why internet marketing

Christian Arno is founder of Lingo24, a global translation company specializing in website localization and optimization. Christian has more than nine years experience working with some of the world’s biggest global brands. Additional research and writing by Paul Sawers from Lingo24.

All signs point toward an increasingly multilingual future for the web. It’s estimated that over a billion people will be using PCs in the so-called BRIC countries alone by 2015, and the opportunity is even greater when you factor more people accessing the web using mobile devices than computers in many emerging markets. It’s time businesses of all sizes embraced the foreign language Internet.

Foreign Languages on the Web

A truly global web must represent the languages of its users. And with growth in usage of the web in foreign languages outstripping English, businesses are playing catch-up with their potential customers. They’re rapidly trying to get as multi-lingual and diverse as their current and prospective client base.

In the last ten years, the use of Arabic online has increased by over 2500%, while Chinese and Spanish rose twelve and seven-fold respectively. And English? It didn’t even triple.

Today, 42% of all Internet users are in Asia, while almost a quarter are in Europe and just over 10% are in Latin America. These stats shouldn’t sway businesses towards targeting one region over another, though — Latin American countries account for over 200 million people on the web.

However, the vast majority of all online searches are in a language other than English. English is losing its online market share rapidly, which is no bad thing for businesses that recognize and embrace the opportunities on the foreign language Internet.

Optimizing the Non-English Web

The rise of the foreign language Internet doesn’t change the fact English leads the world in terms of volume and depth of content. Whether your industry is car insurance, web design or musical instruments, achieving top rankings for your English-language website for lucrative search terms is getting ever more difficult. The English-language web is saturated and competition for key search terms is tough, which makes increasing your online visibility tough too.

Conversely, the saturation of key search terms on non-English language websites hasn’t reached anywhere near the level of the English-language web. This means that businesses can attain high — and lucrative — positions on search engines far easier on the foreign language Internet.

This also means that it costs less for businesses to achieve prominence on the foreign language web. So the return on your internet marketing investment in Brazil, Russia, India, China — whatever your target market — should be greater than in English-speaking markets.

And the successful web marketer’s advantage when tackling the foreign language Internet is that you already know the essentials to achieve prominence online. You’ve proved this in the web’s toughest language market: English.

Chitika Research found that the difference between first and second place on Google is significant. In fact, a number one spot on Google attracts nearly double the traffic as the number two spot, and about the same amount of traffic as the second through fifth spots combined. For marketers, you’re several times more likely to hit top spot if you escape English-language levels of competition and target almost any other language market.

Going Local

Doesn’t everyone speak English? Although many non-natives of English do, studies have shown consumers are up to five times more likely to buy from a website with content in their native language.

It stands to reason that consumers would rather search for products and services in their own language. Even if a consumer does speak English as a second language, a report by Common Sense Advisory found that 85% of online shoppers required information in their own language before parting with their hard-earned cash.

So to really make the most of the foreign language Internet, you need search engine optimized localization — a hybrid somewhere between what an Internet marketing company and a translation service provider might offer.

Localization involves addressing the cultural and linguistic needs of each of your target countries. When it comes to search, this includes addressing different local search habits. It’s more complicated than simply translating the search terms that work for you in English. In Italy, for example, one of the top terms for low cost airlines is actually half English, half Italian (“voli low cost”). As British and Irish airlines pioneered low cost travel in Europe, it seems their language infiltrated the Italian psyche and made this hybrid term lucrative. Brands really need local knowledge if they’re to take advantage of commercial opportunities like this.

A 2007 paper by the Localization Industry Standards Association (LISA) reported that $25 dollars was returned for every $1 invested in localization. And with e-commerce set to grow by over 10% (CAGR) in Western Europe alone over the next five years, and much faster in so-called emerging markets, businesses should be gearing up for the surge in Internet spending.

Search and Social

Google’s search algorithm uses many aspects of online activity to determine how highly a website is ranked for a given term. Social media is becoming an increasingly important factor. What does this mean for the multi-lingual digital marketer?

The number of tweets a piece of your content receives and the reputation of those tweeters is important. The same goes for “Likes” on Facebook or “Diggs” on Digg. From a foreign language perspective, increased use of social media around the world creates another opportunity to communicate with customers and a way to improve search rankings at the same time.

According to comScore, Latin American tweets are up over 300% between June 2009 and June 2010, followed by 243% in the Asia Pacific region, 142% in the Middle East and Africa, and 106% in Europe. By comparison, North America only increased by 22%.

So the “rest of the world” is actually leading the Twitter revolution. Big, global companies have already taken action. Sony supports twenty international Twitter feeds, while Microsoft, Cisco and PricewaterhouseCoopers all offer Twitter feeds in ten or more languages.

Of course, to succeed locally with social media depends on the prominence of your local websites. A consumer is far more likely to follow your Twitter feed in French if they find it on your French language website. Developing global social media strategies and fully SEO’d localized websites should all form part of the same grand globalization plan.

This plan should also factor what social media platforms are popular locally. According to Comscore, Russia is the biggest country for engaging with social media overall, with Yandex the number one platform. Facebook isn’t even in the top ten most popular websites in Russia. And while Brazil is big on Twitter (alongside Indonesia), Orkut rules the roost there as the mainstream go-to social network.

Similar patterns emerge across the world. Just because one social network leads your home market, this may not be the case in your target market.

Putting the “World” in “World Wide Web”

May 2010 saw a major development for the foreign language Internet — something that will make the web itself more localized. ICANN, the Internet regulator, enabled full URLs in non-Latin scripts. This includes the country code, which means that Arabic and Chinese characters can be used in web addresses.

This is another clear sign that the web is becoming less English-centric. Businesses that have thus far tackled only English-speaking markets online — with perhaps German, French or Spanish thrown in to help support their single biggest international markets — must cater to a more diverse user base.

The foreign language Internet is the low-cost gateway to global success. With online populations growing at a frenetic pace in the non-English speaking world, businesses need to plan how they’ll keep up. Consumers and businesses in the fastest growing markets of the world -– online and offline -– want to talk to you in their languages. And their languages are usually anything but English.

More Business Resources from Mashable:

- 5 Tips for Marketing Online to an International Audience/> - 5 Tips for Developing a Global-Friendly Website/> - HOW TO: Build Your International Business Network Online/> - 6 Free Web Tools for Managing Time Differences/> - 15 Mobile Translation Apps for the International Businessperson

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, zennie

For more Business coverage:

class="f-el">class="cov-twit">Follow Mashable Businessclass="s-el">class="cov-rss">Subscribe to the Business channelclass="f-el">class="cov-fb">Become a Fan on Facebookclass="s-el">class="cov-apple">Download our free apps for Android, iPhone and iPad

Trouble and trends, they say, come in threes. Today, a trifecta of deals shows how old-school web companies are engaging in a little retail therapy because they must, and because Wall Street has given them the equivalent of a year-end bonus, thanks to an uplift in tech stocks.

• Amazon is buying Quidsi, the parent of Diapers.com, for $500 million in cash, or roughly 3 times Quidsi’s 2009 sales. Diapers.com is a hit with the mommy set and is on target to generate $300 million in sales for 2010.  Amazon will assume $45 million in debt as well.


• QuinStreet, an online marketing and lead-generation company is buying CarInsurance.com for $49.7 million in cash and is expanding its footprint in the insurance business. CarInsurance.com, as the name suggests, sells car insurance online and provides leads to automobile insurers.


• Shutterfly, an online photo service, bought the assets of WMSG Inc., for $6 million and will use these to expand its commercial print-on-demand business. WSMG was in the business of helping deliver direct-marketing campaigns for large companies like Toyota and Dell

Now, while we all like to obsess about what company Google will buy next, the recent wave of M&A shows that it’s actually these old school web companies of a certain age that are looking at a current boom in tech stocks as a way to bolster their businesses. A report from the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) recently noted that during the third quarter of 2010, there were 104 mergers, a trend they expected to continue. And why not?

Over the past two months, the tech-heavy NASDAQ composite is up almost 500 points or roughly 18.5 percent to over 2800. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, the tech stocks in the S&P 500 are trading at 13.9 times their forward earnings, versus the average of 12.7 times for the entire index. The current rally in technology stocks is driven by profits and growing sales for companies such as QuinStreet and Amazon.

QuinStreet’s stock is up 60 percent over the past three months, while Amazon has seen its stock jump 40 percent since early September, and Shutterfly shares have climbed over 35 percent since August of this year. Positive earnings are only adding to their coffers, which in turn means they can be used to beef up their businesses.

For related research check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

• Cleantech Financing  Trends 2010 & Beyond


• Report: U.S. Mobile Venture Capital Investment, Q2 2010


• Motives and Possibilities for a Big Apple Acquisition

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Sun <b>News</b> Gets Green Light: &#39;Fox <b>News</b> North&#39; Secures Broadcast <b>...</b>

Canada is to get a conservative all-news TV channel after the CRTC on Friday granted Quebecor Media a license to launch Sun TV News nationwide. The upstart cable channel, dubbed Fox News North by liberal critics, has the go-ahead to ...

Real Estate <b>News</b>: Home Mortgage Rates Stabilize - Developments - WSJ

Here is a look at real-estate news in today's WSJ:

Sun TV <b>News</b> application approved - Need to know - Macleans.ca

Sun TV News has been green-lit by the CRTC after a long war with the regulator and critics who are opposed to the 24-7 news-and-opinion channel nicknamed “Fox News North.” The CRTC had previously refused to grant the Quebecor property a ...

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Sun <b>News</b> Gets Green Light: &#39;Fox <b>News</b> North&#39; Secures Broadcast <b>...</b>

Canada is to get a conservative all-news TV channel after the CRTC on Friday granted Quebecor Media a license to launch Sun TV News nationwide. The upstart cable channel, dubbed Fox News North by liberal critics, has the go-ahead to ...

Real Estate <b>News</b>: Home Mortgage Rates Stabilize - Developments - WSJ

Here is a look at real-estate news in today's WSJ:

Sun TV <b>News</b> application approved - Need to know - Macleans.ca

Sun TV News has been green-lit by the CRTC after a long war with the regulator and critics who are opposed to the 24-7 news-and-opinion channel nicknamed “Fox News North.” The CRTC had previously refused to grant the Quebecor property a ...

bench craft company management

Christian Arno is founder of Lingo24, a global translation company specializing in website localization and optimization. Christian has more than nine years experience working with some of the world’s biggest global brands. Additional research and writing by Paul Sawers from Lingo24.

All signs point toward an increasingly multilingual future for the web. It’s estimated that over a billion people will be using PCs in the so-called BRIC countries alone by 2015, and the opportunity is even greater when you factor more people accessing the web using mobile devices than computers in many emerging markets. It’s time businesses of all sizes embraced the foreign language Internet.

Foreign Languages on the Web

A truly global web must represent the languages of its users. And with growth in usage of the web in foreign languages outstripping English, businesses are playing catch-up with their potential customers. They’re rapidly trying to get as multi-lingual and diverse as their current and prospective client base.

In the last ten years, the use of Arabic online has increased by over 2500%, while Chinese and Spanish rose twelve and seven-fold respectively. And English? It didn’t even triple.

Today, 42% of all Internet users are in Asia, while almost a quarter are in Europe and just over 10% are in Latin America. These stats shouldn’t sway businesses towards targeting one region over another, though — Latin American countries account for over 200 million people on the web.

However, the vast majority of all online searches are in a language other than English. English is losing its online market share rapidly, which is no bad thing for businesses that recognize and embrace the opportunities on the foreign language Internet.

Optimizing the Non-English Web

The rise of the foreign language Internet doesn’t change the fact English leads the world in terms of volume and depth of content. Whether your industry is car insurance, web design or musical instruments, achieving top rankings for your English-language website for lucrative search terms is getting ever more difficult. The English-language web is saturated and competition for key search terms is tough, which makes increasing your online visibility tough too.

Conversely, the saturation of key search terms on non-English language websites hasn’t reached anywhere near the level of the English-language web. This means that businesses can attain high — and lucrative — positions on search engines far easier on the foreign language Internet.

This also means that it costs less for businesses to achieve prominence on the foreign language web. So the return on your internet marketing investment in Brazil, Russia, India, China — whatever your target market — should be greater than in English-speaking markets.

And the successful web marketer’s advantage when tackling the foreign language Internet is that you already know the essentials to achieve prominence online. You’ve proved this in the web’s toughest language market: English.

Chitika Research found that the difference between first and second place on Google is significant. In fact, a number one spot on Google attracts nearly double the traffic as the number two spot, and about the same amount of traffic as the second through fifth spots combined. For marketers, you’re several times more likely to hit top spot if you escape English-language levels of competition and target almost any other language market.

Going Local

Doesn’t everyone speak English? Although many non-natives of English do, studies have shown consumers are up to five times more likely to buy from a website with content in their native language.

It stands to reason that consumers would rather search for products and services in their own language. Even if a consumer does speak English as a second language, a report by Common Sense Advisory found that 85% of online shoppers required information in their own language before parting with their hard-earned cash.

So to really make the most of the foreign language Internet, you need search engine optimized localization — a hybrid somewhere between what an Internet marketing company and a translation service provider might offer.

Localization involves addressing the cultural and linguistic needs of each of your target countries. When it comes to search, this includes addressing different local search habits. It’s more complicated than simply translating the search terms that work for you in English. In Italy, for example, one of the top terms for low cost airlines is actually half English, half Italian (“voli low cost”). As British and Irish airlines pioneered low cost travel in Europe, it seems their language infiltrated the Italian psyche and made this hybrid term lucrative. Brands really need local knowledge if they’re to take advantage of commercial opportunities like this.

A 2007 paper by the Localization Industry Standards Association (LISA) reported that $25 dollars was returned for every $1 invested in localization. And with e-commerce set to grow by over 10% (CAGR) in Western Europe alone over the next five years, and much faster in so-called emerging markets, businesses should be gearing up for the surge in Internet spending.

Search and Social

Google’s search algorithm uses many aspects of online activity to determine how highly a website is ranked for a given term. Social media is becoming an increasingly important factor. What does this mean for the multi-lingual digital marketer?

The number of tweets a piece of your content receives and the reputation of those tweeters is important. The same goes for “Likes” on Facebook or “Diggs” on Digg. From a foreign language perspective, increased use of social media around the world creates another opportunity to communicate with customers and a way to improve search rankings at the same time.

According to comScore, Latin American tweets are up over 300% between June 2009 and June 2010, followed by 243% in the Asia Pacific region, 142% in the Middle East and Africa, and 106% in Europe. By comparison, North America only increased by 22%.

So the “rest of the world” is actually leading the Twitter revolution. Big, global companies have already taken action. Sony supports twenty international Twitter feeds, while Microsoft, Cisco and PricewaterhouseCoopers all offer Twitter feeds in ten or more languages.

Of course, to succeed locally with social media depends on the prominence of your local websites. A consumer is far more likely to follow your Twitter feed in French if they find it on your French language website. Developing global social media strategies and fully SEO’d localized websites should all form part of the same grand globalization plan.

This plan should also factor what social media platforms are popular locally. According to Comscore, Russia is the biggest country for engaging with social media overall, with Yandex the number one platform. Facebook isn’t even in the top ten most popular websites in Russia. And while Brazil is big on Twitter (alongside Indonesia), Orkut rules the roost there as the mainstream go-to social network.

Similar patterns emerge across the world. Just because one social network leads your home market, this may not be the case in your target market.

Putting the “World” in “World Wide Web”

May 2010 saw a major development for the foreign language Internet — something that will make the web itself more localized. ICANN, the Internet regulator, enabled full URLs in non-Latin scripts. This includes the country code, which means that Arabic and Chinese characters can be used in web addresses.

This is another clear sign that the web is becoming less English-centric. Businesses that have thus far tackled only English-speaking markets online — with perhaps German, French or Spanish thrown in to help support their single biggest international markets — must cater to a more diverse user base.

The foreign language Internet is the low-cost gateway to global success. With online populations growing at a frenetic pace in the non-English speaking world, businesses need to plan how they’ll keep up. Consumers and businesses in the fastest growing markets of the world -– online and offline -– want to talk to you in their languages. And their languages are usually anything but English.

More Business Resources from Mashable:

- 5 Tips for Marketing Online to an International Audience/> - 5 Tips for Developing a Global-Friendly Website/> - HOW TO: Build Your International Business Network Online/> - 6 Free Web Tools for Managing Time Differences/> - 15 Mobile Translation Apps for the International Businessperson

Image courtesy of iStockphoto, zennie

For more Business coverage:

class="f-el">class="cov-twit">Follow Mashable Businessclass="s-el">class="cov-rss">Subscribe to the Business channelclass="f-el">class="cov-fb">Become a Fan on Facebookclass="s-el">class="cov-apple">Download our free apps for Android, iPhone and iPad

Trouble and trends, they say, come in threes. Today, a trifecta of deals shows how old-school web companies are engaging in a little retail therapy because they must, and because Wall Street has given them the equivalent of a year-end bonus, thanks to an uplift in tech stocks.

• Amazon is buying Quidsi, the parent of Diapers.com, for $500 million in cash, or roughly 3 times Quidsi’s 2009 sales. Diapers.com is a hit with the mommy set and is on target to generate $300 million in sales for 2010.  Amazon will assume $45 million in debt as well.


• QuinStreet, an online marketing and lead-generation company is buying CarInsurance.com for $49.7 million in cash and is expanding its footprint in the insurance business. CarInsurance.com, as the name suggests, sells car insurance online and provides leads to automobile insurers.


• Shutterfly, an online photo service, bought the assets of WMSG Inc., for $6 million and will use these to expand its commercial print-on-demand business. WSMG was in the business of helping deliver direct-marketing campaigns for large companies like Toyota and Dell

Now, while we all like to obsess about what company Google will buy next, the recent wave of M&A shows that it’s actually these old school web companies of a certain age that are looking at a current boom in tech stocks as a way to bolster their businesses. A report from the National Venture Capital Association (NVCA) recently noted that during the third quarter of 2010, there were 104 mergers, a trend they expected to continue. And why not?

Over the past two months, the tech-heavy NASDAQ composite is up almost 500 points or roughly 18.5 percent to over 2800. According to a report in the Wall Street Journal, the tech stocks in the S&P 500 are trading at 13.9 times their forward earnings, versus the average of 12.7 times for the entire index. The current rally in technology stocks is driven by profits and growing sales for companies such as QuinStreet and Amazon.

QuinStreet’s stock is up 60 percent over the past three months, while Amazon has seen its stock jump 40 percent since early September, and Shutterfly shares have climbed over 35 percent since August of this year. Positive earnings are only adding to their coffers, which in turn means they can be used to beef up their businesses.

For related research check out GigaOM Pro (subscription required):

• Cleantech Financing  Trends 2010 & Beyond


• Report: U.S. Mobile Venture Capital Investment, Q2 2010


• Motives and Possibilities for a Big Apple Acquisition

bench craft company ad space

Sun <b>News</b> Gets Green Light: &#39;Fox <b>News</b> North&#39; Secures Broadcast <b>...</b>

Canada is to get a conservative all-news TV channel after the CRTC on Friday granted Quebecor Media a license to launch Sun TV News nationwide. The upstart cable channel, dubbed Fox News North by liberal critics, has the go-ahead to ...

Real Estate <b>News</b>: Home Mortgage Rates Stabilize - Developments - WSJ

Here is a look at real-estate news in today's WSJ:

Sun TV <b>News</b> application approved - Need to know - Macleans.ca

Sun TV News has been green-lit by the CRTC after a long war with the regulator and critics who are opposed to the 24-7 news-and-opinion channel nicknamed “Fox News North.” The CRTC had previously refused to grant the Quebecor property a ...

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Sun <b>News</b> Gets Green Light: &#39;Fox <b>News</b> North&#39; Secures Broadcast <b>...</b>

Canada is to get a conservative all-news TV channel after the CRTC on Friday granted Quebecor Media a license to launch Sun TV News nationwide. The upstart cable channel, dubbed Fox News North by liberal critics, has the go-ahead to ...

Real Estate <b>News</b>: Home Mortgage Rates Stabilize - Developments - WSJ

Here is a look at real-estate news in today's WSJ:

Sun TV <b>News</b> application approved - Need to know - Macleans.ca

Sun TV News has been green-lit by the CRTC after a long war with the regulator and critics who are opposed to the 24-7 news-and-opinion channel nicknamed “Fox News North.” The CRTC had previously refused to grant the Quebecor property a ...

bench craft company management

Sun <b>News</b> Gets Green Light: &#39;Fox <b>News</b> North&#39; Secures Broadcast <b>...</b>

Canada is to get a conservative all-news TV channel after the CRTC on Friday granted Quebecor Media a license to launch Sun TV News nationwide. The upstart cable channel, dubbed Fox News North by liberal critics, has the go-ahead to ...

Real Estate <b>News</b>: Home Mortgage Rates Stabilize - Developments - WSJ

Here is a look at real-estate news in today's WSJ:

Sun TV <b>News</b> application approved - Need to know - Macleans.ca

Sun TV News has been green-lit by the CRTC after a long war with the regulator and critics who are opposed to the 24-7 news-and-opinion channel nicknamed “Fox News North.” The CRTC had previously refused to grant the Quebecor property a ...

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Making Money Without

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Fox <b>News</b> Commentators Caught On Camera Mocking Sarah Palin&#39;s Show <b>...</b>

WASHINGTON -- The Fox News channel has been something of a safe haven for Sarah Palin, the type of outlet that provided the former Alaska Governor not only with a friendly audience but similarly kind questions.

Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

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Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

More on Fox <b>News</b>, David Henderson | EconLog | Library of Economics <b>...</b>

I had had hopes for the Fox News Channel as an advocate of smaller government, hopes somewhat justified by evidence. But their treatment of Ron Paul has been off the charts. Chris Wallace has been absolutely vicious - at one point, ...

One and a Half Cheers for Fox <b>News</b>, David Henderson | EconLog <b>...</b>

Senator Jay Rockefeller made a splash Wednesday by suggesting that the Federal Communications Commission shut down the Fox News Channel and MSNBC. My guess is that he mentioned MSNBC because he wanted to sound equally oppressive of both ...

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Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3? PlayStation 3 <b>News</b> - Page 1 <b>...</b>

Read our PlayStation 3 news of Sony Russia confirms Mass Effect 3?.

Rivet returning to lineup - Sabres Edge - Blogs - The Buffalo <b>News</b>

The Buffalo News updated every day with news from Buffalo, New York. Links to national and business news, entertainment listings, recipes, sports teams, classified ads, death notices.

Fox <b>News</b> President: Jon Stewart Is Crazy And NPR Is Run By Nazis <b>...</b>

The second part of The Daily Beast's interview with Fox News president Roger Ailes is out today, and Ailes' encore doesn't disappoint. He responded harshly to Jon Stewart's pervasive criticism of cable news and had some tough, ...

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Fox <b>News</b> President: Jon Stewart Is Crazy And NPR Is Run By Nazis <b>...</b>

The second part of The Daily Beast's interview with Fox News president Roger Ailes is out today, and Ailes' encore doesn't disappoint. He responded harshly to Jon Stewart's pervasive criticism of cable news and had some tough, ...

EA launching Facebook golf game PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of EA launching Facebook golf game.

Photos Implant &#39;Memories&#39; of Fictional <b>News</b> Events | Smart <b>...</b>

Participants in a study were far more likely to “remember” a fictional news event when a headline was accompanied by a tangentially relevant photograph.

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foreclosure statistics

A CBS poll shows that only 6% of the public is concerned about budget deficits or taxes. The rest of us are more concerned about jobs and the economy, with very good reason. The Washington elite are insulated from the pain the rest of us and are focused on the deficit instead of jobs and the economy. This post looks at the consequences of that divide.

In yesterday's post, The Six Percenters, Richard (RJ) Eskow’s lays out the extent of the divide between the DC elites and the rest of the country.

Only 6% of Americans think Congress should concentrate on reducing the deficit or changing the tax code, according to the latest CBS News poll. Nearly ten times as many people, 56%, want it to focus on creating jobs and fixing the economy. Guess which set of policies is the center of attention in Washington right now?

Pick up any newspaper or turn on any news channel and you'll hear a lot of talk about the deficit. But creating jobs and spurring economic growth? Nobody's even discussing it.

Only 6% of the public is concerned about the deficit. The only thing Washington elites are concerned about is the deficit. The rest of us live on the other side of the planet from the people in DC who make the policies. Maybe the other side of the solar system.

You can see how this divide affects policy. There is a “deficit commission” but no jobs commission. There are millions of people needing jobs and millions of jobs that need doing, but Washington won't "spend," even on badly-needed infrastructure investment. People over 50 (laid off because they were paid more or their health care was expensive) can’t find jobs but the DC elite discuss raising the retirement age to 70. The deficit commission proposes cutting back the already-meager “safety net” while cutting tax rates for the really rich even more.

And while all of this goes on the rest of the people in the country are worried about jobs, foreclosures, bills, jobs, wages, jobs, and jobs – the things that matter to regular people. And they are feeling the consequences of the DC/rest-of-us divide.

Unemployment

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics 14.8 million people are just plain-old unemployed. (Of those 6.2 million people have been out of work six months or more.) Another 2.6 million persons were "marginally attached," meaning unemployed and wanting a job but had not looked in the previous 4 weeks. And another 9.2 million are employed part time but want full-time work.

That is 26.6 million people, 17% of the workforce. Just a stunning number.

On November 30 unemployment benefit extensions expire, unless Congress acts. That means that all state unemployment programs will revert back to no more than 26 weeks of benefits for anyone, no matter their circumstances or the unemployment rate in the state. A Hart Research Associates poll released Nov.15 found that by a majority of 60% to 37%, registered voters support Congress continuing unemployment benefits for workers who have exhausted their state unemployment benefits but still cannot find a job. 63% of independents but only 38% of Republicans support extending benefits. Only 24% of registered voters say that deficits are a reason to cut back unemployment benefits. (Chart source.)

Foreclosures

A record 102,134 homes were seized by banks in September, according to RealtyTrac Inc.

Foreclosure filings, including default and auction notices, rose 3 percent from the prior month to 347,420. One out of every 371 households received a notice.

Fewer homes were seized in October, but only because banks had to stop foreclosures because the records fraud scandal came to light.

One in four home mortgage holders is “underwater,” meaning they owe more than the home is worth.

The Greenlining Institute warns that unless immediate action is taken to stem the tide of foreclosures 10-13 million more foreclosures can be expected over the next four years.

Homelessness

According to 2009 figures gathered by the National Coalition for the Homeless, many gathered pre-recession, 3.5 million Americans experience homelessness in a year and on any given night, over 7-800,000 people are homeless. 1.6 million people use transitional housing or emergency shelters.

Food Security/Hunger

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture 17 million American families had trouble putting enough food on the table at some point last year. Of those 5.6 million had trouble throughout the year.

This has more than tripled since 2008.

Poverty

According to the Census Bureau,

The nation's official poverty rate in 2009 was 14.3 percent, up from 13.2 percent in 2008 — the second statistically significant annual increase in the poverty rate since 2004. There were 43.6 million people in poverty in 2009, up from 39.8 million in 2008 — the third consecutive annual increase.

... As defined by the Office of Management and Budget and updated for inflation using the Consumer Price Index, the weighted average poverty threshold for a family of four in 2009 was $21,954.

Health Care

According to the CDC, 59.1 million Americans were with no health insurance in the 1st quarter of 2010, up 3 million from 2008. 30.4 million of those were without health care for an entire year.

These numbers are from before the Congress cut off COBRA subsidies for the unemployed.

Marriages

AP: Recession Rips at US Marriages, Expands Income Gap,

The recession seems to be socking Americans in the heart as well as the wallet: Marriages have hit an all-time low while pleas for food stamps have reached a record high and the gap between rich and poor has grown to its widest ever.

… In America, marriages fell to a record low in 2009, with just 52 percent of adults 18 and over saying they were joined in wedlock, compared to 57 percent in 2000.

Income Gap

AP: Recession Rips at US Marriages, Expands Income Gap,

The top-earning 20 percent of Americans — those making more than $100,000 each year — received 49.4 percent of all income generated in the U.S., compared with the 3.4 percent made by the bottom 20 percent of earners, those who fell below the poverty line, according to the new figures.

… At the top, the wealthiest 5 percent of Americans, who earn more than $180,000, added slightly to their annual incomes last year, the data show. Families at the $50,000 median level slipped lower.

On each side the divide is so wide you don’t know how things are on the other side.

Josh Rosner of Graham, Fisher didn’t predict the collapse of the housing market. He did something more perceptive than that. Back in 2001 (2001!) he identified the changes in the housing market that would lead to the collapse and warned of the possibility. He called his analysis “Housing in the New Millenium: A Home Without Equity is Just A Rental With Debt.”  He saw things no one else at the time saw and he understood the implications. You should be able to find his paper here or here. From the summary:

This report assesses the prospects of the U.S. housing/mortgage sector over the next several years.  Based on our analysis, we believe there are elements in place for the housing sector to continue to experience growth well above GDP. However, we believe there are risks that can materially distort the growth prospects of the sector.   Specifically, it appears that a large portion of the housing sector’s growth in the 1990’s came from the easing of the credit underwriting process.  Such easing includes:

• The drastic reduction of minimum down payment levels from 20% to 0%

• A focused effort to target the “low income” borrower

• The reduction in private mortgage insurance requirements on high loan to value mortgages

• The increasing use of software to streamline the origination process and modify/recast delinquent loans in order to keep them classified as  ‘current’

• Changes in the appraisal process which has led to widespread over-appraisal/over-valuation problems

If these trends remain in place, it is likely that the home purchase boom of the past decade will continue unabated.  Despite the increasingly more difficult economic environment, it may be possible for lenders to further ease credit standards and more fully exploit less penetrated markets. Recently targeted populations that have historically been denied homeownership opportunities have offered the mortgage industry novel hurdles to overcome. Industry participants in combination with eased regulatory standards and the support of the GSEs (Government Sponsored Enterprises) have overcome many of them.

If there is an economic disruption that causes a marked rise in unemployment, the negative impact on the housing market could be quite large.  These impacts come in several forms. They include a reduction in the demand for homeownership, a decline in real estate prices and increased foreclosure expenses. These impacts would be exacerbated by the increasing debt burden of the U.S. consumer and the reduction of home equity available in the home.

Although we have yet to see any materially negative consequences of the relaxation of credit standards, we believe the risk of credit relaxation and leverage can’t be ignored.  Importantly, a relatively new method of loan forgiveness can temporarily alter the perception of credit health in the housing sector.  In an effort to keep homeowners in the home and reduce foreclosure expenses, holders of mortgage assets are currently recasting or modifying troubled loans.  Such policy initiatives may for a time distort the relevancy of delinquency and foreclosure statistics.  However, a protracted housing slowdown could eventually cause modifications to become uneconomic and, thus, credit quality statistics would likely become relevant once again.  The virtuous circle of increasing homeownership due to greater leverage has the potential to become a vicious cycle of lower home prices due to an accelerating rate of foreclosures.

Rosner recently wrote an analysis of the state of the securitization market. It is superb. He argues that it is crucial to re-establish the securitization market. I disagree. But that doesn’t matter. What does matter is his superb analysis of the Dodd-Frank bill. First, he appears to have read it. Second, he shows how much the legislation relies on government agencies implementing the goals of the legislation. Third, he understands that that is not ideal. Fourth, he shows how even if the legislation is implemented according to its intentions, there are still lots of problems. It’s the best analysis I have read of the current state of the market and the likely impact of the financial reform legislation. A must read.

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Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

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A CBS poll shows that only 6% of the public is concerned about budget deficits or taxes. The rest of us are more concerned about jobs and the economy, with very good reason. The Washington elite are insulated from the pain the rest of us and are focused on the deficit instead of jobs and the economy. This post looks at the consequences of that divide.

In yesterday's post, The Six Percenters, Richard (RJ) Eskow’s lays out the extent of the divide between the DC elites and the rest of the country.

Only 6% of Americans think Congress should concentrate on reducing the deficit or changing the tax code, according to the latest CBS News poll. Nearly ten times as many people, 56%, want it to focus on creating jobs and fixing the economy. Guess which set of policies is the center of attention in Washington right now?

Pick up any newspaper or turn on any news channel and you'll hear a lot of talk about the deficit. But creating jobs and spurring economic growth? Nobody's even discussing it.

Only 6% of the public is concerned about the deficit. The only thing Washington elites are concerned about is the deficit. The rest of us live on the other side of the planet from the people in DC who make the policies. Maybe the other side of the solar system.

You can see how this divide affects policy. There is a “deficit commission” but no jobs commission. There are millions of people needing jobs and millions of jobs that need doing, but Washington won't "spend," even on badly-needed infrastructure investment. People over 50 (laid off because they were paid more or their health care was expensive) can’t find jobs but the DC elite discuss raising the retirement age to 70. The deficit commission proposes cutting back the already-meager “safety net” while cutting tax rates for the really rich even more.

And while all of this goes on the rest of the people in the country are worried about jobs, foreclosures, bills, jobs, wages, jobs, and jobs – the things that matter to regular people. And they are feeling the consequences of the DC/rest-of-us divide.

Unemployment

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics 14.8 million people are just plain-old unemployed. (Of those 6.2 million people have been out of work six months or more.) Another 2.6 million persons were "marginally attached," meaning unemployed and wanting a job but had not looked in the previous 4 weeks. And another 9.2 million are employed part time but want full-time work.

That is 26.6 million people, 17% of the workforce. Just a stunning number.

On November 30 unemployment benefit extensions expire, unless Congress acts. That means that all state unemployment programs will revert back to no more than 26 weeks of benefits for anyone, no matter their circumstances or the unemployment rate in the state. A Hart Research Associates poll released Nov.15 found that by a majority of 60% to 37%, registered voters support Congress continuing unemployment benefits for workers who have exhausted their state unemployment benefits but still cannot find a job. 63% of independents but only 38% of Republicans support extending benefits. Only 24% of registered voters say that deficits are a reason to cut back unemployment benefits. (Chart source.)

Foreclosures

A record 102,134 homes were seized by banks in September, according to RealtyTrac Inc.

Foreclosure filings, including default and auction notices, rose 3 percent from the prior month to 347,420. One out of every 371 households received a notice.

Fewer homes were seized in October, but only because banks had to stop foreclosures because the records fraud scandal came to light.

One in four home mortgage holders is “underwater,” meaning they owe more than the home is worth.

The Greenlining Institute warns that unless immediate action is taken to stem the tide of foreclosures 10-13 million more foreclosures can be expected over the next four years.

Homelessness

According to 2009 figures gathered by the National Coalition for the Homeless, many gathered pre-recession, 3.5 million Americans experience homelessness in a year and on any given night, over 7-800,000 people are homeless. 1.6 million people use transitional housing or emergency shelters.

Food Security/Hunger

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture 17 million American families had trouble putting enough food on the table at some point last year. Of those 5.6 million had trouble throughout the year.

This has more than tripled since 2008.

Poverty

According to the Census Bureau,

The nation's official poverty rate in 2009 was 14.3 percent, up from 13.2 percent in 2008 — the second statistically significant annual increase in the poverty rate since 2004. There were 43.6 million people in poverty in 2009, up from 39.8 million in 2008 — the third consecutive annual increase.

... As defined by the Office of Management and Budget and updated for inflation using the Consumer Price Index, the weighted average poverty threshold for a family of four in 2009 was $21,954.

Health Care

According to the CDC, 59.1 million Americans were with no health insurance in the 1st quarter of 2010, up 3 million from 2008. 30.4 million of those were without health care for an entire year.

These numbers are from before the Congress cut off COBRA subsidies for the unemployed.

Marriages

AP: Recession Rips at US Marriages, Expands Income Gap,

The recession seems to be socking Americans in the heart as well as the wallet: Marriages have hit an all-time low while pleas for food stamps have reached a record high and the gap between rich and poor has grown to its widest ever.

… In America, marriages fell to a record low in 2009, with just 52 percent of adults 18 and over saying they were joined in wedlock, compared to 57 percent in 2000.

Income Gap

AP: Recession Rips at US Marriages, Expands Income Gap,

The top-earning 20 percent of Americans — those making more than $100,000 each year — received 49.4 percent of all income generated in the U.S., compared with the 3.4 percent made by the bottom 20 percent of earners, those who fell below the poverty line, according to the new figures.

… At the top, the wealthiest 5 percent of Americans, who earn more than $180,000, added slightly to their annual incomes last year, the data show. Families at the $50,000 median level slipped lower.

On each side the divide is so wide you don’t know how things are on the other side.

Josh Rosner of Graham, Fisher didn’t predict the collapse of the housing market. He did something more perceptive than that. Back in 2001 (2001!) he identified the changes in the housing market that would lead to the collapse and warned of the possibility. He called his analysis “Housing in the New Millenium: A Home Without Equity is Just A Rental With Debt.”  He saw things no one else at the time saw and he understood the implications. You should be able to find his paper here or here. From the summary:

This report assesses the prospects of the U.S. housing/mortgage sector over the next several years.  Based on our analysis, we believe there are elements in place for the housing sector to continue to experience growth well above GDP. However, we believe there are risks that can materially distort the growth prospects of the sector.   Specifically, it appears that a large portion of the housing sector’s growth in the 1990’s came from the easing of the credit underwriting process.  Such easing includes:

• The drastic reduction of minimum down payment levels from 20% to 0%

• A focused effort to target the “low income” borrower

• The reduction in private mortgage insurance requirements on high loan to value mortgages

• The increasing use of software to streamline the origination process and modify/recast delinquent loans in order to keep them classified as  ‘current’

• Changes in the appraisal process which has led to widespread over-appraisal/over-valuation problems

If these trends remain in place, it is likely that the home purchase boom of the past decade will continue unabated.  Despite the increasingly more difficult economic environment, it may be possible for lenders to further ease credit standards and more fully exploit less penetrated markets. Recently targeted populations that have historically been denied homeownership opportunities have offered the mortgage industry novel hurdles to overcome. Industry participants in combination with eased regulatory standards and the support of the GSEs (Government Sponsored Enterprises) have overcome many of them.

If there is an economic disruption that causes a marked rise in unemployment, the negative impact on the housing market could be quite large.  These impacts come in several forms. They include a reduction in the demand for homeownership, a decline in real estate prices and increased foreclosure expenses. These impacts would be exacerbated by the increasing debt burden of the U.S. consumer and the reduction of home equity available in the home.

Although we have yet to see any materially negative consequences of the relaxation of credit standards, we believe the risk of credit relaxation and leverage can’t be ignored.  Importantly, a relatively new method of loan forgiveness can temporarily alter the perception of credit health in the housing sector.  In an effort to keep homeowners in the home and reduce foreclosure expenses, holders of mortgage assets are currently recasting or modifying troubled loans.  Such policy initiatives may for a time distort the relevancy of delinquency and foreclosure statistics.  However, a protracted housing slowdown could eventually cause modifications to become uneconomic and, thus, credit quality statistics would likely become relevant once again.  The virtuous circle of increasing homeownership due to greater leverage has the potential to become a vicious cycle of lower home prices due to an accelerating rate of foreclosures.

Rosner recently wrote an analysis of the state of the securitization market. It is superb. He argues that it is crucial to re-establish the securitization market. I disagree. But that doesn’t matter. What does matter is his superb analysis of the Dodd-Frank bill. First, he appears to have read it. Second, he shows how much the legislation relies on government agencies implementing the goals of the legislation. Third, he understands that that is not ideal. Fourth, he shows how even if the legislation is implemented according to its intentions, there are still lots of problems. It’s the best analysis I have read of the current state of the market and the likely impact of the financial reform legislation. A must read.

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Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2 PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

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Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

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Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2 PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

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Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

bench craft company

A CBS poll shows that only 6% of the public is concerned about budget deficits or taxes. The rest of us are more concerned about jobs and the economy, with very good reason. The Washington elite are insulated from the pain the rest of us and are focused on the deficit instead of jobs and the economy. This post looks at the consequences of that divide.

In yesterday's post, The Six Percenters, Richard (RJ) Eskow’s lays out the extent of the divide between the DC elites and the rest of the country.

Only 6% of Americans think Congress should concentrate on reducing the deficit or changing the tax code, according to the latest CBS News poll. Nearly ten times as many people, 56%, want it to focus on creating jobs and fixing the economy. Guess which set of policies is the center of attention in Washington right now?

Pick up any newspaper or turn on any news channel and you'll hear a lot of talk about the deficit. But creating jobs and spurring economic growth? Nobody's even discussing it.

Only 6% of the public is concerned about the deficit. The only thing Washington elites are concerned about is the deficit. The rest of us live on the other side of the planet from the people in DC who make the policies. Maybe the other side of the solar system.

You can see how this divide affects policy. There is a “deficit commission” but no jobs commission. There are millions of people needing jobs and millions of jobs that need doing, but Washington won't "spend," even on badly-needed infrastructure investment. People over 50 (laid off because they were paid more or their health care was expensive) can’t find jobs but the DC elite discuss raising the retirement age to 70. The deficit commission proposes cutting back the already-meager “safety net” while cutting tax rates for the really rich even more.

And while all of this goes on the rest of the people in the country are worried about jobs, foreclosures, bills, jobs, wages, jobs, and jobs – the things that matter to regular people. And they are feeling the consequences of the DC/rest-of-us divide.

Unemployment

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics 14.8 million people are just plain-old unemployed. (Of those 6.2 million people have been out of work six months or more.) Another 2.6 million persons were "marginally attached," meaning unemployed and wanting a job but had not looked in the previous 4 weeks. And another 9.2 million are employed part time but want full-time work.

That is 26.6 million people, 17% of the workforce. Just a stunning number.

On November 30 unemployment benefit extensions expire, unless Congress acts. That means that all state unemployment programs will revert back to no more than 26 weeks of benefits for anyone, no matter their circumstances or the unemployment rate in the state. A Hart Research Associates poll released Nov.15 found that by a majority of 60% to 37%, registered voters support Congress continuing unemployment benefits for workers who have exhausted their state unemployment benefits but still cannot find a job. 63% of independents but only 38% of Republicans support extending benefits. Only 24% of registered voters say that deficits are a reason to cut back unemployment benefits. (Chart source.)

Foreclosures

A record 102,134 homes were seized by banks in September, according to RealtyTrac Inc.

Foreclosure filings, including default and auction notices, rose 3 percent from the prior month to 347,420. One out of every 371 households received a notice.

Fewer homes were seized in October, but only because banks had to stop foreclosures because the records fraud scandal came to light.

One in four home mortgage holders is “underwater,” meaning they owe more than the home is worth.

The Greenlining Institute warns that unless immediate action is taken to stem the tide of foreclosures 10-13 million more foreclosures can be expected over the next four years.

Homelessness

According to 2009 figures gathered by the National Coalition for the Homeless, many gathered pre-recession, 3.5 million Americans experience homelessness in a year and on any given night, over 7-800,000 people are homeless. 1.6 million people use transitional housing or emergency shelters.

Food Security/Hunger

According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture 17 million American families had trouble putting enough food on the table at some point last year. Of those 5.6 million had trouble throughout the year.

This has more than tripled since 2008.

Poverty

According to the Census Bureau,

The nation's official poverty rate in 2009 was 14.3 percent, up from 13.2 percent in 2008 — the second statistically significant annual increase in the poverty rate since 2004. There were 43.6 million people in poverty in 2009, up from 39.8 million in 2008 — the third consecutive annual increase.

... As defined by the Office of Management and Budget and updated for inflation using the Consumer Price Index, the weighted average poverty threshold for a family of four in 2009 was $21,954.

Health Care

According to the CDC, 59.1 million Americans were with no health insurance in the 1st quarter of 2010, up 3 million from 2008. 30.4 million of those were without health care for an entire year.

These numbers are from before the Congress cut off COBRA subsidies for the unemployed.

Marriages

AP: Recession Rips at US Marriages, Expands Income Gap,

The recession seems to be socking Americans in the heart as well as the wallet: Marriages have hit an all-time low while pleas for food stamps have reached a record high and the gap between rich and poor has grown to its widest ever.

… In America, marriages fell to a record low in 2009, with just 52 percent of adults 18 and over saying they were joined in wedlock, compared to 57 percent in 2000.

Income Gap

AP: Recession Rips at US Marriages, Expands Income Gap,

The top-earning 20 percent of Americans — those making more than $100,000 each year — received 49.4 percent of all income generated in the U.S., compared with the 3.4 percent made by the bottom 20 percent of earners, those who fell below the poverty line, according to the new figures.

… At the top, the wealthiest 5 percent of Americans, who earn more than $180,000, added slightly to their annual incomes last year, the data show. Families at the $50,000 median level slipped lower.

On each side the divide is so wide you don’t know how things are on the other side.

Josh Rosner of Graham, Fisher didn’t predict the collapse of the housing market. He did something more perceptive than that. Back in 2001 (2001!) he identified the changes in the housing market that would lead to the collapse and warned of the possibility. He called his analysis “Housing in the New Millenium: A Home Without Equity is Just A Rental With Debt.”  He saw things no one else at the time saw and he understood the implications. You should be able to find his paper here or here. From the summary:

This report assesses the prospects of the U.S. housing/mortgage sector over the next several years.  Based on our analysis, we believe there are elements in place for the housing sector to continue to experience growth well above GDP. However, we believe there are risks that can materially distort the growth prospects of the sector.   Specifically, it appears that a large portion of the housing sector’s growth in the 1990’s came from the easing of the credit underwriting process.  Such easing includes:

• The drastic reduction of minimum down payment levels from 20% to 0%

• A focused effort to target the “low income” borrower

• The reduction in private mortgage insurance requirements on high loan to value mortgages

• The increasing use of software to streamline the origination process and modify/recast delinquent loans in order to keep them classified as  ‘current’

• Changes in the appraisal process which has led to widespread over-appraisal/over-valuation problems

If these trends remain in place, it is likely that the home purchase boom of the past decade will continue unabated.  Despite the increasingly more difficult economic environment, it may be possible for lenders to further ease credit standards and more fully exploit less penetrated markets. Recently targeted populations that have historically been denied homeownership opportunities have offered the mortgage industry novel hurdles to overcome. Industry participants in combination with eased regulatory standards and the support of the GSEs (Government Sponsored Enterprises) have overcome many of them.

If there is an economic disruption that causes a marked rise in unemployment, the negative impact on the housing market could be quite large.  These impacts come in several forms. They include a reduction in the demand for homeownership, a decline in real estate prices and increased foreclosure expenses. These impacts would be exacerbated by the increasing debt burden of the U.S. consumer and the reduction of home equity available in the home.

Although we have yet to see any materially negative consequences of the relaxation of credit standards, we believe the risk of credit relaxation and leverage can’t be ignored.  Importantly, a relatively new method of loan forgiveness can temporarily alter the perception of credit health in the housing sector.  In an effort to keep homeowners in the home and reduce foreclosure expenses, holders of mortgage assets are currently recasting or modifying troubled loans.  Such policy initiatives may for a time distort the relevancy of delinquency and foreclosure statistics.  However, a protracted housing slowdown could eventually cause modifications to become uneconomic and, thus, credit quality statistics would likely become relevant once again.  The virtuous circle of increasing homeownership due to greater leverage has the potential to become a vicious cycle of lower home prices due to an accelerating rate of foreclosures.

Rosner recently wrote an analysis of the state of the securitization market. It is superb. He argues that it is crucial to re-establish the securitization market. I disagree. But that doesn’t matter. What does matter is his superb analysis of the Dodd-Frank bill. First, he appears to have read it. Second, he shows how much the legislation relies on government agencies implementing the goals of the legislation. Third, he understands that that is not ideal. Fourth, he shows how even if the legislation is implemented according to its intentions, there are still lots of problems. It’s the best analysis I have read of the current state of the market and the likely impact of the financial reform legislation. A must read.

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Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2 PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

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Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

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Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2 PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

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Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2 PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

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Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2 PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

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Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2 PC <b>News</b> - Page 1 | Eurogamer.net

Read our PC news of Good Old Games to sell The Witcher 2.

Ominous Colts Injury <b>News</b> From Phil Wilson UPDATE Collie Cleared <b>...</b>

Phil Wilson Tweets some ominous news on the injury front for the Colts.

Great <b>News</b>: The Donald May Agree to be President « Hot Air

During a longer video with Fox News (video) The Donald goes into more detail about how the world has lost respect for America under the Obama administration, as well as the need for his type of “finesse” to be a truly effective ...

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personal finance manager

'Morning Glory' Has Us Looking Back at Our Favorite Working Girls

Ever since Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant's newsroom shenanigans in "His Girl Friday," Hollywood has been fascinated by the Working Girl—that chic, career-driven leading lady who kicks ass, takes names and looks fabulous in a pencil skirt. Driven by pure professionalism, the Working Girl excels at the office, intimidates her male coworkers, sacrifices her personal life to work extra hours and, of course, would never, ever get caught using an office Xerox to make illicit photocopies of her butt.

The latest star to take on a working woman role is Rachel McAdams, who we'll get to see play a hotshot morning show producer when her latest film, "Morning Glory" premieres this week. And today, we're taking a look at all the ladies who paved the way before her, with a list of our favorite working girls throughout cinematic history. Which of these actresses would we most want to share a cubicle with?





1. Anne Hathaway in "The Devil Wears Prada"

Poor Anne sacrifices everything—her love life, her self-esteem, and even her deep, abiding love of onion bagels—in the service of an evil editor who in no way is based on Anna Wintour, at a magazine which in no way resembles Vogue. Her only solace? A closet full of stolen samples from fashion photo shoots.



2. Julia Roberts in "Erin Brockovich"

Julia won an Oscar for her excellent portrayal of real-life go-getter Erin Brockovich, who took down an environmentally-poisonous corporation using nothing but hard work, keen investigation...and her boobs.



3. Maggie Gyllenhaal in "Secretary"

This might be what people mean when they talk about a "hostile work environment." Maggie plays a secretary to the sadistic-but-weirdly-sexy James Spader, who punishes her proofreading errors by spanking her. Not exactly our recipe for workplace romance, but hey, whatever tickles you.



4. Gwyneth Paltrow in "Iron Man"

Tony Stark might be Iron Man, but he'd be nothing without the cool intellect and devoted assistance of Gwyneth's Pepper Potts.



5. Scarlett Johansson in "Scoop"

It's a credit to Scarlett's acting skills that despite being one of the most gorgeous women on the whole damn planet, she still managed to make us buy her performance as an overeager journalism student who stumbles onto an aristocratic scandal. (The doofy glasses helped.)



6. Sanaa Lathan in "Something New"

Sanaa plays a busy lawyer with a classic Working Girl conundrum: pursuing a career at the expense of her love life. Good thing she's got Simon Baker to, er, landscape her yard, if you know what we mean.



7. Christina Applegate in "Anchorman"

Starring opposite Will Ferrell as a plucky newscaster, Christina's go-getter role can best be summed up as follows: "Mr. Harken, this city needs its news. And you are going to deprive them of that because I have breasts? EXQUISITE BREASTS?"



8. Katherine Heigl in "Knocked Up"

Katherine is a struggling entertainment reporter when she has a one-night stand with a slacker played by Seth Rogen. The good news: It turns out that carrying Seth Rogen's babyspawn is great for your career.



9. Melanie Griffith in "Working Girl"

Despite being an under-appreciated secretary with blond hair and a breathy voice, Melanie's Tess McGill is the ultimate driven career girl: a secret finance whiz who uses duplicity to get her foot in the door on Wall Street, pitch a major merger between two companies, and—of course—seduce Harrison Ford while she's at it.



10. Zooey Deschanel in "(500) Days of Summer"

It's never really clear just what Zooey's professional role is at the greeting-card company where she meets Joseph Gordon-Levitt... but if we had to guess, it's probably something like "Senior Manager of Epic, Soul-Rending Heartbreak."

Just for fun, Rosalind Russell and her snazzy outfit in His Girl Friday:



Source

Good job MTV, I actually like this list. Are they missing anyone? (besides obviously Peggy and Joan if this included TV).

If you don't believe Reggie, try this from Chris Whalen.

 

The Fed's Zero Rate Policy Is Destroying AmericaChristopher Whalen, Institutional Risk Analytics | Oct. 12, 2010, 9:55 AM | 9,401 | 33

• "You ever hear the story of Mr. Faded Glory??
  Says he who rides a pony must someday fall.?
  I've been talkin' to my alter, says "Life is what you make it.
  And if you make it death well rest your soul away, away, away."

"Crown of Thorns"?
Pearl Jam
Ament/Fairweather/Gilmore/Gossard/Wood

In this issue of The Institutional Risk Analyst, we turn the camera eye on two different perspectives on the continuing crisis affecting the U.S. economy, the Fed's deflationary monetary policy and the surging price of gold.  We look at how the rapid changes now underway in how consumers and investors alike view the dollar will affect the risk picture facing banks, companies and individuals. BTW, tomorrow IRA cofounder Christopher Whalen will be travelling back to the heartland to visit our friends at Indiana State University. We will give a talk entitled: "Do Americans Need a New Deal?"  More on this theme next week.

Last week The IRA traveled to Washington D.C. to participate in the latest event sponsored by our friend Alex Pollock at American Enterprise Institute, "Living in the Post-Bubble World: What's Next?" We received a great deal of media buzz before and after the event, but the most poignant comment came in this unexpected and very disturbing letter from Dianna in Rockford, IL:

"I have no way of knowing if this message will ever actually reach you. Nevertheless, I want to extend a most sincere message of appreciation for one of the comments you made during recent participation in an American Enterprise Institute symposium. You are the only financial guru /analyst whom I have heard make any reference to the devastating impact of extraordinary quantitative easing on "grandma" and her carefully laid financial plans. Many middle class retirees have no generous government or corporate pension. We have had to plan and save prudently for retirement. Now, as we watch returns on CD's plunge from an average 5% to an anemic 1.5%, we also experience a plunge from a comfortable retirement into a state of severe "penny-pinching". You were correct...not only do we have to cut back on gifts for the grandchildren, we are also drastically curtailing many discretionary purchases, travel to spend time with family and so forth. I have heard NO other analyst speak to this impact on responsible retirees who thought they had done all the right things to prepare for the "golden years". It just felt good to realize that there is at least one individual who has given any consideration to this fallout from "Fed" policies."

Now you know why we at IRA take time away from our business to engage in public debate about how the world of finance affects real people. And you also see the horrible damage that the Bernanke Fed is inflicting upon real American in order to bail out the large Wall Street banks. And the irony is that all of this damage and sacrifice by Dianna and tens of millions of American individuals and businesses who depend upon interest income to survive will be for naught.  The Big Banks will have to be restrructured in any event using the resolution authority in the Dodd-Frank legislation.

We also heard from our friend Henry Smyth, proprietor of Granville Cooper Asset Management Ltd., which features a unique gold fund that is comprised solely of rolling forward positions in the noble metal. The fund is domiciled entirely out of reach of America's spendthrift government and settles via Julius Baer in Zurich. (Disclosure: IRA co-founder Chris Whalen is a neighbor of Smyth and an introducing party of GCAM.)

Smyth, who we know from our Mexico days, has been pestering us since the summer about a chart created by his colleague Zeke Brustkern that illustrates the growth of the demand for gold over the past decade and how the increased estimates each year understate the actual market performance. Click here to see the gold chart which Smyth explains below:

"What this graphic aims to elucidate is the evolution of parabolic estimates of the future of gold price over the last five years. Starting with five years of data, from Sept. 2000 through Sept. 2005, a growth projection is forecasted through Sept. 2012. Each subsequent year another projection is crafted adding the additional data points into the curve's slope estimate. Five curves are portrayed in all, representing data from Sept. 2000-Sept. 2010, all projecting through 2012. What becomes clear is that despite using estimation methods intended to represent rapid parabolic growth, the estimated values continue to fall short of the real asset value appreciation. With the exception of 2008/2009, each passing year has brought substantial upward revision of growth projections, and has continued to do so throughout 2010."

Consider these two data points: First, an American retiree named Dianna who has seen her retirement savings rendered worthless by the ill-considered policy actions of the Federal Open Market Committee. Second, the action of the gold market, which is likewise suggesting that fiat paper dollars have no value. If you take the two observations together, it suggests to us that the Fed's actions are feeding global deflation and that the next leg down in the U.S. financial markets could be particularly severe -- especially if the Fed resumes printing more funny money.

While some analysts are calling for a mild devaluation of the dollar, what we see forming ahead could be something far more dramatic and potentially disruptive to the world economy, namely a protracted period of deflation driven by the subserviant position of the Fed vis-a-vis the largest banks. This new shrinkage will not only see gold moving higher but will also see the dollar collapse a la the FDR dollar devaluation of the early 1930s.  This crisis is being caused by Fed zero interest rate and quantitative easing ("QE") policies.

As we have said before and we'll say again, the FOMC's zero rate policies imply that the dollar and all assets denominated in dollars have no value. Stocks, bonds and other financial assets depend upon income to make these obligations money good. Without a positive return, there is no reason to hold dollar assets. When President Abraham Lincoln introduced fiat paper dollars backed by nothing to finance the Civil War, these pieces of debt originally were convertible into Treasury notes that paid interest. But the need of a growing nation for a means of exchange rendered such devices irrelevant.

Today the situation is reversed. Non-commercial demand for dollars is collapsing in much of the global economy, in part because the Fed is transferring something like three quarters of a trillion dollars annually from individual and corporate savers to the Wall Street banks. And even this vast subsidy will be insufficient to prevent the ultimate restructuring of the top three U.S. banks.  What will Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and the other members of the FOMC say to Dianna and the millions of other Americans impoverished by their policy errors when we have to break up the top-three U.S. banks anyway?

Forget more QE. If the FOMC does not soon allow interest rates to rise and thereby rebalance the policy equation between American savers and borrowers, then we fully expect to see gold prices climb further. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and the FOMC will hand the detractors of the central bank led by Rep Ron Paul (I-TX) the political issue they need to eliminate the Fed once and for all. And President Barack Obama will be wearing the concrete booties that once belonged to President Herbert Hoover.  Unlike your worthless greenbacks, you can take that to the bank. 

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/fed-zero-rate-policy-destroying-america-2010-10#ixzz12uaKHMFk

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/fed-zero-rate-policy-destroying-america-2010-10

benchcraft company scam

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Breaking <b>News</b>: Humanities in Decline! Film at 11. — Crooked Timber

But I just don't know of any realm of human endeavor in which a precipitous decline from 1967 to 1987, followed by a couple of decades of stability, counts as breaking news. It's the equivalent of saying “sales of Sgt. Pepper posters ...

Pulse Brings You <b>News</b> and RSS in an Elegant Flow

Android/iOS: Blogs and news sites put all that effort into making their posts graphically appealing, so why not see what they've got? Pulse, a nicely different kind of news reader, pulls your news in through side-scrolling, ...

benchcraft company scam



'Morning Glory' Has Us Looking Back at Our Favorite Working Girls

Ever since Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant's newsroom shenanigans in "His Girl Friday," Hollywood has been fascinated by the Working Girl—that chic, career-driven leading lady who kicks ass, takes names and looks fabulous in a pencil skirt. Driven by pure professionalism, the Working Girl excels at the office, intimidates her male coworkers, sacrifices her personal life to work extra hours and, of course, would never, ever get caught using an office Xerox to make illicit photocopies of her butt.

The latest star to take on a working woman role is Rachel McAdams, who we'll get to see play a hotshot morning show producer when her latest film, "Morning Glory" premieres this week. And today, we're taking a look at all the ladies who paved the way before her, with a list of our favorite working girls throughout cinematic history. Which of these actresses would we most want to share a cubicle with?





1. Anne Hathaway in "The Devil Wears Prada"

Poor Anne sacrifices everything—her love life, her self-esteem, and even her deep, abiding love of onion bagels—in the service of an evil editor who in no way is based on Anna Wintour, at a magazine which in no way resembles Vogue. Her only solace? A closet full of stolen samples from fashion photo shoots.



2. Julia Roberts in "Erin Brockovich"

Julia won an Oscar for her excellent portrayal of real-life go-getter Erin Brockovich, who took down an environmentally-poisonous corporation using nothing but hard work, keen investigation...and her boobs.



3. Maggie Gyllenhaal in "Secretary"

This might be what people mean when they talk about a "hostile work environment." Maggie plays a secretary to the sadistic-but-weirdly-sexy James Spader, who punishes her proofreading errors by spanking her. Not exactly our recipe for workplace romance, but hey, whatever tickles you.



4. Gwyneth Paltrow in "Iron Man"

Tony Stark might be Iron Man, but he'd be nothing without the cool intellect and devoted assistance of Gwyneth's Pepper Potts.



5. Scarlett Johansson in "Scoop"

It's a credit to Scarlett's acting skills that despite being one of the most gorgeous women on the whole damn planet, she still managed to make us buy her performance as an overeager journalism student who stumbles onto an aristocratic scandal. (The doofy glasses helped.)



6. Sanaa Lathan in "Something New"

Sanaa plays a busy lawyer with a classic Working Girl conundrum: pursuing a career at the expense of her love life. Good thing she's got Simon Baker to, er, landscape her yard, if you know what we mean.



7. Christina Applegate in "Anchorman"

Starring opposite Will Ferrell as a plucky newscaster, Christina's go-getter role can best be summed up as follows: "Mr. Harken, this city needs its news. And you are going to deprive them of that because I have breasts? EXQUISITE BREASTS?"



8. Katherine Heigl in "Knocked Up"

Katherine is a struggling entertainment reporter when she has a one-night stand with a slacker played by Seth Rogen. The good news: It turns out that carrying Seth Rogen's babyspawn is great for your career.



9. Melanie Griffith in "Working Girl"

Despite being an under-appreciated secretary with blond hair and a breathy voice, Melanie's Tess McGill is the ultimate driven career girl: a secret finance whiz who uses duplicity to get her foot in the door on Wall Street, pitch a major merger between two companies, and—of course—seduce Harrison Ford while she's at it.



10. Zooey Deschanel in "(500) Days of Summer"

It's never really clear just what Zooey's professional role is at the greeting-card company where she meets Joseph Gordon-Levitt... but if we had to guess, it's probably something like "Senior Manager of Epic, Soul-Rending Heartbreak."

Just for fun, Rosalind Russell and her snazzy outfit in His Girl Friday:



Source

Good job MTV, I actually like this list. Are they missing anyone? (besides obviously Peggy and Joan if this included TV).

If you don't believe Reggie, try this from Chris Whalen.

 

The Fed's Zero Rate Policy Is Destroying AmericaChristopher Whalen, Institutional Risk Analytics | Oct. 12, 2010, 9:55 AM | 9,401 | 33

• "You ever hear the story of Mr. Faded Glory??
  Says he who rides a pony must someday fall.?
  I've been talkin' to my alter, says "Life is what you make it.
  And if you make it death well rest your soul away, away, away."

"Crown of Thorns"?
Pearl Jam
Ament/Fairweather/Gilmore/Gossard/Wood

In this issue of The Institutional Risk Analyst, we turn the camera eye on two different perspectives on the continuing crisis affecting the U.S. economy, the Fed's deflationary monetary policy and the surging price of gold.  We look at how the rapid changes now underway in how consumers and investors alike view the dollar will affect the risk picture facing banks, companies and individuals. BTW, tomorrow IRA cofounder Christopher Whalen will be travelling back to the heartland to visit our friends at Indiana State University. We will give a talk entitled: "Do Americans Need a New Deal?"  More on this theme next week.

Last week The IRA traveled to Washington D.C. to participate in the latest event sponsored by our friend Alex Pollock at American Enterprise Institute, "Living in the Post-Bubble World: What's Next?" We received a great deal of media buzz before and after the event, but the most poignant comment came in this unexpected and very disturbing letter from Dianna in Rockford, IL:

"I have no way of knowing if this message will ever actually reach you. Nevertheless, I want to extend a most sincere message of appreciation for one of the comments you made during recent participation in an American Enterprise Institute symposium. You are the only financial guru /analyst whom I have heard make any reference to the devastating impact of extraordinary quantitative easing on "grandma" and her carefully laid financial plans. Many middle class retirees have no generous government or corporate pension. We have had to plan and save prudently for retirement. Now, as we watch returns on CD's plunge from an average 5% to an anemic 1.5%, we also experience a plunge from a comfortable retirement into a state of severe "penny-pinching". You were correct...not only do we have to cut back on gifts for the grandchildren, we are also drastically curtailing many discretionary purchases, travel to spend time with family and so forth. I have heard NO other analyst speak to this impact on responsible retirees who thought they had done all the right things to prepare for the "golden years". It just felt good to realize that there is at least one individual who has given any consideration to this fallout from "Fed" policies."

Now you know why we at IRA take time away from our business to engage in public debate about how the world of finance affects real people. And you also see the horrible damage that the Bernanke Fed is inflicting upon real American in order to bail out the large Wall Street banks. And the irony is that all of this damage and sacrifice by Dianna and tens of millions of American individuals and businesses who depend upon interest income to survive will be for naught.  The Big Banks will have to be restrructured in any event using the resolution authority in the Dodd-Frank legislation.

We also heard from our friend Henry Smyth, proprietor of Granville Cooper Asset Management Ltd., which features a unique gold fund that is comprised solely of rolling forward positions in the noble metal. The fund is domiciled entirely out of reach of America's spendthrift government and settles via Julius Baer in Zurich. (Disclosure: IRA co-founder Chris Whalen is a neighbor of Smyth and an introducing party of GCAM.)

Smyth, who we know from our Mexico days, has been pestering us since the summer about a chart created by his colleague Zeke Brustkern that illustrates the growth of the demand for gold over the past decade and how the increased estimates each year understate the actual market performance. Click here to see the gold chart which Smyth explains below:

"What this graphic aims to elucidate is the evolution of parabolic estimates of the future of gold price over the last five years. Starting with five years of data, from Sept. 2000 through Sept. 2005, a growth projection is forecasted through Sept. 2012. Each subsequent year another projection is crafted adding the additional data points into the curve's slope estimate. Five curves are portrayed in all, representing data from Sept. 2000-Sept. 2010, all projecting through 2012. What becomes clear is that despite using estimation methods intended to represent rapid parabolic growth, the estimated values continue to fall short of the real asset value appreciation. With the exception of 2008/2009, each passing year has brought substantial upward revision of growth projections, and has continued to do so throughout 2010."

Consider these two data points: First, an American retiree named Dianna who has seen her retirement savings rendered worthless by the ill-considered policy actions of the Federal Open Market Committee. Second, the action of the gold market, which is likewise suggesting that fiat paper dollars have no value. If you take the two observations together, it suggests to us that the Fed's actions are feeding global deflation and that the next leg down in the U.S. financial markets could be particularly severe -- especially if the Fed resumes printing more funny money.

While some analysts are calling for a mild devaluation of the dollar, what we see forming ahead could be something far more dramatic and potentially disruptive to the world economy, namely a protracted period of deflation driven by the subserviant position of the Fed vis-a-vis the largest banks. This new shrinkage will not only see gold moving higher but will also see the dollar collapse a la the FDR dollar devaluation of the early 1930s.  This crisis is being caused by Fed zero interest rate and quantitative easing ("QE") policies.

As we have said before and we'll say again, the FOMC's zero rate policies imply that the dollar and all assets denominated in dollars have no value. Stocks, bonds and other financial assets depend upon income to make these obligations money good. Without a positive return, there is no reason to hold dollar assets. When President Abraham Lincoln introduced fiat paper dollars backed by nothing to finance the Civil War, these pieces of debt originally were convertible into Treasury notes that paid interest. But the need of a growing nation for a means of exchange rendered such devices irrelevant.

Today the situation is reversed. Non-commercial demand for dollars is collapsing in much of the global economy, in part because the Fed is transferring something like three quarters of a trillion dollars annually from individual and corporate savers to the Wall Street banks. And even this vast subsidy will be insufficient to prevent the ultimate restructuring of the top three U.S. banks.  What will Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and the other members of the FOMC say to Dianna and the millions of other Americans impoverished by their policy errors when we have to break up the top-three U.S. banks anyway?

Forget more QE. If the FOMC does not soon allow interest rates to rise and thereby rebalance the policy equation between American savers and borrowers, then we fully expect to see gold prices climb further. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and the FOMC will hand the detractors of the central bank led by Rep Ron Paul (I-TX) the political issue they need to eliminate the Fed once and for all. And President Barack Obama will be wearing the concrete booties that once belonged to President Herbert Hoover.  Unlike your worthless greenbacks, you can take that to the bank. 

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/fed-zero-rate-policy-destroying-america-2010-10#ixzz12uaKHMFk

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/fed-zero-rate-policy-destroying-america-2010-10

bench craft company scam

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Breaking <b>News</b>: Humanities in Decline! Film at 11. — Crooked Timber

But I just don't know of any realm of human endeavor in which a precipitous decline from 1967 to 1987, followed by a couple of decades of stability, counts as breaking news. It's the equivalent of saying “sales of Sgt. Pepper posters ...

Pulse Brings You <b>News</b> and RSS in an Elegant Flow

Android/iOS: Blogs and news sites put all that effort into making their posts graphically appealing, so why not see what they've got? Pulse, a nicely different kind of news reader, pulls your news in through side-scrolling, ...

benchcraft company scam

benchcraft company scam

benchcraft company scam

Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Breaking <b>News</b>: Humanities in Decline! Film at 11. — Crooked Timber

But I just don't know of any realm of human endeavor in which a precipitous decline from 1967 to 1987, followed by a couple of decades of stability, counts as breaking news. It's the equivalent of saying “sales of Sgt. Pepper posters ...

Pulse Brings You <b>News</b> and RSS in an Elegant Flow

Android/iOS: Blogs and news sites put all that effort into making their posts graphically appealing, so why not see what they've got? Pulse, a nicely different kind of news reader, pulls your news in through side-scrolling, ...

bench craft company scam



'Morning Glory' Has Us Looking Back at Our Favorite Working Girls

Ever since Rosalind Russell and Cary Grant's newsroom shenanigans in "His Girl Friday," Hollywood has been fascinated by the Working Girl—that chic, career-driven leading lady who kicks ass, takes names and looks fabulous in a pencil skirt. Driven by pure professionalism, the Working Girl excels at the office, intimidates her male coworkers, sacrifices her personal life to work extra hours and, of course, would never, ever get caught using an office Xerox to make illicit photocopies of her butt.

The latest star to take on a working woman role is Rachel McAdams, who we'll get to see play a hotshot morning show producer when her latest film, "Morning Glory" premieres this week. And today, we're taking a look at all the ladies who paved the way before her, with a list of our favorite working girls throughout cinematic history. Which of these actresses would we most want to share a cubicle with?





1. Anne Hathaway in "The Devil Wears Prada"

Poor Anne sacrifices everything—her love life, her self-esteem, and even her deep, abiding love of onion bagels—in the service of an evil editor who in no way is based on Anna Wintour, at a magazine which in no way resembles Vogue. Her only solace? A closet full of stolen samples from fashion photo shoots.



2. Julia Roberts in "Erin Brockovich"

Julia won an Oscar for her excellent portrayal of real-life go-getter Erin Brockovich, who took down an environmentally-poisonous corporation using nothing but hard work, keen investigation...and her boobs.



3. Maggie Gyllenhaal in "Secretary"

This might be what people mean when they talk about a "hostile work environment." Maggie plays a secretary to the sadistic-but-weirdly-sexy James Spader, who punishes her proofreading errors by spanking her. Not exactly our recipe for workplace romance, but hey, whatever tickles you.



4. Gwyneth Paltrow in "Iron Man"

Tony Stark might be Iron Man, but he'd be nothing without the cool intellect and devoted assistance of Gwyneth's Pepper Potts.



5. Scarlett Johansson in "Scoop"

It's a credit to Scarlett's acting skills that despite being one of the most gorgeous women on the whole damn planet, she still managed to make us buy her performance as an overeager journalism student who stumbles onto an aristocratic scandal. (The doofy glasses helped.)



6. Sanaa Lathan in "Something New"

Sanaa plays a busy lawyer with a classic Working Girl conundrum: pursuing a career at the expense of her love life. Good thing she's got Simon Baker to, er, landscape her yard, if you know what we mean.



7. Christina Applegate in "Anchorman"

Starring opposite Will Ferrell as a plucky newscaster, Christina's go-getter role can best be summed up as follows: "Mr. Harken, this city needs its news. And you are going to deprive them of that because I have breasts? EXQUISITE BREASTS?"



8. Katherine Heigl in "Knocked Up"

Katherine is a struggling entertainment reporter when she has a one-night stand with a slacker played by Seth Rogen. The good news: It turns out that carrying Seth Rogen's babyspawn is great for your career.



9. Melanie Griffith in "Working Girl"

Despite being an under-appreciated secretary with blond hair and a breathy voice, Melanie's Tess McGill is the ultimate driven career girl: a secret finance whiz who uses duplicity to get her foot in the door on Wall Street, pitch a major merger between two companies, and—of course—seduce Harrison Ford while she's at it.



10. Zooey Deschanel in "(500) Days of Summer"

It's never really clear just what Zooey's professional role is at the greeting-card company where she meets Joseph Gordon-Levitt... but if we had to guess, it's probably something like "Senior Manager of Epic, Soul-Rending Heartbreak."

Just for fun, Rosalind Russell and her snazzy outfit in His Girl Friday:



Source

Good job MTV, I actually like this list. Are they missing anyone? (besides obviously Peggy and Joan if this included TV).

If you don't believe Reggie, try this from Chris Whalen.

 

The Fed's Zero Rate Policy Is Destroying AmericaChristopher Whalen, Institutional Risk Analytics | Oct. 12, 2010, 9:55 AM | 9,401 | 33

• "You ever hear the story of Mr. Faded Glory??
  Says he who rides a pony must someday fall.?
  I've been talkin' to my alter, says "Life is what you make it.
  And if you make it death well rest your soul away, away, away."

"Crown of Thorns"?
Pearl Jam
Ament/Fairweather/Gilmore/Gossard/Wood

In this issue of The Institutional Risk Analyst, we turn the camera eye on two different perspectives on the continuing crisis affecting the U.S. economy, the Fed's deflationary monetary policy and the surging price of gold.  We look at how the rapid changes now underway in how consumers and investors alike view the dollar will affect the risk picture facing banks, companies and individuals. BTW, tomorrow IRA cofounder Christopher Whalen will be travelling back to the heartland to visit our friends at Indiana State University. We will give a talk entitled: "Do Americans Need a New Deal?"  More on this theme next week.

Last week The IRA traveled to Washington D.C. to participate in the latest event sponsored by our friend Alex Pollock at American Enterprise Institute, "Living in the Post-Bubble World: What's Next?" We received a great deal of media buzz before and after the event, but the most poignant comment came in this unexpected and very disturbing letter from Dianna in Rockford, IL:

"I have no way of knowing if this message will ever actually reach you. Nevertheless, I want to extend a most sincere message of appreciation for one of the comments you made during recent participation in an American Enterprise Institute symposium. You are the only financial guru /analyst whom I have heard make any reference to the devastating impact of extraordinary quantitative easing on "grandma" and her carefully laid financial plans. Many middle class retirees have no generous government or corporate pension. We have had to plan and save prudently for retirement. Now, as we watch returns on CD's plunge from an average 5% to an anemic 1.5%, we also experience a plunge from a comfortable retirement into a state of severe "penny-pinching". You were correct...not only do we have to cut back on gifts for the grandchildren, we are also drastically curtailing many discretionary purchases, travel to spend time with family and so forth. I have heard NO other analyst speak to this impact on responsible retirees who thought they had done all the right things to prepare for the "golden years". It just felt good to realize that there is at least one individual who has given any consideration to this fallout from "Fed" policies."

Now you know why we at IRA take time away from our business to engage in public debate about how the world of finance affects real people. And you also see the horrible damage that the Bernanke Fed is inflicting upon real American in order to bail out the large Wall Street banks. And the irony is that all of this damage and sacrifice by Dianna and tens of millions of American individuals and businesses who depend upon interest income to survive will be for naught.  The Big Banks will have to be restrructured in any event using the resolution authority in the Dodd-Frank legislation.

We also heard from our friend Henry Smyth, proprietor of Granville Cooper Asset Management Ltd., which features a unique gold fund that is comprised solely of rolling forward positions in the noble metal. The fund is domiciled entirely out of reach of America's spendthrift government and settles via Julius Baer in Zurich. (Disclosure: IRA co-founder Chris Whalen is a neighbor of Smyth and an introducing party of GCAM.)

Smyth, who we know from our Mexico days, has been pestering us since the summer about a chart created by his colleague Zeke Brustkern that illustrates the growth of the demand for gold over the past decade and how the increased estimates each year understate the actual market performance. Click here to see the gold chart which Smyth explains below:

"What this graphic aims to elucidate is the evolution of parabolic estimates of the future of gold price over the last five years. Starting with five years of data, from Sept. 2000 through Sept. 2005, a growth projection is forecasted through Sept. 2012. Each subsequent year another projection is crafted adding the additional data points into the curve's slope estimate. Five curves are portrayed in all, representing data from Sept. 2000-Sept. 2010, all projecting through 2012. What becomes clear is that despite using estimation methods intended to represent rapid parabolic growth, the estimated values continue to fall short of the real asset value appreciation. With the exception of 2008/2009, each passing year has brought substantial upward revision of growth projections, and has continued to do so throughout 2010."

Consider these two data points: First, an American retiree named Dianna who has seen her retirement savings rendered worthless by the ill-considered policy actions of the Federal Open Market Committee. Second, the action of the gold market, which is likewise suggesting that fiat paper dollars have no value. If you take the two observations together, it suggests to us that the Fed's actions are feeding global deflation and that the next leg down in the U.S. financial markets could be particularly severe -- especially if the Fed resumes printing more funny money.

While some analysts are calling for a mild devaluation of the dollar, what we see forming ahead could be something far more dramatic and potentially disruptive to the world economy, namely a protracted period of deflation driven by the subserviant position of the Fed vis-a-vis the largest banks. This new shrinkage will not only see gold moving higher but will also see the dollar collapse a la the FDR dollar devaluation of the early 1930s.  This crisis is being caused by Fed zero interest rate and quantitative easing ("QE") policies.

As we have said before and we'll say again, the FOMC's zero rate policies imply that the dollar and all assets denominated in dollars have no value. Stocks, bonds and other financial assets depend upon income to make these obligations money good. Without a positive return, there is no reason to hold dollar assets. When President Abraham Lincoln introduced fiat paper dollars backed by nothing to finance the Civil War, these pieces of debt originally were convertible into Treasury notes that paid interest. But the need of a growing nation for a means of exchange rendered such devices irrelevant.

Today the situation is reversed. Non-commercial demand for dollars is collapsing in much of the global economy, in part because the Fed is transferring something like three quarters of a trillion dollars annually from individual and corporate savers to the Wall Street banks. And even this vast subsidy will be insufficient to prevent the ultimate restructuring of the top three U.S. banks.  What will Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and the other members of the FOMC say to Dianna and the millions of other Americans impoverished by their policy errors when we have to break up the top-three U.S. banks anyway?

Forget more QE. If the FOMC does not soon allow interest rates to rise and thereby rebalance the policy equation between American savers and borrowers, then we fully expect to see gold prices climb further. Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and the FOMC will hand the detractors of the central bank led by Rep Ron Paul (I-TX) the political issue they need to eliminate the Fed once and for all. And President Barack Obama will be wearing the concrete booties that once belonged to President Herbert Hoover.  Unlike your worthless greenbacks, you can take that to the bank. 

Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/fed-zero-rate-policy-destroying-america-2010-10#ixzz12uaKHMFk

 

http://www.businessinsider.com/fed-zero-rate-policy-destroying-america-2010-10

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Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Breaking <b>News</b>: Humanities in Decline! Film at 11. — Crooked Timber

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Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Breaking <b>News</b>: Humanities in Decline! Film at 11. — Crooked Timber

But I just don't know of any realm of human endeavor in which a precipitous decline from 1967 to 1987, followed by a couple of decades of stability, counts as breaking news. It's the equivalent of saying “sales of Sgt. Pepper posters ...

Pulse Brings You <b>News</b> and RSS in an Elegant Flow

Android/iOS: Blogs and news sites put all that effort into making their posts graphically appealing, so why not see what they've got? Pulse, a nicely different kind of news reader, pulls your news in through side-scrolling, ...

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Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Breaking <b>News</b>: Humanities in Decline! Film at 11. — Crooked Timber

But I just don't know of any realm of human endeavor in which a precipitous decline from 1967 to 1987, followed by a couple of decades of stability, counts as breaking news. It's the equivalent of saying “sales of Sgt. Pepper posters ...

Pulse Brings You <b>News</b> and RSS in an Elegant Flow

Android/iOS: Blogs and news sites put all that effort into making their posts graphically appealing, so why not see what they've got? Pulse, a nicely different kind of news reader, pulls your news in through side-scrolling, ...

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Energy Drinks Linked to Alcohol Problems - Health <b>News</b> - Health.com

College students who consume nonalcoholic energy drinks such as Red Bull at least once a week are more than twice as likely as their peers to show signs of alcohol dependence, according to a new study.

Breaking <b>News</b>: Humanities in Decline! Film at 11. — Crooked Timber

But I just don't know of any realm of human endeavor in which a precipitous decline from 1967 to 1987, followed by a couple of decades of stability, counts as breaking news. It's the equivalent of saying “sales of Sgt. Pepper posters ...

Pulse Brings You <b>News</b> and RSS in an Elegant Flow

Android/iOS: Blogs and news sites put all that effort into making their posts graphically appealing, so why not see what they've got? Pulse, a nicely different kind of news reader, pulls your news in through side-scrolling, ...

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