patrick.net

Worrying about the safety of FDIC should be the last thing on anyone's mind. You are about 12,000 times more likely to get killed in a car accident than you are to lose any money under the FDIC regime.

Seriously. It's really safe (from everything but inflation that is). That's the rub in Treasuries. They're even safer (though safer is an insignificant term at that point because you're talking about the different between the risk of the FDIC system defaulting versus the US Government imploding). But they're even less inflation reflective (assuming you buy at auction).

You could always buy TIPS if you want to go hyper diaper conservative. I'm happy just keeping my rotating sets-of-threes CDs for my cash holdings: rotating 6mo, 12mo & 15mo accounts, making sure there's not more than $100K in any account.

You can buy treasuries direct at

www.treasurydirect.gov

** Not investment advice **

Seriously folks, how many times are we going to worry about FDIC ? Being bearish should not equate to being a doom-gloom person.

One convenient way for buying treasuries, is to use a mutual fund. You have a much better control over the amounts that you want to put in, set up a monthly purchase plan etc. Vanguard has a decent selection of treasury related funds.

(I am not employed by Vanguard. I am just in love with many of their funds.)

Not an investment advice etc.

CNBC just reported - 26 year low in the USD today

StuckInBA: Like I said, man, for some reason it's a tin foil hat week. :o Put some gold in your Swiss bank account and start stockpiling food, fuel and ammo!

For anyone that follows the saga of any municipal government, there are always extremely passionate people with vastly different theories, all of whom are at least partially incorrect. And as soon as you enact any law, people will figure out how to scam it. That's just human nature--finding the most advantage within the framework of the law.

Right now in Fort Collins there is some development company holding a run-down mall near the center of town. Their buddies on the board commissioned a study so they could declare it a "blight zone" and redirect some tax money towards rehabilitation. Some of the infrastructure problems listed were things like potholes in the parking lot and faded parking paint. I'm pretty sure if they just put some money into the place, they could attract new tenants and make money... but why do that when your carefully cultivated political pals can get you money for free?

But when people complain that these sorts of things are a "conspiracy", I remind them that they can form a citizens group, lobby for a fair evaluation and generally educate the public. The things that happen thanks to apathy from the citizens are well deserved. At least the developers are out there working hard, educating the politicians and actively participating in our government...

Damn. Now I need a tin foil hat! :)

HeadSet Says:
“Would Paris Hilton become Section 8 if she was cut off from her family fortune?”
You may have to father a kid with her first. I’m not a authority, but all the Section 8 I know of invoved a single mother with kids(s).

Great. So all I have to do is:

1) get Paris Hilton cut off from her inheritance somehow
2) somehow get her to become a single mom, possibly with more than 1 kid

then we can try out the social experiment of seeing how far she gets on her own. Sounds like a plan to me. As long as she doesn't somehow find a way of turning it into a reality TV series and cashing in all over again...

Objectively the concept of Section 8 renters within gated community is hysterically funny. Talk about the Law of Unintended Consequences!!

(I'll admit I might think differently if I owned next door.)

I can post on the blog again. :twisted:

Maybe Bush will just personally pardon all the illegal immigrants to please big business. The only people that he wants punished nowadays seems to be hapless Democratic get-out-the-vote activists.

Hey, it worked for Silivio Berlesconi for long enough, and that (fascist motherf&cking) guy is still out and about. Hell, all we need is a big global depression and we're right back in the 1930s.

Somebody hand me a piece of aluminum foil.

Right on, Astrid. Hand me some foil, too. The 1930s may be coming back. That can only mean one thing: A new generation of baby boomers once the dust settles ;-). Everyone get ready. I can dig the idea of an illegal immigrant presidential pardon, too (for its ballsy creativity, not for the substance of it),

More seriously, the word "conspiracy" was introduced twice in this thread, both times by Brand, essentially in the context "stop invoking conspiracies".
Well, nobody was invoking them. People were just saying that the government is in bed with business, big and small, wasting tax funds in the process.

Sean,

>2) somehow get her to become a single mom, possibly with more than 1 kid

Maybe K-Fed can be pressed into service?

Brand,

Lots of activities relating to "blight" and "redevelopment" and "eminent domain" are just thinly veiled attempts at getting public entities to confiscate land and handing it over to some other private owner. It is almost funny how it is usually some rich developer that benefits, the kind of person that is adamant about typical "conservative values" suach as low taxes and (ahem) strong property rights.

justme,

Hehe. Bush wants the illegal immigrants in this country but does not want to give them full citizenship rights. So he can commute their sentence of deportation into a payable fine and limit their political rights (such as minimum wage or OSHA protection).

Imperial executive indeed!

illegal immigrant presidential pardon

I wouldn't put it past him. God help us (and by 'God', I don't mean St. Shrub, Jeebus's self-appointed representative here on earth).

astrid Says:
Somebody hand me a piece of aluminum foil.

I predict the next bubble will be in Aluminium and large companies in the tinfoil-industrial complex will be referred to as Big-Al (tm)
:-)
SP

But seriously, if you really want a conspiracy, there is a real one going on right now - big banks are effectively colluding to keep CDO's from getting properly valued at a fraction of par. And they aren't even being particularly discreet about it. And the ratings agencies are playing along for the time-being, so they can do damage control on their own reputations.

The thing I haven't quite figured out is - now that the cat's not only out of the bag but has also dragged in a couple of dead birds into the parlor, who are they going to unload this on? The glib answer is 'pension funds', but why on earth would a pension fund manager not ask for a steep discount as well?

SP

By the way, I heard someone talking about 'The Borat Funds', with reference to Bear-Stearns' High Grade Structured Credit Strategies Fund and High Grade Structured Credit Strategies Enhanced Leverage Fund.

I recall a few days ago, someone on this forum had also called them High Grade Structured Credit Strategies Enhanced Leverage For Make Benefit of Kazakhstan Fund. Looks like that meme is going places.

SP

Looks like that meme is going places.
I still find the
tramp stamp comment from Pimco's Bill Gross extremely coincidental, given that it was a "thread diversion" a couple of weeks ago.

I forgot to put this in my Anecdotes from the East Bay entry. Some folks I know in El Cerrito (bought around 2005) recently had their property taxes reassessed downward.

I still find the tramp stamp comment from Pimco’s Bill Gross extremely coincidental, given that it was a “thread diversion” a couple of weeks ago.

I thought the same thing! Not to give ourselves too much credit, but it's obvious that the analysts at various institutions are monitoring blogs like this one for the "word on the street."

"Bush wants the illegal immigrants in this country but does not want to give them full citizenship rights. So he can commute their sentence of deportation into a payable fine and limit their political rights (such as minimum wage or OSHA protection)."

Interesting concept. I'll send it over to the guys at National Review to chew over.

Weird. My very own meme.

Speaking of the Kazakhstan fund, the Uzbeki fund went back stateside a couple of days after I dined with him, so rumours of his flight from justice, debts and his partner were greatly exaggerated...

More seriously, the word “conspiracy” was introduced twice in this thread, both times by Brand, essentially in the context “stop invoking conspiracies”.

hmm, he also invokes straw men and tells me to "stop invoking straw men" a lot too... and, more mysteriously, I can't recall ever constructing any!

Different Sean Says:
I can’t recall ever constructing any [strawman arguments]!

It is difficult to make a man recall something when his argument depends on him not recalling it. :-)

SP