The heat is on in Washington where headlines questioning the omniscience of the Obama administration are popping up all over the place. For one, there’s the matter of the GOP digging in on the debt ceiling, although admittedly, Obama may win on this one when the GOP caves in, which should (predictably) happen in the final hours going into next week.
And the rabid right is making the most of it with one writing “Democrats to America: We own the government!” Another decries how inarticulate republicans are, while the bloviator-in-chief notes Obama’s approval ranking and questions how repubs can question how they’re losing…
One of our well-connected sources called from the low-rent district of “203-land” to bemoan the obvious: Actuarial reality is that America’s debt monster is anything but solved and appointing Janet Yellen to the Fed won’t change any of the hard physics of compound interest.
Sadly, the brief respite in debt growth claimed by the administration’s apologists is more attributable to falling interest rates and debt growth will go absolutely crazy when rates begin to rise. The same for the mis-named “shutdown.” Looks good on paper now, but when the back pay comes through…
But we have other problems as well: For one, TechDirt is bemoaning the quality of the Affordable Care Act website and “We paid $634 million for the Obamacare sites and all we got was this lousy 404…”
What’s more, a growing chorus is beginning to wonder “If the system doesn’t work, how can people be penalized?”
Well, the answer here is simple: Read Kafka! Wiki it!
During 1914, Kafka began the novel Der Process (The Trial),[124] the story of a man arrested and prosecuted by a remote, inaccessible authority, with the nature of his crime revealed neither to him nor to the reader. Kafka did not complete the novel, although he finished the final chapter.
And it’s here that we find the delicious irony of a Thursday morning: Just as Kafka didn’t finish his novel, so too ‘Merica seems to be in a terrible rush to finishing the final chapter without filling in the blanks along the way.
Amazingly, the stock market is buying it: Futures this morning are up 123 on the Dow which should about finish off the “Princess Janet” rally. Like fans of Kafka, who seemed not too bothered by the holes in “The Trial” fans of Yellen are happy that easy money and keep on printing is the route ahead.
Besides, the holes in economic thought are probably just those damn actuarial realities that an East Texas curmudgeon keeps mentioning. That and the mistaken belief that there are jobs left to puff-up with again. The reality of automation’s contribution to structural employment won’t been seen until too late.
In the meantime, the Janet Express should drive the S&P back to 1,700 and maybe new highs just as soon as the GOP caves in. If it doesn’t happen? Well, cue the Big Distraction and let’s grab some more powers once reserved to the States and try again, shall we?
More after this…
Jesse Ventura in 2016!
Already a Facebook site trying to get him on the ballot in all 50-states. I, for one, would vote for him. And if Hillary runs? Can I vote twice, please? Hey…maybe if I could lose my proof of citizenship, ya think?
Middle East Roulette
Our first spin of the Big Wheel of Life landed on Saudi Arabia where the powers that tent are looking for how to deal with the US burying the hatchet with (instead of in ) Iran.
Our second spin came up Triple Zero…but that turned out to be a typo, so it must have been Tripoli where the prime minster was held by rebel gunmen for a while, then released. No accounting for how that works…if this was any kind of ‘Merican gang, he’d have been dropped and popped, but maybe there is a different code of honor there.
Our third spin of the Big Wheel came up “6” which I can only assume means the six soldiers who were killed this week near the Suez Canal which is starting to look like its own little craps table.
“Big Shooter Coming Out?”
Speaking of gambling, the odds and such: We have to comment on the blessedly lousy aim of our scheduled “Murder Cycle/Outrage” case which came along one day behind schedule, showing up in Wheeling West Virginia, of all places. Turns out that although 15-20 shots were fired, no one was hit but the would-be killer who was taken down by security officers.
And, in terms of a better date match, a curious “open carry” report came out of Green Bay…but no harm was intended there, seems.
We’ve set an alarm to mention this cycle when it comes up again in March of next year, or so.
Climate Disaster, Big, Ugly Winter?
Despite there being a government shutdown, thanks to the hard working people at NOAA who track such things, the monthly solar cycle update is out, and it continues to show the current Solar Cycle is in epic fail mode. I mean seriously colder sun…
Now, this is not meant to send you scurrying for the dust bunnies under the bed, or anything, but please think through what a return to a Dalton Minimum would be like. I suppose I could suggested a petition to the White House to name this the Ure Minimum when it is eventually realized as having occurred, but I haven’t seen petitions get much done there, so I’m thinking it may not be worth the effort.
Nobel Dreams
Still, while I wait for my Nobel Prize in Mental Clarity (a prize they haven’t seen the wisdom of awarding yet, but what do you expect when dynamite money hands out “peace” prizes, right?) I should mention the Nobel Prize in lit to Alice Munro.
We have an arrangement, I think: I haven’t read any of her books, but I doubt she’s read any of mine, either. Fair’s fair.
Buzz Word of the Day
Cyberchondriac: Someone who self diagnoses on the web. Although yes, your voice dropping into a falsetto could mean low-T… or it’s time to call 1-800-genderbend. Operators are standing by, this is a free call.
Licensing Beggars
Sounds like something out of India (OK, without deliberately maiming kids so they make more money) but if you ever doubted my contention that ‘Merican’s lifestyles are being systematically flushed down to old crapperoo, here’s proof as Middle Township, New Jersey wants to license pan-handlers.
In order not to be confused with Kafka, the permit is free.
Backassward Edjumacation
Used to be that students would go to school to learn, and come how to do their writing (as in homework). But Madison Avenue Mike’s find of morning in the NY Times is a story about how kids are being sent home to watch video lectures and then come to school to do their homework there…
Amazingly, it seems to be working.
Lonesome Planet
One of those oddities around the net is the notion that the planet Venus just sort of showed up at some point in our remote past, swept into our solar system, caused a calamity on Mars and finally took up station in its present orbit. All stuff of internet lore and we could argue the science of it all day long.
But look this morning at the NBC Science story about how a lonesome planet – without a Sun – has been spotted and this means that yes, there may be orphaned planets out there waiting to be captured and in the process, yes, they could cause Velikovsky-sized planetary calamity.
Truth of Chinaquenses
We’re please by a report from reader Roaming Ron, that UrbanSurvival is once again available in China:
Hi George,
As I had to report last time here UrbanSurvival was blocked, I’m happy to report now I found out coming back to China for some months to stay yesterday that some Liberalization’s coming here luckily: I can (and so everybody else here) access your site again. Hurray!!
And a Wujo notice, you published my experience with navigation system wujo last year, well I can tell you last month it happened again… the adress I removed as home adress last year again after the strange reappearance, out of the blue it was there again and my real adress removed– strange , is time a river that now and then wants to flow in another bed?
Thanks for your hard work on your site, Ron</HTML>
While I would like to believe that the Chinese officialdom has seen the wisdom of our numerically weighted evaluation of most of the MSM bullshit that rolls, but the more likely reason is that we are on a huge cloud server so coming at them from all directions.
Remind me to put an auto-translate button on the menu, got that as a to-do item for this week and it will save me the time of converting Urban different languages.
Including English.
Well, time to park that big D9 of language (with the verb ripper attachment) and move on to…