Our Third World Country

by tdaxp ~ November 17th, 2009



Our Third World Country

The economy may never recover from decisions of the late Bush Administration and the early Obama Administration.
http://www.economist.com/specialreports/di...ory_id=14530093

Our pundit class does not think we are the future.
http://www.nytimes.com/2009/11/17/opinion/...tml?_r=2&hp

Our Administration is making up employment numbers.
http://catholicgauze.blogspot.com/2009/11/...s-jobs-map.html

Our voting machines are easily hackable, unlike in mature democracies, such as Brazil.
http://yro.slashdot.org/story/09/11/14/193...Voting-Machines

AIG’s bailout succeeded… in transferring billions from the government to banks in no-strings-attached, never-pay back loans.
http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2009/11/...ransferred.html

Under the late Bush and early Obama administrations, the U.S. transformed into a state that acts like a third-world country.

No wonder China shut Obama off. http://politics.slashdot.org/story/09/11/1...t=Google+Reader

We don’t offer free TV time to the President of Uruguay, either.


http://www.tdaxp.com/archive/2009/11/17/ou...ld-country.html

"Obama won no concessions from China on points at issue"

By Margaret Talev, McClatchy Newspapers

17 NOVEMBER 2009

BEIJING — President Barack Obama on Wednesday wraps up a three-day visit to China that's left him keenly aware of the limits of his administration's leverage over this economic powerhouse on issues from currency exchange rates to human rights.

Obama has little leverage over China , in part because the U.S. depends on the Chinese to finance the U.S. government's growing debt, and because of the perception in China , which for years was an economic nonentity, that the U.S. is troubled and China is ascendant.

"Analysis: Obama's China trip shows power shifting"

By CHARLES HUTZLER and JENNIFER LOVEN, Associated Press Writers

17 NOVEMBER 2009

But Obama went into the meetings with a weaker hand than most past presidents.

The battering that economic recession and wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have given U.S. prestige is felt nowhere more keenly than in a China that is busily growing and accruing global clout.

"The U.S. has a lot to ask from China," said Xue Chen, a researcher on strategic affairs at the Shanghai Institute for International Studies.

"On the other hand, the U.S. has little to offer China."

The Chinese government is America's biggest foreign creditor, with $800 billion of federal U.S. debt that gives it extraordinary power in the relationship.

MARKETWATCH Currencies

Nov. 18, 2009, 2:41 p.m. EST

"Dollar declines as investors see low rates for longer - British pound mixed after minutes reveal 3-way BOE split on bond buys"

By Deborah Levine & William L. Watts, MarketWatch

The chronically weak dollar had rebounded Tuesday, boosted after European Central Bank President Jean-Claude Trichet backed U.S. Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke's call for a stronger U.S. dollar.

The bounce was unable to maintain momentum, however.

"Despite the call for a stronger dollar from the heads of the two most powerful central banks in the world, the greenback was unable to extend its gains as traders consider the unit to be the weakest link in the G20 universe and continue to believe that U.S. rates will remain stationary for the better part of 2010," said Boris Schlossberg, head of currency research at GFT.

Deborah Levine is a MarketWatch reporter, based in New York.

William L. Watts is a reporter for MarketWatch in London.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/dollar-sl...gain-2009-11-18

One Euro costs $1.49373

One GB Pound costs $1.67130

You call this falling?

Last year the Euro was $1.70 and the Pound $2.00

It's just to keep my spirits up huh?

No, it's to get people to address and acknowledge certain realities, the only place from which meaningful change and action can be taken.

If we as a society/culture/nation are operating from an incorrect assessment, illusion, lie, or wishful thinking, then what we do will be as if it is built on quicksand. In the end, I'm talking here about individual people, their "community" (however they perceive that), their family, their choices, their 'survival' options (and when I use that word I'm not suggesting you have to store 1,500 MRE's and 900 rounds of ammo), and more. There is a "hunk" of information about there about the topics of transition, empowerment, "deep survival", and several related topics. If "we" are still arguing left versus right, Dem's vs. GOP, "rogue" approaches versus salvation through Obama, we are going to fail to be ready for the big train coming through the tunnel at high speed. If "we" still think Obama is going to save us, if "we" think we know it all and that our arrogant exceptionalism will again rule the day, if we think that technology, the government and the application of hope are going to help us, then "we" are seriously going to be hurting when the reality comes to roost.

The piece I posted is surely not the only one, nor is its author the only "pundit", who has made these observations.

All good comments Mag, and I do appreciate it.

I've always thought that every American could 'vote with their feet' - until I found out that was much more difficult than it seemed. I've always had a great amount of curiosity when it comes to other nations and their way of doing things, and their happiness level, their effectiveness and such. When Reagan was in office and there were "defections" from the USSR to the USA I went to the academic library to see what I could find about people going the other way and emigrating to the USSR. I don't know why, but I had never heard of average people doing that. In fact, I had only heard of how much EVERYONE wanted to come to the US. It struck me that this could not be totally true. As much of a patriot as I was, it was never something that made me think the USA was good for all people no matter what. Yet, when I went to research these things in the 80's, there was NO INFORMATION about the subject, no academic studies had been done on emigration but tons had been done on immigration. Maybe I wasn't as good of a researcher then as now, or maybe there really wasn't any information written on the subject, I don't know. What I did find were statistics on happiness among other statistics on education and health. The happiness index really impressed me. I have never figured out whether it is cultural to be happy, somehow genetic and local, or if the system under which one lives provides a place where those who do not have a genetic or medical predilication for depression or lack of pleasure issues could go to these places that scored so high and be as happy as the natives.

That is just an aside Mag, I know it's off topic.

I think when we look at our system and its failures we always come back to the corrupting influence of money and its concentration or distribution even though that is not any recipe for happiness. Yet, no matter how hard I try, I cannot figure out what to do (that could really be done as opposed to what should be done) about the large global corp's and the outsourcing of war, and under-handed nature of the governments actions or inaction. It isn't just our government either. It's all of them.

When I learned Marxist theory (from a capitalist), I learned that the projection would be that corporations would grow until they ruled the governments and they would spread out across the world looking for more and more areas to exploit. That has happened. Unfortunately, there is no outcome of any nature that could be seen from that time to say how this system would, or could, fall and what its alternatives would be. I know that it was supposed to be socialism, and from a Trot point of view that would be global, but that assumed things about human nature that are simply not in evidence. There will be no world uprising of any significance, because when the boiling level gets too hot a few bones are thrown everyone calms down or goes to prison.

I wonder constantly what kind of change could really ever happen....it having been said revolutions happen in the blink of an eye and usually by a small faction. Of course, these things turn out bad about 90 percent of the time, and there are very few that turned out to be better in history so I don't think I want that to happen....but I still try to figure out how it could be better? Are there any trends that serve the people? That work? That do not require humans to go against their own natures? I guess I'm just not enough of a visionary to figure that out. My only answer is to keep the pot boiling so the bones thrown are sufficient.

Being from New England, I prefer a Portuguese fisherman's stew found in the Fall River/New Bedford area [DWB04 knows whereof I speak, and speaking of her, where did she go?]... some tomatoes, and potatoes, and olive oil, and onions, and garlic, and some linguica and some hot seasonings of choice, and whatever the catch of the day is, some mussels, some clams, some white fish, even lobster if you have it, served on a thin linguine or even angel hair pasta... .

.. and, yes, you keep throwing things in and boiling it down and then you get to ladle it out and grab some fresh hard-crust bread to sop up all the broth with, and you pop a top on something cold and tasty, and put on some good tunes, and you sit down and you keep throwing things into the discussion like you did the soup.

It would do well, in my mind, to be in a setting in which the folks are poor and already know how to get by, make do, etc. and have the requisite skills, mindset, and pre-existent community. This would extend up into the lower half of whatever is left of the middle class. The upper half probably lack the necessary manual skills and are too busy trying to get up into the upper class. The upper class is clearly interested in only themselves and not the people and wouldn't be happy sitting at that table or with the company.

I think one of the issues here is to stop thinking about things on a national or international scale and try to get down and get "real" with the ten people within the range of the scent of the kitchen.

Schumaker/think small/sustainability/resilience/make it yourself/grow it yourself
(or catch it, shoot it, trap it if that is applicable but for most it is not).

Frankly, I could give two rats’ tails about the rest of the nation, or what’s going on with it, or where the Wall Street parameters or bonuses or bailouts are, or who’s saying what inside the Beltway, or what anyone’s plan is for the next wave of warfare, violence, force projection, or full spectrum domination. But the people who’d be sitting around with me at that table would mean something, and they would have my full attention and respect and love.

"The most fundamental, essential element, without which any community would fail, boils down to interpersonal skills. The glue that holds any group together is the ability to put aside your own personal ego at times, and to recognize that you have to look out for other people."

– Albert Bates

Somebody better have some facilitation skills…
see this: http://www.blog.biggerpicture.dk/learn-gra...ippit-learning/


All the debates about China and the economy and oil and what's going on in the Mideast and who's got the latest, best cultural icon of a something-or-other are meaningless drivel; if these folks (all of them, no matter what country, nationality, ethnicity, religion or political party they come from) are intent on "winning", warring, killing, etc., then good riddance to them and it all.

I am more interested in living, loving, and learning. And there's no one I know who requires any country, nationality, ethnicity, religion or political party to do any of those things.

###

Yes, I looked into the emigration thing a lot too in the past. They've essentially closed the borders in one sense or another for emigration, and made them grossly permeable for immigration. Taking money out is exceedingly difficult (that’s assuming you have some), and you’d have to be incredibly wealthy and willing to spread around a little of what Indianhead would call "lagniappe". Most places that seem habitable and comfortable and attractive have been spoken for in many ways and thus the price of living is way up. But, as is said in the song, once you call someplace paradise, you can kiss it goodbye. So we have got to make it here; there is no more new frontier. But I do have a secret plan ready in the event the window of opportunity opens.

Meanwhile, within range of your kitchen, you have to find that small group of people who can put down their cups of prior learning and mindset and enter into a form of creative problem solving and who are willing, on the level of small-scale community, to throw in with everyone else into the game or the enterprise. They have to be able to let go, to understand that the other nine have something to offer and, best, to understand that the real learning and value and enterprise has yet to emerge from all of that because no one has coaxed it out from its hiding place. You have to be able to identify that talent in others or know how to coax it out onto the table. (Most of us have a hard time understanding our own, let alone working in a group.)

Myself, I can’t find a lot of people who are willing to acknowledge the necessity for such a conversation or dialogue, or who can get out of their own way long enough to make such a conversation effective. First, they have to be able to turn off the TV, and then they have to be able to sidestep the tremendous propaganda games underway, and then they have to be able to focus, and then they have to be able to summon up the will and the drive and the motivation to do the work…. To continue the conversation, to do the work, to keep the conversation alive, and then to do the work indicated… again... and again... and still more....

To the reader: How many people do you know in your immediate world (physical surround) who are willing and able to have that kind of conversation? How many of them would have you in that group? How many of them would you want in your group? Do you have the skills, the plan and the ability to hold their attention and focus for enough time to actually make any progress in such a conversation?

In my estimation, it would take at least 40-50 hours to begin the conversation. Who has that much time and willpower and drive?

As for happiness, I don’t need to seek happiness. I am already happy. I’m a student of Eastern approaches, and I am quite happy eating my bowl of rice and then doing what I do. Happiness is found in the doing, in the conversation, in the progress, in chopping wood and carrying water. Laborare est orare. Meditation in motion. Mindfulness in living. For me, happiness is good conversation, being surrounded with good people, good food, good music, and a common purpose and connectivity.

Without the connectivity and common purpose, though, the food is tasteless and the music is just noise.

America is alone, externally and internally.

It’s ma-ai is way screwed up, perhaps beyond repair.

It does not know where its hara is, or what to do with it if it found it.

But no one is going to create any of that for us; we have to learn to create it, or find it, or secure it, and then re-create it at will… for ourselves.


No political parties or corporations are required.

No one’s assent is necessary save that of the participants.


That's The Impression That I Get (music video)

I used to live in Attleboro! I LOVE Portuguese Linguica which you just can't get here at all. Yes, that's where DWB (my Jetgirl) is from and I sure wish she would come back around!

I will have to think on the other stuff when I've had some sleep. I'm up late working on some inventory issues.

There is something to be said for flying below the radar, economically speaking. You always know where you are, and are comfortable within your boundaries.

Which realities should we confront or address, Magmak1?

If there were one who needs to ask, there are none who could answer?

don't let facts get in the way of some posters these days
magmak used to not be sloppy

Actually, jeffmoskin, all the financial news I read calls it falling ....

Or sliding ....

Or weak ....

For example ...

MARKETWATCH Currencies

Nov. 18, 2009, 2:41 p.m. EST

"Dollar declines as investors see low rates for longer - British pound mixed after minutes reveal 3-way BOE split on bond buys"

By Deborah Levine & William L. Watts, MarketWatch

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) -- The dollar headed lower versus the euro and other major counterparts on Wednesday, falling for the third session in four, as a surprisingly weak report on U.S. housing starts and comments from a Federal Reserve policy maker solidified expectations that interest rates would remain low for some time.

The commentary and data "gives people no reason to support the U.S. dollar," said David Watt, senior currency strategist at RBC Capital Markets.

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/dollar-sl...gain-2009-11-18

And then, there is this, of course, where even Ben Bernanke, normally one of the last to know these things, acknowledges the falling or "sliding" dollar, to wit:

"Bernanke: Fed will keep eye on sliding dollar - Bernanke: Fed will keep eye on sliding dollar, but pledges anew to hold rates at record lows"

By JEANNINE AVERSA, Associated Press

Last updated: 6:35 p.m., Monday, November 16, 2009

WASHINGTON -- Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke on Monday said the central bank will monitor the sliding U.S. dollar but pledged anew to keep interest rates at record lows to nurture the economic recovery.

In remarks to the Economic Club of New York, Bernanke engaged in a delicate dance.

He tried to bolster confidence in the dollar without taking any real action.

Bernanke's remarks gave a brief lift to the dollar in trading Monday.

But it resumed its fall after traders focused on his assertion that the central bank would hold interest rates low for an extended period.

The dollar has posted double-digit declines against other major currencies since spring.

But if the dollar were to plunge in value, it could ignite a new economic crisis in the U.S., prompting investors to dump their dollar holdings and driving up domestic interest rates.

end quotes

I don't know what the dollar was against some other currency back before the melt-down, nor do I really care what it was, since that is now a year ago, and all of that time is gone ....

I am more concerned with where we are going to be tomarrow, myself ....

And whose VASSAL STATE we are going to be ....

Likely China's .....

And so ...

The undeniable state of decline in things...

economic, political, situational, social, budgetary, infrastructure, the poor performance of our educational systems, leadership, Congress, legal enforcement, the state of quality (or lack thereof), the failure of the press to inquire and inform, etc etc. ...

the fact that the government is (was) (probably always will be) incapable of effecting meaningful change for anyone or anything save the plutocratic elite who run the joint and have systematically pulled the wool over our eyes for decades... (Republic and Democrat) ... )(there are no saints in government)

There are some positives...

we have the most expensive and powerful military inside the Solar System ...
we have an effective system of torture and assassination...
we have a system in which the government knows -- in real time -- everything everyone is doing
(but often can't remember where it put the file)(and manipulates that in ways we can see and other ways we cannot see)....

But enough of the government, or whomever wants to be part of that government...

It now has to be about the individual and the people in close proximity to him or her, and what they can do together in a way that, as Frenchy says, is under the radar, off the grid, outside the purview/overview/interference/control of Big Government and an out-of-control political system.

Pardon me if I disbelieve (or, more importantly, am disinterested in) "the facts" ...
at a time when software manipulation of trades, marketplaces, commodities, votes and almost anything anywhere on any computer has been widely documented and it is clear that is the way in which many do "business".

None of that can have meaning or value when I do not or can not have those capabilities, or have a seat at the table, or even exercise the rights given to me by the Constitution and the higher powers to defend myself or my rights.

The sloppiness is not mine, Graham, but in the system's failure to account, to be accountable, to submit to audit, or to engage in reasonable disclosure to the people or the investors.

sorry.

I overpaid.

One GB Pound costs $1.66424

and the euro is 1.48990

Going down?

Next floor, ladies underwear.

Well, then, you'll want to take in my forthcoming virtual tour of Massachusetts, appearing soon at a web site near here.

Next floor, bargain basement
Euro $1.48450
Pound $1.65107

source: xe.com

Money Changer eh ?
Nyuck nyuck nyuck .......
Jesus is gonna kick your a$$ Jeff

WELL, jeffmoskin, YOU ARE PROVING THAT YOU ARE VERY ADEPT AT USING THE COMPUTER OVER THE INTERNET TO CHECK ON THE LATEST EXCHANGE RATES ....

WELL DONE ....

NOW ....

AS TO WHY THAT REVERSE HAS HAPPENED, AT LEAST MOMENTARILY, WE GO TO SOME ALLEGED FACTS ABOUT THE U.S. ECONOMY ...

AS YOU VERY WELL KNOW, jeffmoskin, THE DOLLAR CAME BACK UP BECAUSE PEOPLE NOW THINK THAT THE U.S ECONOMY IS GOING BACK DOWN ....

NEXT STOP, THE TOILET ....

And so ...

"Dollar gains as homeowners, job-seekers struggle - Safe-haven dollar jumps higher as homeowners, job-seekers struggle; some see stabilization"

By MARTIN CRUTSINGER and TALI ARBEL, Associated Press

Last updated: 7:25 p.m., Thursday, November 19, 2009

WASHINGTON -- The dollar's appeal as a safe haven sent it higher in trading Thursday after reports on housing and unemployment raised fears that the economy will be weak next year.

Some analysts said the slight rebound could signal that the dollar will stabilize against major currencies and halt an eight-month slide.

U.S. Treasurys, based in dollars, became an attractive alternative to riskier investments during the worst of the economic crisis.

But the stock market has rallied since March, and the dollar has tumbled, as prospects for an economic recovery have made investors more willing to take risks.

Traders have sold the dollar to invest in U.S. or foreign stocks or commodities such as oil.

On Thursday, said Michael Woolfolk, senior currency strategist at Bank of New York Mellon, there was "a dialing back of risk."

People are starting to second-guess the strength of the U.S. recovery, said David Gilmore of Foreign Exchange Analytics in Essex, Conn.

"Some are beginning to raise the issue of a double-dip" recession.

That occurs when the economy begins to recover briefly from a recession only to be dragged back under.

That sent the dollar higher.

In afternoon trading in New York, the 16-nation euro dropped to $1.4865 from $1.4940 and the British pound slid to $1.6617 from $1.6718.

The dollar slipped to 88.74 Japanese yen from 89.48 yen.

Some analysts said Thursday's trading could be a sign that investors are realizing they had become overconfident about an economic rebound.

"We had thought for some time that the markets were running ahead of the fundamentals in terms of how confident they should be about a global recovery," said Nigel Gault, an economist at IHS Global Insight, a private economic forecasting firm.

Gault said the next major move for the dollar could be to climb higher by the middle of next year as a stronger economy leads the Federal Reserve to begin to boost U.S. interest rates.

The dollar isn't expected to strengthen against all currencies next year.

Gault predicted it would weaken against the Chinese yuan and the currencies of other emerging market countries such as Thailand and South Korea.

These nations have been making moves to keep their currencies from rising against the U.S. dollar because they compete in global markets against Chinese goods.

A lower currency makes a nation's goods cheaper for foreigners to buy.

China in mid-2008 stopped letting its currency's value rise against the dollar after the global economic crisis began to cut into Chinese exports.

That action has angered American manufacturers and U.S. lawmakers.

They say it shows China is violating global trade rules to manipulate its currency to gain trade advantages.

A stronger yuan and a weaker dollar would boost sales of U.S. products in China and make Chinese goods more expensive for American consumers.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner faced criticism from members of Congress on Thursday that President Barack Obama didn't take a harder line against China on the currency issue in his discussions this week in Beijing.

"Today, millions of Americans are out of work because the Chinese are manipulating their currency," Sen. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., told Geithner during a hearing by the congressional Joint Economic Committee.

Schumer and Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., sent a letter urging the administration to launch a Commerce Department investigation into China's currency practices.

They favor imposing penalty tariffs on Chinese imports if Beijing doesn't change its currency policy.

Geithner told Schumer that Chinese officials have indicated they plan to allow the yuan's value to eventually be set by market forces.

He predicted China would soon resume allowing the yuan to rise against the dollar.

Many private economists also expect that to occur by next spring, once the Chinese are more confident about a global economic rebound.

In trading Thursday, the dollar was up 2 percent against the New Zealand dollar and 1 percent against the Australian dollar.

Currency analysts use the "kiwi" and the "Aussie" as barometers of traders' appetite for risky bets.

They tend to rise in tandem with stocks.

The dollar also gained as the government said jobless claims for the newly unemployed remained elevated.

Another report showed more homeowners with good credit sinking into foreclosure.

Some economists questioned whether there has been a fundamental change in investor views on the dollar.

"The dollar will remain weak in the first quarter of 2010."

"The factors that have weighed on the dollar are still in place," said Meg Browne of Brown Brothers Harriman in New York.

--------

Arbel reported from New York.

"Stronger dollar, weak economic data pummels stocks - Rising dollar, weak economic data drags stocks lower; Dow gives up 94 points"

By SARA LEPRO and TIM PARADIS, Associated Press

Last updated: 6:55 p.m., Thursday, November 19, 2009

NEW YORK -- Signs of a subdued economic recovery sent investors out of stocks Thursday and in search of safer assets like the dollar.

Major indexes tumbled about 1 percent, including the Dow Jones industrial average, which lost 94 points but ended well off its low.

Energy and material stocks logged some of the biggest losses as a jump in the dollar sent commodity prices tumbling.

Meanwhile, an analyst's downgrade of the chip industry pulled technology shares sharply lower.

Tech stocks could get hit again Friday following a report from Dell Inc. that sales of its computers to big businesses remain sluggish.

After the closing bell, the company posted quarterly revenue and profits that fell short of analysts' forecasts.

Dell shares slid 6 percent in after-hours trading.

As stocks fell, investors flocked to the dollar and Treasurys.

The yield on the three-month T-bill, considered one of the safest investments, tumbled to its lowest level since December.

The Chicago Board Options Exchange's Volatility Index, also known as Wall Street's fear gauge, rose more than 4 percent.

Overseas markets also fell sharply.

The day's trade was a shift out of riskier assets and back into safe havens like the dollar and Treasurys.

After amassing significant gains during an eight-month rally in stocks, investors are hesitant to take on too many risks as the year ends, worried that the economy's rebound might not be sustainable.

"Large money managers, going into the end of the year, are looking to protect their gains and are shifting assets," said Adam Gould, senior portfolio manager at Direxion Funds in New York.

For much of this year, investors have been selling dollars and putting their money in riskier assets like stocks and commodities that have the potential to earn higher returns.

Now, investors are wondering whether the dollar's slide has run its course and whether other markets have gotten overheated considering the many challenges to the economy including high unemployment.

Reports on the economy gave investors little incentive to hold on to stocks.

Figures from the Labor Department indicated that employers are still shedding jobs, and the Mortgage Bankers Association reported a surge in foreclosures.

Still, analysts warn that the dollar's rise Thursday doesn't necessarily mark the beginning of a long-term move.

Record-low U.S. interest rates could continue to weigh on the dollar.

Jon Biele, head of capital markets at Cowen & Co., said investors are searching for direction.

"There are a lot of questions out there and not a lot of answers."

"When you don't have the right information you don't do anything," he said.

The Dow fell 93.87, or 0.9 percent, to 10,332.44, after being down as much as 170.

It was the Dow's biggest point drop since Oct. 30.

The broader Standard & Poor's 500 index fell 14.90, or 1.3 percent, to 1,094.90, while the Nasdaq composite index fell 36.32, or 1.7 percent, to 2,156.82.

The Russell 2000 index of smaller companies fell 14.47, or 2.4 percent, to 585.68.

Bonds rallied as stocks fell.

The yield on the benchmark 10-year Treasury note, which moves opposite its price, fell to 3.34 percent from 3.37 percent late Wednesday.

The yield on the three-month T-bill was flat at 0.02 percent after falling as low as 0.005 percent.

The ICE Futures US dollar index, which measures the dollar against other major currencies, gained 0.3 percent, weighing on commodities.

Gold inched higher, while oil prices dropped $2.12 to settle at $77.46 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.

"There might be a little fear out there about dollar strengthening, as well as some natural profit-taking opportunities," said Dan Cook, senior market analyst at IG Markets Inc. in Chicago.

"We've been on an amazing run."

The stronger dollar also makes U.S. goods and services more expensive overseas.

One thing about economic statistics is that you can almost always find something to cheer you up, or to depress you, whatever your needs at the moment.

BTW what I took from that Economist article is that the crisis has delivered us a body blow that will mean lower growth for years. Which is certainly a bad thing, relatively speaking. But to put some perspective on things, it would be nice to have the maximum possible growth all of the time with our government and business leaders always making rational decisions. But in the real world that just doesn't happen all of the time, and in the meantime we are hardly Third World, and our bad recession-wracked economy may just start turning around the unemployment figures sooner than many think. (Or not, economics predictions is a perilous business.) And the Economist of a week ago featured a fairly optimistic article about Brazil. Perhaps a Third World country becoming First World? Good for all of us if so...

Stocks Plunge as Treasury Three-Month Bill Yields Turn Negative

By Elizabeth Stanton and Cordell Eddings


Nov. 19 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. stocks extended a global drop as concern grew that the rally has outpaced the prospects for economic growth. The yen and the dollar strengthened, oil tumbled and yields on Treasury three-month bills turned negative for the first time since financial markets froze last year.

The MSCI World Index of equities 23 developed countries dropped 1.7 percent at 4:31 p.m. in New York, its steepest loss this month. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index fell 1.3 percent to 1,094.90 as Bank of America Corp. downgraded chipmakers, sending Intel Corp. and Texas Instruments Inc. down at least 3.4 percent. The yen climbed against all 16 of its most-traded counterparts and the Dollar Index rose as much as 0.5 percent. Aluminum and copper led declines in industrial metals.

Stocks slid amid speculation the eight-month, 68 percent rally that drove the valuation of the MSCI World Index to the most expensive level in seven years already reflects forecasts for a 25 percent rebound in corporate earnings next year. The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development doubled its growth forecast for the leading developed economies next year to 1.9 percent in a report today, while saying that mounting debt burdens will keep the expansion in check.

“It makes perfect sense that the market’s going to take a little bit of a breather,” said Michael Mullaney, who manages $9 billion at Fiduciary Trust Co. in Boston. “Sentiment had gotten a little too bullish.”

Fall From Peak

The S&P 500 retreated from a 13-month high for a second day even as the Labor Department said the number of Americans filing claims for unemployment benefits held at a 10-month low and the Federal Reserve Bank of Philadelphia’s general economic index rose more than estimated. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 93.87 points, or 0.9 percent, to 10,332.44.

Rates turned negative on some bills maturing in January, according to Sarah Sobeck, a Treasury trader at primary dealer Jefferies & Co. The three-month bill rate was at 0.0051 percent, the least this year. Six-month bill rates dropped to the lowest since 1958. Treasury bills turned negative last December for the first time since the government began selling them in 1929 as investors scrambled to preserve principal and were willing to sacrifice returns in the months following the collapse of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.

Bill Gross, who runs the world’s biggest bond fund at Pacific Investment Management Co., said the “systemic risk” of new asset bubbles is rising with the Fed keeping interest rates at record lows.

‘Painful Level’

“The Fed is trying to reflate the U.S. economy,” Gross wrote in his December investment outlook posted on the Newport Beach, California-based company’s Web site today. “The process of reflation involves lowering short-term rates to such a painful level that investors are forced or enticed to term out their short-term cash into higher-risk bonds or stocks.”

The two-year note yield fell five basis points to 0.70 percent at 4:24 p.m. in New York, according to BGCantor Market Data. The 1 percent security due October 2011 rose 3/32, or 94 cents per $1,000 face amount, to 100 18/32. The yield touched 0.6759, the lowest since Dec. 19. It fell to an all-time low of 0.6044 percent on Dec. 17.

Today’s slide in the S&P 500 was the biggest since Oct. 30, when the benchmark for U.S. stocks dropped 2.8 percent.

Intel, the world’s largest maker of semiconductors, fell 4.1 percent and Texas Instruments, the second-biggest, dropped 3.4 percent. Dan Heyler, head of Asian semiconductor research at Merrill, said the supply of chips is growing faster than demand, putting earnings at risk. Intel and Texas Instruments were lowered to “neutral” from “buy” and the global chip industry was cut to “negative” from “positive.”

Chip Stocks, Alcoa

Semiconductor stocks in the S&P 500 lost 3.7 percent as a group, the largest tumble among 24 industry groups.

Alcoa Inc. declined 3.9 percent for the second-steepest drop in the Dow as aluminum, copper, lead, nickel and tin all retreated.

ConocoPhillips, the third-largest U.S. oil company, slipped 1.9 percent and Chevron Corp. lost 2 percent as crude fell for the first time in four days. Schlumberger Ltd., the world’s biggest oilfield-services provider, lost 3.3 percent. Crude for delivery next month tumbled 2.6 percent to $77.50 a barrel.

Energy producers in the S&P 500 fell 2.1 percent as a group, the biggest drop among its 10 industries. Technology shares, the largest group in the index, lost 1.6 percent and contributed the most to the decline.

‘Grossly Overvalued’

Bank shares slid after Meredith Whitney, the analyst who correctly predicted in 2007 that Citigroup Inc. would cut its dividend, said lenders “are still grossly overvalued” and reliant on government purchases of mortgage-backed securities.

JPMorgan Chase & Co., the second-largest U.S. bank, and Wells Fargo & Co., the fourth-biggest, each dropped 1.9 percent. The S&P 500 Financials Index slumped 2 percent.

Writedowns of mortgage-backed debt contributed to a combined $1.7 trillion of losses by financial companies globally since the beginning of 2007. Mortgage delinquencies have continued to rise as job losses render consumers unable to stay current on their debt payments.

One out of every six home loans insured by the Federal Housing Administration was late by at least one payment and 3.32 percent were in foreclosure in the third quarter, the highest for both since at least 1979, the Mortgage Bankers Association said today.

Europe’s Dow Jones Stoxx 600 Index fell 1.7 percent in the first three-day decline this month after Groupe Danone SA, the world’s largest yogurt maker, cut its forecast for annual sales growth. The company cited “profound” changes in consumer spending. Danone lost 4.4 percent in Paris.

Share Sales

Asian stocks declined, dragging the MSCI Asia Pacific Index down for a third day, as share-sale plans at Japanese companies raised concern the value of existing holdings will be reduced. Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc. sank 3.7 percent and Nomura Real Estate Residential Fund Inc. slumped 8.6 percent after filing to sell stock.

Sixty-five percent of companies in the MSCI World Index that reported earnings since Oct. 7 have beaten analysts’ estimates, Bloomberg data show, and 80 percent of S&P 500 companies have topped estimates. The two indexes have rallied since March 9 on signs government stimulus policies and record- low interest rates are helping to pull the global economy out of the recession.

Fewer ‘Buy’ Ratings

The MSCI Emerging Markets Index dropped the most in a week, losing 1.4 percent. Emerging-market analysts cut “buy” ratings on Brazil to 44.6 percent this month, the lowest since Bloomberg began tracking them in 1997, after a 139 percent surge in the benchmark Bovespa Index pushed equities to their priciest levels in six years. Brazil’s Bovespa Index lost 0.3 percent today.

The yen appreciated 0.6 percent against the euro and 0.3 percent against the dollar. The dollar advanced 0.3 percent to $1.4916 versus the euro as it strengthened against all 16 major counterparts except the yen.

“The yen and U.S. dollar have been supported by the continued upturn in risk-averse conditions,” Lee Hardman, a currency strategist at Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ Ltd. in London, wrote in a report. “Current conditions remain unfavorable for risk assets, leaving them vulnerable to a correction lower.”

The combined economy of the OECD’s 30 member countries will expand 1.9 percent next year and 2.5 percent in 2011, the Paris- based organization said. Output will contract 3.5 percent this year. The 2010 forecast compares with the 0.7 percent growth predicted by the OECD in June, when the major economies were just beginning to emerge from their worst recession in more than half a century.

Losing Confidence

President Barack Obama said in an interview with Fox News recorded in Beijing that the U.S. must get the federal deficit under control. If the government continues to pile up debt, “people could lose confidence in the U.S. economy in a way that could actually lead to a double-dip recession,” he said.

Sales of coupon-bearing Treasuries will increase to $2.38 trillion in the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, from $1.81 trillion in the prior 12 months, primary dealer Goldman Sachs Group Inc. said in a report on Oct. 20.

The U.S. will auction $44 billion of two-year notes on Nov. 23, $42 billion of five-year debt on Nov. 24 and $32 billion of seven-year securities on Nov. 25. The $44 billion in two-year notes matches a record and the five- and seven-year amounts are both records.

To contact the reporters on this story: Elizabeth Stanton in New York at estanton@bloomberg.net; Cordell Eddings in New York at ceddings@bloomberg.net.

Last Updated: November 19, 2009 17:28 EST

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=206...LDsbM&pos=1

Some facts:

1. We are losing manufacturing jobs like crazy, and this is BAD for our workers, because they will not be able to maintain their lifestyles without those high paying (union) jobs.

2. We are still manufacturing a LOT OF STUFF, much of which we export. Check out aircraft and engines, tractors and construction equipment, power generators and turbines, medicines, etc, etc. Notice that clothing, shoes, radios, televisions, computers, etc are off the list. This is GOOD for our multinational corporations, because they use less labor, more robots, more off shoring, and make bigger profits.

"We are an ownership society" - Bush the lesser.

We are not becoming a third world country. Russia is becoming one because all her factories are obsolete. Venezuela is one because nearly all its income (which it generously gives to its people) comes from selling a finite resource.

Brazil is in transition. It has oil, it has brains, it has factories. Brazil will be to South America what Germany is to Europe.

Of course not ....

HEY!

This is AMERICA, the world's only remaining SUPERPOWER!

And EVERYBODY in the world knows that the world's only remaining SUPERPOWER has to be a first-world country ....

Even though our economy is shot, people don't have food, our air and water is polluted, and people are losing their houses ....

And so ...

There are TWO Americas. (Gee, I wish I had thought of that first). One America is doing just fine. The other, well...

Gee, excuse me if I detect just a slight bit of sarcasm here!

But it is your right to regard the U.S. as a Third World country, I cannot make you think differently. What I can do is do a bit of research...say find out what airlines might be a good bet to take you somewhere better, say Guatamala or Paraguay.

We decided in a different thread that The Common Good was both relative and scalable. The common good relative to the USA may be theoritically scalable but it is far from normally distributed. Well being
takes an exaggerated by-polar distribution in the US. That is what progressive political activists mean when they say there are two Americas...

The use of a single gross national product (GNP) measure as an indicator of well being grossly distorts the real situation because it averages these two Americas together for comparisons to other developed nations...This lack of integration of the two Americas is the reason we are sitting on a powder keg that could implode with anyone of a dozen potential stimuli...

The common good has been long forgotten.

Starting with Ray-gun.

Let's hope we can revive it.

Richard Cohen recently said that Reagan did more, long-lasting damage that we acknowledge these days. While I eventually managed to accord him some respect for his positive attributes and good things that he did, that damage is a huge part of his legacy.

He did damage at home, but good in Foreign Policy. After the near nuclear war emanating from the 1983 war games we ran in Europe without bothering to tell the Russians, and with Gorbachov suddenly taking power after a series of old men died off almost annually, he held out the olive branch of nuclear disarmament, while simultaneously spending fortunes on Star Wars which they could afford to match even less than we could afford to develop.

Oh, and 41, who was "out of the loop" had his Arab buddies open the valves, driving the price of crude down to $8.00 a barrel. 41 knew from CIA intel that Russia's oil fields had peaked in 1977, and that this was (still is) their prime source of foreign exchange.

So Reagan, 41, and Gorby "tore down that wall".

And the world is better for it.

But oh my oh my what he did to the working class here in America.

I agree. The destruction of the Middle Class began in earnest with Reagan. While he was mostly a figurehead his administration was chock full of criminals and economic Benedict Arnolds who sold America out to whoever was buying. his "Morning in America" was the "Dawn of the Undead" for the American worker. If we survive as a nation and retain the idea of government of by and FOR the people we will someday look back with clear historical eyes. I hope on that day somewhere in the future we will throw out the village idiots on the school boards who sought to dumb down a generation and once again teach real civics un politicized and without some whack-job fundamentalist's hatred of truth and real history.

Only then will we have a real safeguard from such "Voo-Doo" Economics ever being foisted on us again.

Just my opinion.

The Reagan Administration was even more detrimental in International Relations than at home. The Iran-Contra Affair and Regan's world wide war on Communism set all the players and processes in motion that become the world-wide war of Terror. The key players are still in place:Robert Gates, Henry Kissinger, Jim Baker and on and on...

Well, the USSR is gone, and Russia is a shadow of its former military self. We have Kissinger to thank for getting the Saudis to make OIL solely denominated in US Dollars, thus avoiding a catastrophic devaluation of our economy. Jim Baker and Robert Gates, well you can kick them around all you like.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder...

Courting Convulsion
By James Howard Kunstler
on November 23, 2009 6:52 AM

How infantile is American society? Last night's CBS "Business Update" (in the midst of its "60 Minutes" program) featured three items: 1.) The New Moon teen vampire movie led the weekend box-office receipts; 2.) Cadbury shares hit an all-time high; 3.) Michael Jackson's rhinestone-studded white glove sold at auction for $350,000. Some in-house CBS-News producer is responsible for this "expletive deleted"ing nonsense. How does he or she keep her job? Is there no adult supervision at the network?

Meanwhile, over at The New York Times this morning, Paul "Nobel Prize" Krugman writes:

"Most economists I talk to believe that the big risk to recovery comes from the inadequacy of government efforts; the stimulus was too small, and it will fade out next year, while high unemployment is undermining both consumer and business confidence."

Disclosure: I'm not one of the economists that Mr. Krugman talks to (nor am I an economist). But it's sure interesting to know that the ones palavering with Mr. Krugman imagine that that the US can possibly return to an economy based on the fraudulent securitization of reckless debt. Does Mr. Krugman think that the production housing industry can resume paving over the nether exurbs with half-million-dollar houses (to be bought with no money down loans by the sheet-rockers working inside them)? Does he think all those people receiving cancellation notices from their credit card issuers are in a position to flash their plastic at the Gallerias this Friday? Or ever will be again? Is he perhaps misusing the term "recovery?" After all, that is generally taken to mean resuming a prior state, which is, in turn, presumed to be a healthy prior state. Is that what the economy of the past decade was? And, incidentally, what exactly is a "consumer?" And why, at the highest levels of journalism in this land, do we refer to citizens that way? As if the American people have no other purpose except to buy things? Or is that that the only way an "economist" can imagine them?

I'm sorry to burden the reader with so many questions, but the idiots running the mainstream news media in this land are not doing it and somebody has to.

If a "recovery" is not in the cards, then what exactly is going on out there?

What's going on in the US economy is a slow-motion convulsion from which we will emerge as a very different nation with a different economy. The wild irresponsibility of the media in pretending otherwise is only going to make the convulsion worse, more painful, more socially and politically destructive. The convulsion can be described with precision as one of compressive contraction. Historic circumstances are requiring us to change our behavior, to make new arrangements for everyday life in all the major particulars: capital accumulation and deployment; food production; commerce; habitation; transport; education; and health care. These new arrangements must be organized at a smaller and finer scale, and on a much more local basis.

The main "historic circumstance" mandating these changes goes under the heading of "peak oil." We've come to the end of our ability in this world to increase energy inputs to the global economy. The routine "growth" in industrial activity and production that has been the basis of our financial arrangements for 200-odd years is no longer possible. Offsetting this decline in oil energy "input" with "alt.energy" is a dangerous fantasy because it distracts us from the urgent task of making new arrangements for trade, food production, et cetera - the very things that would provide jobs and social roles for our citizens in the future.

We are seeing a comprehensive failure of leadership in every sector and every level of American life - in politics, business, banking, education, news media, medicine, and the clergy. All are determined to pretend that we can somehow continue the habits and behaviors of the pre peak oil era. They are all unwilling to face reality, and are all engaged in mutually supporting each other's dangerous fantasies.

If we don't attend to the transformation of American life by downscaling our activities and changing the way they are carried out, and re-localizing them, we will see our society disintegrate - and I use the word "dis-integrate" with purposeful precision. Everything will come apart - our political arrangements, our households, our health and well-being.

At the moment, banking is disintegrating. It's happening because the end of regular, predictable, cyclical, industrial growth means the end of our ability to generate credit without limits, and in fact we passed this point by stealth some time ago leaving the banks in "Wile E. Coyote" suspension above an abyss, where they have lately been joined by government at all levels and the indebted citizens of the land. The profound nausea spreading through the offices of America is the somatic recognition of exactly where we are in all this: off the cliff.

It's important to remind readers that so-called "capitalism" is not to blame. Capitalism is not an ideology. It refers to a set of laws governing the disposition of surplus wealth. There is going to be surplus wealth somewhere in the years ahead, even if our living standards fall substantially, even under the strictures of peak oil. All the communist experiments of the 20th century produced some kind of surplus wealth. All of them were subject to the phenomenon of compound interest. What matters in the disposition of capital are the rules created for accumulating and deploying it. In the USA the past two decades, we ignored the rules, repealed some of the critical laws, and failed to enforce the existing ones so that, when faced by the historic circumstances of peak oil, we allowed fraud and swindling to run wild - just at the moment when we should have taken the most care. That is why our money system ran off the rails.

We're now seeing worldwide a kind of race between the assertion of peak oil and the failures of capital management as to which will provoke a widespread convulsion first. They are obviously related and whichever gets us in the most trouble fastest, our destination is the same: the absolute necessity to reorganize how we live. Among the many elements of this is the fact that "globalism," in the Thomas Friedman sense of the word, is over. The urgent need to re-localize economies makes this self-evident. As a practical matter for us, this means committing to import replacement - making things we need in the US, probably much more regionally. "Globalism" now joins the many other fantasies that we can no longer indulge in.

At the moment, going into Thanksgiving 2009, America's leadership has dedicated itself to worst action it could take under the circumstances: a campaign to sustain the unsustainable. This is what's embodied in the foolish term "recovery." The way we try to explain things to ourselves matters, if we don't want to be crushed by history. Go back to the top of this blog and look at the things we pay attention to. Aren't you ashamed?

http://kunstler.com/blog/2009/11/courting-...lsion.html#more

An excellent statement of the problem...

Lets start a list of possible solutions...

1. In the political domain, I think we need to re-work the interfaces between State and National government, between State and local (community) governments and between nation states and
the United Nations...

2.

"To open ourselves to the truth and to bring ourselves face to face with our personal and collective reality is not an option that can be accepted or rejected. It is an undeniable requirement of all people and all societies that seek to humanize themselves and to be free.."

-- Guatemalan Bishop Juan Jose Gerardi Conedera

Assassinated April 25, 1998, one day after his speech (and above quote), when he presented his findings of an in-depth probe into a campaign of terror against the people of Guatemala waged by their own government.

Kunstler already laid out the challenge, if not in his book "The Long Emergency" and his novel "World Made by Hand", then here:

"... the urgent task of making new arrangements for trade, food production, et cetera - the very things that would provide jobs and social roles for our citizens in the future"

and here:

"... Historic circumstances are requiring us to change our behavior, to make new arrangements for everyday life in all the major particulars: capital accumulation and deployment; food production; commerce; habitation; transport; education; and health care. These new arrangements must be organized at a smaller and finer scale, and on a much more local basis."

Promote the concept of Foodsheds(use food originating from within a 75 miles radius)

Radically reduce the size of the Federal Office of Education and convert all federal education dollars
into block grants to the states

Change the criteria for services from the Small Business Administration from 750 employees to 100
employes

I like these ideas, rla

I know for a fact that I plan on converting 4 acres of my property into a truck garden.

That is what I would do if I could call back 10 years...at 74, I'll settle on putting a couple of calves
on my wife's horse pasture...

Well, ya got me by 12 years, but with my fiance's help (master gardener), I should be able to manage it. I have the equipment I need. I'm looking to put a couple of calves with my neighbor's herd, and do the chicken thing too.

We need to get rid of the ridiculous notion that we can "grow our way out" of this recession.

That is entirely the point - we have reached the LIMITS of growth. We have to SHRINK our way out of this recession.

That means ENTIRELY new ways of thinking, shorter working hours at higher pay for a greater number of workers. What with so many of our old manufacturing jobs either outsourced or automated out of existance, we should "share" the work better and we will end up sharing the wages better WITHOUT feeling like we are robbing the rich to give welfare to the poor.

And the poor will feel good about having EARNED their daily bread.

Happy Meal.

I agree and we need to do more, as a society, to develop a greater appreciation of work and raise the
status and pay of service work...

I'VE BEEN TO VIET NAM, Arneoker .....

SO I HAVE A BASIS FOR COMPARISON ....

"EPA: Uranium from polluted mine in Nev. wells"

By SCOTT SONNER, Associated Press Writer

Sat Nov 21, 2:53 pm ET

YERINGTON, Nev. – Peggy Pauly lives in a robin-egg blue, two-story house not far from acres of onion fields that make the northern Nevada air smell sweet at harvest time.

But she can look through the window from her kitchen table, just past her backyard with its swingset and pet llama, and see an ominous sign on a neighboring fence:

"Danger: Uranium Mine."

For almost a decade, people who make their homes in this rural community in the Mason Valley 65 miles southeast of Reno have blamed that enormous abandoned mine for the high levels of uranium in their water wells.

They say they have been met by a stone wall from state regulators, local politicians and the huge oil company that inherited the toxic site — British Petroleum.

Those interests have insisted uranium naturally occurs in the region's soil and there's no way to prove that a half-century of processing metals at the former Anaconda pit mine is responsible for the contamination.

That has changed.

A new wave of testing by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has found that 79 percent of the wells tested north of the World War II-era copper mine have dangerous levels of uranium or arsenic or both that make the water unsafe to drink.

And, more importantly to the neighbors, that the source of the pollution is a groundwater plume that has slowly migrated from the six-square-mile mine site.

The new samples likely never would have been taken if not for a whistleblower, a preacher's wife, a tribal consultant and some stubborn government scientists who finally helped crack the toxic mystery that has plagued this rural mining and farming community for decades.

"They have completely ruined the groundwater out here," said Pauly, the wife of a local pastor and mother of two girls who organized a community action group five years to seek the truth about the pollution.

"It almost sounds like we are happy the contamination has moved off the site," she said.

"But what we are happy about is ... they have enough data to now answer our questions."

"Prior to this, we didn't really have an understanding of where water was moving," said Steve Acree, a highly regarded hydrogeologist for the EPA in Oklahoma, who was brought in to examine the test results.

"My interpretation at this stage of the process is yes, you now have evidence of mine-impacted groundwater."

The tests found levels of uranium more than 10 times the legal drinking water standard in one monitoring well a half mile north of the mine.

Though the health effects of specific levels are not well understood, the EPA says long-term exposure to high levels of uranium in drinking water may cause cancer and damage kidneys.

At the mine itself, wells tested as high as 3.4 miligrams per liter — more than 100 times the standard.

That's in an area where ore was processed with sulfuric acid and other toxic chemicals in unlined ponds.

Moving north toward the mine's boundary and beyond, readings begin to decline but several wells still tested two to three times above health limits.

"The hots spots, the treatment areas on the site, are places you totally expect to see readings like that," said Dietrick McGinnis, an environmental consultant for the neighboring Yerington Paiute Tribe.

"But this shows you have a continuous plume with decreasing concentration as you move away from the site."

The new findings are no surprise to Earle Dixon, the site's former project manager for the U.S. Bureau of Land Management, which owns about half of the property.

An administrative judge ruled last year that the BLM illegally fired Dixon in 2004 in retaliation for speaking out about the health and safety dangers at the mine.

"The new data depicts the story that I had tried to hypothesize as a possibility," Dixon told AP.

"It was speculation, because I didn't have the dramatic evidence they have now."

"You just had all the symptoms," he said from New Mexico, where he is now a state geologist.

"The way the state has been telling the story and BP and Lyon County ... is this is mostly all natural."

"Well, no it's not," he said.

"We now know for a fact that most of this uranium as far as 2 miles out from the mine comes from the mine."

"This site becomes a poster child for mining pollution."

Officials for BP and its subsidiary Atlantic Richfield have insisted until now that the uranium could not be tied to the mine.

They maintained the high concentrations were due to a naturally occurring phenomenon beneath Nevada's mineral-laiden mountains.

The new discovery has Pauly, McGinnis and others renewing a call for the EPA to declare the mine a Superfund site — something the state and county have opposed despite a new potential source of money to help cover clean-up costs that could reach hundreds of millions of dollars.

Jill Lufrano, spokeswoman for the Nevada Department of Environmental Protection, said an investigation into the source of contamination is continuing but "the new finding does put scientific confirmation behind the theory that this would migrate off site."

She said the new evidence doesn't change the state's opposition to Superfund listing.

Nevada has a long tradition of supporting mining and now produces more gold than anywhere in the world except China, South Africa and Australia.

Copper first was discovered around Yerington in 1865.

Anaconda bought the property in 1941 and — fueled by demand after World War II — produced nearly 1.75 billion pounds of copper from 1952-78.

A mineral firm launched a then-secret plan to produce yellowcake uranium from the mine's waste piles in the 1970s.

An engineer reported in 1976 that they weren't finding as much uranium as anticipated in the processing ponds.

"Where could it be now?" he wrote.

"Should we continue to look for it?"

Had they continued the search outside the processing area, Wyoming Mineral Corp. likely would have detected the movement of the contamination.

But the market for uranium dipped and the company scuttled the venture.

Pauly never suspected the mine was leaking contamination when she and her husband finished building their home in 1990.

They drank water from their well until 2003 — and used it to mix formula for a baby from 1996-98 — before becoming suspicious as rumors swirled about the contaminated mine.

"Everybody said it was fine," she said.

"Legally they didn't have to disclose anything because technically there was nothing definitive then that showed the contamination was moving off the site."

BP and Atlantic Richfield, which bought Anaconda Copper Co. in 1978, have stopped claiming there is no evidence the mine caused any contamination, but they aren't conceding anything about how much.

"We know the mine has had an impact but to what extent is not really known at this time," Tom Mueller, spokesman for BP America in Houston, told the Associate Press in a recent e-mail.

He said the sampling "remains inconclusive regarding relative impacts from the mine" compared with other potential sources.

Yerington Paiute Tribe Chairman Elwood Emm said he hopes the new findings help expedite cleanup.

"In the meantime, we continue to lose our water resource," he said.

So who will pay for the cleanup?

"That is the million-dollar question," Dixon said.

"Every Superfund site needs an advocate or two or three and in my view there are none for Yerington except for Peggy Pauly."

Regardless of who pays, Acree said, it likely will take decades to clean up.

I don't want the "virtual" tour!! I want the in person tour I love the place except I couldn't get my jasmine to grow and it's hard for me to come to terms with a place where jasmine won't even grow in a hothouse.

Is that why we are currently using a credit card to pay another credit cards bill

What you propose might have merit, but the DC fools are not interested in cutting back on anything, and are taking us very close to the edge of a major collapse that will make the great depression seem like a small ripple.

Hey, it might even be intentional.
Who gains if we suddenly see the dollar collapse into worthless paper ?
The U.S. Government does.
They have the reserve due to having added liquidity to the market at the rate of 120% in the last year.

They did this during the Clinton era, at a rate of 13% additional liquidity, and it required a 20% interest rate to generate a replacement.
Wanna guess what a 120% increase is going to do, when the bill comes due to the U.S. tax-payer ?

Ah, who cares !
If we owe China money, we will just pay them.
Our loan is in U.S. dollars.
NOT Gold !

The again, if a loaf of bread costs $500 then I guess the pay rate will have to go up.

Those who are making mortgage payments will make out big time, if they can hold onto their house until the pay structure is adjusted.
Those who can't will turn it over to ?
Yea, those good guys who insure the banks.
The FDIC

How cool is that

Try reading this - Hyperinflation - It's where we are headed as a nation.
If you study what caused it, it is the direction we are headed.

Here's a good (PBS) essay on the subject, and it does outline exactly what is occurring in this country - German Hyperinflation, 1923

This is the only reason IMO, why China has not just pulled the plug on our line of credit.
They want their investment paid back with interest.

If they decide we are no longer worth the risk,
Hey, that's why they had such stern questions about the health-care proposal,
Then you can be almost guaranteed that we will economically collapse, and ultimately become a third world country, economically.

Heck, we might get there in other ways, also.
What will happen to our import/export relations, if we can't get a line of credit ?
What do we produce ?

Tough times might be just around the corner !

But we do have a few choices,
We might survive with the current system.
We might be absorbed via a global leverage scheme into a global currency.
Then again, we might just do our own starting over with a new currency and have a government mandated turn-in of old currency at an exchange rate that is once again, set by the FED.