Good evening ladies and gentlemen, welcome to SDA Late Nite Radio. Tonight, for your delectation, here's Duke Ellington and his Orchestra performing Satin Doll:

www.youtube.com/watch?v=SDDCzb3dv_Y

Seems that Al Gore was for biofuel in 2006.

[The Evening Standard can reveal that Branson intends to unveil a major investment in the US biofuels industry by the end of the summer with plans to start production of bioethanol from the extracts of corn, wheat, and sugar cane and beet.

After a private meeting at his Holland Park home with one of America's leading green politicians and Democrat Presidential hopeful Al Gore, Branson recently appeared on the Larry King Live show in the US to announce his environmental conversion.]

http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/news/article.html?in_article_id=410136&in_page_id=2

When I see "extreme weather" (hailstorms, violent thunder and lightning, rain torrents) I look at it and wonder in amazement at nature, me being a relatively insignificant speck on the surface of the planet. Then I think how fortunate I am to be sheltered because of human ingenuity during this display of power that I have no hope of controlling (why would I even want to?).

It looks like others see the same thing and think, "how can I make money off this?".

I was living in Montreal during the 1998 ice storm - it was quite the experience.

Sitting here in Vancouver tonight, with the snow coming down, maybe 2-3inches here now. I've never seen snow in April here before.

This is for you and yours, Cynical Joe:

Oh, the weather outside is frightful,
But the fire is so delightful,
And since we've no place to go,
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

It doesn't show signs of stopping,
And I brought some corn for popping;
The lights are turned way down low,
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

When we finally say good night,
How I'll hate going out in the storm;
But if you really hold me tight,
All the way home I'll be warm.

The fire is slowly dying,
And, my dear, we're still good-bye-ing,
But as long as you love me so.
Let it snow, let it snow, let it snow.

Librano$ Names of Interest: Benoit Corbeil, Joe Morselli, Alain Renaud, Real Ouimet, Denis Coderre, Allan Rock, Brian Tobin, Jean Brault, Paul Coffin and Jean Lafleur, Chuck Guité.
No mention made of Chretien-Martin-Dion-Gagliano, etc.
...-

"Former Liberal official charged in alleged kickback scheme
DANIEL LEBLANC
From Saturday's Globe and mail"
OTTAWA -- Three high-profile Liberal officials conspired to defraud their party of more than $100,000 in 1999 and 2000, with one of them receiving an additional $50,000 in kickbacks to help a businessman who wanted to buy federal land, the RCMP alleged yesterday."
http://tinyurl.com/64sk6w (No comments allowed))
...-

Ex-Liberal apparatchik charged in alleged kickback scheme
RCMP say former organizer of Quebec wing approved $100,000 in fake invoice
http://tinyurl.com/6kdvsu (No comments allowed)

"Former Liberal official charged in alleged kickback scheme
DANIEL LEBLANC
From Saturday's Globe and mail"

Geez, I wonder if the RCMP were the high bidders for "The Lost Last Chapter" on EBay a week or so ago.

Ottawa Citizen - Sat./ The Ontario 18.

How 18 becomes 11. I guess we can only hope that 11 doesn't gradually (or quickly) become 0. If no convictions come out of any of this, it will be a very sad commentary on Canada as a nation.

While we talk about banning baby bottles, our security continues to go south. Even if the ON 18 had blown 3 tons of fertilizer and caused huge damage - would the outcome have been any different for the alleged perpetrators?

Had the investigators allowed this to happen without reigning them in - one could hear the MSM condemnations for months - not to mention the $M claims against the government for inaction.

I can't imagine anyone wanting to be investigating terrorism related activities/issues these days with the judiciary rolling in after the fact and ruling basically that as no one seems to be illegal, it also seems very few people really commit crimes.

Investigators are put in a huge Catch 22 - don't pursue charges unless conviction is guaranteed. The only guarantee in Canada seems to be that the judiciary, in the end, will invoke bleeding-heart justice so why bother in the first place.

If people are close enough to the action for a search warrant to be executed - then any concern about them being "unjustly treated" in the process is misplaced.

Mao Stlong say: Orympics not Red; Orympics Black.
...-

"Chinese troops are on the streets of Zimbabwean city, witnesses say

Chinese troops have been seen on the streets of Zimbabwe's third largest city, Mutare, according to local witnesses. They were seen patrolling with Zimbabwean soldiers before and during Tuesday's ill-fated general strike called by the opposition Movement for Democratic Change (MDC)."
http://tinyurl.com/4x5lke (independent)

"Leading article: The new colonial masters"

"Beijing's willingness to give aid and extend credit without attaching any conditions about good governance or human rights is winning friends across Africa, but nowhere more so than in Zimbabwe. In 2005 Mr Mugabe signed a big aid deal with China. A year later he signed a massive energy treaty, bartering chrome and other mineral concessions for new Chinese-built coal mines and power stations. China is to rebuild Zimbabwe's rail network, provide trains and buses and 12 fighter jets. Last year it swapped agricultural machinery for tobacco. It provides spare parts for military vehicles which are banned under Western sanctions. It has sold water cannons, bugging equipment and a jamming device to block independent radio stations. It even provided all the pro-Mugabe T-shirts in the run-up to the elections."
http://tinyurl.com/4rvauq (independent)

Dear Bob Rae: A letter from a Tamil Canadian

http://dustmybroom.com

Over at the broom an expose of Librano terrorist coddling and vote harvesting:

"Surely, not when your Immigration Minister Judy Sgro, whom I have dubbed as “Canada’s God-Mother of Tamil Tigers” got up on her high horse after the December 2004 Tsunami and announced in parliament, that she would send her Immigration Officers to Jaffna to process Tamil applicants, when it were the Sinhalese and Muslims who were effected most, to bring them over to Canada to bloat the Liberal voter bank. She also said with a profusion of arrogance that she didn’t have to get permission from the Sri Lankan Government to send her Officers to Jaffna. And I told her in a letter to go back to school and study Diplomacy 101, before she embarrasses Canada before the Sri Lankan government would tell her to “go jump in your biggest lake, Lady, and cut out your bullish white mentality.”

* Surely not after this ‘God-Mother of Tamil Tigers’ had to fire her senior staffer, a Tamil Tiger, after he was escorted from her office by the RCMP for suspicions of being a threat to our country, (...)

* Surely, not after the Liberals let the Tamil Diaspora cut a cheque for $7.5 million dollars from a bank in Vancouver in 1994, to purchase 50 tonnes of TNT and 10 tonnes of plastic RDX explosive materials from the Rubezone Ukraine Chemical Factory which was used to bringing down the Central Bank Building in Colombo on January 31, 1996, killing 114 innocent people and maiming for life 1,400 others.""

Almost ten years ago, we were told that, by now, our winters would start to be unrecognizable. Summers would start to be unbearably hot. Due to melting ice caps, cities like New York would start to submerge, with low level areas requiring diking or even evacuation.

One of the responses that has been embraced was biofuels.

Burning our food.

In that ten years:

-Our winters have remained unbearably cold.

-The ice caps are the same size.

- There has been no flooding. Indeed no appreciable rise in the oceans whatsoever. Due to the fact that the modeling was as predicted (by those who know about computer modeling) - completely fraught with unkowable variables, guesses, and hypothesis driven (as opposed to verifiable) conclusions.

And today,

as we burn our food to prevent a crisis that did not exist,

food prices skyrocket and we've created an entirely new population of starving people.

Malaria anyone?

A dose of reality for those who think the US economy is in bad shape,

So far, the Dow has declined about 12% from its record high of last fall. In the Depression, it dropped more than 80%. Unemployment is about 5%. In the Depression it was 25%.

Maybe 2% of mortgages are in trouble, and abandoned homes line some parts of Cleveland Heights. During the Depression, more than half of Cleveland was underwater. Today, one big bank has collapsed. In 1931, 1,400 banks collapsed.

This is worth repeating,

Today, one big bank has collapsed. In 1931, 1,400 banks collapsed.

Read the whole thing here

Almost ten years ago, we were told that, by now, our winters would start to be unrecognizable. Summers would start to be unbearably hot. Due to melting ice caps, cities like New York would start to submerge, with low level areas requiring diking or even evacuation.

I watched split second the other day with Rutger Hauer it was made in 1993, and in the movie set in 2008 it has London flooding because of global warming.

:)

Like David Suzuki sez we're doomed, in fact he said we were doomed a decade or so ago. As long as the money comes rolling in though who cares.

Meanwhile in the real world my snow finally melted off my lot yesterday Yahooo!!!!!

Sure, "Mao Stlong" say China do good, make more fliends, get all the business, corner the malket on porrution.

Where are common sense and sanity hiding out in this 21st century.

maz2: "Librano$ Names of Interest: Benoit Corbeil, Joe Morselli, Alain Renaud, Real Ouimet, Denis Coderre, Allan Rock, Brian Tobin, Jean Brault, Paul Coffin and Jean Lafleur, Chuck Guité.
...No mention made of...Gagliano, etc."

Hmmmm...strange, these folks have not become household names like Chuck Cadman, Brenda Martin, Andre Thouin, and all of the other 15-minutes-of-fame "celebrities" of the 3-week-wonder-scandals-of-the-week emanating from the fevered brains of the desperate and morally bankrupt Librano$.

Oh, yeah. I forgot: The Librano cads and cons find shelter under the wings of the MSM flying monkeys, whereas the CPC and Prime Minister Stephen Harper are fair game and target practice all of the time.

Where else have we seen this kind of widespread collusion between political parties and news organizations for the purpose of swaying the vote? In Communist countries?

"CBCPravda" fits like a glove.

If Dr. Mengele Suzuki was really afraid of global warming he would have moved out of his house on Kitsalano beach.

biff: "And today, as we burn our food to prevent a crisis that did not exist, food prices skyrocket and we've created an entirely new population of starving people"...

...and an entirely new population of get-rich-quick-con-artists like Dr. Fruitfly and AlBore.

Like they say, a sucker's born every minute. 'Seems to me, we've got a lot of multiple-birth suckers born every minute.

"I've never seen snow in April here before."
cynical joe @ 3:51 AM
======================
Lucky you. The only month I have never seen snow is July. And I'm sure that's just a stroke of luck.

Global warming???? Not in Edmonton.
Yesterday a flock of robins were drinking from and flapping playfully in the water in our yard pond.
Today they are walking on the snow covered ice, compliments of 10 below and snow.

In May 1976, I can remember driving through a heavy snow storm on the upper levels highway of Vancouver.

Hey Biff, sure the whole man-made global warming thing is overblown (It’s -8 and snowing like crazy here in southern Alberta today), but biofuel production isn’t causing starvation.
Governments subsidizing and dumping cheap grain into world markets helps to kill the local agriculture in those markets as well as lower the price of grain for other farmers around the world. At least biofuel production doesn’t lower the price of grain. It’s been blamed for all of the increase in price of food, but most of that increase comes from the higher fuel cost for transporting it. Droughts in Australia and elsewhere, increased demand from China and India are larger factors.

www.setamericafree.org/wordpress/?p=378

“AFTER corn crop removal for ethanol production the US produced a net of 9.7 million bushels in 2002, 10.4 million bushels in 2006, and 12.2 million bushels in 2007.” Higher grain prices have helped farmers to ramp up production to provide more food worldwide, far greater than any consumption by the biofuel industry.

“At $5/bu, a $2.50 box of cornflakes, which contains 15 oz or corn, contains corn that cost 8 cents when bought from the farmer.” The price of that box of cornflakes goes up far more from oil doubling in price than from corn price rising by the amount it did the last five years.

People starve from governments artificially holding down commodity prices and thereby killing production. Biofuels don’t’ kill people, governments kill people.

hi it is snowing here in Qualicum on April 19, say anyone able to google earth Suzookis mansions????? I don't think deisel davey lives in that tree house with the squirrels.
Bubba

Mao Stlong's extirpated/murdered 70 millions of his own people.
Mao is Mugabe's hero. Mao is Mugabe's role model.
Socialism kills/ murders.
The left is silent.
...-

Mugabe

From comments:

"Catholic Charities estimates that over 3,000 people die in Zimbabwe each week, mostly of starvation. That's 3 times the death toll in Iraq during the height of the violence there."
"I remember a quote from Mugabe:

Mugabe said: "We don't need all these people around here anyway."

Wretchard said: "And the most damning thing about Mugabe is that he wasn't, as Saddam was, at the head of an Army of Millions. He didn't occupy a strategic crossroads in world affairs. Bob Mugabe was nothing but a low-rent, tinpot, no-account and jumped up dictator. No easier target, no less demanding test of the "international will" to uphold human rights could be found. It only took 2,500 French troops to put a stop to the genocide in Rwanda after it had happened. Taking down Bob Mugabe might have required even less.

And that got me to thinking whether all those advocating turning over the prosecution of the war on terror to the UN can be serious. If the UN can't stop Mugabe, what chance do they have against Osama Bin Laden?

None. None whatsoever. The sad fact is that most people must look to themselves and to their legitimately elected representatives for salvation. To hope for protection from the mythical "international community", some strongman, or abasement is only self-deception."
http://fallbackbelmont.blogspot.com/2008/04/mugabe.html

Bubba...that would be an excellent mission for someone in the Vancouver area with a pilots licence...get some aerial pics of the great Screwzuki's estates. I would think those pics would be very interesting. I'd like to see just what the good Dr. and his family drives. I'm guessing it's not a Honda civic.

http://www.insidethecbc.com/prezshadow#comments

"CBC’s new president Hubert Lacroix says he’ll start job-shadowing production teams to help understand how the program production process works."

"....Lacroix also said he’ll attend one of the CBC’s infamous “Respect Workshops” next week."

johnboy: "I'd like to see just what the good Dr. [Fruitfly] and his family drives. I'm guessing it's not a Honda civic."

A horse and buggy...? ;-)

Ahem, friend of US.

The Depression started in Oct, 1929. The banks closures are from 1931.

Bear Sterns closed Mar, 2008.
What will the banking landscape look like in 2010/11?

I'm surprised that the highly educated MS Amity Shlaes can have such impeccable credentials and make such a silly rookie mistake comparison like that.

Maybe you and her should mosey on over to the Reuters newswire and read 'Wall Street Braces for 1000s of Pink Slips'.

Analyst Marzeni expects at least 100,000 jobs losses, rising to maybe 150,000 to 200,000 in the next 12 to 18 months in the financial industry.

USA financial job losses in 2007 was 153,105 jobs.
In London, UK, 40,000 job losses are expected.

Economics 101 - job losses come first, then the bank/company closures.

By the time the credit card losses and the home equity loans are included, the total global financial losses will probably be around $1 trillion.

So why doncha google 'tent cities in the USA' and tell us why this little item is not in the MSM?

It wouldn't be somebody trying to sweep bad news under the rug, would it?

Excellent stuff from Michael Coren, rebutting Polley's whine.
'Kinky Cash'...he also dicusses real censorship that the so-called entertainers choose to ignore.
Mentions Kathy's blog.

http://www.torontosun.com/Comment/2008/04/19/5329691-sun.html

As I know Kathy Shaidle reads this blog and I cannot comment on hers, I have message for her.
If you are going to comment on the UK get your countries right or you may find yourself in front of a kangaroo court for racism (joke by the way)

I am refering to this stupid statement,

Can you spot the truly "retarded" people in this story?
England is doomed, quite possibly possessed by Satan

Everyone with a brain know Lanakshire is in SCOTLAND the same country the present jackass UK PM comes from. So are you surprised about what happened.

I guess you missed the obvious connection. heh

The Ontario Human Rights Commission is about to become more powerful, more totalitarian.

In an article by Joseph Brean in today's National post, Barbara Hall informs us that speech and publication must be put through a 'human rights filter' before articulation. That effectively means that we citizens mustn't say anything deemed by her Commission to be 'critical'. Or else.

The OHRC is removing the requirement of a complaint for it to investigate speech/writing. That is, "the commission will be allowed to bring complaints on its own initiative to the Ontario Human Rights Tribunal, even without individual complainants."

What are we allowing to be set up? A totalitarian state - that's what. We are allowing a group of unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats to set themselves up as Overseers, as Judge and Jury, as Esteemed Rulers, over what we think, read, and speak.

Barbara Hall, the head of the OHRC gave us a taste of this future already. The OHRC dismissed the case against Macleans magazine and Mark Steyn only because it had no mandate to review the content of articles. BUT, BUT, BUT, Hall then went on, in her public announcement of the OHRC's lack of a mandate, to judge the content!! She, without any input from Macleans, any defense, any hearing - she herself pronounced that Macleans was 'Islamophobic'.

So, what we are getting now, from these HRCs is totalitarianism. There is no other word for it. An unelected, unaccountable set of people, paid by the government, who will oversee what we say and read and hear - and rule over our right to speak, write and listen to ourselves.

Are we going to allow this? Are we silent as our rights are taken away by these arrogant activists who are setting themselves up as an elite set of Rulers?

What's with the Forrest Gump thingy?

Barbara Hall, don't get me started. She even outdid herself when she stated Macleans was "Islamophobic".
She's trying to pose as a champion of free speech, what utter crass and bull crap.

Some of these twits stir up enough anger to want to boot them in the arse with a frozen pointy-toed boot. It could inject some sense, that's where their brains sit.

Oui, agreed. We must top tormenting Citoyen Dion.
...-

"Robert Fulford: For the love of humanity, stop tormenting Stéphane Dion"
http://tinyurl.com/5vb4zr (NP)

george jonas is spot on at the post

human rights=human ambitions

http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/04/18/george-jonas-on-the-trouble-with-human-rights-

commissions.aspx

awhile back Suzuki claimed he didn't "own a car".
he then bought a Honda Hybrid or Insight.
anyone see him in that?

Saw Jim Shaw of Shaw Cable driving around Calgary in a Mercedes-Benz, Oh Lord.

Aw nuts... I just tried to post a couple links in a comment, but it's been (understandably) held up by the filter... anyways, if the comment makes it through I meant to type "couldn't disagree more" not "could disagree more"... why is it I can never proof-read properly until it's too late, despite using the "preview" option? :p

I have spotted the elusive Neo Nazi in the back forty, the man was a six foot four white man with a bald head. He appeared to be giving the Nazi Salute however in hindsight and using common sense I've concluded he's just my neighbour scratching his nose.

Whew, I need a little lie down after that false alarm.

Regarding Englandstan, the leftards won't be happy until every single female is forced to don a burka and is living under lock and key ergo a prisoner in their own homes. Why do leftards hate women? England has fallen to Islam and not one single bullet was fired, behold the leftards and their lack of moxie. Be afraid, be very afraid.

ET, the irony of this is, should anyone - government, courts, the public, try to bring these "human rights" commissions to bear, to be scrutinized in any way, they will be the first the cry "censorship."

Mao Stlong asks, Is Rake Wang a raciarist?

Lake Wang's best argument ever in favour of free speech:

"We understand free speech," said Lake Wang, 39, of Thousand Oaks. "But what if Cafferty said this about other racial groups? I think he would be fired."
...-

"Thousands ["of Chinese Americans"] in Hollywood protest remarks from CNN's Jack Cafferty (Dinosaur Media DeathWatch™)"
http://tinyurl.com/3zwn3h

With all due respect to his family and friends.

[SAN FRANCISCO—Alexander Farrell, a University of California, Berkeley associate professor who was advising the state on the use of alternative fuels, died this week at his home in San Francisco, according to the university. He was 46.
Colleagues and friends expressed shock and grief at Farrell's death, noting that it came at a time when his career trajectory was climbing rapidly and his life's work was finding an audience with policy makers.

"Alex Farrell was an extraordinarily influential scientist at the peak of his work," said Mary Nichols, who knew Farrell from his work as a consultant for the California Air Resources Board. "It's a terrible void he leaves behind."

The circumstances surrounding Farrell's death made it appear to be a suicide, according to Nichols, who did not have many details. The San Francisco Medical Examiner said an exact cause would not be known for several weeks.] AP

http://www.mercurynews.com/news/ci_8976348

Until recently, Fiona Bauld thought her 18-year-old son Jamie had not fully grasped the gravity of the situation he found himself in.

It brought her solace that her child, who has Down's syndrome and the mental age of a five-year-old, hadn't fully comprehended the charges of racism and assault against him, let alone begun to contemplate the consequences.....

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/news.html?in_article_id=560226&in_page_id=1770

"17 More Reasons -- and Then Some -- to Boycott the Beijing Olympics"

"Specifically, there are 17 North Korean refugees whom Beijing right now is treating as bargaining chips in a bid to ensure that the hundreds of thousands of others stay out of the way."
http://tinyurl.com/6bjnne (Claudia Rosett)

If you've been following the FLDS raid in Texas, you might be interested to know that there is apparently a Canadian citizen involved.

A 17 year old girl was visiting her grandmother when the raid took place. Instead of sending her home to Canada, as you'd think would make sense, Texas has made her a ward of the state of Texas:

http://blogs.sltrib.com/plurallife/2008/04/ruling.htm

What are the international implications? Has the girl been allowed to speak to the Canadian Embassy?

once more into the breach horatio -
http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fullcomment/archive/2008/04/18/george-jonas-on-the-trouble-with-human-rights-commissions.aspx

human rights=human ambitions

darn unix carriage returns

This is really, really cool. Something you likely will never see on television otherrwise. Have a Bud.

http://video.yahoo.com/watch/270001

or here

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-5763357813009315583&pr=goog-sl&hl=en

or here

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn8b1DL8NGo

Allen Abel had a front page story in today's National Post, which quoted a surviving member of the Tuskegee Airmen (the first black fliers allowed by USAAF). Abel asked "Did you ever expect to see a black man so close to the presidency?"

Curtis Robinson replied "I'm not sure I'm going to see it. I'm afraid someone will shoot him."

This comes from an 88-year old veteran.

So apparently this meme resounds among more than crazed right-wing white supremacists.

Helprin said that Ortega "had been convinced that history had run itself out, and that the final discovery was that we have been born from nothingness into nothingness and will exit into nowhere," which is why Ortega capitulated to the inevitablity that the "new art," which he endorsed would "in fact destroy art, destroy civilization"...

Sitting in my car on this very warm and lovely afternoon, which meant that my neighbourhood was full of humanity on foot, going here and there, enjoying the new warmth, the brilliant sunshine, I was struck by the nihilism we're examining here.

I have never seen so many truly ugly women on parade: faded, ill-fitting clothing, hair all over the place and every colour imaginable, bellies hanging out of spandexed-tops, skirts up to their crotches, no joy in their faces, hardly any children to be seen with them, let alone men, as they loped and limped their way across the street while I waited for the light to turn green.

My heart sank as I contemplated the reason for such ugliness, such rebellion toward the beauty of God's creation: shere bloody-mindedness and arrogance..."we know better, and we spit on God and His Creation."

When human being choose destruction, rebellion, ugliness, and crassness over creativity, harmony, beauty, and grace, then you know they've capitulated to the same destructive nihilism as Ortega.

In much less elegant terms than Helprin's, I was having a similar "discussion" with myself this afternoon about the direction in which our society is headed. It saddened me to see potential beauty stunted, blunted, and rejected, while "innovation," "originality," and "personal" expressiveness (emphasis on "personal" as opposed to "communal/community") were celebrated and on parade.

Singularly lacking were any expressions of joy or liveliness. Just plodding narcissism.

Sorry--post above on wrong thread.

Friend of USA:

I'll call your link, and raise you: http://www.slate.com/id/2188982

Since you appear slightly mathematically challenged, let me explain how option reset ARMS work:

You buy a home worth $400,000 at 4% initial rate. By rights, you should be paying at least $16,000/yr in interest alone (never mind actually paying down the principal), but you're allowed the "negative interest option" of only paying $1,000/month (that's $12,000/yr if you've lost your calculator). So each year, you're another $4,000 under water. This continues until you reach some preset limit, such as 105% of the original loan. At that point, you owe $420,000, and the loan converts to a conventional mortgage at the then current interest rate. Right now, a 30-yr fixed rate is about 5.9%. So, your $1,000 payment has suddenly gone to $2,500 (approx. and that doesn't include that quaint US institution called "points" which may require another $4-8k payment up front), and your annual total is now $30,000 instead of $12,000. If your income was about $60,000, your mortgage costs have now gone from 20% of your income to 50%. That's a pretty hefty hit to take.

And, as the linked article notes, WaMu and Countrywide have sold over $300 billion of these loans in California alone over the last two years. And when will most of these "mortgages" reset? Over the next two-three years. And that's just two lenders in California - there are plenty of other brokers, and 49 other states where the same nonsense as gone on.

So what starts happening in 2010? Mr. Homeowner gets a notice that he now owes $420,000 on his home, and his mortgage payment is going up 250%. But his friend across the street has had his quite similar house on the market for six months now, and the best offer he's gotten is $300,000. Mr. H now has two choices - he can sign up for a mortgage that's 30% more than the value of his home and half his salary, or.. he can walk away, since California is a non-recourse state (i.e. the bank can repossess the property, but they can't come after the former owner for any difference between what the mortgage and what the house was worth) and rent a place for $1,000/month. Well, Friend, what would you do? Cut your family's standard of living in half, or walk away?

Now, $300 billion in loans represents another $12 billion of losses for WaMu and Countrywide. They will desperately try to sell their huge portfolio of properties, further depressing the real estate market, and turning more homeowners "upside down" on their mortgages. The Fed will try to respond by reducing short term rates to near zero, as Japan did, and it won't work, just as it didn't work in Japan. They've already cut short term rates dramatically, and mortgage rates have gone up.

Oh, and while the falling US dollar will help coal and grain exporters, Boeing, and most of the S&P 500, who now get about half their earnings from overseas, there's no way it's going to bring back the thousands of small manufacturers who saw their markets disappear to cheap Asian products. So, the stock market, as measured by the Dow/S&P 500 may well hold up, but the rest of the economy will shrink. I'd be watching the Russell 2K or the Wilshire 5K to see the real health of the US stock market.

In case you missed LEV at 10:34 above . .

This made my day . . Worthy of a post on it*s own.

Decent people recognizing other decent people.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwXo4PnTMYA&NR=1

These people know freedom and prosperity can be lost. = TG

Tip. If EEstor, [ Ultra-cap & Battery maker ] comes out with an IPO, it may be worthwhile to be aware. Future growth could be phenomenal.
===============
According to EEStor's patent application, the breakthrough is based on a technically arduous process of purifying and fabricating units with barium titanate, a material known to retain vast amounts of power.

** The main feature of the EESU is the charge and dis-charge at electric speed,** Weir writes. **This is a key enabling factor for the advancement of the next generation of vehicles. Another feature is the amount of power the EESU can store. Lastly, the EESU is expected to be considered fully 'green.' **

But some bloggers call the purported breakthrough pure hype, today's version of ** cold fusion,** the still-theoretical energy source announced in 1989.

At least some analysts and researchers, though skeptical, seem reluctant to dismiss entirely the possibility that EEStor could be onto something significant.

**I'm sure they do have a technology, but skepticism revolves around the fact that nobody knows much about it,** says Anu Cherian, an analyst who tracks the $100 million global ultracapacitor market for Frost & Sullivan, a growth consulting company. **The ZENN car looks to be an exciting development. But there's a lot of hype in the market.**

Other ultracapacitor experts won't dismiss EEStor's claim despite technical challenges.

**It would be unfair to make an analogy between what EEStor is doing and cold fusion,** says Joel Schindall, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor who is using nanotechnology to improve ultracapacitors. **I don't doubt that they have built a device on a small scale that does store the amounts of energy they are talking about. I just don't know if they can manage the process of scaling it up ... for commercial applications.**

Dr. Schindall and his colleagues hope soon to demonstrate a fivefold boost in ultracapacitor energy storage to up to 25 percent of the energy storage capacity of a lithium battery - and someday up to 50 percent - using a different approach to the problem.

Such significant advances would make ultracapacitors viable in vehicles, though they still fall far short of Clifford's claims about EESU.

Making commercial quantities of EESUs could prove challenging since even tiny impurities and defects in manufacturing could result in **a violent discharge,** Schindall notes.

Safety is a huge issue for energy storage in vehicles whether powered by gasoline, ethanol, hydrogen, batteries - or ultracapacitors. High-capacity lithium-ion battery research for cars, for instance, is focused on ensuring those devices don't burst into flames. EEStor has ensured that its new ultracapacitor will be safe if damaged in a crash by **instantly discharging to ground,** Clifford says.

Skeptics don't bother him, he says, because **we've seen this product with our own eyes.**

**We've had a great 100-year run with petroleum,** Clifford says. **But the time has come for all of us to come to our senses now and realize that the electric-powered era for cars has finally arrived.**
http://tinyurl.com/6q4jgp
==================== LexisNexis
Ener 1 is a battery pack maker. Just signed to supply Norway firms. Going up while the market droops. = TG

KevinB,

The essence of your markets forecasting is entirely correct, yet there may be two points you may not have given enough weight to.

The enormity of the trading market today.

Secondly, the failproof aspect of essential goods and services. Corporations that provide food staples, soap toothpaste and tissue will continue in business and even pay dividends through the toughest of times.

Just check with Warren Buffet and Birkshire Hathaway. You will not believe this . .

http://finance.aol.com/quotes/berkshire-hathaway-inc-del/brk.a/nys

= TG

Amen LEV:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wn8b1DL8NGo

.. gave me chills, and a tear or two.