BobDrye

Howl by Nicholas von Hoffman Economic Chaos, Political Consequences [posted online on March 17, 2008] What's the single most important step the government can take to address the crumbling economy? Cast your vote in the Nation Poll. "Fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy night!" --Margo Channing (Bette Davis) in All About Eve. Bumpy is no word for it. The news coming out of Wall Street makes what the three presidential candidates are saying beside the point. Cancel the fun. The bad news also bids fair to change the daily lives of 300 million Americans. No, kidding, folks. What's going on in the business world is as serious as it can get. Events unfolding this week on the lower end of Manhattan will cancel out all the projects John McCain, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have been talking about. McCain will have to deal with the home truth that, though he may dig up enough soldier boys for the Middle Eastern wars, there is no money to pay for them. And thanks to the ever-shrinking dollar, other countries are not going to lend us more money to carry them on. We have run out of money: it's time to cut and run. The billions that Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama would have had to spend to do the wonderful things they are dangling in front of the voters do not exist. Tradition has always allowed campaigning candidates to make promises they will not make good on, but this time they are bumping up against the limits of the plausible, let alone the possible. It might be helpful if they would ease off with the pretty pictures. There will be no health insurance for everyone. No long-needed increases in teachers' salaries, no big infrastructure projects, no decent-paying new jobs for those laid-off workers in Ohio, Michigan and Pennsylvania, and nothing for single-parent (read mothers) households. There is no money. As things stand now we may have to spend hundreds of billions to prevent millions of people from being thrown out of their homes and billions more to prop our crooked, avaricious, heedless and duplicitous financial system so it does not come crashing down on all of us. Just a couple of days ago the Federal Reserve Board committed a mere $200 billion to Wall Street to back up their rotten bonds. The news of that expensive move had hardly been digested when it was announced that the Fed would pledge untold billions more to keep the investment banking house of Bear Stearns from sinking with all hands aboard. The floatation device was a hastily arrange purchase of the once prestigious, 85-year-old investment bank by J.P. Morgan for $2 a share, which a little more than a year ago was selling for $170 and as recently as a couple of days ago for $30. God only knows how much this will cost the government by the time the expensive, gory details are ironed out, something that will take months. This news prompted the New York Times's Gretchen Morgenson, one of the best business journalists around, to write, "What are the consequences of a world in which regulators rescue even the financial institutions whose recklessness and greed helped create the titanic credit mess we are in? Will the consequences be an even weaker currency, rampant inflation, a continuation of the slow bleed that we have witnessed at banks and brokerage firms for the past year?" The answers to Morgenson's question may well be yes and even worse. As of now nothing is clear, nothing is certain and nothing can relied on. In the chaos which has taken over Wall Street, the Fed, the Treasury Department and the other organs of government concerned with managing the crisis, there comes a new announcement of a new remedy every hour. Nobody knows if these remedies will blow off the hysteria and restore a modicum of order. Nor do we know who is being saved by our panicky federal officials. Are they saving some millions of jobs and homes, which may be in danger from the fallout stemming from this train of financial disasters? Or are they saving some of the most despicable rich guys to make an appearance in our society since the 1870s, w

Brighter! There very expensive @ $.20 each. I have several types, 5mm, 10mm, 3x5mm square, etc. Let's have lunch one day soon and I'll give you a handfull.

"Beauty is in the eyes of the beholder" :ack:

2025 "rage of robots". Who do we charge when it's friendly fire? :_deadhorse:

Have you thought about making your own led light? http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/855164491_P1010646.JPG

My wife and I had much fun in this boat! When I started going too fast for her, her fingernails would head towards my legs. The faster that I went the deeper her nails went. About 60 mph was her comfort level. It's not jet, its a v-drive flat. http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/771991752_img381.jpg

By PAUL KRUGMAN Published: March 17, 2008 O.K., here it comes: The unthinkable is about to become the inevitable. Times Topics: Bear Stearns CompaniesLast week, Robert Rubin, the former Treasury secretary, and John Lipsky, a top official at the International Monetary Fund, both suggested that public funds might be needed to rescue the U.S. financial system. Mr. Lipsky insisted that he wasn’t talking about a bailout. But he was. It’s true that Henry Paulson, the current Treasury secretary, still says that any proposal to use taxpayers’ money to help resolve the crisis is a “non-starter.” But that’s about as credible as all of his previous pronouncements on the financial situation. So here’s the question we really should be asking: When the feds do bail out the financial system, what will they do to ensure that they aren’t also bailing out the people who got us into this mess? Let’s talk about why a bailout is inevitable. Between 2002 and 2007, false beliefs in the private sector — the belief that home prices only go up, that financial innovation had made risk go away, that a triple-A rating really meant that an investment was safe — led to an epidemic of bad lending. Meanwhile, false beliefs in the political arena — the belief of Alan Greenspan and his friends in the Bush administration that the market is always right and regulation always a bad thing — led Washington to ignore the warning signs. By the way, Mr. Greenspan is still at it: accepting no blame, he continues to insist that “market flexibility and open competition” are the “most reliable safeguards against cumulative economic failure.” The result of all that bad lending was an unholy financial mess that will cause trillions of dollars in losses. A large chunk of these losses will fall on financial institutions: commercial banks, investment banks, hedge funds and so on. Many people say that the government should let the chips fall where they may — that those who made bad loans should simply be left to suffer the consequences. But it’s not going to happen. When push comes to shove, financial officials — rightly — aren’t willing to run the risk that losses on bad loans will cripple the financial system and take the real economy down with it. Consider what happened last Friday, when the Federal Reserve rushed to the aid of Bear Stearns. Nobody expects an investment bank to be a charitable institution, but Bear has a particularly nasty reputation. As Gretchen Morgenson of The New York Times reminds us, Bear “has often operated in the gray areas of Wall Street and with an aggressive, brass-knuckles approach.” Bear was a major promoter of the most questionable subprime lenders. It lured customers into two of its own hedge funds that were among the first to go bust in the current crisis. And it’s a bad financial citizen: the last time the Fed tried to contain a financial crisis, after the collapse of Long-Term Capital Management in 1998, Bear refused to participate in the rescue operation. Bear, in other words, deserved to be allowed to fail — both on the merits and to teach Wall Street not to expect someone else to clean up its messes. But the Fed rode to Bear’s rescue anyway, fearing that the collapse of a major investment bank would cause panic in the markets and wreak havoc with the wider economy. Fed officials knew that they were doing a bad thing, but believed that the alternative would be even worse. As Bear goes, so will go the rest of the financial system. And if history is any guide, the coming taxpayer-financed bailout will end up costing a lot of money. The U.S. savings and loan crisis of the 1980s ended up costing taxpayers 3.2 percent of G.D.P., the equivalent of $450 billion today. Some estimates put the fiscal cost of Japan’s post-bubble cleanup at more than 20 percent of G.D.P. — the equivalent of $3 trillion for the United States. If these numbers shock you, they should. But the big bailout is coming. The only question is how well it will be managed. As I said, the important thing is to bai

It's not a speed that I would want to say at. The wind makes it intense.

Is this more of the look that you're looking for? http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/599203563_P1010607.JPG

Maz: As I spent the week in 70 deg weather lookin at the waves, working on my suntan, I want to make sure that you don't think that I have forgotten about you. I went to a car show and I think that I have a great idea for your problem of going hoodless! I'm posting the following pictures. http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/608987267_P1010599.JPG This is a consertive approach. http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/1298665600_P1010624.JPG This is the "raw" power image. http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/705954112_P1010642.JPG The color really matches the whole car. http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/1705833829_P1010604.JPG I think that this is the "cat's meow". The most important parts are available @ your local Home Depot. :ack:

I've got a voodoo doll on my desk, and anytime that I feel that someone is going to call you I put a pin in it! :) :)

130 would put me about 200 mili seconds short of shifting into 5th. P.S. Even with prodding from Mazda I've never been faster than that! :banghead:

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Maz: It's hard to remember what I did 5 years ago. I think that 50% is correct. :7fume:

About an inch just on the lower control arms. :) :)

Maz: I don't think that static ride is as important as the dynamic height is with weight transfer under breaking. I know that I use softer springs than most, as I can stand on the front of the car and get the frame to touch the concrete, but as I watch the movement of the front suspension I don't see that much movement when I brake hard on the road. ??????????????????????????????????????????????????????? :ack: :ack: :ack:

;: Maz: (due to higher hood line) I thought we were both going naked. Are you covering your jewels :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

7evin: Some of the better airfoils have lift to drag coefficient of 3. In other words for every 3 pounds of lift you create 1 pound of drag. Do you what it is for your wings? :7head:

Arya: I'm leaving town tomorrow for spring break. I'm going to spend 7 days with the family at Myrtle Beach. When I get back in 1 week I'm installing a 16 camera security system in my shop. We should be able to track the progress of both sevens. Remember that my seven hasn't even been taken apart completely yet. :ack:

What did you use for skin protection, Coppertone or Hawiian Tropic ? :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

Maz: When you state that you can tig most car nuts will ask you if you do aluminum. The secret is that it's more about the sound than it is with steel. If it looks wet you better not be adding much more heat. Add filler and move on. Welding steel is like talking to a guy, welding aluminum is like talking to a moody woman. Just because you scored with her yesterday doesn't mean you will today. :7head:

Arya: I still think that your side has the advantage as I haven't taken my seven fully apart yet. Pictures are to follow in the next few days. :ack:

I think that the time date of that picture is in December and that a more recent picture would be more complete. However I accept the date of June the 21st. We will need a crowd of witnesses and a small blat to celebrate. :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead: :banghead:

Maz: I’m handicapping you 6 months and a nephew. The bet if you accept is is dinner for the whole family at the restaurant of the winner’s choice. Budget $150.00. The winner has to drive his completed car as is, for the summer. We would need to enforce spirit and intent. http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/358289163_P1010533.JPG http://www.usa7s.com/aspnetforum/upload/1822510999_P1010537.JPG Negotiations: I need to: Replace all of the exterior aluminum and polish. Paint all of the fiberglass. Have the computer and screen operational. Dyno over 500 hp with a printout. Replace the lower control arms. Install custom taillights. Living on Tulsa time. :7frog: :7frog: