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May 28, 2004

Economic News: Mixed to Hopeful

Nothing here you can't get off Yahoo Finance, but since I read this stuff, I might as well digest it and blog it.

OPEC considers quota suspension. Trouble is, most oil-producers, except Saudi Arabia, are already pumping at capacity. However:

Suspending output quotas temporarily would make little difference to actual output but could provide the psychological impact on prices that OPEC's President Purnomo Yusgiantoro spoke of in Jakarta on Thursday.

It would also give official cartel blessing for Saudi to pump more without blatantly ignoring any new, higher quota.

This might not have a major impact on oil prices, but it couldn't help but have a sanguine affect.

Once again, Midwest factory activity surprises. "Midwest factory activity surprises" = "a bad surprise for John Kerry," since he's counting on a lingering manufacturing recession to deliver him Ohio.

And Michigan. And Wisconsin. And Pennsylvania. And Minnesota. And etc.:

Strength in the Chicago Purchasing Management index of business activity backed up that argument. The index jumped to 68.0 in May, when economists had looked for a modest pullback to 61.0 after April's already robust 63.9. The employment index also firmed, pointing to some improvement in the labor market.

"This is a very stunning report. The Chicago PMI is a volatile series and I thought you'd get some retracement and you didn't," said an impressed Joseph LaVorgna, senior U.S. economist at Deutsche Bank Securities.

But complicating this is the public's anxiety over rising gas prices and the uncertain (they think) situation in Iraq, which has reduced confidence:

The University of Michigan's final survey of consumer confidence for May showed its index falling to 90.2 from April's final reading of 94.2.

"What's affecting consumer sentiment is the geopolitical news, which is quite negative coming out of Iraq. But also the rise in oil prices is of concern to consumers as it affects their pocketbooks directly and that surely had an impact," said Kevin Logan, senior economist at Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein.

On the other hand, personal spending rose with expectations, personal incomes jumped, and yet inflation remained tame:

Personal spending rose 0.3 percent in April, the smallest gain in six months, the Commerce Department said. The figure was in line with forecasts.

More importantly for the economic outlook, incomes rose by a solid 0.6 percent, the biggest gain since last November as the job market improved. The rise showed households will have the wherewithal to keep on spending in the months ahead even if gasoline prices stay high.

A key indicator of inflation in the report -- and the Fed's favored measure of prices -- came in weaker than expected with a 0.1 percent increase, easing worries in the bond market that the Fed would need to make a series of aggressive rate hikes. The annual increase in the core personal consumption expenditures index was a moderate 1.4 percent.

"This eases fears that the Fed was behind the curve," said JP Morgan senior economist Jim Glassman.

"It allows the Fed to go at a measured pace without causing people to worry they are falling behind. The inflation scares are going to be dying down," he said.

Net effect? Well, the markets are slightly down.

Runaway inflation and interest rates, the liberals' latest economic bugaboos -- now that their unemployment bugaboo has been thoroughly rubbished by events -- would seem to be a phantasmal threat at this point.

Alas, no cowbell for mixed-to-hopeful economic news.

posted by Ace at 02:19 PM

Comments

Ace, you missed one important point in the reporting of the good economic news from Chicago and that is that the numbers report were the HIGHEST since july of 1988. Just let that date sink in a moment....ok, are you siting down? Because what I am about to tell you will absolutely shock you.

We have just had a higher increase in manufacturing in May then we EVER had under Clinton economic boom years.

Since the mainstream media is constantly assuring us that the pre-Clinton era was the economic dark ages, you know...forced child labor camps, single mothers having to sell their children for medical experimentation, orphans used as yard markers on golf ranges, etc....I am really having a hard time coming to grasp with this. After all the liberal economic "experts" have stated point blank that W's tax cuts would hurt the economy and NOT help it. So how can this horrible economic policy by the present administration possible produce economic output greater than that of the glory years under Clinton.

I'm going to go lay down for a moment...all this cowbell is making my head hurt.

Posted by: WindyCity on May 28, 2004 03:13 PM

New poll shows that more people think the economy is bad. 41%, up from 29% in April.

I blame media brain control. I have the cure.

http://zapatopi.net/afdb.html

Posted by: lauraw on May 28, 2004 04:17 PM

Dude,
Here I was....scrolling down...looking for some cowbell....*sigh*. Don't blame me for wandering to greener pastures for cowbell.

Posted by: Rusty Shackleford on May 28, 2004 07:11 PM

War economies do tend to boom, especially when the gov't is going into deficit to pump up the economy.

Bush's tax cuts may be helping the machine to hum smoothly (finally), but your children and grandchildren will have one hell of a hole to dig themselves out of.

Posted by: Jeremy Brendan on May 31, 2004 04:48 AM

Jeremy,

Thanks for providing the other great liberal scare tactic...the deficit is going to destroy the world that we give to our children. The funny thing is that economic growth has a way of making deficits go "poof". If I can take you back to the 90's I can show you that the reason the deficit shrank so much back then had very little to do with government restraining its spending habits and a great deal to do with economic growth (people and companies make more money, which means the government collects more in taxes).

Similarly, long term economic growth can make any deficity disappear faster than a whiskey and coke in Ted Kennedy's hand.

Finally, how big does a deficit need to get before it has a chance of causing a financial crisis similar to what's happened in Korea or Brazil? As a percentage of GDP, the US deficit is a tiny fraction of what it was to those countries and the amount of additional spending for the War is an even smaller fraction of the total economic throughput of the US. Amazingly liberals refuse to factor in these things.

But take heart Jeremy, you can still go on scaring old people about medicare and telling the college kids that the FBI is looking at their library records.

Posted by: WindyCity on June 1, 2004 11:56 AM

Really cool blog! What you say makes total sense! Keep up the good work.

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Oh no! Hamas' de facto press agent at the UN complains that she can't use her credit cards or rent a card now that she's been sanctioned as a terrorist operative
Why does this keep happening to members of the "political organization" (per Tucker Carlson) of Hamas?!?!

Tucker Carlson claims that it's weird that Ted Cruz is interested in the massacre of Christians by Nigerian Muslims, because he has "no track record of being interested in Christians," then blows off the massacre of Christians by Nigerian Muslims, saying it might or might not be a real concern
Tucker Carlson enjoys using the left-wing tactic of "Tactical Ignorance" to avoid taking positions on topics. Is Hamas really a terrorist organization? Tucker can't say. He hasn't looked into it enough, but "it seems like a political organization to me." Are Muslims slaughtering Christians in Nigeria? Again, Tucker just doesn't know. He hasn't examined the evidence yet. He knows every Palestinian Christian who said he was blocked from visiting holy sites in Bethlehem, but he just hasn't had the time to look into the mass slaughter of Christians in Nigeria that has been going on since (checks watch) 2009. He doesn't know, so he can't offer an opinion. Wouldn't be prudent, you know? Don't rush him! He'll sift through the evidence at some point in the future and render an opinion sometime around 2044.
Of course, if you need an opinion on Jewish Perfidy, he has all the facts at his fingertips and can give you a fully informed opinion pronto. Say, have you ever heard of the USS Liberty incident...?
You'd think that the main issue for Tucker Carlson, who pretends to be so deeply concerned about Palestinian Christians being bullied by Jews in Israel (supposedly), would be the massacre of 185,000 Christians in Nigeria itself. But no, his main problem is that Ted Cruz is talking about it, "who has no track record of being interested in Christians at all." And then he just shrugs as to whether this is even a real issue or not.
Whatever we do we must never "divide the right," huh?
Tucker is attacking Ted Cruz for bringing the issue up because he's acting as an apologist for Jihadism, and he can't cleanly admit that Jihadists are killing any Christians, anywhere. There is no daylight between him and CAIR at this point.
One might conclude that Tucker Carlson himself isn't interested in the plight of Christians -- except as they can be used as a cudgel to attack Jews.
Just gonna ask an Interesting Question myself -- why is it that Tucker Carlson's arguments all track with those shit out by Qatarian propaganda agents and the far left? That if Jews crush an ant underfoot it is worldwide news, but when Muslims slaughter Christians it elicits not even a vigorous shrug?

Sydney Sweeney has passed from celebrity to Meme Legend

Garth Merenghi is interviewed by the only man who can fathom his ineffable brilliance -- Garth Merenghi
From the comments:

I once glimpsed Garth in the penumbra betwixt my wake and sleep. He was in my dream, standing afar, not looking my way, nor did he acknowledge me. But I felt seen. And that's when I knew I was a traveler on the right path. I'm glad he's still with us.

Now that's some Merenghian prose.
Garth Merenghi on the writer's craft

Greetings, Traveler. If you still have not experienced Garth Merenghi -- Author, Dream-weaver, Visionary, plus Actor -- the six episodes of his Darkplace are still available on YouTube and supposedly upscaled to HD. (Viewing it now, it doesn't appeared upscaled for shit.)
I think the second episode, "Hell Hath Fury," is the best by a good margin. Try to at least watch through to that one. It's Mereghi's incisive but nuanced take on sexism.

TJM Returns with a discussion of Auteur Theory.

Podcast: The elections! NYC, Virginia, New Jersey, Texas, California, and the future prospects of the Republican party...

Update on Scott Adams:

Scott Adams had approval for this cancer drug but they hadn't scheduled him to get it. He was taking a turn for the worse. Trump had told him to call if he needed anything, so he did. Talked to Don Jr (who is in Africa) , then RFK Jr, then Dr Oz. Someone talked to Kaiser and he was scheduled. Shouldn't have needed it but he did and he says it saved his life.
Posted by: Notsothoreau

"Trump" goes trick-or-treating

Funny retro kid costumes, thanks to SMH
Good to see people honoring Lamont the Big Dummy

Four hours of retro Halloween commercials and specials
The first short is the original 1996 appearance of "Sam," the dangerous undead trick-or-treater from Trick r' Treat.

ICYMI: Australian journalist actually presses Kamala Harris when she repeatedly dodges questions about Biden's mental fitness
Kamala admits she didn't have the stamina to run for president, while continuing to insist he had the mental capacity to serve as president. He was too frail to run but perfectly strong enough to govern. Yeah sure whatever lying whore.

On Wednesday, we'll see the "Beaver Super-Moon." Which sounds hot.

Podcast: Historian and Pundit Robert Spencer joins us for a wide-ranging discussion about the Islamists in our midst: Mamdani in NYC, all across Europe, and others.

Full Episode: The Hardy Boys (and Nancy Drew) Meet Dracula
I don't remember this show, except for remembering that Nancy Drew was hot and the opening credits were foreboding and exicting

According to Grok, Latrine John-Pissoir has never failed to mention she is "black" (or "queer") during her book interviews
She may not know what the hell her book is about, but she definitely knows that "every day I wake up black and queer." Join the club, sister!

Schmoll: 53% of New Jersey likely voters say their neighbors are voting for Ciattarelli, while 47% say the cheater/grifter Mikie Sherrill
The "who do you think your neighbors are voting for" question is designed to avoid the Shy Tory problem, wherein conservative people lie to schmollsters because they don't want to go on record with a likely left-winger telling them who they're really voting for. So instead the question is who do you think your neighbors are voting for, so people can talk about who they themselves support without actually having to admit it to a left-wing rando stranger recording their answers on the phone.

Hackers take over University of Penn website, calling the school a "dogshit elitist institution full of woke retards" and threatening to release its admissions files to prove illegal racial discrimination
No lies detected so far

Live Now: Dana Loesch is interrogating Heritage President Kevin Roberts on his insistence that the gay Nazi Nick Fuentes is an absolutely essential "conservative" voice whose ideas we must take seriously and who we must absolutely not exclude based on his Naziism

TJM Complains about Wreck-It Ralph The very topical premiere of TJM's YouTube Channel.

Interesting football history: How the forward pass was created in response to the nineteen -- 19! -- people killed playing football in 1905 alone
The original rules of football did not allow forward passes. The ball was primarily advanced by running, with blockers forming lines with interlocked arms and just smashing into the similarly-interlocked defensive lines. It was basically Greek hoplite spear formations but with a semi-spherical ball. As calls to ban the sport entirely grew, some looked for ways to de-emphasize mass charges as the primary means of advancing the ball, and some specifically championed allowing a passer to throw the ball forward.