Clipmarks | BartendingBear's Economy collection

"Our economy will now face death by hyperinflation"

Sat, 11 Oct 2008 22:55:44 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Peter Schiff calls it the beginning of the end.

Schiff predicted the current crisis with stunning accuracy over two years ago and now he is sounding another alarm bell.

[Video]

From Peter Schiff's weekly email:

I have warned for years that the United States was headed into the eye of an economic hurricane

Now

absent the Federal mortgage bailout, my dire forecast would have come to pass

the bailout plan substantially increases the threats to the U.S. economy.

I not only predicted that our consumer/mortgage credit-based economy would fall apart, but that the government would ineptly try to repair it.

the U.S. Government is now set to destroy all hope of economic recovery.

had the government resisted

political pressure to interfere

we would now be experiencing a very deep recession.

by refusing to let the markets work, policy makers are resisting the only medicine capable of curing the economic disease that afflicts us.

If I Were To Win The Powerball Jackpot Saturday...

Fri, 26 Sep 2008 12:34:06 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Would I even bother to celebrate? Where would you put the money, given the current economic woes, which are getting darker not brighter. Remember that there are limits on the exportation of cash (can't hedge with Euros) and a massive gold or silver buy could cause a run-up in the market. I suppose international mutual funds are the best bet. Your thoughts?

Clip Source: powerball.com

$ 200 Million
$ 101.1 Million Cash Value

Secrets of the Federal Reserve

Thu, 25 Sep 2008 06:19:10 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: LOTS more at the clipped source.

Clip Source: www.apfn.org

[Video]

SECRETS OF THE FEDERAL RESERVE

The Creature from Jekyll Island: A Lecture on the Federal Reserve
"G. Edward Griffin exposes the most blatant scam of all history. It’s all here: the cause of wars, boom-bust cycles, inflation, depression, prosperity. It's just exactly what every American needs to know about the power of the central bank."
Running time: 1:29:28.3 / File Size: 10.6 MB

The book: The Secrets of the Federal Reserve
Read word for word for audio:
http://www.apfn.org/audio/Secrets-of-the-Federal-Reserve.mp3

Milwaukee School Board Votes To Investigate Dissolution

Fri, 19 Sep 2008 12:25:57 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Money woes break the system.

Clip Source: www.jsonline.com

The Milwaukee School Board voted Thursday night to begin looking into dissolving the Milwaukee Public Schools system.

The completely unexpected 6-to-3 vote followed a gloomy assessment of the short- and long-term financial situation of MPS from Superintendent William Andrekopoulos and several board members.

While it is extremely far from this step to MPS going out of business — and the action might turn out to be largely a symbolic protest of the MPS financial situation — it was by far the board’s most dramatic reaction to the pressures it is under. Those pressures include wide demands for better student achievement, a tightening money vise and the strong prospect of a double-digit increase in the property tax levy to be imposed this fall.

Andrekopoulos told the board that as he looked at years beyond the current one, the financial trends present a picture of “a spiral-down effect” that will affect the stability of MPS.

Does Ben Bernake Have A Part-Time Job?

Wed, 27 Aug 2008 03:10:43 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: You'd think the Chair of the Federal Reserve could make a go of it on his salary.

Clip Source: www.whitepages.com

Benjamin S Bernanke

work

1818 H St NW

Washington, DC 20433-0001

(202) 473-1000

Type: Land Line
Provider: Verizon
Location: Washington, DC
Due to number portability, some numbers have been transferred to a new service provider.

Job title: President

Company: World Bank

Are Malthus's 1798 Food Shortage Predictions Coming True?

Mon, 25 Aug 2008 05:53:00 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: "Have we beaten Malthus? After two centuries, we still do not really know."

Clip Source: www.sciam.com

In 1798 Thomas Robert Malthus famously predicted that short-term gains in living standards would inevitably be undermined as human population growth outstripped food production, and thereby drive living standards back toward subsistence. We were, he argued, condemned by the tendency of population to grow geometrically while food production would increase only arithmetically.

For 200 years, economists have contended that Malthus overlooked technological advancement, which would allow human beings to keep ahead of the population curve.

The idea that improved know-how and voluntary fertility reduction can sustain a high, indeed rising, level of incomes for the world remains correct, but only if future technology enables us to economize on natural capital rather than finding ever more clever ways to deplete it more cheaply and rapidly.

We will need a new politics to recognize the importance of a sustainable growth strategy and global cooperation to achieve it.

The Coming Collapse of the Middle Class

Wed, 20 Aug 2008 04:39:52 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Elizabeth Warren, Harvard Law School Professor

Clip Source: www.youtube.com

[Video]

Did You Hear That Alaska Has More Oil Than The Middle East?

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 17:46:42 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Read the full article to appreciate why that is a myth.

Clip Source: www.salon.com

Petroleum may be in short supply these days, but the United States does have a related surplus: myths of oil abundance.

an array of books, Internet forums and YouTube videos constitute a subterranean layer of storytelling, creating a narrative of perpetually cheap domestic oil being denied to us

there's another side to them: They reveal our inability to accept that the United States is not always a land of plenty.

"In America, we're a frontier nation, and so the idea is that just beyond the next ridge is the perfect farmland, a giant oil field or an abundant supply of timber,"

"People don't like the idea that the frontier is now closed and we've got to live within limits."

These narratives also require spectacularly limited scientific literacy about oil: what it is, how we find it, how much remains.

Clip Source: www.salon.com

The sooner people realize that and stop dreaming about energy independence or one huge undiscovered field that's going to solve all our problems, the better off we'll be.

When The Bottom Line Overrides The Hippocratic Oath

Tue, 19 Aug 2008 17:32:19 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Even if single-payer healthcare wouldn't be perfect, it sure isn't perfect now.

Clip Source: www.salon.com

Take my experiences in a Los Angeles hospital with kids who needed a surgeon.

When the surgeon, a partner in a private Beverly Hills orthopedic group, returned my call,

his first question was: "What's their insurance?"

he refused to come in. His group didn't cover "those kinds" of patients.

I learned how even in the dead of night, in the presence of a child suffering, the bottom line can override the Hippocratic oath.

Such is our peculiar institution called American healthcare.

gobs of money

best technology

specialists

spend the most money on healthcare in the world. Despite that, a child gets left out in the cold.

You can blame insurers

the American Medical Association

lawyers

drug makers

it's a system, a monstrous medical-pharmaceutical-legal-actuarial-industrial complex that's leaving a lot of people behind.

healthcare, unlike caviar and first-class airline tickets, shouldn't just be for rich patients and their doctors

Stop relying on market forces

give people

access to quality healthcare

10 Reasons Your Economic Pain Isn't "Mental"

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 15:20:02 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Ten important facts Phil Gramm forgot when he said “I said we are in a mental recession. We keep getting the steady drum beat of bad news…it’s become a mental recession.”

Clip Source: thinkprogress.org

HOUSING FORECLOSURES INCREASING

housing foreclosures nationwide were up 50% in June compared with the same month in 2007.

HOMELESSNESS INCREASING

The number of homeless over the age of 50 are “steadily increasing.”

HEALTHCARE COSTS RISING

Government Accountability Office, “health-care costs are growing much faster than the economy.”

GAS PRICES RISING

JOB LOSSES INCREASING

In the first six months of this year, a total of 438,000 jobs have been lost, bringing unemployment to 5.5%.

FOOD COSTS RISING

U.S. food prices rose 4 percent in 2007

HEATING AND ELECTRICITY COSTS RISING

Heating oil costs across the north are expected to be “up 60 percent from last year” and utilities across the country are “raising power prices up to 29%.”

REAL WAGES DECLINING

Slower wage growth and faster inflation has led to falling real hourly and weekly earnings for most workers.

LEISURE SPENDING DECLINING

VALUE OF DOLLAR DECLINING

undercutting its role as the leading international banking currency.

Home forclosures up 53% in June compared to last June

Fri, 11 Jul 2008 04:54:03 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Don't you just love a robust economy? Don't we have some great economic geniuses at the helm?

Clip Source: www.reuters.com

Home foreclosure filings jumped 53 percent in June from a year earlier, although they were down 3 percent from May, and foreclosures are expected to rise further, real estate data firm RealtyTrac said on Thursday.

Foreclosure filings rose on an annual basis in 39 states to a total of 252,363 properties during the month, with Nevada, California, Arizona and Florida posting the highest foreclosure rates.

One out of every 501 U.S. households received a notice of default, auction sale or bank repossession in June, RealtyTrac said.

"June was the second straight month with more than a quarter million properties nationwide receiving foreclosure filings,"

"We have not yet reached the top of this foreclosure cycle."

WikiLeaks - Changing The World Through Openness

Sun, 06 Jul 2008 02:29:34 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: "It is time for less civil society and more civil disobedience." - Walden Bello

Clip Source: www.wired.com

Julian Assange co-founded Wikileaks, the net's premiere document-leaking site last year

after 18 months of publishing government, industry and military secrets that have sparked international scandals, led to takedown threats and briefly gotten the site banned in the United States, Assange says Wikileaks is just getting started changing the world.

"In every negotiation, in every planning meeting and in every workplace dispute, a perception is slowly forming that the public interest may have a silent advocate in the room,"

Wikileaks was conceived as a safe place for whistle-blowers to reveal their secrets to the world.

Wikileaks published never-before-seen operating manuals for the U.S. detention facility at Guantanamo Bay, revealing that the United States had a policy for hiding some detainees from the International Red Cross

"It is time journalists and publishers starting actually engaging in 'fearless journalism' rather than simply placing the words on their mastheads,"

The Buckminster Fuller Challenge

Sat, 05 Jul 2008 18:41:23 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: Change the world.

Clip Source: www.bfi.org

[Video]

Bucky had it right. “You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”

FoodPriceTruth.org Expert Advisors

Fri, 04 Jul 2008 16:39:27 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: They say it's all about oil.

Clip Source: www.foodpricetruth.org

FoodPriceTruth.org believes the following experts will help facilitate a more balanced debate on food prices and biofuels.

David Morris, Vice President, Institute for Local Self Reliance

Lee Lynd, Professor of Engineering Sciences, Dartmouth College

Nathaniel Greene, Senior Policy Analyst, Natural Resource Defense Council (NRDC)

Patrick Mazza, Climate Solutions

Brent Searle, Special Assistant to the Director, Oregon Department of Agriculture

Dr. Bruce E. Dale, Professor of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, Michigan State University

Carol Werner, Executive Director, Environmental & Energy Study Institute (EESI)

Jetta Wong, Senior Policy Associate, Environmental & Energy Study Institute (EESI)

Brooke Coleman, Executive Director, New Fuels Alliance; Founder, Northeast Biofuels Collaborative

Anne Steckel

Note: The experts' willingness to be a Food Price Truth Expert does not connote endorsement of the FoodPriceTruth.org campaign.

The Great Lakes Are At Great Peril

Sun, 29 Jun 2008 16:35:17 GMT

clipped by: BartendingBear
clipper's remarks: This is a crisis. We simply cannot afford to lose this battle.

Clip Source: www.jsonline.com

What price would you put on our Great Lakes - the sand beaches and rocky shores; the salmon, perch and rainbow trout; the smell of a freshwater breeze? Should we give it all up so that international shippers can save about $55 million a year? What if we already have?

Toll of a Calamity

Lake Michigan's prey fish population has dropped 93% since invasive mussels were discovered

Recreational fishing in Michigan towns on Lake Huron has plummeted 77% since 2003

65% of new species invasions since the St. Lawrence Seaway opened have been traced to overseas ships

$300 MILLION: Estimated annual economic loss from the 57 exotic species known to have been delivered to the lake by overseas vessels.

$1.5 BILLION: Estimated cost to industry and government since 1988 to keep water intake pipes free of mussel and algae buildup.

SIX MONTHS: Average time between each discovery of a new invasive species in the Great Lakes.