Cynical Nation

I agree with what Obama wants to do 100%. I hope he taxes the bastards who sold this country out until they are forced to care when gas hits $5 a gallon.

Actually, I would prefer he simply use the military to round them up and shoot them. They are all traitors.

Every Kenneth Lay, every Halliburton, Blackwater, and Big Oil executive, and even Bill Gates who can't employ Americans at the going wage and must have millions of cheap foreigners, even if he has to build a huge new warehouse in Canada to get around American limits -- they should all be kicked the hell out of this country.

The rich don't need to get richer while they are allowed to fuck over America.

All foreign employees should carry the same high tariff as foreign goods that threaten to interfere with Corporate America's huge profits.

Hey! Wait a minute, "the traitors" who own Exxon-Mobil, Chevron, even BP-Amocco are primarily "the little people."

Appx. 65% of the stock of Exxon-Mobil is owned by 401-Ks, 457s and various Pension funds. Much of the rest is owned by small, individual investors.

Likewise, the people responsible for "profiting off the rising price of oil" are also, largely, regular folks. Most of the futures investors (over 80%) aren't big time investors. They aren't "rich," they're just smart enough to see that that's the place where a person can "take a shot," and make some money based on sound research of the facts and the grit to put up the money to bank on your own analyses.

For nearly a decade I've bought unleaded gasoline futures in mid-February and sold them in mid-May to take advantage of the price spike caused by the federally mandated summer blends. It's worked to my advantage EVERY time so far. I was a little concerned this year by McCain's saber rattling about nixing the mandated summer blends, but that didn't happen.

If I'd had a larger liquid portfolio, I'd have bought corn futures a year ago and caught the spike in corn and grain prices this past summer and fall. It's still not a terrible bet that corn, grain and food prices will continue to escalate, as our ethanol program is still underway.

It IS "the right thing to do." It's ALWAYS right to invest wisely, even when (perhaps especially when) others get hurt in the process. After all, individual investors are not responsible for the short-sightedness of others!

For instance, my meager investments in gasoline futures in February predicated on the March summer blend rules, doesn't hurt others, even though I'm, in effect, betting that gasoline prices are going to rise.

It's not my fault that I understand that things like those mandated summer blends will raise the price of gas at the pumps and some other people don't. Their shortsightedness or stupidity is NOT my fault and it's not my responsibility to educate them.

In fact, getting reamed and taken advantage of, is often the very best education a person can get!

Moreover, there isn't a politician alive who isn't beholden to the investor class, and primarily as big investors rightly claim, "The investor class includes 80% of Americans."

And it does! It includes small investors, who, just like the "big boys," will short the American economy should taxes rise and Keynesian policies be initiated...and THAT is what would initially tank a Keynesian economy here! The investor class simply wouldn't have it. When that group holds back on investments, there's less Venture Capital available for new businesses and fewer new businesses mean fewer jobs....and a downward tailspin.

And we can't forget that the investor class includes many "non-investors," who have a stake in various pension funds, 457s and 401-Ks.

The irony about what you say ("I hope he taxes the bastards who sold this country out until they are forced to care when gas hits $5 a gallon") is that the "heavyweights," those big investors, won't feel $5/gallon gas at all....they COULD easily pay $10/gallon!

In fact, there are many who'd see opportunity in the misfortune of those who couldn't pay the freight (that's many of us regular folk Barely), just as there've been many opportunities in the foreclosures market lately.

It's going to be those earning between $60,000 and $200,000 a year who're going to get smacked by those tax hikes....and as you'd say, "Rightly so."

A lot of big investors hate the fact that the Tech Bubble and the Housing Bubble made so many common people look like winners for awhile. The phrase you hear a lot now is "clearing the board," as in, "It's time to clear the board and return to the natural order of things, where there are only the quick (the very rich) and the dead or doomed (everybody else)."

Much like yourself and most others around these parts, I'm in the "everybody else" category, although I seem to be quite a bit more sanguine about it than you are.

Of course, I see the shearing coming and realize that, either way, there's not much we're going to do about it.

Hell, Henry Paulson (Goldman Sachs), Jon Corzine (Goldman Sachs), Josh Bolton, Robert Rubin are all major public policy makers who've served in many administrations on BOTH sides of the aisle and are "investors FIRST and FOREMOST."

In the end investors in high government positions, "Isn't a BAD thing, it's a GOOD thing"...for all of us.

Nice try, liar.

The "little people" hold the kind of stock that is worthless when the "Kenny Boy" Lay types (Republicans, friends of Bush) insider sell their premium shares after destroying the company.

The "little people" sure as hell aren't speculators as you suggest. That is for the big boys like T. Boone Pickens.

While the stock market does create wealth for insiders, in the past decade the "little guy" has lost his shirt. Wow, bad luck!

Leave it JMK to be an apologist for criminals.

I like how he even quotes Goldman Sachs, the firm that had all tech stocks as STRONG BUY while they were selling off their corporate, personal, and high end client holdings, allowing the sacred (little guy) "investor" to eat huge losses.

Go ahead, JMK, try to argue this with actual facts.

You are a liar and a moron.

Actually Barely, we NEED Exxon-Mobil, we NEED Chevron and Microsoft, and the vast majority of American companies that are being run by the best and brightest America has produced.

In fact, it's irrefutable that we need MORE private sector activity and LESS public/governmental activity.

Goldman Sachs produced the likes of Clinton economic guru Robert Rubin and Bush economic guru Henry Paulson....both stalwart Supply-Siders.

And indeed over 80% of those holding unleaded gasoline futures and corn futures, etc., are regular work-a-day folks.

Those "shrewd investors" may know that their buying those futures is betting on the price of those commodities to rise, as certainly investor psychology has as much to do with both commdity and stock performance as anything else, but they're doing "the American thing," which is primarily "looking out for themselves."

For instance, why should I forego buying unleaded gasoline futures in February, to sell them in May?

If I don't, someone else will!

It's not like any individual investment actually raises the price of gasoline or corn or anything else. It's merely a bet, based on a judgment rooted in the fundamentals of that market....sure, if enough people bet that way, prices of those commodities do rise, but it's wrong to blame the people who invest in those things for the coming price rises.

After all, there's nothing at all nefarious, nor criminal about that!

Look, bottomline, you have the outlook of a loser and thus you attract what you expect - lack, loss and limitation....and that's exactly what people who embrace negativity deserve.

LOL! Try embracing reality, you fucking dolt.

Do you seriously imagine, and contend, that the stock market isn't a thousand times more rigged than a Vegas casino? Wait, you probably don't think casinos are rigged either, do you? You might even think that Three Card Monty is reasonably fair.

I swear, Big Oil runs a couple of commercials on Rush Limbaugh and Faux News and you are here screaming out the talking points. So, it is your contention that "little guys" hold 80% of the unleaded gasoline futures, right?

Now, we all know that not 5% of the "little guys" even know what a future is, so you obviously mean that the "little guys" mutual funds hold 80% of unleaded gasoline futures, right?

Let me explain to you how mutual funds actually work. First of all, not everyone in the fund is a "little guy". Secondly, most funds have more than one "class" of investor, with the "little guys" constantly being screwed by the "big guys", who get most of the return for the risk. The "little guys" are there, in the mutual fund, to protect the brokers and "big guys" from taking a loss no matter how rashly they gamble.

So, it is real traders and speculators with all of the unleaded gasoline futures, and any high risk futures speculation by mutual funds is at the "little guys" risk, but successful gambles are siphoned off to the "big guys" and those Goldman Sachs gurus who managed to screw the "little guys" out of hundreds of billions in 2000 with STRONG BUY on all the tech stocks they were selling off.

Your naivite would be charming, if you weren't such a righteously retarded ditto-lemming.

Actually I directly own Exxon-Mobil stock! I don't know what percentage of Americans directly own stock, but I'd think it's enormous (I'd guess well over 80%?)...

I say that because I don't believe I know anyone who doesn't, except for a few firefighters who don't directly invest, BUT even they're in the firehouse "investment club" where a committee of guys pick some stocks to invest in.....so even they own stock, even though they don't directly invest or chart stocks themselves.

I also buy unleaded gasoline futures every February for the past few years and sell them around mid-May. That, among other things, has helped me add an additional 70% of what I earn in income each year from investments. I was hoping, a decade ago, that I'd be earning the same (100%) from my investments as I do from my work income by now, but that isn't the case, though I'm getting close.

And just as our Pension funds (along with our 401-Ks, 457s, etc) are, by faaaaar the largest holders of Exxon-Mobil, Chevron and the other Big Energy Companies stock, the vast majority of those buying gasoline futures, corn futures, etc., are indeed regular people, like you and me....OK, obviously a little more like me, and a little less like yourself.

"...the "little guys" mutual funds hold 80% of unleaded gasoline futures, right?" (Barely Hanging)

Wrong, yet again!

Mutual Funds are not how regular people invest in commodities futures. In fact, the Mutual Fund is primarily a stock vehicle, not a commodities vehicle. Although I've heard of a few precious metals Mutual Funds, I've never seen a corn futures Mutual Fund.

You remind me of those folks who blame investors for the economic problems around them. I had a guy at work the other day, who objected to me telling guys how they could "make a killing" by buying unleaded gasoline futures in February and selling them off in May - he said, "It's people like you who are helping to raise gas prices! Its commodities speculators who raise the prices of those things by investing or specualting that their price will rise. When enough people bet that way - prices go up. YOU'RE 'hooray for me, the hell with everyone else' attitude is hurting everybody else!"

Actually, despite being largely wrong, he's still slightly more right than you are.

Yes, commodities speculation/investment drives commodities prices and when people buy unleaded gasoline futures, with the expectation of a price increase, they're generally expecting the price of that commodity to rise.

BUT, that investment/speculation ISN'T based on a whim, or a hope that prices rise, but instead that speculation is based on pre-existing FACTS, like demand from India and China is swamping even our increased SUPPLY of oil and the federally mandated summer blends can alwasy be counted on to raise the price of unleaded gasoline starting in March.

So, he's wrong that it's commodities speculation ALONE that's responsible for any given commodity's price rise, as pre-existing facts CAN change. In fact, it's those market facts or parameters that frame, or drive such investments/speculation.

For instance, say we found even larger, retrievable oil deposits beneath our seas off our shorelines (Whoooops! We already have!), but let's say that we began bringing that supply to market and added both Canadian and U.S. oil sands and shale oil to the Supply and say Congress eliminated those summer blends, well ALL THAT would change the speculation dynamic.

If all that happened AFTER I and people like me, had invested in unleaded gasoline futures that would be personally ruinous. If it happened before we invested, I'd bet that most of us would simply switch to "shorting" those futures - in effect, betting that the price of unleaded gasoline would go down.

It's highly unlikely that I'd ever get caught in the former scenario, as information is so free flowing now-a-days (and that's good)...we'd all know, well ahead of time, if Congress were going to scuttle those summer blends, or if the U.S. were going to allow Big Energy companies to harvest more oil offshore and build more gasoline refineries within the continental U.S. and be able to invest/speculate accordingly.

I don't know it it'll help (it's hard for reading to help when you refuse to accept the facts), but read Ben Mezrich's Rigged - it gives a pretty clear picture of how a mercantile exchange (commodities market to you) works....and it's a very easy read, in that it reads like a novel, so it won't tax you all that much.

About 50% of Americans own stocks or mutual funds, acc to the Fed. More worrisome is that 68% own their own houses (some degree of equity).
Economy went sour in 2000-2002 when stocks went down. Imagine what'll happen if housing continues going into the toilet.

WoW! I actually thought it would be a lot more than 50%....and I don't mean Mutual Funds.

I do have a few Vanguard Funds (Health and Energy), but I'd have thought more people owned stock, though 150 million is a lot of people, especially if you caount the underaged and very elderly among those who most likely don't.

The worst idea I've seen (OK, I'd call it a tie with the Keynesian "stimulus package that passed in February) concerning the Housing slump is "inflating the money supply in order to bolster the price of housing."

THAT would be a real disaster!

Every PROBLEM we've had post-Gingrich has been a "Big Government" one.

From the reckless spending on the Prescription Drug Boondoggle and the NCLB Act, in the midst of a very expensive military action abroad and a huge security build-up at home.

Predicting gloom is not the same as wishing for it (I don't), but given that Big Government policies have created our current mess, the even BIGGER Government policies advocated by the likes of Clinton and Obama are certain to make the current mess look like "halcyon days."

Especially with tax hikes incentivisng higher income people to defer MORE of their income in tax deferred vehicles (reducing revenues) and with Cap Gains and Dividend Taxes curtailing investment, especially venture capital investment.

Now I DO want Keynesian policies to fail, but I don't wish harm on our economy.

It's just a matter of, "If we choose that pathway, Carter-styled Stagflation would appear virtually inevitable."

WoW! I actually thought it would be a lot more than 50%....and I don't mean Mutual Funds.

I do have a few Vanguard Funds (Health and Energy), but I'd have thought more people owned stock, though 150 million is a lot of people, especially if you caount the underaged and very elderly among those who most likely don't.

The worst idea I've seen (OK, I'd call it a tie with the Keynesian "stimulus package that passed in February) concerning the Housing slump is "inflating the money supply in order to bolster the price of housing."

THAT would be a real disaster!

Every PROBLEM we've had post-Gingrich has been a "Big Government" one.

From the reckless spending on the Prescription Drug Boondoggle and the NCLB Act, in the midst of a very expensive military action abroad and a huge security build-up at home.

Predicting gloom is not the same as wishing for it (I don't), but given that Big Government policies have created our current mess, the even BIGGER Government policies advocated by the likes of Clinton and Obama are certain to make the current mess look like "halcyon days."

Especially with tax hikes incentivisng higher income people to defer MORE of their income in tax deferred vehicles (reducing revenues) and with Cap Gains and Dividend Taxes curtailing investment, especially venture capital investment.

Now I DO want Keynesian policies to fail, but I don't wish harm on our economy.

It's just a matter of, "If we choose that pathway, Carter-styled Stagflation would appear virtually inevitable."