CapitalistMarks

Obama’s mistake

Posted on 28. Jan, 2010 by scott.

I was spell-bound as President Obama addressed the nation last night.  With a wonderful opportunity to unify the nation he struck out.  He disappointed me.  The guy is  real personable and he is on of the best at political rhetoric.  Yet, I believed he failed.

How do I count the ways?

Jeeze Louise, couldn’t he have dropped back just a little bit before making the ‘hail Mary’ pass?

Sure he talked about unemployment and even mentioned a few generalized notions about how to deal with the problem . . . but, nothing specific and nothing immediate.  Strike one.

As I predicted the stock market, which represents most of us through direct investment or indirectly through ownership of funds/retirement accounts or such, tanked.  The DOW was down 181 points early on and was only a ‘fiddy-cent’ away from breaking through the 10,000 barrier.  Anyway a BIG strike one.

The next problem was that Obama apparently has decided to continue his original massive agenda to change America in his own way.  He didn’t back down on a single issue.  This of course diminished the issue of unemployment.  How the heck can he expect a now crippled congress to pursue the ‘Obama’ agenda?  If you are at a huge, expensive buffet — everyone knows you have to pick mostly the best stuff and leave the ‘veggies’ alone.  Every one but our President.   Hence, strike two.

Then the fact that he blamed everyone but himself for our current miserable status.  Wasn’t he the one that promised the stimulus would hold unemployment to 8%?  Dang, he blamed Bush and everyone else who was involved in the previous 8 year administration–as if Obama himself  could have done nothing to save us.  You take the job . . . you gotta take the blame, my man.  Don’t hide in the White House . . . get out and about (not just at democrat fund raisers).

It was such a partisan speech, yet he took big jabs at the dems, and huge one at the repubs.  Shoot, he even managed to offend the Supreme Court and the Joint-Chiefs-of-Staff.  He wants gays in the military, limits on corporate election spending and to tax every state that uses coal to generate electricity?  Why doesn’t Obama just make this great nation one huge state . . . he could be the Governor and run forever.

Oh, ohh . . . strike three!

Then there was the 2,000,000 jobs he supposedly saved.  How the heck can he ever prove that! Even if its true it doesn’t comfort the 15 million that are still out of work.

President Obama seems to be living in another world (‘Avatar’?) and not paying any attention to public opinion.  The poor dems must be shaking in their already shaky ‘red’ election shoes.

This unrelenting, strident approach to the Presidency is not working.

The shotgun approach Obama is taking  is clearly wrong and misdirected.  The only thing that I can think is that he is throwing so many ‘things’ out there that he is just hoping  one of them will hit the target and make him a hero.

That is not going to happen.

And what is up with promising that American exports are going to double in 5 years?  CNBC confirmed this morning that the last time we doubled exports it took 12 years.  What is this guy smoking?  Strike four (guess this is a new and different game).

As I wrap this up Ben Bernanke has been confirmed by the Senate to continue as the head of the FED for another 4 years and that should help the market — oww, the DOW  closed down only 115 points.

You paying attention Mr. President.

It is ALL about:

Unemployment, Unemployment, Unemployment!!!!

thanks for the flickr photo to the giant vermin

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Obama gets a 2nd chance.

Posted on 26. Jan, 2010 by scott.

Except for a few die-hard dems there are few American fans  (I exclude Norwegians and Swedes)  of  President Obama’s first year.

A Noble Peace Prize?  Oh come on, who thinks the world is safer or more peaceful than it was a year ago at this time?

Really.

But, with few real accomplishments in his first year, tomorrow presents our  ’celebrity’ leader a 2nd chance to move America forward.  The State of  The Union message is traditionally a time for the President to speak of past achievements and lay out plans for the coming year(s).  This time around there is only cause for future plans.

Tomorrow Obama needs to talk about only three things — unemployment and unemployment and unemployment.

If he does so in a way that is encouraging and restores optimism to the average American,  I think they will give him another chance and perhaps his party too.

If he does not, then I believe both America’s and World-wide stock markets will tank (accelerating last week’s declines) in a visible reflection of the populace’s distrust and doubt regarding the World’s preeminent leader’s policies.

A lot of this will have to do with how the media characterizes the future after the speech, but I believe most American’s will ‘get it’ on their own too.

This  ’do nothing ‘ Democrat-heavy government has got to start focusing on the issue that resonates with Americans of class except the ‘royalty’ residing in plush Washington D.C. homes.

It is not a difficult call.

With 15 million unemployed, 5  million under-employed and at least another 20 million more who are married to, parents of, or friends to the first 20 million, there will be heads to roll in the next election.

That ought to give the D.C. royalty a thing (or 20 million) to think about.

How many voters really give a crap about high falootin and pork belly  health care issues if they or a friend/relative is out of work!

President Obama had better have some genuine solutions for unemployment, and not the income transfering middle-class benefits that have been touted on the news as White House leaks lately.  Giving a few $$ more deduction for kids on someone’s taxes isn’t putting anyone to work!

Things that he needs to promote are:

Immediate infrastructure projects that have real usefulness over the long-term,

increasing military recruitment (to take the pressure off of soldiers who have spent 2 or 3         tours in the battlefields),

immediate, huge  incentives to small businesses to encourage them to hire,

the same incentives to entrepreneurs to encourage them,

and, how about the government hiring another 500,000 or so homeland security types — it isn’t like we don’t need them at our airports, border crossings and in our malls.

We need action that will add jobs within 60 days —  not 3 years!

And, stop VP Biden,  or anyone else in the administration, from talking about the millions of jobs Obama has saved or created . . . that is just political ‘preeming.’

Show us the money!

I’m waiting Mr. President, because I really want you to succeed.

Darnit, I have friends and family that are out of work and can start tomorrow!

Actually day-after-tomorrow will be fine with them.

thanks to flickr’s ewen and donabel for the photo

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Obama goes on the offensive.

Posted on 21. Jan, 2010 by scott.

With the loss of his super-majority in the senate, President Obama has decided to act quickly and decisively — setting the stage for a moderate stance that could work in the months to come.

He announced today a number of initiatives to limit the ‘free-market’ activities of big banks. The implications to future profitability for those institutions (think here of JP Morgan, Wells Fargo, Goldman Sachs and such) is going to be significant.

Apparently investors think things are going to get a bit darker for the ‘biggies’ as a result.  Stocks of most of them took a big hit today.

thanks to adobemac for the flickr foto

Summarizing Obama’s speech is easy.  He doesn’t want the big banks to be able to take risky bets on other people’s money.  Heck, what precipitated the recent recession if not the big banks (financial institutions) and their Las Vegas style of money management?  The President gets it.

At first I was a bit disappointed.  You know, here goes the democrats putting new regulations and restrictions on free enterprise.  But on further reflection I am inclined to take a Keynesian mock-liberal view.  Do what is best for the country.

In fact I believe the President’s action will go a long way toward limiting  future financial crises.

You see, what happened in the past few years is that financial institutions had every incentive to take the ‘big’ bets.  Low interest rates made money readily available.  The banks ability to leverage ‘our’ money made it even easier and potentially more profitability.  There seemed little or no risk to taking big bets.

Lack of regulations in that  wild-west landscape?

Even Greenspan admitted that financial executives were legally (morally?) able to operate for their best good at the expense of ‘us.’

Bottom line:  I approve of the President’s anger and response.

Financial institutions should be free to do whatever they want with their own equity (money they have put up).  But, as regards to all of ‘our’ depository money (which gave them huge additional leverage)?

Whoa cowboy, keep that money safe and even off the freaking radar of the overpaid money managers who just loved to bet ‘our’ money so they could get any spoils but not risk any of their own $$.  $20 million bonuses?  Easy money folks.  But not so much now.

Good work, Mr. President!  Keep thinking outside of the box . . . you may even be able to persuade a republican or two to consider legitimate health care reform.

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Crack in Obama’s dike? Scott Brown . . .

Posted on 18. Jan, 2010 by scott.

The special election in Massachusetts tomorrow is about more than a simple Senate seat.  Read on.

We all know that Senator Kennedy was considered an icon . . . bigger than life and all that.  His stated goal for the last few decades has been to reform health care and that goal, which seemed so ‘given’ in the last month or so, is now in doubt.

The lowdown is this:  if the republican candidate, Scott Brown, wins then the entire balance of power in the Senate will change dramatically.

Obama’s entire economic/political strategy would have to change and he is getting worried.  He even went to Boston to push the dems to get out the vote.

you see, the democratic candidate, Martha Coakley, had a big lead until recently and there was no real issue other than the coming special election.

However, now that Scott Brown has stumped the polling specialists and pulled into a marginal lead the whole economic and political future is at stake.

If Brown is elected the dems will lose the critical 60 seat super-majority in the senate that made their idealogical dreams safe from a republican filibuster.

HELLO!

Yep, the dems much touted health care bill may be headed for the garbage heap of failed health care reform.  Sure, they are trying to put together a strategy that will avoid this by getting the House dems to just accept the Senate bill and send it to the President.  Then Obama could just sign it into law.  Game. Set. Match.  Ouch!

Ah, hemmm.  If a republican takes over the Kennedy senate seat an alarm will go out in Washington.  Dems have held the seat since the ’70’s.  A republican?

Shoot, all the dems in the House and the Senate will be scared . . . too scared to vote for a partisan health care bill that will be the primary reason for the (potential for now) change in Kennedy’s relm.

You mean they might even have to consider tort reform (doc’s paid $8 bill. in premiums last year)?  Or national competition for insurance companies?  Hck yeah!

What do I want?  The republican to win.  You should to.

A super-majority is dangerous.  The need for reasonable ‘across-the-aisle’ debate is out the window.  Whoever is in charge in such a case has an unhealthy (for Americans) control of developing legislation.

A change in Mass. politics would be good.  For everybody.

Would it kill the important health care legislation?

I really hope not because we need real change in this regard.  All the dems would have to do is start taking into account the opinions of others (including the angry electorate that want more effective health cost controls and not just ‘income transfers’ from the rich).

We can hope.

Tomorrow’s election will be real interesting.  I will be up late watching for the final returns.

Go change go!  Go change go!

thanks to david reece for the photo from flickr

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Obama’s right re: TARP and big banks!

Posted on 14. Jan, 2010 by scott.

I listened to Obama’s talk on the TARP today and almost felt like cheering.  He nailed much of the issue right on the head.  If it had not been for taxpayers money — via the $700 billion TARP — then most, if not all of the big banks would be bust right now.

Remember when JP Morgan, Morgan Stanley and others applied for bank status (they had been brokers and financial firms prior) so that they could apply for and get federal subsidies to keep them alive and mitigate the billions they were losing in bundled mortgage paper?  Well, now it is coming back to bite these suckers right where it hurts . . . the bottom line (we can only hope).

I loved it when the President called executive bonuses at the big banks obscene, I think he read my May, 2009 post where I used the exact word (see Capitalism Redux) in the same reference.  When 15 million folk our out of jobs, another 5 million working for a fraction of previous wages, and a good many others just plain ‘chapped’ at the blatant selfishness of bank compensation, the word obscene really strikes home.

The managers at the big banks are real clowns.  How can they not get it?

They are posting record profits right now (in the hundreds of Billions of $$ and during a recession for crying out loud) . . . and it is all because we (well congress did it for us) stepped in with our hard-earned tax money and bailed them out.  What would the executives be earning this year without that help?

Zero, zilch, nada, nuttin’, not much, less than us, and finally, NOT tens of millions of $$ per person!

And why?  Well, partly because Lehman Brothers is gone, Merrill Lynch is swallowed up, and 140 smaller local banks folded and were taken over by the FDIC.  Think the executives recognize that there is a lot less competition now, that they have increased their own business as a result, that you and I on mainstreet funded these chumps?  Or that we financed them to stay alive?  Nope, etc.!

Crud, we helped GM and Chrysler too and they aren’t making fortunes now and passing them on to their executives.  Shoot, their executives have mostly been fired and those that are still around are sure as heck not doing their business travel on cushy and expensive executive jets.

President Obama says that there is about $117 billion left to pay back on the TARP funds and it is only right to charge the biggest winners (the big financial institutions) to pay that back.  On that we can all agree.

I am a little concerned that this ten year ‘fee’ on the big banks will just be passed along to customers (us taxpaying consumers again) and so I hope the legislation contains limits on that.  Also, as I have written before, the government should be taxing the living daylights out of high bonuses (up to 90% seems fair).

As economist say, ‘the best way to change bad behavior is to tax it.’  Well, the democrats that are running things right now had better find a way to tax those dudes and leave us ‘average’ folk alone.

Congratulations, Mr. President, you got this one right.

And thanks!

My expectations for you and your team have bumped up a notch.

thanks to flickr’s lu lu for the photo

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Mea culpa — economic predictions.

Posted on 08. Jan, 2010 by scott.

Today I look back at the risky predictions I made just two days ago (see here).  Clearly I was no Nostradamus.

There was not a significant job increase in December, in fact the economy lost 80,000 jobs, which was more than most economists and analysts expected–but small consolation to me.

However, there were revised numbers for November and guess what?  For the first month since December 2007 the economy added jobs rather than losing them.  Not a big increase mind you, just a measly 4,000 jobs.  But the fact that there was any increase at all is big news!  And, the best showing in 24 months?  Fantastic!

The Dow?  Gosh, it didn’t make it to the 10,700 forecast, but it did go up about 190 points for the week and was up 4 out of  5 days.  Closing at 10,618 means I was off a little (well 82 points) but the trend was up and that has been a pretty good historical forecast for the coming year.

The above mentioned predictions were on the whole wrong.  I admit it.  Due to my overly optimistic  and hopeful expectations.  But not really by far.

Here is the tally:  My December job numbers off by 130,000 and November off by a measly 16,000.  The DOW up only a bit on Friday and I wanted another 100 points or so.  Oh, well.

Not so bad overall and pretty dang good in the stratospheric fields of economic and market estimating  (to which I do not belong).  Consider it luck.

But there is a greater issue here, a real lesson to be learned for the average Joe and Jolene out there.

It is that you simply can’t rely on the professional prognosticators.  Whether they are economists or market analysts they are just not to be trusted.

You see, despite what you might here, all the predictions are just one person’s view and most of them have their own reasons (likely economic gain).

A straight forward thing to remember (and this could save you a lot of m0ney and grief in the future):  at any given moment 1/2 of the economists (or analysts) will be wrong and less than 1/2 of them will be right.  Go figure.

There are no formulas or equations or strategies that work all the time or even  most of the time . . . over the short-term or long-term.  If there were the majority of us would glom onto them and we would all be millionaires.

So, consider this some very direct advice (a warning if you will): don’t believe anything you here or read regarding the economy or markets.

To get ahead, or even to stay in-tune with what is going on, you have to listen to both (or however many) sides and then consider them with what you already know. Then make your own decision about what is right.

This lesson is valid for economics, politics, social issues, menu selection or anything  else requiring human reasoning . . . especially for any predictions you may read here.

No simple answers folks.

Gotta do some homework on your own, and even then a decision may not be forthcoming and you will have to go with your ‘gut’ feeling.

Do not buy any stock because that CNBC circus act Cramer tells you to.  Do not go out and buy a home right  because Paul Krugman says that interest rates will go up tomorrow, and especially don’t quit your job and expect to get a better one soon because you hear Bernanke testify before Congress that the economy is on its way up.

All those people offer opinions only (and all are being paid to do so) and you are smart enough to have your own.

So do I.  Some have cost me and some have profited.  Life goes on.  Like my 92 year old dad told me:  you only have to be right 51% of the time to get rich.

We can only hope.

With that bit of advice I wish all of you a very happy New Year!

Thanks to gage skidmore for the photo from Flickr

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Economic forecasting: week 1 2010.

Posted on 06. Jan, 2010 by scott.

Up to now, the first week of 2010 has been a real improvement over the first week of 2009.  So far, in just three days of trading, the DOW is up 145 points or about 1.3%.  According to ‘tradition’ this bodes well for the rest of the year.

However, I believe everything about the first week will depend solely on the unemployment numbers that come out on Friday.  If they are good then the market will take a significant further bounce and the first week will end on a high note (predicting a good year, remember).  If they are bad then I believe Friday will end with a distinct tumble downward in the DOW . . . and investor confidence will follow.

I am feeling confident about what our great country is doing right now and so I am going to make two very imp0rtant predictions of a short-term nature.

The first is that the unemployment numbers will actually be ‘employment’ numbers.  I believe that December will show job growth of around 50,000 jobs.  Further I believe that November’s numbers will be revised upward from the 11,000 jobs lost to a positive number of about 20,000 jobs gained.  Remember that economics is an art not a science and so a 25-50% range in the above numbers is okay.

These job numbers will have a real influence on markets Friday and so I am also predicting (the second one promised above) that Friday the DOW will jump more than 100 points on the good news and set a multi-year high of around 10,700!

I hesitate to make these kind of predictions but I really do believe there is a sumani confluence of factors (record low interest rates, good holiday retail numbers, strong tailwinds in markets, and others as well as . . . real job creation.

It will be fun to see what happens in just two days . . . there aren’t may economists who would support my views right now . . . but short-term predictions are the most fun because they are so quickly proven right or wrong.

Chastise me if it is the latter . . . but send me your congratulations if I am right and take that as congratulations for you too (and our great country)!

thanks to flickr’s ethan bloch

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The Tigernomics recession.

Posted on 30. Dec, 2009 by scott.

Are we to believe anything about Tiger Woods?  I don’t know . . . the social media has grabbed the story of his infidelity and tried to turn it into the biggest of 2009.  Perhaps they are right –  but one thing is for sure.

Tiger’s folly has had a very real economic impact.

While I don’t trust much on the news (especially the paparrazi type) I do trust the recent careful and educated analysis of Tiger’s downfall on the stocks of companies he endorsed.

Two economists at the University of California did a careful analysis of stocks of such companies since the announcement of his ‘accident’,  ‘confession’ and disappearance.  They took into consideration all pertinent factors such as the relative value of the S&P 500 since the bust and also compared the changing valuations of the sponsor’s closest competitors. Their study determined the stock losses for the first 13 trading days thereafter.

The result:  shareholders lost about $12 billion as a result of the golf star’s philandering ways (so far more than a dozen women have admitted — and quite publicly in some cases — to adulterous relations with Tiger). Three of those companies (Electronic Arts, Nike and Gatorade) are responsible for about $6 billion of that loss.

To refresh you memory, I wrote about this earlier (see Tiger) and said that I would never buy or use products from any company supporting Tiger.  Guess I wasn’t the only one.  The boycott of those of us enraged enough to show our displeasure at the checkout counter has worked.

I am glad that the lies Tiger has been living and telling us has had significant consequences for Tiger (at least one terminated Tiger) and ‘those’ companies.  About time that dishonesty is proving to be both wrong and costly.

As for the Tiger recession?

I hope it continues.  One of my son’s, a fellow golfer, carefully chose my Christmas presents to avoid any products from Tiger’s sponsors (whew!).

It really is sad.

I am sorry for the shareholders loss, but the companies themselves should have done more due diligence before forking out more than $100,000,000 a year for a guy who has proven to be more disappointing that he ever was talented.

Go Phil Mickelson, Ernie Els and Jim Furyk and Padraig Harrington!!

Honesty, loyalty and commitment should have its rewards!

It is us big-slicing weekend golfers who are the real victims here (with appropriate apologies to Elin and the two children)

thanks to flickr’s bradlypjohnson for the photo

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Al Qaeda’s economic warfare.

Posted on 28. Dec, 2009 by scott.

The last few days have reminded Americans of the dangers we face from radical religious groups.  Right at the top is Al Qaeda whose Yemeni ‘branch’ is now claiming responsibility for the failed Christmas bombing of a Delta jet.

American security forces need to stop thinking of such radical groups as third-world ‘nut jobs’ out to make a statement.  Al Qaeda is clearly more sophisticated that they are given credit for and a lot more sophisticated than our present security measures allow for.  They don’t want to just kill people.  They want to bring us down and are smart enough to know that attempts like this latest one have the capacity to damage our society more than killing a plane load of people does.

Look at what happened with this latest incident.  Of course it would have been horrible if the crazy Nigerian had succeeded but the truth is his failing has caused more social/economic problems, simply because we now understand exactly what he was trying to do.  And we are running scared and unprepared.

He had a very powerful and sophisticated explosive that was sewn into his underpants.  Yep you read that right.  Doesn’t sound sophisticated but it surely is . . . he got through all checkpoints and security this way.

Beyond the technical issues of the ‘bomb’ itself — and thank heavens this chump was too dumb to set it off correctly despite his training — the broader social and economic issues have surely already met the goals of his handlers.

Airports and airlines have been forced to spend huge amounts of $$ and time in response to this new threat.  Our government, and others as well, have been in a tizzy about what to do.  There have been conferences, meetings, study groups, counter-terror analysis and such by the dozens.  The President has gotten involved himself and even held a press-conference today on the issue.

Economic and social impacts?

Airline stocks have taken a tumble.  And that is the least of the problems this botched bombing attempt has caused.  Oil stocks have risen since the attempt, security branches of many governments are working overtime, huge amounts of wasted time and money has been spent.  Governments have turned from the pressing recession issues to security.

There has been, and continues to be,  a very real economic impact to this one incident . . . and according to the satanic idiot who failed, he is one of many that have been sent out to accomplish the same thing.  That threat, real or not, is awful to contemplate and will require huge amounts of time and money to be wasted in the next few weeks or months.

All of this begs the more pressing issue of how do we start checking people’s underwear — I hated the shoe stuff at airports and I sure as heck am not going to let some TSA dude check out my nether regions!

Right now — Al Qaeda 1 — America and the free world 0.

We have got to believe these morons are smart and know what they are doing.  They are thinking like well-educated economists and sociologists.  They know how to cause panic, fear and hatred.

Start thinking like them TSA and Homeland security — they are smarter than the average guy that is for sure.  Fact is, I believe they wanted this latest idiot to be caught. Pretty smart suckers.

Come on President Obama, your time to shine is now here.  You might have avoided this latest incident by the skin of your teeth but Al Qaeda is still out there.  What are you going to do Mr. President?  We can’t let every crazy person who is willing to lose their life bring us to our knees every month or two — can we?

All I have for your current government is one last question:  If ‘they’ aren’t with us, then are ‘they’ against us?

You figure that out.

thanks to flickr’s saiosaio for the photo

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Economic light . . . and the tunnel looks short.

Posted on 21. Dec, 2009 by scott.

I have had little to feel confident about for the last 2 years regarding our economy and our stock markets.  This lack of confidence has caused me to tighten up our family’s economic belt and we have gotten used to it.  I have also pulled way back on investments.

I will be honest, I have not stayed out of the market and in fact have traded stocks at a pace about double what I have done in the previous 4 or 5 years.  But I have done so with less money and with substantially shorter-term  trades.  That is what caution and the high volatility of the past two years have dictated (at least from my view).

But hold on here, folks!  The wait for smoke to start pouring out of American factories is about to end.  (please take this metaphorically because lots of growth will come from small business and service industries)

Anywho, starting a few weeks ago I began to take a different tack as the view from the bottom had changed.  I have been looking for investments and not trades.  That means that long-term buys appeal more than short term trading.  I did so very cautiously and with a bit of trepidation. A lot of worry still wracked my fragile mind.

Then as the news piled up last week (I will give you the headlines soon) I realized that key economic indicators were finally confirming my earlier impression.  Now I am looking at investments to hold on to for at least six months and perhaps even a year or more.  Things that have real growth potential in an expanding economy, things that provide a steady income stream via historically high dividends that can only grow if the corner has  really been turned.

Why am I telling you this.

Its simple.

For the first time I don’t believe we will have a “W” recession — the kind where another big downturn would be imminent any day.  For the first time I really believe that a “V” recession is what we have just gone through and that the right-hand side of that “V” is going to be steep and long.

That means companies will start growing, earnings will increase (a lot really since most companies are ‘lean and mean’ right now), tax revenues will begin to increase (so the government can start paying off our incredibly high national debt), and unemployment will start to shrink (not as fast unless Obama really takes action as promised recently).  More importantly, because the FED is keeping interest rates low (no quick end to that policy) and hundreds of billions of Obama’s stimulus plan will start to hit main street this year, growth could be pretty phenomenal.

Now, let me give you a few of the headlines from last week as promised:

“Exports up for 6th straight month, boost recovery” — a weak dollar has helped here

“American’s net worth up for 2nd straight quarter” — think both home values and investment portfolios

“Leading indicators rise for the 8th straight month” — money supply, stock prices, building permits, improving labor markets all helped here

“Americans most pessimistic they’ve been since January”  — this is a contra indicator (from CNBC) and and is mostly reflective of political issues rather than raw economic ones

The bottom line is that I have changed my view on the current recession.

It’s over folks!!

And it is not coming back anytime soon.  It was painful, yes, but the gain from the pain is just ahead.

The next year or so of economic and investment  (primarily stocks) growth is going to be really good — probably at least 3% GDP growth in 2010 and the stock markers should be up steeply as well (but not straight up)  I wouldn’t be surprised with the  Dow at 13-14,000 by next year end.

I’m feeling real good about the near term future ( I always feel good about the long-term future) and I think you should too.

The old caveat on unemployment is always out there but it is a 6-12 month lagging indicator and yet I expect it will begin to improve almost from the first months of 2010. So I’m not going to beat that dead horse anymore (unless Obama and the dems fail to stimulate here as they have recently promised — and I will be watching President Obama).

Whew!  Thanks heaven (and I really mean that).

The recession is over.

Good times are just ahead.

I’m counting on it!

Thanks for the photo from flickr to ahbijeet.rane

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