Joseph’s Blog – josephrodgers.com

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California City

[Image: Geoglyphs of nowhere].

In the desert 100 miles northeast of Los Angeles is a suburb abandoned in advance of itself—the unfinished extension of a place called California City. Visible from above now are a series of badly paved streets carved into the dust and gravel, like some peculiarly American response to the Nazca Lines (or even the labyrinth at Chartres cathedral). The uninhabited street plan has become an abstract geoglyph—unintentional land art visible from airplanes—not a thriving community at all.

Take a look.

[Image: Empty streets from above, rotated 90º (north is to the right)].

On Google Street View, distant structures like McMansions can be made out here and there amidst the ghost-grid, mirages of suburbia in the middle of nowhere.

And it’s a weird geography: two of the most prominent nearby landmarks include a prison—

[Image: The geometry of incarceration].

—and an automobile test-driving facility run by Honda. There is also a visually spectacular boron mine to the southeast—it’s the largest open-pit mine in California, according to the

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The Dollar Is Now The Laughing Stock Of The World

We are currently combing for Youtube clips of Weimar Republic pundits (or even Robert Mugabe’s finance minister) ridiculing the dollar and the Fed’s “strong currency” posturing (heaven forbid Ron Paul succeeds and the Fed’s threat that the dollar may actually turn weaker transpires: what shall we ever do then?). And while it would appear video recordings, let along internet access, were a little problematic in the 1920’s, we present the following obeservations on the dollar courtesy of our German colleagues at Berninger.

[YouTube Video]

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Bank Of America On Gold’s Imminent Rise To $1,500

Earlier we presented one view on why gold is about to plunge. While that perspective was somewhat truncated, a report recently issued by Bank Of America’s commodities team presents the case for gold at $1,500/ounce. As BACMLCFC observes, and agrees with other observations presented on Zero Hedge by both SocGen and by Jim Grant, “[d]uring the last decade we found that three variables alone could explain the fluctuations in the price of gold: risk, currency and commodity prices. In a nutshell, our analysis showed that gold is sometimes a currency, sometimes a commodity and sometimes a store of value. Of course, the elusive question will always be figuring out which market gold will track next.” In essence, a very detailed report (get a cup of coffee now) to confirm that Paulson and Ackman will soon be much richer.

Gold Prices Continue To Move Towards $1,500/oz

The three stages of gold price appreciation

Departing from this analytic framework, we argued back in October 2008 that gold prices would move up to $1500/oz in three steps. The outburst of the credit crisis in August 2007 marked the start of the first stage where gold started to reflect the rising risk premia, rising from $650/oz to about $950/oz. The second stage of gold price appreciation, we argued well over a year ago, would primarily be about USD weakness and lack of confidence in fiat currencies. We argued that gold could break through $1200/oz in this second stage and strengthen against all currency crosses. The third and final stage will be driven, in our view, by a strong cyclical recovery in energy and commodity prices.

A weak dollar is now driving investors into gold

Our analysis shows that the recent rally in gold prices that started in April this year has mainly been about currency weakness, matching the second stage described in our October 2008 piece. Of course, many observers will argue that investor and central bank demand has been the main driver of gold prices for
some time (Chart 2). But this is the old traders’ truism: prices go up because there are more buyers than sellers. The more critical question to understand whether a trend is sustainable is what drives that investor demand. In that sense, gold prices have rallied this year on the back of a weaker trade-weighted
USD (Chart 3).

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How to Conquer Poverty

“The free-swinging enterpriser, using capitalist savings, is the true hero of the war on poverty.”

The message of Henry Hazlitt’s The Conquest of Poverty is that his subject could have been dealt with in the past tense if it weren’t for the pernicious doctrine that “the state knows best.”

Alas! the tendency to hand problems of income “distribution” over to politicians whose only real skill is the accumulation of votes has prevented the West from utilizing the great productive strength that is to be found in the principle of voluntary association. So the cure for poverty is still in the future.

Just how far are we from getting government off our backs? Mr. Hazlitt is not a total pessimist; he believes in the power of education. Mere verbal demonstration, however, is not an infallible schoolteacher; the collaboration of events is needed to make education effective.

Fortunately, events are coming to Mr. Hazlitt’s aid; what he was saying twenty years ago about the fallacies of statism is becoming hindsight as it is repeated by other and less prescient men who now stand appalled at what inflation, a government created phenomenon, is doing to compound our troubles.

Since poverty is a relative thing (some people are always going to be poorer than others), Mr. HazIitt has had his difficulties with the conventional definitions. Value judgments are involved. It is wrong to define poverty, as one “authority” does, as the condition affecting “any family with an income less than one-half that of the median family.” If such a definition were to be accepted it would mean that the percentage of the poor would never decrease until all incomes were equalized. The bottom fourth of a nation might be sufficiently fed to remain healthy and still be candidates for soaring relief if any such definition were to be perpetuated.

What Mr. Hazlitt proposes is that the “subsistence level” must provide our working definition of the poverty line. Any attempt to provide relief for able bodied adults beyond subsistence must take money away from production and so render society poorer on the whole.

Capitalism, in league with technological ingenuity, is what delivered the West from the specter of Malthusian doom. Before the industrial revolution, soaring populations pressed inexorably on the means of subsistence. But when the Manchester factories in…

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From Zero Hedge:

Here Is Why The Dollar Is Now Effectively Worthless

A picture is worth a thousand Krugman essays, which is why we present a chart comparing the US Monetary Base (and by subtracting Reserve Balances with Fed Reserve Banks, Currency in Circulation), and the Fed’s holdings of MBS and Agency paper (worthless GSE/FHA garbage). In summary: Currency in Circulation: $920 billion; MBS/Agency Holdings: $997 billion. The dollar in your pocket is now entirely backed only by worthless, rapidly devaluing and subsidized housing.

Source: H.3 and H.4.1

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Teens Texting While Driving in Alarming Numbers [STUDY]

The Pew Internet & American Life Project has just published the results of a study on distracted driving behavior amongst teenagers which shows that teens are aware of the dangers of texting while driving, but they choose to do it anyway.

After surveying 800 teens in 4 US cities over the summer of 2009, Pew estimates that 26% of all American teens 16-17 have texted while driving, and 43% have talked on a cell phone while driving.

Even more alarming is that 48% of teens 12-17 have witnessed someone else texting while driving, which points to an ambivalence and acceptance of the practice. The findings also indicate that even state laws prohibiting these activities may not be discouraging newly licensed drivers from using their mobile devices while behind the wheel.

Amanda Lenhart, co-author of the report, claims that teens are well aware of the risks associated with texting while driving, “but the desire to stay connected is so strong for teens and their parents that safety sometimes takes a backseat to staying in touch with friends and family.”

The research is also indicative of the fact that children might be picking up the dangerous behaviors from their parents. The report states that, “the frequency of teens reporting parent cell phone use behind the wheel in our focus groups was striking, and suggested that, in many cases, texting while driving is a family affair.”

In a qualitative interview one teen boy even said, “Yeah [my dad] drives like he’s drunk. His phone is just like sitting in front of his face, and he puts his knees on the bottom of the steering wheel and tries to text.”

We’ve included the full research report below, but here are a few additional findings that stand out:

- 75% of all American teens 12-17 own a cell phone

- 82% of teens 16-17 have a cell phone & 76% text.

- Overall, 34% of teens 16-17 say they have texted while driving, which translates to 26% of all American teens 16-17.

- Boys and girls are equally likely to report texting behind the wheel.

- 55% of teens 14-17 report that they have witnessed a driver texting as a passenger (48% for 12-17, and 32% for 12-13).

If this research highlights anything it’s that teens are uber-connected, picking up bad behaviors from their parents, and unabashedly driving dangerously i…

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I get this dreadful disease every saturday, especially when the hogs play.

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I failed. I Kade it through a week a few days, quit blogging it and got lazy. Jeeze. Anyways, life is still good. I feel healthier and I am definitely starting back. A major setback for me has been an issue with my condo, the sink is out of commission. Basically I was on this uber diet/ exercise and couldn’t even cook.

We are installing a new disposal this week and I will have no excuses.

BTW, I played flag football yesterday and I feel like mush. I need to get cardio in chek stat.