Oh the Delicious Irony

From the L.A. Slimes

In what is apparently the first legal action of its kind, an association of community-based organizations has filed a federal civil rights complaint against two of the three largest Wall Street rating firms, charging that their inflated ratings on subprime mortgage bonds disproportionately caused financial harm to African American and Latino home buyers across the country. The complaint, filed by the National Community Reinvestment Coalition, alleges that Moody's Investors Service and Fitch Ratings enriched themselves by assigning high ratings to bonds backed by mortgages "that were designed to fail" because of "unfair payment terms and insufficient borrower income levels."

The lawsuit should extend to Barney Frank and his boyfriend who was writing the Fannie Mae sub-prime rules.

The fact of the matter is that the poor were better off renting the last few years because they could have benefited from real estate deals of the century available right now.

The IRS 1040 form

Our Fading National Heritage

US officials flunk test of American history, economics, civics

US elected officials scored abysmally on a test measuring their civic knowledge, with an average grade of just 44 percent, the group that organized the exam said Thursday.

Ordinary citizens did not fare much better, scoring just 49 percent correct on the 33 exam questions compiled by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI).

"It is disturbing enough that the general public failed ISI's civic literacy test, but when you consider the even more dismal scores of elected officials, you have to be concerned," said Josiah Bunting, chairman of the National Civic Literacy Board at ISI.

"How can political leaders make informed decisions if they don't understand the American experience?" he added.

The exam questions covered American history, the workings of the US government and economics.

Among the questions asked of some 2,500 people who were randomly selected to take the test, including "self-identified elected officials," was one which asked respondents to "name two countries that were our enemies during World War II."

I took the challenge and missed a few of the obscure ones, but 84.5% isn't bad. But maybe this is all about a new country called Ameria. See the headline from Yahoo.

Indeed, how can political leaders make informed decisions if they don't understand the American experience? And how can journalists tell us anything if they do not know how to spell?

Where's the 401K Going?

How the Obama plan is Working in Argentina So Far

Pethokoukis: Would Obama and Dems Kill 401K Plans?

The Slow (15%) Bleed This is actually a plan I support. As I can make tons of money as the Dow slides down to 4000 or so.

Welfare Nation

That's right, you just smoke all that crack, Obamba will pay for it all. You just relax.

A Message from the Boss to Employees

from an anonymous poster on freerepublic.com

Notice to All Employees

As of November 5, 2008, when President Obama is officially elected into office, our company will instill a few new policies which are in keeping with his new, inspiring issues of change and fairness:

1. All salespeople will be pooling their sales bonuses into a common pool that will be divided equally between all of you. This will serve to give those of you who are underachieving a “fair shake.”

2. All low level workers will be pooling their wages, including overtime, into a common pool, dividing it equally amongst yourselves. This will help those who are “too busy for overtime” to reap the rewards from t hose who have more spare time and can work extra hours.

3. All top management will now be referred to as “the government.” We will not participate in this “pooling” experience because the law doesn't apply to us.

4. The “government” will give eloquent speeches to all employees every week, encouraging its workers to continue to work hard “for the good of all.”

5. The employees will be thrilled with these new policies because it's “good to spread the wealth.” Those of you who have underachieved will finally get an opportunity; those of you who have worked hard and had success will feel more “patriotic.”

6. The last few people who were hired should clean out their desks. Don't feel bad though, because President Obama will give you free healthcare, free handouts, free oil for heating your home, free food stamps, and he'll let you stay in your home for as long as you want even if you can't pay your mort gage. If you appeal directly to our democratic congress, you might even get a free flat screen TV and a coupon for free haircuts (shouldn't all Americans be entitled to nice looking hair?) !!!

If for any reason you are not happy with the new policies, you may want to rethink your vote on November 4th.

Obama Trade: MEE, KOL, BTU, PCX puts

Obama Tells SF Chronicle He Will Bankrupt Coal Industry

from newsbusters.org via drudgereport.com

Imagine if John McCain had whispered somewhere that he was willing to bankrupt a major industry? Would this declaration not immediately be front page news? Well, Barack Obama actually flat out told the San Francisco Chronicle (SF Gate) that he was willing to see the coal industry go bankrupt in a January 17, 2008 interview. The result? Nothing. This audio interview has been hidden from the public...until now. Here is the transcript of Obama's statement about bankrupting the coal industry :

Let me sort of describe my overall policy.

What I've said is that we would put a cap and trade system in place that is as aggressive, if not more aggressive, than anybody else's out there.

I was the first to call for a 100% auction on the cap and trade system, which means that every unit of carbon or greenhouse gases emitted would be charged to the polluter. That will create a market in which whatever technologies are out there that are being presented, whatever power plants that are being built, that they would have to meet the rigors of that market and the ratcheted down caps that are being placed, imposed every year.

So if somebody wants to build a coal-powered plant, they can; it's just that it will bankrupt them because they're going to be charged a huge sum for all that greenhouse gas that's being emitted.

So there, that'll my first trade Wednesday, massive selling of bear call spreads (or put spreads) on KOL (Coal ETF) , BTU (Peabody Energy) , MEE (Massey Energy) , PCX (Patriot Coal) if the homicidal, Islamic, street radical gets elected. I haven't done much trade posting here but once this election is settled the market will take on the next wave: DOW 5000 if its Obama, DOW 12000 if it is McCain.

Either way, with my awesome Investools training I plan on profiting big.

Street Wisdom from Alfonzo

h/t to audacitywatch.com