So most of what I'm posting happened over the weekend. I want to start with this video from Baltimore. I'm not sure how people could do this to a fellow human being. Makes me sick...
********************************************************************************
I can't believe that Rhino horns are more valuable than gold. Amazing.
By Rohit Kachroo, NBC News
More than one rhino is being killed in South Africa by poachers each day -- with 2012 on target to be the worst year on record.
Some 159 rhinos have fallen victim to poachers since January, a death toll that looks set to surpass last year's grim figure of 449. In 2007, only 13 were killed in the country.
Demand comes from parts of China and Vietnam, where new wealth has combined with an age-old myth that rhino horns can be used to cure cancer.
Rhino horns are now worth an estimated $25,000 per pound, making their natural weapon worth more than gold.
Three rhinos were wounded in a single incident last month. Two died, but one -- named Thandi -- survived, though she remains seriously ill.
With little positive news from the frontline of the war with poachers, "Save Thandi" has become a rallying cry amongst those who care about the plight of the rhino in South Africa.
"People are desperate to see something going right, some positive news, some glimmer of hope that we can actually do something that saves one," wildlife veternarian Dr William Fowlds said. "I think what has come through so strongly over the past month is how important every single animal is to us."
******************************************************************************
I wish Arkansas would have got some of the snow from Alaska. It's wild that we had the warmest winter I can remember and they set snow records.
TOP NEWS
Winter snowfall record set in Anchorage
Sun, Apr 08 19:08 PM EDT
By Yereth Rosen
ANCHORAGE, Alaska (Reuters) - A storm dumped more than 4 inches of snow on Anchorage over the weekend, bringing the total snowfall for Alaska's largest city to a record 11.2 feet for the year, the National Weather Service said on Sunday.
The official snow tally was 134.5 inches, 1.9 inches above the previous record set in the winter of 1954-1955, the weather service said.
The average for winter snowfall in Anchorage over the past 30 years is 74.5 inches, the agency said.
The abundant snow has strained the city's street-clearing budget. From October through March, the city spent $11.9 million on snow removal, compared to $8.1 million over the same period last winter, according to a municipal report.
With many snow storage sites full, the Anchorage Assembly created temporary storage areas in late February. Some of the snow piles are expected to last through the summer.
Several roofs in Anchorage have caved in under the weight of accumulated snow, including the roof of a church auditorium.
There are similar concerns about roofs in the towns of Valdez and Cordova, where the snowpack is much higher than normal.
The National Weather Service warned that flooding is a possibility once the snow melts. And avalanches can occur as warmer weather arrives and loosens accumulated snow and ice.
A 32-year-old woman was critically injured on Friday when a large chunk of ice tumbled down a slope and crushed her pickup truck on the Seward Highway, which carries traffic south from Anchorage.
Winter sports enthusiasts have reveled in the record snowfall.
Alyeska Resort in Girdwood, the state's largest ski area, is enjoying a banner season. And Chugach Powder Guides, a Girdwood company that runs helicopter tours, is almost completely booked.
Alaska's plentiful snow contrasts with poor skiing conditions in the lower 48 states and in much of Europe, said Chris Owens, who helps run the tour operator.
"For the most part, we pretty much have all of the snow on the planet right now," Owens said. "We have waiting lists for our waiting lists."
*******************************************************************************
I'm sure everyone heard about the Petrino situation. Here is a funny song about it. You will have to go to the link and download the file. Google won't let me add it here.
*******************************************************************************
Spain rates on the rise again.
US data this week is relatively sparse (as usual in a post payroll week) leaving little evidence over the next few days to progress the seasonality debate but after a long weekend of derisking in mind and now in reality, Europe is front-and-center once again. Spain (and less so Italy) has decompressed to its worst levels of the year (5.96% yield and 425bps spread on 10Y) has now lost all of the LTRO gains as the curves of these liquidity-fueled optical illusions of recovery bear-flatten (as front-running Sarkozy traders unwind into the sad reality - most specifically for Spain - that we described in glorious must read detail here). Divergence and decoupling remain sidelined also as Deutsche Banks' Jim Reid notes the 4-week rolling beat:miss ratio in the US macro data has fallen to 24%: 73% (3% in line) from a recent peak at a string 70%:30% on February 29th. His view is still that in a post crisis world, especially as severe as the one we've just been through, Western growth is going to continue to be well below trend for many years and with more regular cycles. With Spain teetering on the verge of a 6% yield once again, we are still off the record wides from late November but not by much as the vicious cycle of sovereign-stress-to-banking-stress-to-banking-stress re-emerges in style. The European situation is still incredibly political and while we'd expect much more intervention down the line, expect the discussions and rhetoric to be fairly tough. The ECB last week indicated that they felt the recent widening in Sovereign spreads was more due to sluggishness in the pace of reforms. They are therefore unlikely to intervene in a hurry. So if Europe does need further intervention it is likely to need to get far worse again first.
US macro data is missing expectations more and more as US decoupling myths get exposed as seasonal adjustment folly...
And Europe's vicious cycle re-emerges as Yields...
*******************************************************************************
This is from Peter Schiff's weekly commentary.
By: Peter Schiff
Thursday, April 5, 2012
As this fall’s presidential election takes shape as a contest between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney, the rhetoric out of both camps is becoming sharper and more ideological. Looking to exploit Governor Romney’s increasingly close association with Wisconsin representative Paul Ryan (who has been mentioned as a potential vice presidential nominee), the President dedicated a lengthy address earlier this week to specifically heap scorn on Ryan’s budget plan (Ryan is the chairman of the House Budget Committee). The attack lines used by the President not only reveal a preview of the fall campaign but also offer a glimpse of Obama’s skewed views of the social and economic history of the United States.
The President laid bare his beliefs that America’s source of economic strength has been her historical embrace of collective action, wealth redistribution, and government policies that have protected workers from the ravages of the wealthy. To reiterate, he was talking about the United States, not Soviet Russia. He asserted that prosperity “grows outward from the middle class” and that it “never trickles down from the success of the wealthy.” Accordingly, he concludes that our recent struggles stem from the Republican-led abandonment of these successful policies.
In reaching these conclusions Obama relies on classic “wet sidewalks cause rain” reasoning, and assumes that an effect can be the father of the cause. But as we debate how to move the American economy out of the rut in which it is trapped, it’s important to know where to put the cart and where the horse.
To illustrate his point, Obama singled out auto pioneer Henry Ford, who famously paid among the highest wages in the world at that time his company began churning out Model T’s. By paying such high wages Obama believes Ford created consumers who could afford to purchase his cars, thereby giving business the ability to grow. Based on this understanding, any program that puts money into the pockets of the average American consumer will be successful in creating growth, especially if those funds can be taxed from the wealthy, who are less likely to spend. Obama argues that Republican proposals that reign in government spending, and cut benefits to the middle or low incomes, are antithetical to this goal.
While it is true that the American middle class rose in tandem with her economic might, it was the success of the country’s industrialists that allowed the middle class to arise. Capitalism unleashed the productive capacity of entrepreneurs and workers, which brought down the cost of goods to the point that high levels of consumption were possible for a wider cross section of individuals. While Henry Ford, as Obama noted, paid his workers well enough to buy Ford cars, those high wages would never have been possible, or his products affordable, if not for the personal innovation he, and other American industrialists, brought to the table in the first place.
The economists that Obama follows believe that business will only create jobs once they know consumers have the money to buy their products. But just as wet sidewalks don’t cause rain, consumption does not lead to production. Rather, production leads to consumption. Something must be produced before it can be consumed.
Human demand is endless and does not need to be stimulated into existence. Suppose you want a new car, but then you lose your job and you decide to forgo the purchase. Has your desire (or demand) for the car lessened as a result of your diminished employment circumstances? If you are like most people, you still desire the car just as much, but you may decide not to buy it because of your reduced income. It’s not that you no longer want the car (if someone offered it to you at 90% below the sticker price, you might still buy it). It’s that you have lost the ability to afford it given its price and your income. The best way to transform demand into consumption is to lower prices to the point where things become affordable. Efficiently operating industries increase supply and bring down prices. This is what Ford did 100 years ago and Steve Jobs did much more recently.
But by introducing revolutionary manufacturing processes for the mass production of low-end vehicles, Ford was able to drastically lower the price of a product (cars) that were previously available only to the wealthy. Ford didn’t create desire to buy cars, that existed independently. But he greatly expanded the quantity of inexpensive cars which allowed that demand to be fulfilled through consumption. In the process he created wealth for himself and his workers (his efficient techniques meant that workers could demand high wages) and higher living standards for society as a whole.
Obama believes that prosperity came only in the 20th century after the government began redistributing wealth from rich people like Henry Ford to the middle and lower classes. He ignores the fact that America’s greatest growth streak occurred in the 19th rather than the 20th century, and that America had become by far the world’s richest nation before any serious wealth redistribution even began.
The unfortunate part for the President is that wealth must first be produced before it can be redistributed. But redistribution always creates disincentives that result in less wealth being created. All societies that have attempted to create wealth through redistribution have failed miserably. This should be obvious to anyone who spends more than a few minutes studying world economic history. But the President is on a mission to get reelected and his ace in the hole is to fan the flames of class warfare. It’s a tried and true political strategy, and he looks ready to ride that hobby horse until it breaks.
*******************************************************************************
No comments:
Post a Comment