Home2015June

The Fortune Cookie Knows

June 30, 2015June 30, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy CPI, Economic Growth, France, Hyperinflation, Inflation, Interest Rates, Money Supply, Secular Stagnation, the FED

By Richard Daughty (Mogambo Guru) – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

… Just as I was ready to hit bottom, having dimly decided to give the glories of gluttony one more try (but this time with less bacon and more pornography), was absolutely delighted to read that Ben Bernanke was paid $250,000 to give a speech. A speech!

I was reborn! The reason for my new-found zest for living is because Ben Bernanke is BOTH a total, monumental failure as a former chairman of the Federal Reserve (I mean, look around you!), and an arrogant Keynesian dork-face chump if there ever was one. Yet, look at the loot!

One speech! A quarter mill! I mean, this guy is absolutely, completely delusional by actually thinking, and believing, that laughable Keynesian econometric gibberish (to replace falling consumer spending with more government spending) can prevent the horrific economic collapse that always comes after radical expansions of the money supply that distorts the whole price structure of everything into a bloated, inflationary insanity.

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Bubbles Never Pop Painlessly

June 29, 2015June 29, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Bonds, Central Bank, Fed Funds, Housing Bubble, Interest Rates, Janet Yellen, Leverage, Margin Debt, NYSE Margin Debt, QE, Tech Buubble, the FED, ZIRP

By Michael Pento – Re-Bloged From http://www.Goldd-Eagle.com

Investors are obsessed over predicting the timing of the Fed’s first interest rate hike. Will it raise the Fed Funds rate in September, or wait until next year? But it is far more important to get a grasp on the pace of rate hikes. Will it be a one and done move, or does this mark the beginning of an incremental tightening cycle? Those of us who are not in the inner circle are forced to only speculate.

But one thing is certain: If history is any guide, whatever they do the Fed will get it wrong. Most market commentators place unfounded belief in the Fed’s acumen. But the truth is: I wouldn’t trust the Fed to tell me what the weather is going to do in the next 30 seconds–even if they were looking out the window.

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Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #185

June 29, 2015June 29, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Energy Policy, Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Regulation CAGW, CIRA, Climate Alarmism, Climate Change, Climate Models, CO2, EPA, global warming, greenhouse gases, IPCC, Little Ice Age, Maunder Minimum, NASA, NOAA, Oil, Solar, Wind

The Week That Was: June 27, 2015 – Brought to You by www.SEPP.org

By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project

Delayed Offensive: On June 22, the White House and the EPA announced a new offensive on global warming, now called climate change. “The plan wraps in a handful of federal departments that deal with health, the environment or both, from the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).”

The EPA report announcing the plan asserted global warming/climate change a dire threat to the economy and to human health. One of the bolder claims was that up to 57,000 Americans could die per year from poor air quality by 2100, if action is not taken now. “This report summarizes results from the Climate Change Impacts and Risks Analysis (CIRA) project, a peer-reviewed study comparing impacts in a future with significant global action on climate change to a future in which current greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise.”

The EPA fails to establish that “poor air quality” is directly related to human-caused global warming.

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The Beginning Of “The Ending Sequence!”

June 28, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Central Bank, China, Credit, Credit Markets, Greece, Interest Rates, Markeet Crash, Stock Market, the FED

By Bill Holter – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

This coming week could be very telling. China just ended a disastrous week and finished just whiskers away from entering bear market (-20%) territory. Credit markets all over the world are weakening and yields are rising. Greece will not make their June 30 payment(s) and probably go through a referendum to decide whether or not to flip their creditors the bird in a meaningless vote. In fact, Greece will probably “go boom” this week. Their banks and stock markets may not open Monday morning. Two days later, some sort of plan will need to be concocted to classify their bankruptcy as not a “DEFAULT”, otherwise a $3 trillion fuse to a $1.4 quadrillion bomb will be lit! These and more will be very important “mid-term exams”, any failure will bleed over into derivatives and become “final and terminal exams” with zero chance of a passing grade!

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Don’t Push A Bad Position!

June 27, 2015June 27, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy China, Debt, Debt Bubble, France, GDP, Germany, Gold, Greece, Naked Shorts, Russia, Silver

By Bill Holter – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

“Don’t push a bad position”! This is good advice in many varied quests. It is good advice in games like chess or poker. Also good advice in sports, business, politics, geopolitics and certainly in militarily ventures. Today we will look at two separate issues where “bad positions” are being pushed to the wall!

First, we have an insane situation brewing in COMEX silver. The open interest finally exceeded 200,000 contracts (1 billion ounces). I believe the only other time this much open interest existed was back in 1980 or ’81. This makes no sense whatsoever, the price is again plumbing 4 year lows yet open interest has moved to record highs? The fact open interest has expanded while price has declined is proof positive the “initiation” of this expanded open interest has been by “shorts” but absorbed by “someone” on the other side of the trade. Total global production of silver is only 800 million ounces or thereabouts so COMEX shorts have contracted to deliver 25% more silver than will even be produced globally over the next 12 months. Silver available for COMEX delivery only totals 57 million ounces so they sit on a naked short time bomb of more than 950 million ounces!

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Bank Depositor Protection Act

June 26, 2015June 26, 2015 usissuescom Monetary Policy, Regulation Bail In, Bail Out, Derivatives, Doddd-Frank, FDIC, Financial Collapse, Financial Crisis, Too Big To Fail

By Bob Shapiro

I generally am NOT a fan of business regulation. I believe that simple enforcement of laws against fraud and other crimes should be sufficient to keep businesses on the straight and narrow.

Diligent enforcement of the law, together with every business’ best interest – serve customers, employees, and owners faithfully, or go out of business – should be all that is needed.

However, in many industries, large businesses have captured the regulators and have made a mockery of diligent law enforcement.

With that in mind, and mindful of the daily increase in the risk of a financial meltdown in the US, which would steal the savings of most Americans, I would like to propose a new regulation. (I apologize in advance for breaking one of my own cardinal rules.) But first, a little background.

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Apocalyptic Fear-mongering: Sometimes Rush Limbaugh is Right!

June 26, 2015June 26, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism ButterfliesGreenpeace, CAGW, Climate Alarmism, Climate Change, Extinctions, Global Waarming, Palmisano, Rush Limbaugh

By Jim Steele,director emeritus Sierra Nevada Field Campus, San Francisco State University and author of Landscapes & Cycles: An Environmentalist’s Journey to Climate Skepticism – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

Thirty years ago I never would have dreamed I would or could utter the words of my title. As a left-leaning young ecologist, I hated the way Limbaugh painted all environmentalists as “whackos”! I was a strong believer in the Endangered Species Act as a law that would ensure people stopped to consider win-win solutions for humans and all other species. I believed conservation science could guide us toward wise environmental stewardship, and when married to innovative entrepreneurial endeavors, we could build a better world for all. As director of a university environmental field station, I met people of all political persuasions eager to enjoy and protect the environment, and I believed both the left and right would rally around sound environmental science. So why did Rush label us as whackos? I saw Limbaugh’s polarizing polemics as an attack on the environment. But now I must agree with Rush’s recent view that “Apocalyptic, Fear-Mongering Accelerates the Decline of Our Culture”. In his critique of a newly published paper, “Accelerated modern human–induced species losses: Entering the sixth mass extinction” (hereafter Ceballos and Ehrlich 2015), Rush correctly points out that it is just another example of apocalyptic fear mongering that drives some people into hopeless despair, while forcing others to ignore scientists’ steady drone that the end of the world is before us.

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Green Energy ‘Steals’ From the Biosphere

June 25, 2015June 25, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism Biofuel, Biomass, CAGW, Climate Change, Coal, fossil fuel, global warming, Nuclear, Oil

An Opinion Piece by
Viv Forbes, BScAppGeol, FAusIMM
Scientist, mineral economist and grass farmer.

Earth has only three significant sources of energy.

First is geothermal energy from Earth’s molten core and decaying radioactive minerals in Earth’s crust. This energy moves continents, powers volcanoes and its heat migrates towards the crust, warming the lithosphere and the deep oceans. It can be harvested successfully in favourable locations, and radioactive minerals can be extracted to provide large amounts of reliable heat for power generation.

Second is energy stored in combustible hydrocarbon minerals such as coal, oil, gas, tar sands and oil shale. These all store solar and geothermal energy collected eons ago and they are the primary energy sources supporting modern industrial societies and the vast populations dependent on them.

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Illegal EPA Scheming on Private Email Extended to GHG Rules

June 24, 2015June 24, 2015 usissuescom Uncategorized CAGW, Climate Change, Coal, Collusion, EPA, FOIA, Gina McCarthy, global warming, Michael Goo, NSPS, Pebble Mine, Sierra Club

By Chris Horner – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

Former Secretary of State, and presumptive Democratic Party presidential nominee Hillary Clinton is not the only current or former Obama administration official facing investigation for use of a private email account skirting federal record keeping laws. The list of offenders recently grew longer, with an interesting twist.

In late May, House Science Committee chairman Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX) wrote to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and Department of Energy (DoE) seeking private-account emails of a former key staffer. He was following up on revelations from Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests I made on behalf of the Energy & Environment Legal Institute. Chairman Smith also wrote to the former appointee, a man named Michael Goo currently ensconced on Capitol Hill as a Democratic lawyer.

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Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #184

June 24, 2015June 24, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Energy Policy, Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Regulation, Statistics Australia, CAGW, Climate Alarmists, Climate Change, Climate Models, COP21, EIA, Encyclical, global warming, Lysenkoism, NCDC, Paris, Science, the Pope, Thomas Karl, UNFCCC, US

The Week That Was: June 20, 2015 – Brought to You by www.SEPP.org

By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)

The Encyclical: Early in the week, an Italian newspaper leaked a version of the Pope Francis’ highly anticipated encyclical letter on the environment and climate change. After a flurry concerning the unauthorized release, a final document has been released, which is under review. [There is a bit of irony here because Galileo wrote his scientific works in “vulgar” Italian rather than “scientific” Latin.]

The Pope’s encyclical does not advance science. It offers no empirical evidence that 20^th century warming resulted from human carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions (and other greenhouse gas emissions). The primary, critical hypothesis needed to be tested is that CO2 emissions are causing dangerous global warming, now called climate change. The pope’s advisors do not advance empirical evidence supporting the hypothesis. The failure of the globe to warm is more than sufficient evidence that there are problems with the hypothesis. Local and regional climate change from land use changes are a secondary issues.

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It’s Already In The Market?

June 24, 2015June 24, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Black Swab, central banks, China, Credit, Credit Markets, France, Greece, Grexit, Interest Rates, Russia, Stock Market, Texas, the FED, US

By Bill Holter – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

You have heard the phrase many times “it’s already in the market”, meaning if “something” or some sort of event happens it is already factored in to prices. I was overseas last week, travelled much of the week and stayed in a hotel that had only two English speaking channels …one of which was CNBC. I cannot tell you how many talking heads were paraded forth whom all parroted the same pabulum, “a Greek default is already factored in the market”. Really? REALLY?

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Rates Are Rising For All The Wrong Reasons

June 23, 2015June 23, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy central banks, Euro, Eurozone, France, Germany, InterestRates, Stock Market, the FED, US, US Economy

By Michael Pento – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

Wall Street carnival barkers are relishing in the fantasy that the economy has finally achieved escape velocity. Therefore, they accept with alacrity that this is the primary reason why interest rates have started to rise. However, the fact still remains for the first half of 2015 GDP growth will probably be less than 1%.

GDP contracted by 0.7% in the first quarter of 2015. The Atlanta Fed, whose GDP Now calculation has been on the money, now sees second quarter growth at 1.9%. Therefore, it is prudent to conclude the most optimistic case for growth in the first half of the year will be about 1%. Of course, the perpetually upbeat economists on Wall Street are always convinced the economy will skyrocket in the second half of each year. But still, if the Atlanta Fed is correct—and it looks like it will be spot on given the anemic data already released for April and May—annualized GDP for the first two quarters of 2015 will be running at a pace that is less than half of the 2.2% growth averaged since 2010.

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Will Seizure Of Russian Assets Hasten US Dollar Decline?

June 22, 2015June 22, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy Asset Seizure, Belgium, Chin, France, Obama, President Obama, Putin, Russia, Ukraine, US, Vladimir Putin

By Ron Paul – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

While much of the world focused last week on whether or not the Federal Reserve was going to raise interest rates, or whether the Greek debt crisis would bring Europe to a crisis, the Permanent Court of Arbitration in The Hague awarded a $50 billion judgment to shareholders of the former oil company Yukos in their case against the Russian government. The governments of Belgium and France moved immediately to freeze Russian state assets in their countries, naturally provoking the anger of the Russian government.

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The Twilight of Cash?

June 21, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Capital, capital controls, Cash, Fiat Currency, Fiat Money, Gold, paper money, Silver, the FED

By Andy Sutton – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

Many decades ago you could walk into almost any bank with a bundle of cash and exchange it for a predetermined amount of gold and/or silver. Cash was used because of its portability, light weight, and the confidence of the citizenry that it was as good as gold. I’m sure you already know where this is going. Fast forward to present day and look around you at the plight of cash. It is now redeemable for nothing, is essentially worth nothing, has zero intrinsic value, and despite ludicrous measures, is rather easily counterfeited. So the question I’m going to pose is this: Why oh why would banks, the USGovt, and the global establishment want to outlaw and abolish something that is already a proxy for slavery and servitude? The dollar (and all paper currency for that matter) has already fulfilled its predestined purpose. A dollar buys a nickel’s worth – quite literally – and still people will break their backs, sacrifice their families, and even take the life of another all in the pursuit of pieces of paper. Why is the establishment so against cash?

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Daily Use of Silver Coins

June 20, 2015June 20, 2015 usissuescom Monetary Policy Dollar, Liberty Eagle Coin, Mexico, Peso, Silver, Silver Dollar

By Bob Shapiro

I was in Mexico a dozen years ago, trying to interest the three parties’ leaders to institute a Silver Backed Peso. The country was ideally situated at the time, with a National Debt and GDP that were significant but small enough to allow a reasonably large amount of Silver coinage to solve their problems. And, Mexico was – and is – the world leading country in the production of Silver.

My suggestion was simple:

Amass a Silver stockpile of a couple of billion ounces
Allow purchases to increase the price of the metal – then at the low price of $4.50 an ounce – to perhaps $100 an ounce
Use the knowledge of the program to gain price advantage and profits in related markets, such as Silver stocks
When the time was right, introduce a Peso Monetary Coin system, letting the rest of the world know that the previous purchases would NOT be unwound as Silver bullion sales – with Silver Coins bearing a specific Peso denomination
Continue Silver purchases so long as the Price of Silver was below the foreign exchange value of the Silver-backed Peso

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Unions Seek Exemptions from Minimum Wage Laws

June 19, 2015June 19, 2015 usissuescom Regulation AFL-CIO, Automation, Exemption, federal minimum wage, Higher Costs, Liberals, Los Angeles, Minimum Wage, Socialists

By Michael Greibrok & Logan Albright – Re-Blogged From Freedom Works

Since the first federal minimum wage went into effect in 1938, there have been people calling for an increase. Recently, there has been a push for a $15 hourly minimum wage at the federal level, as well as within various state and municipalities. Many of these calls for minimum wage hike have been led by, and funded by, unions. One in particular, Raise the Wage, called for a $15.25 minimum wage in Los Angeles and was funded by unions, including AFL-CIO.

While unions have been fighting for increasing minimum wages, they have also been fighting for unions to be exempted from the increased minimum wages. Rusty Hicks, Executive Secretary-Treasurer of the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor, AFL-CIO, argued why union members should be exempt from minimum wage requirements.

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The Climate Wars’ Damage to Science

June 19, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Energy Policy, Regulation ButterfliesGreenpeace, CAGW, Climate Chnge, ClimateChange: The Facts, global warming, Heartland Institute, Hockey Stick, IPCC, Lysenkoism, Michael Mann, NIPCC, Skeptic, WWF

By Matt Ridley – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

(Note: due to the length of this essay, I am only including paragraph excerpts here. See the link at the end for the full essay. – Anthony)

Thanks largely to climate science, bad ideas can persist for decades, and surrounded by myrmidons of furious defenders they become intolerant dogmas. For much of my life I have been a science writer. That means I eavesdrop on what’s going on in laboratories so I can tell interesting stories. It’s analogous to the way art critics write about art, but with a difference: we “science critics” rarely criticise. If we think a scientific paper is dumb, we just ignore it. There’s too much good stuff coming out of science to waste time knocking the bad stuff.

Sure, we occasionally take a swipe at pseudoscience—homeopathy, astrology, claims that genetically modified food causes cancer, and so on. But the great thing about science is that it’s self-correcting. The good drives out the bad, because experiments get replicated and hypotheses put to the test. So a really bad idea cannot survive long in science. Or so I used to think. Now, thanks largely to climate science, I have changed my mind. It turns out bad ideas can persist in science for decades, and surrounded by myrmidons of furious defenders they can turn into intolerant dogmas.

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EPA Clean Power Plan Will Hit Blacks And Hispanics Hardest

June 19, 2015June 19, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Energy Policy, GDP & Employment, Regulation Blacks, CAGW, Climate Alarmism, Climate Change, Cost of Living, EPA, global warming, Hispanics, Job Losses, Lower Income

By Harry Alford = Re-Blogged From http://news.investors.com

The Obama administration, the Environmental Protection Agency and environmental activists frequently claim that climate change will disproportionately affect poor and minority communities. This, they argue, justifies unprecedented environmental regulations like the EPA’s soon-to-be-finalized “Clean Power Plan” to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 30% by 2030.

But what effect will the regulation itself have on minority communities? A new study commissioned by my organization, the National Black Chamber of Commerce, answers this question. The Clean Power Plan will lead to lost jobs, lower incomes and higher poverty rates for the 128 million blacks and Hispanics living in America. This should serve as a warning to federal and state lawmakers as they prepare for this sweeping regulation to go into effect in the coming months.

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Why Stocks Are Not “Cheap Relative To Bonds”

June 18, 2015June 18, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Bond Yields, Interest Rates, Investments, Market Bubble, Market Valuation, Stock Market, stock valuations, Stocks, the FED

By Dr. John Hussman – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

One of the constant refrains we hear at present is that while stocks may be richly valued on an absolute basis, they are “cheap relative to bonds.” At least one professor recently told students that valuations are meaningless because the P/E on cash is 100. Technically, with T-bill yields at just 0.01%, the P/E on cash is more like 10,000, but let’s not quibble. Using simple P/E ratios or inverted interest rates as a standard of value only makes sense if you have no appreciation for how securities are valued. By this kind of standard, I would advise these students to propose that their professor give them each $100 in return for a promise of a single payment of $2 next year, on the argument that the P/E of 50 is a fraction of the “P/E on cash.” The immediate objection – “but, value isn’t just about the coming year” – is the beginning of insight.

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The Value of Prices

June 17, 2015June 17, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Education, Energy Policy, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Regulation, Taxes & Spending Adam Smith, Bob Shapiro, Commodities, Dollar, EPA, Gold, Interest Rates, Prices, Regulation, Silver, the FED, War on Energy

By Bob Shapiro

Prices convey information within an Economy. Prices distill all the known, and unknown, factors affecting the availability of things we might choose to buy.

Generally, if Price goes up, we will tend to purchase less of an item, while if Price goes down, we’ll buy more. But why does Price go up or down?

Let’s look at an example. Last year, pig farmers suffered through an epidemic (of the pigs, not the farmers), which caused a significant percentage of the animals to be destroyed.

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New Project Makes Theories and Writings of Legendary F.A. Hayek Accessible to New Audiences

June 17, 2015June 17, 2015 usissuescom Education, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Regulation, Taxes & Spending Economic Freedom, Essential Hayek, F A Hayek, Hayek, Road to Serfdom

By Donald Boudreaux & Jason Clemens – Re-Blogged From the Fraser Institute

A new book, supported by a website and animated videos, makes the ideas of Nobel laureate economist F.A. Hayek easily accessible for a new generation.

Published by the Fraser Institute, the Essential Hayek book and website are being released five years after Hayek’s classic 1944 book, The Road to Serfdom, unexpectedly rose to Number 1 on the Amazon best-seller list.

Hayek, who died in 1992, has long been considered one of the most influential thinkers of the 20th century and his work still resonates with economists and scholars around the world today.

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Why The Fed Is Afraid To Raise Interest Rates

June 17, 2015June 17, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy CAPE Ratio, Dot Com Bubble, Interest Rates, PE Ratio, PEG Ratio, Price to Earnings Ratio, Q Ratio, S&P 500, S&P500, Stock Market Bubble, the FED, Wilshire 5000

By Michael Pento – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

Even though the major stock market averages are flat for the first six months of the year, by nearly every measure the stock market is still extremely overvalued. This point is not lost on Ms. Yellen and company, as the Fed Chair herself has recently assented that the current value of stocks are “quite high”. Given this, the Fed must privately be afraid that even a small change in the Fed Funds Rate could serve as the needle that pops the massive bubble in the stock market.

Exactly How Overvalued Is This Market?

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Solar Fossil Fueled Fantasies

June 16, 2015June 16, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Energy Policy, Regulation CAGW, Climate Change, Environmental Policy, global warming, Ivanpah, Solar, Solar Power, Solar Thermal

By Willis Eschenbach – Re=Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

Sometimes when I’m reading about renewable technologies, I just break out laughing at the madness that the war on carbon has wrought. Consider the Ivanpah solar tower electric power plant. It covers five square miles in Southern California with mirrors which are all focusing the sun on a central tower. The concentrated sunlight boils water that is used to run a steam turbine to generate electricity.

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Nevada Passes Universal School Choice

June 16, 2015June 16, 2015 usissuescom Education, Regulation, Taxes & Spending Competition, Education, Education Choice, Entrepreneurship, Innovation, Market Power, Monopoly, poverty, Regulation, Subsidies, Vouchers

Vouchers for everyone!

By Max Borders – Re-Blogged From the Foundation for Economic Education

Nevada is changing everything. According to the NRO,

Nevada governor Brian Sandoval [recently] signed into law the nation’s first universal school-choice program. That in and of itself is groundbreaking: The state has created an option open to every single public-school student.

Even better, this option improves upon the traditional voucher model, coming in the form of an education savings account (ESA) that parents control and can use to fully customize their children’s education.

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Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #183

June 15, 2015June 15, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, GDP & Employment, Regulation CAGW, Climte Change, EPA, Ethanol in Gasoline, global warming, IPCC, NAS, NIPCC, USGCRP

The Week That Was: June 13, 2015 – By SEPP (www.SEPP.org)

By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project

ICCC-10: Due to The Heartland Institute’s Tenth International Conference on Climate Change (ICCC-10), June 11 and 12, this week’s TWTW will be brief. The conference was co-sponsored by, among others, SEPP and the Virginia Scientists and Engineers for Energy and Environment (VA-SEEE), Next week’s TWTW will include material that was overlooked this week due to time constraints. The conference was sold out about one week in advance. Videos of the keynote speeches and the panel sessions are available at: http://climateconference.heartland.org/. It is our understanding that high resolution videos will be available shortly.

Political: The political high points of ICCC-10 were presentations by Senator James Inhofe (R-Oklahoma) and Representative Lamar Smith (R-21^st District of Texas). Senator Inhofe is chairman of the influential Environment and Public Works Committee and a Senior Member of the U.S. Senate Armed Services Committee.

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Ten Thousand Commandments 2015

June 15, 2015June 15, 2015 usissuescom Regulation Congress, EPA, Federal Register, Regulation, Unconstitutionality Index

By Clyde Wayne Crews – Re-Blogged From the Competitive Enterprise Institute

Ten Thousand Commandments is the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s annual survey of the size, scope and cost of federal regulations, and how they affect American consumers, businesses, and the U.S. economy. Authored by CEI Vice President for Policy Clyde Wayne Crews Jr., it shines a light on the large, growing “hidden tax” of America’s regulatory state.

The scope of federal government spending, deficits and the national debt is staggering, but so is the impact of federal regulations, which now exceeds half the amount the federal government spends annually. Unfortunately, regulations get too little attention in policy debates because, unlike taxes, they are unbudgeted. They are also difficult to quantify because their effects are often indirect.

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The War On Cash: Why Now?

June 14, 2015June 14, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Regulation, Taxes & Spending Bail In, Bail Out, Bank Holiday, Financial Panic, Inflation, Negative Interest Rates, Real Wages, Taxes, the FED, War on Cash

By Charles Hugh Smith – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

Why are governments suddenly acting as if cash money is a bad thing that must be severely limited or eliminated?

Before we get to that, let’s distinguish between physical cash—currency and coins in your possession—and digital cash in the bank. The difference is self-evident: cash in hand cannot be confiscated by a “bail-in” (i.e. officially sanctioned theft) in which the government or bank expropriates a percentage of cash deposited in the bank. Cash in hand cannot be chipped away by negative interest rates or fees like cash held in a bank.

Cash in the bank cannot be withdrawn in a financial emergency that shutters the banks, i.e. a bank holiday.

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Another Me-Too Climate Statement by a Non-Climate Body

June 14, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, GDP & Employment Adaptation, Australia, CAGW, Carbon Pollution, Climate Alarmism, Climate Change, CO2, Coal, fossil fuel, global warming, Mitigation

By Christopher Monckton of Brenchley – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

Several concerned senior members of the medical profession in Australia have contacted the Lord Monckton Foundation to express their disappointment at an opinion survey on climate change circulated by the Association’s President, who proposes to promulgate what would be yet another me-too “Position Statement on Climate Change”.

Though, as one doctor has pointed out, it is welcome that before the Association commits itself to any position statement it is first consulting its members [which is more than can be said for most scientific societies that have issued “me-too” statements on climate change], members are dismayed that they are being consulted on a subject that is wholly beyond the scientific competence or remit of the medical profession.

An eminent specialist at a tertiary training institution put it thus: “I have no expert knowledge in the sciences associated with climate, meteorology etc. I very much doubt if many members of the AMA have the relevant knowledge to come out in support or protest of any particular climate stance … any noise generated by the AMA carries no more weight than any other trade grouping.”

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Big Bubble In Little China!

June 14, 2015June 14, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment AIIB, Asia, China, Chinese Stock Market, ermany, IMF, Japan, NASDAQ, Silk Road

By David Chapman – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

OK pardon the play on a 1986 Kurt Russell action adventure flick entitled “Big Trouble in Little China”. China isn’t little but the bubble is potentially big. Apparently, the Chinese stock market has boomed to a value of $6.5 trillion in the past year. That still leaves the Chinese stock market well short of the NYSE whose value in February 2015 was $16.6 trillion. The Shanghai Stock Exchange (SSEC) is up 58% thus far in 2015 and a 152% since the low of 2014. To put that in some perspective the SSEC was up in 2007 129% to the top in October and had run 293% from the low of 2006. The current market is still about 20% below the highs of 2007.

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NLRB Joint-Employer Cases

June 13, 2015June 13, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Regulation Contractors, Labor, Minimum Wage, National Labor Relations Board, NLRB, Union Contracts, Unions, Wages

By Aloysius Hogan – Re-Blogged From Competitive Enterprise Institute

Your salary, purchasing power, and job are on the line as an independent federal agency takes the core American business concepts of franchising, temporary staffing, contracting, sourcing, and outsourcing to court.

Regular Americans stand to lose a lot as some franchises are regulated out of existence. Franchise businesses provide us food, tax preparation, day care, gasoline, and many other products and services. We all know someone who has worked in a temp agency. Businesses commonly outsource accounting and cleaning. Our cars are manufactured with parts sourced from smaller businesses. Our homes are constructed with subcontractors plumbing the bathrooms and wiring the fixtures. All are at risk.

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The Minimalist Surveillance Reforms of USA Freedom

June 13, 2015June 13, 2015 usissuescom Regulation Constitution, NSA, Patriot Act, Privacy, Spying, Surveilance, USA Freedom Act

On April 30, the House Judiciary Committee will take up a warmed-over version of last year’s USA Freedom Act. The committee has offered a rather optimistic claim of the surveillance reforms the bill will accomplish if passed — an optimism I do not share (and my skepticism is buttressed by the concerns of transparency advocates and other well-informed NSA critics).

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The Warren Buffett Economy——Why Its Days Are Numbered (Part 4)

June 12, 2015June 12, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy BLS, GDP, Interest Rates, Janet Yellen, Monetary Policy, Participation Rate, the FED, Underemployment, Unemployment, unemployment rate, Warren Buffet

By David Stockman – Re-Blogged From http://davidstockmanscontracorner.com

….As reviewed in Part 3, the very idea that 12 people sitting on the FOMC can adroitly manipulate an economic ether called “aggregate demand” by means of falsifying market interest rates is a bad joke when in it comes to that part of “potential GDP” comprised of goods production capacity. In today’s world of open trade and massive excess industrial capacity, the Fed can do exactly nothing to cause the domestic steel industry’s capacity utilization rate to be 90% or 65%.

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Two Suicide Bombers Get Into a Fight – Blow Themselves Up!

June 11, 2015June 11, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy Islam, Pakistam, Suicide Bomb, Suicide Bomber, Terrorism

By Onan Coca – Re-Blogged From http://eaglerising.com

I shouldn’t find this story so deliciously ironic. But I do. The loss of life is never something to be cheered but there are times when it becomes difficult to remember that. Like when a person or persons plans to kill as many innocent people as they can, but instead they just end up killing themselves. In cases like that, we can breath a sigh of relief and actually be thankful that more people weren’t hurt.

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How Could the Fed Protect Us from Economic Waves?

June 11, 2015June 11, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Central Bank, CPI, Inflation, Interest Rates, Money Supply, the FED, Unemployment

By Keith Weiner – Re-Blogged From http://snbchf.com

Mainstream economists tell us that the Federal Reserve protects us from economic waves, indeed from the business cycle itself. In their view, people naturally tend to go overboard and cause wild swings in both directions. Thus, we need an economic central planner to alternatively stimulate us and then take away the punch bowl.

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Europe’s Template For Dealing With Crises (Capital & Border Controls) is Coming To The US

June 10, 2015June 10, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Regulation Bailin, Bailout, Cash, Cash Carry Tax, Cyprus, European Central Bank, Eurozone, Financial Collapse, France, Germany, the FED, War on Cash

By Graham Summers – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

More and more analysts are beginning to take note of the “War on Cash.” However, they’re missing the fact that the actual template for what’s coming to the US first appeared in Europe back in 2012.

Back in March of 2012, when the EU Crisis first began to spin out of control, then Prime Minister of France Nicolas Sarkozy openly called for the renegotiation of the Schengen Treaty: the treaty that established the 26-nation EU as a “borderless” entity in which individuals could move from one country to another with little difficulty and which also made trade among EU members easier.

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The Punch Bowl Stays

June 10, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Taxes & Spending Dow Jones, Interest Rates, Monetary Stimulus, Money Supply, Mortgage Bubble, QE, QE3, Stock Market Bubble, Subprime Bubble, the FED

By Peter Schiff – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

It is well known that I don’t think much of the ability of government officials to correctly forecast much of anything. Alan Greenspan and Ben Bernanke have made famously clueless predictions with respect to stock and housing bubbles, and rank and file Fed economists have consistently overestimated the strength of the economy ever since their forecasts became public in 2008 (see my previous article on the subject). But there is one former Fed and White House economist who has a slightly better track record…which is really not saying much. Over his public and private career, former Fed Governor and Bush-era White House Chief Economist Larry Lindsey actually got a few things right.

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Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #182

June 10, 2015June 10, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Energy Policy, GDP & Employment CAGW, Climate Alarmism, Climate Change, Climate Models, EPA, Fracking, global warming, IPCC, NIPCC, Social Cost of Carbon, Solar, Wind nergy

The Week That Was: June 6, 2015 – Brought to You by www.SEPP.org

By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project

Climate and Health – USGCRP: As discussed in prior TWTWS, April 18, May 16 and May 31, the US Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) released a draft for public review of its upcoming Climate & Health Assessment. The entire document has significant issues, including it is based on forecasts from climate models that have not been validated, it ignores the importance of public health measures in controlling infectious diseases, and it estimates deaths from extreme weather events, namely heat, that cannot be supported by mortality tables. The last findings are contradicted by a far more comprehensive study published in Lancet shows cold weather, not heat, kills about 20 times more people than hot weather. (TWTW May 31, 2015)

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Ending the US Economic Tailspin

June 9, 2015June 9, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Taxes & Spending Budget Deficit, Capitalism, Deficit, Entitlements, Free Market, Interest Rates, Monetizzation, National Debt, ObamaCare, QE, Socialism, Spending, Taxes, the FED

By Bob Shapiro

After WWII, with the advent of the jet engine, a race was on to see who could break the Sound Barrier first.

To pick up the final burst of speed in order to get past Mach I, just over 760 mph, test pilots would go up to 45,000 feet, and then point the nose down and fall to earth. At the last moment, they would “pull up” on the stick, expecting for that to pull the plane up and out of the dive.

Several pilots killed themselves in crashes, until in October, 1947, one pilot, Chuck Yeager, realized that pulling up on the stick was making the plane go down even more.

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1 is Too Many And 12 Are Not Enough

June 9, 2015June 9, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy, Taxes & Spending budget, Debt, Deficit, Dollar, Euro, Interest Rates, QE, QE3, the FED, Yen

By Gary Christenson – R-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

You have probably heard that phrase regarding alcoholics. It applies elsewhere.

One hit of “meth” is too many, but when you NEED it, 12 hits are not enough.
One shot of “mainlined” heroin is too many, and you know the rest of that story.
One burst of monetary heroin – quantitative easing – is too much if central bankers want a financial system that does not debase their currencies. But central banks around the world are “shooting-up” with increasing amounts of fiat currency created from nothing.
A government sale or “lease” of 100 tons of gold is silly, but after years of deficit spending, dumping 1,000 tons on the market is not enough to stabilize fiat currencies.

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An IT Expert’s View on Climate Modelling

June 8, 2015June 8, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism Anthony Watts, Bill McKibben, CAGW, Climate Alarmist, Climate Change, Climate Models, global warming, Models

By Eric Worrall – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

One point struck me, reading Anthony’s fascinating account of his meeting with Bill McKibben. Bill, whose primary expertise is writing, appears to have an almost magical view of what computers can do.

Computers are amazing, remarkable, incredibly useful, but they are not magic. As an IT expert with over 25 years commercial experience, someone who has spent a significant part of almost every day of my life, since my mid teens, working on computer software, I’m going to share some of my insights into this most remarkable device – and I’m going to explain why my experience of computers makes me skeptical, of claims about the accuracy and efficacy of climate modelling.

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State Department Tramples 1st & 2nd Amendment Rights

June 8, 2015June 8, 2015 usissuescom Regulation Constitution, Free Speech, Gun Rights, Internet, Kerry, NRA, Obama, President Obama, State Dept

By Paul Bedard – Re-Blogged From http://www.washingtonexaminer.com

NRA: Gun blogs, videos, web forums threatened by new Obama regulation.

Commonly used and unregulated internet discussions and videos about guns and ammo could be closed down under rules proposed by the State Department, amounting to a “gag order on firearm-related speech,” the National Rifle Association is warning.

In updating regulations governing international arms sales, State is demanding that anyone who puts technical details about arms and ammo on the web first get the OK from the federal government — or face a fine of up to $1 million and 20 years in jail.

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Downsizing Homeland Security

June 6, 2015June 6, 2015 usissuescom Regulation, Taxes & Spending Border Patrol, Department of Homeland Security, DHS, Federal Spending, FEMA, GAO, General Accountability Office, Homeland Security, TSA

By Chris Edwards – Re-Blogged From http://www.downsizinggovernment.org

The department spent $46 billion in 2015, or about $373 for every U.S. household. It employs 186,000 people.

Congress created the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) in 2002 by combining 22 existing federal agencies responsible for a vast array of activities. The largest agencies are Customs and Border Protection, the Coast Guard, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, the Transportation Security Administration, Citizenship and Immigration Services, and the Secret Service.President George W. Bush promised that the new department would “improve efficiency without growing government” and would cut out “duplicative and redundant activities that drain critical homeland security resources.”¹

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Shiller And Goldman Say US Stocks Are Overvalued

June 5, 2015June 5, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Bubble, CAPE, Gold, Goldman Sachs, Market Bubble, PE Ratio, Robert Schiller, S&P 500, S&P500, Silver, Stock Market Bubble

By Arkadiusz Sieroń – Re-Blogged From http://www.Gold-Eagle.com

Goldman Sachs’ chief equity strategist, David Kostin, said that “by almost any measure, US equity valuations look expensive”, which echoed Robert Shiller’s earlier opinion. Is the U.S. stock bubble finally going to burst? How will it affect the gold market?

More and more analysts are warning against a U.S. stock market bubble. Last weekend, Yale professor and Nobel Prize winner Robert Shiller said that in his opinion U.S. stocks were overvalued. Although he is not sure that the current situation is a classic bubble, he clearly sees the bubble element. For example, Shiller pointed out that the CAPE (cyclically adjusted P/E) ratio has been recently around 27, which is high by U.S. historical standards (the only other times it was that high or higher were in 1929, 2000, and 2007 – all moments before market crashes).

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Continued Decline In Money Velocity

June 5, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Central Bank, Depression, Eurozzone, Interest Rates, Japan, Money Supply, MZM, Recession, the FED, War on Cash

By David Chapman -Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

I’d thought I would show another chart of the velocity of money but from a somewhat different perspective. I last showed a chart on the velocity of M1 in a Chart of the Week – The End of Cash? – April, 30, 2015. This is a chart of the velocity of MZM money stock and prior to 1960 money stock. Money stock is the total amount of monetary assets available in an economy at any specific time. MZM money stock is defined as money with zero maturity. It includes notes & coins, travelers’ cheques & demand deposits, savings accounts and money market funds. MZM is not M1 or M2 but a hybrid of the two plus money market funds.

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Self-Made Billionaires

June 4, 2015June 4, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment Billionaire, Capitalism, Eliabeth Holmes, Mark Zuckerberg, Socialism, Wealth, Wealth Tax

By Frank Holmes – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

Many of us are aware that 400 billionaires appear on Forbes’ list of the wealthiest Americans. But if you had to guess what percentage of them is self-made, what would you say? A quarter? A third?

Before I give you the answer, let me posit which way Thomas Piketty might lean.

If you’re unfamiliar with the name, Piketty is the socialist economist whose book Capital in the Twenty-First Century was published a little over a year ago. It was an instant bestseller and elicited much debate not just in academic circles but also the popular media.

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Damn you Microsoft! How to Remove the Windows 10 ‘free upgrade’ Icon

June 4, 2015 usissuescom Uncategorized Microsoft, Spyware, Trojan, Updates, Windows

By Anthony Watts – Re-Blogged From http://www.WattsUpWithThat.com

From the don’t force shit on me I don’t want and prevent me from saying NO department.

Forgive my off-topic rant, but this will be useful for others having this same problem. One of the things I hate about Microsoft recently is the idea that Windows 8, 8.1, and the upcoming Windows 10 is the greatest thing since sliced bread. If you own a Windows based tablet, or a Windows phone, it probably is (I own a Windows 8 based tablet, and I’m able to use it just fine, because Windows 8.1 is a touch based operating system).

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Weekly Climate and Energy News Roundup #181

June 4, 2015June 4, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Energy Policy Alarmism, CAGW, Climate Change, Cold Deaths, global warming, Heat Deaths, Hot Spot, IPCC, Lancet, NIPCC, Pressident Obama

The Week That Was: May 30, 2015- Brought to You by www.sepp.org

By Ken Haapala, President, Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)
Climate and Health – Lancet: The British medical journal Lancet released what is billed as the most comprehensive study on the relationship between temperature extremes and human mortality. According to the abstract: “Although studies have provided estimates of premature deaths attributable to either heat or cold in selected countries, none has so far offered a systematic assessment across the whole temperature range in populations exposed to different climates. We aimed to quantify the total mortality burden attributable to non-optimum ambient temperature, and the relative contributions from heat and cold and from moderate and extreme temperatures.

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Curbing EPA Abuses

June 3, 2015 usissuescom CAGW Alarmism, Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Regulation Alarmism, CAGW, Climate Change, Climate Models, CO2, Coal, EPA, global warming, IPCC, Putin, Russia, Sue & Settle, US EPA

By Paul Driessen- Re-Blogged From http://www.cfact.org

Russian President Vladimir Putin is outraged that the United States has indicted 14 FIFA soccer officials, accusing them of corruption, racketeering, fraud and conspiracy, involving bribes totaling over $150 million in kickbacks for awarding tournament rights. He says the US is meddling in Russian affairs and plotting to steal the 2018 World Cup from his country. What chutzpah.

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How To Profit From A Bursting Bond Bubble

June 2, 2015June 2, 2015 usissuescom GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Bond Bubble, Depression, GDP, German Bunds, Japan, Recession, Short Bonds, Treasury Bonds

By Taki Tsaklanos – Re-Blogged From http://www.Silver-Phoenix500.com

Recent economic data do not show much strength, at least not in the U.S. The Q1 Gross National Product in the U.S. pointed to an economic contraction of -0,7%. It was the second consecutive year in which the economic activity declined quarter-on-quarter. That has not happened since the credit crisis of 2008.

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Bond Bubble Bust Won’t Cause Great Rotation Into Stocks

June 2, 2015June 2, 2015 usissuescom Foreign Policy, GDP & Employment, Monetary Policy Budget Deficit, Central Bank, Debt, GDP, Interest Rates, National Debt, Portugal, the FED

By Michael Pento – Re-Blogged From http://www.pentoport.com

For the first time in its country’s history, Portugal sold 6 month T-bills at a negative yield. The 300 million euros ($333 million) worth of bills due in November 2015 sold at an average yield of minus 0.002%. A negative yield means investors buying these securities will get back less money from the government than they paid when the debt matures.

To put this in perspective, the 10 year note in Portugal now yields just 2.38%, down from 18% a mere three years ago. Back in 2012, creditors grew wary of the countries referred to as PIIG’s (Portugal, Ireland, Italy and Greece) and their ability to pay back the massive amounts of outstanding debt. Consequently, creditors drove interest rates dramatically higher to reflect the added risk of potential defaults.

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