Crack Cocaine

After East Chicago re-elected an accused drug dealer and murderer as councilman, we thought the bar had dropped as low as it gets for the ignorance of an electorate. But, no! Bridgeport, Connecticut residents just took the proverbial biscuit by re-electing Mayor Joseph P. Ganim - who during his last 'reign' was convicted of 16 felonies including racketeering, extortion, and bribery.

No one should attempt to treat Ayn Rand and Murray N. Rothbard as uncomplicated and rather similar defenders of the free society although they have more in common than many believe.

We simply don’t see any time in the future that would see Americans start spending again at a rate anywhere near what would be required for an economic recovery. However, that is by no means a generally accepted point of view in the financial press; and so these issues must be addressed time and again until people begin to understand, and quit making the wrong decisions for the wrong reasons. People have a right to know what’s truly happening to their lives, and their societies. And they’re not nearly getting enough of it through the ‘official’ press.

One of Chancellor George Osborne’s senior advisers on economic policy has been captured on video smoking crack cocaine in a drugs den. Prof Douglas McWilliams, who last year ­estimated we would all be £165 a year better off by the election, is seen inhaling it through a glass tube at a flat in North London. Red-faced and slurring his speech, he later told the dealer he had “too much” and that he had spent the day on a binge. Two rocks of the deadly drug can clearly been seen on a table beside the dazed professor. The grainy footage, seen by the Sunday Mirror, will heap embarrassment on the Chancellor and raise serious ­questions about his choice of adviser.

The president of the Japan's, and the world's largest, pension fund has a warning for Japan's citizens: “I have no doubt that the economy is in a recovery trend if you look at the long run,” GPIF President Takahiro Mitani said in an interview Friday. Actually, no, it isn't, unless you call a quadruple-dip recession a "recovery." But where it gets bad is what happens when not even Japan's corrupt apparatchiks can deny reality. Because, said otherwise, "Abenomics better work, or else all your pensions are toast."

While the impact of the student loan bubble on the labor participation rate has been extensively covered in the past, there is a just as important question of just what these "students" spend their money on. Among the items revealed: "A U.S. Middle District Court indictment alleges that Price spent much of the loan money on crack cocaine, cars, motorcycles, jewelry, tattoos and video games." And iPhones of course, because someone has to indirectly provide US subsidies to the NSA's favorite company. Now we know one more thing that America's young adults, of whom some 24% expect that their debt will ultimately be forgiven, are blowing Uncle Sam's debt on. The answer: high-school level classes.

• Euro left reeling after ECB's liquidity splurge (Reuters)
• Coalition Emerges to Battle Islamic State Militants (WSJ)
• Ukraine Gas Chief Takes on Gazprom in Race With Winter (BBG)
• Nato leaders fail to agree spending targets (FT)
• JPMorgan Had Exodus of Tech Talent Before Hacker Breach (BBG)
• Mercedes-Benz Sales Rise Despite Weak German Demand (WSJ)
• Secret Network Connects Harvard Money to Payday Loans (BBG)
• ICE looks to crack financial data market (FT)

First it was Italy which, as we reported last week, had decided to "boost" its GDP by adding the estimated impact of cocaine and hookers. And now, riding on the coattails of this economics gimmick designed solely to make the economy appear more solvent, it is Britain's turn, whose Office for National Statistics will also add add up the "contribution" made by prostitutes and drug dealers. According to the Guardian "for the first time official statisticians are measuring the value to the UK economy of sex work and drug dealing – and they have discovered these unsavoury hidden-economy trades make roughly the same contribution as farming – and only slightly less than book and newspaper publishers added together."

• More than 20 dead, doctor says, as anti-China riots spread in Vietnam (Reuters)
• Russia's Gazprom plans Singapore stock exchange listing (Reuters)
• Inside Europe’s Plan Z (FT)
• Ukraine slides deeper toward war as Russia warns to vote (BBG)
• Fast-Food Protests Spread Overseas (NYT)
• BOJ Beat, Officials Could Upgrade Outlook for Capex (WSJ)
• Euro-Zone Economy Shows Weaker-Than -Expected Expansion (WSJ)
• Yahoo to YouTube Ads Spreading Viruses Rile Lawmakers (BBG)
• New York Times Ousts Jill Abramson as Executive Editor, Names Dean Baquet (BBG)
• NYT Publisher Said to Always Have Clashed With Abramson (BBG)
• Google gets take-down requests after European court ruling - source (Reuters)

The following story by David Sirota at PandoDaily is simply excellent. It zeros in on the secretive and rapidly expanding relationship between private equity firms and the public pensions that invest in them. It shows a crony capitalist love affair greased by lobbyist influence peddlers known as “placement agents”, as well as non-public agreements between PE firms and public pensions chock full of conflicts of interest, extremely high fees and underperformance. Unbelievably, in many instances the trustees of the public pensions are not allowed to know what funds the “fund of funds” invest in. This makes due diligence impossible, and in one particularly egregious example it led the Kentucky Retirement Systems to unknowingly invest in SAC Capital despite the fact it was under SEC investigation at the time.The chief villain in this article will be no stranger to readers of this site. It is Blackstone...

• Two-Thirds of Insurance Exchange Enrollees Paid Premiums (WSJ)
• Panic: Criminal Charges Against Banks Risk Sparking Crisis (BBG)
• Did the junk bubble pop: Junk Loans Pulled as Investors Say No After Fed Raises Concerns (BBG)
• CME mulls price fluctuation limits for gold, silver futures (Reuters)
• AT&T Has Approached DirecTV About Possible Acquisition (WSJ)
• NBA sets wheels turning for Clippers sale; Oprah in wings (Reuters)
• One way to fix prison overcrowding: Florida Jail Hit by Deadly Blast (WSJ)
• New Boeing jets hold key to more than half of future sales (Reuters)
• Sony slashes profit estimate by 70% (Guardian)

America’s massive prison system is creating a long list of unintended consequences, some of which will effect all of us in the coming years. To help explain just how bad things have gotten, we’ve compiled this list of the most stunning facts and statistics on the America’s prison system today.

About a month ago, English bank Co-Operative Bank plc, which in October was handed over to bondholders in order to plug a 1.5 billion pound capital shortfall and which added last month it will need to raise an additional 400 million pounds to plug another funding shortfall related to legal and restructuring costs, surprised its brand new owners with news that its full year loss would be a massive $2.2 billion. However the bank's insolvency was just the beginning, and the biggest surprise was not to be unveiled until today when UK prosecution charged Paul Flowers, the banks' former chairman from March 2010 until June 2013, and a Methodist minister, with possession of cocaine and ketamine. Oh and crystal meth.