Cab Thought 1/11/13

"We human beings always seek happiness. Now there are two ways. You can make yourself happy by making other people unhappy--I call that the logic of robbery. The other way, you make yourself happy by making other people happy--that's the logic of the market. Which way do you prefer?"-- Zhang Weiying



"The ironic thing is now that Christie is denying everything he sounds even more presidential, doesn't he?"--Jay Leno.
While we ponder the childish vindictiveness of the New Jersey administration, let us not forget other politician-defining characteristics that give us mere citizens insight to those high-minded leaders we adore: Nixon, and later, Obama using the IRS for leverage against opponents, JFK's unbridled sexual behavior in Hersh' book, and my personal favorite, Henry Paulson on his knee before Nancy Pelosi as he begged for her support for the Wall Street bailout in 2008.

 

While American rules and regulations are driving coal use down in the U.S., coal is the fastest growing fossil fuel, growing faster than oil or gas, according to the IEA.

Nabokov once wrote that, had he not left Russia, he might have spent his life entirely on lepidoptery, and not fiction. So, at heart, was Nabokov a scientist or an artist? Asked that question once, he expressed puzzlement: “There can be no science without fancy,” he replied “no art without facts.”

 

Tidal locking:  makes one side of an astronomical body always face another, like the Moon and the Earth; no matter where you are on the earth you always see the same face of the moon. A tidally locked body takes just as long to rotate around its own axis as it does to revolve around its partner. In the case of the moon, this period is just over 4 weeks.

 

In October, there were almost 5.7 million "missing workers" — people who had dropped out of the labor force but, under trends prevailing before the Great Recession, would have had jobs or been looking for work. Counting them would have raised October's unemployment rate to about 10% instead of the reported 7% (the Economic Policy Institute).

Who is......Huma Abedin?

 

Baron Rothschild, an 18th century British nobleman and member of the Rothschild banking family, is credited with saying that "The time to buy is when there's blood in the streets." He should know. Rothschild made a fortune buying in the panic that followed the Battle of Waterloo against Napoleon. But that's not the whole story. The original quote is believed to be "Buy when there's blood in the streets, even if the blood is your own."
Now that is contrarian investing at its heart.

 

Flaring of natural gas in North Dakota is essentially out of control, burning $100 million of product a month, and emitting 4.5 million tons of carbon dioxide per year. Those are big numbers, and the economic loss has caused landowners to sue to recover lost royalty payments that have literally gone up in smoke. But what is most telling about the gas flaring in North Dakota is the attitude it demonstrates about environmentally responsible operations among those companies doing it and the regulators allowing it.

 

There is something in us that certain particularly brutal people can tap under the right circumstances. While most remember the Indian Wars as the French and Indian War or the Iroquois-Creek War fought by Jackson, there was a similarly vicious war in Minnesota fought between the Dakota Sioux and virtually every one else in 1862, during the Civil War. What the Sioux did during that short war would make al-Qaida avert their eyes. There are astonishing witness accounts of the savagery of the encounters--the Dakota were almost inhuman during parts of it--which ended in the defeat of the Dakotas and the execution of their leaders, Medicine Bottle and Little Crow.

 

Milksop: noun: One who is timid or indecisive. ety: A milksop is, literally, a piece of bread soaked in milk, a diet considered suitable for babies and the sick. A synonym of this term is milquetoast. Earliest documented use: 1390.

 

The power grid blew out in Buenos Aires,  price inflation rose 26% in December from a year earlier, the IMF criticized them for lying about its inflation data and Argentina still hasn't sorted out its $100 billion sovereign default with all its creditors dating back to 2001. So what did they do in December? Argentina's air force launched a research rocket connected to its space program.  Argentina's defense spending has risen 132% since 2003, according to the Swedish defense think tank Stockholm International Peace Research Institute, while Jane's reports that that latest defense budget represents a 33.4% increase over 2012.

 

Golden Oldie:

http://steeleydock.blogspot.com/2011/03/obamas-rock-and-hard-place.html 

 

From 2000-06, there was an average of 239 players on IR in the NFL. That average has jumped to about 314 over the past seven years.

 

Albert Einstein picked up cigarette butts off the street to get tobacco for his pipe; Howard Hughes spent entire days on a chair in the middle of the supposedly germ-free zone of his Beverly Hills Hotel suite; the composer Robert Schumann believed that his musical compositions were dictated to him by Beethoven and other deceased luminaries from their tombs; and Charles Dickens is said to have fended off imaginary urchins with his umbrella as he walked the streets of London. (From Shelley Carson's book on eccentrics.)

 

Steve Wilson, an Ohio psychologist and self-proclaimed 'joyologist,' launched the World Laughter organization in 1998 after meeting Indian gurus who were advocating laughter in hasya yoga clubs as a road toward health and peace. Apparently trainers are necessary.

 

Almost three-quarters (72%) of online Americans use social networking sites, up from 8% in 2005. There are few differences by educational attainment: 67% of high-school dropouts are users vs. 72% of college graduates (Pew Internet & American Life Project).

In an article subtitled "Goodbye, smart meters and distribution automation. Hello, energy storage and energy management," GreenTechGrid reviews current directions in grid investing. Greentech Media took a look at 2012 investment trends and observed two key emerging trends: VC funding for companies reliant on big utility capital spending (smart metering, distribution automation, etc.) has gone away and  future smart grid investment will be focused on managing the emerging challenges on the grid. That includes software and data analytics to integrate smart grid systems at the utility level, as well as energy storage, efficiency, energy management, building automation and other technologies.

 

America's Marcellus region produced 13 billion cubic feet per day--18% of America's gas supply. And, while for 40 years, nuclear power production rose steadily and set new record production levels, this year it declined for the third straight year.

 

AAAAnnnnnndddd.........a picture of Little Crow: