Early Signs of a Market Crash Ahead?

[101Scout]

Hummmm... Italy now looks at privatizing .... where have we heard that from before .... ??



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Italy on Wednesday opened the way for a new wave of privatisations as part of its efforts to calm the markets after a three-day run on its shares and bonds.

Measures to encourage the sale of local authority assets and of state holdings in big corporations were among new provisions inserted at the last minute into a €40bn (£35bn) austerity plan aiming at balancing Italy's public accounts by 2014.

The finance minister, Giulio Tremonti, had earlier reacted to concerns about the possibility of Rome being dragged into the eurozone debt crisis with a promise to impose another round of spending cuts by Friday.

His assurance that opposition parties would agree within a matter of days to rally round further austerity measures immediately calmed jittery investors and revealed yet again the respect that Silvio Berlusconi's finance chief has retained with investors during the crisis.

[Schneibster]

In Italy, the government owns substantial portions of many of the largest companies in their economy. "Privatization" for them involves getting a bunch of political appointees to stop sucking the life out of the private sector with graft.

Comparing them with the US is meritless, particularly in terms of privatization; they are just about the opposite of us. Their graft is by government; ours is by the private sector (though the Reprehensibles have been working for decades to change that, and partly succeeded with Bush 43). "Privatization" for us involves selling off organizations that were doing a perfectly fine job to companies so they can rip us all off; in Italy, the government appointees are doing the ripping off.

Nice try though.

[101Scout]

You talking about the US lawmakers who 'actually' works for big corp instead of the ppl aren't ripping the common ppl off??? Who also dips in the ppl's social security fund to pay for their out of control spending/debts?? How often has the US been compared to sharing in the economic chaos taking place in the Europe?? Nations like the US and Italy just approach it a little differently that helps makes them appear 'different'. If the US govt wasn't so tied to Big Corp (Banks, Wealthy Investors and Contractors), I'd say that you're correct. But ... our govt is tied very close to them. Look what Hank Paulson did to us July 3, 2006 to January 20, 2009! Mr Wall Street bailout who is part of the problem and govt appointed!!

Chomsky gave this interview in 2001 about the US vs Italy. Interesting.



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by Domenico Pacitti

Pacitti: Billionaire media magnate Silvio Berlusconi was recently elected premier at Italian general elections despite a welter of serious criminal accusations and conflicts of business and political interests. It would appear that Italian electors are less interested in moral issues and more interested in what they think he can do for them.



Chomsky: Well, why do you think that’s different from Britain and the United States?



Pacitti: That’s what I was hoping you would explain.



Chomsky: Well the answer is that it isn’t different.



Pacitti: Can you elaborate?



Chomsky: We had an election here a few months ago. Now, I don’t know about Italy, but here the population is polled very extensively, so we have a pretty good grasp of public attitudes. There is, in fact, at Harvard a project called “The Vanishing Voter Project”, which I hope tells you something. It does extensive polling analysis to try to determine why the voters have been losing interest in elections over the past twenty years. One of the things they measure is the sense of helplessness, that is, that you feel you cannot do anything that will affect the political process. It hit a new high this year, far beyond anything before. Right before the election about 75 per cent of the population felt that there was no election at all, that it was just some kind of game being played by rich contributors, party bosses and the media. The whole public relations, or advertising, industry was crafting candidates, training them to use certain gestures and produce certain words that the research industry showed might increase the number of votes. But they didn’t mean what they said and you weren’t supposed to be able to understand what they said and it was all meaningless, just some kind of public relations game.



Pacitti: And do you feel then that what is happening in Italy is similar?



Chomsky: Well as far as I can tell it is very similar, but I don’t know Italy as well as I know here. This is a tendency which was led by the United States and Britain and goes back to the early part of the century. It was very natural that it should be in more democratic countries. There was a recognition back in the 1920s – I think hitting other countries later – that you can no longer control people by force. The countries were becoming more democratic. The franchise was extending. The British Conservative Party – we have their internal records – realised by the First World War that there was no longer any way to keep the general population out of the electoral system. They realised they were part of a union that was going to be a broadening of franchise and therefore they had to turn to what they call political warfare. It’s called public relations, meaning propaganda, to try to control people’s attitudes and thoughts and direct them to other concerns and keep them all out of the political arena since you could no longer simply control them by force. The same was done in the United States. In fact, there was a huge growth of the public relations industry right around that same time for the same reasons. In the most advanced, more democratic societies, there is good reason to believe that as a society gains more freedom, propaganda takes the place of violence as a means to control people.



Pacitti: Berlusconi is on record as having a list of criminal offences with actual convictions. But because of the Italian law of statutory time limitations he has not in fact served any of those sentences. A recent book lists fourteen criminal cases against him. It confirms that in the last decade he has received three prison sentences totalling six years and five months for corruption, illegal financing and false accounts.



Chomsky: By US standards that’s a triviality.



Pacitti: In 1990, Berlusconi was found guilty of perjury for denying his membership of the P2 Masonic lodge, an anti-Communist organisation which used Italy’s security services for political ends. His conviction was one of many later annulled by a general amnesty. Alleged US backing of P2 would appear to confirm what you’re saying.



Chomsky: Exactly. Italy, as far as we know, has been the main target of US efforts to undermine democracy since the Second World War. There was great fear in the 1940s that the Left in Italy would win a democratic election. In 1948 particularly, there was great concern that the Left, which had a lot of prestige – I mean, it supported the resistance against Fascism and those were important things in those days, and it had backed labour unions – were going to win the elections, and the US had plans. I don’t know if you know this, but the National Security Council’s first planning body, NSC1 [see the first, 1947 memorandum in “History of the National Security Council, 1947-1997”: [Only registered and activated users can see links. ] ] was concerned with how to undermine democracy in Italy. That was considered to be the problem at the time. And they concluded that they could undermine democracy by withholding food – and I don’t have to remind you that people were starving at that time – reinstating Fascist police, which they did, undermining unions and a whole variety of techniques of that sort were used. But then it was concluded that if this doesn’t work, if Italy nevertheless has a Left political victory, the US will call a national mobilisation, will begin to support paramilitary activities in Italy against the government. The National Security Council won, and that continued until the seventies and maybe beyond. I mean, we only know until the seventies because that’s where the documents stop. That includes supporting P2. So the effort to undermine Italian democracy goes back very far. Compared with this, Berlusconi isn’t making plans to carry out military activity to overthrow the government. What’s going on isn’t correct, but in terms of the efforts to undermine democracy it’s not a major thing. And it’s the same here. Clinton didn’t happen to have a lot of trials for corruption. But just look at his record. But look at Reagan’s record and just look at some of the people in the Reagan administration [1981-89].

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Romero describes the efforts of the British and the Americans to undermine the labour groups and the resistance against Fascism in northern Italy. And he describes it very positively, but he also describes it pretty accurately.

[Schneibster]

You talking about the US lawmakers who 'actually' works for big corp instead of the ppl aren't ripping the common ppl off???

No, I'm saying they're not ripping the common people off the same way as the Italian government is. In fact, I'm saying they're ripping people off the opposite way.

Who also dips in the ppl's social security fund to pay for their out of control spending/debts?? How often has the US been compared to sharing in the economic chaos taking place in the Europe?? Nations like the US and Italy just approach it a little differently that helps makes them appear 'different'. If the US govt wasn't so tied to Big Corp (Banks, Wealthy Investors and Contractors), I'd say that you're correct. But ... our govt is tied very close to them. Look what Hank Paulson did to us July 3, 2006 to January 20, 2009! Mr Wall Street bailout who is part of the problem and govt appointed!!

There had to be a baillout. We'd be at 30% unemployment and rising if there hadn't been.

The problem is not and was not the bailout; it's the fact that what they did wasn't illegal. The Democrats did everything they could to hold them at least partly accountable in the last Congress, while they had the majority... which the House of Reprehensibles is now trying to kill (by not funding investigations, or cancelling them when inconvenient facts start bubbling up, like Issa did). People apparently voted for Reprehensibles in 2010 because they didn't like the bailout. Which is pretty stupid if you ask me. Considering that the bailout is not and was not the problem. But the average IQ is 100. And people will believe anything, most commonly because they want it bad, or because they are afraid of it.

As far as Chomsky, he's wrong too often for me, anyway on politics. He's a brilliant linguist; he's not much of a psychologist; and he's a lousy political thinker. Worst of all, he's a philosophical deconstructionist; they're the worst kind of philosophical idiots. He's far too optimistic about people, and that's why he's so often wrong on politics. As far as philosohpy, he's from space and they came down and opened the doors and shoved him out and they ain't never comin' back. He shoulda stuck to linguistics.

[101Scout]

Yeah .... I can see where Chomsky is too rough around the edges for Cons & Centrist Pals.

Wall Street today is trying to bounce back on the debt ceiling news after the Dems handed over a sizable victory to many Cons and Tea Bags, but the very low GPD growth (1.3%) shoved reality right up the market player's asses. OUCH!



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Stock Market News for August 1, 2011

Benchmarks took a battering to register their worst weekly performance in a year as the stalemate over the debt-ceiling crisis pushed the US closer to losing its ‘AAA’ rating. Investor sentiment was dragged even lower as data revealed economic growth in the first half of the year had receded to the slowest pace since the downturn faded a couple of years ago.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) fell to 12,083 soon after the opening bell on Friday. However, after President Obama said there were many ways in which an agreement on the debt ceiling issue could be reached the index moved into the green, only to close at 12,143.24, having lost 0.8% through the day. The Standard & Poor 500 (S&P 500) lost 0.7% and settled at 1,292.28. The Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 0.4% to close at 2,756.38. The fear-gauge CBOE Volatility Index (VIX) increased by 6%. On the New York Stock Exchange, consolidated volumes were 4.5 billion shares and for every stock that rose, two stocks moved down. For the week, the Dow, S&P 500 and the Nasdaq declined 4.2%, 3.9% and 3.6%, respectively.
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Markets on Friday were also dragged lower by disappointing GDP data. The Commerce Department reported a mere 1.3% increase in GDP in the second quarter. The increase was also slower-than-expected as the consensus estimate had projected a 1.6% increase.

[101Scout]

Wall Street still trembling ....... I still take these tremblings as early signs for what's coming this Fall. All things cash related .... choking.



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Summary Box:Commodities Fall on Economic Worries



By The Associated Press
August 3, 2011 (AP)

BROAD DECLINES: Commodities fell broadly as signs of a slowing global economy heightened concerns about demand for oil, industrial metals and agriculture products. The only gains were in gold and silver.

[101Scout]

The market has shown more signs of a coming collapse since 3 days ago. Today, the market fell another 600+ points (634). Gold is soaring thru the roof ... great news for those who holds gold. I still think that this Fall, we'll hurt like hell.



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Dow Down 600 Points; S&P and Nasdaq Down More Than 6 Percent

AP August 8, 2011 (AP)

AP () — — Dow down 600 points; S&P and Nasdaq down more than 6 percent

[101Scout]

The market has shown more signs of a coming collapse since 4 days ago. Today, the market fell another 600+ points (634). Gold is soaring thru the roof ... great news for those who holds gold. I still think that this Fall, we'll hurt like hell.

I smell another bailout. Now... or soon .... or both.





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Dow Down 600 Points; S&P and Nasdaq Down More Than 6 Percent

AP August 8, 2011 (AP)

AP () — — Dow down 600 points; S&P and Nasdaq down more than 6 percent

[webhead]

DOW @ 7/25/11 close = 12,679.72
DOW @ 8/8/11 close = 10,809.85

In the past two weeks, down -1,869.87 points, or -14.75%

It will take 12 to 18 months to recover the loss.

But for those who have had stocks since 12/31/07, when the DOW closed at 13,364.16, his or her portfolios are currently down 2,554.31 points, or -19.11% based solely upon the DOW. So it is reasonable to assume his or her portfolios are down 15% to 20%. Think about this for a minute - people who held stock have seen no growth during the past 3-1/2 years.

[101Scout]

Damn, when ya put it that way .... it does make ya wonder why ppl do stay in the market at all. I keep thinking about Goober trying to sink the SS into the market. Yeah .... lookie at how that would have worked out.

If the market falls another 1000points in 2-3 days.... I say bailout will come up again.

[101Scout]

Ok...here's my take on today's market performance. It jumped up 420 points!!! I think the Fed rigged a rally in order to save the dying clusterfuck for another day. The main reason why I came to this conclusion today is that there's nothing in this world that created anyone to have 'more' confidence. NOTHING! I believe the Asian market today still fell. Riots increase in the UK .... and Congress is heading to Israel to party. There's absolutely nothing to give reason for stocks to go up that much. Hell, 200 + points today would have been a miracle. Instead it zoomed 420 points!!! Over NOTHING!!! That's a fix ladies and gents. Another false bottom that'll cave in either this Fall or in 2012. IMHO

(on edit by scout)
Here's a little something on the Asian market today.

In Asian on Tuesday, the Tokyo stock market closed down 1.68 percent, Hong Kong dived 5.66 percent, Seoul lost 3.63 percent but Sydney gained 1.22 percent.
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[101Scout]

Ok, back to normal again.... market is still choking despite the fakeout hiking of stocks that they pulled yesterday. Stocks dropped 521 points today!




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NEW YORK Aug 10 (Reuters) - Fear returned to Wall Street on Wednesday, pushing the S&P 500 down in another 4 percent drop, triggered by worries that Europe's crisis could engulf French banks and eventually spill onto the U.S. financial sector.

Based on the latest available data, the Dow Jones industrial average .DJI fell 521.42 points, or 4.64 percent, to unofficially end at 10,718.35

[101Scout]

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By Ashley Lau | 08/19/2011 5:21 AM HKT
Beaten-down Wall Street tanks on recession fears

By Ashley Lau | August 19, 2011 5:21 AM HKT

Wall Street sank in volatile trading on Thursday, with the S&P 500 down more than 4 percent as weak U.S. economic data pressured markets already beaten down by renewed fears about the health of European banks.

The losses extended a slide in stocks that began in late July, with the S&P 500 now off 15.7 percent from its April 29 closing high. Economic worries on both sides of the Altantic have caused investors to exit risky assets.
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The Dow Jones industrial average plunged 487.18 points, or 4.27 percent, to 10,923.03. The Standard & Poor's 500 Index dropped 59.26 points, or 4.96 percent, to 1,134.63. The Nasdaq Composite Index slid 136.41 points, or 5.43 percent, to 2,375.07.

[Schneibster]

Well, I suppose Chomsky must be fine for firebaggers, then. Figures.

Like I said, the average IQ is 100.

[101Scout]

Being that Chomsky did back JF Kerry and was anti Goober Bush and anti-lie wars, not to mention that he still qualified in the Liberal quadrant of the graph below, makes him pretty spot on with most of his calls. He seems to be getting it right with this ongoing financial clusterfuck as Europe crumbles faster than America will. Again, thanks to 'mostly' BushCo.

Chomsky is no hero of mine, but he's certainly one I can appreciate over many many others. Like I remind some folks, he's more spot on than spot off. IMHO


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Noam Chomsky is a Moderate Liberal.

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An article in Saturday's Guardian reports that left-wing icon Noam Chomsky has given his "reluctant endorsement to the Democratic party's presidential contender, John Kerry". Chomsky's support for Kerry is far from enthusiastic. He describes the choice between Bush and Kerry as one "between two factions of the business party" and Kerry as "Bush-lite", only a "fraction" better than his Republican opponent. But Chomsky argues that the current administration is exceptionally "cruel and savage" and "deeply committed to dismantling the achievements of popular struggle through the past century no matter what the cost to the general population." He concludes that "despite the limited differences [between Bush and Kerry] both domestically and internationally, there are differences. In a system of immense power, small differences can translate into large outcomes."