More than just Bed Head

So, after spending the night in a shared condo (the one where aysha puked upon arrival and then a few days later her friend was puking at home), I wake up and the Zman, all of four years old, points to me says: 'hey errol, what's wrong with your hair?'.

'what, what do mean?' The sides of my whispy hair peppered with grays are typically very curly when i wake up, perhaps even matted, what kid you ain't never seen bedhead?

'you're bald.'

In general friends, family, coworkers, etc... try to be nice about this topic, at the minimum they not going to be aggressive in my face about it. But a 4 year old kids calls 'em like he sees 'em, Jah bless, and so what I have known for more than a decade is now official: I'm bald.

bob dylan

Listening to Pandora, Redemption song by Bob Marley starts playing, with Arman sitting on my lap. 'Arman, this is Bob Marley, daddy's favorite Singer.' Arman responds, 'Mine's Bob Dylan'.

Debt Celiling Debacle, pt2

forwarded by Pat O'Connor

http://pragcap.com/news-flash-america-avoids-default-crisis-averted

As you likely know by now, the U.S. government has agreed on a debt ceiling agreement that will avoid the default of the USA. Let me just begin by saying that the media’s coverage of this debate has been absurd and embarrassing. I have yet to see one accurate portrayal of the actual situation. But nothing has been more absurd than the political circus that has erupted over the course of the last few weeks. It’s embarrassing and every single one of our representatives should be ashamed of themselves for allowing this conversation to even reach this point.

As of Sunday evening futures are up almost 200 points and everyone thinks some great crisis has been averted. Last week I predicted this exact scenario to a tee:

“We’re running right up against the debt ceiling deadline and the two sides don’t look like they’re ready to agree on anything. The Boehner plan is going to go up for vote on Thursday according to the latest reports, but Obama has already said he’ll veto it. So, there’s some potential that we get a “mini TARP” in the next few days where markets continue to tumble as the politicians prove they are serious about deciding to let America go bankrupt.

Then, when push comes to shove, they’ll “work all weekend” (those hard workers in Congress!) and we’ll get some sort of incredible rescue announcement at the last hour on Sunday evening. Futures soar 200 points and everyone breathes a big sigh of relief as our politicians ride off into the sunset on their white horses….”

Now, let’s have the discussion that really matters here and ignore all of these politicians who are shaking each other’s hands and celebrating this grand “achievement” of theirs.

What actually matters:

THE USA IS THE MONOPOLY SUPPLIER OF U.S. DOLLARS. THE DEBT OF THE U.S.A. IS DENOMINATED ENTIRELY IN A CURRENCY THAT IT CAN PRINT AT WILL. THIS MEANS THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS THE U.S.A. BEING ABLE TO “RUN OUT OF MONEY” OR DEFAULT IN A TRADITIONAL SENSE LIKE A HOUSEHOLD, STATE, BUSINESS OR EUROPEAN NATION CAN (THESE ARE ALL CURRENCY USERS AND NOT ISSUERS). THE DEBT CEILING IS ENTIRELY SELF IMPOSED AND NOTHING MORE THAN A POLITICAL TOOL. IT IS ABSURD TO RATE THE CREDIT OR AN AUTONOMOUS CURRENCY ISSUER LIKE THE UNITED STATES. THE DEBT CEILING IS A RELIC OF THE GOLD STANDARD THAT SERVES NO PURPOSE TODAY. TONIGHT, PRESIDENT OBAMA SAID WE “AVOIDED A DEFAULT”. NO, WE AVOIDED A SELF IMPOSED DEFAULT. THERE IS NO SUCH THING AS THE U.S.A. RUNNING OUT OF U.S. DOLLARS AND NOT BEING ABLE TO MEET ITS OBLIGATIONS. THE LEADER OF THIS COUNTRY UNEQUIVOCALLY DOES NOT UNDERSTAND HOW OUR MONETARY SYSTEM WORKS AND HIS ADVISERS AND THE OTHER CONGRESSIONAL REPRESENTATIVES ARE LARGELY TO BLAME FOR THE CURRENT ECONOMIC DEBACLE. VOTERS SHOULD BE OUTRAGED BY THIS IGNORANCE.

What the debt ceiling agreement actually means:

The U.S. economy remains mired in a balance sheet recession. This means that the private sector remains too weak to run with the baton as they pay down their excessive debts from the debt bubble of the last 10 years. By accounting identity, the USA, as a current account deficit country cannot grow its economy with a very weak private sector and a government that isn’t spending sufficiently. In other words, the foreign sector, private sector and government sector cannot all stop spending at the same time. Someone must be a net spender.

During a balance sheet recession, if the government does not cover the balance of the current account deficit then the economy is very likely to contract. This debt ceiling agreement means that austerity is likely to continue gripping the U.S. economy and even though the Republicans did not entirely steamroll President Obama (make no mistake, he got bullied like a schoolyard child in these debates and rolled over like a dog) they have essentially succeeded in convincing the President that cuts are what is now needed.

The bottom line:

These unfounded fears of becoming the next Greece means we are increasingly becoming the next Japan. The debt ceiling debate does not matter at all. The agreement did not save anything. All it does is increase the risks of a weaker economy in the coming 12 months.

Debt Ceiling Debacle, pt.1

Paul Krugman, http://www.nytimes.com/2011/08/01/opinion/the-president-surrenders-on-debt-ceiling.html?_r=1&ref=global-home

A deal to raise the federal debt ceiling is in the works. If it goes through, many commentators will declare that disaster was avoided. But they will be wrong.

For the deal itself, given the available information, is a disaster, and not just for President Obama and his party. It will damage an already depressed economy; it will probably make America’s long-run deficit problem worse, not better; and most important, by demonstrating that raw extortion works and carries no political cost, it will take America a long way down the road to banana-republic status.

Start with the economics. We currently have a deeply depressed economy. We will almost certainly continue to have a depressed economy all through next year. And we will probably have a depressed economy through 2013 as well, if not beyond.

The worst thing you can do in these circumstances is slash government spending, since that will depress the economy even further. Pay no attention to those who invoke the confidence fairy, claiming that tough action on the budget will reassure businesses and consumers, leading them to spend more. It doesn’t work that way, a fact confirmed by many studies of the historical record.

Indeed, slashing spending while the economy is depressed won’t even help the budget situation much, and might well make it worse. On one side, interest rates on federal borrowing are currently very low, so spending cuts now will do little to reduce future interest costs. On the other side, making the economy weaker now will also hurt its long-run prospects, which will in turn reduce future revenue. So those demanding spending cuts now are like medieval doctors who treated the sick by bleeding them, and thereby made them even sicker.

And then there are the reported terms of the deal, which amount to an abject surrender on the part of the president. First, there will be big spending cuts, with no increase in revenue. Then a panel will make recommendations for further deficit reduction — and if these recommendations aren’t accepted, there will be more spending cuts.

Republicans will supposedly have an incentive to make concessions the next time around, because defense spending will be among the areas cut. But the G.O.P. has just demonstrated its willingness to risk financial collapse unless it gets everything its most extreme members want. Why expect it to be more reasonable in the next round?

In fact, Republicans will surely be emboldened by the way Mr. Obama keeps folding in the face of their threats. He surrendered last December, extending all the Bush tax cuts; he surrendered in the spring when they threatened to shut down the government; and he has now surrendered on a grand scale to raw extortion over the debt ceiling. Maybe it’s just me, but I see a pattern here.

Did the president have any alternative this time around? Yes.

First of all, he could and should have demanded an increase in the debt ceiling back in December. When asked why he didn’t, he replied that he was sure that Republicans would act responsibly. Great call.

And even now, the Obama administration could have resorted to legal maneuvering to sidestep the debt ceiling, using any of several options. In ordinary circumstances, this might have been an extreme step. But faced with the reality of what is happening, namely raw extortion on the part of a party that, after all, only controls one house of Congress, it would have been totally justifiable.

At the very least, Mr. Obama could have used the possibility of a legal end run to strengthen his bargaining position. Instead, however, he ruled all such options out from the beginning.

But wouldn’t taking a tough stance have worried markets? Probably not. In fact, if I were an investor I would be reassured, not dismayed, by a demonstration that the president is willing and able to stand up to blackmail on the part of right-wing extremists. Instead, he has chosen to demonstrate the opposite.

Make no mistake about it, what we’re witnessing here is a catastrophe on multiple levels.

It is, of course, a political catastrophe for Democrats, who just a few weeks ago seemed to have Republicans on the run over their plan to dismantle Medicare; now Mr. Obama has thrown all that away. And the damage isn’t over: there will be more choke points where Republicans can threaten to create a crisis unless the president surrenders, and they can now act with the confident expectation that he will.

In the long run, however, Democrats won’t be the only losers. What Republicans have just gotten away with calls our whole system of government into question. After all, how can American democracy work if whichever party is most prepared to be ruthless, to threaten the nation’s economic security, gets to dictate policy? And the answer is, maybe it can’t.

donkeys fight elephants?

“The ugliest part of the saga is that the well-being of many other countries is also in the impact zone when the donkey and the elephant fight,” the state-run news agency, Xinhua — considered the propaganda arm of the Communist Party — said in an opinion piece Friday

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/30/business/global/global-concern-over-us-debt-ceiling-disagreement.html?ref=global-home

Witch's teat

The "witch's teat" may have been merely a mole or a wart, a freckle or a blemish, or even a supernumerary nipple, which occurs in approximately one out of two hundred women; but for susceptible minds, it was an aberrant breast in the service of the devil.

from Marilyn Yalom, A History of the Breast

angel island

http://t.co/tQbRNFB pared with muscadet-sur-lie