Another Week, World Fails to End – Doomporn Collapsing!!!

Time for another one of our Adult Education Courses in How the World Really Works 101 from our guest lecturer, Mr. Who Me Skeptical?

This is not the week you want to be a prophet of doom.  Not enough bummers to go around 21-thousand news and doom channels.

As predicted by our trading model, the markets took a huge leap skyward off the recent bottom of trend line that we use as our keen insight into whether the world will end (financially), or not.

Not being the operative word.

Still, there are a few things the doom-porn types are hanging onto that deserve consideration, so before we hit the PPI numbers, a few economic realities to consider:

1.  The markets in Europe have stabilized a bit.  Since we all knew that the Continent would be making up $60-billion this month out of a trillion Euro QE, a genius trader would have purchased the German DAX AND 11,470 Monday and be bailing today around 11,795.

Sure, that’s only 2.8% for the week, but if you could do that every week, for a whole year, it would pencil out to returns of (the magic of compounding here): 427%…or better than four times your money.  (Trust me, it’s easier to write than actually, do however; I’ve spent a fortune trying.)

Investing in Germany has been a fine idea since World War II, and despite the fact they can’t get their gold back from us (the US is ‘babysitting it’ for their own good you undertsand), the fact is Germans are the only ones with enough brains to complain about the hoch uber-commandants of the EU trying to saddle Germany with the debts of Greece. 

France, meantime, is being out-screwed by immigrants, so it will fall – it’s just a matter of time.  It won’t be the first time that procreational sex has become a favored tool of conquest.  Go read your history.

True for both sexes:  The most dangerous weapons long-term are between the legs.

2.  Race rioting and hatred has failed to breakout nationally…and in fact, it was a quiet night up in Ferguson…much to the dismay of the doomporners.   Meantime, the police work continues looking for the shooter or shooters.

Seems you and I may not be the only ones beginning to wonder if the MSM is trying to play the race card in order to “make up news” to cover.  Sometimes, it seems so.

Like the old assignment desk editor told me back when “We will find the news…or make it…” and the jokes about the local teevee crews turning over cars on the freeway in order to have something  like “This just in…breaking news…A  truck carrying dangerous rabid chickens has just overturned on the 123 freeway and Ure-Witness News is there live from the scene…” for the 5 o-clock early news, isn’t exactly a joke among reporters.

The reporters call their live, on-scene gigs “Stand-ups.”  Like “Sally, you take Remote 2 and do a stand-up for the 5:30 on the mayor’s new…”  tweazel-wanker, or whatever.  Reporters seem to forget “stand-up” is comedy.

3.  Hillary Clinton’s odds of becoming the next uber-groB fuhrer of the US is becoming slimmer by the day.  A Google news search on clinton email popped more than 26-million hits this morning,  although in fairness, it’s not all Hil bashing (drat!).

In fact, seems New York State has a kind of Email Scandal Lite going…and it must be true because it’s in the NY Times this morning.

4. “Watch out for Ebola – it’s going to kill us all!”  When the doomporners write this, there’s actually an element of truth to it, since the WHO admits the body count is over 10,000 now.

A thoughtful Jerome Corsi piece on the re-emergence of the mandatory vaccine debate is over here.  It’s not just Ebola…measles is back, too.  Oh, goodie…get ‘em while they’re hot.

Still, most of the planet is still here.  Although about 56-million humans die annually. an additional 10,000 is budget dust.   (Specifically 1.7857142857142857142857142857143e-4 but this only makes sense if you are a b-school geek and like long strings of useless scientific notation to convince yourself something is true.) Unless you’re one of them, of course.

The real story continues to largely evade the doomporn crowd.  There is growing concern about what will happen next in EUkraine. 

One reason is Vlad Putin has dropped out of sight, leading to informed speculation he may be up to something.  “Kremlin Critics Fear Political ‘Hit List’ as Putin Drops Out of Sight” writes Time Magazine this morning.

Think about it:  The recent killing of a leading Putin critic, both the US and Europe are pouring military goods into Ukraine and back-up positions like there’s no tomorrow.  And, as we’ve said for a long time:  Wars cast long shadows before them.  Wars get focus off internal problems and hand out big boots to stomp dissidents.

This was something the US State Department botched more than a year ago by deciding to escalate what had been a standoff that might have worked between the EU and Russia.  But, of course, all that changed in April of last year when the EUrocrats started talking about extended EU boundaries all the way to Vladivostok.  You don’t say things like that to Russians who still remember the Great War where they lost millions.

If Ferguson, and a good chunk of cities around the country, are poster-children for “racially insensitive” the EUrocrats have written the definitive text with their moves on Russia.  Same issue, just scaled differently.  Humans with rights.

Ready, or not, time to face up to this being Friday and weeding through some “breaking news.”  Some of it is interesting/revealing.

Press Release of the Day:

This talks about digital addiction…though not by name…something very closely related to groupthink, hive-mind, and ADHD:

LOS ANGELES, March 12, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ — For distracted drivers, actions do indeed speak louder than words.

Although large percentages of Americans of all ages say that driving while sending or checking texts or emails is unsafe, unsettling numbers of drivers in all age ranges – especially Millennials – are frequently or always engaged in distracted behavior behind the wheel, according to findings by the USC Annenberg Center for the Digital Future and Bovitz Inc.

“Large majorities recognize the dangers of texting while driving, but we found disturbing differences in actual behavior based on age,” said Jeffrey I. Cole, director of the USC Annenberg Center for the Digital Future. 

Overall, the survey found that a very large percentage of respondents — 87 percent — said that sending or checking online messages while driving is unsafe. Millennials (age 18-34) are somewhat less likely to believe that online communication while driving is unsafe – 81 percent.

However, when asked about their actual behavior, some drivers admit that they still engage in driving behavior that has been proven unsafe and is illegal in many states:

• 18 percent overall said they cannot resist the urge to send or check online messages while driving. 
• Eight percent said they text or email while driving always or often. Of this group, Millennials are the biggest offenders, with 17 percent saying they always or often text or email while driving, compared to 4 percent of non-Millennials. 
• Fourteen percent of Millennials always or often check online messages or online notifications while driving, compared to only 4 percent of non-Millennials.

When asked if sending or checking online messages was dangerous while driving, agreeing or strongly agreeing were 95 percent of those age 55 or older.  In contrast, 81 percent of Millennials said sending or checking online messages was dangerous while driving.

I assume Nuance (the makers of Dragon NaturallySpeaking) its chops because obviously, down the road,  texting will become voice driven and first thing you know?

We’ll have re-invented the telephone!  OMG we are such FGs.

So we can skip all that have have something like a killer ap that will send text and do text to voice the other way…or better, just call someone on hands-free?

PPI and Deflation-zilla

While most monsters would “rear up” we assume the inflation monster would “rear down” as is reported in the latest data out this morning…

The Producer Price Index for final demand fell 0.5 percent in February, seasonally adjusted, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics reported today. Final demand prices moved down 0.8 percent in January and 0.2 percent in December.

On an unadjusted basis, the index for final demand decreased 0.6 percent for the 12 months ended in February. (See table A.) In February, about 70 percent of the decline in final demand prices can be attributed to a 0.5- percent decrease in the index for final demand services. Prices for final demand goods moved down 0.4 percent. Within intermediate demand, the index for processed goods fell 0.6 percent, the index for unprocessed goods dropped 3.9 percent, and prices for services edged up 0.1 percent. (See tables B and C.)

Final Demand Final demand services: Prices for final demand services fell 0.5 percent in February, the largest decline since the inception of the index in December 2009. Leading the decrease, margins for final demand trade services dropped 1.5 percent. (Trade indexes measure changes in margins received by wholesalers and retailers.)

The index for final demand transportation and warehousing services also moved down 1.5 percent. In contrast, prices for final demand services less trade, transportation, and warehousing rose 0.3 percent. Product detail: In February, nearly 30 percent of the decline in the index for final demand services can be traced to margins for fuels and lubricants retailing, which fell 13.4 percent.

The indexes for machinery, equipment, parts, and supplies wholesaling; food and alcohol retailing; apparel, jewelry, footwear, and accessories retailing; truck transportation of freight; and wireless telecommunication services also moved lower.

Conversely, prices for inpatient care advanced 0.6 percent. The indexes for outpatient care (partial) and for TV, video, and photographic equipment and supplies wholesaling also increased.

On this last, gee, let me think:  Pass a crooked national healthcare system where about half of the jobs are not health related (they are simply make work:  One side fills out the claim forms, the other side reviews and pays claims, then claim reviewers and claim review reviewers and auditors and….well it’s all f/u’ed – everyone get into the act…and Uncle pays regular. 

But don’t mind me…I’m just a hopeless economic realist who has washed up on a huge island of economic savages.  Hell, I can’t even tell the gender of most of the savages, anymore.  Maybe I’ve been here too long…NO?  You mean because our credit cards have zero on them because we passed consumer-super-saturation years go?  Oh crap…

Obviously, the arrival and stomping around by Deflation-zilla hasn’t scared anyone else on this continent-sized rock except me and the Natives we stole it from:  The Dow futures are only down 50 and gold was actually up a few bucks.  Am I the only one with a pulse?

Hmmm… you don’t think I could buy-off the deflation-denying savages with some trinkets, do you?  Worked once, I remember….  Say, here’s something that might work…Bend a card, save a country…we’re all economic savages here.