Dave Ramsey, Foreclosure Analysis
Kathleen Versteegh, Military Wife
Justin Tuck, NY Giants
Trustan Prettyman, Singer/Songwriter/Surfer
John Rutlege, Chairman of Rutledge Capital
Scott Rothbort, Lakeview Asset Management President
Jerre Stead, IHS C.E.O.
Rep. Joseph Crowley, Congressman on the Ways and Means Comittee
Refinance.com
Bob O’Brien, Barron’s
John Haley, Watson Wyatt Worldwide C.E.O.
Kevin Loving, Downtown Little League Uniform Manager
Little League Kids, Downtown Little League
Jim McCluney, Emulex CEO
Jill Schlesinger, Strategic Point
Carolyn Maloney, D-NY
Lolita, Designs by Lolita
James Millership, Everlands Conservation Initiative Co-Founder
Deborah Wince-Smith, Council on Competitiveness President
Patrick Campbell, Iava.org Legislative Director
What the heck is the Administration doing with this endless promoting of their meaningless Free Trade Agreement with Colombia. (Put more accurately, why can’t they just tell us which of their cronies will benefit from this bill and tell us to do them a favor? Same can be said of course for any bill that gets through the Democrats or Republicans pretty much EVER). The time and energy they’ve spent hyping and selling this bill, which frankly doesn’t hurt and might actually be a tiny positive for the economy, to the American public has huge opportunity costs. I mean, for example, couldn’t they instead be fixing the tax code or fighting corruption and fraud. Or they could just start clicking on the spam they get and go after who ever sent it to them…that wouldn’t be so hard, would it? And that would definitely help this economy become more efficient.
You know how much their best original estimate for the boost in sales to Colombia might be if they get this bill passed? $1.1 billion. Woo hoo. That’s a full 1/160th of the money the Democrats and Republicans in office borrowed from our grand children for their pre-emptive stimulus package. $1.1 billion — that’s the same amount of your money that the Democrats and Republicans and their cronies at the Fed gave the shareholders of Bear Stearns, some of the richest people on the planet, for their worthless stock after they leveraged their company into the ground.
$1.1 billion….sheesh, I guess it’s good that there’s something meaningless and not just simply redistributing wealth to their cronies for both those fraternity powers in power to focus on and then vote and pass in this stupid Colombian Free Trade agreement already.
Flipped it on myself in one brief post here, didn’t I?
But I don’t have time for love or poetry or song,
Protecting my ranch from dangerous forces, I’ve got to be strong,
But maybe I’m wrong again. - Beulah’s Song, Hank the Cowdog
Cowboy Cody did a decent enough job of trying to introduce me, but let me be formal about it: I’m Lobo The City Cattle Dog, and as of this weekend, it’s true that I’m in charge of running security for much of lower New York State. Now before you ask me to explain how a dog, even a Cattle Dog can end up with so much responsibility, let me ask you to think about my network of associates — the other dogs you see everywhere you go. All that mindless sniffing you see us doing on the streets? Those are my colleagues, collectively known as the Mysnifftery Workers, keeping our country safe.
A little about my background then - I started my security work in a small crate in an apartment in Brooklyn as a little puppy. I had been captured by two Storm Twoofers of The Evil Order of the Sphinx, that cartel of mean dogs and lazy people who justify their violence with annoying barking and socialist doctrines. After weeks of plotting my escape, I finally made contact with my sister who’d had her own ordeal at the hands of Storm Twoofers herself, but had been rescued by those good Rebels of the at the North Shore Animal Shelter Alliance.
The Dogi High Council then voted to have me assigned for top secret security training under the guidance of veteran Dogi High Council member, Cowboy Cody. Now I suppose once again I outta stop you before you ask me this time to explain why I’m allowed to go public with my top secret security training — see, that’s an old counter-espionage / propaganda trick (often used by The Evil Order of the Sphinx, btw): if you tell everyone your secret then nobody believes it could be true. I mean, you do realize that you’ve already forgotten that you don’t wanna believe a dog could be in charge of running security for much of lower New York state, after all, huh?
At any rate, whether it was a coincidence or not, the day after the legendary counter-espionage agent William Shatner (what you thought Captain Kirk was fictional?! — ha, you folks on two legs are so gullible….all dogs know the USS Enterprise is the greatest counter terrorist weapon the US has ever produced and it’s up there working all the time….every time you see William Shatner playing himself in real life, it’s because the Enterprise crew has once again ended up accidentally on earth and blowing their cover…so they end up using that counter-espionage trick, “It’s just TV, it’s not real!”. Oh, diggity dog, Cody’s gonna be upset for me revealing too much counter-espionage tricks, I better get back on bark here.) was on Fox Business, I got a call about this possible promotion to being in charge of running security for much of lower New York state.
So Cody took me upstate for a real-life Security Excursion in the Fahnestock Woods. Can some human please explain to me why we had to ride his bicycle 20 blocks to his car to then drive upstate to our ultimate destination? Cody grumbled something about NYC as we rode along, but I still don’t get you two-legged folk.
I think he was testing me when, just a couple hours into our first day in the woods, I came across a six foot long black snake sunning just a few yards away from where Cowboy was sunning. Lucky for me, we’ve had National Geographic on the plasma at home when we watch TV on the couch to wrap up our day (when we’re not watching one of the co-Heads of the Dogi High Council themselves: Judge Judy or Neil Young…I wonder if I’ll get in trouble for admitting that I prefer the nature shows with more action and less talking/singing…cut me some slack - I’m a dog, even if I am a Cattle Dog, after all), so I’ve seen a few snakes already and I just barked once and then retreated back to the trail with Cody. Here’s a picture of me running security detail back and forth around the perimeter of a lake that could have ended up the target of a sonic blast had I not disrupted the sound waves with my own energy bursts:
I also met my first river and passed the “Nip at all rapids” test with flying colors, according to Cody. Not sure why those rapids wouldn’t give up after all my relentless yipping, but maybe that’s part of the test too or something. I’ll have to ask Cody. Love the river, that’s for sure.
I also ran security detail (in between naps) while The Cowboy got his grill on. Cody never shares his food with me…but I guess I’d done something right that day, because he gave me a bite at the end of the night - that fresh-cooked meat stuff is delicious, huh:
I might be a puppy still (Cody says we’re gonna mark my first birthday with the next full moon…sounds close enough to this underdog!), but I do know that there’s more reason for the holiday this season than just my job interview - the are real soldiers out there who have given real lives so that I can prove that I can nip twenty rapids in one minute:
It seems I proved enough this weekend that the Dogi High Council approved me for being in charge of running security for much of lower New York state. I felt pretty good about my performance this weekend except for one little incident this morning – as we were about to start driving back to The City, I sorta stepped on the door lock button while Cody was outside saying his good byes with words and hugs instead of just sniffs like you humans always do. I got impatient and stepped in the wrong spot. I kept trying to step back on the right button, but that darn hazards button right next to the door lock button on the BMW 330i is twice the size and my paws kept hitting it instead. Cody figured it out like a good Dogi Master should though and got the doors back open after not too long. I still have a lot to learn – hope I’m up for all the responsibilities of this new job I’ve got. (Oh, great, I really am starting to sound like Cody!)
1. Commodity Boom on Internet Time?
2. iMiniMacBookPro with Free Service
3. Applauding All Those Serving
1. Jim Rogers has often said that the commodity boom will last 18 years. That means we’re less than halfway through it. But doesn’t all information and capital travel faster in this day and age? Is the commodity boom actually on internet time and the energy bulls just don’t realize it?
2. The new 3G iPhone is gonna be great and all that, but Apple’s actually spending much more time and capital position its next iPod to simply be used as a phone over any Wifi/WiMax and when you absolutely have to, cellular network. And calls and text messages will be 100% free.
3. In addition to remembering those who have served and died serving us citizens in this country, be sure to thank any troops you see on the streets this weekend. I shared an airplane ride home from New Orleans with several soldiers on a two week leave from Iraq this week and the entire plane applauded them when we landed. We applaud all of you in service.
Check it out on YouTube
1. Mojo missing? Better sell
2. Capital desperate? Better sell.
3. Frame your time frame.
1. ISRG, AAPL, GOOG and other former momentum stocks have lost their mojo. I continue to think this is a market that should be sold.
2. Dick Bove of Ladenburg says the brokerage firms are an outright sell. I agree with his consensus as these guys remain stuck pretending that they’re not desperate for capital. Either the bulls or the bears are a’gonna be very right in coming weeks, months and years.
3. Speaking of which, remember to think about time frame time frame time frame when you’re trading. Oil’s gonna be both up big sometimes and down big sometimes regardless of whether the $130 print right now is just a sign post on the way to $1000 by 2010 or on a way to $30 by 2010.
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Amanda Gengler, Money Magazine
Jim Greer, Fl GOP Chair
Jim Fowler, Jigsaw CEO (dressed as Ben Franklin)
Dr. John Tantillo, Marketing Doctor
Here’s what was on my mind when I wasn’t thinking about my suit:
1. When the Guilty Feign Accusations
2. Oil Short Hurts; Will Require Discipline
3. Credit Crisis Cockroaches
1. If the politicians wanna feign anger with some of their own cronies about high oil prices why don’t they call those at least remotely responsible for it…their own selves for their endless bail out and stimulus packages and their crony Bubble Ben for his endless gimmicks of creating worthless money out of thin air because all of those moves by politicians and bureaucrats is collectively creating the inflationary factors that are making the dollar collapse in value relative to oil
2. Oh, boy, mea culpa on the oil’s gonna top in the 120s, eh? I’d probably, between puking and crying and praying, would be holding onto the oil short at least until $140 where I might be forced to cry uncle. Stop losses hurt the ego, but they can save a lot of performance.
3. Reports are now surfacing that Moody’s not only had a stupid computer glitch causing some of the junk they rated as AAA to be junk rated as AAA, but even though they’ve been fretting about that internally for a year and a half as the credit market has imploded around them, Moody’s hasn’t told any of us or the regulators about the mistake it seems. Things like that are masked during booms, but we can expect a whole lot more revelations like this in coming months as the Great Capital Shortage of 2008 continues to ripple.
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Melissa Kronfeld, NY Post & American Idol Blog Writer
Mike Santoli, Barron’s Senior Editor
Dave Dewalt, Mcaffe INC CEO & President
Jay Rein, Travelworm CEO
Todd Harrison
, Minyanville
Macho Man Randy Jones joins Happy Hour.
WHAT CAN WE LOOK FORWARD TO IN 2Q EARNINGS?
WHAT CAN WE LOOK FORWARD TO IN 2Q EARNINGS?
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