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12946 [lbo-talk] Dick Morris: forget that Gallup poll -- rank: 1000

<http://thehill.com/thehill/export/TheHill/Comment/DickMorris/ 092006.html> [Dick Morris] Wake up call for GOP or snooze alarm for Dems With the Gallup Poll showing a spike in Bush s approval ratings and a narrowing of the gap between Democrats and Republicans in party congressional preferences, a looming question is how enduring the change is. Will it last until November? Presidential-support scores and party ballot preferences are notoriously fickle, often swinging one way or another ...

Document Size:	8979
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Wed Sep 20 08:30:53 PDT 2006

12947 [lbo-talk] micro-mini development schemes -- rank: 1000

<http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/TheNote/story?id=156238> ABC News' Jessica Yellin hears that "when the First Lady speaks at the Clinton Global Initiative today she'll announce a new partnership with the Case Foundation (Steve and Jean Case) to help bring clean water to sub-Saharan African countries. They're investing in a system that uses merry-go-rounds. When kids play on the merry-go-round it powers septic systems to clean the water." More Yellin: "Also expect the Fir ...

Document Size:	5297
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Wed Sep 20 08:17:17 PDT 2006

12948 [lbo-talk] transformation -- rank: 1000

On Sep 20, 2006, at 9:14 AM, Michael McIntyre wrote: > I wouldn't call a market where prices go apeshit crazy (my words) > an efficient market, so my intent was never to give an opening to > capitalist apologetics. When it comes to markets and information, > I guess I'm much more in line with Stiglitz, Akerloff, etc. who > emphasize how information asymmetries lead to inefficient markets. > For example, I think it was Akerloff who wrote the early paper "The > Market in ...

Document Size:	6135
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Wed Sep 20 08:04:04 PDT 2006

12949 [lbo-talk] transformation -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 11:03 PM, abu hartal wrote: > You said (very roughly) that the price of oil includes information > about likely political conditions. Don't the Hayekians argue that > prices are nothing but information, information which could not be > gotten any other way than through anonymous unplanned markets? Of course prices reflect information, but what about the quality of that information? And what else do the reflect besides information? In speculative markets, which a ...

Document Size:	5101
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Wed Sep 20 04:54:32 PDT 2006

12950 [lbo-talk] Re: (didnt we agree to stop talking about) The Transformation Problem -- rank: 1000

On Sep 20, 2006, at 2:50 AM, Daniel Davies wrote: > I don't agree with Doug that it is intrinsically impossible to > manipulate the > oil price for political ends. Enron manipulated the electricity > price in > California - mainly for profit but they must have been aware that > the blackout > would likely have favourable political consequences. Since the big > catalyst > for the last leg up in oil prices was the BP Proudhon Bay fiasco, > you can sort > of see h ...

Document Size:	6341
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Wed Sep 20 04:45:10 PDT 2006

12951 [lbo-talk] Transformation problem -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 10:59 PM, Michael Perelman wrote: > temporarily before the election -- after reading your graph. And they can be confident of getting oil prices higher again after the election? Such power they have! Doug

Document Size:	4727
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Wed Sep 20 04:37:27 PDT 2006

12952 [lbo-talk] Transformation problem -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 8:38 PM, Michael Perelman wrote: > How much would it cost big oil to sell futures to deflate the > bubble before the > election? They might be able to benefit by playing the predictable > movement. Why would Big Oil want to drive down oil prices? Doug

Document Size:	4819
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 19:41:58 PDT 2006

12953 [lbo-talk] 10% of "straight" men aren't -- rank: 1000

From: Doug Ireland [mailto:direland at nyc.rr.com] Sent: Tuesday, September 19, 2006 12:04 AM To: Doug Ireland Subject: 10% of straight men only hve sex with men, study finds These interesting findings appear in the Sept. 19 issue of the Annals of Internal Medicine. WebMD 28 Sept 06 http://www.webmd.com/content/article/127/116736.htm Many 'Straight' Men Have Gay Sex Nearly 10% of Self-Proclaimed 'Straight' Men Only Have Sex With Men By Daniel DeNoon WebMD Medical News Reviewed By Louise Chang, M ...

Document Size:	8426
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 19:41:02 PDT 2006

12954 [lbo-talk] Transformation problem -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 5:55 PM, Charles Brown wrote: > However, the current price drop is less attributable to a > thingwithnoname > because there's no big political event like 9/11 that could be > claimed to > trigger it. It doesn't take much to burst a speculative bubble, though higher interest rates (and we've had plenty of those) are always effective. > What about big plays by individuals ? Was it Soros who stuck up the > British > financiers ? Perhaps that is cunning i ...

Document Size:	5601
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 15:06:09 PDT 2006

12955 [lbo-talk] Stratfor on the Pope -- rank: 1000

[I've mostly been ignoring all that free Stratfor stuff that flows in, but this was kind of interesting.] Faith, Reason and Politics: Parsing the Pope's Remarks By George Friedman On Sept. 12, Pope Benedict XVI delivered a lecture on "Faith, Reason and the University" at the University of Regensburg. In his discussion (full text available on the Vatican Web site) the pope appeared to be trying to define a course between dogmatic faith and cultural relativism -- making his personal ...

Document Size:	19863
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 15:02:44 PDT 2006

12956 [lbo-talk] Transformation problem -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 5:21 PM, Charles Brown wrote: > CB: I don't want to suggest the c.t. words, but some of these loud > mouth > radicals on the radio are saying things like "what a surprise ! The > gas > prices drop as the election nears". Now that's not me. It's those > radicals > on the radio How could they manipulate the price of crude oil? The market is huge, with tons of non-American players. Must be those same brilliant traders who shorted airline stocks b ...

Document Size:	5088
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 14:44:31 PDT 2006

12957 [lbo-talk] Transformation problem -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 5:12 PM, Chuck wrote: > Doug Henwood wrote: >> On Sep 19, 2006, at 4:48 PM, Charles Brown wrote: >>> Gasoline prices are falling very fast. Is this a supply and >>> demand thing ? >> Not really - it's some of the speculative froth getting blown >> away. One big hedge fund has already taken losses in natural gas, >> and no doubt there's more to come. The supply/demand situation >> has been tight, there was Katrina, and the ...

Document Size:	5763
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 14:22:51 PDT 2006

12958 [lbo-talk] Transformation problem -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 4:48 PM, Charles Brown wrote: > Gasoline prices are falling very fast. Is this a supply and demand > thing ? Not really - it's some of the speculative froth getting blown away. One big hedge fund has already taken losses in natural gas, and no doubt there's more to come. The supply/demand situation has been tight, there was Katrina, and there's a lot of what markets call political risk, but all that together would justify a crude price of maybe $50/barrel, not the ...

Document Size:	5048
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 13:59:38 PDT 2006

12959 [lbo-talk] Old Europe catches up -- rank: 1000

Interesting paper from John Schmitt and Dean Baker at CEPR: much of Old Europe has either caught up or even surpassed U.S. employment rates (employed/population, aka the employment/population ratio) for prime-age workers (25-54). Sweden is now well ahead of the U.S. See <http://www.cepr.net/publications/europe_2006_09_19.pdf>.

Document Size:	4961
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 12:18:43 PDT 2006

12960 [lbo-talk] Anti-Constitutional Constitutional authority -- rank: 1000

On Sep 19, 2006, at 1:47 PM, Jordan Hayes wrote: > Early next year we'll be coming up on the end of the 4th year of > the war in Iraq, On Nov 25 of this year, the war in Iraq will be as long as WW II (1,346 days). > So the question is: why is the Bush administration pushing so hard > on this stuff? Politics and the expansion of executive power. They've been pretty masterful at mixing fright and reassurance, which keeps people loyal (as George Will said during the first Gulf War, h ...

Document Size:	6078
Author:	Doug Henwood
Date:	Tue Sep 19 12:04:24 PDT 2006