We thought we had today’s Money Morning all planned out. Yesterday we took a swipe at the banks and how they’re surviving by a thread.
In our guest appearance over at The Daily Reckoning we mentioned to those readers what we’ve written here. That any global treaty on Climate Change is merely an excuse for ‘Stable Climate Deniers’ to foist a massive tax burden on individuals.
Although of course if you read comments from the Fairy Ruddfather, he’s promising to wave his magic wand so that the “Government” pays for it not the people.
Except he’s obviously forgotten that government doesn’t have its own money. Any money it does have has been ripped and stolen from the people.
Which makes the Fairy Ruddfather’s comments a little confusing:
“But anyone who goes out there and argues there is a cost-free, pain-free way for Australia to act on climate change is not being honest with people.”
At least he didn’t say “is not being fair dinkum with people”, so that’s something to be grateful for.
But the quote above doesn’t quite fit with the following claim that from News Ltd that:
“FAMILIES will pay little or nothing for Labor’s emissions trading scheme, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd pledged yesterday.”
So in typical bureaucratic double-talk it you cost you a lot of money to get something for free.
Maybe it’s like the 2-for-1 deals in the supermarket or clothes stores – “What a bargain, you think, I can get two tins of prunes for the price of one.”
“But you don’t like prunes!”
“I know, but I’ll save a dollar if I buy two.”
But anyway, it was as we were glancing around the interweb this morning that everything came undone. Our plans to poke a stick at the Stable Climate Deniers and their massive tax plan have been scuppered.
The cause?
This headline in today’s The Age newspaper: “Someone needs to save us from too much saving.”
Look, I’m not a Scrooge who thinks saving money is the only sensible course of action. I mean, we all want to have some fun.
There’s nothing wrong with blowing a few hundred bucks or even a few thousand bucks on something extravagant. Where’s the fun in working eight or nine hours a day and then living on tinned hot dogs?
Buy a giant television. Spend $1,000 on an iPhone so you can work out which way is North, or so you can play Zombie Pizza!
But it’s headlines like that one we saw in today’s The Age that makes us wonder whether academia is going mad.
You can read the full article here. To be honest, after reading the first paragraph we thought it was a parody:
“THE world is trapped in a global savings glut. It is the source of our economic woes and an obstacle to the task of pulling ourselves out of the ditch. Worse yet, the glut’s continued existence will feed a succession of asset bubbles until we confront it head on and find ways to soak up the excess.”
We even smiled and let out an audible, “Hah!” as we commended the author on a wonderful piece of irony.
But then we read on. We reached the following sentence:
“The real culprits are thrifty Germans…”
And we thought we had been transported back in time to a 1970s British sitcom – “Bloody ‘Gerries’ stealing our sunbeds… they’re so efficient the Fritzes…Who won the war… Remember 1966…”
Accompanies to sounds of raucous laughter and whacky music.
So we kept reading. Perhaps the entire article was supposed to be an ironic take on what’s happened to the global economy over the last couple of years.
As we read we were treated to this gem:
“Germany’s surpluses were a result of its attempt to export its way out of the stagnation arising from the reintegration of East and West Germany…”
And this:
“It is Britain’s good fortune to possess a falling pound, which almost certainly will allow it to recover more quickly than troubled euro zone economies.”
I mean, it must be a parody because from what we’ve read, Britain is the only major European country to still be in recession. And the outlook doesn’t seem to be improving.
But then there was the coup de grace, le grand finale to the article:
“Until the savings glut is vanquished, asset bubbles and instability will be fed, exacerbating income inequality and favouring wealthy bankers and the Chinese elite. It will continue drawing resources away from productive sectors of the economy and channelling them into high-paying but socially useless financial engineering – or into yet more excess capacity.”
It was at that point your editor slumped in his ‘leather-look’ office chair, amazed at the length of this economic parody. Until we read the biography of the author at the end…
“Robin Wells has taught at Princeton University, MIT and the University of Southampton. She is co-author, with Paul Krugman, of several economics texts.”
Of course, we should have seen the warning signs – A Paul Krugman crony.
It wasn’t a parody at all. Which shouldn’t have surprised us considering the article was published in The Age.
We didn’t really think even the mainstream press was that dumb to not only believe what Wells has written but to go so far as to publish it.
According to Wells – and we can infer, Krugman – the cause of the global financial meltdown is due to people saving too much.
And it’s also due to the Germans producing too many things and exporting them to other countries.
It’s no wonder that politicians and bureaucrats can get away with claiming that spending fuels an economy, and that a $120 billion Climate Change tax won’t cost you a penny.
Cheers.
Kris.
60-Second Market Round Up
by Shae Smith
The S&P/ASX200 finished down yesterday to 4,676.50, lower by 25 points. The market has had a flat start this morning.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average added a tiny 1 point overnight, ending an ordinary session at 10,390.11. Despite Ben Bernanke’s reassurance that rates will continue to remain at the near zero level all the major US banks finished in the red. Read more about the US market here.
In the UK overnight, the FTSE was down by 11 points to 5,310.66.
The Nikkei was up again yesterday, closing at 10,167.50, higher by 1.45%
The price of spot gold in Australian dollars is trading at $1,267.56, while in US Dollars it is trading at $1,158.05. The price of silver in Aussie dollars is $19.92 and in US Dollars it is $18.19.
The Aussie dollar versus the US dollar is trading at USD$0.9127, and against the Japanese Yen JPY81.71
Crude oil closed at USD$74.06
For the biggest movers on the market yesterday click here…
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http://www.elliottwave.com/single-issues/ff/0810FF_Special_Report_End_of_the_Mania_Era.aspx?code=cg2
Climategate : Australia’s very own order for a more effective climate scare.
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/climategate_ordering_a_better_scare_for_australia/
“cb” so right.
Public has no idea what this creep is about to do.
This is not democracy!
It is a New World Order behind our backs.
Abbott is a disappointment also!!!
Why should we follow the BO line?
There is no data that supports the claim that man triggered climate change.
The ‘hockey stick’ graph was a fiction to create the impression that there was a tipping point where things would go out of control.
The only thing man made was made by discredited Mann.
Imagine if it were cooling – it might be. Would anyone honestly believe running our cars would stop it? You would deserve to be put in a mental institution.
When the cooling scare was on a Dane did make that recommendation and he was laughed out of court.
Margaret Thatcher who was fed up with the coal miners looked to climate change as an argument for ‘clean’ power from nuclear.
That has surfaced again. CO2 is life – nuclear is an ongoing threat to life. Environmentalists – bah, they are just a rag taggle bunch of activists who when the Berlin wall came down looked for another ’cause’.
Past Greenpeace leader says as much. They do not like an ordered World where people have a reasonable standard of life while technology improves the lot for all mankind. Or is it personkind in this politically correct time warp?
COT 15 if allowed will kill millions in Africa and elsewhere.
Environmentalists do not care about our children let alone Africa’s – they are a cruel institutionalised mob of no-hopers.
So KRudd’s team is twice the size if Britain’s. That’s 200 times the carbon foot print of Britain at least. Go KRudd Go – as soon as possible!!
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