Not earning that little red 'R'

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I'll have to work on that.

Judge her as she judges herself

Al Eisele has a suggestion:

C'mon, she's been a good mother to Chelsea; she hasn't killed anybody, including her philandering husband; she's been an effective senator for her adopted state of New York; she's smart as hell and knows all the ins and outs of public policy, ranging from her hard-won expertise about what will and won't work on healthcare reform to how to deal with tyrants and dictators and the globalized economy, and she even knows how to do Saturday Night Live and Stephen Colbert.

OK, so she tried to make it look like she braved incoming on her trip to Bosnia, and that she helped settle the Israeli-Palestinian problem*...

Let's let Hillary off the hook for her Bosnia boast and judge her for what she is, and not for what she sometimes says she was.

I really liked the part about her "hard-won expertise about what will and won't work on healthcare reform." That's a lot like saying the Minnesota Vikings, by virtue of having lost 4 Super Bowls, have hard-won expertise about how to win the big one. Sure, they've seen it done close up, but for some unexplained reason, they haven't actually done it.

Voters, I suspect, would be a little more willing to take this advice if it appeared that Hillary was taking it herself. After all, she's the one who, by making up fairy stories designed to prove that she has sufficient foreign policy poundage to Take That Call(tm), is belying a belief that "what she is" is not enough, both in her eyes and in the eyes of the people she's lying to.

* and she brought peace to Northern Ireland. Can't forget that.

Guy like

Who says this blog never posts good news? The above illustration comes from John Maudlin's weekly newsletter (.PDF) and confirms what I thought about the housing problem: since the housing bubble never came to Kansas*, there's not much here to pop. Assuming one can find work here - admittedly not always an easy task - "Flyover Country" is looking pretty good these days, no?

* Except a little bit in the KC area, but I sold out there 10 years ago. Of course, the fact that my lovely wife was a real estate agent here in SEK for a while gave me something of an inside track on the housing market here and allowed us to buy a 1400 square foot commercial building downtown for ~$10k and a second, rental house (which needs a lot of work, alas) for ~$5k.

Straight to hell, baby

Business Week has nailed this one*. And with the release of El Presidente's new Wall Street "reform" package, which puts even more of our economy under the control of the Federal Reserve**, Comrade Ben is going to have even more power to "reluctantly" recoup the losses of Wall Street from the pockets of Main Street.

It will be interesting to see how much the Democrats squawk and scream before giving Bush everything he asks for. Not that they don't want to see it or pass it - it has been almost a century since Democrats opposed anything resembling centralization of power - but they will want to get a little more plunder for their base in advance of the election.

Gotta take care of that proletariat, comrade.

* With the possible exception of the word "reluctant." Moneycakes has not seemed terribly unwilling to act thus far. Fat lot of good it's done, though.

** As if creating money from nothing and loaning it to us at interest was not enough.

The gods we don't believe in

Brendoman presents a comprehensive list* of the "gods" that Christians and atheists share a non-belief in. On it are many familiar names, Aesir and Mars and Shiva among them, and at the bottom of the atheist list there is but one extra, Yahweh. The idea, of course, is that atheists "just believe in one less god" than do Christians.

But the frankly bizarre arguments of some Christians in the comments** aside, I can't help but think that such a list seriously misrepresents one facet of Christianity that is all but ignored in 21st Century America; Christianity has never asserted the non-existence of Aesir, of Mars, of Shiva. In fact, it asserts not only their existence, but their influence in the material world.

Around the middle of the First Century, a Christian church had grown up in the Greek city of Corinth, made up mostly of gentile converts from several of the pagan faiths whose namesakes are listed on the chart. They wrote the Apostle Paul a letter filled with questions, about ethics, about morality, about theology, and though unfortunately we do not retain the original questions, we still have Paul's answers. One of them related to this very thing:

I tell you that the things offered by the pagans are offered to evil spirits and not to God. And my desire is that you not have anything to do with evil spirits. - 1Cor 10:20

The former worshipers of Mars and of Diana, people who believed fervently in their existence and power, were not told by Paul that such beings did not exist, but rather that their true form had been concealed from them. The things sacrificed to Mars were sacrificed to evil spirits (demons or devils, if you will), and few Christians*** will deny that such non-physical beings exist. But even if they do not, even if we moderns believe that they do not, it does not change the historical fact that Christianity has asserted that when the worshipers of Mars sacrificed to Mars, Mars received their sacrifice****. The early Christians believed their pagan neighbors were in real spiritual bondage because they were under the influence of the real spiritual creatures they had chosen to follow.

But lest one think that that backsliding Jew Paul was the inventor of a concept, I probably ought to take it back a little further, like to the Psalmist:

Yes, parents sacrificed their sons and their daughters to devils. They shed the innocent blood of their sons and of their daughters, sacrificing them to the idols of Canaan.
-- Psalm 106:37-8

Or we could take it back to Moses:

[Some Israelites] sacrificed to devils and not to God. They sacrificed to gods they did not understand, to new gods newly arisen, gods whom your fathers did not know. -- Deu 32:16

In short, Judaism long before Jesus and Paul taught that the gods whom the idols represented were real beings. I won't bore you with any more of that*****, as I think the point is made. The Christian and atheist worldviews are not different simply in the inclusion or exclusion of a single non-material being from some list, but of the existence of any such beings in the first place.

Either there are spiritual beings which exist and which have influenced the actions of people and nations - no matter their names, no matter their attributes, the matter the specifics of the faithful who have worshiped them, followed them, killed for them throughout the centuries - or there are not. That is the distinction, and it runs far deeper than one name on a list, whether the modern American materialist Christian or the modern American materialist atheist chooses to believe it or not.

* alas, it's an image file and a big one at that, so presenting it here is, as the Spanish say, muy dificil.

** And in general. It is probably fair to say that most modern American Christians are theologically indistinguishable from materialists with the single exception that Brendoman points out. There remains, however, a difference between what modern American Christians believe and what Christianity historically asserts.

*** Unless they are members of the clergy of a dying denomination. Then that confession is all but required to receive an officer's commission on such a spiritual Titanic.

**** An excellent illustration of this concept can be found in CS Lewis' "The Last Battle," book 7 in the Chronicles of Narnia. In fact, reading even his childrens' fiction is a better use of your time than reading me, if I may say so myself.

***** Though if one is interested, a study of the "prince of the kingdom of Persia" in Daniel 10, "the god of this world" in 2Cor 4, or Jesus' response to Satan's demand for worship in Matt 4 ought to be enough to convince anyone that historical Judaism and Christianity have always asserted the reality of the influence of spiritual beings on this material plane. That those beings have long been called 'gods' is more a fact of history than a point of theology.

World ends! Women and Minorities Hardest Hit!

Or so the paper says:

Hollister - Despite making only $14,000 a year, strawberry picker Alberto Ramirez managed to buy his own slice of the American Dream. But his Hollister home came with a hefty price tag - $720,000.

A year and a half later, Ramirez has defaulted on his loan, and he's hoping to sell the house before it's repossessed. And according to many housing advocates and civil rights groups, Ramirez is not alone. As mortgage foreclosures rise, many minorities are suffering...

White people who live in a house that costs the equivalent of 100,000 hours of their work apparently do not "suffer" when economic reality asserts itself - just one more bonus for us, I guess.

But I do wonder, when a bank lends $720,000 to a guy who would have to work a half a century* to pay it off, does it issue the yellow right shirt then or does the borrower have to wait a few months until actual default?

* assuming he paid no interest at all. And never ate.

Can't stop the bum rush

Moonbatty as they are, the marching yellow shirts can at least follow* rudimentary logic:

To some, the $30 billion deal allowing JP Morgan Chase to buy Bear Stearns deal also raised a fairness issue: Should the government bail out a prestigious investment bank while doing little to address the hardships of Americans facing foreclosures on their homes, or caught in other troubled segments of the economy, such as laid-off factory workers?

..."The big thing about the Bear Stearns bailout--if you want to call it that--is that it kind of opens the doors for other types of bailouts like for homeowners and individuals," said federal budget expert Stanley Collender.

Of course it does**, which is why it's imperative that the door not be opened in the first place. Now that it is opened, and now that it is obvious that the Fed, the Congress, and the Executive Branch have shown no propensity to keep anyone out provided they make sufficient noise, the whole mob is coming to Treasury, torches and all.

It's a good thing all that money isn't made of paper or anything.

* ...which is why they protested at Bear Stearns yesterday, marching in a circle and shouting , "J.P. [Morgan], Chase, what do you know - Corporate greed has got to go!" Not a single "Hey, hey, ho, ho!" as far as I could tell. What are demonstrations coming to?

** In fact, you might hear an echo in this complaint from a NACA spokesman:

"All we're saying is homeowners need assistance too...You can't bail out the investors, bail out the wall street firms who created this crisis and leave homeowners at risk. We think that's not fair. And that's not the American way."

Obviously the American way is to give everyone enough money that they can't possibly lose it all, no matter how stupidly they act.

Protesting solves everything

It's all about the romance

So in Spanish class we're taking a three-day break following the midterms to watch "The Motorcycle Diaries," a romanticized film based loosely on the romanticized autobiography of Ernesto "Che" Guevara, Argentinian Revolutionary and erstwhile hangman for Fidel Castro. The most insightful thing in the film is not the blatant logical contradictions between what Che sees and his growing communist idealism, but that such contradiction is apparently what makes him so attractive to the moonbat psyche.

One such contradiction, and certainly not the only one*, is presented as Che is sitting in the ruins of Machu Pichu. Mentally comparing the glory of the ruins with the poverty of a copper mine he has recently visited**, concludes that life would have been better if the Spaniards never came. Apparently the miners in the Incas' day cut, moved, and stacked all of those enormous stones while lying in La-Z-Boy chairs, which the Spaniards took away and shipped back to Europe as soon as they arrived.

By casting aside a multitude of silly symbolisms, like the 15 American Dollars his upper-class girlfriend gives him to purchase a bathing suit***, which have been inserted simply for political and dramatic effect, one can perhaps distill Che's entire worldview into one of his thoughts: How is it possible that I feel nostalgia for a world I never knew?

One can't, of course, especially when such a world as he feels nostalic for never existed anywhere. It is a creation of his own mind, his own ideal world into which he and other idealists are more than willing to have everyone else inhabit, by force if necessary****.

It is not and never has been the economics that has made a communist - socialist economics has never worked and can't work - and in fact, most communists are blissfully unaware of anything that might even be confused with economics. It is the dream, the emotion, the romance, the nostalgia for a world of their own making, where they can be in charge and move people about like so many plastic Fisher-Price people, for their own good, that makes a communist.

A picture of Che on the wall is no more than a confession that one has a dangerous mental illness.

* The fact that his life is dependent upon medicine that the Incas never had is just a bonus contradiction, like getting a toaster when you open a bank account.

** By "visited" I mean, "sat outside of and then threw a rock at a truck."

*** Which he gives to a communist couple who are complaining that land that belonged to the husband's grandfather has been stolen. Which is itself ironic in that the first (0f 10) points in Marx's Communist Manifesto calls for "Abolition of property in land..." But I suspect they would simply rather be the ones in charge of the abolishing.

**** Then when it doesn't work out, when reality and theory diverge, skulls pile up.

My apologies

New video footage proves Hillary was right after all.

The countdown to the next crying video begins

a four-footed misstep explained:

Clinton on Tuesday explained her Bosnia "misstatement" by saying, "This has been a very long campaign. Occasionally, I am a human being like everybody else."

Don't count on it.

(hat tip: Dots)

Midterm

So as half of my Spanish midterm I have to write a letter home to Mom and Dad, describing life in college, what I like and dislike, and what I do with my time. Given that I like my professor and really pity him for having to read 50 versions of "On Mondays I swim at the beach, on Tuesdays I read a book" I figured I'd do something a little different. But since I haven't figured out* how to do all the accent marks and en-yays that are necessary to type in Spanish, I figured I'd probably best just present it here in English**.

Dear Mom and Dad:

Thanks for the money you sent: I spent it all on salsa CDs.

Here at the University I have two classes (tengo dos clases). The first is the History of Mexico and the second is brats' literature (literatura de mocosos). My history professor is quite tall, but he's very ugly. He's also boring (es muy aburrido), which is why I will have to drink a lot of beer (tengo que beber muchas cervezas) if I hope to pass his class.

My literature professor is rather eccentric. On Monday she brought her pet cat to class, and we discovered that cats really do not swim well at all (los gatos no nada bien). We all ate cat empanadas with cheese (con queso), which made her very angry, but I didn't think it was a big deal (no importa). We don't study literature much (no estudiamos nada) in her class but it can be fun at times.

Overall, I dislike college quite a bit (no me gusta la universidad). In fact, I'm pretty tired of everything here except for my many new friends, whom I like a lot. We spend a lot of time together. On Mondays we drink a lot of beer. On Tuesdays, we surf the internet (navigamos por internet). On Wednesdays we drink more beer. On Thursdays we sing all night. On Fridays and Saturdays we don't drink any beer, instead we drink cuba libres and dance with girls at the nightclub. On Sundays, though, I prefer to stay at home (prefiero cadarme en casa) to read history and literature. After all, it's important to get good grades (sacar buenas notas) at University.

Your loving son,

Alejandro***

* there's actually a very easy way, I hear. I just haven't cared enough to follow up on it.

** Besides, my mom doesn't read Spanish, so what good would it be?

*** Alejandro is something of a joke in class, as some guy named "Bob" a few semesters back insisted that everyone in class call him "Alejandro." Apparently he still goes by it.

Rambabe on the front lines

UPDATE:

WASHINGTON - Hillary Rodham Clinton's campaign said she "misspoke" last week when saying she had landed under sniper fire during a trip to Bosnia as first lady in March 1996.

Um, yeah....

What's on tonight?

Night of the Lepus (Latin for "guy in a rabbit costume") is one of those movies you see only on Easter night. Long after the L-tryptophan from all that turkey has worn off and Charlton Heston has freed the Israelites from the evil clutches of Yul Brynner, you just might catch an overly serious newsroom narrator in a gnarly crimson suit coat intoning, "The world within the last few years has become more and more aware of the population explosion." You've found it! Sit back and relax, because you're about to witness the funniest rabbits since Sir Robin wet himself twice outside the Cave of Kyre Bannor.

The film opens in a familiar style (a la The Deadly Mantis and Empire of the Ants) with a narrator giving us background which will help set us up for the horror to follow. In this case, stock footage is shown of a rabbit round-up in Australia in the 1950s, where populations overran vast areas, "destroying crops and threatening Man's very existence."

"Does Man have the right to defend himself from this menace?" he asks us knowingly, "And if so, how?" We are left to ponder these deep questions as the stock footage shifts to the American southwest (and into color), where another rabbit round-up is underway. But these aren't the wild, mangy, hares of the Australian Outback, these are wild, mangy hares of Arizona, which switch quickly to fat, pet store bunnies in freeze frame as our title comes up on the screen.

Rancher Cole Hillman (Rory Calhoun) seems to have a problem. He's galloping his horse through open range with what are apparently huge anthills spread about. Carefully he points his trusty steed between two of them until, "Breeeeheeeheee," the horse goes down. Rancher Cole, surrounded by normal-sized pet store rabbits, feels the horse's leg and lets out a groan. Then he pulls out a rifle from his saddle, aims, and has to walk the mile back to his home carrying the rifle on his shoulder. When he arrives, his nameless son (hereafter known as "Boy") asks "Where's Ranger, Dad?" Rancher Cole sends a farmhand out to retrieve his saddle from Ranger, who has suddenly died of lead poisoning, and picks up the phone. Rancher Cole has had enough.

"Mildred," he tells the operator with whom he is on a first-name basis, "Get me Doctor McCoy at the university." Actually, he asks for Dr. Elgin Clark, but in the next scene, he's walking at the University talking to Dr. McCoy (DeForrest Kelley) from Star Trek about how to get rid of the rabbits. McCoy offers the services of a local professor, but Cole is having none of that - apparently that guy killed off Cole's coyotes so well that the rabbits have no natural enemies left, which accounts for their profitable hole-digging business at Cole's Ranch. But luckily, there's an exchange professor in town who's trying to control things rather than poisoning the heck out of them. This exchange professor has a wife and an annoying child. That's just what this movie needs.

The wife is Dr. Gerry Bennett (Janet Leigh), and Annoying Child (or AC) is their precocious and impish daughter, Amanda (Melanie Fullerton). The man fortunate enough to head such a family is Dr. Ray Bennett (Stuart Whitman), who is at present outside the BatCave, putting bats in a box and shaking it so he can record "The Cry of Fear" on his tape recorder. He's such a serious scientist that he doesn't even go down to meet the man that Annoying Child calls "Uncle Elgin" (but we know as Dr. McCoy). Instead, he shakes the box again and attempts to record the bats. I guess some things just can't be done in a place like, say, a quiet laboratory.

Without so much as a "Hello" to Dr. McCoy, he informs us that he's going to use the bat's cry to scare them into areas which are overrun with mosquitoes. McCoy tells Doctor Ray about Cole's problem and about how he was a great football player in the 1940s, which induces our fearsome threesome to visit Cole's ranch. A rabbit hunt is underway, but long gone are the mangy, wild rabbits from our intro. These are fat, black and white pet rabbits, and Annoying Child hides her face from the spectacle and announces, "Mommy! I like rabbits, Mommy!" as if we expected anything else from a 9-year old who aspires to be a harpy biologist like good old mom.

More stock footage is shown of mangy, wild rabbits being caught in nets and put in cages, and Ray picks a fat, happy bunny out of one of them while remarking that this is no ordinary rodent. Cole relates how a neighbor used to raise domestic rabbits, but during a fire a couple hundred got away and mixed in with the local population. This explains why any time we see a rabbit from here on out, they are of the pet store variety (or a guy in a rabbit suit). "So they're mongrels," Dr. Gerry informs those who slept though genetics in 6th grade science class. Thanks, Doc.

After returning to the lab with two dozen rabbits, Annoying Child introduces us to the concept of the control group. Ray has a new serum from some Dr. Dirkson, which he magically knows the rabbits have never been exposed to. "I wish I knew what the effects of this serum would be," he ponders (you might try it...I always thought that the purpose of testing was to find out what those effects would be). But after injecting the serum into Annoying Child's favorite bunny, AC switches the rabbit into the control group, so apparently we're going to have to find out what the effects are the hard way.

Soon AC, in a fit of lacrimation, induces her parents to let her keep one rabbit, which not surprisingly is the same rabbit which has just been injected with the mystery serum. Upon returning to Rancher Cole's, Boy struggles with AC (rabbits killed his chickens, and he hates ‘em), and the rabbit escapes down a hole, so we are off to Wonderland. Meanwhile Rancher Cole establishes himself as our Environmental Hero, because he burns the ground between his ranch and the neighboring ranches to "starve ‘em out natural," much to the chagrin of his Environmental Villain neighbors who still say poison is the way to go. In this case, they're right.

Cut forward an indeterminate amount of time, and Cole and the two doctors make a startling discovery. Near a pond there is a footprint, bigger than Cole's hand, with five elongated claws like a bear's. Could be a mountain lion, but Cole hasn't seen one of them around in years. Whatever could it be? Meanwhile, Annoying Child and Boy are riding some ponies up to see Captain Billy, an unsuccessful gold miner who lives alone in a shack nearby. Upon not finding the Captain in his house (maybe the miner is in the mine?), Boy sends AC into the old shaft by herself to find him while he looks inside the same shack he already looked inside. He discovers more prints in some overturned flour. Now, while sending a nine-year-old girl alone into an old gold mine might seem dangerous, it's actually an opportunity to introduce our villains, and AC finds the body of Captain Billy, gets the snot scared out of her by pet store bunnies of indeterminate size (watch for the ripe red pin tomatoes on the ground near one of them...if these were real big rabbits, these would be tomatoes a foot across -- how do they grow inside a gold mine?), and awakens at home in a delirious fever. As I said, these are no ordinary rodents.

Dr. Gerry, snappily dressed in an early 1970s acid trip shirt with wavy gray and brown lines all over it, assures us that there is really something in that shaft ("Well, something scared her half to death"). Boy, who lied earlier about asking permission to go to the mine, now lies again by saying that he was in the mine shaft when he heard her scream and that he first saw her coming out of the shaft (how he managed to do both simultaneously is not really explored). In reality, he went into the cave while she was in there, and we can only assume they left together. But hey, what's a lie (or poor scriptwriting) between friends, since nothing ever comes of it?

Now the fun begins. It's nighttime, and a man in a refrigerated produce truck is driving on an unlit road in the middle of nowhere. Though it's cold enough outside that we can see his breath, for some reason he pulls off to the side of the road to check the thermostat in the back of the truck. Apparently he's concerned that the produce might be too cold or something, so he puts on his hazard lights and goes around to open the back door. One second to shine his flashlight into the back and he's completed his task, but then he hears the somethings that Gerry has convinced us exist. Shots of rabbits, close up, shots of rabbits far away, man looks into the dark but for some reason light is shining on his face, so bright that we can see his shadow on the truck. Rabbit. Man. Rabbit. Jump. Aaaahh! If you stop your truck in the middle of nowhere for no reason, you're rabbit chow.

It's the next day, and a mustachioed Deputy Sheriff is driving by. He stops to examine the truck. Hazards are still flashing, and the flashlight is still bright (where can I get batteries like that?), but the produce is all gone. Finding pieces of the man's shirt and then pieces of the man, he calls Sheriff Cody (Paul Fix), but apparently the news that you have a dead body by a truck can't be disclosed over the police radio, because the sheriff asks, "Now what's so urgent?" as soon as he arrives. While they are examining the body, a phone call (yes, they have a real telephone in the car) comes in. I guess the folks at the ranch have finally decided to tell someone about dead Captain Billy after all.

Later, back at the lab, Dr. Leopold is explaining to Sheriff Cody that the tin cans and boxes that they recovered were not chopped with an axe but were bitten through "slowly and with great strength" and that saliva was found on the victim and the assembled accoutrements from the site. Sheriff Cody even looks through a microscope (apparently, he's an expert on saliva), and we get a one-second shot of something that looks vaguely scientific. Then he backs away from it. He's obviously impressed and wonders out loud if vampires could have created all this commotion -- vampires that haul off truckloads of lettuce, I guess. We switch to an unnamed deputy calling in that a family of four has been horribly mutilated. I guess he's free to disclose the fact over the radio, so mustachioed deputy must be on radio probation or something.

We go back to a different lab, where a doctor (an expert on birth defects and really terrible haircuts) is explaining how giant rabbits could have come from a single one getting loose. He does not bother to inform us how hundreds of them could have grown to full size without either eating or being seen, nor why they chose the previous night to begin their murderous rampage. Gerry (still dressed in her acid trip shirt) suggests that Sheriff Cody be brought in but is overruled by McCoy and Ray. Apparently the facts that at least six people are dead and he's looking for vampires do not concern our heroes enough to inform someone in authority. They've got more important things to worry about, like the university's reputation, so they get Cole, his buddies, and some leftover dynamite they got at 7-11 for a trip up to Captain Billy's playground to see if they can solve the problem themselves. (Spoiler alert: They can't.)

The fearsome threesome apparently travels the globe in a lime green pickup with a camper on the back (this becomes important later), and they reach the mine with Cole, McCoy, and some others (but without AC), only to discover that the monstrous rabbits have opened up three holes in the area above the mine, where McCoy and an unnamed fellow Voyager are to set up dynamite. McCoy drops a rock into the hole (after we view the same frothy-mouthed, turning-away bunny that we've seen three times already), and asks Ray if he can hear the bongo music played by the rabbits over the CB, which he is holding down into the hole. Apparently, these are special magic CBs which allow people on both ends to talk and listen simultaneously, because we continue to hear the rabbits from McCoy's CB as Ray tells McCoy he's going in to try to take one out alive. "Whatever is in there is a mystery," he reports. And since he is a man of mystery (though whether he's "international" I don't know) it's his job to solve it before he buries them forever. I guess he forgot that mine shafts can go into the mountain for miles, might have several exits, and even if they plug them up, rabbits can dig their way out, as evidenced by the three holes above. Either way, he and Cole take flashlight, camera, and a rifle into the cave entrance to solve the mystery of the Easter Bunnies from Hell.

The rabbits, understanding their impending doom [insert /sarcasm tag here] have moved about a half mile into the cave, which should tell Ray and Cole that dynamite blown up at the entrance is unlikely to kill them, but apparently they overestimate the power of the stuff.

Finally, we get to see rabbits and humans in the same frame. The way it's done is by filming two sequences, one of humans on the left side of the screen and one of rabbits on the right side, and splicing the parts together. In this scene it's done well...in others, well, let's just say the rabbits are inconsistently proportional at times. Anyway, now that we've photographed them, it's time for the "run away" scene, where Cole and Ray make their way back to the cave mouth, only to have Cole get jumped on by a guy in a rabbit suit. Ray uses the rifle not as a gun but as a bat (he's quite the sportsman), and the rabbit grabs its head with its very human arm and falls off the uninjured Cole.

Not remaining uninjured is Jed, who's hanging out with Dr. Gerry outside the mine. He wanders into Captain Billy's former residence, while, outside, a light brown velveteen rabbit digs its way out of the ground (it's actually just buried in the loose dirt and sits up). Inside, Jed is jumped on by a guy in a dark brown rabbit suit made of shag carpet, and Gerri runs in and shoots the bugger. Jed, covered in blood, comes out of the shack just as Cole and Ray exit the mine and it blows up. They all watch the dust fly, and no one asks why he looks like he just lost Hell in a Cell.

Back at the lab, the doctors are poring over the photograph of the rabbits in the cave, apparently forgetting Gerri killed a real one in Captain Billy's shack. Being more afraid of the press than the rapacious residents of the Warren of Death, Gerry and Annoying Child decide it's time to head for the lodge in the lime green pickup.

It nighttime again, and all the dead rabbits are on the prowl. Climbing gingerly out of their faux grave, the bongo music starts up again, and we see them galloping past model houses toward Cole's real house, and his horses don't like it one bit. Over the protests of Cole, they break out of their corral and run away into an open plain where there is sunlight shining. The rabbits, still in a time zone where it is dark, approach the top of the cliff. The horses, in the middle of a valley bereft of cliffs but full of sunlight, are still running. Then the rabbits jump, and a guy in a rabbit suit lands on a screaming horse. Jed, apparently recovered from his beating, decides it's time to play "guy who gets scared by the dark and runs away in a panic." Haven't seen many of these movies, have we, Jed? He jumps in the truck and drives off, while Cole goes in to call Mildred, who runs a glass-fronted general store in addition to being the phone operator. Jed sees a bunch of rabbits, so he hauls back to the ranch and hits the telephone pole (yeah, never saw that coming), jumps out of the truck, and in a scene usually reserved for the heroine, trips over the only board in sight as the rabbits close in. Here we can see perfectly how the rabbits and human scenes are spliced together. If you look at the sky you can see that it's day on the left side of the sky, night on the right, and there's a straight line separating them. Anyway, the rabbits leap into nighttime and attack Jed.

Due to improper matting, the rabbits are now as tall as the truck and have parts of the fencing sticking through them, but with the help of the guy in the shag suit, they finish off Jed while Cole and his family hunker down in the basement. The bunnies run across some Astroturf (the only green grass in the whole movie) to rummage through his kitchen while he shoots them from underneath. The rabbits decide it's time to kill Mildred instead, so they retreat back across the Astroturf.

Mildred is unsuccessful in getting her checkers-playing husband and his buddy to run up to see why Cole's phone call was cut short, and they leave her to her death. Once they are gone, taking the only truck in sight (maybe she flies home?), the rabbits arrive. Smartly locking the glass door for protection, Mildred stands in front of it and waits, making scared faces by bulging her eyes out. Checker-buddy is also toast, due to the fact that he takes a full 45 seconds and five backward glances to walk the ten feet from the gate to his house. Once the bunnies arrive, he picks up a chair and hits one, then gets blasted through the front window. Ahhh, home sweet home.

It's morning, and time for Dr. Gerri and Annoying Child to head for the lodge. At the first turn-off, she gets stuck in the sand. We'll be back to her in ten hours or so. Meanwhile Sheriff Cody arrives from the crime lab, and he knows the problem is rabbits, so let's jump in the police helicopter and go for a look-see at all the dead ones from yesterday's Fourth of July celebration. McCoy and Ray tag along. Once they reach the mine they find that the rabbits aren't dead but have re-dug the same holes. McCoy drops a rock into the hole, hears a thud, and deduces that the rabbits have gone. But where?

Cole is hiking into town and discovers Mildred's body in the General Store, along with about 20 rabbits, which is supposed to represent all of them, I guess. Tossing his rifle away, he hitches a ride with a friendly priest and joins the others for the final Heroes' Death Battle with the furry firebrands. It's night again (apparently we went the whole day without actually doing anything), and now there are hundreds of rabbits approaching the city (which is being evacuated) on a front two miles wide. How hundreds of eight foot rabbits could have hidden out all day long in a 30x30 foot General Store is beyond me, but the National Guard is coming, and Doctor Ray has an idea. Electrify the railroad tracks and shock and awe them to death, of course. The rabbits are spending the early evening crossing bridges, playing the bongos, and jumping off cliffs. They even manage to catch a herd of cattle (stampeding across the plains in broad daylight), drag them into the darkness, and kill them. But where is Gerry? Why hasn't she called? Annoying Child informs us, once again, of how scared she is.

Now, how do you funnel hundreds of giant killer rabbits into your half mile of electric railroad tracks? Of course! With lots of cars! Just because we've evacuated the town doesn't mean that hundreds of people won't be enjoying a Tom and Jerry cartoon at the drive-in, so a deputy easily convinces the moviegoers that they should turn on their lights and follow him to save the town. They line the cars up to wait for the horde.

Since Ray hasn't heard from Gerry yet, he jumps into the chopper with Sheriff Cody's sidearm and heads up to the lodge. Gerry, who has been digging in the sand since morning, has still not freed the lime green truck o' death, but she does have a hole about eight feet deep behind the back tire. It's dark now, and the rabbits are coming.

Now it's time to break out the highway flares. Obviously, Gerry has seen Empire of the Ants and knows that no matter the odds, all giant monsters can be held off with highway flares, so she locks Annoying Child in the back of the truck and rather than joining her in a safe, aluminum cocoon, stands at the back of the truck to do single combat with the furry mischief makers. Annoying Child, her head in the window, cries out, "Mommy! Mommy! Look out, Mommy! Oh, Mommy, I'm scared!" until I was ready to yank open the camper door and toss her to the beasts myself.

We switch quickly between Doctor Gerri in front of a full-size truck with two windows in the camper to a model truck with only one window, surrounded by rabbits as big as it is. Gerri, running side to side holding the flares in front of her, manages to ignite a dead rabbit on a string (where's the ASPCA when you need them?), and Ray arrives just in time with the chopper to scare the saber-toothed monsters away. Now we're set for the final showdown.

Imagine it, if you will. There's a line of cars to the east and one to the west. The track has been electrified, and here come the rabbits, right for it. The National Guard, McCoy, Ray, and Cole have their guns out, and as soon as the rabbits arrive, they begin firing, oblivious to the lines of civilian-occupied cars right behind the rabbits. As the rabbits jump across the model train tracks, they panic and flounder, but it's too late for them. Sparks, fire, and the stench of burnt rabbit fur fills the air. The killer rabbits are defeated.

Jump forward an indeterminate period of time, and Dr. Ray is playing football, apparently at the college, when a happy Rancher Cole shows up. He's pleased because there's a new pack of coyotes in the hills. "Any sign of rabbits?" Ray asks. "A couple," laughs Cole, "but they're nothing like they used to be, hahahaha."

Indeed.

Scene to watch for: The Drive-in. During a Tom and Jerry cartoon, a trooper announces over his loudspeaker, "Your attention please. A herd of killer rabbits is headed this way. Everyone turn on your headlights and follow the police car at the entrance of the theater." Like all loyal citizens, they do.

Best line: Rancher Cole sticks his hand into the cage to pull out a bunny but jerks his hand back and says "Ow!" "What happened?" Dr. Gerry asks. "A rabbit bit me," Cole informs us. Ummmm, duh?

Things that make you go "Huh?": The film begins recalling the woes created by Man when he introduced rabbits into an environment where they did not exist previously. So why is it that the first thing Doctor Ray is doing is planning to introduce bats into an area where they do not exist? This guy's our hero?

I have mentioned before that I would not be surprised to see a temporary turnaround in the dollar's fortune's soon. With sentiment so negative, everyone who could sell has sold and everyone who would go short has already gone so, the next move may be one Kudlow would like to see. In fact, I think it's here. Enjoy it while it lasts.

Full of sound and fury, signifying nothing

Larry Kudlow tells a tale:

With the dollar rising all of a sudden, and commodity prices plunging, this would be a great time for the Treasury to get out there and buy dollars. Totally squeeze the short sellers. Right now. Send a clear statement that the U.S. wants a stronger dollar. It would do a lot to reduce inflation expectations. And it would drive gold prices down $200 from here.

I have to admit I'm not terribly surprised to see a Republican partisan talking head like Kudlow come right out and call for blatant government manipulation of the currency and commodity markets* - I suspect we'll see the same thing in a McCain administration, were there going to be one, which there's not. And Mr. Kudlow does not let us down if we were expecting he would, like many of his party, mistake talking about a strong dollar with increasing American prestige**. Currency strengths reflect a number of things, including national prestige, but that does not make cause and effect interchangeable here - you don't increase your national prestige by talking up your tattered currency or manipulating it on world markets.

But that's all well and good. A lot of nations intervene in the currency markets. For example, when Japan wants to keep the yen from appreciating, they print up a bunch of yen and buy dollars, increasing the demand for dollars and therefore raising its price vis-a-vis the yen***. China does the same thing. If the US government needs to create the same effect, all it needs to do is go into the market the same way and buy dollars.

However, unlike exporting countries that actually accumulate the currencies of other nations with which to intervene in the markets, we a) do not have a trade surplus, and b) do not keep other nations' currency lying around.

So I have only one question: even if we were, as a nation, going to go into the currency markets and rescue Kudlow's friends who are caught short gold, with what are we going to buy dollars?

* though to be fair, one of the very few things Bush has done right is to allow those markets to reflect American fundamentals, which they do. Unfortunately for us in many ways, because of what he has done to the fundamentals. But that is a different issue altogether.

** After all, Bush and Paulson talking about a strong dollar, interminably, has been so beneficial thus far.

*** Conversely, if they want to strengthen the yen, they sell some of the dollars they receive as part of their trade deficit and buy yen.

Thanks for the info

The Philippine government lets us in on a little secret:

Officials in the Philippines are warning Catholics that a longstanding Easter tradition of crucifixion and self-flagellation could be bad for their health, the U.K.'s Telegraph reports...

In the Philippine’s San Fernando City, 23 people, including two women, have signed up to reenact the crucifixion. Four will use real nails, the Telegraph reports.

But government officials are warning that doing so is dangerous and can lead to serious infections. They are encouraging worshippers to get tetanus shots first and to be sure to use clean whips and nails for their reenactments.

I'm not sure how one goes about sterilizing a whip to the point that laying open scores of bloody wounds on your body will not get infected. But while this Easter shares with all others the freakish sideshow known as re-enactments, one thing that has been missing this season has been that one big story that is supposed to show that the re-enactments are missing that crucial "re-" element.

Remember last year when right about Easter there was the big kerfuffle about Jesus' family tomb? No? Well, there was. And in prior years there have been the "revelations" that Jesus and Mary were married, there were Last Temptations, there were "recovered" gospels that were supposed to put this troublesome myth to bed once and for all.

Where is it this year? I know I've been out of it, but even Time magazine this week doesn't seem to have discovered some liberal Anglican bishop who reveals the deep dark secret (to the traditional shock and outrage of other professional quotees), that Jesus just recovered in the cool of the tomb or something.

I'm a little disappointed, to be honest. I mean, I don't want to have to blog about Bernanke all the time...

Banking in Sneakyville

Bank runs are here

Terrymum asks a succinct question:

Bank runs are not far off, are they?

Bank runs are already here, but not the kind you're thinking of.

When the rumors (which were at least a little true) started that Bear had liquidity problems, the other banks became afraid to lend Bear money. As soon as they would not lend it money, then - in a bizarro debt-money self-fulfilling prophecy* - Bear immediately developed fatal liquidity problems.

Now, what is a bank run? It is when people are afraid to lend the bank money, which results in fatal liquidity problems, the immediate death of the bank.

What happened to Bear Stearns was a bank run, but it was a run by OTHER BANKS. And as soon as the other banks ran, Bear went from a $100 stock to being sold off for $2. It had no choice, because if no one will do business with a bank, the bank is out of business. Bear-like collapses are coming again and again and again, because nearly all investment banks are highly-leveraged upon instruments that have questionable market value. That means they are all illiquid**. Any one of them that becomes the subject of rumours can be out of business within days***.

You don't have to worry so much about a bank run at your personal bank because there's nothing there but paper anyway. The government can deliver as much paper as the bank needs, on loan from the Federal Reserve, which has shown that it will loan to any bank on any collateral to avoid scaring the horses. If you want your money from the bank, you'll get it (though it may be subject to some withdrawal limits) even if it's printed up just for you.

So while there may be scattered bank runs of the kind you're thinking of (there was one at Northern Rock in London a while back and the bank had to be nationalized), I think that's a battle from the last war, not the coming one...

Unfortunately, there's nothing you can do to keep banks confident in one another. That looks like a job for MoneyCakes. I'm sure a big rate cut this afternoon will do the trick.

* This is why Sheriff Bush and his posse of Fail Riders incessantly repeat mantras like "The economy is strong" and "We believe in a strong dollar" even when it's obvious that it is not only not the case, but EXACTLY not the case. It's not that they believe what they are saying, but it is essential that you believe it.

** Not to mention insolvent, but that will be hidden by the Fed through asset swaps for as long as possible.

*** "Days" if it falls on a Friday. The first one to fail on a Tuesday is going to be a sight to behold.

Right for the wrong reasons

Chuck Schumer understands history as well as most politicians. Which is to say, not at all:

Democratic Senator Charles Schumer likened Bush to president Herbert Hoover, who led the United States into the 1930s Great Depression.

"We're in the most serious economic problem we've been in in a very long time, much worse than 2001. The president's hands-off attitude is reminiscent of Herbert Hoover in 1929, in 1930," he said on Fox.

While it is true that the words "Bush" and "Hoover" will soon be synonymous, it is a bit of Democrat mythology that Hoover took a hands-off approach to anything. Hoover was, in fact, a Progressive (with a capital P) and an engineer, who relished the chance to show how government could scientifically if mostly voluntarily* manage such a crisis. He created the first national unemployment insurance and entities like the Federal Home Loan Bank in order to help people (wait for it...) purchase homes. He promoted public works, not because things needed to be built because people could be employed in building them, and he lent money to cities and states to do the same. Yet even with more intervention in the economy than any peacetime administration before him, he failed to arrest what the Fed had wrought. He failed, but he didn't fail to try.

But rather than show that Hoover was explicitly against a hand's off approach** to the economy, I'd rather do something more entertaining. I'm going to pull a couple of quotes out of Encarta's article on the Great Depression***, because it's not Hoover that's the problem, but Hoover's problem that's the problem:

[People were] persuaded to abandon such traditional values as saving, postponing pleasures and purchases, and buying only what they needed...

Many banks had made loans to businesses and people who now could not repay them...

As people lost their jobs and savings, mortgages on many homes and farms were foreclosed...

The initial government response to the Great Depression was ineffective, as President Hoover insisted that the economy was sound...

Hoover believed the basic need was to restore public confidence...

Hoover is today accused of being laissez-faire by those who love spending and centralization, yet in the ultimate irony:

...[I]t was Roosevelt who accused the President of "reckless and extravagant" spending, and of thinking "that we ought to center control of everything in Washington as rapidly as possible." Roosevelt's running mate, Congressman John Nance Garner of Texas, 63, even claimed that Hoover was "leading the country down the path of socialism."

Then FDR got the reins of power and gave America the same thing Hoover had, but with more acronyms and with no lube. Then the whole world went to war and millions died in ovens, on battlefields, and beneath the rubble of burning cities.

Sometimes I wish I didn't know anything about history.

* When he called the captains of industry into his office and asked them not only to maintain wages but jobs, they volunteered to do so, for almost a year, until the middle of 1930.

** Hoover even wrote a book against laissez-fair and in defense of government meddling in the economy, called American Individualism. But where is the challenge in showing that a Democrat senator doesn't know what he's talking about?

** Without context, I might add. Of course it's unfair to do that. Who ever said life was fair?

The bear is dead

Not the bear market, Bear Stearns:

JPMorgan Chase said Sunday it will acquire rival Bear Stearns in a deal valued at $236.2 million--or $2 a share--a stunning collapse for one of the world's largest and most venerable investment banks.

The last-minute buyout was aimed at averting a Bear Stearns bankruptcy and a spreading crisis of confidence in the global financial system...

And just like that, the nation's fifth largest investment bank - and one of only 20 primary dealers in US Treasury securities - is no more. This is the same Bear Stearns that the Fed bailed out the day before yesterday. This is the same Bear Stearns that closed at $60 a share the day before that. This is the same Bear Stearns that traded north of $160 a few months ago. This is the same Bear Stearns that just 6 months ago was bailing out its own hedge funds; now it has taken a buyout deal, funded by the nation's central bank, to keep it from imploding utterly and taking the world's derivatives-based financial system with it. Chase has bought a rival on the cheap, with taxpayer money provided via a special loan from the Fed*, but in the end, all it has bought for itself is a little time, because Bear Stearns derivatives are tied into every major bank in every nation in the world** to the tune of nearly $50 trillion dollars.

Gold is up about $30 on the news, silver is trading over $21 for the first time in almost 3 decades, the Fed cut the discount rate again, the dollar is bouncing off 70(!) on the news. This is bad*** and is getting worse faster than the internets can deliver the news to millions of day traders who were too late in getting out of the way.

I read a lot of very sober, very boring news, like Doug Noland's Credit Bubble Bulletin, filled with paragraphs upon paragraphs of this:

Three-month Treasury bill rates sank 30 bps this past week to 1.17%... The spread between MBS and Treasuries narrowed 18 to a still extraordinary 200 bps. Widening further, the spread on Fannie’s 5% 2017 note jumped 11 to 99 bps and the spread on Freddie’s 5% 2017 note surged 10 to 98 bps. The 10-year dollar swap spread narrowed 15.2 to 70.80. Corporate bond spreads were volatile and ended wider...

but when stolid and sober guys like Noland start dropping quotes like this:

• We’re now clearly in the midst of a precarious systemic crisis...
• Candidly, I wish I had another of the Fed’s Z.1 “flow of fund” reports to grind through this evening - conveniently providing the opportunity to keep most of my thoughts and fears to myself...
• [W]e’ve been witnessing the worst-case scenario unfold before our very eyes - and it all imparts a bad feeling deep in my gut...
• [W]e’re now on Dollar Crisis Watch...

You can be assured that what is heading our way, what is knocking at the door, is not a 2001-style recession or even a 1980-style recession. It is something far bigger, far deeper, and frankly, far scarier than anything I have seen in my lifetime. Just ask the employees of Bear Stearns, who own 30+% of a world-class investment bank that just disappeared. In the words of one Bear director, "no early retirement for me." He speaks for millions, they just don't know it yet.

Something wicked does not this way come. Something wicked is here.

* The Fed is taking over some of Bear's "less liquid assets" (read: crap) to the tune of $30 billion dollars.

** Get used to hearing the phrase "cascading cross-defaults." It's going to be the new "e pluribus unum."

*** understatement of a lifetime, that one.

Christians and circularity

Spread Rationality has a bone to pick:

The most common arguments for the Bible's authenticity commit a fallacy known as begging the question. Begging the question uses the conclusion of an argument as a premises or an intermediate step. For instance:

• 1. Assume the Bible is true.
• The Bible says that God exists and inspired the Bible
• Therefore, the Bible is true
  

The first step of this argument asks that we assume that the conclusion is true. This means that although the rest of the argument may logically sound, the conclusion has no bearing on reality.

The first thing we must confess is that Spread Rationality’s argument is absolutely correct as presented. However, the problem with the argument is that it is not necessarily complete. Step 1 is a big (and in this case fatal) assumption, but is it possible that there is a way to argue to step 1 using another basis, i.e. that it can be a conclusion rather than an assumption? I think there is. In fact, there are several, but I’ll only take on one here, that is historicity.

Let us, just for a moment, forget that the Acts of the Apostles is in the Bible* and just take it as a letter written ca 62 AD from a country doctor to a friend, explaining what he’d been doing for the last 30 years. The first question we have to ask is whether Acts is “historical,” whether we can believe the things it says happened really happened, more or less** in the way they are written.

Now there are plenty of reasons to believe that Luke is generally accurate in what he writes. His work can be cross-checked through archaeology (and has been), through the writings of others***, and through his explanation of the causes of effects we find later in history. Unless one is going to make the assertion that Acts is completely fictional – a tough sell indeed – then one must conclude that Luke was in position to know the things he wrote in Acts. That said, one can argue about the value of his historical work (and many have), but simply for the sake of establishing an anchor for our logic – remember the problem we are dealing with is one of circularity - we are going to begin with the assertion, “Luke’s Acts are generally a reliable historical document.” That is a verifiable or falsifiable assertion, and we are going to call this number 0.5 in the example above.

Luke’s Gospel is going to be more troublesome because it deals more overtly with religious subjects and less with travels, appointed officials, and geography than do the Acts. Because it is limited to fewer years (with the exception of the first few chapters) and covers less ground, there are fewer ways to cross-check it. However, we are going to transfer Luke’s historicity in the Acts to his Gospel, and we are going to do so by undergirding that transfer with two assertions. The first is that because they are generally one volume (written by the same person, to the same person, probably near the same time, and for the same purpose) therefore the attributes of the second also belong to the first. The second is that carefulness and attention to detail are habits of mind, and therefore it is unthinkable that Luke should be reliably historical in Acts but a victim and then purveyor of myth in its companion volume. Therefore, we are going to assert in number 0.6 that “Luke’s Gospel is a generally reliable historical document.” We have to realize that Luke was not there to see or hear what he recorded, but as we established in Acts that he is around people who DID hear them, we are still on solid ground historically, at least as solid ground as any historian is likely to be. This is also verifiable and/or falsifiable.

Now, within this Gospel we meet a man named Jesus who said a lot of amazing things. In fact, he claimed that he was God, would die for all mankind, and perform an act that showed divine power, rising from the dead, to prove it. Which things, according to Luke, he did. If we accept, based on our acceptance of the historicity of Luke’s letter here – in other words, that Luke is telling Theophilus, in this private letter, the truth - that those things occurred, then we have a 0.7 for above: Jesus is God, and a dependent 0.8: Jesus speaks with authority. Since we have already accepted the accuracy of Luke, we accept that he recorded Jesus accurately, and therefore the words of Jesus recorded in Luke are the authoritative words of God, 0.9.

Now, finally, we get to #1 above, “assume the Bible is true”****, but we see that such assumption – even though many Christians do exactly that – is not necessary. One can argue with the “facts” of any of the steps above, but I do not see that, since they are based on verifiable/falsifiable historical assertions, one can hold to the conclusion that the Christian’s belief in the general "authority" of Scripture necessarily depends upon a priori assumptions and therefore circular argument.

* We can do this because it was originally NOT in the Bible and was not written to be in the Bible. It was written to an individual named Theophilus (the same person to whom his Gospel, a companion edition, was written) to give him some background on the church. Acts has a primary historical purpose above and beyond its religious one.

** I say “more or less” here because it’s a fact of history that no historian can possibly include everything about everything. He must make choices. Therefore it’s out of order to say, “He should have included this,” or “There was more to that than what he says.” Of course there is. You try to reduce the last 30 years of your life to 100 pages and see what you must leave out.

*** Both religious and secular. For example, Seutonius (Twelve Caesars) notes that in 49ad Claudius kicked all the Jews out of Rome. Luke notes it in passing (18:2) as the reason Paul met Priscilla and Aquilla where he did. He also can be tested against Paul, because they both wrote to different audiences and both claimed they were traveling together. They generally agree, though there are differences and even a few problems. That is to be expected unless they are copying one from the other.

**** We could place – and probably need - a few more steps between “Luke accurately records the authoritative words of God” and “the Bible is true,” but it’s late and I’m tired. We're close enough for government work, and the point is made.

I'm an ordinary guy

burning down the house:

How desperate would you have to get to burn down your own home just to avoid foreclosure?

It's an arson trend nationwide and one North Georgia fire marshal says it's happening in his county...

The Walker County fire marshal explains, "We'll just ask the people, you know, why did you do it and they'll just tell us, well here's why."

And the why turns out to be quite simple: fear of losing it all.

Fear is going to make a lot of people do a lot of things that in other times might have been considered crazy. But as Charles Mackay noted in his famous tome*, "Men, it has been well said, think in herds; it will be seen that they go mad in herds, while they only recover their senses slowly, and one by one."

How many cows does it take to make a stampede, Earl**? Is it like three or more? Is there a minimum speed?

* "Memoirs of Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds," available here. The preface alone is enough to scare the pie right out of you.

** I'll admit, this reference may be a little TOO obscure.

Nationalization via hyperinflation

The government considers the next logical step:

NEW YORK (Fortune) -- With a vicious storm pelting the markets, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson is urging bankers to batten down the hatches - possibly foreshadowing an expanded government role as a financial-sector investor...

A federal purchase of Fannie or Freddie debt could make sense for all involved if the securities convert into common stock or carry equity warrants. [David] Merkel says a government purchase of, say, convertible subordinated debt would help the companies reliquefy their balance sheets while allowing taxpayers to participate in the gains of an eventual market recovery...

That's very much the thinking of Nobel-winning economist Myron Scholes, who tells The Wall Street Journal that the government should be looking to buy into all sorts of private-sector financial firms.

There is a word for government ownership of the means of production, and that word is "socialism." Socialism always fails because it lacks the kinds of feedback mechanisms that reward good decisions and punish bad ones. It always results in stagnation and collapse as bad decisions eventually overwhelm the system. Then skulls pile up and we start over.

That the government is promoting plan after failed plan to eliminate the consequences of foolishness is proof that bad decisions are going to be rewarded going forward, whether it takes an equity stake or not. The government will not allow the feedback to work, therefore we are embarked on a socialist road and must ride it out. Just know that the road to hell will eventually get you there.

But I do have two major concerns about this specific plan, both of which arise because this plan is guaranteed to press the accellerator.

The first is that government purchase of private equities is a sure-fire recipe for corruption. Every company would probably love to see Uncle Sam's deep pockets in the market for their stock; after all, one buyer of that size can vastly increase the value of all those management stock options that are probably under water right now. And just imagine the value of a little bit of, shall we say, foreknowledge of when the government will act. It also opens up a whole new avenue for graft in Congress, as companies in one district convince their Congressman that a purchase of their company's stock by government at above-market prices is critical to the nation's future. It opens up a similar conflict of interest in the Treasury Department as well, as the top dogs came from Wall Street and will all go back there when the next administration is sworn in. Of course, that knowledge would never influence how they spend all that free government money.

But that aside, a second issue is, "Where is the government going to get this money?" It is already spending (at least this month) more than twice its revenues. Will it issue more debt to cover those purchases? That makes sense*. In order to purchase $200b of agency debt, the government will need to issue that same $200b in Treasury debt. The whole scheme is designed to transfer the losses of bond traders to the taxpayers' balance sheet** and the government's credit rating to well-connected companies, allowing those bond traders to jump back in the markets secure in the knowledge that they have literally nothing to lose. If they make a profit, they keep it, if they get a loss, Uncle Sam sets them right by buying their crap at face value.

The immediate result of overt manipulation of the stock and credit markets and nationalization of financial industries is an unfathomable moral hazard to the benefit of leveraged hedge funds and a hyperinflation of the currency as the government prints up endless wads of money to keep stock and bond prices at "a permanently high plateau***." That's certain to reduce the kind of risky behavior that caused this mess, right?

The end result - which is coming whether this specific plan or another with the same goal is implemented - is the rolling of small failures into one colossal future one, as the dollar - and therefore the bond market whose instruments are nothing but promises to pay dollars - finally implodes in fiery cataclysm. How is the government going to pay our soldiers and sailors then? Let them forage?

Sure, the taxpayers will benefit, just like the taxpayers of Rome benefited when they looked over the walls one sunny morning in 410ad and saw Alaric parked outside their gates with hordes of hairy horsemen. When the government creates, via printed money, a single socialized financial entity too big to fail, it will have merely succeed in guaranteeing that when systemic failure comes - and it will - that failure will be total.

* So long as you are the one selling your worthless MBS bonds to the government at face value.

** Think of it as helicopter money for the over-leveraged.

*** kudos if you recognize the quote.

The answers you seek

lie deep within:

Grounded Theory represents an inductive investigation in which the researcher poses questions about information provided by respondents or taken from historical records. The researcher asks the questions to him or herself and repeatedly questions the responses to derive deeper explanations.
- my marketing textbook, P138.

No, this one's not an error. There really is a branch of market research where I as a researcher get to ask myself questions about your problems, then repeatedly question my own answers, so I can get a deeper understanding of what is troubling* you.

It sure sounds like a lot more fun than stopping people in a mall.

* My first guess would be that you are not experiencially familiar with Franklin's maxim concerning a fool and his money. And that's one I can help you with.

(hat tip: Chris Tackett)

A real conversation

A father is teaching his daughter the fine art of preparing scrambled eggs. Reaching deep into the bowels of his bowl cupboard for an appropriate container, he finds one but fails to look inside it before breaking an egg and dropping it in...

Father: ...so what you're going to do is break two eggs and then add a little bit of... oh crap!

Daughter: What's the matter?

Father, looking disgustedly into the bowl: There's a mouse turd in this.

Daughter, confused: How did a mouse turd get inside the egg?

Lulu is back

So what if the federal government's deficit* for February was more than its revenues? Who needs another post about that? The important thing is that Lawrence's favorite moonbat, Lulu, is back, and this time she's not pulling any punches**:

On the resignation of Fidel Castro:

This is one of the sadist days in memory.

On picking a President:

I'm voting for Hillary. Her husband was heavily influenced by her and he was the best president since Ted Kennedy.

On the Governess' Christmas tree:

I pity the loss of this most potential bird nesting place, and the increase in hydrocarbon release this wood will cause in a fireplace, and the lack of oxygen this tree won't be able to produce for our earthly well being. Quite ironic isn't it? May Mother Earth find solace in this great loss.

On "look, up in the sky":

The war birds of death scared my two poodles almost to death. The poor babies were yelping for an hour after these death machines made their exit.

On personal hygiene:

Hand washing is a waste of water. It should be discouraged.

On the future of America's youth:

I'm proud to be an anti-American bisexual anarchist leaning anti-corporate American socialist Democrat Atheist environmentalist, because at least I know I'm free.

It's just a shame that she forgot to mention "school teacher." It's 2008. Do you know where your children are?

* Not its income, its deficit, meaning that with income of $106b and outlays of $281b, its spending was more than twice what it brought in. We should all be so proud. That's not something you see very often. Or for very long.

** Nor throwing them, as Lulu doesn't believe in fighting, especially if it means someone will win.

Collect them all

Is it worth it?

I'm thinking not:

PSU Women’s Studies Program will offer cash prizes (made available through the Office of University Advancement) and publication consideration for the best essay by a PSU student on a subject concerning women or gender roles

Three awards will be given: first ($75), second ($50), and third prize ($25)...

All entries will be judged according to the following criteria: Relevance to Women’s Studies, Originality and/or Depth of Analysis, Quality of Writing, and Impact on the Reader.

Even though I could probably nail "impact on the reader," I'm pretty sure there are easier ways to not make $75...