Native American Advisors Chippewa Partners

Could you hear the groan Mr. Obama?

2012-01-24T22:06:00.000-05:00

Every High School administrator in the country probably came close to defecating in their pants tonight with the Teleprompter-in-Chief announcing that he wants all students to be required to stay in high school until they are 18 or until they graduate.

Imagine what the schools will have to do to oversee these "students' who don't want to be there, don't want to learn, have no ambition or work ethic and just want to remain disruptive to the students and teachers around them. Go ahead, just put armed guards in every hall way (make sure they are all NEA members while you are at it) and keep these young thugs occupied with biology, economics, physics, history and higher or lower math. Yea right. Is it any wonder we fall further behind in the global rankings?

Welcome Back DeepCapture.com

2012-01-24T09:49:00.002-05:00

http://www.deepcapture.com/what-happened-to-deep-capture/

Remember "TRADING PLACES"?

2012-01-23T12:12:00.000-05:00

Remember this part of the movie? On the commodities trading floor at Four World Trade Center, the Dukes commit all their holdings (Randolph doing so against Mortimer's advice) to buying frozen concentrated orange-juice futures contracts; other traders follow their lead, inflating the price. Before the real crop report is declassified, Valentine and Winthorpe sell futures heavily at the increased price. After the forecast that the orange crop will be normal, the price of orange-juice futures plummets. Valentine and Winthorpe successfully cover their short sales, turning a profit of more than three hundred million American dollars. The Dukes fail to meet a margin call and are ruined, being left owing three hundred and ninety-four million American dollars for futures now worth a fraction of what they contracted to pay. Valentine and Winthorpe explain to the Dukes that they had made a wager on whether they could get rich while making the Dukes poor simultaneously. Valentine collects $1 from Winthorpe (who had believed their revenge plan would fail) while Randolph collapses holding his chest, a heart attack having seized him, and Mortimer shouts angrily at his brother about their failed plan.

Well as of today, Orange Juice has just hit an all time high price of $223.25 , and has returned a jaw-dropping 32.4% YTD, or 7,032% annualized. This is the biggest 4 day surge since October 2006, and for all intents and purposes, essentially the biggest ever. Needless to say, Randolph and Mortimer Capital LLC is back up and running, and has been forced to limit investor inflows due to unprecedented interest in this asset class, which, yes, you can eat (a little freeze drying may be required in advance). At this rate, bottle service of Dom Perignon will cost less than a small container of Tropicana!

Another Montana rancher who gets it!

2012-01-22T17:29:00.002-05:00

Twisted Taco.......run, flee or stay hungry

2012-01-21T14:56:00.000-05:00

I've been eating in restaurants for most of my life, well since I moved to San Diego about 33 years ago. Outside of the three tiny reservation towns we lived in while I was in high school, (note, not a single one of them had a public restaurant) I can usually find a decent place to eat.

Today, after a swim meet, we took in the Twisted Taco in Dunwoody, Georgia.

Do not, I repeat, do not ever order the carne asada taco's in that place.

Friday, the 20th..........

2012-01-20T17:39:00.001-05:00

Silver jumped dramatically (up over 8% on the week) while Gold gently pushed higher (+1.7% matching USD's weakness on the week). Oil was the week's biggest loser (down 0.5%) as Copper clung to 3% gains on the week. Treasuries ended the week at their high yields (30Y +19bps). The real kicker today is that today's volume is an incredible 27% below the January 2011 Option expiration volume.

With options expiring it's a new ball game on Monday. Eat something good and may your favorite teams win! I am pulling for the New England Patriots.

Images of my Dad

2012-01-20T07:35:00.000-05:00

4 years of age

My Dad can do anything!

7 years of age

My Dad knows so much about everything!

12 years of age

Dad doesn’t really know everything.

14 years of age

My Dad? He is so out of it.

21 years of age

Dad? He is so old-fashioned, he doesn’t get it and isn’t that smart

25 years of age

Well, he knows some things pretty good

35 years of age

Before we make that decision let’s see what Dad has to say about it.

(I can’t believe how much Dad has learned in the last 9 years!)

50 years of age

I wonder what Dad would have thought about this.

Pete Shaw, the greatest NY Giant of them all........

2012-01-19T12:30:00.002-05:00

Pete Shaw, a 7 year veteran of the NFL, played as the smallest safety in the league for the San Diego Chargers and New York Giants. With a 28-inch waist the guy had speed, strength and a great attitude to knock somebody down. Where ever you are Pete, this weekend I know you will be toasting the Giants to victory! As a graduate of the Big 10's Northwestern you were the quintessential Drexel Burnham Lambert salesman. Those were the days my friend, can you still "get-a-hat"?

Dicks Sporting Goods, Mall of Georgia

2012-01-19T11:29:00.000-05:00

I tried to call Doug Fowler twice today up there. The first time I was on hold for over 5 minutes and was asked to call back as he was with a customer. I tried later and the phone rang for over 4 minutes and nobody picked up the main line into the store. As Clark Howard fondly calls it, definitely customer NO-SERVICE!

If anybody is there, say Doug Fowler or Meagan Eads please give me a call. 877-772-1621.

I was trying to spend some money in your store. Edward Stack probably wants me to spend some money there too.

Par for the course

2012-01-18T09:54:00.001-05:00

I mean this news today is simply sad. Corzine and crew at M.F. Global can't find, lost or evaporated $1.2 BILLION of customers money; real American investors and they want to throw this news out at the American public? Come on. Pooling information versus stealing 1.2 billion dollars of investors money? As you could guess, Corzine will never, ever set foot in jail stripes. That sucks.

Federal authorities arrested three people in New York and Boston early Wednesday and were expected to charge another, expanding an insider-trading investigation to directly involve some of Wall Street's most prominent money managers.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation in Boston arrested Todd Newman, a former portfolio manager with hedge-fund firm Diamondback Capital Management who oversaw technology investments, according to a law enforcement official.
The FBI separately arrested Jon Horvath, a technology analyst with Sigma Capital Management, an affiliate of giant hedge fund SAC Capital Advisors, in Manhattan, an official said. Anthony Chiasson, a former hedge-fund manager at Level Global Investors LP, surrendered to the FBI in New York, and a fourth person was being sought. Chiasson and Newman are accused of illegally trading ahead of computer maker Dell's earnings announcements for the first and second quarters of 2008, netting them profits, respectively, of $57 million and $3.8 million. Another defendant, Jon Horvath, is accused of making an illegal $1 million trade in Dell. The charges Wednesday appear to hew to a pattern emerging in the government's insider-trading investigation, in which tight-knit circles of associates at different firms are accused of pooling their information for mutual benefit.

Do America a favor and sign this petition!

2012-01-18T09:48:00.002-05:00

https://www.google.com/landing/takeaction/

529 plans..........

2012-01-18T09:40:00.000-05:00

Just looked at some of the plan results for 2011 of which I have invested in for my sons.

The results are dismal over all time frames. More gimmicks for stock peddlers to engage in coming soon.

Excellent...........

2012-01-17T20:19:00.002-05:00

“Send not your foolish and feeble, send me your strong and your sane.” - Robert Service, The Law of the Yukon.

You think Mitch has money in a Swiss account?

2012-01-17T10:44:00.001-05:00

First Buffet, now Mitt Romney. Via Bloomberg:

ROMNEY SAYS HIS EFFECTIVE TAX RATE CLOSER TO 15%
ROMNEY SPEAKS TO REPORTERS IN FLORENCE, SOUTH CAROLINA
ROMNEY SAYS MUCH OF HIS INCOME COMES FROM INVESTMENTS

Take it to heart........

2012-01-16T18:41:00.000-05:00

Everybody can be great... because anybody can serve. You don't have to have a college degree to serve. You don't have to make your subject and verb agree to serve. You only need a heart full of grace. A soul generated by love.

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

GOLD on Monday

2012-01-16T10:29:00.002-05:00

Although gold had its largest drop in the last 2 weeks on Friday, (-1.6%), it was 1.3% higher on the week and trading higher this morning.

American students, global students

2012-01-16T09:19:00.002-05:00

"Hungry man, reach for the book: It is a weapon." B. Brecht

Dimon will double-down......

2012-01-14T15:43:00.000-05:00

In an interview with Italian newspaper Milan Finanza, JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon said that he could lose up to $5 billion from the firm's exposure to the PIIGS countries. As Reuters reports, "Dimon said the bank was exposed to the five countries (PIIGS) to the tune of around $15 billion. "We fear we could lose up to $5 billion ... We hope the worst won't happen, but even if it did happen, I wouldn't be pulling my hair out," he said. Dimon said Europe was the worst problem for the banking sector. "But the EU and euro are solid even if the states will have to be financially responsible and do all they can to develop common social policies," he said." While it is admirable of JPMorgan to disclose some of its dirty laundry, as this was a topic that received hardly any mention in the firm's prepared quarterly release, and is predicated surely by the fact that its Basel III Tier 1 Common of $122 billion dwarfs this possible impairment, there are some questions left open. Such as what happens if and when Greek CDS, now most likely before March 20, were triggered? And the logical follow up - what happens when Portugal, Ireland, Spain and Italy, and who knows who else (Hungary?) follow suit and decide that a coercive restructuring is actually not suicidal, even though it most certainly is once a given threshold is reached. In other words, how long can Europe tolerate the same two-tiered sovereign debt market that S&P warned about so explicitly yesterday?

Can you find the coyote?

2012-01-14T11:34:00.005-05:00

Presented without comment

2012-01-13T16:15:00.000-05:00

The University of Georgia, one of the oldest public universities in the U.S., has many noble, time-honored traditions. This blog isn’t about one of them. Instead, a report issued today concludes potential gold-diggers have made Athens their second most popular higher education destination.

Georgia State is No. 11, which seems odd considering many could easily date walk down the safe streets of Atlanta and find an employable North Avenue Trade School grad.

The results of the report will be featured on ABC News’ 20/20, says SeekingArrangement.com, a dating site that helps moneyed men hook up with cash-strapped women looking for little more than a proper education. The number of ladies seeking a free ride grew in 2011.

“In 2011, we saw an explosion in the number of college students seeking Sugar Daddies to help pay their college tuition”, says website founder and MIT graduate Brandon Wade. “One in every two Sugar Babies who join our website today are college students, and college Sugar Babies now make up 40% of our Sugar Baby population, up from 33% in 2010.” Perhaps this explains why the original name of Sugar Daddy, the candy, not the man writing checks, was Papa Sucker.

Here’s the Top 20 list for 2011, ranked according to the number of Sugar Babies silly enough to use their school email address when signing up. Penn State rolls in at No. 13, but I’ll let you write your own jokes.

1. New York University (NYU) — 185
2. University of Georgia — 155
3. University of Phoenix — 144
4. Tulane University — 129
5. Temple University — 113
6. Virginia Community College — 108
7. University of Southern Florida — 93
8. Arizona State University — 85
9. Michigan State — 81
10. Ivy Tech Community College — 78
11. Georgia State University — 74
12. University of Wisconsin — 73
13. Penn State University — 72
14. University of Central Florida — 67
15. Kent University — 65
16. Maricopa Community College — 63
17. Indiana University — 62
18. University of California, Berkeley — 61
19. The Art Institutes — 60
20. Florida International University — 59

Georgia Hunters

2012-01-13T10:59:00.000-05:00

Two Georgia hunters got a pilot to fly them into the Canadian wilderness, where they managed to bag two big Bull Moose. As they were loading the plane to return, the pilot said the plane could take only the hunters, their gear and one moose.

The hunters objected strongly saying, "Last year we shot two and the pilot let us take them both...and he had exactly the same airplane as yours." Reluctantly the pilot, not wanting to be outdone by another bush pilot, gave in and everything was loaded. However, even under full power the little plane couldn't handle the load and went down, crashing in the wooded wilderness. Somehow, surrounded by the moose, clothing and sleeping bags, Bubba and Bobby Joe survived the crash.

After climbing out of the wreckage, Bubba asked Bobby Joe, "Any idea where we are?"

Bobby Joe replied, "I think we're pretty close to where we crashed last year."

Feeling left out by Merrill Lynch? Welcome home!

2012-01-12T16:40:00.000-05:00

Merrill Lynch is run by Bank of America executives who were never stockbrokers. Merrill Lynch now penalizes Advisers for opening up accounts less than $250,000. The payout the stockbrokers gets is lower. If you are a serious investor in Alpharetta or Milton, Georgia we welcome your inquiry.

“We manage hard-earned money. We are fiercely independent and pride ourselves on hard work and unbiased critical thinking. I find it disturbing that every broker, banker or insurance agent with a pie-chart calls themselves a financial planner. We don’t do taxes, we don’t pitch insurance, and we are not estate planners. Our clients hire full-time accountants and attorneys when they need specific help.”

“One aspect of our success has nothing to do with money. The bottom line shouldn’t be measured just in dollars and cents. We never forget where we came from. We could never tell a prospective client we have a minimum account size. Why would Dean Parisian, raised in the poorest county in America, tell someone they’re too small to get world-class investment help?”

From a Chippewa Partners seminar in Rancho Santa Fe, CA

“The economic role of a client for a brokerage firm is to enrich the brokers. Brokers are trained to sell investments that generate huge fees and commissions and typically have an agenda other than your financial welfare. The interests of Wall Street and the media are not aligned with those of investors. The NASD makes it very clear; investors should never let their guard down with brokers who have a sales agenda. Do you really want to trust your portfolio and retirement to a broker-salesman?”

“As an arbitrator for the New York Stock Exchange I censured many stockbrokers and know that investors often confuse a sales pitch with impartial investment advice. Do you think Tiger Woods and Bill Gates use stockbrokers to increase their net worth and protect their assets? Not a chance. The simple answer is they have competent, unbiased investment managers. They hire investment management professionals to manage their assets. So should you.”

From a Chippewa Partners Atlanta Athletic Club seminar.

“Trading in IPO’s are not part of our methodology. Their problems stem from the deliberate overpricing of new shares, which creates a huge wealth transfer from a newly public company to the major customers of an investment bank. Shareholders are much better off in the long run with a higher net worth than with an artificial and temporarily high stock price. IPO’s are allocated to clients who pay big commissions. Those responsible for completion of an IPO are the lead underwriters. If brokers were held liable for the tremendous carnage inflicted on early buyers of IPO’s the mispricings would end. Those responsible for a company are the directors. If directors were held liable for the eradication of corporate assets, the mispricings would end. We don’t play the game by paying big commissions for syndicate allocations of initial public offerings.”

Dean T. Parisian, Chairman, in a letter to the Wall Street Journal

Nothing but butt ugly.......

2012-01-12T15:25:00.002-05:00

I neither twitter or tweet. Not for me and probably not for you. Bill Gross of PIMCO and stamp collecting fame sent out a line today that bears repeating for it's hilarity and truth.

Here it is: Bill Gross: Putrid long bond auction shows that the only investor that wants 30-yr Treasuries is the Fed.

It may not end well but it sure is going to be entertaining.

Charles Hugh Smith wrote this...........

2012-01-12T15:19:00.002-05:00

Dear U.S.A.--your overdraft protection is about to be pulled.

Dear United States of America: We regret to inform you that your withdrawals exceeded your deposits last year by $1,600,000,000,000 ($1.6 trillion), including your "supplemental appropriations" spending.

Your account does have an overdraft protection, and so bonds were sold to cover your $1.6 trillion overdraft. While we value your business, we feel obligated to remind you that this is the third year that your overdraft protection exceeded 10% of your gross national product (GDP), and it seems your account is on course to register yet another $1.6 trillion overdraft in fiscal year 2012.

Currently, your overdraft account exceeds your GDP of $15 trillion.

Quite frankly, we are worried that you have become dependent on extensive overdraft protection--a feature designed to tide the account holder over for a short period of time in near-term expectation of higher deposits or lower withdrawals--and that relying on large-scale overdraft borrowing to cover your basic expenses is now your standard operating procedure.

This violates the intent of the overdraft feature, and as a result we must seriously consider modifying the terms of the overdraft protection on your account. Current conditions enable us to provide this overdraft, but the feature was not designed to be permanent nor on this scale.

In order to give you sufficient time to bring your deposits and withdrawals back into alignment, we will maintain the current low-interest overdraft protection on your account through fiscal year 2012. Beyond that, however, please be aware that to maintain the integrity of the system, we will have to raise the rate of interest on your overdraft and scale back the size of the overdraft line of credit.

We regret informing you of these modifications, but the overdraft protection was not intended to be permanent nor near-infinite in scale.

Yours truly,

The Global Bond Market

January is nearly half over............

2012-01-12T11:15:00.001-05:00

It's been a "more-of-the-same" start to the trading year. Watching paint dry might be more exciting.

I think the trend in gold has reversed and the miners should participate. We'll see. The bots trading against bots is nothing the SEC or NYSE want to address in an election year and there's too much money involved to do anything for the American public. Watching all the zombies on CNBC talk about earnings, sovereign countries, Fed policy, tax structure, fundamentals, market share, revenue growth, this was important stuff once upon a time but no longer, not with over 80% of trades being bot trades. Prices and volume are being manipulated by bots. Just fire all the humans on CNBC and flash computer code across the screen all day. The equity markets are dead. The sad reality is that our SEC has no interest in touching this problem. Let the last algo turn itself off when the ponzi is done.

Reading about the implosion of so many hedge funds is getting old. It's funny how many funds call themselves hedge funds when there isn't hedging but rather a single leveraged punt.

I have a very busy weekend ahead of me and hope you do to. Living in America we have so much to be thankful for and so many to help. I thought I would share this video so that you may share it.

Enjoy!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nwAYpLVyeFU

I don't know Stella Paul but I like how she thinks

2012-01-12T07:32:00.000-05:00

The Top 5 Reasons Obama Must Be Removed as Commander-in-Chief

By Stella Paul
Obama recently signed a mysterious new law that proclaims all American soil is a "battleground," thereby allowing the president to indefinitely detain any American citizen without charges. Critics fear Obama will use his fun new unconstitutional powers to make his political enemies disappear, but that may not be necessary.

The way things are going, most patriotic Americans will soon be six feet under, felled by apoplectic strokes brought on by reading the latest outrage committed by our "Commander in Chief." He may not have a limit to what he'll inflict; but our collective blood pressure may have a limit to what we can bear.

With each passing hour, the question becomes not if America can survive a second term, but whether we can survive another day. It's not just the $15 trillion in debt, the Muslim Brotherhood in the catbird seat, and our bleeding open border. It's the never-ending deliberate assaults against our safety and security laughingly committed by the cold-eyed man with the nuclear code.

Here are the top 5 reasons Obama must be removed as Commander-in-Chief. Please read them while seated.

ONE - LightSquared: If we had an actual media, you should be able to wake up an average fourth grader at 3 AM and ask, "Who's General William Shelton?" and the fourth grader would chirpily recite: "He's the Air Force Commander who was pressured by the White House to change his testimony about LightSquared."

The facts are not in dispute. A four-star general has testified to Congress that he was pressured by the White House to alter his testimony to make it friendlier to a broadband company backed by a major Democratic donor.

The problem with LightSquared's new wireless project is that it could disrupt all military communications and GPS. But what worth has the entire capacity of the military's communication system against the pleadings of LightSquared's biggest investor, Philip Falcone, who shovels cash to Obama?

TWO - Fast and Furious: No matter how many times you hear the facts they never get less sickening or bizarre. The United States Department of Justice deliberately ran thousands of guns to Mexican drug cartels, which then used them to commit at least 11 violent crimes in the US and 200 violent crimes in Mexico. A Fast and Furious gun was used to murder U.S. Border Patrol Agent Brian Terry and possibly U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement agent Jaime Zapata.

ATF Agent Vince Cefalu was fired for whistle blowing about this surreal horror show. Attorney General Eric Holder perjured himself to Congress, pretending he knew nothing about it. And newly released emails confirm that the motivation for supplying weapons to Mexico's most violent criminals was to use the ensuing chaos to enact stricter gun control laws here.

Not content to unleash murder and mayhem, the Department of Justice also went into the money-laundering racket, washing clean millions of dollars for Mexico's drug cartels. Your tax dollars at work! And while this evil madness was raging, Obama conducted a hysterical campaign against Sarah Palin for using an image of a target on her website.

THREE - Giving Top-Secret Technology to Our Enemies: Last week brought word that Obama is planning to share U.S. missile defense secrets with Russia, over the strenuous objections of security officials who say it could devastate the effectiveness of our entire defense system. They also fear Russia will share our secrets with China, Iran and North Korea.

Remember how Obama's Mommy and Daddy met in Russian class? If only they could see their little boy now.

Obama also gave a freebie of our most classified intelligence to Iran, refusing all three options to destroy a downed U.S. drone. Instead, he let the mullahs paw their way through our most sensitive high-tech secrets. Not to worry -- he did politely ask them to give it back.

FOUR - Waging War Against Libya Without Congressional Approval: Obama's handlers dreamed up a catchy new doctrine called Responsibility to Protect (R2P), and they were itching to try it out. So Obama gave them a nice, peppy little war to conduct in Libya. Why not take out the mad transvestite, Qadaffi? Nobody likes him, anyway.

Flagrantly flouting the War Powers Resolution, Obama spent a billion dollars to wage an unconstitutional war. The grand result is Al Qaeda's flag waving over Benghazi and 20,000 anti-aircraft missiles missing, which will probably wind up blasting towards us.

FIVE - Hollowing Out Our Military: This week we learn that Obama is slashing the defense budget, planning to lay off 14% off our troops, reduce our nuclear arsenal, shelve key weapon systems and explicitly cripple our ability to wage ground wars. What hath Saul Alinsky wrought!

Already, Obama has strait-jacketed the military in political correctness, forbidding discussion of the nature of radical Islam and sanitizing the jihad-crazed murder of 13 soldiers at Fort Hood into "workplace violence." But that was not enough for our Commander-in-Chief.

Our troops are so heroic that even in straitjackets, they can win. And if there's one thing Obama will not tolerate it's American victory.

From George Washington to Barack Obama - it's been quite a ride.

Write Stella Paul at Stellapundit@aol.com.

Here's some math America!!

2012-01-10T22:03:00.000-05:00

"The Obama administration will be asking Congress to raise the debt limit in the coming days, White House press secretary Jay Carney said on Tuesday. "I'm confident it will be executed in a matter of days, not weeks," he told reporters. The notification by the administration — which had been scheduled for last month — was delayed because Congress has been holding only pro forma sessions. The White House will be asking Congress to raise the U.S. borrowing limit by $1.2 trillion. The move would mark the third and final increase from the debt-ceiling deal reached last year by Congress." Of course, the optics of yet another debt-ceiling increase, even a preapproved one, are simply horrible during campaign season. But such is life. Here is the kicker though: the US has preapproval for $1.2 trillion in debt issuance, as per the August 2011 agreement. So far so good. The problem is that since then the US has issued $900 billion in debt in five short months! In other words, somehow the remaining buffer of just $300 billion, or a final debt ceiling of $15.5 trillion, is supposed to last the US until after the presidential election, because this topic flaring up just before Obama is due to hit the debate circuit will be reelection suicide. So our question is: how will the US, which has a gross debt issuance rate of over $100 billion per month on average, last for a year with just $300 billion in dry powder?

2 coyotes I caught last week

2012-01-09T16:34:00.002-05:00

Trading this volatility?

2012-01-09T16:09:00.002-05:00

It's now 4 days in row without a change of more than 0.1 %!

Hawking up some taxpayer funded nonsense!

2012-01-08T17:39:00.000-05:00

Brits should be fuming over this crapola. We aren't going interplanetary anytime soon. Trust me.

In his recorded speech, Hawking pleaded for interplanetary travel, arguing that humans faced a grim future unless they spread out from their terrestrial home. "I don't think we will survive another thousand years without escaping beyond our fragile planet," he said.

As a matter of fact.............

2012-01-08T07:31:00.000-05:00

Obama has proven to everyone that you really can say anything to get elected and then you just do whatever the puppetmasters told you to.

Facts on Dividends

2012-01-07T14:31:00.000-05:00

Dividends accounted for 20% of the 7.2% annualized total return to US stocks since 1950, 40% of the 1.6% average total return during the past decade, and 100% of the total return last year, (2011).

North Georgia in Winter

2012-01-05T21:34:00.000-05:00

The wealth pillagers in Washington, D.C.

2012-01-03T17:24:00.001-05:00

Our government indebtedness in America has a new record.

Our nation's debt on 12/31/2011 was at an all time record $15,222,940,045,451.09.

That works out to about $124,000 for every single American.

But hey, it's only debt.

Look deep into the eyes of our children and just tell it like it is.

Ron Paul

2012-01-03T13:59:00.000-05:00

Submitted to ZeroHedge.com by Charles Hugh Smith from Of Two Minds

The Ministry Of Propaganda Declares Ron Paul "Unelectable"

The Ministry of Propaganda has chosen to suppress the only dangerous-to-the-Power Elites candidate by declaring him "unelectable."

The Status Quo's Ministry of Propaganda has a single political task for 2012: eliminate the sole threat to the Status Quo (Ron Paul) from the running, leaving voters with a "choice" of clueless stooges for the Power Elite.

That roster includes President Obama and the daytime-TV/soap-opera field of Republicrat contenders.

The Ministry of Propaganda has settled on a ludicrous strategy to eliminate Ron Paul: declare Paul "unelectable."

As with all propaganda, the basic idea is that if it is repeated often enough on officially sanctioned stages, it will eventually be accepted as "true."

Our Christmas-New Year's week of family visits took us to homes where the television is on all the time, and as a result I was exposed to the Ministry of Propaganda's preferred media, TV "news." Regardless of the channel or program, the message was the same: "The presidential race will between Obama and either Romney or Gingrich."

Despite the polls that find Paul and Romney with equal levels of support in Iowa, Romney has been declared the front-runner and Paul written off as "unelectable."

In other words, the voters don't even need to check in; the Ministry of Propaganda's army of toadies, lackeys and media apparatchiks have their marching orders: repeat that Ron Paul is unelectable at every opportunity, either explicitly or implicitly via leaving him off the list of "frontrunners."

The Ministry of Propaganda's campaign is easily revealed by two simple thought experiments. How would the corporate media characterize Newt Gingrich's "electability" if he was running neck-and-neck with Romney? Answer: the media toadies would be falling over each other to declare Gingrich "electable."

Now repeat the experiment with Rick Santorum or Michelle Bachmann. The answer is the same: since these candidates are on the list of Power-Elites approved stooges, a showing equal to Ron Paul's would instantly win them veritable tsunamis of media coverage, all focused on their eminent "electability."

Here is the second thought experiment: does anyone seriously think any of the Republicrat candidates are even remotely qualified to deal with the crises brewing on the horizon? What exactly makes them "electable"?

Let's consider them one at a time, scrubbed of spin, PR and propaganda:

Mitt Romney: the perfect player for a remake of "The Stepford Wives" entitled "The Stepford Politicos." Romney is the personification of the telegenic, wealthy empty suit, devoid of any ideas beyond retreads of Status Quo tweaks that leave the Power Elite--of which he is a member--safely in charge.

Romney's "electability" rests on the hopes that the hard drives from his time as governor stay safely erased and that zombified voters conclude that having a family and membership in a church are sufficient qualifications for President.

His handlers have carefully studied the political satire The Candidate and have not yet formulated an answer to the question, "What do we do now?" should the wealthy pawn of the Power Elite improbably win the presidency.

Michelle Bachmann: Imagine her wearing a witch's hat, it isn't hard to do; Bachmann is the ideal Wicked Witch of the West, but without the charisma. She does have a host of frightful winged monkeys, though--her handlers.

Newt Gingrich: Gingrich has a number of redeeming characteristics, starting with his famously unsavory "baggage" that reveals an appealingly flawed core. He is also the only Republicrat candidate that wouldn't bore you to despair within a few minutes, i.e. he actually strays from the canned scripts approved by the Ministry of Propaganda. Third, on occasion he actually reveals glimmers of awareness that the next 10 years will not be like the previous decade, and that America is at a critical crossroads.

Unfortunately, his canned ideology-as-"solution" ideas expired a decade ago and he has no coherent vision of a future that isn't just a slightly modified version of the Power-Elite dominated one that is now hurtling toward instability.

He has shown a remarkable ability, however, to hide his horns and forked tail.

Rick Perry: Another telegenic empty suit who hoped that having a family and membership in a church qualified him for the presidency.

Rick Santorum: Rick's ruthlessness has its charm, starting with his long and painful campaign to establish a simulacrum of intellectual "seriousness." Like all the other stooges, his version of "the vision thing" is a tepid edit of the Status Quo. Like all the stooges other than the refreshingly flawed Gingrich, he hopes membership in a church qualifies him for the presidency.

What all the candidates but Ron Paul dare not acknowledge because it isn't on the approved Ministry of Propaganda script is that the Status Quo is heading off a cliff at the direct behest of the nation's Power Elite. The only candidate that has "the vision thing" and that clearly enunciates exactly how the Power Elite's policies have led the nation off a cliff of insolvency and Imperial hubris is Ron Paul.

For this sin against the Status Quo and its Power Elite, Paul has been excommunicated, and the (pardon my language) smarmy army of corporate media whores cannot declare him "unelectable" often enough.

That is proof that he is highly electable, for otherwise the Ministry of Propaganda wouldn't be running a campaign of such transparent desperation.

The Top 10 Wealth Pillagers in America today.........

2012-01-03T08:03:00.002-05:00

https://www.judicialwatch.org/corrupt-politicians-lists/washingtons-ten-most-wanted-corrupt-politicians-for-2011/

January 1, 2012

2012-01-01T14:34:00.001-05:00

There was nary a car on the roads in Alpharetta this morning at 6 a.m. Even McDonalds was closed for business. My traps were open for business and this is what New Years Day morning brought. I love the look of that black coyote don't you?

Whattaday!! Four more fawn killers on New Years Eve!

2011-12-31T16:32:00.000-05:00

I caught another four coyotes today which brings me to 8 the last two days. A nice way to ring in the New Year! The black one was a beauty but it was near the crack of dawn when we started checking traps. My two trapping friends had a nice "double" on a red fox and a big tom bobcat!

40 years later........

2011-12-30T19:05:00.000-05:00

It dawned on me today that I have been trapping fox for 40 years. Seems just like yesterday I caught my first red fox down on the Chippewa River on a mound set way back in the fall of 1972.

Here is what I caught today in north Georgia.

It's done, and down is down.............

2011-12-30T18:49:00.000-05:00

The S&P 500 traveled a marvelous 3240 total points close to close while amassing the 0.003181% loss it achieved on the year.

Eric Holder is an unacceptable trend....................

2011-12-28T18:54:00.000-05:00

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- In-the-line-of-duty deaths of law enforcement officers jumped 13% in 2011 compared to last year, according to preliminary figures released Wednesday by the National Law Enforcement Officers Memorial Fund.
A total of 173 federal, state and local officers have been killed in the United States, and the year is not quite over yet.
Gunfire accounted for the largest number of deaths, claiming 68 officers. That represents a 15% increase from 2010.
"This is a devastating and unacceptable trend," Attorney General Eric Holder said in a written statement.
"Each of these deaths is a tragic reminder of the threats that law enforcement officers face each day -- and the fact that too many guns have fallen into the hands of those who are not legally permitted to possess them."
The National Law Enforcement Memorial Fund notes that for the first time in 14 years, more police and other law enforcement agents died in shootings than in traffic accidents. This year, 64 officers were killed either in car or motorcycle crashes, or by being struck by vehicles while on the job.
"Drastic budget cuts affecting law enforcement agencies across the country have put our officers at grave risk," said Craig Floyd, the chairman of the memorial fund. Floyd and others have expressed concerns that in these tight economic times, there have been reductions in training and equipment for police.
Spurred by approximately 50 officer deaths early this year, Holder met with a number of police chiefs as well as federal law enforcement leaders in March to discuss what could be done and announced a Law Enforcement Safety Initiative. The program provides information and training.
Holder said in his Wednesday statement that a Justice Department program to help local police obtain bullet- and stab-resistant vests has saved 16 officers since January.
Florida has had the largest number of officer deaths this year -- a total of 14. That was followed by Texas with 13, New York with 11, and 10 fatalities in both California and Georgia.
In additions to gunshots and traffic accidents, law-enforcement deaths this year were caused by a variety of things including stabbings, falls and job-related illnesses.
The report provides some historical perspective -- the deadliest year for gunfire deaths of police in the United States was 1973, when 156 officers were shot and killed.
Gun deaths declined in recent decades, hitting a low of 40 officers lost in 2008.
"However, firearms-related fatalities have increased 70% from 2008 to 2011," according to the report.

Drew Brees

2011-12-26T23:38:00.000-05:00

Way beyond my bedtime to be watching a "normal" Monday night football game but this one was special.

Congratulations Mr. Brees on your single-season passing record in the NFL.

Growing up with the attitude to get it done!

2011-12-26T12:16:00.000-05:00

Chippewa Partners, Native American Advisors Inc. "Man of the Year, 2011"

2011-12-26T11:17:00.001-05:00

Our two award recipients this year both provide the truth and speak it.

Our co-winners for the 2011 "Man of the Year" award go to Judge Jed Rakoff and to "Tyler Durden" of ZeroHedge.com fame.

On behalf of both winners there will be a contribution made to the Dean Thomas Parisian Native American Scholarship Fund at the University of Minnesota, Morris.

Congratulations Judge Rakoff and to Tyler Durden and the crew at ZeroHedge.com!

Gretchen is the best at calling it straight!!!

2011-12-25T19:18:00.000-05:00

Foreclosure Relief? Don’t Hold Your Breath

By GRETCHEN MORGENSON

THROUGHOUT the foreclosure crisis, Washington has done little to help people hang on to their homes. All those programs that were supposed to help — HAMP, HARP, Hope for Homeowners — have mostly failed.
So many were skeptical when the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency announced yet another program in April. This one was intended to provide reparations to homeowners who’d been hurt financially by foreclosure abuses at banks.
As the details trickle out, the program looks like more of the disappointing same. “This is just the next program that’s getting people’s hopes up,” said Alys Cohen, staff attorney at the National Consumer Law Center in Washington. “Not only will it not help people, it could easily harm them.”
The program arose out of a regulatory review in late 2010 of loan servicing practices at the nation’s largest banks. The review followed the robo-signing scandal that erupted after consumer lawyers — not regulators, mind you — identified numerous apparent forgeries and other improper foreclosure documents filed with courts by banks and their representatives.
Last April, the banks agreed to fix problems found in the review and were required to hire independent consultants to audit their practices in 2009 and 2010. JPMorgan Chase engaged Deloitte, while Citibank and U.S. Bancorp hired PricewaterhouseCoopers. Three other banks hired Promontory Financial.
On Nov. 1, letters started going out to more than four million borrowers who were ensnared in the foreclosure process in the two years covered by the program. Those people were told how to request reviews of their cases. The letters also described 22 types of financial harm they might have experienced. Borrowers have until April 30 to request a review.
Obviously, this program has a lot of moving parts. But many of them are flawed, according to Ms. Cohen and other foreclosure experts.
Some of the problems were aired at a Senate subcommittee hearing on Dec. 13. Three Democrats — Robert Menendez of New Jersey, Jeff Merkley of Oregon and Jack Reed of Rhode Island — expressed doubts about the program to Julie L. Williams, chief counsel at the comptroller’s office. The senators were especially vocal about the potential for conflicts of interest among the consultants hired to conduct the reviews.
This is a real defect since the consultants were chosen by the banks that are paying them. And companies that have done work for these banks in the past, or that hope to do more work for them in the future, were not barred from taking on the assignments.
According to Ms. Williams, the comptroller’s office closely vetted the consultants to disqualify any that posed a conflict.
BUT Michael Olenick, a specialist in mortgage research, said he spotted a conflicted consultant after one hour of digging. Allonhill, a smallish firm appointed by Aurora Bank, a mortgage servicer, is headed by Sue Allon, whose previous small firm acted as credit risk manager in a 2003 mortgage pool for which Aurora oversaw the loans’ servicing. The prospectus on that deal noted that Murrayhill, Ms. Allon’s former firm, would “monitor and advise the servicers with respect to default management of the mortgage loans.” It also said that Murrayhill would make recommendations to the servicers regarding delinquent loans.
Now, under the comptroller office’s program, Ms. Allon’s firm may be analyzing the treatment of borrowers on whose loans it acted as credit risk manager. “This conflict is so deep and so obvious, how could anybody have missed it?” Mr. Olenick asked.
A representative for Ms. Allon wrote in an e-mail that Allonhill “focuses on a different area of the mortgage industry than Murrayhill did.” She said the foreclosure information Allonhill was reviewing for Aurora was “outside the scope of what was provided to Murrayhill.”
Aurora did not comment.
JPMorgan Chase’s hiring of Deloitte to analyze foreclosure practices also raises questions. Deloitte was the auditor not only for Washington Mutual, the huge mortgage lender that collapsed in 2008, but also for Bear Stearns, another defunct firm. Both WaMu and Bear were acquired by JPMorgan, so any loans they made may come under scrutiny by the same firm that audited their books.
Nye Lavalle, a foreclosure fraud expert who began warning bank executives about bad lending practices back in 1999, is troubled by this situation. “This review process is a wink-wink, nod-nod,” he said.
JPMorgan and Deloitte declined to comment.
Robert Garsson, a spokesman for the comptroller’s office, said the regulator was satisfied with its vetting process. “We were particularly focused on situations where consultants and law firms may have previously worked on issues they would be called upon to evaluate in the review process,” he said in a statement. “If we identify conflicts that were not apparent at the time the engagement letters were signed, we will take steps to address them.”
Beyond the potential for conflicts, Ms. Cohen pointed to other flaws in the program. For instance, she said the years under review were not when most subprime loans were put into foreclosure. Many predatory loans are likely to be excluded from the analysis.
Even more problematic, Ms. Cohen said, is the fact that the program has left troubled borrowers who participate in it unprotected against further damage. For example, participants in line to get remuneration may be asked to give up their rights to defend themselves if they get into financial trouble again.
“This process is not meant to fix the original lending practices, so people need to hang on to their right to challenge the original loan later,” she said.
She also noted that borrowers in the process of having their cases reviewed could still lose their homes under the program. “O.C.C. has said their policy will involve an escalation process and expedited review of people in a certain proximity to a foreclosure sale,” Ms. Cohen said. “But the sale itself is not being stayed in any systematic way.”
None of this surprises Ms. Cohen or others familiar with the regulator. “This is the O.C.C . that we’re talking about,” she said. “It has a long record of favoring banks over homeowners.”

Today, 1100 days later......Nothing has changed, No one is in jail

2011-12-25T14:58:00.000-05:00

"Although we at the Federal Reserve remain focused on addressing the current risks to economic and financial stability, we have also begun thinking about the lessons for the future. I have discussed today two strategies for reducing systemic risk: strengthening the financial infrastructure, broadly construed, and increasing the systemwide focus of financial regulation and supervision. Work on the financial infrastructure is already well under way, and I expect further progress as the public and private sectors cooperate to address common concerns. The adoption of a regulatory and supervisory approach with a heavier macroprudential focus has a strong rationale, but we should be careful about over-promising, as we are still rather far from having the capacity to implement such an approach in a thoroughgoing way. The Federal Reserve will continue to work with the Congress, other regulators, and the private sector to explore this and other strategies to increase financial stability."

Ben S. Bernanke

Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City's Annual Economic Symposium, Jackson Hole, Wyoming

August 22, 2008

A Minnesota Collegiate Christmas Party...........

2011-12-24T16:28:00.001-05:00

http://www.carlsonschool.umn.edu/holiday11/

Christmas Eve, 2011

2011-12-24T16:17:00.000-05:00

Just back in the Big A from Pamelot. Nice to be at the 801 once again.

There are some north Georgia coyotes that are in the last week of their life and don't know it.

The Dean Parisian edition of the 2011-2012 Georgia coyote trapping seasons starts soon!

Now to catch the mice that tore up my bird seed bags! Does Santa make mouse traps?

Michael Savage

2011-12-21T22:41:00.002-05:00

If you are sitting around surfing Facebook like tens of millions do every day you might want to shut off the social media and educate yourself. That's right, learn somthing. Sound foreign to you doesn't it? You might actually learn something about America, how it runs and who runs it.

Listen to this guy every night.

http://www.iheart.com/#/live/737/?autoplay=true

It's nice to live and work in Milton

2011-12-21T08:47:00.002-05:00

It may be one of Georgia’s newest cities, but Milton is already one of the best places to live in the state, according to a new study.
The study conducted by Business Journals and based on the U.S. Census Bureau's 2009 American Community survey, ranks the City of Milton as having the highest quality of life in Georgia, and the ninth best in the south.
Milton Spokesman Jason Wright tells WSB the study looked at economic factors, as well as quality of housing and education.
"It's a beautiful place with very intelligent, engaged residents," said Wright.
More than 96 percent of Milton residents older than 25 have a high school diploma, 66 percent have a bachelor's degree, and more than 20 percent have advanced degrees.
According to the survey, Milton had a median household income of $117,608, more than double the national median of roughly $50,000. It also had a tremendously low poverty rate for families of only 2.82 percent compared to the national average of 11.1 percent.
Wright says as a young city, they're constantly trying to put themselves on the map, both literally and figuratively.
"We are only five years old and this was the first time that we've ever been recognized for anything like this," said Wright.

Too Big To Jail Corzine

2011-12-19T15:02:00.000-05:00

TBTJ. Only the finest web site on the planet, ZeroHedge.com could come up with that moniker!

I thought this was an excellent story on Corzine and MF Global. I bet you will too!

Submitted by Nomi Prins

Jon Corzine, MF Global, and Unaccountability

In April 2007, former New Jersey governor, 'honorable', Jon Corzine had an altercation with a Garden State Parkway guardrail. A year later, he addressed a bevy of reporters at the swanky Drumthwacket mansion and expressed appreciation for “family, friends, and the fragility of life.” During his recovery period, he advocated seatbelt safety, before returning to New Jersey's budget, extracting $500 million in austerity measures from farmers, educators, and environmentalists, and hiking tolls on New Jersey roadways.

On the one-year anniversary of his accident, his chief-of-staff, Bradley I. Abelow declared, “Corzine has returned to his former self as a thorough and exacting boss.” (Italics mine.)

Fast forward to the current MF Global flameout. Abelow shifted to Corzine’s Chief Operating Officer. And not only did Corzine ratchet up the ante on ways to really piss off farmers, but after several days of engaging in verbal dodge ball with Congress, this ‘thorough and exacting boss’ maintained his Forest Gump type cloak of secrecy regarding the stolen $1.2 billion of his customers’ segregated money.

After days of political-reality TV, we knew nothing more about its evaporation. Corzine and his stewards, Abelow and Chief Financial Officer, Henri Steenkamp, executed a perfect chorus of ‘I don’t recalls’, ‘I didn’t intends’ and ‘the butler did its’.

For the most part, testimony from the various regulators didn’t shed additional light on the ‘missing’ funds either (everyone’s extremely sorry and deep in search mode) but they did reveal extreme, pass-the-blame incompetence, in the spirit of AIG.

Acronym alert. SEC director, Robert Cook testified that MF Global Holding Company (like AIG) had no official consolidated supervisor regulating it; one of its subsidiaries, MF Global UK Limited, fell under the UK Financial Services Authority (FSA.) The other one, MF Global Inc. (MFGI) was registered under the Commodity Futures Trade Commission (CFTC) as a FCM (futures commission merchant) and also, under the SEC as a broker-dealer. It was the Chicago Board of Options Exchange (CBOE) supposedly overseeing MFGI’s broker-dealer activities, while its futures activities fell under the CFTC, National Futures Association and the Chicago Mercantile Exchange (CME). Somewhere in the mix lurked the private self-regulatory body, the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA). Really, how many inept regulatory bodies does it take to screw customers out of $1.2 billion?

But, here’s how we know Corzine was lying – besides the nervous body movements.

During the summer of 2011, the CBOE and FINRA told MF Global Inc. that it didn’t have enough capital behind its repo-to-maturity (RTM) positions in European sovereign bonds – the positions Corzine put on. By mid-August, the SEC got involved and met with Corzine and other MF Globalites. They then had to file a net capital deficiency notice on August 25^th for $150 million.

During the week of October, 17^th – MF Global Holding had to increase capital again at MFGI - for the same positions. The next week, on October 25^th, it released abysmal quarterly earnings, and got downgraded to almost junk status. The stock plummeted and customers were heading for the hills, the fastest ones getting their money out, others getting locked out. The SEC set up camp at MF Global headquarters in Manhattan on October 27^th to “monitor the situation” and “engage with senior management regarding the steps that were being taken by the firm” regarding possibilities like selling the firm, selling the customer business, or selling the RTM positions.

On Sunday afternoon, October 30, a perspective buyer for MFGI’s customer business emerged: Interactive Brokers (whose judgment I question, so watch out for them). In the wee hours of Monday morning, October 31, – the ‘missing’ funds were detected. Interactive Brokers balked. Bankruptcy proceedings begun at 9 AM.

The CME’s testimony stated that just past mid-night on October 31,^st Christine Serwinski, the chief financial officer of MF Global's North American division, and Edith O’Brien, a treasurer, told Mike Procajlo, an exchange auditor that about $700 million in customer money was transferred on October 27th, 28th and possibly October 26 from the broker-dealer side of the business to ‘meeting liquidity issues.’ The CME hadn’t noticed this while reviewing the firm’s books prior to bankruptcy. Another $175 million was used by MF Global UK.

The CFTC disclosed that MF Global’s general counsel, Laurie Ferber notified them Monday evening, October 31st about “a significant shortfall in its segregated funds account”. Neither the SEC, nor the CME had picked up on this beforehand.

As a broker-dealer registered with the SEC, MFGI was not just subject to CFTC rules, but also to the SEC's customer protection rule that prohibits use of customer funds or securities to support proprietary trading or expenses. It also prohibits customer funds or assets from being pledged as collateral for the firm’s own trades or to raise funds, plus requires a reserve account be maintained that is bigger than their holdings – just in case.

The CFTC has a more lax rule, called Reg 1.25, weakened courtesy of MF Global, JPM Chase, and others that enables segregated customer funds to be used for investing in foreign sovereign bonds (investing – not posting as margin or acting as collateral). But as Janet Tavakoli pointed out in her excellent MF Global analysis; the ‘missing’ customer funds were not in the currency of the foreign sovereign bonds, as per the rule’s stipulation. Plus, none of the required replacement assets were held against those funds. Indeed, there is no element of Reg 1.25, the reg cited as a potential legal loophole by various media, that allows segregated customer funds to be used for risky purposes – like saving a firm from destruction long enough to sell it. Translation – the ‘missing’ funds were stolen against rules, from their rightful segregated customer accounts. Corzine claimed no knowledge of this.

But the reality is - the clock ran out on Corzine’s big bet and customer funds were the only way to keep it ticking until a potential sale of the firm could be confirmed. If the funds hadn’t been switched, the firms seeking margins would have taken losses. The motive was to optically alter the appearance of MF Global and exit, leaving the bag with someone else. You can’t have that clear a motive and no idea of how to achieve it. It’s implausible.

Let me put $1.2 billion into a perspective that the House committees didn’t. According to its second quarter SEC filing, MF Global had $3.7 billion of available liquidity. The funds were equivalent to a third of that liquidity. That’s not a tiny figure. If you’re running a firm buckling under the weight of the bets you’re losing, you’re damn well aware of your liquidity lines – they are your life raft.

Besides that, MF Global’s net revenue for the second quarter was $206 million and for the six months ending September 30, 2011, it was $520 million. The ‘missing’ customer money was more than twice the firm’s net for the first half of their year.

To recap. Corzine was obsessed with the European sovereign bet. So, he fired his risk officer, Michael Roseman for questioning it, and replaced him with a yes-man, Michael Stockman whose job description appeared to have included stroking Corzine's – er – ego, and to remain quiet about any trade concerns. He rides the trade through a succession of flailing earnings and intense market volatility, while meeting with regulators questioning its sustainability. He knows he’s got to pony up a chunk of capital in the summer to appease them and stick with it. And when finally, MF Global’s ratings were downgraded on October 25th, a bunch of calls transpire between him and NY Fed head and former Goldmanite, William Dudley before the firm goes bankrupt a week later, with nearly $1.2 billion in customer money ‘missing.’

We’re supposed to believe this ‘thorough and exacting’ man knew nothing about where it went? Or that his sense of entitlement and bravado was so big, he didn’t think it was wrong to take that money? Or that he wasn’t aware it was available? At all?

No. Not possible. And yet, over half a dozen regulatory bodies were oblivious to the fund heist. Finding Corzine guilty of a crime would be like asking them to indict themselves. The CFTC Enforcement division can refer criminal matters to the Department of Justice for prosecution. But the DOJ has punted on every Wall Street crime related to the 2008 subprime crisis. So what will probably happen – is that Corzine may get a little fine from the Washington regulators. Legislators will move on to figuring out how to incorporate MF Global into stump speeches. Those that had their money stolen will battle it out in civil suits for years. And again, no lessons will be learned. No practices altered. No heads will roll.

CNBC cheerleaders

2011-12-19T09:50:00.000-05:00

The cheerleading crew is out in force this morning. The only thing missing is the pom-poms.

Rick Santelli is the only voice of sanity.

Afghanistan and the United States

2011-12-16T21:44:00.000-05:00

Wars are expensive. Why is America sending Americans into combat there? What are we doing there?

They will never be a democracy. Somebody, anybody?

Tom Smith of AT&T

2011-12-16T14:51:00.000-05:00

The world lost a good man last night. Tom Smith went on ahead. What a great guy, husband, father and football fanatic. It is almost uncanny that you would have left us on the way home from the Falcons game. Your good nature, your friendship, your wonderful humor and your love for Clemson football will never be forgotten. Rest in peace, Tom Smith!

Amazing Statistics, from ZeroHedge.com

2011-12-16T14:28:00.000-05:00

The Economic Collapse Blog does a terrific job of periodically putting together a compilation of the scariest data points about the US economy. Today is one such day, and the list of 50 economic numbers presented is indeed, as the author puts it, "almost too crazy to believe"... Almost. As noted: "At this time of the year, a lot of families get together, and in most homes the conversation usually gets around to politics at some point. Hopefully many of you will use the list below as a tool to help you share the reality of the U.S. economic crisis with your family and friends. If we all work together, hopefully we can get millions of people to wake up and realize that "business as usual" will result in a national economic apocalypse." Or, far more likely, 99% of the population can continue watching Dancing with the Stars, as what little wealth remains is terminally transferred to those who are paying attention right below everyone's eyes.

From the Ecopnomic Collapse Blog:

The following are 50 economic numbers from 2011 that are almost too crazy to believe....

#1 A staggering 48 percent of all Americans are either considered to be "low income" or are living in poverty.

#2 Approximately 57 percent of all children in the United States are living in homes that are either considered to be "low income" or impoverished.

#3 If the number of Americans that "wanted jobs" was the same today as it was back in 2007, the "official" unemployment rate put out by the U.S. government would be up to 11 percent.

#4 The average amount of time that a worker stays unemployed in the United States is now over 40 weeks.

#5 One recent survey found that 77 percent of all U.S. small businesses do not plan to hire any more workers.

#6 There are fewer payroll jobs in the United States today than there were back in 2000 even though we have added 30 million extra people to the population since then.

#7 Since December 2007, median household income in the United States has declined by a total of 6.8% once you account for inflation.

#8 According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, 16.6 million Americans were self-employed back in December 2006. Today, that number has shrunk to 14.5 million.

#9 A Gallup poll from earlier this year found that approximately one out of every five Americans that do have a job consider themselves to be underemployed.

#10 According to author Paul Osterman, about 20 percent of all U.S. adults are currently working jobs that pay poverty-level wages.

#11 Back in 1980, less than 30% of all jobs in the United States were low income jobs. Today, more than 40% of all jobs in the United States are low income jobs.

#12 Back in 1969, 95 percent of all men between the ages of 25 and 54 had a job. In July, only 81.2 percent of men in that age group had a job.

#13 One recent survey found that one out of every three Americans would not be able to make a mortgage or rent payment next month if they suddenly lost their current job.

#14 The Federal Reserve recently announced that the total net worth of U.S. households declined by 4.1 percent in the 3rd quarter of 2011 alone.

#15 According to a recent study conducted by the BlackRock Investment Institute, the ratio of household debt to personal income in the United States is now 154 percent.

#16 As the economy has slowed down, so has the number of marriages. According to a Pew Research Center analysis, only 51 percent of all Americans that are at least 18 years old are currently married. Back in 1960, 72 percent of all U.S. adults were married.

#17 The U.S. Postal Service has lost more than 5 billion dollars over the past year.

#18 In Stockton, California home prices have declined 64 percent from where they were at when the housing market peaked.

#19 Nevada has had the highest foreclosure rate in the nation for 59 months in a row.

#20 If you can believe it, the median price of a home in Detroit is now just $6000.

#21 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 18 percent of all homes in the state of Florida are sitting vacant. That figure is 63 percent larger than it was just ten years ago.

#22 New home construction in the United States is on pace to set a brand new all-time record low in 2011.

#23 As I have written about previously, 19 percent of all American men between the ages of 25 and 34 are now living with their parents.

#24 Electricity bills in the United States have risen faster than the overall rate of inflation for five years in a row.

#25 According to the Bureau of Economic Analysis, health care costs accounted for just 9.5% of all personal consumption back in 1980. Today they account for approximately 16.3%.

#26 One study found that approximately 41 percent of all working age Americans either have medical bill problems or are currently paying off medical debt.

#27 If you can believe it, one out of every seven Americans has at least 10 credit cards.

#28 The United States spends about 4 dollars on goods and services from China for every one dollar that China spends on goods and services from the United States.

#29 It is being projected that the U.S. trade deficit for 2011 will be 558.2 billion dollars.

#30 The retirement crisis in the United States just continues to get worse. According to the Employee Benefit Research Institute, 46 percent of all American workers have less than $10,000 saved for retirement, and 29 percent of all American workers have less than $1,000 saved for retirement.

#31 Today, one out of every six elderly Americans lives below the federal poverty line.

#32 According to a study that was just released, CEO pay at America's biggest companies rose by 36.5% in just one recent 12 month period.

#33 Today, the "too big to fail" banks are larger than ever. The total assets of the six largest U.S. banks increased by 39 percent between September 30, 2006 and September 30, 2011.

#34 The six heirs of Wal-Mart founder Sam Walton have a net worth that is roughly equal to the bottom 30 percent of all Americans combined.

#35 According to an analysis of Census Bureau data done by the Pew Research Center, the median net worth for households led by someone 65 years of age or older is 47 times greater than the median net worth for households led by someone under the age of 35.

#36 If you can believe it, 37 percent of all U.S. households that are led by someone under the age of 35 have a net worth of zero or less than zero.

#37 A higher percentage of Americans is living in extreme poverty (6.7%) than has ever been measured before.

#38 Child homelessness in the United States is now 33 percent higher than it was back in 2007.

#39 Since 2007, the number of children living in poverty in the state of California has increased by 30 percent.

#40 Sadly, child poverty is absolutely exploding all over America. According to the National Center for Children in Poverty, 36.4% of all children that live in Philadelphia are living in poverty, 40.1% of all children that live in Atlanta are living in poverty, 52.6% of all children that live in Cleveland are living in poverty and 53.6% of all children that live in Detroit are living in poverty.

#41 Today, one out of every seven Americans is on food stamps and one out of every four American children is on food stamps.

#42 In 1980, government transfer payments accounted for just 11.7% of all income. Today, government transfer payments account for more than 18 percent of all income.

#43 A staggering 48.5% of all Americans live in a household that receives some form of government benefits. Back in 1983, that number was below 30 percent.

#44 Right now, spending by the federal government accounts for about 24 percent of GDP. Back in 2001, it accounted for just 18 percent.

#45 For fiscal year 2011, the U.S. federal government had a budget deficit of nearly 1.3 trillion dollars. That was the third year in a row that our budget deficit has topped one trillion dollars.

#46 If Bill Gates gave every single penny of his fortune to the U.S. government, it would only cover the U.S. budget deficit for about 15 days.

#47 Amazingly, the U.S. government has now accumulated a total debt of 15 trillion dollars. When Barack Obama first took office the national debt was just 10.6 trillion dollars.

#48 If the federal government began right at this moment to repay the U.S. national debt at a rate of one dollar per second, it would take over 440,000 years to pay off the national debt.

#49 The U.S. national debt has been increasing by an average of more than 4 billion dollars per day since the beginning of the Obama administration.

#50 During the Obama administration, the U.S. government has accumulated more debt than it did from the time that George Washington took office to the time that Bill Clinton took office.

As for the culprit, there is no surprise here - all central planning, all the time.

Of course the heart of our economic problems is the Federal Reserve. The Federal Reserve is a perpetual debt machine, it has almost completely destroyed the value of the U.S. dollar and it has an absolutely nightmarish track record of incompetence. If the Federal Reserve system had never been created, the U.S. economy would be in far better shape. The federal government needs to shut down the Federal Reserve and start issuing currency that is not debt-based. That would be a very significant step toward restoring prosperity to America.

During 2011 we made a lot of progress in educating the American people about our economic problems, but we still have a long way to go.

Hopefully next year more Americans than ever will wake up, because 2012 is going to represent a huge turning point for this country.

Indeed it will - in it America will pick yet another president that it so rightfully deserves.

Hey you, ask yourself this question, come on, be honest......

2011-12-15T15:07:00.000-05:00

How often do you suppose money "disappears" at Goldman Sachs and the fiduciary or manager in charge gets away with it?

Bill Yellowtail, surely a relative of my friend, Robert Yellowtail

2011-12-14T19:01:00.002-05:00

“Privatizing land is fine but it falls far short of the answer,” says Yellowtail. “Our people don’t understand business. After 10 or 15 generations of not being involved in business, they’ve lost their feel for it. Capitalism is considered threatening to our identity, our traditions. Successful entrepreneurs are considered sell-outs, they’re ostracized. We have to promote the dignity of self-sufficiency among Indians. Instead we have a culture of malaise: ‘The tribe will take care of us.’ We accept the myth of communalism. And we don’t value education. We resist it.”

But Yellowtail believes that the situation is improving. He says there are more entrepreneurs than 20 years ago as networks of Native American business people have sprung up in Montana and elsewhere. “We have to start with micro loans, encouraging small businesses. Then we have to make it okay to leave the reservation because the most successful are going to want to branch out. Entrepreneurs are going to have to stick their neck out, be a role model. We Indians are going to have to do it.”

Morality in a WalMartian America

2011-12-14T09:40:00.000-05:00

Christmas, like at all times of the year, a time to share, to give and help those less fortunate.

I live close to a WalMart store. If anyone from the WalMart brass wants to see theft in action I encourage you to give me a call and we can drive on over to the store or I can meet you there and we will see all kinds of theft in action. Almost 100% of the time I go to WalMart and look for theft I can find it.

Easy. Yes it is sad. It's unfair in many ways. Here's a young lady who tells it straight on what is wrong with America.

http://thecollegeconservative.com/2011/12/13/my-time-at-walmart-why-we-need-serious-welfare-reform/

$50 Grand a month buys what?

2011-12-11T17:28:00.000-05:00

I bet the old Arkansas duck hunter will try to distance himself from this quagmire faster then he went after the intern with the blue dress in the Oval Office. The problem for America is that Corzine is like Bank of America. Too Big To Jail. TBTJ.

http://nation.foxnews.com/mf-global/2011/12/05/report-bill-clinton-reaped-big-bucks-corzine-firm-collapse

Who pays? Do you?

2011-12-11T17:16:00.000-05:00

http://usgovinfo.about.com/od/incometaxandtheirs/a/whopaysmost.htm

Doug Server

2011-12-11T16:36:00.000-05:00

Good guy, father, a giver. Rest in peace.

Sandi Lewis of San Diego, California

2011-12-11T12:48:00.001-05:00

My friend, you lost your worldly battle on Friday, December 9th. You were a friend who inspired, a woman with grace, warmth, fun, intellect and charm. You will alway be remembered that way.

To your precious daughter, your loving husband, to the world, you are gone.

Your inspiration to all those who knew you will live forever. May God hold you close as he did your parents. I know you would want us to celebrate your life. Thank you for your friendship, and may God be with you.

Wake Up America

2011-12-09T17:44:00.001-05:00

America sits idly by. The Congress-critters are all at home tonight, sitting smug on what they all "do" for their constituents.    Any change in Native America? Nope. The casino skim continues.

There is no budget, no discussion of what ails America.   They are talking about trading pipelines for payroll taxes. What on earth is up with that?   No immigration reform, no social security reform, no tax code reform. It is just business as usual with $15 trillion in debt.

They don't even ask the right questions of Corzine and the nonsense of having time limits on each inquisitor of Corzine is laughable.   The buffoonery continues.

All of these mobsters should all be voted out.

Alpharetta fee-only investment manager

2011-12-09T17:05:00.000-05:00

That would be Chippewa Partners for those of you who still believe that salesmen-stockbrokers still have your best interests at heart. If you want a true fiduciary Registered Investment Advisory firm to work for you we are easy to contact.

Divorce versus Murder

2011-12-08T10:49:00.000-05:00

A nice, calm and respectable lady went into the pharmacy, walked up to the pharmacist, looked straight into his eyes, and said, "I would like to buy some cyanide.

The pharmacist asked, "Why in the world do you need cyanide?"

The lady replied, "I need it to poison my husband."

The pharmacist's eyes got big and he explained, "Lord have mercy!

I can't give you cyanide to kill your husband, that's against the law. I'll lose my license! They'll throw both of us in jail! All kinds of bad things will happen. Absolutely not! You CANNOT have any cyanide!"

The lady reached into her purse and pulled out a picture of her husband in bed with the pharmacist's wife. The pharmacist looked at the picture and replied, "You didn't tell me you had a prescription."

Quote of the Decade, maybe of our entire American history

2011-12-08T10:24:00.002-05:00

The fact that we are here today to debate raising America 's debt limit is a sign of leadership failure. It is a sign that the US Government cannot pay its own bills. It is a sign that we now depend on ongoing financial assistance from foreign countries to finance our Government's reckless fiscal policies. Increasing America 's debt weakens us domestically and internationally. Leadership means that, "the buck stops here.' Instead, Washington is shifting the burden of bad choices today onto the backs of our children and grandchildren. America has a debt problem and a failure of leadership. Americans deserve better.”
~ Senator Barack H. Obama, March 2006

Lies by Corzine today............

2011-12-08T10:03:00.003-05:00

The under/over on how many times Corzine pleads the 5th is 7 times today.

Place your bets.

I'll lay odds that Corzine is not going to do 14 days compared to Blago's 14 years.

South Georgia

2011-12-07T12:12:00.000-05:00

There is an entire generation "lost" down there. There is almost zero desire to work.

Many, if not most of the younger generation have no clue about work, working, work ethic, love of work, incentives or how to remain employed. It is like being in a communist country.

All Obama voters.

If you know this soldier........

2011-12-06T18:19:00.000-05:00

This young fighter might make the best hire on the planet. If there is an H.R. department with any hutzpah they best look him up.

http://www.mywarvideo.com/play.php?vid=132

Jail for Jon Corzine? Does anybody care?

2011-12-03T07:05:00.001-05:00

Why Jon Corzine isn't in prison stripes and cuffs for his Congressional hearing next week is hard to fathom.   Frank Lucas should have some sense and do the right thing, let Jeff Liddle and his firm into the fray and clean up right from wrong. Nope, look who gives to Frank's coffers. These psychopaths think they won't be prosecuted for anything. NO ONE has been indicted in the last few years for this insane mess.

Corzine stole hundreds of millions, maybe billions of unmargined customer cash, the CME didn't allow those customers to trade their options for a full week, costing actual ranchers and farmers hedging their business expectations like they must, hundreds of millions, and now they're talking about clawbacks of cash from recent customers who may even be totally out of the exchange altogether when the company went under!   You steal a $6 item from WalMart today and go straight to jail.

Then you have creditors like BoA who think they should have first dibs at the bankruptcy.  It's insane. If everyone is not made whole, EVERYONE, then the sacred law preventing the co-mingling of customer cash is destroyed, as is the trust in all brokers. If Corzine gets off on this, that means they can all get off, they can all say, for example, some broker like Schwab or Fidelity or Ameritrade or Interactive Brokers or Morgan Stanley can say "oh sure you have x number of shares in some company, see it says there right on our web page, and all sorts of cash there too, see it on the screen there?" Meanwhile, they could be doing exactly as MF Global's prop desk was doing, using that cash for their own purposes.

There is no gray area here, Corzine should go to straight to jail and the customers must be made whole, with the creditors taking ALL OF THE LOSSES. The whole system is destroyed because of the way this was handled. There is a clear path to make things right, and if they stray from it at all, then the whole thing is a goner.

Here's some of the latest that should make any investor shudder:   Click here: MF Customer: $50M Commodity Account Gone - Bloomberg

TEAM PARISIAN, Montana, 2011

2011-12-02T17:32:00.000-05:00

If you can't laugh at this.............

2011-12-02T16:29:00.001-05:00

A man boarded an airplane and took his seat. As he settled in, he glanced up and saw the most beautiful woman boarding the plane. He soon realized she was heading straight towards his seat . As fate would have it, she took the seat right beside his. Eager to strike up a conversation he blurted out, "Business trip or pleasure?"

She turned, smiled and said, "Business. I'm going to the Annual Nymphomaniacs of America Convention in Boston "

He swallowed hard. Here was the most gorgeous woman he had ever seen sitting next to him, and she was going to a meeting of nymphomaniacs. Struggling to maintain his composure, he calmly asked, "What's your business role at this convention?""Lecturer," she responded. "I use information that I have learned from my personal experiences to debunk some of the popular myths about sexuality. "Really?" he said. "And what kind of myths are there?"

"Well," she explained, "one popular myth is that African-American men are the most well-endowed of all men, when in fact it is the Native American Indian who is most likely to possess that trait.

Another popular myth is that Frenchmen are the best lovers, when actually it is men of Jewish descent who are the best.

I have also discovered that the lover with absolutely the best stamina is the Southern Redneck."

Suddenly the woman became a little uncomfortable and blushed. "I'm
sorry," she said, "I shouldn't really be discussing all of this with you. I
don't even know your name."

"Tonto," the man said, "Tonto Goldstein, but my friends call me
Bubba."

Envy, uncensored...........

2011-12-02T16:10:00.000-05:00

Click here: Adam Carolla explains the OWS Generation - YouTube

Smart guy, pay attention for your own good............

2011-12-02T15:56:00.001-05:00

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/kyle-bass-explains-new-world-order

Herman Cain and Tiger Woods.......

2011-12-02T08:40:00.000-05:00

They seem to have alot in common.........alot!

Ignorance at Thanksgiving

2011-11-18T13:14:00.002-05:00

This week has been a doozy! American media can't get enough of the few hundred OWS crowd it seems. The blow-by-blow coverage of the mob mentality doesn't astound me, it sickens me. A few hundred slackers getting together and sharing STD's for some reason isn't the same as 46,000,000 on food stamps.

Of half of the American work force NOT paying a dime in tax.

Or open borders, wide-open borders.

Or a bankrupt Social Security System.

Or the Obama healthcare billl that is holding up corporate hiring.

Or the sound bites that the GOP candidates spout at each other.

Or the military industrial complex "owning" Obama and opening up a new revenue stream in Australia this week.

Or $600,000,000 missing from citizens accounts at MF Global.

Or the Fed keeping interest rates artificially low to rob and plunder the retirees of America.

On second thought, there are plenty of sales to be found in your Christmas shopping. Get after it this weekend so you won't have to deal with the thieves at the mall next week and the week after. But be careful of your personal spending because your country owes $15,000,000,000,000, yes folks, that is Trillion in debt.

Enjoy your Thanksgiving. We have much to be thankful. Gratitude is a gift, share it.

Today, we are fortunate to call ourselves American. And give some thought to many Native Americans this week for taking good care of the first settlers to our shores. They needed all the help they could get then. In many ways, we still need all the help we can get now.

CNBC cheerleaders

2011-11-18T09:57:00.000-05:00

are at it again.........Cramer telling the world how bad Europe is compared to the United States takes the cake. Leaving the sound on when watching CNBC is grounds for termination around here.

Darla Leslie, NAJA

2011-11-17T07:12:00.000-05:00

Your resignation was rather unusual.

What "fix" is needed other than some smarts about handling money?

Sad numbers for America, my children and yours..........

2011-11-16T18:06:00.002-05:00

Too sad for commentary, but here is some math: total US debt has increased by 41.5%, or $4.4 trillion, from $10,626,877,048,913 on January 20, to $15,033,607,255,920, under Obama as president.

(as a reminder the most recently updated debt ceiling is $15.194 trillion)

Clients have so much to be thankful for.........

2011-11-16T15:13:00.001-05:00

http://www.chippewapartners.com/ria

Geez, all I wanted for Christmas was some CRP fields..........

2011-11-15T13:24:00.000-05:00

Secret farm bill’ primed for passage in debt deal

By Erik Wasson - 11/15/11 05:15 AM ET

Lawmakers on the House and Senate Agriculture committees are trying to write a new five-year farm bill through the supercommittee process.
The legislators are using the supercommittee to avoid what would be a more public, election-year debate in 2012, when the current farm bill expires and new legislation would be scheduled for writing, according to critics of the effort.
“We call it the secret farm bill,” said one environmental activist, who worries that if the lawmakers succeed, it will prop up U.S. farm payments through 2017.

Environmental groups and poverty advocates say the supercommittee should dismiss the recommendations from the farm-state lawmakers, which are expected to be delivered later this week. The recommendations are expected to propose the replacement of some existing farm payments with a new crop insurance program and new payments that would be linked to commodity prices.
While some of the changes lawmakers are expected to propose would save billions on paper, critics say the new farm payments could balloon in cost if commodity prices fall.
Opponents also worry the lawmakers are trying to get around longtime critics of the farm bill who for years have said the legislation is a symbol of waste that costs taxpayers money while hurting farmers in poor countries who do not receive similar levels of support.
“They are completely trying to write a whole new farm subsidy program,” a second activist said. “They are making an end-run around people who question these programs.”
An advantage of locking in the changes through the supercommittee is that the panel’s recommendations must get an up-or-down vote in Congress. That would give less leverage to opponents of farm subsidies.
Ben Becker, a spokesman for the Senate Agriculture Committee, defended the effort to propose farm bill changes to the supercommittee.
“Either the supercommittee would in essence write the Farm Bill, with no hearings or public input, or the Agriculture Committees and the communities we represent would have a voice. Democrats and Republicans are working hard within the process that’s been imposed on us to develop a sound bipartisan and bicameral recommendation that members of both parties can support,” he said.
But the secrecy of the process has even some farm lobbyists raising questions.

“All big legislation is written behind closed doors, but they are doing this is in such a compressed way,“ one longtime agricultural lobbyist said. “I am having trouble finding out what’s going on.”
The proposals from Senate Agriculture Committee Chairwoman Debbie Stabenow (D-Mich.) and ranking member Pat Roberts (R-Kan.) and House Agriculture Chairman Frank Lucas (R-Okla.) and ranking member Collin Peterson (D-Minn.), who have been negotiating for weeks, are expected to include a new type of revenue-based insurance for some crops as well as a bolstered price-triggered payment for other crops.
The Agriculture committees had been asked to deliver recommendations on $23 billion in cuts over the next 10 years by Nov. 1, but they missed that deadline.

Different commodity groups have been trying to maximize their payments by pushing their own formulas, which has lengthened and complicated the lawmakers’ effort.
The $23 billion package is expected to include billions in cuts to nutrition and conservation programs, but the biggest chunk, estimated at $13 billion, would come from payments to farmers.
Stabenow has focused on a new revenue-based “shallow loss” insurance program that is supported by corn, wheat, barley, soy and canola farmers.
Lucas, with the support of rice and peanut farmers, wants to modify the existing price-based payment to farmers for those crops.
Payments to cotton farmers have been a sticking point, and they are set to get their own program, also linked to commodity prices.
Farmers now receive “direct payments” that are based on historical production. This means that even if the farmer produces nothing, payments from the government can still be received.
The farm safety net includes subsidized crop insurance and countercyclical and marketing loan payments that rise when prices fall. These latter payments are intended to help farmer survive dramatic changes in world prices.
Outrage over direct payments going to farmers who no longer farm has led the Agriculture committees to largely agree that direct payments need to be replaced.
Stabenow’s proposed “shallow loss” insurance program would complement traditional crop insurance. The program would pay farmers for small losses typically not covered by existing insurance.
The proposed replacement payments for cotton, rice and peanuts would be based on higher “target” prices. If the market falls below the higher “target,” the government would pay farmers the difference through countercyclical payments or marketing loans.
The American Farm Bureau decided to oppose the shallow-loss proposal, arguing that it will encourage farmers to take on excessive risk.
Environmental and international poverty advocates are against the whole process.
The groups believe higher price-based payments promote overproduction and distort world trade, hurting farmers in the Third World and causing them to cut down rainforest in search of more income.
This story was updated at 11:21 a.m.

Unbelievable

2011-11-15T11:19:00.002-05:00

This Mr. Evans from the FED on CNBC is clueless about how America lives.

So very sad for America.

Rick Santelli schooled this guy on common sense for America. Great work again Rick!!

From where I sit........

2011-11-15T06:51:00.000-05:00

If you're at a party and someone tells you they work for a "creditor's rights" firm, dig a little. If they tell you "I work in real estate finance", ask what that means. Ask if residential judicial and non-judicial foreclosures constitute part of their work. If they say "yes", walk away. De-friend them on Facebook. Anything. Shame them and make those that do this work for their masters question their efforts and who they work for.

Why not?

2011-11-14T19:16:00.002-05:00

Paul/Rakoff 2012

The Integrity Ticket.

Keepseagle

2011-11-14T16:46:00.000-05:00

As a member of the White Earth Reservation, Minnesota Chippewa Tribe the Keepseagle case is looking to me like it's a whole lot of money chasing very few Native American Farmers.

As a farmer, I wish I had been denied some loans. As a businessman, it wouldn't have been good business for me to do so, that is, run to a bank looking for money for buying a farm back in 2005.

The lawyers make out. If you are a Native American farmer who gets himself into a "windfall" ie, my tax dollars and you want Chippewa Partners to entertain investing those funds give me a call or shoot an email this way.

Another palindromic day.......11/11/11

2011-11-11T09:49:00.000-05:00

Friday

You knew it was coming...........

2011-11-11T08:46:00.002-05:00

If an older woman going after a younger man is a cougar, is an older man going after a young boy a Nittany Lion?

A bad stage to commit a blooper pal..................

2011-11-10T06:25:00.002-05:00

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/moment-rick-perrys-presidential-chances-flash-crashed

Native American tragedy today

2011-11-09T20:59:00.000-05:00

The annual National Survey on Drug Use and Health reported that 39 percent of white teens between the ages of 12 and 17 admitted to using substances in the past year, compared to just 32 percent of blacks and 24 percent of Asians.

Topping the list of adolescent substance users are Native American youth, at an astounding 48 percent.

I grew up on several welfare states propogated by the Federal Government.

Anyone care to comment on these numbers?

Cramer on the Bakken field........

2011-11-09T20:32:00.000-05:00

Am watching Cramer ask questions on North Dakota's Bakken bonanza.

What ND needs is infrastructure, drug rehabilitation services and housing.

So many come to ND to work, find work, make some big money over a short period of time and then fail drug tests.

Some Christmas "change" from Obama

2011-11-09T12:38:00.003-05:00

The Teleprompter-in-Chief's historic, legacy legislation will not be ObamaCare.

It will be the Christmas Tree tax.

No one has done more to drive gun and ammunition sales than the Teleprompter-in-Chief.

And with this tax, no one will do more to drive "fake" Christmas tree sales which will help foreign manufacturers.

He doesn't get it.

Dogwood Forest, Alpharetta

2011-11-09T06:50:00.000-05:00

Last evening I went to the Dogwood Forest facility in Alpharetta, Georgia to attend a nice meeting for family members of former Dogwood Forest residents who have gone on ahead.

If there is anybody in the Alpharetta, Cumming, Roswell or Milton areas who might like to speak with somebody who has first hand experience with the facility feel free to call me at 877-772-1621.

My experience, and I will speak for my late Father, couldn't have been better. Yes, the walls are pretty, the lights are nice, the food is good. Dogwood is all about the people who so selfishly give their best to make the lives of the residents so comfortable with the quality care they so richly deserve. I am so glad I went.

There is alot of love there and it shows.

Monday in Atlanta...........

2011-11-07T17:50:00.000-05:00

Had to run down to Georgia Tech today. Just a gorgeous fall day in the city. Great to see the fall colors and the sparkle in the city. Someday, and it's coming, far, far slower than I ever thought, Atlanta will have a vibrant down-town. I thought the 1996 Olympic Games might have brought some majic but that was only wishful thinking. Atlantic Station isn't happening, the surrounding neighborhoods won't allow for it. Eventually, they will get it figured out and the economics of real estate, interest rates, demand, schools, business, transportation and entertainment will trump the welfare state.

Be smart forever...........

2011-11-06T15:24:00.000-05:00

Many years ago, prior to moving my banking relationships to a credit union I did business with Chase.

One of the most brilliant financial moves of my life. You should too.

Reservation life or life in white America?

2011-11-05T18:43:00.000-04:00

The following are some statistics about the poor that might astound you....

#1 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the percentage of "very poor" rose in 300 out of the 360 largest metropolitan areas during 2010.

#2 Last year, 2.6 million more Americans descended into poverty. That was the largest increase that we have seen since the U.S. government began keeping statistics on this back in 1959.

#3 It isn't just the ranks of the "very poor" that are rising. The number of those just considered to be "poor" is rapidly increasing as well. Back in the year 2000, 11.3% of all Americans were living in poverty. Today, 15.1% of all Americans are living in poverty.

#4 The poverty rate for children living in the United States increased to 22% in 2010.

#5 There are 314 counties in the United States where at least 30% of the children are facing food insecurity.

#6 In Washington D.C., the "child food insecurity rate" is 32.3%.

#7 More than 20 million U.S. children rely on school meal programs to keep from going hungry.

#8 One out of every six elderly Americans now lives below the federal poverty line.

#9 Today, there are over 45 million Americans on food stamps.

#10 According to the Wall Street Journal, nearly 15 percent of all Americans are now on food stamps.

#11 In 2010, 42 percent of all single mothers in the United States were on food stamps.

#12 The number of Americans on food stamps has increased 74% since 2007.

#13 We are told that the economy is recovering, but the number of Americans on food stamps has grown by another 8 percent over the past year.

#14 Right now, one out of every four American children is on food stamps.

#15 It is being projected that approximately 50 percent of all U.S. children will be on food stamps at some point in their lives before they reach the age of 18.

#16 More than 50 million Americans are now on Medicaid. Back in 1965, only one out of every 50 Americans was on Medicaid. Today, approximately one out of every 6 Americans is on Medicaid.

#17 One out of every six Americans is now enrolled in at least one government anti-poverty program.

#18 The number of Americans that are going to food pantries and soup kitchens has increased by 46% since 2006.

Lies and more lies......

2011-11-04T10:45:00.000-04:00

Obama talking about saving the banks, with more money and saving Greece, with more money

All with tax money taken from taxpayers. The American Jobs Act will not put people back to work. It will only take care of the union bosses so popular in an election cycle.

Funny.............

2011-11-04T10:41:00.002-04:00

Obama addressing the G-20 would be like me addressing the National Association of Quilters.

Scott Galloway

2011-11-03T10:46:00.002-04:00

Holy cow cowboy, great job on Bloomberg today on the NYSE floor!

You shoot straight and keep those spurs on.

Medivation

2011-11-03T09:04:00.000-04:00

This name extracted it's pound of flesh from me last year.

Congratulations to anyone long this name today.

No hubris with her..........

2011-11-03T08:54:00.000-04:00

"Don't be so humble - you are not that great."
~~~Golda Meir (1898-1978) to a visiting diplomat