time people were not in a cigarette lending mood and I went back in for the trophy presentation.  But after we had switched to KTLA, I came back out and now Larry Barton ended up giving me four cigarettes- - and in the morning when I got up today I had cigarettes to smoke.  This was right around six o clock.  Steve Young was out there with a full cup of coffee and a big cinnamon roll and I asked him if I could have a sip and he says ‘No, I’m thirsty.  I need it”.  When the cup was just sitting there on the table.

Exodus International is one of these “pray away the gay” Christian groups in Florida and it’s headed by one Alan Chambers, who is a self professed reformed gay.  He is now married to a woman named Leslie but confession he’s still plagued by homosexual thoughts.  I position is that any woman who would marry such a gay man is being greviously cheated, because the relationship is an inherently dishonest one.  I don’t want to deny anyone the practice of their religious faith.  Therefore I would not condemn outright “pray away the gay” groups.  But I wouldn’t endorse them either.  He now tells this tale about how he got in a major car crash because a bee was buzzing around in his car and he swatted the dashboard once, but then the bee came back to life and began flying around so he swatted it again, and got distracted and didn’t notice that a bus three cars in front of him had stopped, along with the three cars inbetween, which he crashed into and injured several people.  He now says “The fact that I bore no malice tword these people doesn’t lessen their suffering”.  It sure doesn’t.  This man is now dispanding his anti-gay organization, Exodus saying that he’s basically a denial of Christian principles, and he went on at length in a major text speech he released to the public about it.  By the way in a slight topic change- - speaking of “actions” - - how many times have I criticized a liberal for misquoting the Bible or misinterpreting a passage-  - - as opposed to how often I have criticized a conservative for that.  I would put the ratio conservatively at ten to one.  Liberals may not be schooled in “heremonutic “interpretation- - but they have a whole lot more Common Sense.

There was this K K K group I heard about yesterday where I was informed that the leaders had built some kind of “Death Ray gun”, which was a functioning X Ray device that had the potential of actually being able to be aimed at innocent people and rendering that person dead within two weeks.  The stated targets of this K K K group were President Obama, and “Any Moslem who was an enemy of Israel”.  Immediately I wondered how the hell any Klu Klux Clan member would be pro Israel.  I guess we need phone wire tapping for groups like this.

In the George Zimmerman trial they have finally seated a jury of six women.  Five of the women are White and one is Hispanic, and none of the jurors are Black.  There is still speculation that they won’t let certain expert scientific testimony in because the South doesn’t accept science or something, leaving it to the caprice of the jury which voice sounded like who.  It would seem that the smart thing for Zimmerman to do is not to testify because you just know he’s going to make a complete ass of himself on the stand, the same way O J would have.  Someone stated that using the word “nigger’ only denotes “bad” Blacks.  This is untrue, and always has been.  The word “nigger” is generic to genetics, and is a moral neutral term.  Therefore there are “good blacks’ and “bad blacks”.   Some want to expunge the word “nigger” from Mark Twane’s Huck Finn exchanging it for the word “slave”, which is fine with me.  Again this denotes a morality neutral generic reference to a particular race, and not their morality.  There was one story last night how women people going into car dealers to get a minor problem with their car fixed, are still charged twice as much as a man, for the same service.  Or perhaps they will find other bogus things wrong, or replace a clean air filter in “pristine’ condition, with a dirty one, and show you the dirty filter and say “You really ought to have that replaced”.

There are still people who are Assholes as far as the economy is concerned.  Rick Edelman, to keep the anti Obama thing going now sees the dark side of a glass nine-tenths filled with water.  He says now “You used to be concerned about prices being too low.  Now you are concerned about stock prices being too high.  Come to us and let’s talk about it”.   My diagnosis to all that is “- - then you worry too much”.  I’d say “Just think of all the equity capital you have now you didn’t have before that you can draw on for a rainy day”.  They say that FOX news is “worse than a broken clock”.  Because a broken clock is right twice a day, and FOX news is never right; they always get it wrong.  There are people who still maintain that the Detroit auto bail-out was wrong.  Two years ago Dr. Levy was still touting the line “The bail out was wrong because it only amounted to a power play by the Labor Unions”, and he also said “And no matter what the media says- - Detroit hasn’t paid back the loans yet”.  There are still people who are bitching about the “Cash for clunkers” bill that was first proposed by a George Bush cabinet secretary.  The program did what it was supposed to in getting high polluting cars off the road and stimulated new car sales.  But now they are saying “Labor unions are the ones responsible for your job being shipped over-seas” even though labor Unions conatitute but seven percent (and falling) of the labor force.  With the tea party it’s all about fomenting ignorance and targeted prejudice.   On a lighter note - -  Bad Cartoonists in the News - - the cereal icon should be demoted to “Commander Crunch” because he only has three strips and not the four stripes of a Captain.  Of course there was that Star Trek episode where Commander Data know to take Commander Reyker’s advice on a key matter- - because the “3” had been implanted in his brain from a previous time warp and Reyker’s rank was that of Commander.