All-purpose news and politics thread

[Iangould]

Seems the dead are more important than the living.

That's an unfortunate sentiment and one which I doubt the families of the deceased would share.

[Iangould]

US Stocks close almost 5% up after Bernanke says US interest rates will be held near zero for up to another two years.

That should stabilize the other world markets for a while at least.

[Matt Algren]

Obama has canceled all commitments today and he's expected to announce - something.

Unless something happened later in the day, it turned out that he was going to Maryland (I think), where the bodies of those soldiers that died in the helicopter accident last weekend were scheduled to arrive. Nothing to do with the economy.

[Iangould]

Recall elections for the Wisconsin Senate are tonight.

Democrats have forced recall elections in 6 Republican-held State senate districts. They need to win three to take control of the Senate.

[Nick Soapdish]

Recall elections for the Wisconsin Senate are tonight.

Democrats have forced recall elections in 6 Republican-held State senate districts. They need to win three to take control of the Senate.

And they need to win the two recall elections of Democratic-held seats which are next week. I don't know why they didn't just hold them all on the same day.

[Paul McEnery]

There seemed to be some question about whose side Standard and Poor's was taking over the debt crisis.

Not much need to wonder any more.

I did some checking this afternoon on the Federal Election Commission's database of financial contributors to political candidates. Within minutes I found that Harold W. McGraw III, the Chairman, President, and CEO of Standard & Poor's parent company, is a big money contributor to lots of Republicans.

Repeat recipients of McGraw's largess include Mitt Romney, George W. Bush, the National Republican Congressional Committee, the National Republican Senatorial Committee, something called the Bush-Cheney Compliance Committee, and many more Republicans. He primarily gives his big money donations to PACs and Republicans, although a few Democrats have benefited as well. He has never given any money to the Obama campaign nor any to the Democratic Party.

Gee, how convenient. Standard and Poor's issues a politically biased rating with a $2 trillion error. Republicans wave that rating around like Moses just brought it down from the mountain as verification of their defamation about the Obama presidency. And the head of the company making those ratings happens to give money to the likes of Mitt Romney and the Republican Party.

It would be interesting to chart political contributions by other executives at S&P.

[dupersuper]

US stocks open higher

Obama has canceled all commitments today and he's expected to announce - something.

Considering how thing have been going it will probably be that we all need to co-operate with our new alien overlords and line up at the organ-harvesting centres in a common and orderly fashion..

10-1 the Republican leaders refer to the overlords as "job creators".

[the4thpip]

Wisconsin Democrats picked up two seats in the state Senate after defeating incumbent Republicans in recall elections on Tuesday, falling short of the three seats needed to gain a majority.

http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2011/08/0...ion-tampering/

[the4thpip]

US Stocks close almost 5% up after Bernanke says US interest rates will be held near zero for up to another two years.

That should stabilize the other world markets for a while at least.

Didn't even last 24 hours, it seems. DAX and DJI down sharply again.

[FalconX2000]

Rick Perry will be entering the presidential race. Probably the only one with a good shot at beating Romney. And I know Rick Perry will definitely lose the general.

[Iangould]

Didn't even last 24 hours, it seems. DAX and DJI down sharply again.

When you see markets bounce 5% in a day, it's not surprising to see them fall significantly the next day. But so far, they aren't reaching new sort-term lows,.

[Romero]

Rick Perry will be entering the presidential race. Probably the only one with a good shot at beating Romney. And I know Rick Perry will definitely lose the general.

Really? He is the only Republican candidate that actually does make me fear for the 2012 elections.

Perhaps I am just unaware of how the rest of the country sees him, but I think he could actually get the nomination, and if shit doesn't get better before 2012, I think he could pull a win. He's been working hard to shore up his tea party and religious conservative image, and Texas has been selling the rest of the country the idea that we have a great economy, so he must be doing something right.

Granted, the information is out there that pokes holes in his Tea Party love, and in Texas' economic picture. Still, I think he will make the right forget about Bachmann or Palin (except as possible VP candidates). Since other front runners like Pawlenty and Romney aren't even in political office right now, I think as a current sitting governor he could use that to his advantage.

[king mob]

The Bank of England is predicting more gloom.

The Bank of England signalled that interest rates would stay on hold for a long time to come as it cut its growth forecasts for the UK, blaming the weaker global economy.

The Bank's governor, Mervyn King, also warned that it could take several years to bring high debt under control in some eurozone countries.

The City is expecting UK borrowing costs to stay on hold until early 2013, and King suggested an early rise was certainly off the agenda.

Speaking at a press conference after the publication of the Bank's latest quarterly forecasts on Wednesday, King said the greatest risks to Britain's economic recovery came from the eurozone debt crisis, and that these "headwinds are becoming stronger by the day". He said the UK must work with other countries to reduce public and private debt mountains.

King said: "The imbalances in the world economy are still not being properly tackled and the burden of debt is still there. This problem will take, I think, a number of years before we will find our way through it."

He added: "Were they to crystallise, the risks emanating from the euro area have the potential to have a significant impact on the UK economy."

The Bank lowered its UK growth estimate for 2011 to 1.5%, from a previous forecast of about 1.8%, and cut its 2012 forecast to around 2% from 2.5%. The Bank expects the growth rate will reach 2% on an annual rate by the fourth quarter of this year – down from 2.5% in its May forecast. In two years' time, annual growth would be 2.7%, a fraction lower than in May.

Vicky Redwood, senior UK economist at Capital Economics, said: "August's UK inflation report echoes Tuesday's message from the US Federal Reserve that interest rates are likely to stay very low for a long time yet."

On Tuesday, the US Federal Reserve took the unusual step of freezing interest rates close to zero for at least two more years, and said it would consider further steps to boost growth.

King, meanwhile, gave little indication that the Bank would provide more economic stimulus.

Chris Williamson, chief economist at Markit, said: "This is a far less bleak assessment of an economy than that given for the US yesterday by Fed chairman Bernanke. It seems that the downgraded forecast raises the likelihood that the Bank's monetary policy committee will increasingly mull the need for further quantitative easing, but it would require the economic data flow to continue to disappoint in coming months before we might see any real chance of further stimulus."

The Bank is still predicting that inflation will peak about around 5% later this year due to rising utility bills – the same as the May forecast – before falling steadily to 1.8% in two years' time, a degree lower than expected three months ago and below the Bank's 2% inflation target.

King reiterated comments he made in January about household incomes suffering the worst squeeze since the 1920s. "This is a long and deep squeeze in real living standards," he said, adding that the good news was that oil prices had come down in recent days.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/2...and-uk-economy

[PiratesPensSteelers]

Do you go about buying Gold in the same manner you would buy a stock? Meaning, can it be done via ScottTrade or something like that?

[the4thpip]

When you see markets bounce 5% in a day, it's not surprising to see them fall significantly the next day. But so far, they aren't reaching new sort-term lows,.

The DAX closed down more than 5% (after closing almost where it had opened yesterday, so no bounce for us at all), the DJI is now down 3.2% with minutes left in the trading day.