A Week of Oil Charts #1

I got an outstanding report send to me the other day which does a great job of showing why oil is so overvalued, why it isn't BIG OIL that's been driving up prices and is about the best way I can think of (aside from $4 per gallon gasoline) to convince those (primarily on the left) that it is plain, simple economics driving prices and not some BushCheneyHaliburton Bogey Man.

And I say this with a half conciliatory tone in that I want to in a very Dennis Prager type way to try to convince those otherwise instead of just berating them as "stupid effing liberals." That being said, if these charts don't convince you, then I have no problem berating you, simply because if you can't see this is why oil prices are so high, then you literally, quite LITERALLY are one of two things;

1. A moron
2. An operative who fully knows why gas prices are so high, but will feign otherwise because you have a political agenda and are not only being intellectually dishonest, but a hypocrite as well.

So here's the first chart, which I think some of us are already familiar with, other commodities have been going up as well;


This obviously points out that if you're going to blame "big oil" for manipulating prices, then you might as well blame "big wheat" "big aluminum" and "big copper." Prices of pretty much all commodities have been going up because of increasing demand from other countries around the world growing at a much faster pace than the US.

Again, if you are to be intellectually honest, then you should be just as pissed at big corn or big coal. You would also have to expand your conspiracy theory to make it so Bush and Cheney not only ran oil, but all these other commodities as well.

Awwwww, Poor Babies

This is a photo of oil traders in shock at the precipitous drop in oil prices.



The irony is they're upset because the price of oil DROPPED.

To hell with them.

How Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae Work

This sums it up.

Paid Maternity Leave

80 weeks off the ladies of Sweden get when they have a kid.

That's 560 days. A year and a half you get off from work, WITH PAY, for having a kid.



I'd be curious to see how many of them then spring for day care so they can go about and play for a year and a half and not really raise the kid. Or, since this is Sweden, have the government day care take care of the kid while they take a 16 month vacation.

Anybody from Sweden know if people do that? They get the 1.5 year maternity leave, but then send the kid to day care and loaf around for 16 months?

Oil as a Percent of the Trade Deficit

Another interesting chart from The Economist.



Didn't realize oil was nearly half our trade deficit.

I Said an Alaskan Polar Bear Heater!

So one of my favorite movies is the original Nutty Professor. And probably the best scene is when Buddy Love goes in an orders an Alaskan Polar Bear Heater (which you will click on now).

This guy actually made one and tried it.

I too shall follow in the footsteps of Buddy Love and try one.

Thus concludes your obscure American trivia of the day.

Single Christian Groups

In my elder 20's I was recruited to play some basketball at this league for single Christian men. Only two problems;

1. Not Christian.

2. Kind of your run of the mill Irish/Jewish/American short white guy. I can dribble and pass, but my aim is nothing like Halo 3.

In any case, the presumed goal of the Christian's singles group was (I'm guessing) to meet other single Christian ladies. There was not one girl around, except for the janitor who was not...um...young.

Then I realized it was more of a polite way to get people interested in perhaps joining the church. And I'm inclined to agree. It was through comradery and fun that you would emphasize the positive aspects of Christianity (salvation, forgiveness, free wine on Sundays) and not the fire and brimstone and guilt and no smoochy smooch until married BS that you could recruit some people.

That being said, I think I will join the Church of Mindless Self-Indulgence. They have a better sales pitch.

The bachelor life is actually not too far off from this.

Everything BUT GDP Points to a Recession

Add another tidbit of data pointing to recession, but since it's not GDP, we technically cannot complain it's a recession yet. That being said, I found this chart interesting showing the trend since the 1960's where commodity prices have jumped (as measured by producer prices) a recession usually follows (denoted by those gray bars).



Don't worry, it will happen. Give it time.

Great

Great, just great.

And who, I ask is going to pick up the tab?

Mandatory economics and personal financial management classes in the public schools NOW!

Oh, wait, that would kill the democratic party.

Housing as a Percent of GDP

Had a request asking how much housing accounts for the economy. Well here you go;

"Put Me in Command"

One of my favorite quotes from one of my favorite movies is Captain Jack Sparrow;

"Put me in command."

And that is more or less what I would like to convey to all the shareholders out there of;

Merrill Lynch
JP Morgan
Citigroup
UBS
Fannie Mae
Freddie Mac
and any other financial firm that is now having to go to the taxpayer with a cup in their hand.

Put me in command. I would do better than any one of their Ivy League educated, blue bloods and for about 1/2 the price...then again, if I was CEO of all firms, 1/2 of the normal pay for all of them would still be billions, but I would guarantee you this new megalopolis of a firm would not lose even 1/2 of a billion.

Ah, but that is unheard of, an outsider not from the East coast heading up these dinosaur of firms now becoming parasites on the US taxpayer. So outlandish of an idea, so radical to put somebody under 40 who is not a grayhaired MBA putz who's more concerned about his commission than the overall health of the firm.

Ah, to hell with it, I'm erroneously assuming it's a meritocracy anyway.

That being said, I would be the Captain Jack Sparrow of the finance world.

Sub Prime Slime

It is known amongst my circles that I am indeed writing a book on the housing crash (and for those interested parties, yes it's off to the publisher). And whenst at parties this usually begets questions of me like;

"How much further does housing have to drop?" - Answer: 10-15%

"Are we in a recession?" - Answer: Not yet

"I hate Bush, he's to blame for all my problems, including the crash." - Answer: Don't worry, I hear Obama will make it all better.

But one of my favorite responses is when inevitably they ask me who to blame, and I say, "sub prime borrowers" the knee jerk "everybody's a winner" reaction is;

"Well the majority of sub prime borrowers still pay their loans on time."

This response is typically based in pity or defense for those who are deemed "sub prime" and ergo are of a lower economic class and therefore deserving of all benefits of the doubts and are above criticism. And while technically true, the majority of the sub prime borrowers do pay back their loans on time, it's not the vast majority.

Based on "vintage" as The Economist refers to it, sub prime borrowers pain the rest of us with default rates anywhere between 20-40%. It is absolutely inexcusable that not only roughly 1 in 4 people default on their loans, but that banks and mortgage lenders were so poor at analyzing the creditworthiness of these borrowers that 30% of their client base is defaulting.



Now the modern day psychology in America is that, by default, these people are victims. Oh, the poor sub prime borrower. Boo hoo, they are in default. They must have come upon hard times. We need to help them.

I, of course, being the evil, right wing fascist who smashes butterflies and doesn't wash after going to the bathroom, am of the more old school American psychology; let them sink. I am also so bold to call these people what they would have been called all of 30 years ago;

Deadbeats.

Give it time, this too will become politically incorrect word you will no longer be able to use.

Keep the Bad News Coming

For all you middle age, corrupt, scum bucket bankers out there who put your precious little commission ahead of the solvency of the banks you worked at, I have one thing to say;

Keep it coming.

The more collapses and crises, the better it is for the book and the easier it will be for the younger generation to usurp power from your corrupt asses.

I'm Not a Big PETA Guy

But I feel bad for the bunny.

Herman, my feral backyard, bachelor bunny, sends his sympathy.

You should too. Send Snarks your well wishes.

Why College Students Shouldn't Be Granted the Freedom of Speech

Brought up under the impression they’re all winners and told their excrement is platinum by their mothers, today’s college students find nothing wrong with dispensing their wise, sage-like wisdom to us schleps. Us morons, us simpletons who do not have the benefit of being so intelligent and enlightened as they. Us working stiffs who despite our age are not as wise as these 20 year old putzes.

And the reason I bring this up is because I have ran into another one of these geniuses our public schools has spit out of the assembly line, sent to the local community college, and now sent out into the real world where I get to listen to this idiot’s drivel.

However, there is one benefit about this, and that is when the topic turns to things like economics, politics and so forth, wherein I might be “slightly” more learned than the 19 year old emo kid, I find it amusing listening to them tell me “how the real world works” and “how the economy works.”

Now there was many things this latest sophomoric sage had to tell me; global warming, Obama is our saviour (did you know he’s for change?)and so forth, but one of them was that if we really cared about energy independence and the environment, we’d get rid of as much plastic as we possibly could.

This was an odd one to me, because I didn’t know that plastic was now enemy #1. So I asked him, “Aside from cutting holds in bottle holders so turtles don’t get caught in them, how is cutting back on plastic going to help lessen our dependence on foreign oil?”

“Well,” the future Albert Einstein said, “because we don’t just use oil for gas, we use it for making plastics as well. And if we all just cut back on the plastic we’d use, we’d be able to do a lot in terms of fighting high gas prices. Even if you recycle your grocery bags, it will help.”

My eyes now rolling, I contemplated asking him what percent of the oil we consumed ended up going into actual plastic, but thought this would short circuit his brain. I doubt he had the intellectual veracity to look it up, let alone develop this idea with independent thought, but instead had been fed a line of BS by his professor about how re-using plastic bags was going to crush OPEC and now, like the millions of college freshmen today, parrot this line of BS to parents, elders, strangers and economists who could actually verify such things.

Doing some quick eyeball math (and generously assuming ALL residuals go into plastics) 4.6% MAX goes into plastics.

What angers me most about this I cannot decide. Is it the fact such a large percent of our youth (and presumedly the “educated” ones at that) have such a lack of intellectual independence and a spine to think critically about such things and can therefore be fed such lines of BS? Is it this moron, and legions like him, are going to vote for Obama and therefore not only negate my vote, but force me to suffer the consequences of their ignorance? Or is it their arrogance in thinking somehow they’re actually wiser than people who have 10 years on them AND the ability to think for themselves? It may even be the slight depression I’m going through realizing this is the generation that’s going to “work up the wealth” to pay for my social security.

Plus, there’s a sense of hopelessness. This was at a bar, I don’t want to lecture somebody who is in under the impression he is the lecturer and I am the student at a bar. It’s pointless, he’s not going to listen. I am tired of being that one guy at the party when he was 23 that wasn’t a democrat or a pot-smoking liberal and having to defend myself, capitalism and America by a bunch of brainwashed dolts, and 10 years later, still having to do so. It gets tiring. It behooves the question, “When the hell are you guys going to grow up and start thinking for yourselves? When is curiosity or an intellectual honesty going to take hold of your thought process by which you kind of prove to yourself the sh!t you’ve been spewing since you were 18 is actually true or not? When are you going to turn off American Idol and the Barack Obama Fest on the MSM and pick up an issue of The Economist or the WSJ? Or is it going to take a massive recession and massive poverty on par with the Great Depression to kick your asses into giving a damn about the country’s finances and becoming good financial stewards of this democracy?”

And then, there they sit. Looking at me as some oddity, like a zoo animal.

“Ooo, I didn’t know we had a Republican in town. He’s so strange looking. Look at how he acts. I didn’t know capitalists drink beer. Interesting. Take a picture of it!”

Regardless, the price for this youthful ignorance that just doesn’t seem to want to go away with age is going to be incalculable. We are still a democracy. And for better or for worse, we will get the government we deserve, inevitably one that is not a democracy.

But at least we’ll be recycling plastic bags.

Food and Fuel

My friend John has a great saying;

"It's still a great country despite the liberals' efforts."



I always say, "Give it time."

The Republicans Can Learn Something from This.. But They Won't

And that is no matter what you do, you will still be vilified as those evil, greedy, racist, sexist, puppy-kicking people, because you are Republicans. The Democrats want to be in power, and they don't care if you implement socialist policies, they'll still find something to criminalize you over.

Case in point, George Bush.



GW's ratings would be a lot higher if he didn't spend more money than any president in recent memory. He would have at least not alienated his base. Leftists hate Bush because, well, he's Bush, even though he spent more money on social programs than LBJ. Conservatives hate Bush because, he's not conservative.

So here's a lesson to McCain and any other Republican out there. Quit trying to be everything to everyone. You could advocate nationalized health care and the left will still try to find something wrong with you, even if they have to make it up (Bush caused Katrina anyone???). Be Republican, advocate lower taxes IN CONJUNCTION WITH CUTS IN SPENDING, be an adult and TELL the American people you WILL revamp social security whether they like it or not, because you are the father figure and you make the hard choices for this family known as America.

Of course you can keep on trying to win the favor of your children by bribing them with cake, but something about good parents are "parents" and not "best friends" comes to mind. Ah, heck, never mind, with the lot of Republicans running for office I have no hope for the future.