Year: 2015

God, I love it when between Landry, my consigliore and me we can look so accurately into the future…

Maybe it takes a little bit of the fun out of life, if you’re a stress addict.

I mean that works until you’re 40-something.  But at some point your doctor will whisper something in your ear about blood pressure and life will change.

The double shot Americano talls will become single shot decaf Americanos.  You will turn down your ringer on the phone.  Music volume fades to under 85 db, loud clubs and dangerous situation change.

My son’s favorite phrase when in stress is still “We can talk this out or shoot it out…makes no difference to me…”

But as you age, you learn to look people in the eye and say “My lawyer is meaner than your lawyer” and that relieves a lot of stress.

Which gets us to markets and your retirement.

If we hold at S&P 1,812 or above (choice #1) or 1,740 (choice #2) then we should see a screaming rally after the Fed Meeting.

If we collapse past that, then we’ll all be eating Alpo.  That’s why we have been telling you for the past couple of weeks:  Rally before the holiday (check!_) but fade Friday because people who pumped will dump and you don’t want to be the dumpee unless you’re short, in which case Thursday’s highs was where that party was for the Sept puts.

Since the market is closed Monday and we will be partying on a cruise ship, pardon me while we kick it and wait for the washout low either the 10-11th or the 14-15th and that one should be 1,812 low max or 1,740, but we shall see.

In the meantime, there are more BS date-pickers around the net than you can shake a stick at which gets me to wondering do you think some shadow government or terrorist group is double dumb? 

I mean a) no one will be watching the tube, which is why Labor Day is safe.  And b) they sure as shit aren’t going to put a notice out on the internet because IPs can be tracked and what the hell do you think The Castle is all about?

(The Castle is that installation near Provo that has the moat around it. Not unlike The Fort  back in merry land.) 

Sheesh!  GMAFB.  “Go read Thomas Gilovich” is what I tell Schmita proponents.  His book,  How We Know What Isn’t So: The Fallibility of Human Reason in Everyday Life” explains in terms simple enough even I could follow along, how we are bred to use that gray matter thing to understand what’s coming to eat us.  We look for patterns.

Unfortunately, it  (Schimta)  was close in 2001, and 2008.  Two points does not a legit pattern make.  I don’t remember a market collapse in 1994, though yeah, a miss in 1987.  But 1980?  1973?  September is the worst month of the year anyway, so you could attribute anhything you want.

If people had any brains at all, they would figure out there is this thing called the National Day Calendar, too. 

Today (if you didn’t know) is National Wildlife Day, National Newspaper Carrier Day, National Macadamia Nut Day, National Lazy Mon’s Day, National Hug Your Boss Day, and National College Colors day.

If I wanted to get rich, I would come up with something closer to the middle of the month (*so I could claim “close” when the market declines like it does in September anyway).  I’m thinking the 13th is National Peanut Day and National Programmers Day because it’s the 256th day of this year, right?

So then I do some sermons, post them on YouTube, write a quick book and Kindle my way to retirement.

When that doesn’t work out this year, I retool for next year (selling sermons, books, and advertisements on a web site) because September 15th is Google Day or National Double Cheeseburger Day.

You see how this works? 

No one goes further back that 2001 because Schmita is a Jewish Lunar Calendar event and the collapse in 1987 was in October, not September.  But hey, don’t let me be the lone voice of reason.  I’m just the guy standing at the rain barrel shooting fish and looking for the panic moment before the Fed Meeting to go long.

The really amazing part of this kind of clarity of thought is people miss the really delicious jokes the Universe plays on us…the the upcoming one on September 16. 

THERE is a conspiracy for you:  The Fed Announcement on the 16th which happens to be (I shit you not)  “National Play-Doh Day.”

ROFLOL  Get it?  Play dough?  (I crack myself up with facts, sometimes.)

See how much fun we have here in the Total Reality Newsroom?  Anchor/Reverend George, presidin’.   Here, buy my doom book.

Now onto the Jobs Reports

Nope., no particular doom here, either.

Hot off the press release:

Total nonfarm payroll employment increased by 173,000 in August, and the unemployment rate edged down to 5.1 percent, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today.

Read More

The one I’ve been mentioning lately?

Well, here we is.

(Unless you have a Grammar Police badge, please don’t try to correct the error of my ways or you’ll miss the phun of the “voice” of the column here…)

The Dow and the S&P were up a shade over 1.8% Wednesday while the NASDAQ was up almost 2 1/2%.

That’s pretty good, but like I was telling Peter Pham (Forbes) yesterday, our U.S. Aggregate Index that we use on the Peoplenomics.com side for insights into the market may have its own version of the old Dogs of the Dow Theory.

Since 2013 the Dow is up about 7%, the S&P up 17.5%, and the NASDAQ up 34.5%.  Actually a little more since those were the numbers last weekend.

Point is, there are always laggards and leaders.  One of the tricks to making wheelbarrows full of money so you too can have a fabulous life and go on cruises is to buy laggards and ride them up to the leader position.

Rinse and repeat.

All of which would make for a fine profession in life, except we all end up in the icebox at some morgue, so I want to have as much fun as possible.  More on the Pham interview in Coping which follows the more rational look at the world.

The futures were up 70, but I’d be surprised if the market can hold those levels into the long weekend close.

China Fears Overblown?

Not, not necessarily…but maybe in a weird kind of way. 

Remember how the markets were getting all panicky about the Shanghai Exchange slipping on a banana peel?

Well the REAL thing to be looking at is how five CHINESE WAR SHIPS were sighted off Alaska.

Here’s where we revisit the problem of common sense versus money fixations: 

Which is worse:  Getting your butt handed to you in the SSE fall when our Global Index has been screaming be o u t of international  and our Aggregate Index has been short or neutral since the 4th of July, OR China flexing its muscles so when we get to the timeframe for our projected Manufacturer’s Resource Wars (2020-2026)?

I don’t know about you, but gee, gosh, I expect that war thing to be a savory mix of EMP, tactical nukes, DNA specific bioweapons, in a buttery glass sauce with a lead finish.  A delightful menu choice and, since robots are coming, we can have many sides of tossed bodies topped with crumbled retirement flakes. Yeah…..

In the meantime, what we need is a businessman (with vision) in  the White House and that’s been missing for 20+ years, so the whole thing sinks like Babylon, except that really means lost in the electronic noise here on the net, and it’s now spelled Babble On.

This is human progress, for you.

Consumer Alert:  I may have double dosed on my cynicism pills this mourning.  (No grammar badge, right?)

It’s still a ways off, though, since the WaPo reports China is cutting 300,000 .mil jobs.  At least someone is thinking balanced budget on the planet.  Just happens to be the wrong country.

Meanwhile, Back at the Rally:  Job Cuts

Death by a thousand cuts, then, is it?  Stand by to be disappointed: The Challenger Job Cuts report is hot off der press release.

Read More

As I explain on Coast to Coast AM Monday night, we come to this interesting “fork in the future” two weeks from today.

That’s when the Federal Reserve decision on interest rates will be made.  That will likely trigger one of two scenarios.  Under one, rates go up (as the Fed did in 1928) and it triggers a massive 2-year bubble that ends in the Crash of All Time.

Under the other, we get the same result.  It’s just we don’t get the luxury of two more years of preparing for it.  We crash now.

Read More

There’s an old firehouse saying I was brought up with:

Say what you mean and mean what you say.

I have no idea why, but this popped into my head one day last week when I was in town for something, or other.  No, come to think of it, it was Wednesday morning when I met the mechanic down at the airport.  After that, Chinese food was comfort food.

Anyway, the point is I was at my favorite Chinese joint having the big buffet ($6.09) and watching people because it’s fun to do that, now and then.

The mood of the restaurant has changed very little over the years.  One change is they are now showing CNN instead of Faux, at least on the big screen easily seen from my favorite table.

So there I was and I notice the number of people who come in wearing sports-branded shirts.

By the time I was done, I concluded that more than likely, the independence-mindedness of a person could be determined by going through their closets and inspecting their cars or trucks.  It wouldn’t take but a minute.

You see, branding controls us.  If you wear a brand and you don’t own the franchise, you are chattel of the franchise.  A capital asset and that makes you less free and more owned.

One lady had on an “Elkhart Football” Jersey.  Which the logical brain explained, since the woman looked to be mid 40’s – that she wasn’t the football player.  Son, or nephew, more likely.

And then came the lunchtime procession of working males.  About an even mix of white, black, and latin.  (Capityalize all or none of those labels – depends on how well the Political Correctness Franchise has you imprinted.)   More than half the working males were wearing sports franchise or beer shirts.

I found myself wondering:  Do these people have any idea what they are doing?

Free advertising OR (the even worse possibility) actually telling the world that deep down in their deluded minds that they could even carry the water for a major sports team.

Consequently, I’ve come up with a proposal called the “Truth in Clothing” law.

The law would provide that if you wear a shirt or Jersey of any kind, you have to be able to prove some kind of legitimate connection with that franchise.  And, except for current and past direct employees (who have been paid by the club and have tax receipts to prove it), they would be required to identify their role that they are advertising.

For example, the fellow with the Oakland shirt on would have a patch that said “FAN” and the fellow with the beer shirt on (Corona) would have a patch called “USER” so innocent bystanders would know the proper thing to think.

People don’t realize how much their personal “branding” gives away. 

For example, say you’re a cop.  You pull someone over for erratic driving – they touched a line, say.

Who would you be more inclined (if even at the subconscious level) a breathalyzer test to? 

Candidate A)  Someone wearing a Boston Marathon shirt or…

Candidate B)  Someone weather a Corona beer shirt?

Maybe it is because I’m sensitive to branding, marketing, this thing I’ve been writing about lately on the PEOPLENOMICS.COM side of the house – THE FRANCHISE – but seems to me that many people don’t look in the mirror before they go somewhere and ask a very simple question:  “Am I dressed for my role?”

Works on cars.  If your car has a dealer named license frame, you are “owned” bitch.  If you have a dealer decal on your car, you’ve been imprinted with their brand on your ass….and are too sleepy to get it.  WTFU/.

Me?  I like to be low key and to be the most unremarkable fellow in sight.  Elaine, no matter what, always ends up looking like a movie star,, and every so often people look at me with the “What’s she doing with him?”  look.  That’s OK. But she does have a few things with “branding”:  A Hooters T-shirt (though she qualifies, lol), a DKNY top and a Fairbanks sweatshirt purchased?  (You get three guesses…)

At least when I walk out of the house, what I am wearing is real.  I own  exactly two logo pieces of clothing.  And one, which I am not “connected to” would be thrown away except it’s a “blend in.”

If you do own a lot?  I suppose my “Truth in Clothing” law would have to exempt outfits like the Seahawk’s 12th Man group.  Everyone is supposed to know that’s a fan organization, although I can’t be sure.  Just a guess based on 11 people on a side and the 12th person would likely be the fan who pays for the other 11, or so it felt like last time I went to a football game.

I quit going to sports events for a laundry list of reasons:  The ticket price, beer price, fan behavior, parking prices, parking lot rudeness,  long lines to pee, people standing up in my sight lines and so forth.  Not to mention the stupid assault on my senses from too much branding.

Were it not for the occasional research trip to see such technology breakthroughs as bottom-filling beer cups, and the current crop of cheerleaders (I’m old, not dead)  there’d be no reason to go anywhere near sports.

Same thing is true for concerts.  I’ve been to a few concerts and many clubs when we lived out in Burbank.  But the truth is, most sound systems slap you with +120 dbm sound and since we have a recording studio at home (along with our own low-power FM station so we don’t need to listen to commercials) we much prefer sound levels at 85 dbn for most music so we don’t have to scream over it.

Even when we’re playing along on drums or doing karaoke, we usually hold well under 95 dbm.  Why should we have to scream to be heard? (See my hobby site at www.musicengineerandproducer.com and no, not kidding about any of it.  In fact, the price of a basic audio meter to measure sound intensity is down to $15 bucks, can you believe it?  GM1351 Digital Sound Noise Level Meter 30-130 dB/Auto Backlight Display with Tripod Mounting Option.

On this concert thing:  Again, people don’t think.  Which car will get the canine unit called to sniff for drugs?  The slightly overweight old man with the movie star looking wife, or the guy wearing the NORML t-shirt?

Just saying, there are two reasons to rid your world of brand clothing.  I only buy a product with a brand on it if it’s the cheapest thing and disposable.  I had to buy a hat on a trip recently and the only convenient hat I could find has the stupid checkmark on it.  I didn’t care:  It was $6-bucks. 

I’d forgotten to pack my Beechcraft hat, which has a couple of FAA WINGS program tacks on it.  But that is not false advertising because it’s real, as are the “endorsements.”

I must be the odd duck, though, because no one else seems to give a rip.

Maybe it’s because I don’t watch enough TV and therefore have not been adequately “imprinted” with the Nanny State and Consumer Crazed Society.

Or because I’ve read too many books like Jerry Mander’s Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television.  On our cruise next week, I’ll be paging through his The Capitalism Papers: Fatal Flaws of an Obsolete System.

(Mander sees the same problem we deal with on the Peoplenomics side, namely that a constant growth model (except on market days like today, lol) doesn’t work out in the long term…you end up with so many people and so much junk the planet ends up barren as the monkeys kill themselves on coke overdoses experiments show the bigger apes do the same thing.  We just do it with cars and styrofoam and shit and laugh at them.  It’s quite insane.)

This is all only a first step.  One we get Truth in Clothing out there, then we can move on to Truth in Politics, which would begin by moving the Federal Trade Commission so it reports to the Supreme Court instead of the lobbyist-infested other two choices.

Then the FTC would be given the mandate to make politicians vote and legislate the way they represented in their campaigns or go to prison.  Think how much of an economic stimulus that would be?  Can you imagine how many special elections we would end up holding?

None of which will happen, of course, because Jack Nicholson was right in the great line from A Few Good Men.    “You can’t handle the Truth.”

But we do hope you have a better time handling Monday.

Note From Dream Land

Two weird dreams last night. 

In one of them, a 45-year old male type male (dark hair)  comes back from lunch an an assistant is emptying his desk out.  He has a ceramic vase wrapped with a rough twine that is designed as a weight for balloons and such.

Since the only “day residue” I can come up with on this vase and balloon thing for the desk would be the local NASA Balloon Center and the fact that you only need Pi to 39 places to calculate the width of the Universe (don’t ask) it could just mean that a “high level resignation or firing” of some kind should be along in headlines shortly.

The second weird  dream was through the eyes of someone who was cleaning up from the storms this weekend.  They normally have a creek that flows across the south part of their property, though some kind of low (2’) seawall, or such.  And it backed up and overflowed the back yard and the wind ruined a plant which has 12’ stalks (many) which broke off about ground level (rotten) and will be hauled away this week.

No day residue I can think of there except that I need to mow the yard before the Landry’s get here Friday and we take off on our cruise to Jamaica, etc.

Read More

I bet you’re wondering what’s ahead of the economy, don’t you?

Well, not to worry, mon ami, we have the answers.  A discussion from Robin Landry who has missed all the big declines like 2008/2009 and 1987 and 2001… and of course our own Trading Model which signaled the present downturn nicely by going to cash on July 3rd.

Read More

You may want to check yourself in after reading the latest G’ment report on such things as personal income and personal savings.

Personal income increased $67.1 billion, or 0.4 percent, and disposable personal income (DPI) increased $61.5 billion, or 0.5 percent, in July, according to the Bureau of Economic Analysis. Personal consumption expenditures (PCE) increased $37.4 billion, or 0.3 percent. In June, personal income increased $59.4 billion, or 0.4 percent, DPI increased $52.4 billion, or 0.4 percent, and PCE increased $31.8 billion, or 0.3 percent, based on revised estimates.

Read More