- http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/33471824/ns ... al_estate/On the auction block in Detroit: almost 9,000 homes and lots in various states of abandonment and decay from the tidy owner-occupied to the burned-out shell claimed by squatters.
Taken together, the properties seized by tax collectors for arrears and put up for sale last week represented an area the size of New York's Central Park. Total vacant land in Detroit now occupies an area almost the size of Boston, according to a Detroit Free Press estimate.
The tax foreclosure auction by Wayne County authorities also stood as one of the most ambitious one-stop attempts to sell off urban property since the real-estate market collapse.
Despite a minimum bid of $500, less than a fifth of the Detroit land was sold after four days.
The county had no estimate of how much was raised by the auction, a second attempt to sell property that had failed to find buyers for the full amount of back taxes in September.
- http://rawstory.com/2009/10/chief-calls ... se-gasses/United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, in an opinion piece published by The New York Times, laid out a number of benchmarks for success in the upcoming global climate talks, planned to be held in Copenhagen.
Among them, Ki-moon argued in the Tuesday edition that a "global governance structure" must be levied to ensure that nations collaborate on how resources are deployed and managed.
- http://slatest.slate.com/id/2233691The amount of television watched by children reached an eight-year high, according to figures released by Nielsen yesterday. The analysis based on 2008 figures reported the time spent watching live and recorded television, as well as movies and gaming systems. When added all up, children ages 6 to 11 spend more than 28 hours in front of a television every week.
- http://www.cnsnews.com/news/article/56136Des Moines, Iowa (AP) - After burning through $1 million in savings and seeing no end to their losses, dairy farmers Jake and Lori Slegers figured they didn't have much choice -- they had to kill the cows.
So one day last summer their sons tagged all 1,571 cows, loaded them onto trailers at their farm south of Fresno, Calif., and watched them rumble away to a slaughterhouse.
Lori Slegers said her husband came into the house and broke down.
"He said it was the hardest thing he ever had to do," she said. "Luckily, my boys could do it."
Growing demand in developing nations drove up milk prices when times were good, and dairy farmers expanded their herds. But the global recession hurt exports and left farmers with too much milk on their hands. Milk processors cut the price they were willing to pay farmers, in many cases below what it cost to produce milk.
In the past year, hundreds of farmers have come to the same conclusion as the Slegers: The only way to raise prices is to reduce the supply, and that means killing cows. In some cases, whole herds have been turned into hamburger. In others, farmers have kept their best producers and sent the rest to slaughter.
- http://www.prisonplanet.com/soros-china ... order.htmlBillionaire globalist George Soros told the Financial Times during an interview that China will supplant the United States as the leader of the new world order and that America should not resist the country’s decline as the dollar weakens, living standards drop, and a new global currency is introduced.
Asked what Obama should discuss when he visits China next month, Soros stated, “This would be the time because I think you really need to bring China into the creation of a new world order, financial world order,” adding that China was a reluctant member of the IMF who didn’t make enough of a contribution.
“I think you need a new world order that China has to be part of the process of creating it and they have to buy in, they have to own it in the same way as the United States owns…the current order,” said Soros, adding that the G20 was a move in this direction.
Soros said that there was a flight from currencies across the board, and that this is why the price of commodities, notably gold and oil, were generally rising. He also stated that an orderly decline of the dollar was “desirable” and that the entire system needed to be reconstituted towards a global currency.
- http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthc ... girls.htmlHere's something rather rotten from the State of Denmark. Its government yesterday unveiled official research showing that two-year-old children are at risk from a bewildering array of gender-bending chemicals in such everyday items as waterproof clothes, rubber boots, bed linen, food, nappies, sunscreen lotion and moisturising cream.
The 326-page report, published by the environment protection agency, is the latest piece in an increasingly alarming jigsaw. A picture is emerging of ubiquitous chemical contamination driving down sperm counts and feminising male children all over the developed world. And anti-pollution measures and regulations are falling far short of getting to grips with it.
The results build on earlier studies showing that British children have higher levels of gender-bending chemicals in their blood than their parents or grandparents. Indeed WWF (formerly the World Wildlife Fund), which commissioned the older research, warned that the chemicals were so widespread that "there is very little, if anything, individuals can do to prevent contamination of themselves and their families." Prominent among them are dioxins, PVC, flame retardants, phthalates (extensively used to soften plastics) and the now largely banned PCBs, one and a half million tons of which were used in countless products from paints to electrical equipment.
Young boys, like those in the Danish study, could end up producing less sperm and developing feminised behaviour. Research at Rotterdam's Erasmus University found that boys whose mothers were exposed to PCBs and dioxins were more likely to play with dolls and tea sets and dress up in female clothes.
And it is in the womb that babies are most vulnerable; a study of umbilical cords from British mothers found that every one contained hazardous chemicals. Scientists at the University of Rochester in New York discovered that boys born to women exposed to phthalates had smaller penises and other feminisation of the genitals.
The contamination may also offer a clue to a mysterious shift in the sex of babies. Normally 106 boys are born for every 100 girls: it is thought to be nature's way of making up for the fact that men were more likely to be killed hunting or in conflict. But the proportion of females is rising, so much so that some 250,000 babies who statistically should have been boys have ended up as girls in Japan and the United States alone. In Britain, the discrepancy amounts to thousands of babies a year.
- http://paul.kedrosky.com/archives/2009/ ... its_a.htmlTurns out coursing a few gigavolts of financial stimulus current through even an economy the size of the U.S. will still get Frankenstein off the slab, however briefly.
- http://www.lewrockwell.com/blog/lewrw/a ... 41462.htmlFox News, under the guise of a news story, gives free advertising time to the United States Military’s Human Resources Department. (And the Obama White House claims that Fox News doesn’t support him. Silly gooses!) As far as I can tell, this is not one of those spoof videos that are always on youtube —though after watching it, you’ll wish it was.
- http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg2 ... nline-newsPRESIDENT Barack Obama's decision last week to label swine flu a national emergency will likely increase demand for a vaccine that is already in short supply. Yet by the time large amounts of vaccine arrive, it may be too late to stop most infections.
On 23 October, Tom Frieden, head of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, Georgia, reported that the US had received 27.4 million doses of vaccine. This is not enough even for the country's 42 million most vulnerable people: pregnant women, people caring for babies, children under 4, front-line healthcare workers and under-18s with medical problems.
By now, the US should have had 120 million doses, according to predictions in July. This estimate was cut to 45 million when it emerged in August that the vaccine virus was growing at half the usual rate. Now even some of those doses have not arrived. Several companies are now using a faster-growing strain to make vaccine, but supplies won't arrive for weeks.
- http://ferfal.blogspot.com/2009/10/firs ... ndgun.htmlYou're right, as more money is available, work your way towards 6 to 12 months worth of food. Either way you're going to use it no matter what, and you sure can't live without it.
I'm of a different opinion regarding the first (and for many the only) weapon to own.
A used Glock in good condition isn't that expensive, and if nothing else at least get a revolver but I've always insisted on a handgun first, and enough training to be profficient with it.
Of course its less powerful, but you can't drop a shotgun in your jacket's pocket or carry in in your waist and that makes all the difference.
Street, or home, the handgun will cover both, while the shotgun will only be a home defense gun, and even at that, you dont carry a shotgun all the time in the house or keep it handy. Entering or leaving your home, the garage, unless you conceal carry you'll be unarmed when you need it the most.
Another couple things I'd like to mention: A shotgun, specially a pump action shotgun, requires a LOT of skill to operate, specially at close range and against several targets many operators will transition to their handgun when in CQC, which is the most common self defense range.
A shotgun also needs to be aimed well, at close range there's no difference between shogun shells and solid projectile, they both make a single hole. It takes several more feet and even then the spread isnt that much you can afford not to aim as you should.
One of the worst inconveniences with shotguns and close range fighting: A) You need both hands to operate B) It requires a complex mechanical movement that requires both hands for each shot.
Shotguns are nice, but for all these reasons, I always recommend a handgun as a first and maybe only firearm.
- http://acrossthecurve.com/?p=9779Despite that fact, delinquencies have moved steadily higher with the 30 day + delinquency now reaching close to 50% of all outstanding Option Arms. If our economists are right about the size and timing of the Fed Funds rate hike (approx. 1% per quarter starting in Q2 next year), the impact on borrowers of these types of loans could be very significant. Those who are slightly delinquent or barely holding on could see their payments move substantially higher with the impact possible late next year.”
http://market-ticker.denninger.net/arch ... -ARMs.html
- http://stopjarrett.com/Who is Valerie Jarrett? The brain of Barack and Michelle Obama. The alter ego, the “mind meld”. The head of the pimple on a rash of pimples infecting our executive branch. She’s the one who brought in Van Jones, and who knows how many other communist radicals. Read her background – her roots (Chicago tentacles) go way back and very deep into Obama’s background. An insider. In fact, she’s so inside, she’s at the center of it.
The media is hammering Glenn, attacking him at every turn. He is the new “cause du jour” object of the Saul Alinsky Left, who have identified him, polarized him, and are attacking him in an all-out effort to destroy him. For those who are unable to listen to him explain it this morning, his transcript will be available at his site later today.
Why is this important? Because it is a high def example of what Obama and his army of radicals do. Like a heat seeking missile, they attack to destroy anyone who threatens their mission. Both Rush and Glenn are major targets. It is brutal. And the point is this: what they’re doing to Glenn et al, they’ll do next to us. We are in their crosshairs. Mister Smooth and Cool in the White House is the window dressing to a nefarious bunch who’ll stop at nothing to enforce their regime of “hope and change” on all of us. And Valerie Jarrett is the General who’s planning the strategy and issuing marching orders. Familiarize yourself with this pimple.
- http://www.housingwire.com/2009/10/29/h ... gs-moodys/Moody’s Investors Service on Thursday said it will begin taking ratings actions in Q409 as needed to account for updated assumptions underlying US residential mortgage-backed securities (RMBS) loss projections.
The loss projection revisions come as Moody’s expects house prices to continue to decline to a Q310 trough.
- http://georgewashington2.blogspot.com/2 ... apsed.htmlFormer European Central Bank chief economist Otmar Issing recently said what current officials aren't addressing:
Nobody can be sure that we have a self-sustaining recovery. The challenges facing the ECB are tremendous. "Money multipliers have collapsed everywhere. What M3 is telling us is that confidence is missing. I don't see any way to stabilise M3 in such circumstances.
As Ambrose Evans-Pritchard notes:
Data from the European Central Bank shows that the M3 broad money supply has contracted over the last six months, confounding expectations that ultra-low interest rates would soon boost monetary growth. Loans to the private sector fell 0.3pc from a year earlier, the first such decline since the data started in 1983.
The M3 figures include a wide range of bank accounts...
The picture is even starker in America where M3 has shrunk at an annual rate of 6.5pc over the last three months, a pace of contraction not seen since the 1930s. US bank loans have plummeted since May.
- http://www.questionwar.com/US_interventions.htmlThe engine of American foreign policy has been fueled not by a devotion to any kind of morality, but rather by the necessity to serve other imperatives, which can be summarized as follows:
• making the world safe for American corporations;
• enhancing the financial statements of defense contractors at home who have contributed generously to members of congress;
• preventing the rise of any society that might serve as a successful example of an alternative to the capitalist model;
• extending political and economic hegemony over as wide an area as possible, as befits a "great power."
This in the name of fighting a supposed moral crusade against what cold warriors convinced themselves, and the American people, was the existence of an evil International Communist Conspiracy, which in fact never existed, evil or not.
The United States carried out extremely serious interventions into more than 70 nations in this period.
- http://bespokeinvest.typepad.com/bespok ... -west.htmlWhile initial jobless claims have been in a downtrend on a national basis since March, different states have seen different rates of declines. In addition to the weekly national report on initial jobless claims, the Department of Labor also reports claims data on a state by state basis. Although these numbers are not seasonally adjusted, they can help to gain insight as to which areas of the country are recovering (or stabilizing) the quickest. In the map and tables below we have highlighted the ten US states that have seen the largest and smallest percentage declines in initial jobless claims since their recession peaks.
Looking at the chart shows some interesting trends. In terms of states with the largest decreases in jobless claims, all but two of them (North Dakota and Kansas) are in the eastern half of the United States, including Michingan, which has seen the highest decline of any state in the union (84%). Granted, the state had one of the highest unemployment rates, so there is a lot of room for improvement. The southeast has also seen a notable improvement. Four of the ten states with the largest decrease in initial claims are the cluster of Kentucky, Tennessee, North Carolina, and South Carolina.
The states with the smallest decreasees in initial claims for the most part also share some common traits. First of all, just as most of the states with the largest decreases are in the eastern half of the country, all but three of the ten states with the smallest decreases (Arkansas, Florida, and Maryland) are in the western half of the United States. Another theme shared by most of these states is that they are all heavily reliant on tourism. So it would appear that Americans aren't quite confident on their outlooks to spend money on vacations.
Oh man am I glad to get that off my chest!