South Carolina

In more than a dozen states, legislators are pushing for a movement back to a world where gold is considered money. As Bloomberg reports, lawmakers in Arizona are poised to follow Utah, which authorized bullion for currency in 2011. Similar bills are advancing in Kansas, South Carolina and other states to recognize gold and silver coins as legal tender. "The legislation is about signaling discontent with monetary policy and about what Ben Bernanke is doing," which seems confirmed by the recent shift in Texas to bring its gold back from the New York bank warehouse. The new measures would give "people the option of using money that won’t lose any purchasing power to inflation," one supporter of the bill explained, with another adding, "there is a fear that the government, or Bernanke in particular and the Federal Reserve, is pursuing a policy that will lead to the collapse of the dollar." The U.S. Constitution bars states from coining money and also forbids them from making anything except gold and silver coin tender for paying debts. Advocates say that opens the door for the states to allow bullion as legal tender.

Starting at 1147ET, Rand Paul began his James-Joycean discussion on US-based Drone strikes, six hours later (and with some minor aid from Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT) and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX)), he is still going. Have you ever felt so strongly about something that you were willing to talk about it for over six hours? From Cruz's note that today is the 177th anniversary of the fall of (or stand at) the Alamo to Paul's rhetorical (we think) question to the President: "Are you going to just drop a hellfire missile on Jane Fonda?" We suspect the night is yet young as the snowquester continues.

As the video denotes below, here we have big brother traded on an exchange

While it is not news that the GOP has proposed a temporary debt ceiling extension that would suspend the provisions of the debt ceiling target until May 19, as was reported last week, however which would demand that the Senate do something unthinkable, and something it has not done for 4 years, namely pass a budget by April 15, it is news that as The Hill reports, the vote to suspend the debt ceiling in the House will take place "as soon as Wednesday." From The Hill: "While past measures to address the debt limit have simply increased the borrowing cap, the House bill would actually suspend the debt limit for three months. Then, on May 19, the debt limit would be automatically increased from $16.4 trillion to accommodate whatever additional borrowing the Treasury had done during that time frame." As we explained last week, this is merely a plan to shift fiscal (ir)responsibility into the Democrat camp, as it is virtually impossible that America can have a budget now or ever again. After all with $1 trillion deficits as far as the eye can see, the possibility to bluster and claim one is fiscally responsible while demanding $4 trillion in debt until 2016, will hardly fool the majority of the people any more of the time. Sure enough, Pelosi's response has made it quite clear this entire plan is DOA: "the proposed three-month debt- limit increase does not relieve the uncertainty faced by small businesses, the markets and the middle class. This is a gimmick unworthy of the challenges we face.”

What a long and wild ride it has been since then and the forks in the road have been marked with turmoil, disdain and an ever increasing amount of debt for this small nation. The solution for each and every problem has been more money appended by more taxes and more austerity measures and the Greeks keep lining up and will keep lining up until the cash dries up and then other conclusions will be found. You may think it is a never ending story and that the current act will go on forever but that would not be my bet nor do I think it is a likely conclusion. Whether it is the German Parliament or the IMF or some other nation in Europe under the guise of nationalism and prudence who has had enough and rightly says, “That is enough;” there is an ultimate endpoint to this game.

The second update of the day is here, and this one is far less jovial and optimistic than that coming from the seemingly quite cluless Lindsey Graham:

• REID SAYS HAVE BEEN UNABLE TO COME UP WITH COUNTEROFFER
• REID SAYS `WE'RE APART ON SOME PRETTY BIG ISSUES'
• REID SAYS `I WISH THEM WELL' REGARDING MCCONNELL-BIDEN TALKS
• MCCONNELL SAYS HE CALLED BIDEN TO TRY TO `JUMP START' TALKS

Nothing like the fate of the nation in the hands of Joe Biden, who may or may not still be laughing.

A broken safety net is no safety net at all.  

Update: The focus now shifts to the mother, the first casualty of her son's murderous rampage, who was a "big, big gun fan" as the NYT explains, and who went target shooting with her children, one of whom had Asperger's.

As we reported last night, buried inside the NYT biopic of Newtown shooter Adam Lanza was arguably one of the most important missing pieces in the story, at least so far, which could provide clues into partially explaining yesterday's tragic loss of young life, namely that the 20 year old man suffered from Asperger Syndrome, a high-functioning form of autism (two conditions which are being merged in the upcoming update of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM-5) manual of mental disorders), which has been traditionally associated with social communication difficulties, including flat affect, and one which in some clinical studies has been shown to have a causal link to violence. In other words, in addition to the surge in the debate over national gun control and access limitations (ignoring that the perpetrator of the biggest school mass murder in US history - the Bath School disaster - used openly purchased dynamite and no guns, also ignoring that in the US there are roughly 300 million firearms), perhaps there should also be a broad discussion as to the risks of social misadoption of children with autism and other social and behavioral disorders.

Eleven states made Forbes' list of danger spots for investors including California, New York, Illinois, and Ohio. They warned (and with the cliff it is even more critical), if you have muni bonds in these states - clean up your portfolio; if your career takes you there - rent, don't buy! Two factors determine their list of 'fiscal hellholes'. The first is whether there are more takers (someone who draws money from the government) than makers (the gainfully employed). The second is a state credit-worthiness score (via Conning) based on large debts, uncompetitive business climates, weak home prices, and bad trends in employment. Conning rates North Dakota the safest state to lend money to, Connecticut the most hazardous. A state qualifies for the Forbes' death spiral list if its taker/maker ratio exceeds 1.0 and it resides in the bottom half of Conning’s ranking. See below for the 11 states to avoid...no matter what Bob Toll, Larry Yun, Bob Pisani, or Alexandra Lebenthal tells you..

Harry Reid's rebuttal full transcript - ES 1410 as he speaks...

*REID SAYS `WE'RE NOT GOING TO KICK THE CAN DOWN THE ROAD'
*REID SAYS HE HAD `NICE MEETING' WITH GEITHNER
*REID SAYS STILL WAITING FOR `SERIOUS OFFER' FROM REPUBLICANS

The good news is that we can't foretell the future; if we could, it wouldn't be interesting at all.

You've probably noticed the cookie-cutter format of most financial media "news": a few key "buzz words" (fiscal cliff, Bush tax cuts, etc.) are inserted into conventional contexts, and this is passed off as either "reporting" or "commentary" depending on the number of pundits sourced. Correspondent Frank M. kindly passed along a template that is "officially deny its existence" secret within the mainstream media. With this template, you could launch your own financial media channel, ready to compete with the big boys. Heck, you could hire some cheap overseas labor to make a few Skype calls to "the usual suspects," for-hire academics, hedge fund gurus, etc. and actually attribute the fluff to a real person.

Secession:  Exploding Movement, Tempest In a Teapot … Or Something Else?

Rampant Evidence of Electronic Vote Tampering

North Carolina, Virginia, Maryland, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, New York and Connecticut