Cab Thoughts 11/1/14

"But if thought corrupts language, language can also corrupt thought."- George Orwell, 1984


Former US Federal Reserve chief Ben Bernanke gave his first speech in Japan, to a group of more than 100 institutional investors, covering his thoughts on deflation, global monetary policy, and job creation. Bernanke told attendees that he believed central banks around the world had the power to fight our current No. 1 economic fear —  deflation. According to a source who was at the speech, Bernanke sounded positive about global prospects in a general sense. The former Fed Chair doesn't believe in secular stagnation, holding that industries like biotech, tech, and energy are poised to create more jobs to the global economy than we expect. (From Business Insider)

What is the difference between "fiscal" and "monetary?"

Serendipity: n. The faculty of making fortunate discoveries by accident. Coined  by Horace Walpole in a letter to Horace Mann dated 28 January 1754. He took it from the Persian fairy tale The Three Princes of Serendip, whose heroes "were always making discoveries, by accidents and sagacity, of things they were not in quest of." An often overlooked element in the word is the 'sagacity" component.

Who is .....Catherine Evelyn Smith?

“I have left no immortal work behind me, but I have lov’d the principle of beauty in all things, and if I had had the time I would have made myself remember’d.” This heartbreaking line is from a letter written by the remarkable poet John Keats in Rome, 1820, the year before he died of tuberculosis at 25.

British writer John Lanchester wrote “Capital,” a novel about contemporary London. His research taught him that most people do not understand the workings of the economy, an entity that has a huge influence on their everyday lives. So he continued his research and wrote a new book,  “How to Speak Money: What the Money People Say — And What It Really Means. According to him, an example of the problem is the public ignorance of what the words "fiscal" and "monetary"--two commonly used words--mean. ” ‘Fiscal’ means to do with tax and spending, and it is controlled by the government; ‘monetary’ means to do with interest rates, and it is controlled by the central bank,” he says.

Several conservative outside groups that propped up tea party candidates and gave the GOP establishment fits during the primaries have yet to air a single TV ad during the homestretch of the election in key states, according to a review of campaign finance records and media tracking sources.

Hillary Clinton said the following in Boston recently: “Don’t let anybody tell you it’s corporations and businesses create jobs." This is presumably from the "You didn't build that" school of economics and it must be the coming rage. But what does it mean? What are the next several sentences that explain where jobs do come from? This is not a simple question and anyone with the answer has made a very significant breakthrough and must be made to share the information.

A drop of water doubling in size every minute starting at noon will fill the Fenway Park at 12:49 but at 12:44 it will be only 7% filled. So it is with compounding debt: It will grow on the exponential curve. Creating more debt makes it worse. Only decreasing debt and increasing surplus will help.

Golden oldie:

http://steeleydock.blogspot.com/2013/03/confirmational-creativity.html

Yoenis Cespedes was acquired by the Red Sox prior to the trade deadline for Jon Lester and Jonny Gomes. Despite his strong traditional numbers — he had 20 home runs and 100 RBIs — his low walk totals and career .316 on-base percentage is undesirable for many sabermetric-inclined clubs. More, the Red Sox management dislikes him and that has got around. So it might drive his value down a bit when his contract is up after 2015--but probably not. No one liked Barry Bonds.

From the Cotton Mather Gazette: Supporters of Breast Cancer Action are protesting the decision of fellow breast cancer awareness group, Susan G. Komen, to accept a $100,000 donation from Baker Hughes, the Houston-based supplier of equipment for the oil and gas drilling industry.
You see, some money is impure.

It might be worthwhile to open a special section in the news like the comics and cooking and sports sections devoted to wacko Islamic acts. That way the reasonable people of the world would not have to consider every one of these events any more than the average person is confronted with hockey scores or cake recipes on the front page or lead news. 

"We have to use this opportunity," Younesi, formerly Iran's minister of intelligence, said of Democrats holding power in the White House and the Senate, "because if this opportunity is lost, in (the) future we may not have such an opportunity again."
(From a translated  copy of a Farsi language interview with Iran's Fars News Agency, reported in the
 Washington Free Beacon, apparently in the context of Iran's nuclear ambitions and the world's sanctions.)

Sharyl Attkisson was a long-time CBS investigative reporter who was awarded five Emmys in her career. She recently has come in to increasing conflict with her bosses, resigned and, of course, has written a book on her experiences called "Stonewalled." She has a history of a pretty even hand; it was she who exposed the program called Wide Receiver, a program under the Bush administration quite similar to Fast and Furious and she calls herself a "political agnostic." But she has had significant problems reporting on current politics. She writes, “Many in the media are wrestling with their own souls: They know that ObamaCare is in serious trouble, but they’re conflicted about reporting that. Some worry that the news coverage will hurt a cause that they personally believe in. They’re all too eager to dismiss damaging documentary evidence while embracing, sometimes unquestioningly, the Obama administration’s ever-evolving and unproven explanations.”

The U.S. has surpassed Saudi Arabia as the No. 1 oil producer and Russia as the No. 1 natural gas producer. The U.S. has increased oil production by an enormous 65% over the past five years. Saudi Arabia's income is 90% dependent on oil. And ISIS makes 5 million dollars a day on stolen oil. An increase in U.S. production would defund these guys. And the decline in oil and gas prices at the pump is like a $75 billion tax cut per year for U.S. households.

Carole Hinders has run a small restaurant in N.M. for forty years. Recently the IRS confiscated over 30 thousand dollars from her checking account. No crime was stated or implied. The money was seized solely because she had deposited less than $10,000 at a time, which they viewed as an attempt to avoid triggering a required government report. Using a law designed to catch drug traffickers, racketeers and terrorists by tracking their cash, the government has gone after run-of-the-mill business owners and wage earners without so much as an allegation that they have committed serious crimes. The government can take the money without ever filing a criminal complaint, and the owners are left to prove they are innocent. Many give up. Some (tax exempt) group called the Institute for Justice, a Washington-based public interest law firm that is seeking to reform civil forfeiture practices, analyzed structuring data from the I.R.S., which made 639 seizures in 2012, up from 114 in 2005. Only one in five was prosecuted as a criminal structuring case.

AAAaaaaaannnnndddddd.......a chart: