patrick.net

DeoVindice,

Having respect for one's ancestors and history is fine, but calling Southern session “The noble cause” (which was after all, to preserve a system based on the not-so-noble institution of slavery) and then labelling Northen efforts to preserve the union (and nation) "New England tyranny"? *Ahem* I'm sure Lincoln wasn't a saint, but calling him a dictator or murderer is flat out absurd.

People get killed in wars --this is true regardless of who starts (or finishes) the war. That's just the nature of war and why it's so terrible. Civil wars (as the name implies) are usually the worst kind of war --large numbers of "civil"ians including women and children get killed because it's city vs. city, brother vs. brother. Lincoln and Davis were probably no more bloodthirsty than any other leader presiding over such a conflict, IMO.

And don't even get me started about Andersonville...

Give them work passes and legalize these necessary labor migrations.

That is fine with me. I support Bush's worker program.

However, it is not okay to wink and nod. ;)

There should only be LEGAL IMMIGRATION — illegal immigration should be dealt severely. I do not understand why USA grants periodic amnesty!

Certainly, I don't support an endless flow of people into the country. Give undocumented ag workers documentation so their presence can be counted and properly regulated. That said, closing the border--especially a thorough "East-German" approach--will be a very expensive and tedious affair. There must be a better way.

That said, closing the border–especially a thorough “East-German” approach–will be a very expensive and tedious affair. There must be a better way.

Absolutely. We need to have a way for the needed labor to come in legal so the process and be regulated. Then we need to take away the demand for illegal workers - i.e. sending employers to jail.

pardon the poor spelling --meant to say "secession"

HARM--People get killed in wars--women and children are not legitimate combatants. Nor was it legitimate to deny the South infrastructure to deliberately impoverish them after the war. Not only was the South not reconstructed after 50% of the property was destroyed by Union forces, they did not receive any development until the New Deal. Deliberating inflicting generations of suffering is wrong.

The Civil War was about Slavery? Lincoln made it pretty clear more than once that it was not. You're just using the tactic of blaming the rape victim. Certainly, waging war on women and children was not to free the slaves.

What do you call a man who uses force to impose his rule on a people who deomcratically elected their own government? Dictator.

Were are founding fathers wrong when they decalred independence? Why would their children and grandchildren be wrong in doing the same?

And please no bullshit about George Bush and Iraq------

I don’t see the South seceding so much in the future as, a good number of people, hopefully the majority in the present USA, deciding the statist PC master-planned internationalist regime we live under now isn’t for them.

Is it my imagination or are we getting way OT and close to paranoid Illimunati/ZOG/One-World Government conspiracies here? Besides, if the current government is a "statist PC master-planned internationalist regime", then wouldn't this apply to the dominant neo-conservative majority controlling Congress, the Executive and Judicial branches?

Yo hablo espanol. Viva Las Vegas! (Mejor, Muere las Vegas!)

BTW, Is anyone starting to get my point that we live in interesting times? If you watch the news or follow elections, its almost like a low-grade civil war, its so polarized. Has that ever happended before? Hmmmmm.

Did you know that nationalism is like the Taoist uncarved block? Oh shit, here come the voices.......must....get......away... from... keyboard........

DeoVindice,

As far as the treatment of the South after the Civil War goes, all I have to say is compare the South's fate to the fate of people in other civil wars (French Reign of Terror, Red Army/Stalinist purges, Khmer Rouge, Rwandan genocide, etc.). They could have been treated worse --a LOT worse.

Anyhow, we're getting WAY off topic. This is probably a discussion best left to a Civil War themed blog.

TWIT,

I'm far from being an authority on the Civil War, so I'll leave it to the histrians to debate the cause or causes. Even so, I must ask one question: if it was fought over "state's rights", exactly what "right" was being contested? Could it have been the right to continue the institution of slavery? If slavery had nothing to do with it, then why secede in the first place?

Carpetbagging/Reconstruction was not the North's finest hour, true. Even so, it could have been much, much worse. There were some Union Congressmen calling for the summary execution of Confederate officers and outright annexation of Southern lands as 'conquered provinces'. Fortunately, they didn't prevail, and the South has recovered beautifully.

histOrians, dammit --must use spellcheck!

Reginald,

Sorry about the tangent --you're absolutely right.

Testing

I think I out did myslef. Is there some kind of length limit, or what? I'll try to break up, so that I can set this board straight with the TRUTH!

Reginald: This is relevant to the housing discussion for a number of reasons:

1.Economic historians leverage knowledge of the past to understand current macro-economic events. The HB is certainly driven in part by international trade. For example, Chinese and greater asian mercantilsm drives the credit bubbles causing greenspan's conundrum. US industrialization leading the civil is the model that all national industrialization programs have followed. The Chinese approach has striking differences, actually. But they started from an understanding of the US experience and modified it from there.

2 Much like the cycle creating hurricanes in the gulf for the next ten years, there are economic/political cycles that last 150 years. Economic cycles and cycles of Nationalistic tension run in paralell. Today's polarized political environment can unly be understood in the context of the previous cycle that got us here. Also, you can't understand the motivation of the Red states without understanding their view of US history.

3. Many people have asked what to do with their money while they are bubble sitting. They are going to have to worry about inflation, currency value, and the stability of the US financial system. Rmember, the US dollar is a faith based currency; It isn't worth the paper that it is printed on. Politics and stability determine the value of the dollar.

4. The rise of red state political/economic power is key to understanding the future. Also, the political implications of increased housing stock are significant. The houses will still be there.

In particular, the blue states have built much affordable housing for the red states for free. The red states will use that advantage to steal jobs and educated workers from blue states. That will go into a feedback loop that will crush the economies of the Blue states, which is BAD FOR HOUSING PRICES.

DeoVindice,

I can't argue about the international contribution to the housing bubble --specifically that the huge quantities of bonds and MBS paper purchased by our asian "friends" keeping long rates low, despite Mr. Greenspan's recent rate hikes. Of course, it was AG's original rate cuts and the GSEs that really got the ball rolling in the first place. We can't blame China for that.

As far as viewing the housing bubble as something deliberately created by "Red" states as a way to even the score over the Civil War or Culture War, etc., I'm less than convinced. Housing stock has definitely increased in so-called "Red" states, but they have also increased dramatically in "Blue" states. Plus, there's no evidence that this asset bubble (or any previous bubble) is anything more than the unintended consequence of greed, easy credit and poor government policy.

Let's also keep in mind that all states have a mix of conservative, liberal & moderate voters, and even the "reddest" or "bluest" states have a significant percentage of "other" voters. I tend to think that the whole Red/Blue state thing oversimplifies and overstates the actual degree of difference.

If some red states use the advantage to steal jobs and educated workers from blue states, I say more power to 'em. Heck, I may even join 'em. This would accelerate the unwinding of this bubble, which in my mind is a good thing for families and responsible savers.

I’ve been following this listing on craiglist. The price has been reduced twice (that I know of) and now they’re listing it as a lease option.

Lease for $2100? Who is going to rent that? It does not even have graniteel, although it does have wood floor.

I give up. My shit ain't going through........

Good night!

we have TODAY (hurry, these offers will expire TONIGHT) :

$458,000.00 at a 3.27,% fixed-rate
$389,000.00 at a 3.68,% variable-rate
$478,000.00 at a 3.99,% interest-only
$288,000.00 at a 3.10,% fixed-rate
$147,000.00 at a 3.85,% variable-rate

Clearly introduction rates. Why would anyone lend to a sheep at 3.27% when they can lend to the government at 4.3%?

I give up. My shit ain’t going through……..

Try putting it on a website and post a link. That should work if you shrink the url with tinyurl.

Plus, who the hell would lease option anything in a declining market, granishcmeel or not? That pilgrim would love to lock in todays price on that bitch and start collecting rent.

Lease options are complex arrangements. I bet most people do not understand options when they enter into such agreements. Many will face reality. :-P

Welcome back, Mr. Up. How is the weather down there? Have you seen surfer-x lately? :)

And many will get their faces ripped off by it as well.

Faceless reality? :)

PolishKnight,

God love you good sir!

Your comments are very much at the core of this issue. We took the low road every step of the way. Should we,

Stimulate the economy through investment in cap. ex. to assure our leadership role in the global economy? (High Road) or

Spend our weekends at Home Despot (TM) mimicking what we say during weeknights on Trading Spaces? (low road)

Should we,

Confront our economic and tax policies? (High Road) or

Shop for a ridiculously priced RV? (low road)

I won't beat it to death but you get the idea! Whenever we've been confronted with chioces over the last several years we've plunged headlong towards the low road. Now that our very currency is in peril we're out of low roads to take. Bulls like to point out that the FED could lower rates if their precious bubble deflates too quickly and I suppose that might be an option as long as you don't mind paying $5.75 for a gallon of gas!

Hey, you guys ever hear the term "7 sigma events"? It's what I've been going on about. It says that weird shit happens. I am convinced that we are going to see some things that are years in the making, and it will catch most people off guard. I think that debating whether or not there is a housing bubble is now a moot point. I also enjoy the Schadenfreude of hearing about greedy homebuyers getting their due will partially mitigate the total collapse of the global financial system.

I think in the end, people are going to properly forecast the collapse of this bubble, because they won't have the guts to make dire enough predictions.

Anyone ever have trouble posting with the copy paste method from word? Am I doing something wrong? The world needs to see my masterwork.......and it's never too early to start looking at the end game.

People, please consider the purchase of some firearms. BTW, San Francisco does not have the power to suspend the second amendment. I'm waiting for some patriot who lives in SF to go after those fascists.

Hey, you guys ever hear the term “7 sigma events”?

I was predicting a 10-sigma event for October but it did not happen. :(

Perhaps a tsunami on the west coast?

One created by eco-terrorists to show that "global warming" is real? :)

RE: yield-curve inversion

I remember that when the yield-curve was last inverted in 2000, so many people were discussing why it would not matter.

From Ben's blog:

"Although house prices are down about 10 percent from July’s peak, MAR President David Wluka isn’t alarmed. 'This is not a harbinger of anything I see other than a return to normalcy,' he said."

I also remember hearing "a return to normalcy" in year 2000. :)

I guess a crash is a normal event.

Its interesting that George Bush seemed to really hold the Torch for Home Ownership- I think I heard him 2-3 times talking about how great times were and referring to how many % of americans were proud home-owners. He was really doing a Sales Pithc for people to buy homes.

Homeownership is a good thing. However, entry point is very important. I doubt many people would prefer to be renters regardless of market conditions.

The Term Ownership doesn’t really exist… Never Really has..
It really just different Level Of Control..

It is also a way to manipulate emoticons.

emoticons -> emotions :)

emoticons -> emotions ~No Big Deal its Called Fingers one finger typing faster than the other.. or hitting the wrong key- I’m plagued with it~!!

Or "fat-finger risk"?

http://tinyurl.com/c42yq

It can cost hundreds of millions. :)

I Wouldn’t be the one to write the book I would have to get someone to write it for me. My talent doesn’t apply toward writing.

Jamie or SQT may be able to help.

MAYBE FAT FINGERS ARE MY PROBLEM…. 5 Feet 8-9 and size 12 Shoes and FAT FAT FINGERS Myself to match my Shoe Size.

It is not literal. :)

No, but I’ll bet he’s dropped some of his hard earned in one of my businesses.

extremely doubtful, a true 10 sigma event. I don't spend any money in SLO, and if you're one of the fucks that owns CCS, given the recent surfboard price gouging, I won't even buy a bar of wax from them. Panchos just got 650 from me for a 9'6" stewart hydrohull though.

Besides I thought your business was selling bullhorns so you and your piece of shit yuppie friends can laugh more effectively at all the lower class servants.

So what are you guys’ New Year’s resolutions?

Probably a little more work, a bit less internet.
Especially today--we're cleaning up from a nasty storm.
4 foot of water rushed through downtown San Anselmo.
Lucky we're located on a hill (but just 20ft above sea level)

I bet Jack's out there cleaning up as well.
Spending New Year's in Sonoma, that is...if Russian River doesn't wash us away.

Another storm due tonight before dawn though, so I may still be in for a three sigma event before its all over. Thanks and hope you have a Happy New Year in Sonoma!

Thanks, Jack! Have a great (and hopefully drier) New Years everyone!

Local Bay Area bloggers: be on the watch for driving hazards tonight, such as news trucks and reporters clogging areas of local flooding.