DOW Stock Market Tanks...

Wow. Fan... meet shyte.

Yes.

As the Greek treasury minister, Barack Obama must take responsibility for this crisis that happened in Europe and commenced before he was even elected.

There are multiple issues at play here, not the least of which is the phony "recovery" in the U.S.

I suspect that 900 drop (but recovery) was a warning sign. A big one.

But the Greek debt thing is a much bigger issue than the average man on the street probably realizes. If (when?) they default there is expected to be a fairly rapid domino-effect hitting the rest of the "PIGS" (as some refer to them) countries: Portugal, Italy and Spain.

And then it could spread.

The U.S. will certainly try to step in bail out if necessary, but as we all know, we don't have any money left and they won't be able to print their way out of this one.

Decline in world markets prompts fears of Greek 'contagion effect'




Stocks tumble anew on concerns Greek debt problems will spread through Europe,to the US


And here's the funny part:


Any port in a storm I guess.

Right on! I knew someone on the right would be licking their chops at this misfortune.

This doesn't matter as long as the conservatives that were in power when this downturn started get back in control to do more damage.

Right.

Wow is right.

http://www.reuters.com/article/topNe...6455ZG20100506



http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSTRE6456QB20100507

It is interesting that in your view of the world, noticing and reporting are the same as "licking their chops." Odd that.

Wow. That's interesting. Not sure how they can do that. Have they ever done that before?

I know they have halted trading in certain circumstances and even turned off the computer auto-trigger trades in some cases. But this seems unusual to me. Anyone know if it has ever been done? If not why this time?

OP of thread (emphasis added):


Looks pretty chops-lickin' to me....

I suppose. Looks more like an observation to me. But to-mate-o/to-maht-o I guess.

Yea 'cause the left was never cheering for US defeat in Iraq.

Actually it is PIIGS. Not to be a picky butt, however Ireland is in there as well as the second 'I'.

Did you ever hear of me doing that?

Personally I've never read or known of anyone who did.

We just knew how stupid the invasion was.

We just knew it was started for reasons that didn't exist.

We just knew what a colossal waste of time and resources it was going to be.

Why would we want it to fail? That would mean we were right about how bad a president Bush was. And I don't know about you Floorjack but I don't know why anyone would wish their leader was a loser.

For example.

Good point. You're exactly right. Good observation.

I dunno...remember "If you're not with us you're against us"?

To a Winger not cheering for victory = cheering for defeat.

It has seemed that, for you, the generic term "Winger" is specifically referring to Right Winger but I think it would be fair to point out that there seem to be some Left Wingers for whom observing the reality of the economy and not taking the administration's rhetoric and mere good intentions on the economy without question = cheering for economic failure.

There also seems to have been (more subtle mind you) questioning of true Americanism and true patriotism of those not in agreement with the current administration's approaches, policies and actions. Similar to the "If you're not with us you're against us" slogan.

There's a bit of that crap going on both sides.

Now back to the Dow. Today should be interesting.

Questions:

- Was this just a computer glitch or human error as is now being suggested? Nothing to do with the fears about Greece and Europe? Maybe. Sounds a tad "these aren't the droids you're looking for"-ish to me.

- Is there any precedent for the stock exchange canceling trades as they are doing here? If not, why now? Because it was truly only a computer glitch?

True....I do tend to use it in that sense universally.

And your points are well made, I agree...having said that though I do think that people should take others at face value on these forums (I don't mean you here) and not impute things to them other than that which they have said: claiming people 'cheer' when no such action is in evidence is a classic example.

Personally I am more than capable of cheering for UK defeat in Iraq and elsewhere (I am not American so I have no concerns there..) and if I want to I will say so. Ditto with economic collapse which - imo - may be the only way out of the mess in the long term as the system does not work and patching it up will not fix it.

If we can have a debate about WHY someone may think like this then all well and good but just accusing them as a pejorative doesn't cut it imo.

I agree. I have been on the receiving end of being lumped in with other vague, general group of people who have views that I actually don't agree with, even though some of my views do happen to align. I hope I have avoided doing the same to others.



I don't cheer or hope for an economic collapse, but I've read and studied enough to be highly skeptical of the long-term effectiveness of the tactics being used to induce "recovery" such that I actually expect them to make things worse in the longer term. It's not that I want it, it's merely that I expect it. And I have been accused by at least one forum member here of wishing or hoping for an economic collapse because it is Barack Obama. It's a fallacious accusation that gets rather tiresome.

Oh well...the Dow. Are we actually on the verge of a collapse? We might be. The PIIGS (thanks for correcting me trumptman) scare the crap out of me. Because it could just be the spark not the whole fire.

I wouldn't worry....there is an element of scaremongering. I live in Spain and I think there is more to it than meets the eye. Or less.

Firstly; there is, or has been, an economic crisis which is a cyclic thing and which has been exacerbated by the irresponsible (ie rampant greed) practices of the lending banks.

Second; places like Greece and Spain (and Portugal and Italy say) are more vulnerable because their economies are based on areas which are highly vulnerable: tourism, construction etc.

Also the work ethic here is well...it's not the US put it that way. Leaves the country wide open to failure in times like this.

Having said all that I don't think that economies like Germany and France can allow the Euro to fail (and that is what we are talking about in the long term) so there is a point which it is impossible to fall below.

Could be a lot of pain on the way down though.

I have other ideas about this but will not voice them as the 'tin hat' crowd will emerge from the shadows fingers all aquiver... suffice to say I think that the long term end-game is to have a 'United States of Europe' and perhaps an American equivalent embracing Canada and Mexico.

Bailing out Greece (and Spain if necessary) will come at the cost of signing up to this which is driven by Germany/France. Perhaps the 'crisis' is to a certain extent manufactured for this purpose.

I've been trying to work up a post and before that a whole thread on the things now being noted within the stock market. It really is way to hard to boil down though to something digestable for forum discussion. You have to get into Austrian school versus Keynesian school of economics, demographic timebombs in most Western countries, the soverign debt crisis, crony capitalism, central banks and their collusion with the very governments they are supposed to be independent from, government sponsored enterprises, and then.... well then you are about half way into it.

The short version is, ultimately, you can't get something for nothing and there is a reason people keep picking up Atlas Shrugged. The looters are fully willing to follow their lies to the end of the line.

They're morons with no idea of literature?

Or TANSTAAFL.

Greek protesters: Ready to face reality about the debt crisis?

There are some wise words in there for the U.S. too.

Actually I was quoting SDW ( licking your chops ) from a few years ago when I saw how slow unemployment was to come back during the last recession he acussed me of that. Which is really stupid. Bad times affect us all except of course for the very rich. But for some parties are more important than people suffering. MJ couldn't know about the quote unless of course he's here under a new name.

And yes it does look pretty chop lickin'.

Your transition from a Bush defender to flavor of the month libertarian-of-convenience has been a strange thing for me to witness. I guess it could happen...

Flavor of the month is right.

People change - this crisis has turned me from a Libertarian into a Democrat. At least I am a Democrat as long as the Democrats are willing to kick the bankers in the teeth.

The bankers need to be regulated until they bleed, and the regulators need to be audited regularly - and when we discover a "captured regulator", we need to put those people in jail. We need to learn the same lessons that we learned after the great depression.

Good luck with that.

Joke: How do you know when a regulator is captured? (see below)


But apparently we (err...they) haven't given the economic policy prescriptions of the current and previous administrations.


Punchline: They are a regulator.

Things seemed to work pretty well in the banking system for 40 or 50 years after the great depression, it was only the deregulation in the 1980s that started the periodic instability.

You tell a regulator is captured by looking at banking metrics, by monitoring email traffic, and by making it very easy to be a whistleblower.

I suspect you don't have a full comprehension of the facts here. I don't say this to be insulting. It's just that the interrelated factors are much more complicated this. To say that the banking and finance industries have be deregulated in any meaningful and substantive way is something the betrays the reality. These are massively regulated industries. One can easily argue that the banking industry is essentially government sanctioned cartel. It is not free-market or deregulated in an real sense of those terms. This focus on deregulation also ignores the massive amount of (causal) influence that the Fed has had in the economic instability to which you refer. The Fed is the core problem here, but the mystery of the Fed to so many prevents much understanding of what it does and what it is. Eyes begin to glaze when you try to explain it, even in simple terms.



First, it was a joke. Second, not that much of a joke. I doubt seriously you can determine regulatory capture in such a clear and scientific/mathematical fashion. It happens much more subtly than most can detect. As far as the whistleblower, you have to assume that it is worth more to be a whistleblower than a "captured regulator" and also that someone really wants to blow the whistle.

I quite seriously doubt that you could look at any regulatory agency in the federal, state or local governments without finding a string influence (if not actual control) by those who are being regulated. The actual (vs. the stated) purpose of the regulatory apparatus is to protect incumbent industry players, primarily from competition.

The problem is the system more than it is the individuals. Regulatory capture arises out of a few factors but chief among them are the fact that the benefits are concentrated while the costs are widely dispersed. That, in a nutshell, summarizes many of the core problems with government.

I guess there aren't any quotes we could dig up about the Iraq surge right?


I suspect that if people really dig down into this, it will be discovered that certain people have found a way to manipulate the fact that so much trading is done with computers following preset criteria and they will be found to be taking advantage of that fact. It won't be found to be technically illegal, just unethical bu then again we can argue about how ethical it is to have computers making these decisions day in and out in place of people with brains.


I'm sure if the search function were working for the board, you'd find I haven't changed at all. The same issues exist but simply become more strident when the numbers around them change. Did I complain about Bush deficit spending $250 billion a year? I did. Did I complain about Pax Americana back then? Yes. Did I note the country ought to endorse fair trade instead of free trade, absolutely. You have all these factors either grow or the man claiming to fix them double down on the bad and worsen them, and of course the yelling is going to get louder. I've always called myself a Paleo-conservative though and nothing has changed about that.

More interesting is how people change their perceptions of others when the outside circumstances have changed. I think that is what has happened here for you. Again things are hard to find due to the forums changing and the search feature essentually being broken. I did a quick search via Google though and found this post started by me in 2003 called Fair Trade. Look at it and tell me what has changed in seven years.


The biggest, most unregulated, and unaudited back out there is the Federal Reserve. It is the puppet master and until something is done about it, nothing can nor should be done about the others.

MJ - here are the things that were not regulated, that should have been:

Credit default swaps - we have a long history of regulating insurance companies in a way that makes sure that they have enough capital on hand to pay off insurance claims. If they had done this with credit default swaps (in the same way as they do for home insurance) AIG would not have blown up.

Loans - there needed to be some checks in place to make sure that banks were not committing fraud on loan originations. You can't just loan somebody money with fraudulent income, then sell the loan to another bank, without paying some kind of price. I have not heard of anyone being put in jail for these transactions.

Investment bank leverage ratios - 100-1 is a joke, and it was explicitly allowed by the SEC after 8-1 had been the norm before.

Investment bank conflict of interest - Goldman takes customer information and uses it to profit in proprietary trading. Companies should be allowed to service customers, or do proprietary trading, but not both. And trumpt - I agree that the Federal reserve should be audited also - once per year probably (but not at the will of the congress, they will use audits to try to take control of monetary policy).

If you insist on saying that regulation will never work (when it does work in other industries), then we have no hope. We can't let the banks run wild in a deregulated atmosphere - they wreck the world every time. The whole idea of lassez faire capitalism is wrong and bad.

I will have to defer to your expertise in and extensive knowledge of the banking and insurance industries.



I'm sorry to hear that you are so skeptical of people having freedom.

You don't have the freedom to murder people, for good reason. Free speech is limited in that you are not allowed to paint slogans on private property, etc.

Why should the banks be allowed to destroy the world? The whole idea of freedom is that you are allowed to do whatever you like as long as you don't hurt other people or infringe on the freedom of others, the banks are way past that point. They need to be stopped from hurting people and infringing on the freedom of others.