Man Bites Dog: Switzerland Cancels Bond Sales, Because They Are Running Surpluses

Hmmm....amazing what happens when the voters force the government to live within its means.

From Bloomberg(with bold added by OldSouth):
Swiss officials are making decisions their peers in Greece or Portugal envy: Canceling bond sales as a budget surplus reduces the nation’s borrowing needs. Soaring public debt in the 1990s prompted Swiss voters to approve a constitutional amendment requiring that revenue and expenses must balance over an entire economic cycle, though the government may run annual deficits. 

That restraint has paid off, pushing Switzerland’s borrowing costs to the lowest in Europe as investors rush to the safest investments. Switzerland called off bond sales in November and December, saying it didn’t need additional funds to finance the budget. The benchmark 10-year note yields 1.80 percent, compared with Portugal’s 5.48 percent and Greece’s 9.06 percent. 

Let's read that bit again:

Soaring public debt in the 1990s prompted Swiss voters to approve a constitutional amendment requiring that revenue and expenses must balance..

Let's focus in a bit more, for that reader in Washington DC who keeps checking in:

a constitutional amendment requiring that revenue and expenses must balance...

Ya' gotta speak slowly, short sentences composed of short words, when dealing with our friends in Washington. So, let's explain it in terms they can understand. Again.

The Swiss voters said NO to the guv'mint spending more than guv'mint takes in.

'Surplus' means the guv'mint takes in more than it spends.

When the guv'mint stops spending more than it takes in, it has money left over, and the whole country prospers.

Damn! Why didn't we think of that?

And, they retained their national sovereignity by retaining the integrity of their currency.

Greece is, therefore, not their problem.

Damn! Why didn't we think of that?

Damn!

Apparently, No One Learned One Damned Thing: The Tin Cup Approach To Life

Jesse shared this nugget earlier this evening from Bloomberg.

Ya'll remember OldSouth quoting that bizarre interview with the German finance minister last week?

The one where he admitted 'We don't really know who holds all that Greek debt, and how much is held by whom.'?

You know, that one!

Apparently, the domesticated feline mammalian unit has escaped the portable burlap transportation unit.

JPMorgan’s exposure to the five so-called PIIGS countries is $36.3 billion, equating to 28 percent of the firm’s Tier-1 capital, a measure of financial strength, Wells Fargo analysts including Matthew Burnell wrote today. Morgan Stanley holds $32.4 billion of debt in the region, which equates to 69 percent of its Tier 1 capital, Burnell wrote. 

Now, really, OS is not in the habit of cursing in print, but this one deserves a rousing:

Well, Shhhheeeeeeeuuuuuuuttttt!!

It's so satisfying to say that sometimes, releasing all that air, spittle, frustration and utter disbelief in one extended dipthong.

What sort of moron places 36 billion dollars on the table on: 'I'm gonna buy me a bunch of debt instruments from those paragons of progress and capitalist free markets, Greece and Portugal.'

'OK, spin that there roulette wheel, Bubba! What could go wrong?'

In other words, not one damn thing was learned in the Great Meltdown of 2008, except that no matter how bad the screw-up, Uncle Sam will shovel in enough money to make everything all right.

OS saw a rerun of the classic movie 'Tin Cup' last night. The final ten minutes is almost unbearably painful to watch, which is one reason it is such a great flick. OS was struck by how wonderfully the screenwriters did their job. That 'focal point moment of truth' happens before the carnage begins. 'Tin Cup' Roy McAvoy, totally amped up on his own ego, begins ranting about 'his moment of immortality' as he is about to risk his whole life on a golf shot that has maybe a 10% chance of success. He is Don Quixote at the windmill. His Sancho Panza of a caddy, played by Cheech Marin, totally loses patience and shouts: 'Homes, you don't need your immortality! You need your seven-iron! Lay the ball up!'

Of course, reason did not rule, and that final painful ten minutes proceeds.

Romeo the caddy, the eternal Sancho Panza, stands on the 18th fairway with his friend who has spent his life snatching disaster from the jaws of success, pleading with him to act sanely at least once in his benighted existence. Play the seven iron, reduce your risk, win the US Open. Think of all the people who have invested so much of themselves in you. Play the seven-iron!

Here in the small towns and neighborhoods of America, we don't ask for much from the Great and Good, really. Just that they not act like Tin Cup McAvoy.

We wish they would locate the seven-iron in the bag. Before they blow themselves, us, and everything around them to kingdom come.

Trombone Shorty: A Fresh Voice

Again, out early, in late. But Amazon delivered the Trombone Shorty album ordered last week.

OS is not a huge fan of the latest and greatest heavily hyped pop album, in general.

Trombone Shorty, however, lives up to the press he's received.

Moh' latuh.

End Of April, A Thought For The Culture

It's one of those weeks--out of the house at 8:00 am, back in at 10:00 pm.  No time to think, much less write.

In the meantime, these wonderful words from the Sunday Times on the subject of music and worship. 

It's not a subject the general public spends a lot of time thinking about, but trust OS on this, it really matters.  How we say what we say at what should be our most serious and unguarded moments really matters.


Away we go....

Ballantine Championship: European Tour PGA In South Korea

OS is a golf geek. It's one of those things, and he knows there are therapists out there who can help with this sort of stuff. He just enjoys this vice too much for the moment.

It's Saturday morning in Tennessee, and European Tour Golf is broadcasting from South Korea, actually an island off the southern coast of South Korea. Household names like Gareth Maybin, Ted Oh, Marcus Fraser, and Soren Hanson are near the top of the leaderboard.  The course is beautiful, striking flora and terrain, and these guys really play well, even if there aren't thousands of screaming fans. Not one fist-pumper among them... 

Here on the third cup of coffee, it strikes OS that we live in a remarkable world, that allows that live broadcast from South Korea. Considering events of sixty years ago or so, it's remarkable there is a South Korea to broadcast from, much less one that has developed the kind of wealth and order that would allow the event to take place. Golf clubs don't come cheap, and they certainly aren't life-and-death essentials to any nation's economy. But they are built in places that are orderly, where wealth and literacy have developed. 

Let's consider where the golf courses aren't, beginning with North Korea, which managed to stage a war sixty years ago that killed several millions, spread misery all over East Asia, and accomplished nothing. They still can't feed themselves, but are working feverishly to develop nuclear weapons with which to blackmail the world. No time for golf, or music, or much of anything else.

Somalia--nope. Chad--nope. Iran--definitely no. Don't expect to see the 'Tehran Open' in this lifetime, do we? But, then again, in 1950, who could have imagined this middle-aged guy drinking his third cup of coffee in Tennessee, watching the tournament live from South Korea, writing about it on a laptop, chatting with his wife on a mobile phone as she drives home from her business trip?

Lots of moving parts there...but made possible in great part by brave people like Harry Truman who decided that the West should make a stand against the Marxist plague in Korea, and all the brave people from all parts of the world who sacrificed so much in that cause. And by people who live their lives believing that making money by making things that make life better is a worthy pursuit. You know...capitalists. And that things like a free press and rule of law with the consent of the governed is the best way to live. You know...Western constitutional principles, which have thrived best in places like the US, Great Britain, Canada, Australia, New Zealand. (Funny, that's where a lot of golf courses are located. How did that happen?)

See the connection yet? This generation's totalitarian plague is Islam, actually a repeat performance from previous centuries, but that's another discussion. We can't make it go away entirely, just like Marxism (after all, Harvard, Oxford and Berkley will always be with us...), but we can maintain the will to say: 'No. You don't get to take over. You can't even feed yourselves, and all you produce is murder and mayhem. You are the ones with the intrinsic problem, even if we have flaws. We're not going to apologize for being right, and we don't care if you get your feelings hurt.'

If we stand fast, here at home, and in other places where we have to, who knows? OS's grandson might watch Mickelson's grandson tee off in Tehran...

Here's hoping.

The State of Arizona Locates Its Spine: Illegal Immigration Is To Be Enforced By The State

Finally. About time. After heaven knows how many murders, kidnappings, shootings, tons of drugs and tens of thousands of illegal aliens invading Arizona for decades, the legislature and governor come to the obvious conclusion: The Federal Government is not interested in controlling the southern border of the United States. They have abdicated their responsibility, and care not a whit for the widows and orphans that litter the landscape because of unchecked illegal immigration.

And, it not just the Obama administration!! G.W. Bush acted like a man who had long ago been bought off by someone somewhere when it came to this issue. We all have to take our shoes off, be subject to searches, etc., etc., in the name of national security, and Bush refused to take action on the border, until he was forced into it. When he attempted to get an amnesty bill passed in the dark of night over Memorial Day 2007, he alienated the final loyalists of the Republican Party, and damn near destroyed it.

So, finally, Arizona takes back its Constitional prerogative.

OS has just one further word to add:  YEEEEEEESSSSSS!!!!

And this incident, which dates from today, gives insight into why Arizona is so long overdue.

Now, let's see how the Obama administration and its 'political organizing' minions go on the attack. Expect a flood of Federal civil-rights lawsuits, Federal prosecutions of local deputies, attempts to vacate the law in the Federal courts. If Arizona succeeds in asserting its Constitutional rights, Obama knows the floodgates will open against him, state by state, issue by issue.

It's not about immigration. It's about the rule of law, the Constitution, and who gets to rule.

OS is cheering for the states.

This Is How Wars Begin: Obama's Three-fer This Week

Colonel James Corum is an experienced military scholar, a credible voice, now working in a sensitive corner of the world.  
James Corum is Dean of the Baltic Defence College in Estonia. He has taught at American and British staff colleges and is the author of seven books on military history and counter-insurgency. He is a Lieutenant Colonel in the US Army Reserve (rtd) and has 28 years' experience as an army officer.

He's not a pudgy middle-aged white guy in his mother's basement, living in his 'Don't Tread On Me' tee-shirt and adding to his gun collection.

(OS feels compelled to say these things, because anytime anyone anywhere raises his hand and says 'Scuze me! I think Mr. Obama has got it wrong', someone else feels obligated to rant that the objector is some sort of ignorant non-entity. They exist, to be certain, but OS tries to avoid them at all times. There are enough sober voices in objection for a lifetime already.)

So back to Colonel Corum: He points out, calmly, in today's Telegraph that Our Beloved Leader has managed to publicly insult not one, not two, but three loyal allies of the United States, each in its own strategic corner of the world. 

• Instead of attending the state funeral in Poland, to help console a grieving nation, he took the afternoon off to play golf. (The airport in Cracow was open, by the way.) 
• He chased off the Israelis, who chose wisely not to attend the non-proliferation conference, where they knew they would be subjected to anti-Israeli rants by Islamic dictatorships, and-- 
• his government characterized the constitutionally appropriate removal of a Chavez-in-training by the Honduran Congress as a coup-de-etat.

Sweeeet!  Three in one week!

Now, does anyone think that political leaders (outside of nutters like Hitler) wake up in the morning, have their first cup of coffee, look out the window at the flower beds and singing birds, and say: 'I'm gonna start me a war today! Let's get a few hundred thousand people ushered into eternity this year.'

No, these things get blundered into, blind-side and backwards, often because arrogant twits refuse to remember who their friends are, the difference between simple right and wrong, and that totalitarian regimes inevitably blow up and take lots of people with them. They aren't the friends of freedom, 'cuz they're dictatorships!

 
So, the Colonel, an historian, concludes by sharing a bit of irrefutable history with us.

[begin quote, OS providing the bold emphases]

Alienating three close allies in one week is quite a trick, even for a president as inept in foreign policy as Barack Obama. However, it fits a pattern. President Obama has never shown any understanding for the basic rules of foreign policy which include cultivating allies, avoiding unnecessary friction, and doing one’s homework. These things happen because Obama is fundamentally uninterested in foreign policy. It is part of a pattern that began when Obama was elected to the Senate. In 2007 his party made him the chairman of the Senate subcommittee on Europe so Obama could claim foreign policy experience for his presidential run in 2008. Yet even though Obama’s committee had oversight of such vital issues as the U.S. relationship to NATO and the EU, Obama never held Senate hearings and his committee contributed no reports or played any role in setting policy. Few senate committee chairs have ever shown less interest in the work. 

In his career in the Senate and as president, Obama enjoyed his foreign trips when it is all about him – such as receiving the Nobel Prize or basking in the adulation of the Euromasses. But rarely has a president had so much foreign travel with so little substance to show for it. So far, Obama shows no talent for learning on the job – so America’s friends should brace for more weeks like this one.

[end quote]

If you read this from overseas, OS will repeat himself: So many of us did not vote for this person, and so many who did deeply regret it. He's at the helm, but he does not speak for us! Especially to our cousins in the UK, of all stripes--we stand with you, even if he abuses your loyal friendship.

If you read this from the US, please--find a favorite candidate or three to support for Congress, Senate, governorships, and state legislatures who will stand up to these people. Don't just rant, and don't even consider spilling anyone's blood or blowing anything up.

Donate.

Get to work.

Vote, and make sure you take your family and friends with you.

It's about war, peace, and survival, that's all.

Earth Day, Forty Years On: Seven Hundred Peer Reviewed Papers That Ummm... Disagree With AlGore

Lubos Moti is yet another informative blogger who is not a middle-aged guy living in Mom's basement. He offers us The Reference Frame, a most entertaining and informative read.

Today, in honor of Earth Day, he reminds us that it coincides with (drumroll, please), the birthday of one V. I. Lenin. In fact, the first Earth Day was celebrated on Lenin's 100th birthday.

Why, isn't that sweet!

In honor of the day, Moti offers a list of seven hundred publicly available, peer-reviewed articles that express serious doubts about human-sourced global warming. They are found listed on the Popular Technology site.

Hmmm, ya'll remember how we all get beaten up with the mantra: 'Global Warming is the consensus of the entire scientific community, and you are a polar-bear-murdering ingrate if you dare disagree!' Well, like almost all the drivel served up to us by the Left, it's not true.

Just to be fair, OS scrolled down the list, and picked one article at random, from The Bulletin of Canadian Petroleum Geology.

The abstract concludes:

[begin quote]

The atmosphere may warm due to human activity, but if it does, the expected change is unlikely to be much more than 1 degree Celsius in the next 100 years. Even the climate models promoted by the IPCC do not suggest that catastrophic change is occurring. They suggest that increases in greenhouse gases are likely to give rise to a warmer and wetter climate in most places; in particular, warmer nights and warmer winters. Generally, higher latitudes would warm more than lower latitudes. This means milder winters and, coupled with increased atmospheric carbon dioxide, it means a more robust biosphere with greater availability of forest, crops and vegetative ground cover. This is hardly a major threat. A more likely threat is policies that endanger economic progress. The negative effect of such policies would be far greater than any change caused by global warming. Rather than try to reduce innocuous carbon dioxide emissions, we would do better to focus on air pollution, especially those aspects that are known to damage human health.

[end quote]

The pdf of the complete paper is available at the cited link.

Well, just to be fair, maybe he's wrong. Or biased. And his peer reviewers and editors are biased. Only six-hundred-ninety-nine other articles to choose from that draw much the same conclusion, across a wide range of journals.

It has to be a conspiracy to discredit AlGore, the Winner of The Nobel Prize.


Or just maybe, he's blowing smoke...

A Purely Personal Persnickety Perspective

OS is up to his keister in projects with deadlines, bills to pay, and hoping that next week's schedule doesn't get blown to Kingdom Come by another volcanic outburst, cuz' he's expecting someone from London to get some work done that he spent weeks getting scheduled. He also just had a conversation with an apologetic FedEx agent who explained that service to the UK is still intermittent, and no he can't say when tomorrow's package of documents will actually arrive in England's Green And Pleasant Land.

Can't control volcanoes, so nothing to do but keep a sense of humor and think of Plan B.

Other stuff, humans do control. Great parts of the past two days have been spent with various Apple products, supposedly the Latest and Greatest, that simply will not function as advertised. Everything is very elegant, stylish, 'cool', etc.  It just that, upon following all the instructions, not much works well.

He's an old middle-aged guy, admittedly, but he has one thing to say before trying to actually get some work done:  Computers and software are tools. Think of hammers, screwdrivers, picks, shovels.

Tools.

We use tools to get stuff done. We don't care how elegant they are. All we care about is 'Hammer drives nail straight into beam.', 'Pick moves dirt, to be removed by shovel.' When the tool works, then it does what we paid for it to do. When it doesn't, we're not in the mood to be told by a 22-year-old kid with tats and piercings that 'We just don't get it'.

On the contrary, we do get 'it'. This hammer won't drive the nail, and we paid for both.

These things are tools. Before adding elegance, think function. Hammers drive nails.

Please.

Food-Stamp Nation

Mish Shedlock, as always, knows how to paint the picture accurately from both the macro to micro level. He understands that the economy is not about numbers, but about people, culture, behavior, ethics. Look to your right on this page, and allow him to enlighten you.

This post is especially telling.

Quoting below:

[begin copy]

Food stamp usage is up again except the program is now called SNAP Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program.

Inquiring minds are looking at a SNAP Participation Table that shows a record 39,430,724 receive SNAP benefits, a 22.4% increase from a year ago.

Biggest State Increases

Arizona - 32.9%
Colorado - 32.9%
Florida - 38.6%
Idaho - 45.7%
Nevada - 46.9%
Rhode Island - 42.4%
South Dakota - 32.6%
Utah - 37.3%
Wisconsin - 38.9%
Wyoming - 40.0%

Those numbers are as of January 2010

Households

Household SNAP participants increased from 12,728,981 in Fiscal Year 2008 to 15,232,105 in fiscal year 2009, a 16.4% increase. For comparison purposes, watch the growth in household participation.

SNAP Household Participation

FY 2005 - 11,197,377
FY 2006 - 11,734,491
FY 2007 - 11,789,594
FY 2008 - 12,728,981
FY 2009 - 15,232,105

Cost of SNAP Program

FY 2005 - $31.07 Billion
FY 2006 - $32.91 Billion
FY 2007 - $33.19 Billion
FY 2008 - $37.66 Billion
FY 2009 - $53.63 Billion

Household and cost numbers are as of March 30, 2010.

Clearly the recession took its toll, and will continue to do so until there is a dramatic decrease in the unemployment rate.


[end copy]

Since Uncle Sam spent far less in the aggregate of the years cited on keeping people fed than on keeping firms like Freddie, Fannie, AIG, GMAC, Chrysler and GM on life support in 2008 and 2009, (and let's not forget the banks), let's not quibble about numbers. People in large groups who don't have enough to eat or feed their children do desperate and unpleasant things, and listen to people who advocate desperate and unpleasant things.  Ask Marie Antoinette...

Still, we have constructed a culture that begins to look a bit like Louis XVI: Massive wealth and luxury flowing to fewer and fewer people connected to the court in Paris, small family business enterprise increasingly bled dry, a large proportion just barely hanging on beneath them (because small business can't expand and hire), and an intellectual/political elite out of touch with reality.

Stir gently, add a tablespoon of accelerant, heat slowly.

We don't want this to happen.

The glorious revolution of the 1790's was followed by the Napoleonic bloodbath, which was followed by...which was followed by...