Hilarity ensued.

The thing I like about Mike Adams’ writing is that he doesn’t just speak of doom – he occasionally offers some practical solutions along the way, too.  See his latest piece on what we’ve gotten ourselves into.

An interesting piece about James Woolsey and his odd relationship with the CIA community.  Bonus: A Rutgers report on the CIA’s role in the study of UFOs.

Alleges “one of the largest housing investment deceptions in modern U.S. economic times.”  And we’re not even seated for the show yet, folks.

The Center for Public Integrity has assembled an impressive dossier illustrating the lies bandied about by the Bush Administration leading up to the attack on Iraq.  The Center’s War Card project documents nearly 1,000 verifiably false statements.  Spend some time there, and while doing so, reflect on the civilian, military, and diplomatic damage caused by these lies.

An OpEd by Soros in the Financial Times.

Also, an IHT piece about the US as “wounded giant” at this year’s Davos conference.

Too little, way too late, sir. Before my analysis, a short reminder: I hate sounding like a doomsayer. I love my country and don’t want this to be true, but it is true; we are in some deep shit. And we did ask for it.

Bernanke: Prayer is likely to be more helpful, actually.

What kind of fucking country do we live in if the way out of economic trouble is to spend money? That’s been our problem in the first place. Also, $100 billion is spitting in the ocean considering the size and scope of this problem. The financial fauxconomy I’ve been grousing about is finally coming apart – and that’s going to be incredibly unpleasant for lots of people. The financial fauxconomy alone is measured in the hundreds of trillions.

Bernanke is going to keep the printing presses humming – lowering rates (when he shouldn’t) and further inflating our currency. This will turn America into a bargain basement for the world and drive the price of most of our imports up drastically. Conversely, foreign investors will scoop up these bargains and become majority shareholders in what we used to call America. The dollar is extremely unlikely to be the “world’s currency” ever again. Aside from some vague notion that there’s something weird in the real estate market, I suspect most Americans have no clue how putrid things are (after all, the new season of American Idol is on.)

Many “too big to fail” institutions will fail. State and municipal budgets will fall deeply into the red as revenues dry up, thus endangering the state investment pools that pay for things like police officers, firefighters, teachers, snow plows and traffic lights. There is a dreadful feedback loop emerging in the real estate market presently, and the upper middle class and “wealthy” will soon face the same problems that are supposedly “contained” to the sub-prime market. The “second mortgages” will blow apart as well, and with it all will go the mortgage and bond insurers. Despite the economic slowdown, energy prices will continue to climb. Our imperial adventures in the Middle East will need to be brought to an awkward and humiliating end. And who will be left to clean this mess up? The citizens, the cities and even the states who will have been bankrupted by it.

My fellow Americans are in for some nasty surprises, and, in our blame-someone-else culture, I wonder whose heads they will demand?

“I intend to manage the economy.” – Hillary Clinton to NBC News, 1/16/08

Manage the economy? How?  A US President has basically no ability to “manage” the economy.   Most people know that, right?  Does Hillary know that?

I was having a conversation last night with a friend about another mathematician friend who once told me that in any discrete area, more than 90% of Americans don’t have tastes – they just look to others to tell them what’s cool and what isn’t. These people think they have taste, but they are generally just social emulators – they look to a relatively small population of coolhunters / tastemakers to tell them what to think and enjoy. I offer FM radio as one example. But – if a person thinks they have taste and thinks they like something, what difference does it make if they actually do? This piece got me thinking about how that very phenomenon fits into marketing and pricing.

See Patrick Buchanan’s piece today. And also, JHK keeping it real;

“nobody gets it.. voters and candidates in the primary season have been hollering about ‘change’ but I’m afraid the dirty secret of this campaign is that the American public doesn’t want to change its behavior at all. What it really wants is someone to promise them they can keep on doing what they’re used to doing: buying more stuff they can’t afford, eating more shitty food that will kill them, and driving more miles than circumstances will allow..”