Have not had access to internet for the past few days… only online temporarily today and for the next three days.

Here are some press articles of interest:

Examples of industrial overcapacity

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/tradingdesk/archive/2009/11/27/desperate-winemakers-downunder.aspx

Legitimacy of governments under fire from within

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-1231540/Why-I-believe-Blair-stand-trial–face-charges-war-crimes.html

Deflation’s  inexorable march… we’re nowhere near being out of the woods…

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/12/united-nations-us-property-fallout

A self sustaining economy must produce intrinsic value. When development is brought about by financial engineering, then crisis will devastate what little intrinsic wealth there may be

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2009/nov/29/dubai-world-desert-gulf-investors

TEL AVIV (MarketWatch) — Bank of America Corp. altered the salaries of two top executives, including cutting their base pay by more than a third, with approval from the White House special master overseeing bank pay, Kenneth Feinberg.

In a Securities and Exchange Commission Form 8-K dated Friday, the Charlotte, N.C., banking giant said that Joe L. Price, chief financial officer, and Barbara J. Desoer, president of Bank of America Mortgage, Home Equity and Insurance Services, would receive $500,000 of salary for 2009.

The Associated Press reported that the executives each earned $800,000 of salary in 2008.

The CFO also received a grant of stock-unit awards in lieu of cash salary valued at $5.25 million while the head of the mortgage and insurance unit received a grant of $3.95 million.

AP reported that for 2008, each received stock valued at $2.3 million plus options valued at $1.5 million.

The compensation-and-benefits committee of the bank’s board also proposed, and the board agreed, to limit “perquisites and ‘other’ compensation” for each executive to $25,000 for 2009 us fast cash. If they’ve received more than this figure in this category in 2009, they must repay the difference, the filing says.

AP said that the perquisites category includes things like tax-preparation fees and insurance premiums, use of corporate aircraft, and company matches for charitable contributions.

The news service reported that in 2008, Price received $41,000 in this category. Desoer received $2.66 million, including $1.5 million of expenses when she relocated to California to take over the Bank of America subsidiary.

Bank of America received $45 billion under TARP, the Treasury Department’s financial-services bailout, and hasn’t said when it will pay back the money, the news service said.

Bank of America alters pay for 2 top executives

Hot News: U.S. to Pressure Mortgage Firms for Loan Relief

Author: Robert Michael -
Source: articledashboard.com

Most of us already are aware that the change in the bankruptcy law will be effective this October. Those who are already in debt argue that it is unfair. Companies that have suffered profit loss through the years are relieved to hear the news.

The change in the bankruptcy law will force individuals who are in debt or facing debt to file for Chapter 13 bankruptcy. The old way of just erasing debt will no longer be, myeasypayment, an option to most.

How does Chapter 13 bankruptcy work? Well it is a plan that arranges monthly payments of the debtor. The courts calculate what amounts the individual can pay on a monthly basis. Chapter 13 is available to anyone who has some kind of steady income allowing them to come up with money to pay off their debts. It does prevent the debtor from the need to liquidate any of their available assets. The individual does not decide what they can pay and when they can pay it off. The courts will calculate the payment arrangements and the time line in which the debts are to be paid off.

Now that there is a new bankruptcy law people should plan better for the future to prevent their need to file as bankrupt.

There are circumstances that most individuals do not account for when they invest into a home or use credit cards for purchases. One significant cause to debt is suffering some kind of financial loss such as losing a job or investments such as stocks. When this kind of situation occurs people are not equipment to pay their monthly payments such as mortgages leases and credit card bills.

A wise thing to do is to be prepared for the unexpected. Save some money off to the side. Keep it in a separate account in case something that was to happen in the future that effects your income, myeasypayment, . Establishing any kind of financial plan is always a good move to avoid bankruptcy.

There are things that happen that no one ever plans on that can lend him or her in debt. However part of the cause for the change in the bankruptcy law is do to those who have abused the filing power of bankruptcy.

Although there are very many people who never abused the system they will have to suffer the consequences.

Most people may feel that the decision, myeasypayment, is unfair. Especially to those who did all they could from falling into debt. We can not turn back the hands of time and erase the decisions that were made by our government. Regardless of your situation we most pay the same price caused by those, myeasypayment, who abused bankruptcy in the past.

The best step we can take is to be prepared for all financial circumstances.

Make a back up plan of your own and never have the need to even, myeasypayment, consider bankruptcy.

Author: Thomas Erikson
Source: isnare.com

If you are juggling multiple credit cards and possibly other debts as well, anything that lowers your income, such as losing your job or making less in commissions, will affect your ability to make your payments. The short term solution, debt consolidation loan, may be to increase your disposable income by reducing your expenses. An effective and financially beneficial way to reduce your debt repayments is to consolidate them into one personal debt consolidation loan.

You are spending more on debt than you have to if you are paying for a number of different credit cards, debt consolidation loan, and loans each month. Credit cards and consumer lines of credit tend to have higher interest than your average personal debt consolidation loan and can easily stay high. By transferring loan balances to a personal debt consolidation loan, you can stretch your budget by freeing up income that can be used for necessary expenses.

A personal debt consolidation loan can benefit you in many ways.

Here are just a few of them:

1. If you combine your debts into one personal debt consolidation loan, you will lower your monthly expenses, sometimes quite significantly. This means you will keep more of your own money every month to cover living expenses. This monthly saving will immediately alleviate a lot of financial pressure. So why wait any longer before you take action?

2. Instead of having to remember a lot of different payments on different due dates every month, combining your loans into one personal debt consolidation will make financial organization easier.

When you have had a significant income loss, anything that helps to reduce financial stress is beneficial.

3. You will save a lot of money over the term of the loan. Not only will you have more money in your pocket every month, you will save thousands over the years you are paying off the loan. When you consider that the other loans may never have been paid off, you may well have saved more money than you can guess at.

It’s important to cancel your credit cards and any lines of credit once you have consolidated your debts into one personal debt consolidation loan.

Otherwise, you’ll probably, debt consolidation loan, use them under pressure and your debt will increase again, debt consolidation loan, . You need to make a firm decision not to increase, debt consolidation loan, your debt and focus on paying off your personal debt consolidation term. To help keep yourself on track, design a budget that you are able to stick to and which will cover all necessary expenses. Try to include savings for emergencies. It is far more stressful to spend above your income than it is to keep to a strict budget and as your income increases you will be able to include more of your ‘wants’ into your budget.

A personal debt consolidation loan can help you keep going in tough times. If you continue to make good financial decisions and avoid over spending, it can be the first step to financial independence.

An Unprecedented Mountain of Debt.

By Daniel Greenfield  Saturday, November 28, 2009

Since Obama is rather attached to describing everything he does as “unprecedented”, “I have achieved an unprecedented level of transparency”, “I played an unprecedented amount of golf this year” and “I just wasted an unprecedented amount of money”… in honor of the Liar in Chief, we can make “unprecedented” the word of the day.

First up is Obama’s unprecedented deficit. The current real cost of ObamaCare is up to 2.5 Trillion dollars and rising.

The Senate Republicans’ chart demonstrates that the total for all of these costs—based on CBO projections for the bill’s true first 10 years—is $2.5 trillion. And costs would only skyrocket from there, as the chart’s trajectory suggests. In the 5 years to follow (2024-28), spending on “expansions in insurance coverage” alone would be $1.7 trillion, making the bill’s total costs in its real first 15 years well over $4 trillion—based on CBO projections.

A trillion here, a trillion there, and pretty soon you’re looking at real money.

Just by way of comparison, the cost of ObamaCare is more than the entire US national debt during the Reagan Administration, which Democrats repeatedly criticized for being wasteful and running up the national debt.

That’s right, one bill by Obama and the Democratic congress alone outweighs all of Ronald Reagan’s national debt. Under wasteful ole Ron, the national debt was below 50 percent of the Gross Domestic Product. Under Obama we’re now set to have the national debt pass 100 percent of the GDP, at which point we’ve pretty much sold America to the People’s Republic of China.

From Clinton to Bush, the National Debt jumped by 12 percent of the GDP. Under Obama is jumped by 20 percent in only one year, and is set to make that 30 percent pretty soon.

Unprecedented? You betcha.

Oh but there’s some good news, because the crunch isn’t just hitting us, it’s hitting Obama’s buddies too, with Dubai in big trouble.

Just a year after the global downturn derailed Dubai’s explosive growth, the city is now so swamped in debt that it’s asking for a six-month reprieve on paying its bills — causing a drop on world markets Thursday and raising questions about Dubai’s reputation as a magnet for international investment.

The fallout came swiftly and was felt globally after Wednesday statement that Dubai’s main development engine, Dubai World, would ask creditors for a “standstill” on paying back its $60 billion debt until at least May. The company’s real estate arm, Nakheel — whose projects include the palm-shaped island in the Gulf — shoulders the bulk of money due to banks, investment houses and outside development contractors.

Now keep in mind that Dubai World is run by the Dubai government which is in turn run by the family of the region’s biggest headchopping family, which in this case is Sheikh Mohammed.

Dubai’s prosperity was built on slave labor imported from abroad and by convincing stupid Westerns that Dubai was a happening place by hiring foreign architects to create insane skyscrapers and customized islands. Now Dubai World is bleeding badly and the Dhimmis who rushed to sink their money into a brutal oil rich totalitarian dictatorship are thinking twice, not because of morals or ethics, but because of finances.

And here’s what helped break the camel’s back

The straw that broke the Dubai camel’s back is a $3.5 billion sukuk bond. It had been due to be repaid on December 14. It won’t be.

Sukuk is of course Sharia finance. A lot of Western banks jumped on the Sharia finance bandwagon, only to get burned by Dubai.

Investors also face legal risk. If investors seek redress under English law, any ruling may be unenforceable as it is likely to be subject to review by the Dubai courts—who may take a different view. The Dubai courts will never have dealt with a restructuring on this scale, and Dubai law may not allow for creditors to claim government assets. This may also test the Sukuk, or Islamic bond, structure, under which the investors are effectively the owners of the underlying assets, but may find it difficult to enforce their rights.

Dubai has spent the last few years seeking to build a reputation as a modern, international financial center. Much of that work has been undone by Wednesday’s shock announcement. The need now is to start to repair the damage: and that means fair, transparent and equal treatment of all creditors.

That of course is delusional, considering that fair and transparent is not the way things are done in Dubai and the Muslim world. The irony here is that Islamic finance is not fundamentally different than what Madoff was doing, and Dubai is a great example of an attempt to turn worthless desert into desirable real estate through hype and promotion.

Meanwhile Dubai is still raising money through Sukuks vowing that it has come out strong from the financial crisis. Uh huh.

Citing Al Mal Capital fund manager, the Gulf News said “the market expects Dubai to raise another USD 5 billion soon which will take care of some of Dubai’s debt and lift the confidence of the investors”.

Once again another can’t fail plan.

But investors worrying about transparency, need to remember that this is how debt collection works in the UAE.

A video tape smuggled out of the United Arab Emirates shows a member of the country’s royal family mercilessly torturing a man with whips, electric cattle prods and wooden planks with protruding nails.

A man in a UAE police uniform is seen on the tape tying the victim’s arms and legs, and later holding him down as the Sheikh pours salt on the man’s wounds and then drives over him with his Mercedes SUV.

In a statement to ABC News, the UAE Ministry of the Interior said it had reviewed the tape and acknowledged the involvement of Sheikh Issa bin Zayed al Nahyan, brother of the country’s crown prince, Sheikh Mohammed.

“The incidents depicted in the video tapes were not part of a pattern of behavior,” the Interior Ministry’s statement declared.

The Minister of the Interior is also one of Sheikh Issa’s brother.

The government statement said its review found “all rules, policies and procedures were followed correctly by the Police Department.”

Anyone investing in this oil dungeon of a hellhole that is Dubai while signing on to Sharia finance deserves exactly what they get.

Meanwhile back to our own mad Sheikh Hussein Obama, Michael Goldfarb at the Weekly Standard points out that it’s now better to have destroyed the WTC than given a terrorist a fat lip

They could’ve executed him in the desert and left him in a shallow grave for all I care, but the SEALs are professionals, and so they brought the man behind the 2004 murder of four American contractors in Fallujah to the Green Zone, where one SEAL told investigators that he “had showered after the mission, gone to the kitchen and then decided to look in on the detainee.”

Maybe there’s a whole lot more to this story than is currently being reported, but it’d have to be pretty terrible stuff to convince me that three Navy SEALs who successfully captured a high-value target now deserve to be court martialed for their service. A fat lip? That’s enough to get you rough military justice from the Obama administration, but blow up the World Trade Center and you get all the due process rights of the civilian criminal justice system. Sounds fair, right?

And back to the Gulf, Phyllis Chesler asks reasonably enough, Why is America Still Allied with Saudi Arabia?

The Saudi mutawas (“morality police”) are terrifying. Like vultures, they swoop down on their vulnerable prey, especially women, and then send them straight to Hell. The “long beards” curse and beat their female prisoner, totally terrify her; then, they throw her into a dark, medieval dungeon, (assume the worst here). They remove her only in order to gang-rape and torture her—all presumably in the name of Islam. Her crime? In one instance, although the woman was a foreign national, she dared to take a taxi downtown without a male escort.

Remind me: Why are we still allies with Saudi Arabia? Why did President Obama bow to the King who presides over such Hell? Can we find no oil elsewhere, no other sources of energy? Do Americans really understand what goes on in Saudi Arabia? Have we forgotten that the Saudis have single-handedly exported Wahhabi fundamentalism and propaganda that has poisoned both westerners and those in the east—and have funded western universities and media as well? Does anyone remember that 15 of the 19 9/11 hijackers came from Saudi Arabia? Or that Osama bin Laden is a Saudi? Do we not understand that the Kingdom has funded bin Laden? And that they have funded many influential Islamic “charities” in North America?

…

Al Rabaa tells the story of Karin (presumably a pseudonym), a German woman who took a taxi downtown and got arrested for doing so. Thrown into a dungeon, beaten, raped, traumatized, no one knew where she was. Finally, a married Saudi man (alas, one to whom she was already attracted), moved heaven and earth to rescue her. He got her released after having her German husband deported and after marrying her without Karin even being present. A well connected Saudi man can rescue his wife from prison. Satam moved Karin into the home he shared with his first wife Fatima and their children. Satam soon lost interest in Karin and spent long hours away from home. But Karin was already pregnant. Here’s how Fatima handled the situation.

First, around midnight, while Karin was sleeping, Fatima put on loud Arabic music, came into Karin’s room and “slammed a massive stick down onto my stomach…I screamed for help. ‘No one is going to hear you, Gahba (#####)!’” The first wife kept swinging the stick at her. Karin fled. Finally, Satam got Karin her own apartment. Whereupon, Fatima started calling her to “harass and terrorize me…she spread rumors that I had a boyfriend who secretly came to visit me.” In fact, Fatima enlisted relatives in an elaborate scheme to entrap Karin and to report all such concocted suspicious doings to Satam.

But here is the most evil thing that Fatima did. Because Mimi, their housemaid, was helpful to Karin, Fatima reported Mimi to the mutawa for “fornication.” The fact that this was totally untrue made no difference. Once Mimi was arrested, Prince Salman signed her death warrant. Satam could do nothing to reverse this decree. Thus, the following Friday, after prayers, the appropriate verses from the Qu’ran having been read, Mimi was stoned to death. The two Indian men she was accused of “fornicating” with (shopkeepers, where Mimi was shopping for Karin) each received one hundred lashes.

The graphic description of Mimi’s stoning is too awful for me to repeat.

I am waiting for Secretary of State Clinton and President Obama to spell out precisely what American policy should be vis a vis Saudi Arabia given their barbaric record on human rights and their major role in funding and exporting Islamic Jihad globally.

I recommend a big tall fence to keep the Saudis in and everyone else out. If the Saudis want anything, they can pay for it in oil. Which they’ll have to learn to pump themselves.

But oil money rules all. Case in point, after the Lockerbie Bombing release the UK’s elite are still visibly partying with Kaddafi and his spawn.

Lord Mandelson, was there, and also Lord Rothschild’s country neighbour, Cherie Blair. Neither of them picked up a gun. Various young friends of Nat with double-barrelled or European princely names were shooting. But the keenest shot was Saif Al-Islam Gaddafi, son of the Libyan dictator, and the man who escorted the Lockerbie bomber, Al Megrahi, home to a hero’s welcome in Libya in August.

Now that Libya has made its strange bargain with the West, Saif has taken up our traditional upper-class sport with delight. Near Tripoli, he has laid down 40,000 partridges.

How wonderful that Khaddafi’s kids enjoy the sport of shooting birds in the UK. Pity Dick Cheney wasn’t invited along to show off his hunting skills. I suspect he could have bagged something bigger than a partridge.

And more good news from the EU, its new Foreign Secretary will be a Soviet agent.

Baroness Ashton of Upholland’s past came back to haunt her yesterday when the European Union’s new foreign affairs chief was forced to deny taking funds from the Soviet Union during her days as treasurer for the Campaign forNuclear Disarmament.

Lady Ashton, a surprise choice for her post, was challenged to deny that she had contact with Russian sources while she was in charge of its accounts at the height of the Cold War.

The Times has learnt that concerns about her CND involvement are felt across countries from the former Iron Curtain now in the EU and that MEPs plan to question her about it when she appears before them for the hearing to confirm her in her post.

But don’t worry, finally no mercy will be shown to humans, the WHO promises.

Margaret Chan, of the World Health Organisation, warned that “no mercy” would be shown for humans’ mistakes over climate change.

And back to Sheikh Hussein Obama, Israpundit has Ken Timmerman’s interview which charges that Obama is obstructing the progress of Iranian pro-democracy groups

In the interview, Rahman Haj Ahmadi accuses the Obama administration of thwarting negotiations among Iranian pro-democracy groups that were on the verge of creating a united opposition front that could have led to the collapse of the Islamic regime during this summer’s post-election turmoil.

Those negotiations were on the verge of success, Haj Ahmadi told me – until the Obama administration inexplicably placed his group on the terrorism list on Feb. 4, 2009. The U.S. action “made the other groups afraid to work with us, for fear of U.S. government reprisals.”

You will also find in the story a link to some of my earlier reporting from the PJAK training camps in northern Iraq. Far from being a terrorist group, PJAK is dedicated to the overthrow of the Islamic Republic regime in Iran and its replacement by a pro-Western, secular, united Iran that recognizes the rights of all its citizens.

At the Copenhagen Post, a study shows that Muslim immigrants are importing anti-semitic attitudes into Europe. Shocker.

Of course the same thing is happening in the US as well, and not just with Muslims either.

Meanwhile Mikey Weinstein is back. Back in the day I caught some flack for taking Mikey Weinstein apart and demonstrating that he was actually a left wing activist, trying to tout his time in the Reagan Administration and supposed defense of Jews in the military to mainstream his credentials. In fact Weinstein is part of a left wing agenda, and now part of a pro-Muslim agenda too, piggybacking on the Fort Hood shootings to try and give Nidal Hassan some help with his alibi.

Weinstein, founder and president of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, says that Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan’s alleged killing of 13 soldiers at Fort Hood is inexcusable and reprehensible. But he believes that it’s important to investigate reports of harassment that Hasan said he faced as a Muslim in the military, which might have contributed to his mental state.

“There’s enough out there” to look into, said Weinstein. “I’m not excusing him, but did it affect him, or was he just a maniac to begin with?”

Weinstein cited media reports quoting Hasan’s family, saying that someone had put a diaper in his car and told him, “That’s your headdress,” and that a camel was drawn on his car with the words, “Camel jockey, get out!”

Weinstein also provided a letter, with the name withheld, from a Muslim woman and wife of a member of the military, in which she described how her best friend on the base, immediately after the shooting, told her that “Muslims shouldn’t even be allowed in the U.S. Army,” and that she repeatedly heard things like, “Go back to your country” and “F—-ing Muslims,” as she shopped at the base commissary.

Weinstein, who spent 10 years in the Air Force as a military attorney, or JAG, said that he also doesn’t believe that Hasan’s colleagues hesitated to report his changes in behavior because of political correctness. In fact, he claimed, Hasan’s superiors would have been sympathetic to hearing such charges because of their strong Christian beliefs.

Weinstein would like to see military leaders make an “unadulterated clarion call” that Americans shouldn’t “paint all of Islam with a broad brush,” as well as emphasize a “zero tolerance policy” of any religious harassment.

Any Jewish newspaper that runs Mikey Weinstein’s op eds slash infomercials should know exactly what they’re getting into. His organization is backed by non-Jewish left wing activists. It is not about religious freedom, but about promoting their agenda. It is not a Jewish organization, but another tentacle of the myriad of left wing organizations strangling America.

Meanwhile at Joshuapundit, my article Obama Goes Mao, on Obama’s betrayal of Taiwain, was nominated for the watcher’s council. Header cartoon comes courtesy of Jew With a View.

By Elinor Comlay and Jonathan Stempel (Reuters)

Dubai’s debt woes could further unhinge an already fragile U.S. commercial real estate, as it illustrates the importance of that tiny country to global investors in an increasingly interconnected world.

A state-owned investment conglomerate Dubai World, with $59 billion of liabilities, set off a global stock market selloff this week after it said it wants to restructure its debt, including at its property subsidiary Nakheel.

“This downturn has had more of a global impact,” said Tony Ciochetti, chairman of Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Center for Real Estate in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

“As I try to explain to my students, with a global economy, we’re all attached at the hip financially in some way, shape or form,” he added.

The Dubai news also cast doubt over the strength of the fledgling U.S. economic recovery, and the prospects for a bottoming of property prices.

On Friday alone, the Dow Jones U.S. Real Estate Index (DJUSRE) fell 2.9 percent, nearly twice the decline of broader U.S. market indexes.

“Dubai may have to unload some very prestigious properties at distressed prices and this will drive the price of all commercial real estate lower,” wrote Richard Bove, a banking analyst at Rochdale Securities in Lutz, Florida.

PRESTIGIOUS PROPERTIES

In the United States, Dubai World’s portfolio includes several well-known properties, and the fallout could have a larger impact on the entire real estate market.

The company is a partner with casino operator MGM Mirage  in the $8.5 billion CityCenter project, which would add 6,000 rooms to a Las Vegas Strip gambling corridor already saturated with unoccupied hotel rooms.

Nakheel, perhaps best known as the developer of Dubai’s palm-shaped islands, also carries the Mandarin Oriental and W hotels in New York in its portfolio, and has a 50 percent stake in the Fontainebleau Miami Beach resort.

And, through its Istithmar affiliate, Dubai World controls the upscale retailer Barneys New York Inc.

The main threat to U.S. commercial property from Dubai World woes may be “potential for contagion,” said Sam Chandan, chief economist at Real Estate Econometrics LLC in New York.

“It has the potential to spill over into the broader perception of real estate development and real estate as being a very risky area for exposure,” Chandan said.

U.S. commercial real estate values have already fallen 42.9 percent from their 2007 peak, Moody’s Investors Service said.

Last month, delinquencies on U.S. commercial real estate loans that were packaged into commercial mortgage-backed securities reached 4.8 percent, more than six times the year earlier level, according to Trepp LLC in New York.

In a November 23 report, Moody’s analyst Nick Levidy said prices could bottom at 45 percent to 55 percent below their peak, implying an additional 5 percent to 28 percent decline, but in a “stress case” could drop 65 percent from their peak.

CURRENCIES AND SUBMARINES

Like U.S. investors, foreign investors were enticed through much of this decade to buy U.S. real estate aided by cheap credit and the hope that property prices would steadily rise for a long time.

Currency fluctuations also provided a boost.

And the U.S. dollar lost about one-third of its value against a basket of currencies .DXY since late 2002, making it easier for foreign investors to scoop up U.S. real estate even when valuations grew too rich for investors at home.

Dubai World’s holdings go far beyond real estate. It has a 20 percent stake in Canada’s Cirque du Soleil, and also invests in the global bank Standard Chartered Plc  and New York boutique investment bank Perella Weinberg Partners.

Other investments go farther afield — or under water. Dubai World is suing a former executive in a case arising from a wayward foray into submarine financing.

But Ciochetti suggested it is premature to quantify Dubai World’s impact on U.S. commercial real estate.

“It is hard to focus on any one particular participant and then generalize about the whole market,” he said. “It illustrates that very few places and participants in the commercial real estate market are totally exempt from the global economic crisis.”

Eight Dealing With Debt Tips
If you’re weighed down by Debt, here are some tips that could help you improve your finances.

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It seems that even countries are overusing their credit accounts; then suffer from interest rates bringing other debtors down with them:

‘Dubai’s financial implosion could be the beginning of a fresh financial crisis as investors lose faith in the ability of heavily indebted countries to pay their bills. Analysts warn that in the worst-case scenario, the Dubai crisis could lead to mass defaults in emerging markets and even in heavily leveraged Western economies like Ireland and Greece.

‘The amounts involved in Dubai aren’t big enough to destabilize the world economy by themselves, but some investors fear the crisis there foreshadows other “debt bombs” in countries that borrowed heavily to weather the recession. “Whether you are Dubai, Greece, Spain, Ireland, or the UK, you can print as much money as you want, but at the end of the day you have to pay the interest on your debt,” one analyst tells the New York Times.’

As you have all have heard recently Dubai is going through a financial crisis. They have racked up about $80 billion in debt building their city from practically nothing. The Debt crisis was already predicted a few times before with many people questioning dubai’s leader the Sheik about the rapid development in dubai being financed solely by borrowing. All the construction projects launched by the government of Dubai was basically on borrowed money. Dubai didnt plan for an economic downturn where their real estate projects would not sell and they would be able to repay the money they borrowed. The misuse of funds and not building the proper infrastructure to support development even if the real estate market crashed was a wrong move. Now dubai Burden by Debt cannout leave the construction projects undone. I think that Dubai should not have borrowed to much. $80 billion to build a city that is Kind of a bit too much. So just think about it is it worth $80 billion to build a city from nothing? or is $80 billion too much to build a city??

I was surfing the web and thinking about nyquil (I don’t know it happened) and happened upon this site and her article about buying 25 nyquils. Hilarious. My interest was piqued. Surfing across her site I came across her article about her debt and it got me worried.

In the article before I wrote about the Steve Madden shoe (that I did buy last night) and my friend stated that I should join shopaholics anonymous. Am I that far gone that I need to join such a club? Unlike violentacres I don’t have 11 credit cards, my parent’s haven’t (technically) cut me off (I just refuse their money). I know what it means to work for everything I own. But in the back of my mind there is that question of what if that does become me? My aunt has to have 11 credit cards and has lots of debt. She can afford to keep the lights on in her house and drive a nice car, but for how long? She has over 100 bags that each cost over 100 dollars (most are around 100 dollars with some going to 500 dollars and some of her more amazing bags are over 1,000 dollars). She goes shopping every week. She knows she has a problem and yet she still shops. Does the compulsion to buy new things run in the family?

It’s been stated that I have poor impulse control. If I like it I tend to buy it, regardless of if I already have one or don’t need one all together. Like that duvet cover? Beautiful? Yes, but did I really need it? I can justify it in my head, but I doubt I would have died without it. What about that staple-free staples? Cool? I think so, but it only holds four pieces of paper. It holds four pieces of paper rather precariously. Without these things life would have gone on and I wouldn’t have had to pay what I did.

Currently I have student loans. Four thousand dollars, this semester. I got lucky because my parents paid for the first two years, then life got hard. I also got lucky because with careful planning I will graduate a year early. Eight thousand dollars less in debt. But honestly regardless of how much I get from my two jobs and if I can pay off my credit card on time, I am always in debt. Stupid degree that I don’t know what I’m going to do with.

Since I’m always in debt at this moment, I shouldn’t spend money on stuff huh? I can understand that, but what about food? I spend more money on food than my shopping. Food is important to survive. Am I to forgo eating because I’m in debt? No right? I guess I could eat out less often, but that’s how people socialize. I wish I could pass up socializing, but I’m human too.

My fear is that I will indeed become a shopaholic and I will be so much in debt that I’m running from creditors and live homeless for months. I don’t think I’d have the balls to do it. Hopefully, I’d have strong support from my family and some friends who would stop me before that happens. But really, I hope that I have enough sense to not walk down that road at all. I don’t want to live paycheck to paycheck. The stress would get to me. I’m ready to make a mark on the world, but I don’t think I want that mark to be another statistic of someone who filed for bankruptcy.

This one quote sums up the way we SHOULD be doing health care reform:

“…do health care the right way — one reform at a time, each simple and simplifying, aimed at reducing complexity, arbitrariness and inefficiency.”

The stated reason of the democrats to undertake this massive takeover of the health care system was to “insure the 40 million uninsured.”

That number is misleading and inaccurate, but let’s assume for a moment that there are 40 million people who can’t afford insurance.  Tort reform and competition are the BEST ways to make it affordable, but let’s assume again for the sake of argument that the government needs to step in.

A family of four can get a pretty decent health insurance for about $400 per month.  That’s $4,800 per year for a family of four.  Now let’s assume an even worse case that the cost is $4,800 per person per year.  Multiply that times the 40 million claimed by the democrats to be uninsured and that comes out to $192,000,000,000.  That’s 192 billion dollars.

So if the government simply wrote those 40 million people a check to buy a PRIVATE insurance policy, it would be over 13 times LESS EXPENSIVE than the plan the democrats are pushing, and that’s using the most conservative estimates of the overall costs of $2.5 TRILLION.  Most think it will be much, much higher.

Again, looking at THE ORIGINAL STATED GOAL OF INSURING THE UNINSURED, I have to ask how can we possibly be going down this road and remotely think it’s a good way to go about it?

November 27, 2009

Kill the Bills. Do Health Reform Right

By Charles Krauthammer

While the world markets were left shaken over the last few days, based on Lenders concerns about the heavy debt of ‘Dubai World’, Dubai’s neighbor Abu Dhabi may come to ‘Dubai’s rescue to calm investor’s fears…

Source: read more Abu Dhabi rides in to rescue Dubai from debt crisis

The AP is reporting that as world markets absorbed the shock of Dubai’s debt crisis, the ruler of the once-booming city-state left town for an important meeting in a desert palace. His hosts: the leaders of neighboring Abu Dhabi whose balance sheets are flush with oil revenue.

It’s not known what promises were made inside the halls in Al Ain during the parade of visitors for an important Islamic feast day on Friday. But their new relationship is clear. Abu Dhabi has the cash and cache to be Dubai’s white knight — in a Gulf version of a too-big-to-fail bailout or to help calm markets with promises to intervene if Dubai’s fiscal mess deepens.

Asian markets have followed Europe in a slide amid fears about Dubai’s massive debt, which have also driven the U.S. dollar lower. South Korea’s KOSPI lost 4.7 percent and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng dropped 4.8 percent.

Investors are worried that a default by a government investment company in Dubai over $60 billion in debt payments could have a ripple effect in world financial markets. The fear is that losses in the small emirate, which has drawn wealthy tourists from around the globe in the past decade with its Las Vegas-in-the-Middle East appeal, could imperil a nascent economic rebound…CBS news reports.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2009/11/27/business/main5799521.shtml

Christopher Davidson, an expert in Emirate affairs at Britain’s Durham University, wondered if Abu Dhabi wanted to become too deeply involved in lifting Dubai from its fiscal wreckage.

“There is no point throwing good money into Dubai’s black holes,” Davidson said. “These are mistakes of Sheik Mohammed and he needs to deal with them.”

I guess that what goes up, must sometimes come down.I hope for better days in Dubai….

Follow story from the source here…

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5jgIwsGJtixo-F6a2j5e8hebIbaEwD9C8JAB00

Dubai always prided  itself with the positive coverage of international media about the Dubai feats starting with Burj Al Arab, then the Palm and the Burj Dubai. Not this time. International media is giving Dubai a hard beating and its debt default has not only affected the direct investors and the local banks, but also world stock markets for fear of another major downturn. This morning news coming from the USA says that the Dubai default has affected further the housing problems in the US and has driven the prices  down. Since the mention of the freeze of debts till May 2010 two days ago, international media are on Dubai’s case citing issues and possible doomsday scenarios for the emirate. While all this coverage touches upon the impact of such a default on the world markets and world investors and lending countries like the UK, France and the US, nothing has been said on what impact it will have on business in Dubai itself and the thousands of companies that are based here. For the past 11 months the emirate of Abu Dhabi has seen a major shift in terms of drawing a lot of Dubai based businesses looking for projects and being a part of the major projects Abu Dhabi is building, while Dubai has stayed  fairly quiet with hundreds of cranes along the horizon are standing still as if frozen in time.  Check this Huffington Post article for more details: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/26/dubai-request-for-debt-st_n_371852.html

The following story is a possible fictional time line for the day the dollar died. I hope not to instill fear or loathing but to give everyone some perspective on a POSSIBLE outcome which does not really take much of a reach to come to any conclusion. Despite popular belief and promises from those who wish to rob you of your savings and investments, the collapse of the dollar might just be an event measured in hours, not days as their control is not what it seems….

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MIKE WAS LESS THAN AN HOUR FROM home in Minnesota after dropping his load off in Fargo but knew he needed to top his tank off this Sunday evening to insure his rig would make it home. He pulled into the Petro Truck Stop just outside of Fargo and hopped out of the cab into the bitter twenty below temperatures which he could not believe had already hit at ten o’clock at night. He slid his fuel card into the pump waiting for the next prompt when the “SEE ATTENDANT” message flashed in the screen. He blustered, figured it was another card problem and whipped out his Master Card and slid it in after the pump reset and again the “SEE ATTENDANT” message flashed up. “What the hell is going on?” he thought to himself as he wandered into the long line of drivers boisterously yelling at managers and clerks alike.

Tom finished up his shift on the docks at the Nestle warehouse in Hampton, Georgia at exactly 11 o’clock at night and decided that because of the scuttlebutt he had been reading on the message boards, it may not be a bad idea to pick up a few cans of food and some toilet paper at the local Wal-Mart Super center. Even though it was a Sunday night, they were always stocked and it was just five minutes out of the way to his home. As he walked inside the store, his mouth dropped. It looked like the day after Thanksgiving sale with every register open and ten plus people deep at 11:30 p.m. “Oh my God!” he gasped as he walked in grabbing the last shopping cart with the wheel that was half locked up. As he walked as fast as he could to the aisle with the paper goods, he looked at all the shelves then noticed the clerk who looked stunned himself.

“How in the SAM HELL does Wal-Mart sell out of Toilet Paper son?” he screamed at the eighteen-year-old kid. “Sir, I don’t know what is going on. Is the world ending? I’m a little freaked out!” the clerk stammered. Tom realized that he was not to blame and as he calmed down said to the kid “Son, I don’t know what is going on either. It must be an ice storm on the way. Are you folks getting another truck soon?” The clerk said in a very low voice “Sir, I think there are two coming at 2 a.m. I would wait here if I were you.” With that information Tom slinked outside to his car and called his wife at home just before midnight to tell her he would be staying to wait on the Wal-Mart trucks.

1730 ET…February 21, 2010

It was a typical Sunday night in my household, a tremendous dinner, nice weather in Florida and of course a chance to chat with my friends online about the events of the world. The big news was that on Friday, February 19, 2010 the US Dollar Index closed at 69.07 far below any level in history and of course shattering all known technical support. As I grabbed a glass of Port and settled in front of my computer at 5 p.m. Eastern to watch the Asian fireworks and watch Bloomberg and CNBC-Asia on my computer, I noticed the Middle Eastern markets closed in horrid shape. The Israeli market closed three hours after the open and down 22% for the session. The Saudi markets closed after one hour and down 41%. Other regional markets did not open or were shut down due to national emergency declarations. As I tuned in expecting the usual repeat on Bloomberg, it was live with a somewhat excited news babe reading information from a blog reporting “rumors” that the CEO’s of Citigroup and Bank of America were in meetings since 11 a.m. with the New York Fed. At that point, it was time to put the port up and break out the hard stuff.

Gold had closed at a record high again, up some $37 to finish Friday’s session up at $1289 and change so I figured it would be jumping again with all of this worldly instability on display. I searched the boards and feeds like mad, looking for anything on an Iranian attack or outbreak of war elsewhere in the world but nothing was found at all. As 6 p.m. Eastern flipped up on my watch, CNBC interrupted their programming with a live update from New York instead of Australia or Tokyo about the meeting at the NY Fed. Bloomberg also broke from their Asian coverage with a brief story but no details as to why there was a meeting today or who else was there. As the New Zealand markets opened, the prices went nuts but shockingly to the upside. Their markets shot up 11% on the open to break over the 3900 price level but that was not the story. As the futures opened in Chicago for the evening session, no matter where you were in the world that day or night, you printed that screen at 6:04 p.m. Eastern time as the prints were staggering:

Gold UP $212.15 to $1501.15

Silver UP $39.13 to $81.06

US DOLLAR INDEX DOWN 9.5869 or just over 14% to 59.4830

US S&P FUTURES DOWN 49.13

US DOW FUTURES DOWN 472

NASDAQ FUTURES DOWN 135

Holy Smokes! This was an absurd way to start the night and my phone started ringing along with text messages and emails out my wazoo. The sense of panic was evident on Bernie Lo’s face as he came on to the air discussing what was happening in the futures market and fortunately he announced that Jim Rogers would be joining him after the next break. As the commercial started at 6:09 p.m. Eastern the scroll at the bottom of the screen was bright red with the headline:

ALL U.S. EQUITY FUTURES ARE LOCK LIMIT DOWN…. TRADING SUSPENDED UNTIL 0900 ET MONDAY FEB 22….US DOLLAR BEING SOLD ACROSS THE BOARD

By 6:15 the Euro was trading at $1.92, the Kiwi (New Zealand Dollar) at $1.26, the Aussie Dollar well beyond par at $1.39 and the Canadian Loonie rocketing past par to $1.33. The U.S. Dollar was in a full-fledged collapse and the world was putting money anywhere they could to escape the carnage. As the New Zealand equity markets struggled to handle the order flow an announcement emerged at 6:27 p.m. Eastern time that they would no longer accept U.S. dollars within their nation for the next 72 hours until the United States Federal Reserve Bank introduced stability measures. That instantly turned a huge move to the upside to down 17% in less than three minutes and soon thereafter, trading was suspended by 7 p.m. Eastern time. Instead of waiting to see what was next, I left at 6:51 p.m. to run down the street and take $500 from the local grocery store ATM, returning just in time for the top-of-the-hour news.

1900 ET

The Australian markets attempted to open but due to order imbalances they were delayed twenty-seven minutes. It was a buying frenzy in Australia also as the Aussie Dollar was skyrocketing higher and gold continued to gain, now up $273.20 per ounce in less than two hours of trading. The Chicago board was going to make a statement at 8 p.m. ET and the world was holding its collective breath because something bad was happening again in the United States and everyone wanted to buy into foreign markets to escape the American disaster on the horizon. After a brief opening, the Australian government followed suit with the New Zealand announcement and suspended acceptance of the U.S. Dollar for commerce until further notice. The Japanese were very quiet in the mean time as they announced at 7 p.m. they would keep their markets closed but the huge move in the Yen caused massive concerns as noted by the central bank. The yen appreciated from a close of 79.8213 on Friday the 19th to an opening of 48.7326 in less than an hour of trading. Nobody wanted dollars and even fewer people it was discovered wanted the British Pound. The Pound for the first time in its history was worth less than 100 yen and it was well on its way to joining the US Dollar in a death spiral.

2000 ET

The internet is crawling. Message boards were lit up with record numbers of participants. Rumors swirled about declarations of martial law, bank holidays, secret wars and other crazy things. Yet my phone messages, conversations, texts and emails told me there was something very very wrong. Two of my friends called me to tell me the consequences of the failed 30-year-bond auction last Thursday came home to roost over the weekend. Citi and BoA were rumored to have a huge CDS obligation due to the interest rates being blown outside of the norm and the 6.05% yield from the auction cost the banks an estimated $400 billion each if they were forced to settle open swap contracts and derivative issues by Monday or the end of the month. The swaps and derivatives which were to prevent the collapse may actually have finally started it but nobody could verify anything that was happening as the NY Fed looked like a war zone with hundreds of cameras around the building and reporters speculating endlessly on every cable channel.

2100 ET

I did not know who to believe but when Bloomberg played the excerpt from Jim Rogers’ interview just after the top of the hour where he said “this is what a currency collapse looks like and if you were not prepared, you were wiped out” really resonated with everyone on the Bloomberg set and throughout the news worldwide. The Chicago Futures were closed by order of the CFTC and SEC and that was the big announcement but it was assumed anyways because there was no way the COMEX or anyone else could possibly have kept up with the demand for precious metals as the last print had gold over $1579 per ounce and worse, the base metals closing at obscene prices like $6.79 per lb. for copper! The Shanghai markets were ordered open for domestic participants only and no overseas selling was allowed nor trading in US Dollars thus allowing the communists to manage their banking situation without outside influence. Unfortunately a rumor was confirmed on FNC later in the hour that Chinese troops were deployed to all U.S. and British bank branches inside their nation. That only permeated the panic already felt on the internet and in the air. The news at the top of the hour was even more shocking.

2200 ET

CNN led the hour off with coverage of the “FINANCIAL CRISIS OF 2010? with breaking news about two hedge fund managers committing suicide in their offices in New York. That did not help the confidence level nor did the statement from Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner at 10:09 p.m. Eastern that the “government was in full control of the situation and that the panic world wide was unwarranted.” When he finished the statement assuring that the financial markets would probably open on time in the morning, the snicker from CNBC’s team of Gasparino and Griffith spoke volumes about what was really occurring.

2300 ET

Somehow a picture of Goldman Sachs CEO Blankfein and JP Morgan’s CEO Jamie Dimon entering the New York Federal Reserve building was leaked out and broadcast on cable news and financial news outlets causing more discussions and a genuine sense of panic to grip everyone. Reports about credit cards not working for the last two hours nationwide were swamping the newsrooms but no comments from VISA, Master Charge or anyone else was forthcoming.

0000 ET February 22, 2010

It was officially a panic. Reports on local news stations about grocery store shelves being cleaned out and ATM machines running out of money hours ago and not being refilled were broadcast nationwide. Even my local station had a story about accessing the reporter’s bank account online and all they got was a very scary message as they attempted to reach his bank’s web page: 404 – NOT FOUND

0100 ET

WWOR and WCBS started reporting that gas stations in the New York City and northern New Jersey areas were running out of gas even though credit cards did not work. The cable news stations and financial news networks just recycled earlier news with updates at the top of the hour. The world markets were closed and everyone was holding their breath to see what happened the next morning.

0200 ET

As I struggled to stay awake, NY Federal Reserve President Denis Hughes came to the microphones with Dimon, Blankfein and shockingly Ben Bernanke. Hughes immediately deferred to Bernanke who said that the President would address the nation at 7 a.m. Eastern Time and that he felt the crisis was averted for the moment and that everyone should have faith in the United State’s policy of a strong currency and banking system. After that statement was concluded, Bloomberg switched to a banking analyst from Singapore who said that the U.S. was now a hulking smoking black hole in the ground and the only thing it was good for was to return those worthless dollars back to “THAT” nation so “THEY” could burn them to stay warm this winter.

0300 ET

Someone on the message board posted a story from WTOP that military police were seen setting up roadblocks throughout Washington, D.C. There was no video or other confirmation within that hour. I had to make double strength coffee at that point in time but instead set my alarm for 0500 to try to grab a nap. I was not about to miss what was going to be a day to remember in American history.

0509 ET

So sue me! I hit my snooze button then realized I fell asleep with the computer and television on and the news was flying. In big bold red at the top of CNBC’s screen was the announcement COUNTDOWN TO SPEECH and a counter moving towards 0700 Eastern. As I flipped the channels half awake, I noticed a BREAKING NEWS announcement on CNN and there was a feed from WSB in Atlanta, GA with their helicopter video of the Georgia State Patrol closing off all streets within three blocks of the Federal Reserve Bank in Atlanta and also around the Federal Home Loan Bank. That sent a chill down my spine as I flipped back on to the computer to see over two hundred unread emails and message upon message about shortages, internet outages, credit card problems and worst of all, gas stations running out of fuel. The other shocker was the suspension of international flights in many U.S. cities as the suppliers put every airline on C.O.D. effective immediately at 2:30 a.m. Eastern Time and that suspended a ton of flights inside the United States and worldwide. The cascading effects were stunning, even to those of us who were warning about it.

0530 ET

Several European markets attempted to open in coordination with Middle Eastern markets but the declines were so severe that within ten minutes of trading the authorities shut them all down within a half hour:

Russia –35%

Saudi Arabia –43%

Israel –22%

Switzerland –17%

Germany’s DAX –41%

CAC 40 – 29%

FTSE 100 – 32%

The Euro was up another 10% against the dollar and the Swiss Franc was now worth over $1.40 U.S. As the discussions about the problems with the U.S. dollar accelerated, banks were being shut down in Europe in nation after nation to prevent runs. Sadly for the Brits, the Sterling was now trading so poorly in Europe that it was worth just 1/3 of a Euro at some trading desks. By the top of the hour, video of riots in front of banks in Frankfurt and Glasgow were broadcast nationwide. At 5:55 a.m. Eastern the news took a dark turn with this BREAKING NEWS headline:

OBAMA AND BERNANKE TO SPEAK TO THE NATION AT 6 A.M. EST

0600 ET

The speech was low key, solemn and to the point. Obama announced a one-week bank holiday. All credit card transactions and all collection actions of any sort were hereby suspended for seven days. All financial markets were closed until further notice. All mortgage and bill payment due dates were suspended for thirty days and no past due notices nor penalties were to be allowed by Federal Law. All schools were closed for seventy-two hours be they public or private. The city of Washington, D.C. was hereby declared to be under a state of martial law and all citizens were ordered to observe a curfew from 8 p.m. to 8 a.m. daily. Just as that sunk in, Ben Bernanke stepped up to the microphone to announce that President Obama, Treasury Secretary Geithner and all of the Federal Reserve Presidents along with himself were going to depart for Geneva for an emergency meeting of the G-20, IMF, World Bank and United Nations Financial Stability Working Group. Bernanke also announced that Citigroup, N.A. and Bank of America were hereby nationalized and placed under control of the United States Treasury under the auspices of the FDIC and that Sheila Bair would have an announcement at 8 a.m. Eastern. As he finished the announcement, an obviously exhausted Federal Reserve Chairman concluded by assuring the citizens of the nation that a stable currency was their only goal from this meeting of world financial leaders. I noted he did not say what currency though he was referring to.

0800 ET

By now, CNBC, Fox Business and Bloomberg were knee deep in wall-to-wall coverage but so were the broadcast and cable networks. America was on the brink was the preaching and screaming and the “bulls” were being gored by the permabears every time they uttered any statements about “how we’ve been through worse” etc., etc.

The announcement of the seizure by the FDIC of two of the largest banks in the world was pretty standard and short. The follow up statement by Ms. Barr though is what caused every newsroom to take pause when she stated that “further consolidations will be announced in the next seventy-two hours.”

The Bubblemedia was stunned and even shocked when Canada announced that they would attempt to open their financial markets for two hours of trading and that their banks would be open for normal domestic customers and business from 10 a.m. until noon Eastern time. Everyone on television looked at each other and just asked “How?”

0900 ET

I had forgotten to call in sick to work but then again the phone call from the company owner was pretty much a “well now what” as we laughed in a gallows humor discussion. He understood why I was home and he had already told the employees that he was closing at noon and would reopen when we could actually collect real money on what we sold and leased out. I told him I would call him at home later or meet him with a bottle on the golf course in the morning, weather permitting.

The chilling video of the Federal Reserve heads, Geithner and Obama boarding Air Force One to leave for Geneva from Washington, D.C. really had an impact on me.

1000 ET

The Canadian markets opened up 10% in ten minutes then rolled over down 31% by 10:30. The scary part was that the Canadian dollar kept on rising even though commodity trading was suspended and everyone was wondering just what gold would be priced at if the markets were allowed to trade.

As the day wore on, it was a blur of shocking story after shocking story. The President and his entourage arrived in Switzerland along with other world leaders but little was discussed or disclosed. The reports of banks being fire bombed by nuts throughout parts of the U.S. made the international news and caused all of us to feel somewhat uncomfortable as to what was next. The 8 p.m. interruption of normal prime time programming with a FEMA NEWS ALERT which lasted ten minutes and was repeated at the top of every hour with little if any information caused even more panic in the masses. Today I watched our dollar die in a matter of hours even though I knew how it was killed months if not years ago. I just wondered how bad the announcement out of Geneva was going to be as our bankers and politicians sold our souls out to save their rear ends.

I also wondered if I would ever sleep again.