McDuck's Account Talk

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Re: Greg's Account Talk

Greg,

Thanks for the last few post...IBD's The UAW Reneges, Detnews.com's Ford's success tops industry wish list, NPR's Cutting Worker Costs Key To Automakers' Survival, George Wallace's Stand Up For America, and the Daily News This isn't your grandfather's New Deal.
To bad you don't see this on national news. ;)
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

McConnell Urges Caution in Debate on Economic Stimulus Measure

By Laura Litvan

Dec. 29 (Bloomberg) -- Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said he wants to slow consideration of the economic stimulus package Democrats are drafting, warning that the measure sought by President-elect Barack Obama invites wasteful spending.

“A trillion-dollar spending bill would be the largest spending bill in the history of our country at a time when our national debt is already the largest in history,” McConnell, a Kentucky Republican, said in a statement. “As a result, it will require tough scrutiny and oversight. Taxpayers, already stretched to the limit, deserve nothing less.”

McConnell called for giving lawmakers and the public at least one week to review the legislation once it has been written. He also said he wanted Senate committee hearings on the measure, rather than immediate floor consideration.

His demand, in a Senate where minority Republicans will still have the power to block legislation, could stall a drive by Democrats to approve legislation soon after Obama’s Jan. 20 inauguration.

Obama advisers and congressional Democrats estimate the stimulus package, expected to include new infrastructure spending and tax cuts, may total $850 billion. Some economists are recommending as much as $1 trillion to boost the sagging economy.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a California Democrat, says her goal is to send legislation to Obama on the day of his inauguration. A spokesman for Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada said today that, because he will need some Republican support to approve the legislation, the timing of Senate action is unclear.

Republican Cooperation

“It remains to be seen” when the Senate will consider the package, Reid spokesman Jim Manley said. “It all depends on what cooperation we get from Senate Republicans.”

McConnell’s party will have at least 41 Senate seats next year, giving it the power to filibuster legislation or delay it with unlimited debate. He said he wants to closely scrutinize the stimulus proposal to make sure individual projects and tax breaks truly spark economic growth.

“We must make distinctions between what is ‘stimulus’ -- defined by Speaker Pelosi earlier this year as ‘timely, targeted and temporary’ -- and what is merely more government spending on favored projects we don’t need with money we don’t have,” McConnell said.

House Republican leader John Boehner of Ohio said today he has reservations about the size of the plan. He also called for hearings on it and at least a week of publicly available text for taxpayers to review. In the House the minority party doesn’t have as much power as in the Senate to stall legislation.

Last Updated: December 29, 2008 17:04 EST
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

Holiday Sales Drop to Force Bankruptcies, Closings

By Heather Burke

Dec. 29 (Bloomberg) -- U.S. retailers face a wave of store closings, bankruptcies and takeovers starting next month as holiday sales are shaping up to be the worst in 40 years.

Retailers may close 73,000 stores in the first half of 2009, according to the International Council of Shopping Centers. Talbots Inc. and Sears Holdings Corp. are among chains shuttering underperforming locations.

More than a dozen retailers, including Circuit City Stores Inc., Linens ‘n Things Inc., Sharper Image Corp. and Steve & Barry’s LLC, have sought bankruptcy protection this year as the credit squeeze and recession drained sales. Investors will start seeing a wide variety of chains seeking bankruptcy protection in February when they file financial reports, said Burt Flickinger.

“You’ll see department stores, specialty stores, discount stores, grocery stores, drugstores, major chains either multi- regionally or nationally go out,” Flickinger, managing director of Strategic Resource Group, a retail-industry consulting firm in New York, said today in a Bloomberg Radio interview. “There are a number that are real causes for concern.”

Sales at stores open at least a year probably dropped as much as 2 percent in November and December, the ICSC said last week, more than the previously projected 1 percent decline. That would be the largest drop since at least 1969, when the New York-based trade group started tracking data. Gap Inc. and Macy’s Inc. are among retailers that will report December results on Jan. 8.

Women’s Clothing, Electronics

Consumers spent at least 20 percent less on women’s clothing, electronics and jewelry during November and December, according to data from SpendingPulse.

Retail Metrics Inc.’s December comparable-store sales index will drop an estimated 1.2 percent, or 5 percent excluding Wal- Mart Stores Inc. Retailers’ fourth-quarter earnings may fall 19 percent on average, the seventh consecutive quarterly decline, according to Ken Perkins, president of Retail Metrics, a Swampscott, Massachusetts-based consulting firm.

Probably 50,000 stores could close without any effect on consumer choice, Gregory Segall, a managing partner at buyout firm Versa Capital Management Inc., said this month during a panel discussion held at Bloomberg LP’s New York offices. Only retailers with healthy balance sheets will survive the recession, according to Matthew Katz, a managing director at consulting firm AlixPartners LLP.

Store Closings

The ICSC predicts, using U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data, that 148,000 stores will shut down in 2008. That would be the largest number since 151,000 closings in 2001, during the last recession, according to ICSC Chief Economist Michael Niemira. The total number of retail establishments will decline by about 3 percent this year, also taking into account locations that were opened, he said. The U.S. had 1.11 million retail locations in 2002.

Another 73,000 locations may shut their doors in the first part of 2009, Niemira said.

The U.S. economy shrank in the third quarter at a 0.5 percent annual pace, the worst since 2001, according to the Commerce Department. Economists surveyed by Bloomberg in the first week of December forecast the world’s largest economy will contract through the first half of 2009.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Retailing Index has shed 34 percent this year, with only two of its 27 companies rising.

The index doesn’t include Wal-Mart, the world’s largest retailer, which fell 24 cents to $55.11 at 4:02 p.m. in New York Stock Exchange composite trading. Wal-Mart shares have gained 18 percent this year.

Discount Advantage

“If you’re going to be in retail right now, the discount space is where you want to be,” Patrick McKeever, a senior equity analyst at MKM Partners LLC, said today in a Bloomberg Television interview.

Discounts of 70 percent or more by Macy’s, AnnTaylor Stores Inc. and other retailers failed to prevent a spending drop of as much as 4 percent during the final two months of the year, according to data from SpendingPulse. Retailers’ pricing models are being challenged by consumers, according to Richard Hastings, consumer strategist at Global Hunter Securities LLC of Newport Beach, California.

“The whole pricing system is becoming an old-fashioned bazaar,” Hastings said today in a telephone interview. “They’re going into the stores and they’re looking at the stuff and they’re saying ‘You know what? I know that that price is way too high,’ and they have figured out that the signage doesn’t mean that much.”

Retail bankruptcies may help the industry in the long run, according to Flickinger.

“We’ll be going from a Dickens-esque worst of times this December to the best of times in future Decembers because we’ll rationalize out all the redundant retailers and retail space in shopping centers,” Flickinger said.

Last Updated: December 29, 2008 16:17 EST
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-budgeting/article/106290/The-Best-and-Worst-of-Everything-2008

Worst Stock Market Performance*
Iceland

While the U.S. stock market has certainly suffered in 2008 -- the Standard & Poor's 500-stock index had lost 38% of its value through Dec. 8 -- plenty of other markets were hammered even worse. The OMX Iceland 15 Index fell 77% on a single day in October and is down 90% for the year.

*According to most recent data as of Dec. 8 from Bloomberg
 
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Re: Greg's Account Talk

http://finance.yahoo.com/banking-bu...owth-in-China-and-Other-Outrageous-Prophecies

3. S&P 500 to 500
The S&P 500 will fall to 500 points in 2009 as slowing corporate earnings will drag on the U.S. index, according to Saxo Bank. Earnings will slow because of a continued consumer recession, lead by the credit shortage. An increase in corporate funding costs, falls in house prices and a slowdown in investing programs will also add to the weakness, the report said.

4. Italy Could Drop the Euro
Italy could make good on threats to leave the European Exchange Rate Mechanism (ERM) and may drop out in 2009, Saxo Bank said, a decision which would mean the country effectively gives up the euro. The EU is likely to crack down on excessive government budget deficits, which could prompt Italy to leave the currency regulation, it said.

5. Australian Dollar to Slump vs Yen
The Australian dollar will sink to 40 Japanese yen as next year's continued slump in commodities hurts the Australian economy, Saxo Bank said. The whole commodity complex will be left dead in the water for the next ten years, the report said.

6. Dollar to Outstrip the Euro
The euro will fall to 0.95 cents versus the dollar in the New Year, before shifting direction and rising to 1.30 cents, according to Saxo Bank. The euro-zone will face a tough year in 2009 as the banking sector will suffer because of its exposure to Eastern Europe, a region that will increasingly falter next year, the report said.


7. Chinese GDP Growth to 0%
Export-led China will be hit by the double blow of a slowing U.S. economy and the souring of commodity-based investments, according to Saxo Bank. Japan will not actually sink into recession, despite gross-domestic-product growth all but disappearing, the report said.
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

http://dsc.discovery.com/news/2008/12/29/family-brain-02.html

Discovery Channel

How Visiting Your Family Warps Your Brain

Jennifer Viegas, Discovery News

Dec. 29, 2008 -- Visiting -- or even just viewing photos of family members -- prompts brain activity that affects how you feel about them, your friends, and even yourself, a new study suggests.

The study is the first to compare brain activity associated with seeing relatives with that linked to seeing friends and strangers. It suggests our feelings about biological relatives are at least somewhat primal.

The findings may help explain everything from why our family can get on our nerves to why people who look like us can spark immediate feelings of trust, "but not lust," said Steven Platek, who co-authored the study with Shelly Kemp.

"We like to be around people that look more like us, but we do not find them as sexually attractive," added Platek, editor-in-chief of the journal Frontiers in Evolutionary Neuroscience. "I think it is linked to our subconscious ability to detect facial resemblances so we avoid lusting after those that may be related to us."

For the study, the researchers performed MRI brain scans on test subjects viewing images of biological relatives, friends, strangers, themselves and various morphed images.

The scientists found that relatives and self-lookalikes are processed through a self-referential part of the brain. Friends and strangers who look nothing like the viewer, on the other hand, light up entirely different areas of the brain, those linked to making important and risky decisions with respect to the self.

The findings are published in the latest issue of the journal Neuropsychologia.

Platek and Kemp also found that the brain ranks everyone socially, with relatives at the head of the line.

"I think facial resemblance is ranked right up there in importance with attractiveness," Platek said.

Since relatives are processed through areas of the brain linked to self-reference, the study could also help to explain why relatives cause us to take things personally. While we may tolerate a friend's loud laughter or snoring, for example, we may have less patience with a relative because we judge them similarly to how we judge ourselves.

"This research is a wonderful example of the fruitfulness of conducting cognitive neuroscience informed by evolutionary theory," said Todd Shackelford, a professor of psychology at Florida Atlantic University.

"I am hopeful that other researchers in the cognitive neurosciences will follow Dr. Platek's lead and take full advantage of the predictive power of a Darwinian perspective on the design of the structure of the mind," he told Discovery News.

It's likely, he explained, that a face we perceive as "friendly" is one that looks more like us. But how we later feel about that person could be tied to how we feel about ourselves, perhaps explaining the prevalence of arguments during family reunions and holiday gatherings.


Copyright © 2008 Discovery Communications, LLC. The number-one nonfiction media company.
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

http://caps.fool.com/blogs/viewpost.aspx?bpid=123989&t=01000420523245711617

Peter Schiff - There's No Pain-Free Cure for Recession

December 29, 2008

As recession fears cause the nation to embrace greater state control of the economy and unimaginable federal deficits, one searches in vain for debate worthy of the moment. Where there should be an historic clash of ideas, there is only blind resignation and an amorphous queasiness that we are simply sweeping the slouching beast under the rug.

With faith in the free markets now taking a back seat to fear and expediency, nearly the entire political spectrum agrees that the federal government must spend whatever amount is necessary to stabilize the housing market, bail out financial firms, liquefy the credit markets, create jobs and make the recession as shallow and brief as possible. The few who maintain free-market views have been largely marginalized.

Taking the theories of economist John Maynard Keynes as gospel, our most highly respected contemporary economists imagine a complex world in which economics at the personal, corporate and municipal levels are governed by laws far different from those in effect at the national level.

Individuals, companies or cities with heavy debt and shrinking revenues instinctively know that they must reduce spending, tighten their belts, pay down debt and live within their means. But it is axiomatic in Keynesianism that national governments can create and sustain economic activity by injecting printed money into the financial system. In their view, absent the stimuli of the New Deal and World War II, the Depression would never have ended.

On a gut level, we have a hard time with this concept. There is a vague sense of smoke and mirrors, of something being magically created out of nothing. But economics, we are told, is complicated.

It would be irresponsible in the extreme for an individual to forestall a personal recession by taking out newer, bigger loans when the old loans can't be repaid. However, this is precisely what we are planning on a national level.

I believe these ideas hold sway largely because they promise happy, pain-free solutions. They are the economic equivalent of miracle weight-loss programs that require no dieting or exercise. The theories permit economists to claim mystic wisdom, governments to pretend that they have the power to dispel hardship with the whir of a printing press, and voters to believe that they can have recovery without sacrifice.

As a follower of the Austrian School of economics I believe that market forces apply equally to people and nations. The problems we face collectively are no different from those we face individually. Belt tightening is required by all, including government.

Governments cannot create but merely redirect. When the government spends, the money has to come from somewhere. If the government doesn't have a surplus, then it must come from taxes. If taxes don't go up, then it must come from increased borrowing. If lenders won't lend, then it must come from the printing press, which is where all these bailouts are headed. But each additional dollar printed diminishes the value those already in circulation. Something cannot be effortlessly created from nothing.

Similarly, any jobs or other economic activity created by public-sector expansion merely comes at the expense of jobs lost in the private sector. And if the government chooses to save inefficient jobs in select private industries, more efficient jobs will be lost in others. As more factors of production come under government control, the more inefficient our entire economy becomes. Inefficiency lowers productivity, stifles competitiveness and lowers living standards.

If we look at government market interventions through this pragmatic lens, what can we expect from the coming avalanche of federal activism?

By borrowing more than it can ever pay back, the government will guarantee higher inflation for years to come, thereby diminishing the value of all that Americans have saved and acquired. For now the inflationary tide is being held back by the countervailing pressures of bursting asset bubbles in real estate and stocks, forced liquidations in commodities, and troubled retailers slashing prices to unload excess inventory. But when the dust settles, trillions of new dollars will remain, chasing a diminished supply of goods. We will be left with 1970s-style stagflation, only with a much sharper contraction and significantly higher inflation.

The good news is that economics is not all that complicated. The bad news is that our economy is broken and there is nothing the government can do to fix it. However, the free market does have a cure: it's called a recession, and it's not fun, easy or quick. But if we put our faith in the power of government to make the pain go away, we will live with the consequences for generations.
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

Economy Ignites Hospital Layoffs - Tennessean
Rebecca Climer, chief communications officer for Saint Thomas Health Services, said the health system has been finding ways to respond to the economic pressure.
"(The survey) confirms what we all know," Climer said. "The downturn in the economy is affecting every hospital in Nashville," Climer said. "We are in a position to anticipate significant changes to come as we move into a time of sweeping health reform.
"We are developing nearly 30 multi-disciplinary teams across our organization to review our operations and evaluate opportunities for improvement

Hmmm.....Lessee.... 30 teams with how many diciplines represented? Say a conservative estimate of 3 diciplines per team and all will be PHD's of course, working at professional or maybe even consultant's pay... Sheesh they are goning to spend millions of dollars to "review our operations and evaluate opportunities for improvement":mad: Which they already know!

This Is a huge problem, and started when they made healthcare a business...... I say get business out of health care! and you wont be paying $150 dollars for a 50 cent bag of saline.(may be a silght exaggeration, but not by much.)
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

Dang, the F-fund went down 0.5% today. LMBFM had indicated to be in the I-fund.
 
Re: Greg's Account Talk

Great People that died in 2008

William F. Buckley Jr.

1204132194_0986.jpg


Richard Widmark

1209564218_3301.jpg


Charlton Heston

slideshow_779644_charltonhestonmain2.jpg


Jim McKay

1218548329_1538.jpg
 
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Re: Greg's Account Talk

Harvey Korman
slideshow_801440_HarveyKorman4.jpg



Eddy Arnold
slideshow_840656_EddyArnold.JPG


Beverly Garland gained prominence for her acting role as Fred MacMurray's second wife in the long-running 1960s sitcom, "My Three Sons."

slideshow_892625_BeverlyGarland.jpg


Eric Dowling helped plan the mass wartime breakout from a German prison camp that inspired the movie "The Great Escape". He forged documents, made maps and was nicknamed "Digger" for his work helping to excavate the three escape tunnel.

slideshow_840641_EricDowling.jpg
 
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