Archive - Oct 16, 2013

How Many Constitutional Freedoms Have We Lost?

For those wondering, here is the full final roll call of the vote to extend the debt ceiling and temporarily end the government shutdown:

And so, in the proverbial 11th hour, or technically 10th hour and 10th minute before the midnight of the X-Date, the House gets the necessary 216 votes to pass the Senate bill to raise the debt ceiling, and in a final 285-144 tally, in which 87 Republicans voted yea to 144 GOP noes as all 198 Democrats vote yea, has agreed to restore funding.  Next up: the BLS random number generator starts cranking again and informing everyone in just how sorry a state the economy finds itself, which of course is bullish for stocks because it means that the taper is indefinitely delayed, potentially until June 2014. Also next up, as the emergency Treasury measures are netted out against the new debt limit, it means that once the new Daily Treasury Statement hits, the total US Federal debt will be just at, or over $17 trillion. Rejoice.

Doug Casey first met Ron Paul 30 years ago. In this wide-ranging interview, Casey discusses how the "born libertarian's" ideas have changed in that time...

Accute Wiretap Ear spotted...

Given the relatively late hour there is little time for theatrics as the Senate passed the Bill to save the universe for three more months... and, already pre-approved by a confident President Obama, tosses the hot potato over to the House for rubber-stamping (or not)...

Starting at 925ET, there will be one hour of debate...

We have heard all day long what a dismal wreck the Republican Party is about to become, or has, courtesy of the "Wheel of Misfortune" among others. In light of this "fold" we though the following "infographic", courtesy of Jim Quinn's Burning Platform, would help with a "fair and balanced" perspective of just how irresponsible Washington has become, and that at the end of the day, there is no difference between "our" team and "their" team.

Once upon a time the person that ended up with the Nobel Prize for whatever it might have been was always the single person to be left standing on the podium in the number one position.

As it appears the can will be kicked once again, we thought it worth reflecting briefly on the possibility that this farce eventually ends in court (whether in 3 months or some time after that). While the Obama administration has ruled out the use of the 14th Amendment (and the mint-the-coin idiocy has been dismissed for its lifting-the-veil reality), Tangent Capital partners' Bob Rice explains in this brief Bloomberg TV interview his perspective on the legal, political, and market responses to going down this route. Rice goes on to discuss the 14th Amendment's implications (not great), and ends by pointing out the futility of what many are calling for..."The monetary system is a confidence game and if we get rid of the debt ceiling altogether, there is a realistic question (asked by the rest of the world) as to how much discipline we are going to have."

Time for the victory lap?

No surprise here:

• *SENATE VOTES 81-18 TO END GOVERNMENT SHUTDOWN, LIFT DEBT LIMIT

Here is the full list of "nays"... and off we go to The House...

The last few days have seen a great rotation in T-Bill markets. That rotation, as the chart below shows, has seen short-dated Bills rally as the new "deal" became closer and closer but the mid-term Bills start to crack higher in yield. Based on press reports, the short-term debt ceiling extension expected to be passed by Congress would suspend the debt ceiling until February 7. However, as Citi notes, Feb. 7 would only be a "soft" deadline since Treasury would then be able to engage in "extraordinary measures" to open up "headroom" under the debt ceiling.

Legitimate revolution takes time, patience and fortitude. Unfortunately, this is a strategic concept that is lost on many Americans today who suffer from a now common ailment of attention deficit disorder and an obsession with immediate gratification. Even some who have their hearts in the right place and who work to defend and resurrect our nation’s founding ideals seem to believe that any action to defeat corrupt oligarchy must be effective immediately, otherwise, it’s not worth the attempt. History, of course, teaches us the opposite. As things stand at this moment, though, the death of the system is not something to cheer, no matter how much we might wish it to crumble under the weight of its own criminality. The collapse of the existing system will not be the end of our troubles, only the beginning. Chaos always opens doors for evil men, and they will certainly take full advantage of the chaos triggered by shutdown, default or continued inflationary debt spending. We must make ourselves ready to resist by making ourselves separate from the monster we plan to fight. Crisis waits for no one, and on the path our nation now walks, crisis is assured.

Debunking Government’s Justification for Mass Surveillance

We'll give you a hint, says Nanex: fantaseconds. Fantaseconds, everywhere. This is how High Frequency Trading (HFT) practically minted money during the financial crisis. With no regulators in sight, HFT robbed investors and other traders blind. With very little effort, Nanex has created numerous charts to illustrate the absurdity that markets functioned well during the financial meltdown. Many of the short term oscillations shown in these charts were created by HFT algos to induce a lag and create latency arbitrage opportunities. And yet the regulators could not spot a single one. Even after spending millions on MIDAS.