patrick.net

2. Canning

I think you meant "Caning". "Canning" would imply a punishment far more sinister.

LOL. Canning is also a "punishment" for perfect fine TV shows like Firefly.

SP Says:
You can rationalize it that way if it suits you, but the attitude of Communist Aristocrats even before it became ‘post-communist’ is the same as that of the French Aristocrats.

I have lived for some time in a communist country, so I know a little about what it is really like - although I concede you certainly may have read more books about how it should be.

Fair enough, I suppose, but I don't think the attempted point really holds under inspection. You don't seem to have considered what implementations of Communism are supposed to be about, and the whole history of where they may have gone off the rails. Further, China still has a 'peasant'-based economy, and, in fact, the social class or type of 'peasant' is still the most common mode of living in the world. Therefore, you might find something similar occurring in a number of places which are not nominally 'Communist', such as Iraq, central Asia and eastern Europe, South America, Africa, and so on. I think we just established that homicide rates are very high in many of those countries. I absolutely concede I hear very little good out of North Korea or China in parts, because many countries which nominally became 'Communist' often came from underdeveloped status backgrounds with little regard for individual rights as we understand them in the industrialised West -- and the message of Marxism is a very powerful one for people in those societies, being the selfsame peasants. However, Marxist theory, such as it is, proposes that Communism should be a post-high capitalism phase where capitalism basically self-destructs without prompting due to mass movements of protest, and that it would not be suited to pre-industrial societies. We haven't quite seen that yet anywhere either. So I wouldn't blame the event of the BMW on 'Communism', I think that's quite a biased long bow to draw, somehow. Apparently no-one gets necklaced etc in South Africa because it's a good capitalist country that supplies you with diamonds for engagement rings...

As I pointed out, the woman represents the new social class of rich factory owners in China, who are also the ones purchasing more and more 'status goods' from the West with their new wealth. The family may or may not have Party connections. There was a case recently of a Party member who basically put a guy out of business and jailed him because he didn't give the local Party members their perceived share of the loot from his business. This was to the tune of millions. However, equally well, there is tons of corruption in Western politics and business, so I don't really see that Communism is the ultimate evil in that, greed is the universal factor. Just as the French ex-aristocracy quietly worked their way into govt and diplomacy positions post-Rev'n, Chinese citizens saw the Party as the place where all the money was -- and scratch the surface of Chinese 'Communism' and they are still pretty fiercely individualistic and market-oriented...

3. Execution
4. Combination of (3) and (4)

that's recursive as well...

Peter P,

Russia also moved too quickly. Fortunately, Putin seems to be making sure that things go well.

I sometimes wonder whether some of your comments are deliberately designed to ignite debate. This is one of them.

Define 'going well', because to me Russia is returning to the 1950's. Rule of law ignored when inconvenient to the Kremlin (E.g. Forced nationalisation directed against Shell and BP, not to mention Yukos). State-sponsored assassination of an expatriate critic in the UK.

And now the administrative actions being taken against any real opposition parties, with the 'law and order' excuse being trotted out to support riot police crackdowns on any resulting peaceful demonstrations.

Russian life expectancy is falling, the population is falling, and the education level is falling. This is all shielded for the moment by windfall profits from energy exports, much as the 'Thatcher Revolution' in the UK was supported by the oil discoveries in the North Sea.

Vicente,

Very true. We humans miscalculate risk.

I'm very offended that some people equate me to a fertilized egg, or even a 7 month fetus. What makes me truly human is not a combination of my father and my mother's genes, what makes me human is that not only do I have a brain, I've packed it with 20+ years of knowledge, trivia, experience, etc.

ahj to Peter P,

"I sometimes wonder whether some of your comments are deliberately designed to ignite debate. This is one of them."

Only "some"?

ajh,

Sorry for misspelling your name.

Another tax day has come and gone. How many of us took full advantage of all of our available options? How many will resolve "to be better prepared next year" (and how many of us will just continue to piss and moan)?

Ironically, I just remembered I had a huge 'debate' with someone on the blog at the Roanoke Times about a year ago concerning gun control. It's not too far from Virginia Tech from what I can gather. The thread became so vitriolic (for some reason) that the Times removed it. ;) I pointed out on the thread that in the time we had debated the issue, the Times had reported 3 deaths by firearms, one of them a suicide, one a jilted boyfriend, just in the local area. I really had to pull out a lot of international stats and do some research for that one, it makes this debate look like a lovefest, this 'J.D.' character wouldn't budge. I wonder if he has budged now, or will just say 'this proves every kid on campus should be packing heat' despite the ludicrousness of the proposition.

Different Sean Says:

> If you remove the guns as completely as possible,
> as has happened in UK and Oz, then drive-by
> shootings would diminish markedly…

We would also have to remove all the American gang members.

If we took every American gang member (and kid on a ton of psychotropic medication) and put them in the UK or OZ you would have daily drive bys (and school shootings) just like we do and we would be a big happy peaceful country with lots of gun owners just like Switzerland…

P.S. No country (including the UK and OZ has ever “removed” guns…

P.P.S. I bet this the Koren guy in VA was on psychotropic medication just like the kids at EVERY other school shooting in US history…

P.S. No country (including the UK and OZ has ever “removed” guns…

yes they have, they bought thousands of them off collectors, farmers and other owners and crushed them or disabled them. had amnesties, etc. buyback cost a fortune. same in UK. if they find new ones on arrests, they crush those as well.

If we took every American gang member (and kid on a ton of psychotropic medication) and put them in the UK or OZ you would have daily drive bys (and school shootings) just like we do

nope, there's much less to fear here, and people raised here behave better obviously. maybe less financial stress and poverty or something. there's only one particular group of recent arrivals who have proven to be a problem with handguns, and that is in sydney in particular. hence i'm leaving sydney. these particular people have very little of worth to offer our culture in other ways either.

Gun control, violence issues for this blog = BORING and OFF Topic!

Guns, shootings, blah blah blah. Then DS starts derailing everyone into some libertarian/capitalist vs.communist debate.

BORING!

agh, ski and SP are back....

skibum,

Agreed. It's not that I'm "totally" without empathy it's just that there's very little I CAN do about it?

This is a time of year when I spend a lot of time reflecting about the things I could have done better in preparing and tax planning. See, right now I'm facing something of a "burn rate" my damn self! The first few filing years after I sold my primary res. *not having major bubble bucks MID write-off was no big deal. The first year I was under a non-compete agreement so basically I *couldn't make any money. So at that point, no MID=no big deal. In the 2 filing years that followed MAX! SEP contribution filled the hole. But now I'm tapped. Totally tapped out.

In 2007 I will have NO dependent children and NO MID! I sure as hell don't want to buy just when the fruits of all of our research are paying off but another year like '06 and I'll be forced to do something drastic. (Even if it ain't right!) Thoughts?

DinOR,

Ouch! I can't believe your younger daughter would do that to you.

@astrid,

Yeah! How DARE she grow up like that!

I was helping the 22 y.o and she will definitely get everything back (filed as F/T student) and we did a final "walk through" and I asked her if she was Over 65.... OR! BLIND? I mean... like I "could" be... I mean if that would help?

One thing about OR though, the 40S (short form) has been pretty well overhauled and has no provision for student loan int. etc. It's strictly for baby sitters and lawn boys. So... the "40" drags you through "Alternative Fuels Tax Credits" and a lot of other stuff that's N/A for 99% of us. Weird.

DinOR,

Don't feel bad, most of the time, paying a lot of taxes means you're earning lots of dough. Would you rather not earn lots of money?

When you get to a high earned income level, there's really not that much planning you can do lower taxes, legally. Most of the strategies just end up deferring taxes until the next year anyway.

If you're deduction starved, you can always give money to charity. I can maybe setup a "Help MtViewRenter Stop Renting" Foundation...

I wonder how difficult it is to setup a deferred comp plan....

agh, ski and SP are back….

DS,

Well, I must apologize for trying to redirect this blog discussion back to HOUSING. How impolite and rude of me!

If I wanted to hear long-winded blowhard diatribes about the glories of sociali$m, I would be logging on to commietalk@blogspot.com. Instead, imagine my nerve - wanting to talk about housing on a housing blog!

MtViewRenter,

I wasn't really complaining, I just thought it might be an interesting time to look back on the "resolutions" some of us made last year yet somehow got side tracked from following through on.

I fully intended to create an HSA (health savings acct.) but couldn't seem to find a decent HDHP, the time or the GUMPTION to follow through? I was curious to see what challenges (or excuses) others might have encountered.

Having MID to fall back on is such a lazy solution. It's kind of like saying, "tax planning and investing baffle me, so I just load up on house" which seems to be what we've been saying as a country for the last 7 years or so. But you could tell this was coming. You just had to know that the intersection of a) going independent b) selling your primary residence c) waiting for the bubble to completely deflate without d) tap dancing and tightrope walking the tax code... was a LOT to ask!

I never thought for an instant that the whole world would fall over with it's legs up in the air and for the most part things have worked out fairly well. It certainly would have worked out better had the Fed started to raise earlier, '06 moves to '05 (complete w/subslime meltdown) DinOR swoops in w/lowball offer on 2 JAN 2006 and White Sox repeat as World Champs.

BUT NO!!! The REIC Juggernaut wouldn't stop until it hit a WALL. Still and all, I'm pretty happy about the way the bust is progressing so (2) checks are infinitely preferable to a lifetime of giving your lender 24/7 access to your checking account!

DS says:

"There was a time when the govt would offer returned servicemen extremely affordable housing in new suburbs and so on post-WWII. Unfortunately, the beneficiaries of that housing are now selling them for $850K with no new affordable housing being constructed for anyone… "

Are you talking about OZ? Or are you refering to the US Gov GI Bill? Where was it that the US Gov had homes in the suburbs to offer to returning WWII servicemen? Also, most of the homes bought through the GI BIll in the late 40's were small 2 bed 1 bath types. Only in a few select areas would something like that go for $850k. Virtually everywhere outside of such areas, $850k will buy a very upperclass home.

Sevicemen today still get VA housing benefits, in the form of VA backing of zero down loans. Even before the bubble, this drove up home prices in the vicinity of military installations (except altready high markets like CA). Even so, when Castle AFB (Merced/Atwater) closed down in the 90's, I knew quite a few Air Force fellows who made good money selling there VA financed homes to the then climbing market.

By the way, you will not be able to build "affordable" homes as long as you have short term thinking people with easy credit. Dry up the credit and plenty of existing homes will fall into the affordable category for people who will save for a down payment.

Headset,

Thanks for sharing that. DS is probably referring to Levittown, PA sprouting up out of nowhere in post WWII. Back then there was ample reason for the VA Loan (as there are today).

The mistake we made was when we started to give everyone and their long lost brother a zip down loan. Spread out coast to coast vets don't make up enough to drive a market.

Housing starts and permits numbers out for March:

http://money.cnn.com/2007/04/17/news/economy/housingstarts/index.htm?postversion=2007041710

Home building ticked up unexpectedly in March but economists cautioned that a look inside the numbers shows the worst is far from over for the battered housing sector.

The exception to that trend was the Midwest, where starts jumped 44 percent in the Midwest after a February reading that was the slowest in 16 years. Bad weather in the region in February and relatively good weather in March probably played a role in the jump, as builders tried to catch up with delayed projects.

Clearly, outside of the Midwest, the numbers are still falling.

I recall that many economists (Roubini, for instance) see housing starts and permits as the true leading indicator of the housing market. The true bottom of the free-fall is reached when housing starts start consistently increasing again.

The British pound is over $2USD today.

I weep.

@eburbed,

Yeah I did see that. My wife had to help her mom process her tourist visa and the exchange rate in the P.I was 48.30 to the dollar and dropping. Damn! Can't even lay low in these banana republics without taking a beating!

Absolutely NOTHING that I posted should be construed as my support for any of the strawman arguments and/or “bottom lines” and/or “conclusions” that theotherside is trying to arrive at.

This should be the disclaimer for ANYONE's post here re: theotherside's "conclusions," "bottom lines" or "arguments."

(Not TOS-supporting advice)

DinOr,

Levittown was an example of how the GI Bill turned what was planned as a community of rentals homes into an ownership town. The builder was only happy to sell homes rather than rent them out.

Yes the military did have a reason (constant moves) for the VA housing assistance. Unfortunatley, the same dynamics come into play as the easy credit bubble. People who are only in an area for a short term should rent instead of buy. Over the years, I have seen many military folk who when the transfer came, had to take a checkbook to the closing table, leave a wife behind to sell, pay a mortagage on an empty house while renting at their new assignment, etc. Yet I keep hearing the phrase "No equity when you rent", even from guys and gals who had been burned by home debtorship.

Dear Surfer-X:

Thank you for contacting me about subprime mortgages, which are loans that are marketed to borrowers with weak or imperfect credit. I appreciate hearing from you.

In order to purchase a home during the recent housing boom, millions of Americans turned to lenders offering alternative mortgage products such as interest-only and adjustable-rate mortgages. Lured by low interest rates and easy access to credit from predatory subprime lenders, millions of Americans purchased homes they cannot afford.

Though subprime loans have initial monthly payments lower than standard mortgage loans, the payments are structured to increase either suddenly or slowly over time. As a result of recent interest rate hikes coupled with abusive loan terms, payments often grow beyond what borrowers can afford to pay, forcing many families into delinquency or even foreclosure.

The Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs is currently holding hearings on this matter in an effort to gain more information about unscrupulous lending practices and the current crash of the subprime mortgage market.

Please know that I am monitoring this situation closely and will

keep your views in mind should pertinent legislation come before the Senate.

Again thank you for writing to me.

Barbara Boxer
United States Senator

Hey surfer-x,

I got the identical form-letter email response from Boxer's office. I was going to post it too, but you beat me to it.

The first three paragraphs say nothing other than a glib rehashing of the established facts. The rest is useless as well. I'm glad to see our Senator is on top of it....

TOS Says:

Conclusion:
I mean, do you really believe that finding a “free lunch” is that *easy* and *riskless* ?

Hey, isn't that EXACTLY what millions and millions of FB's thought when they signed up for their mortgages? "Hey, free lunch here! It's easy and riskless." SIGN ME UP!

skibum,

Sorry to bore you, but some of us have been at this a little longer than others, and frankly, only discussing housing can get a bit boring too. Btw, we've never been about religiously "staying on topic". Ben's blog is much better at that. ;-)

there’s only one particular group of recent arrivals who have proven to be a problem with handguns, and that is in sydney in particular. hence i’m leaving sydney. these particular people have very little of worth to offer our culture in other ways either.

DS,

And who would that group be? (braces for answer...)

@X,

Too funny! Was that on her web-site?

Speaking of asking prices, you can find stuff in Mountain View in the 800s, and things in Palo Alto in the 900s. And on the right side of the 101! (But not the right side of El Camino, apparantly.

I was talking to the Realtor my wife and I have been looking at homes with as we cruised through some of these MV homes. Many were pretty nice, with decent schools, and fairly decent remodelling. They weren't fixer-upper dives.

I remarked on how many more homes fell into our price range search in MV and PA these days. She said "I know! A year ago these would be offered at around a million, and I wouldn't have expected to see them on the market at these prices!"

Then I said "I wonder how long until cupertino (she mainly works saratoga/cup) starts falling consistantly" and she immediately jumped in saying that properties were still selling with multiple offers there, and the prices wouldn't drop. The schools are just too good!

Oiy.

@Surfer-X & skibum,

I haven't received my boilerplate responses yet, but it's only been a couple weeks since I sent my letters. I'm looking forward to seeing if they exactly match yours.

Speaking of asking prices, you can find stuff in Mountain View in the 800s, and things in Palo Alto in the 900s. And on the right side of the 101! (But not the right side of El Camino, apparantly.

I don't think there's stuff to buy on the "Wrong side" of 101 in Mountain View.

That said, stuff between ElCam and 101 were always in the 800's in Mountain View. Not much of a drop from what I've seen. :(

Headset,

Good points. I never really considered using my VA loan while I was still on active duty. Especially in the NAV where transfers were more frequent and unpredictable. I "almost" bought an apartment conversion right before the last bubble in Imperial Beach, CA in like 1988. That was a good time to "just say no" as well!