Tuesday, September 30, 2008
Monday, September 29, 2008
Stock Market Got You Down?
Retirement fund becoming smaller and smaller? About to lose your job? Can't pay your mortgage? Cheer up. Austria is swinging to the far right, again. And so are a lot of other European countries.
Austria in crisis as far right win 29% of vote | World news | The Guardian:
"Strache calls himself a true patriot, declaring his ambition to be chancellor or interior minister. He hopes to fashion a coalition with Flemish separatists, France's National Front, Bulgarian extreme nationalists and anyone else who will join in a 'European Patriotic party'.
'Thirty percent for people who portray national socialism as innocuous,' wrote the commentator Hans Rauscher yesterday, 'Who crawl around in forests with neo-Nazi mates, who are surrounded by skinheads; who campaign against foreigners; make common cause with the European extreme right; toy with antisemitism; campaign against Muslims, and develop contacts with the Serbian Radical party whose leader, Vojislav Seselj, is in the dock at the war crimes tribunal in The Hague. Austria is tops in Europe again.'"
Sunday, September 28, 2008
What's In The Bailout Deal - Forbes.com
"Under the legislation Treasury will be granted $700 billion in phases to acquire bad mortgage assets from financial institutions at a price it determines or through auction with a market price. If the Treasury decides to take the first option it will have some authority to determine the executive compensation structure of the firm.
If firms sell more than $300 million in assets in the auction, they will lose the ability to deduct the salaries of their top five individuals that have exceeded $500,000. For participating firms there will also be a surtax of 20% on retirement packages of top executives who are involuntarily terminated from their firms, or lose their jobs as a result of the firm's failure."
Sobering quote from Judd Gregg at the end.
"Walking back to his office early Sunday, Gregg told reporters, "Nobody's excited about doing this, but everybody recognizes the alternative to not doing it is so horrific that action needs to be taken." Will it work? We'll see. "
comScore Is Named the Fastest Growing of the 34 Largest Global Market Research Firms - MarketWatch
comScore, Inc. (SCOR:
comscore inc com
Last: 18.73-0.38-1.99%
4:00pm 09/26/2008
SCOR 18.73, -0.38, -2.0%) , a leader in measuring the digital world, today announced that it was recently recognized as the fastest growing global market research firm in the 12th annual Inside Research report on growth rates of the world's largest market research firms. With $87 million in revenues in 2007, comScore posted a five-year revenue growth rate of 463 percent, triple that of the second fastest-growing company on the list.
The next fastest-growing competitors, Market Probe Inc. and Direction Research Inc., posted growth rates of 154 percent and 116 percent, respectively. The average growth rate for all firms listed was 57 percent during the five year span, or approximately 9 percent on an annualized basis. comScore's compound annual growth rate for the period was 41 percent per year."
Friday, September 26, 2008
I Was Just Looking at Obama
and I flashed on the Dilbert cartoon where the pointy haired boss is introducing a new executive. He's saying, "We think his hair will turn silver."
Conservatives Cringe As McCain Flounders
Wednesday, September 24, 2008
Technorati: Discussion about “Link Roundup: So Much Economic News, So Little Time Before the Depression”
Hey John McCain! Campaign not going too well? Try grandstanding instead.
He's already said his strength is not the economy* and he's not on any committee directly related to the 'bailout' but here he is heading back to Washington to come up with a plan. And he wants Obama to go with him so they can work on it together. It's bizarre. Does he want to pick Obama's brain? Would he like to be Obama's Veep? lol If he has something to add to all of this he should just speak up.
*He proved it too when he said last week that the economy was fundamentally sound and then suggested a commission to study the problem, like we have years to deal with this.
Technorati: Discussion about “Link Roundup: So Much Economic News, So Little Time Before the Depression”mccain wants to delay friday’s debate … � didionville
"meanwhile warren buffett is working his magic on wall street, propping up goldman sachs with some mouthwatering terms for berkshire/hathaway.
yes, this is the same warren buffett who is the richest man in the world (when bill gates isn’t), who decries gratuitous ceo salaries, who warned of the sneaky and dastardly nature of the derivatives market waaaayyyyy back in 2002, and who currently advises obama on economic policy, having met with the candidate regularly over the last several years. (mccain can only fantasize about regular meetings with buffett.)"
Sunday, September 21, 2008
Palin Continues Sheltered Workshop Tour
She does know how to deliver a punch line though.
Palin's first Fla. campaign stop a safe one - Yahoo! News:"After some jokes about the difference between golfing in Florida and Alaska, her remarks hit most of the same points she's made since McCain chose her as the first woman to run as a Republican vice presidential nominee. She did, however, update the stump speech to reflect last week's turmoil in the financial markets."