SITTING ON THE EDGE OF ANOTHER CLIFF!
Friday i was driving around upstate NY looking at colleges for my daughter, all of which i can't afford. I was checking in on my phone on the status of a collapsing market and the late day bounce off the lows. It left the Dow Industrials sitting on the edge of a cliff. The mlp index is down 4 days in a row and was off over 10 points at point Friday before bouncing back to 185 which left it in a 6 point loss. 152 is the MLP closing low and we are still up on the year but that gain has been reduced to under 5%.
Monday morning brings no corporate news. Energy complex showing some gains this morning as stock futures are stronger. Overnight news that the government might take a common equity stake in Citigroup rather than go down the nationalization road is causing some short covering but its nothing more than that.
In case you missed it over the weekend Stuart Varney of Fox Business News had this encounter with an ACORN member. Thanks to Flopping Aces and the transcript is also available there. It speaks volumes about where we are headed here. That tea party that Rick Santelli called for is getting bigger and bigger.
joseph cioffi's Source Page - Associated Content
3 comments:
Taxpayers are sheep to be fleeced.
PolySci 101: The political party who wins rewards their elites with an outside shares of the goodies.
Acorn, government workers, labor unions, providers of services to the poor, and the poor ( Democrats can't give them too much or Democrats will loose their base ) are the Democrat's elites.
You wrote that teachers on Long Island make 100k in many districts ( I know because I live on LI ), one has to wonder how a system evolved where the interests of the taxpayer ( and the children ) are secondary to the interest of the employees of government delivering services to the children of taxpayers.
At a school board meeting I asked the board why do we need an assistant superintendent of curriculum? And if we do, why not combine the job with several other districts to reduce the costs?
The board reacted as if I threw a brick at them. The assistant superintendent of business then premptively defended his reason to exist and explained why combining administrative jobs among various districts wasn't a good idea ( from his point of view ).
The School board controls the Agenda and the Microphone. The Taylor Law ( no striking by government workers, but binding arbitration ( with rules that favor workers )), and other labor laws favor workers in negotiations for higher salaries.
Government employee unions can thwart any effort in Albany to change the rules with their influence in both parties.
New York has no petition and recall, so we can't do an end run around Albany, or even throw the bums out of office easily ( Byzantinely complex election laws, incumbent advantages in gerrymandering, and incumbent campaign contribution advantages help maintain the status quo.
Taxpayers don't have much power to resist paying outrageous taxes here with the ballot.
The only thing left to do is leave.
( My house is for sale( but I'll need luck to sell in this market)).
New York's nickname is the Empire State ( and perhaps until the 1960's NY was the richest state ).
But now NY is more like the "Empire
Turkey" state.
(For non New Yorkers, an Empire Turkey is a brand of whole frozen turkeys that is sold here and consumed mainly on Thanksgiving.)
I think it's safe to say that the test of the major averages has failed and that we are heading lower until there is some clarity on the viability of investment decisions. Until then cash is king. Meanwhile, the AMZ is outperforming on the downside now and we are rapidly giving up the gains we had gotten since the first of the year.
My MLP portfolio has a beta of around 2, so it grinds in my gut to watch it drop another 4% today.
I agree with HS on his wonderment at how quickly the government can destroy wealth with its policies.
steve
There is another option rather than leaving. Thomas Jefferson endorsed it. Revolt, Revolution! A million citizen march on Washington DC. This would have to be accomplished with the same zeal as the anti war protesters of the 60's. As someone said earlier, with pitchforks and torches.
What we really need is for someone of stature to come out with something positive. Confidence needs to be put back in the markets. Just look at the Price/Book Ratios, PE's just look at the fundamentals of many stocks. People are just scared to death, especially when some Politician comes out and says we may need to Nationalize Banks. There is way to much negativity from everyone.
I think the only positive remark I have seen on Blogs or anywhere for that matter is here and how well MLP's have been holding up. Even Amazon is way up since the lows of Nov and I am sure there are many more but do we hear that? Nope, all we hear is gloom and doom, and all that does is make people less and less confident. Where is Big Business? Where are the voices of reason. Where is the Silent Majority?
Ron
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