Obamacare

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.

House Speaker Boehner explains in a statement how the GOP will keep fighting the good fight...

"The House has fought with everything it has to convince the president of the United States to engage in bipartisan negotiations aimed at addressing our country's debt and providing fairness for the American people under ObamaCare.  That fight will continue...

By now the general public has long made up its mind about Obamacare, aka the ACA, either positive or negative, and as such any anecdotes about its impact on the broader economy are usually covered by layers of political and ideological bias. One place, however, where the views on the ACA should be impartial is the Federal Reserve. Which is why we were surprised to note that in the just released Beige Book, whose market-moving impact is now absolutely irrelevant as the importance of fundamentals in a time of central planning is "modest to moderate" at best, there were no less than eight instances of "Affordable Care Act."  So in order to further the discussion and debate of Obamacare's impact on the economy from a purportedly apolitical entity, here is what the latest Beige Book had to say about Obama's crowning achievement.

While the House looks set to vote for the Senate bill and kick the can just a little down the road, the Washington Post reports that at least one tea party group is calling for Republicans to hold their ground.

"The Senate deal is a complete sellout.  Speaker Boehner and the House should stand firm and reject this deal to reign in the executive branch’s power before it is too late,” Tea Party Patriots head Jenny Beth Martin said.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell will soon announce an agreement to reopen the government and avert default on U.S. debt, Politico reports, according to several sources familiar with the talks. Here is what that "stunning reversal for the speaker" deal looks like. In short: the can has been kicked for three months, to early February.

Equity investors can't buy enough this morning. The latest rumor - that the House Republicans are willing to consider voting first on an emerging Senate proposal - provided some fillip to an opening selloff. As Politico reports, this move could expedite bipartisan legislation developed by Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. If the House passes the bill first and sends it to the upper chamber, it would eliminate some burdensome procedural hurdles in the Senate and require just one procedural roll call with a 60-vote threshold needed to advance the bill toward final passage in the Senate. Of course, the big question here is "If" the House passes the bill...

It's gotten beyond silly: with less than a day to go until the first X-Date, beyond which if Jack Lew is correct (he isn't) all hell will break loose if the US doesn't have a debt deal in place, stocks couldn't care less, Bills continue to sell off, carry traders only care how big the central banks' balance sheets are, all news are generally shunned and yet stocks have soared 600 DJIA points on Harry Reid's relentless optimism a deal will get done, even though so far none has. Today, as we observed on Monday, we expect more of the same: stocks and futures will ignore the reality that the midnight hour will come and go with no deal in place, but will continue to explode higher as Harry Reid's latest set of "optimism" headlines hits the tape in low volume trading. We expect the first big hope rally around POMO time, then shortly after Senate comes back in Session, around noon. Then for good measure, another one just before market close. Why not: it's not like the "market" even pretend to be one anymore. Keep an eye on today's 4-Week bill auction before noon. It should be a far bigger doozy than yesterday's longer-dated bills.

It’s obvious that we might sometimes have the impression the freedom has no price on it. But, think again.

So much for all the "priced in" hope. At this point a delay past October 17 looks inevitable. But it's ok - despite what all the fearmongers have been saying, the world will not end on October 18, or 19, or later  (which as we said earlier would only embolden the GOP to demand much more, until such time as the market really does crash), because as Goldman admits: 'missing the deadline by a few days would probably be manageable." In short, it seems that no deal by October 17 is now a, well, done deal.

When we first reported to the world the incredible SNAFU that was the Obamacare Helpline number, the reaction was one of disbelief by most until they checked the details and realized that indeed 1-800-F U-CKYO was real. The question was raised, did the US government do any due diligence on anything realted to Obamacare at all? Well, now the Japanese are at it. Meet the newest mascot for Fukushima Industries... as Japan Today reports, this cute winged egg whose name is FUKUPPY. In Japanese, pronounced "foo-koo-pii", unfortunately the english-speaking world may not see it that way... Does it not feel a little like the governments of the US and Japan are now openly mocking its people? Perhaps this should become the new mascot for Washington DC?

With the only thing that matters the level of the S&P 500, we can only wonder at what effect the GOP's discussion (and hopefully Q&A) of their new new bill (with Obamacare issue) will have on the world's key metric... However, it seems the divide is only getting wider (despite the hope/hype) as Boehner comments:

*BOEHNER SAID TO CALL SENATE PROPOSAL A HAND GRENADE

Does it seem like that is the kind of talk that indicates whatever the House priceeds with will be approved by the Senate.

If mere hope of an "imminent" deal starting on Thursday and continuing through Monday, with no actual deal but who cares about details, was enough to push the DJIA up by 600 points, then all it would take to set a new record market high today, is for another day to pass - one day before the October 17 X-Date when one Senator can filibuster the US through the deadline on their own, and when the House still has to have a voice on what the Senate has been doing - without an actual debt deal. After all, the market is so "centrally-planned" all that is needed is knowledge that Bernanke will get to work, and is getting to work to the tune of $85 billion a month, mixed in with some hope. And with today's "market for idiots" facilitating POMO of over $5 billion which guarantees a green close, all that is needed is a complete failure in talks for the SPX to go limit up on even more hopes things will be fine any second now... if not right now.

We all know that it’s not actually the message that is important but the way that the words are interpreted by those reading them. Never has that been more important than with Twitter. You only get 140 characters, which might be too much when we read some of the comments on there. But, for others it’s far from enough. Traders look like they could be needing a few more pages to get the full picture. Just a few days ago traders made a mistake when they read the tweet posted by the Israeli army on October 10th 2013.

Are we on the verge of another major economic downturn?  In recent weeks, most of the focus has been on our politicians in Washington, but there are lots of other reasons to be deeply alarmed about the economy as well.  Economic confidence is down, retail sales figures are disappointing, job cuts are up, and American consumers are deeply struggling.  Even if our politicians do everything right, there would still be a significant chance that we could be heading into tough economic times in the coming months. Our economy is being fundamentally transformed, and the pace of our decline is picking up speed.  The following are 22 reasons to be concerned about the U.S. economy as we head into the holiday season...

With two days to go to until dreaded October 17 D-Day (on which incidentally, very little of note will happen, because as Goldman explained earlier today, that is simply the date past which the Treasury can no longer borrow, but still has some $30 billion in cash which could last to fund the Treasury's needs as long as the end of the month if not longer) Washington is now openly playing with fire. Because for all the hopeful talk of an imminent deal on Thursday, then on Friday, then today, not only is there nothing substantive on the table, but Obama will not even meet with the Senate, let alone the House, until tomorrow morning. At that point there will be about 36 hours until October 17. But what is worse for all the end is nigh-ers, who are absolutely certain the world will end if Congress crosses the D-Day deadline (which, again, as Goldman said earlier "going slightly past the October 17 deadline is entirely possible") is that as The Hill explains, Senate could still miss the debt deadline, assuming there is a debt deal in the first place. Which is a big if.