Just Use Dollars to Staunch the Bleeding

Pricing in another rate cut? Are you serious? I remember hearing on CNN that investors were setting their hearts on another rate cut but I assumed it must be wishful thinking. Looks like it's the season of wishful thinking and naivete. From the NY Times:

Capping a series of wild swings, the Dow Jones industrial average soared to its biggest one-day percentage gain in more than four years yesterday after a top Federal Reserve official hinted at another interest rate cut and oil fell below $91 a barrel.

The Fed’s vice chairman, Donald L. Kohn, further reassured investors yesterday by pledging to follow “flexible and pragmatic policy making” as the bank decides how to cope with the financial upheaval. The unusually candid remarks were taken as a sign that the Fed policy panel was considering a rate cut at its Dec. 11 meeting.

Welcome to Pink Slip Nation

Are you tired of hearing how great the economy is? Many of us see the writing on the wall and realize that no matter what Treasury Secretary Paulson might say, this economy is faltering. Between the weak dollar, exploding trade deficits, budget deficits, the housing housing bubble implosion, credit crunch, layoffs and anemic unemployment numbers we are heading into an unwinding of one of the largest ponzi schemes in history.

I'm no "expert" but plenty of us non experts have seen this coming. And unlike those "experts" I make no great claims to my market prescience. I look at fundamentals and what I see is a country that is structurally out of whack on a very unsustainable path.

This blog is a gathering place for people who recognize the gap between the image and reality to exchange stories, data and observations of what is really going on in the economy. Look for links to stories about housing, employment, business and general economics. This is a clearinghouse of information for bears, by bears and of bears.