Or filter by symbol:
AAPL
AGG
AIG
AIR
AXP
BAC
BBT
BP
BRK.A
C
CHK
CMG.AX
DBO
DBV
DIA
EAT
ECA
FDX
FHN
FNM
FRE
FXA
FXE
GDX
GEOY
GEX
GLD
GM
GRN
GS
IAT
IEV
ITB
IYF
JPM
KBE
KRE
LEH
MER
MOS
MS
MZZ
NCC
OIH
OIL
PBW
PNC
POT
PZD
QID
QQQQ
RCC
RF
RIMM
SCC
SD
SHV
SKF
SPY
SSO
STI
STT
TLM
TNX
UDN
UPS
USL
USO
UUP
WB
WFC
WM
XHB
XLB
XLE
XLF
XLI
XLK
XLU
alajac's Comments Stream Stats
- 112 Comments, 7
, 1 
- Total Comment Stream rating - = 6
- Free E-Newsletters
- About Seeking Alpha
- About Us
- Contact Us
- What's New
- Readers Feedback
- Advertise With Us
- Contributors
- Contribute an Article
- Feature Your Book
- Our Contributors
- Anonymous Contributions
- Dispute an Article?
- Legal
- Terms of Use
- Privacy
- Copyright
Deflation: The Beast Is Here
They (also) didn't believe me - in mid-July, 2008 - when I said " oil would see $20 before $200" . I had also sent out a "go to cash, crash starting now" message on June 3, 2008. Any questions?
Oil Won't Stay Down for Long
FYI, in July I published (in seekingalpha comments) that oil would see $20 before $200. I was told "the market would have to collapse" for that to happen. I said "yeah, that's right."
I wonder what this guy was saying in July.
Federal Reserve, What Do You Have to Hide?
The bankers "campaign contributions" keep enough of our Representatives on THEIR payroll that they have been able to call most of the shots since 1789 and ALL of the shots since the Panic of 1907 and the birth of the Fed in 1913. The only way that is going to change is with a political party that eschews corporate (bank) campaign financing. Obviously that will be neither the Democrats nor the Republicans.
The human body is able to create all the blood it needs (without taking on any debt) by draining off an equivalent amount of "liquidity"; there's absolutely no reason we couldn't do the same thing with our currency (by replacing all income-based taxes with a small and automatically-collecte... "infrastructure maintenance fee" charged on every electronic transfer of funds).
And if all new currency was put into circulation via equi-dollar distributions to every legal US resident, we certainly wouldn't be worrying about the coming GREATER Depression. (The 800 billion dollar bailout alone would put almost $2700 into the hands of every legal US resident, and the money would all end up in the banks - some after being used to purchase US-manufactured automobiles - anyway.)
Why This Isn't Financial Armageddon
Aren't there any standards for SeekingAlpha contributors?
Surprising Call for Return to the Gold Standard
All we have to do is require them to declare their asset-to-debt ratio and quit letting them hide behind FDIC insurance. If the ratio is too low they will lose their conservative depositors, leaving them with speculators who want the juiced returns and are willing to take the risk, as it should be.
The problem is the GOVERNMENT'S legal obfuscation of the actual state of the banks affairs, not the bank's leverage and risk. The problem is on the government side and that is something we can do something about: we can stop socializing the losses and stop hiding the risks that specific banks are taking. And it doesn't take a commodity-backed currency to do that.
Surprising Call for Return to the Gold Standard
Creating/destroying money by means of debt "juices" the system both on the upside and on the downside: great for Wall Street traders but tough for the rest of us. (Actually not so tough for me as I issued my first "crash imminent: go to cash this minute" email on June 3, 2008, having been warning my readers of its approach since November, 2006 due to the historic correlation of the collpase of the Housing index with stock market crashes.)
There isn't anything the Fed does for us (except for putting us in deep into debt) that we can't do for ourselves for free.
The human body regulates itself by draining off excess liquidity: we can do the same thing by replacing the Federal Income Tax (and ALL other income-based taxes) with an "infrastructure maintenance fee" of about one-half percent on all electronic transfers (the exact percentage could be set by a computer similar to the way Milton Freidman suggested we get rid of the Federal Reserve and regulate the money supply automatically).
Lastly, the market will keep going down, making new lows (interspersed with the occasional bear market rally) until the death of the "job model" of economic resource distribution is recognized. Neither commodity-backed money nor "trickle down" bailouts will help, though both will be tried. Only when governments start pumping money to the people like the human body pumps blood to the cells (consistently and debt-free) will the crash end. Oil will hit $20 and the DJIA may hit $400 before that happens.
Reich's Reasons for a New Fiscal Stimulus Bill
Anyway, the "jobs model" of economic resource distribution is dead. Get over it. We go down until that fact gets recognized and dealt with.
It's going to take $1000 PER MONTH (from now on) to every legal resident (and proportional amounts likewise in other countries) to get this crash turned around. See my other comments for details.
FYI, I called the crash 6-3-08 and tops on gold and oil 7-14-08. Published and available.
Is Hyperinflation on the Horizon?
99% of the posters on here and 100% of "our beloved leaders" have not the slightest clue how we got here and where we are going.
This crash has (uncoincidentally) occurred at the same time as the final death throes of the "job model" of resource distribution. "Dollar up, stuff down" until that situation gets recognized and handled.
See details of my "how to fix the economy" plan in other comments of mine (use the most recent version for brevity's sake) on seekingalpha, but briefly:
Replace the Fed dollar with a USG debt-free, totally-fiat dollar, and put all new currency into circulation via equi-dollar distributions to EVERY legal US resident,
Replace ALL government corporate and personal subsidy programs (including all Minimum Wage laws) with $1000 per month to EVERY legal US resident,
Rescind laws that hide the inherent fraudulence of fractional-reserve banking (like FDIC deposit insurance),
Replace the Federal Income tax with a one-half percent electronic transfers tax (no exemptions; avoidable by use of cash or barter).
There are a few other ideas but when the above steps are adopted by the US and other governments, the downwave will end and the world will start on the next 200-year upswing. And until something very much like this plan gets implemented, the price direction (including for gold) is down. And it does not matter a whit how many trillions of dollars are "created" in the interim.
What Comes Next After Paulson Abandons TARP Idea?
The Paulson Plan: Compelling Banks to Lend at Bazooka Point
If we let the MARKET work, it will pick the right banks to help out:THE ONES THAT ATTRACT OUR DEPOSITS. The rest need to die. We don't need 6 bank branches on every block.
The Paulson Plan: Compelling Banks to Lend at Bazooka Point
It is not the banks that were stupid. We are the stupid ones for leaving in place a system that systematically allows banks to steal our accumulated wealth.
The problem is that we pay trillions of dollars (government and personal) to do what we could easily do for ourselves ABSOLUTELY FREE: that is, to supply ourselves with money to exchange with each other and with workers in other countries.
Replace the Fed dollar with our own money, put it into circulation via equal-dollar distribution=End of Depression.
Replace the FederaI Income tax with a flat, one-half percent electronic transfer fee (and get rid of all corporate and personal subsidies and 4000 Federal laws), and the next 200-year boom will start.
Our Coming Depression
The problem is that we pay trillions of dollars (government and personal) to do what we could easily do for ourselves ABSOLUTELY FREE: that is, to supply ourselves with money to exchange with each other and with workers in other countries.
Replace the Fed dollar with our own money, put it into circulation via equal-dollar distribution=End of Depression.
Replace the FederaI Income tax with a flat, one-half percent electronic transfer fee (and get rid of all corporate and personal subsidies and 4000 Federal laws), and the next 200-year boom will start.
Depression's All Talk, So Far
This is a once-in-200-years retracement of the American bull market since1789that will take many years to play out.
Before this is done, the old debt-money system will be replaced and the 'job model' of resource distribution will be dead.
Will Volatility Be Embedded in the System for a Generation?
Replacing the Fed. Income Tax with a one-half percent flat tax on ALL electronic transfers will kickoff the next 200-year boom.
Upping the Stimulus Dosage
PROTEST THE FED`S EXTORTION RACKET
A WRITE-IN ELECTION CAMPAIGN
TO REVOLUTIONIZE RESOURCE DISTRIBUTION AND TAXATION
The `HOW TO FIX THE ECONOMY` plan addresses three problems with America`s economic system which are destroying our financial security.
Problem 1.
America`s National Debt is approaching 10 trillion dollars and the system is less than 100 years old. Nice work. If human bodies worked like America's currency supply, every time a kid grew a little he would need to take out a loan to buy a transfusion of new blood. We can easily replace the bankrupt Federal Reserve with debt-free U.S. money and non-FDIC-backed private banks.
Problem 2.
The Income Tax law was drafted by the same rich guys who invented the Federal Reserve system. They came up with a way to tax us `cash cows` while simultaneously avoiding paying taxes on their own wealth. A kid right out of college shouldn`t be paying a greater percentage of his accumulated wealth in taxes than Bill Gates. We need a flat, transparent, automatically-collecte... tax that produces results corresponding closely to `benefits previously received`.
Problem 3.
Thanks to automation, robotics and computers, the days of plentiful, highly-paid jobs employing vast numbers of manual and mental laborers are gone. Remember the days when there were millions of jobs that paid well enough to buy a house, two cars, an RV and a cottage on the lake...and still save plenty for retirement? If you do, then you`re pretty old. For most of us, those days are gone and they`re not coming back. To address this problem we need to either `kill off a lot of people` or else develop a new resource distribution model suitable for a world where jobs are rapidly going the way of `the buggy whip`.
**********************...
Tell Congress we need a TOTALLY NEW DEAL!
VOTE TO
Replace the Federal Reserve System
with U.S. Government Debt-Free Money
Replace the Income Tax with a tiny, automatically-collecte... flat tax
and Create Better Social Security for ALL
BY WRITING-IN
Alan Jacquemotte for U.S. President
(in states which allow write-in voting)
WRITE-IN VOTES CAN`T BE HACKED!
Make them hand-count your vote
Send no money
JUST MAKE COPIES OF THIS PLAN AND HAND THEM OUT.
HOW TO FIX THE ECONOMY
a plan to stimulate the economy, lower taxes, start paying off the National Debt, alleviate poverty and decrease crime
by replacing our OLD economic system with a NEW system based on
a new and debt-free U.S. currency to replace Federal Reserve Debt-Money,
a 0.5% tax on electronic transfers to replace the Federal Income Tax and the IRS,
and $1000 per month government privatization compensation for legal U.S. residents
The problem is always THE SYSTEM, never just `the people who screwed up`. Until we fix THE SYSTEM, similar bad things will keep on happening. Fault for the credit scam lies not with the banks and borrowers who lost their shirts and homes, but with our predecessors for allowing this SYSTEM to become and remain law, and with ourselves for not getting rid of it earlier.
The primary problem with the OLD SYSTEM is that `our` money (actually the Federal Reserve`s Debt-Money) leaks its purchasing power like a bucket with a hole in the bottom leaks water. The Fed dollar currently buys less than 5% of what it bought in 1913. (To view a video that makes the problems inherent in our use of the Fed`s Debt-Money much clearer, do an online search for `Zeitgeist Fed`.) There is NO BENEFIT AT ALL in having a Central Bank (well, none for us) compared to having the U.S. Treasury print and distribute to ourselves our own debt-free money, and THE ONLY DIFFERENCE between having a central bank (like the Federal Reserve System) or not, is that ``One system costs us 95% of our wealth every hundred years and puts us and our posterity into mind-boggling debt until the end of time``... and the other one doesn`t. So the first thing we need for our NEW SYSTEM is our own, debt-free U.S. Government currency, backed by the value of all of the property within the nation`s borders. Bankers will tell you this will cause `the end of civilization as we know it`. It will certainly end it as THEY knew it.
Another problem is that the OLD SYSTEM`s income-based taxation creates wasteful tax avoidance behavior, requires an expensive tax reporting industry and an intrusive collection bureaucracy, and is, arguably, a form of `involuntary servitude`. Under a NEW SYSTEM, we could replace all income-related taxes with a one-half percent, automatically-collecte... electronic transfer tax (also known as a `debit tax`) which would be avoidable by business transactions that used only cash or barter. This change will not only rid us of the IRS (saving us the billions of dollars that are currently spent on `tax reporting`), it will also end the OLD SYSTEM`s penalization of work and entrepreneurism, as well as freeing up further untold billions currently spent on `tax avoidance`. (Also inhibits market speculation.)
The third problem with the OLD SYSTEM is that, because governments privatize all of their claimed property (allocating it however they like), everyone winds up being denied their natural right to free access to all property without being compensated for that loss. That`s not a problem for those with access to capital and property ownership, but for the rest of us, it is totally unfair and creates a slanted playing field upon which wealth tends to gravitate to the rich and well-connected. Free-market or socialist, every government`s allocation method results in `denial to everyone of free access to all land`, for which ALL governments should provide compensation.
Consequently, our NEW SYSTEM should pay to every legal adult resident $1000 per month (of the new, non-Fed, non-Debt-Money) which can REPLACE ALL FORMS OF PERSONAL AND CORPORATE WELFARE AND SUBSIDIES, no financial qualification required and no restriction on earning additional income (saving us billons in Social Security and Welfare bureauracracy costs and leaving Congress very little to do). Compensation for minors should be held in a trust fund to avoid incentivizing `baby factories`. Since everyone gets the same amount of compensation, this plan does NOT redistribute wealth, but will be of most help to those with the least accumulated wealth.
Besides its immediate and direct assault on poverty, the benefits of this part of our NEW SYSTEM should include a reduction in crimes of all sorts, more jobs at better pay, better childcare, more rural homesteading, better maintained urban areas, no more `homeless veterans`, less intrusive and cheaper government with lower military-related expenses and a safer world in general. We can expect residents of other countries to insist their governments either copy our NEW SYSTEM or else apply for U.S. statehood (as Texas did in 1845) as soon as the see how well this NEW SYSTEM works.
HEALTH CARE...the AMA and FDA work to constrain competition in order to maximize the medical and pharmaceutical industries` ability to extort unconscionable prices for services and substances that should be affordable out-of-pocket. We need to train up thousands more doctors and other healthcare professionals and to decriminalize and unbridle access for adults to WHATEVER drugs adults feel they need and let the market work to make prices of normal medical help and pharmacology affordable.
TO KICK OUR CRUDE (OIL) HABIT, Congress could add on a 10% surcharge at the gas pump, bump it up another 10% every 6 months, and rebate the surcharge revenue in monthly equi-dollar amounts to every registered car OWNER, regardless of how much they drive. The surcharge will incentivize cheaper alternatives which will rapidly come to market, no government subsidies or mandates required.
HELP ME SEND THIS MESSAGE to candidates running for Congress in 2010 and 2012. In order to get elected, you will need to pledge to help us THROW OFF the predatory Federal Reserve System and devise a NEW SYSTEM, one that ``provides new Guards for our future Security``. We can send a very clear message to those candidates with a MASS WRITE-IN CAMPAIGN for an unknown candidate running for no other purpose than to send that message. (That`s where I come in.) With the major parties fielding candidates who seem to be decent people but who are apparently unaware of the damage the present system is causing to us NORMAL folk, and with the 3rd parties addressing only symptoms rather than the BAD SYSTEM at cause, this election is the ideal time to vote for REAL CHANGE, not just new faces. I will register as a write-in candidate in every state that allows write-in votes from which I get emails expressing support. Pass this message along to several people every day (or, even better, to everyone you know today, and to everyone you meet from now on). IF EACH OF US EVERY DAY CONVINCE EVEN ONE OTHER PERSON TO JOIN US, OVER ONE BILLION PEOPLE CAN BE `ON BOARD` IN 30 DAYS. Get out (and online) and DO IT! For questions or more info, email alan_jacquemotte@yahoo...
Protest the Bailout! Remember The Tea Party!
WRITE-IN Alan Jacquemotte for U.S. President
Send no money
JUST MAKE COPIES OF THE PLAN AND HAND THEM OUT