The Wall Stret Journal's Timothy Noah stuck his foot all the way up his own ass until he could taste his big toe

The Wall Stret Journal's (ex, now apparently someone they just let write once in a while) Timothy Noah stuck his foot all the way up his own ass until he could taste his big toe with this piece of fish-wrapper nonsense:

There’s a sad twist to the shooting Tuesday morning at a FedEx facility in Kennesaw, Ga., where an employee injured six co-workers before turning the gun on himself. Kennesaw is one of several U.S. cities and towns that have an ordinance requiring every household to own a gun.

The facts?  The burglary rate in Kennesaw is the lowest in Cobb County -- as is the general crime rate.

But what's the distinguishing factor here?  Why, right there in the image linked off the article itself -- and which Timothy used in an astonishingly dim-witted demolition of his very own argument.

What's that sign say?  It's a bit tough to read but I think it says NO WEAPONS ALLOWED!  (Twice, just in case you missed it the first time, complete with a nice pretty picture for those who are illiterate.)

In Kennesaw, you see, it is the law that each household have a gun.  But, also in Kennesaw, it is not the law that businesses either have or allow weapons on their premises.

So what did our alleged assailant do?  He went where there was a NO GUNS sign, expecting that there would no armed resistance to his assault.  He believed that because he was explicitly told it would be the case, and it was.

Just as it was the case at a Penske Truck Rental business in 2010.

Just as it has been in many other cases, including Newtown and other schools that proudly display signs that, to someone with murder or mayhem on their mind, state "come on in and shoot (or stab, or bomb, or whatever); we guarantee that all the law-abiding people inside are unarmed and will not fire back in an attempt to stop your murderous rampage."

So let's ask the really inconvenient question: Why didn't those assailants in both 2010 and today instead try going into someone's house to commit the same murders in Kennesaw?

I think you can figure that one out for yourself.

A Stunning 80% Of All New York, Florida And Nevada Condo Purchases Are "All Cash"

Back in August of last year, we first reported data that not even believed at first, but has since been proven correct using existing home sales data, namely that a whopping 60% of all home purchases are "cash only." Furthermore, in the eight months since that post, our conclusion has also borne out as absolutely correct:

... due to the very thin marginal source of bidside interest (flipper flipping to flipper and so on), it means that most of America has not participated in this mirage "recovery", and all it will take to send the buoyant housing market crashing is for the one marginal buyer to become a seller. What they will next find, is that when dealing with a bidside orderbook that has zero depth, one indeed takes the escalator down from where the lofty heights achieved courtesy of Fed-funded stairs.

The subsequent tumble in the housing market - both new and existing - confirmed that ther was no "housing recovery" and it was, as we had claimed all along, merely institutional investors bidding up real estate to convert it to rental, and foreign buyers parking illegally obtained cash in US real estate.

However, not even that data could prepare us for what we learned today courtesy of CoreLogic, which narrowed down the range from the broader "housing" segment just to the most appetizing (especially for investors and flippers) condo market. What it found was stunning: not less than 80% of all condos in key markets such as Florida, Nevada And New York are all cash.

Below is CoreLogic's take:

As of January 2014, Florida and Nevada have the highest cash share for condos across the country with shares of 81.2 percent and 80.5 percent respectively. These high rates could be because of several factors including investors buying up properties and the overall shrinking of the mortgage market. Following the leaders are New York (79.5 percent),Alabama (75.7 percent) and Arizona (65.7 percent). These five state account for just over half of all condo cash transactions across the country, with Florida representing 36.7 percent of the total alone. This is more than three times California, which accounts for 10.3 percent of the total condo cash transactions across the U.S.

On the low end, of the largest 25 states by total sales transactions Virginia had the lowest cash share of condos at 32.4 percent followed by Massachusetts (36.7 percent), Minnesota (38.2 percent), Wisconsin (38.7 percent) and Maryland (38.9 percent). These five states only account for 4.8 percent of all condo cash transactions across the country.

The trend for the two highest share states of Nevada and Florida can be broken into three distinct categories over time from January 2000 to January 2014. The pre-recession period-when credit was readily available to purchase condos, the recession-when credit standards tightened and the market contracted making it more difficult to finance a condo and post-recession-where investors play an increasing role in propping up the shares, while the mortgage market continues to shrink.

From 2000 through 2007, Nevada and Florida had an average condo cash share of 22.9 percent and 35.4 percent respectively. During the recession,shares spiked and Nevada, post-recession, has since averaged 85 percent while Florida is averaging 81 percent. The effect of the recession has pushed condo cash shares much higher than pre-recession levels over the past five years and it doesn’t look like that is changing in the short term.

Or, making a rough estimate, "all cash" purchases in the hottest condo markets have soared roughly three-fold in the key investor markets since the last housing bubble!

Without repeating our conclusion from nearly a year ago, what this simply means is that there is absolutely nothing remotely resembling a housing recovery, and certainly not one where the end buyer has to use the house itself as loan collateral, which would be the vast majority of the population, but instead more than three-quarters of all condo purchases are purely by investors who have already piled up cash using other forms of collateral (and thus aren't traditional home purchasers but merely flipping-focused investors), and who will flee from this market the second the Fed starts tightening monetary conditions, which in turns will make the next housing crash far worse even than the 2008 housing and credit bubble collapse.

Try swallowing this ObamaCare pill By: Diane Sori

As many of you know, last week my dear friend Dori was laid to rest after her 16- month battle with brain cancer...and you know of her family's battles through the nightmare of the health care fiasco known as ObamaCare. The battle is over for Dori but it has just begun for the rest of us. 

And that battle begins with us knowing that ObamaCare is a LIE...NO other way to say it. It is NOT health care nor is it affordable as its actual name...The Affordable Care Act (ACA)...claims it to be. ObamaCare from its inception to its roll out to its subsequent implementation is NOTHING but one big scam to 'insure', if you will, the 'sponges' of our society so they stay in the voting pocket of the Democratic party and NOTHING else. 

Obama loves to claim that to date more than eight million Americans have signed up for health insurance through the exchanges, but the truth is more like eight million Americans have perused the Healthcare.gov website and put something into their shopping cart, but have NOT paid that all-important first premium...thus denying the program the dollars needed to keep ObamaCare afloat. And Obama knew this would happen for he knows...and has always known...ObamaCare's inherent flaws. 

And while we conservatives know well ObamaCare's flaws...like the death panels with the 15-member bureaucratic cabal of DC fat cats who will decide who gets to live and who gets to die...like rationed medicine for the rest of us...and all the other medical peccadilloes that are the hallmark of ObamaCare, but what most don't know is that something very dangerous was snuck in ever so sneakily and will affect us all...and that is that drug prices for ALL prescription drugs will be substantially going up to cover for the monies needed but NOT gotten to keep ObamaCare afloat. Obama knew the true sign-up numbers would NEVER allow ObamaCare to survive...so drug prices and sign-up numbers have been manipulated to subsidize almost the entirety of the ACA.

And now I will tell you just how much of a drug price increase you will face and it will shock you like few things in ObamaCare have done before...and I experienced it firsthand. A few months ago I was given a prescription with a few refills for Fluocinolone Acetonide Oil...an ear drop...to be used once a week...the cost at Walgreens was $31.99. A few days ago I had to have it refilled and was blown away when the exact same Rx that I bought NOT long ago now costs $215. There was NO change to the composition of the Rx...NO change to the amount in the bottle nor to the packaging. The Rx did NOT have to mixed as it came pre-packaged and ready to be sold so there was NO justification for any price increase let alone an increase of close to 700%.

Yes, the price increase from $31.99 to $215 is a whopping 700% for a simple ear drop...welcome to yet another piece of the nightmare that is ObamaCare.

Needless to say Walgreens was told to keep their Rx...told after a few choice words of this is out and out robbery, a scam, and that I would go elsewhere. Walgreens claimed the price was raised by corporate headquarters and that all Rx prices were being raised...and guess why...ObamaCare.

Being raised a few dollars is one thing...a 700% price increase is quite another...and this for simple ear drops. Now imagine the price increase for serious medications like those used for cancer or heart disease...imagine how these increases will affect people who cannot afford it. The outcome is they will die without their needed medication... culling the herd in ObamaSpeak if you will...and that equates to more monies saved on the ill and elderly that Obama can now use to buy even more votes for his party of opportunistic socialist traitors. 

But it gets even better...it seems there is something the pharmacists and pharmacy personnel know about but won't tell you... something they did NOT tell me...and that is that there are money saving coupons directly from the drug manufacturers that you can use for your needed Rx...any Rx at most major pharmacies. Even though I was NOT told about this I had an inkling about it so when I got home I typed in the name of my ear drops... Fluocinolone Acetonide Oil...and what I found will simply blow you away for the original $31.99 ear drops that I purchased at Walgreens that they now wanted $215 for, with the said coupon would now cost $86.52...resulting in a loss to Walgreens of a $128.48 mark-up profit. 



But wait, it gets better...my original $31.99 ear drops with the manufacturer's coupon I was NOT told about would now with the coupon cost $140 at Walmart; would cost $170.13 at Publix; would cost $171.13 at Target; and would cost $175 through the mail-order company HealthWarehouse. But here's the kicker...my original $31.99 Walgreens Rx ear drops would now with the manufacturer's coupon cost only $23.47 at CVS...$8.53 LESS than the original cost at Walgreens. 

So from a high without the coupon of $215 at Walgreens to a low of $23.47 with the coupon at CVS that is a savings of $191.53...making this NOTHING short of highway robbery, thievery, fraud, a scam, and an out and out criminal act perpetrated NOT by the drug manufacturers who offer coupons to bring drug prices more in line with the manufacturing cost, but by the pharmacies themselves under the auspices of their corporate headquarters who are in bed with the greed and robbery perpetrated under ObamaCare. 

Greed and robbery and NOTHING less for if CVS can sell my Rx ear drops for a mere $23.47 and still make a profit that shows how much the ear drops really cost to make, and that shows the mark-up the other pharmacies have attached to the Rx NO matter with the manufacturer's coupon or without it. And with the great discrepancy in cost at the other pharmacies it boils down to the specific greed...the specific mark-up...each pharmacy is willing to stick to the customer. 

And all this drug price manipulation has been for the most part kept from the public as it's buried deep within ObamaCare's over 2000 pages that the Democrats passed before reading it. Sure we know that drugs are marked up and NO one is denying a for-profit drug company from making a just and fair profit...after all new drugs are costly to develop and bring to market...but when out-of-line profits are made by greedy pharmacies whose corporate offices set the drug prices they charge their customers for something they just dispense and NOTHING more, that in my opinion is paramount to grand theft of the first degree. 

And adding into this thievery is the fact that health insurers are sorting... manipulating really...drug prices into a complex tier system that in some cases see drug co-payments and co-insurance fees rising as high as 50%. Also, with a general overall decline in the medications that are covered under ObamaCare, that leaves patients on the hook for thousands of dollars, and with about 70% of Americans using prescription drugs at any one time that amounts to a lot of money...a lot of profits being made at the expense of the patient. And those new to ObamaCare who rely on multiple sometimes very costly drugs face the greatest burden from the increases in the co-payments and co-insurance fees. So the fine print in ObamaCare really must be paid attention to as the screwing of 'We the People' continues on. 

Simply, it's NOT big pharma that is in cahoots with Obama and the left as most believe...it's the corporate headquarters of the pharmacies that set the prices they sell big pharma's drugs for, and the ObamaCare insurance companies that sell the policies that manipulate the prices that are to blame. But remember, to the rescue are the drug manufacturer's coupons that the pharmacies and insurance companies do NOT want you to know about (as it cuts into their profit margin) for there are coupons for almost every drug made including the ones used to treat cancer and heart disease...you just have to go online and search for them. 

Search to get them and you too will be amazed by the price discrepancy in drug prices from pharmacy to pharmacy as those in cahoots with Obama try to manipulate and use the sick and elderly to keep the monstrosity that is ObamaCare afloat. 

Here are two links to two different sites that offer literally thousands of manufacturer coupons that save you up to 75% on brand and generic prescription drugs, including drugs used to treat cancer, heart disease, and other major illnesses in addition to routine antibiotics and such: http://www.goodrx.com/ andhttp://www.rxpharmacycoupons.com/medication-list.h... 

So the bottom line in all this is do NOT get sick for ObamaCare will get you one way or another...sad isn't it. 

Number Of Middle Age Californians Living With Their Parents Soars

In the latest indication of just how strong the US "recovery" is, we find that the number of Californians 50 to 64 who live in their parents' homes has surged in recent years, which as the LA Times less than sarcastically adds, reflects "the grim economic aftermath of the Great Recession." Wait, don't they mean the great recovery? Because isn't the S&P just 10 points from its all time closing high? Maybe all those middle-age Californians are merely seeking their comfort (and spare bedrooms) of their parents so they can all use the family E-trade terminal together.

But since everyone knows the latest handout to the population by the administration is ObamaTrade in which everyone gets $100,000 to BTFATH, we know that is not the case, so surely the LA Times is joking.

Unfortunately, it isn't.

Here are the details - "for seven years through 2012, the number of Californians aged 50 to 64 who live in their parents' homes swelled 67.6% to about 194,000, according to the UCLA Center for Health Policy Research and the Insight Center for Community Economic Development. Many more young adults live with their parents than those in their 50s and early 60s live with theirs. Among 18- to 29-year-olds, 1.6 million Californians have taken up residence in their childhood bedrooms, according to the data. Though that's a 33% jump from 2006, the pace is half that of the 50 to 64 age group."

Here, once again, we run into the lack of that R(ecovery) word again:

The jump is almost exclusively the result of financial hardship caused by the recession rather than for other reasons, such as the need to care for aging parents, said Steven P. Wallace, a UCLA professor of public health who crunched the data.

"The numbers are pretty amazing," Wallace said. "It's an age group that you normally think of as pretty financially stable. They're mid-career. They may be thinking ahead toward retirement. They've got a nest egg going. And then all of a sudden you see this huge push back into their parents' homes."

Hmmm, if it's not the recovery, maybe it was the snow in the winter? After all that explained all the bad economic data in the past 3-6 months. Surely the polar vortex is the reason for all this renewed family circle "warmth?"

The surge in middle-aged people moving in with parents reflects the grim economic reality that has taken hold in the aftermath of the Great Recession.

Long-term unemployment is especially acute for older people. The number of Americans 55 and older who have been out of work for a year or more was 617,000 at the end of December, a fivefold jump from the end of 2007 when the recession hit, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

As with Rohr, those in their 50s move in only as a last resort. Many have exhausted savings. Some have jobs but can't shoulder soaring rents in areas such as Los Angeles or San Francisco.

Whatever the cause, moving in with Mom and Dad exacts a bruising emotional toll. Even asking to move the family in was difficult for Rohr.

Maybe not. Actually, in retrospect, maybe there was no recovery at all. Maybe the Second Great Depression - when one ignores the HFT-rigged and Fed-manipulated market hitting daily all time highs - has just been getting worse and worse.

"I said 'Mom, I'm so sorry but I don't know what to do,'" she said. "I dreaded it. If it wasn't for my boys I wouldn't have done it. I would have lived in my car."

Jenny Chung Mejia knows how tough it can be. As a public policy consultant at the Insight Center for Community Economic Development in Los Angeles, she helps people and communities regain their economic health.

"It's unexpected vulnerability at this point in your life," she said. "When you're supposed to be the provider, sort of the rock for yourself and your family and maybe your parents, the table just gets turned on you and the rug gets pulled out from under you."

That's what happened to Janine Rosales, who moved into her mother's San Francisco home two years ago after a career of mostly low-paying jobs left her unable to afford the city's towering rents.

For Rosales, 53, it represented a personal defeat, an unofficial marker of unmet goals in life. 

"I sit here sometimes and I see baby pictures of myself and my teenage years and remember all the dreams I had," Rosales said. "I never thought I'd end up where I am."

Fear not Rosales: every personal defeat and failure in life can be quickly converted into a win, if only on paper - just remember to BTFATH, and failing that, BTFD. The same goes for your parents:

The situation is also trying on elderly parents.

They feel the anxiety afflicting their children. Aging people on fixed incomes also worry that the extra money they spend on utilities or food will drain their own limited retirement savings. 

"When I use up all of my money, who's going to help me?" said Rohr's mother, Penny Goulart.

Well, there's always Aunt Janet, and all those activisit who made billions in the past two months buying calls on a stock they knew would be acquired.

Either way, always repeat: the recovery, the recovery, the recovery:

Rohr is applying frantically for jobs. She's willing to do anything but has had no luck.

Or not. Still, remember to smile, because it will only get worse beofre it gets much worse.Some context: "About half of all Italians between 24 and 35 still live with their parents, compared with 14% in the U.S." ... All coming to America's "recovery" next.

Cars And Stupidity

If you think cars are getting too expensive, you may be right. A new report shows that the average price of a new vehicle is out of reach for people in medium-income households in all but one of the 25 largest metro areas in the U.S.

The report by Interest.com shows that Washington, D.C. is the only American metropolitan area in which a family earning the city's median income can affordthe average price of a new vehicle, which was $32,086 in 2013, according to Kelley Blue Book. That price equates to a monthly payment of $633, assuming the buyers put 20 percent down, financed for 48 months and principal, interest and insurance did not exceed ten percent of the household's gross income.

$32,000 for an average new vehicle is utterly nuts.

Flat-out, stark raving nuts.

First off, virtually nobody puts 20% down on cars any more; almost everyone I have heard from or about is buying them with 100% financing -- which is stupid all on its own, because if you don't take GAP insurance and wreck it you're totally screwed.  If you do take GAP insurance then you're paying for yet another service and your monthly cost goes up even higher.

Second, there is this claim that the car should be "no more" than 10% of household gross income.  What are you smoking over there?  We are talking about two-income households, right?  So now we're also talking about two cars, right, or is the second personwalking to work?  20% of household gross tied up in vehicle payments and insurance?  

Are you stark raving mad?

To put some percentages on this that actually matter my "reasonably safe" financial leverage limit for most people stands at 28% maximum for all fixed housing-related expenses, which means principal, interest, hazard insurance, any mandatory association or coop fees and property tax (or rent + tenant insurance.)  The maximum safe leverage limit for all fixed obligations (including housing and transportation) is 36%.  That means that you can affordone vehicle that has a carrying cost of 8% of your gross assuming no other debt of any sort, such as credit cards or student loans, if you are up against the 28% maximum on housing expenses.  By the way note that taking on that 8% obligation means you are locked into not taking any more debt until either your income rises or you pay off the note -- it is not just a "qualify and then do what you want" ratio.

But this, by the way, this is not what you'll be sold at any dealer.  If you actually run tomy limits (36% maximum gross income obligation against housing and transportation) you will find that your household is pretty damn tight on money.  Not desperately so, but moderately.  That means you won't be buying fancy vacations nor will you end the month with a bunch of extra cash allowing you to go out on shopping sprees and spend it.  Instead you will be coming to the end of the month juggling a few things -- that night in the bar will burn your last disposable $50 but you'll still manage to hit the match on your 401k at work -- barely.

If you go the limits "recommended" by the "finance guys" you will instead be eating Mac-N-Cheese on a fairly regular basis or you will start doing really bad, destructive things -- like carrying a credit card balance from month to month, having zero in cash reserves and, when the inevitable bad thing happens that requires you to spend a few hundred dollars without prior warning or planning you will be screwed.

I am not surprised though.  What did surprise me, as I recently shopped for a new car (and ultimately bought one as I wrote about here a few weeks ago) was how utterlyoutrageous vehicle prices had gotten over the last few years in comparison to what you actually got for your money.

Why, one might ask?

That's pretty simple -- the financialization of vehicles has advanced to the point that we no longer do "traditional" car loans from a bank or credit union, or paying cash, as our primary means of purchase. This has taken what should have been a dramatic and continuing technology improvement process that reduces price and led to everyone along the way, from manufacturers to banks to dealers scalping all of the value add from that process for themselves, increasing prices so that all but the last ten cents of that value goes to them and only a tiny bit comes to you.

This is exactly what has happened in both education and health care -- and what happened in housing as well.

This pattern is self-destructive for the economy as a whole but it will not stop until something breaks the financialization model -- and there is no indication we're going to see that from the car industry or the finance industry any time soon.

Can you fight back against it?  Yes and no.  Unfortunately this same trend causesused prices to rise too, so there is only some defense available by buying a quality used vehicle instead of a new one.  But what you can do is stop playing "I need a Lexus" and start showing the car dealers the back of your head on a regular basis.

I don't think that's going to happen, however, which makes this a problem that we're going to have to deal with for some time to come -- right up until it blows up in all of our faces in aggregate, just as college loans and medical spending are destined to.

As The Bitcoin Bubble Bursts, Digital Currencies Have A Dilution Problem

There was a time when people followed every gyration of bitcoin with pathological curiosity, peaking roughly five months ago when after having generated an epic return for 2013 as more and more momentum chasers got on board, the digital currency flirted with the $1000 (in USD terms) level on a daily basis. Then it peaked, almost to the day when this article came out, and ever since then it has been a slow, painful grind lower both for its holders and for its proponents, as can be seen on the chart below.

Needless to say, now that the bitcoin bubble popped, both the interest, and the momentum has been lost, as has the desire to "mine" bitcoin, which as we profiled previously, requires massive, expensive computer workstations. Or rather required. Because as Bloomberg reports, the Bitcoin mining bubble has also burst.

Speculators, known as miners, use powerful computers to solve complex software problems and verify transactions to unlock new bitcoins. They’re finding that the enterprise isn’t as profitable as it once was.

Drawn by the virtual currency’s jump in value last year, digital prospectors have turned the mining industry into an arms race as they buy expensive computing equipment and gobble up electricity. While that worked well as long as bitcoin’s value kept rising, smaller players are now being crowded out by bigger competition, high utility bills and declining prices.

If you mine at the moment, you have to be very lucky to get anything,”said Mehmet Vatansever, who bought $16,000 worth of mining computers in February to chase after new bitcoins. “It’s a very difficult business.”

End result: Ebay is suddenly flooded with supercomputers whose only purpose was to create more bitcoins, and whose upkeep now that the price of bitcoin has tumbled, costs more than the profit from selling mined bitcoins.

While he has been able to create new bitcoins, Vatansever soon discovered that his equipment was on track to earn less than his monthly utility bill of $480. After selling his computers on EBay Inc. in April, Vatansever estimates that he lost a total of about $6,000 on his mining adventure.

In the past week, miners made $14.9 million in revenue, compared with a weekly average of $25.2 million in December, according to Blockchain.info, an bitcoin-data aggregator. The figures represent the number of bitcoins mined plus transaction fees, multiplied by the dollar-based market price.

EBay now features more than 1,600 listings for mining computers, many of them used.

To be sure, while smaller operators have thrown in the flag, mining is still profitable for the scale operators who are crowding out minor players.

While individuals give up prospecting, at least two other larger mining companies, KnCMiner and Cloud Hashing, are still generating profits. By scaling up operations, they’ve been able to save costs on cooling and power, making their computers more efficient and cost-effective. KnCMiner also sells mining computers to other miners.

KnCMiner, based in Stockholm, operates about 7,000 machines. While the mining company’s electric bill in March came to $450,000, the computers mined 21,000 bitcoins, according to co-founder Sam Cole.

However, the biggest losers are not the miners, especially if they can take the accelerated tax depreciation write off on their supercomputers (unless these can somehow be converted into HFT trading machines), but the sellers of these same machines.

Mining-equipment suppliers are feeling the cool-down firsthand. CoinTerra Inc.,a manufacturer of the powerful computers used to crunch numbers for new bitcoins, has seen new sales shrink by 30 percent in the past three weeks from the preceding period, according to CEO Ravi Iyengar.

Mining-equipment suppliers are also detecting early signs of a shift to new virtual currencies. Approximately 250 KnCMiner customers switched their orders from $10,000 computers to similarly priced alternative-currency mining machines in the past three weeks, according to Cole.

And there is of course AMD, whose Radeon video cards experienced a dramatic surge in popularity as a cheaper alternative to self contained workstations, only to feel the sudden pullback in demand now (and if it hasn't yet, it will soon).

But the biggest irony is the following:

Because they are newer, designed differently and currently mined by fewer people, currencies such as Litecoin can be more profitable, according to CoinWarz, which tracks mining activity. “The new rush right now is Litecoin,” Colin Lusk, a network engineer in Portland, Oregon, said in an interview.

While he once mined only bitcoins, Lusk now uses five of his eight machines to produce Litecoins and other virtual currencies. Created in 2011, Litecoin is similar in design to bitcoin yet requires less computing power. A $3,500 computer can produce $25 worth of Litecoins a day for $3 in electricity, while producing $20 worth of bitcoins would cost $17, Lusk said.

Spot the irony yet? As the bitcoin bubble bursts, the residual price momentum and "mining" bubbles remain only in those currencies where the "mining" of bitcoin is easier. This explains the shift from bitcoin to litecoin. In other words, where it is easier to create digital currencies out of thin air and where there is still a momentum-based surge in popularity. In yet other words - to permit a faster dilution of the existing currency pool.

But what is it that those who oppose fiar rage against? Why the eagerness and desire of central bankers to dilute said fiat at the first deflationary whim in order to protect their banking "custodians."

Who would have though that the digital currency crew would so promptly fall for the same "dangling carrot" incentives that all the fiat proponents are so tempted by on a daily basis...

Then again, monetary alchemy is nothing new - after all people were trying to convert lead into gold centuries before the US Dollar was the reserve currency. Luckily, they failed.

Real Americans Are Ready To Snap

Despite popular belief, every culture of every nation draws a line in the sand against government tyranny. The problem is, many draw this line so close to total defeat that it rarely matters. For the Jews of the Warsaw Ghetto, for instance, it wasn't until the Germans had already herded millions onto railroad cars destined for death camps and cornered the rest into dilapidated central housing that the ZOB resistance was formed, only to be wiped out a month later. Perhaps hindsight is 20/20, but clearly too many freedom movements throughout history waited too long to respond to the trespasses of oligarchs.

The Founding Fathers frequently struggled with the proper measure of resistance. Many colonials wanted vengeance on the British after the Boston Massacre in March of 1770, but patriots knew that the timing was not right. The battle to rally citizens to the cause and to educate the masses as much as possible on the facts took precedence over the desire to enter conflict. The Founders endured five more years of British government criminality until nearly 80 farmers and militiamen stood outnumbered on Lexington Green on April 19^th, 1775 to confront an army of 700 British regulars on a mission to capture rebel leaders and destroy weapons caches. No one knew at the time that the war would be sparked that day, but everyone knew that a fight was inevitable and near.

I believe the same feeling hangs in the air of modern America for REAL Americans, and by “real”, I mean those who actually support and defend the constitutional values and principles that lay at the foundation of our society. We sense that something is coming; a great change, or an unstoppable reckoning.

The question of when to strike back is pivotal to any resistance movement. Turn to violence too soon or without proper cause in the eyes of the public, and the rebellion may lose the moral high ground and the support of the populace. Wait too long, and the totalitarian hordes may be too far entrenched, forcing the rebellion to fight from a position of strategic weakness.

There are those who might argue that America crossed the “red line” long ago and now our society is simply rearranging the deck chairs on the Titanic while arguing over futile semantics. In certain respects, I can see their point. The U.S. political system is utterly lost. Anyone who still has faith in the Left/Right paradigm after two terms of George W. Bush and nearly two terms of Barack Obama is either insane, or mentally challenged. It should be obvious to Republicans and Democrats alike that our government does NOT represent the average man, and our election process is a sham. Democrats in particular should be equally furious and ashamed as the candidate they blindly worshiped to the point of cultism has now forsaken every value they thought he represented.

The legal apparatus of the U.S. is also beyond repair. Those in the mainstream who argue that grievances with government should be addressed by the courts instead of independent action obviously have not considered that the courts continuously uphold and defend legislation like that contained within the NDAA, which allows for rendition, torture, and even assassination of American citizens without trial or due process. And where are the prosecutions of Constitutional violations by the NSA? Why aren't men like James Clapper in prison for lying directly to Congress. Why hasn't Eric Holder been slapped in irons for his involvement with “Fast and Furious”? And what about the international financiers who back these politicians? How many of them have been prosecuted for their involvement in the toxic derivatives scandals that are destroying our economy to this day?

No, we lost the courts a long time ago. They will do nothing to save this country. But is the fight already over? I think not.

Nihilism is tempting for those people who are lazy and frightened and looking for a philosophical excuse to run away from making a stand. Claiming the fight is lost before it has truly begun is a longstanding tradition amongst millions upon millions of cowards through history. Every freedom fighter in every great revolution for liberty has heard the same arguments that we hear today – “It's too late to change things. The enemy is too powerful and you will be crushed. The nail that sticks up will eventually be hammered down. Your movement is a minority on the fringe and no one will support you. None of you have the guts to really follow through...”

While there is certainly much to despair in the state of our nation, I find the notion that Americans will do nothing in response misplaced and ignorant. From what I have observed, it is not a question of “if” citizens snap, but when.

With objective eyes one could easily see it during the last attempts by the federal government to pass anti-gun legislation that would have led to confiscation. Pro-2^ndAmendment protests erupted all over the country (though the MSM mostly ignored them) with participants far outnumbering the miniscule groups in support of gun control. The sentiment amongst millions of gun owners and millions of Liberty Movement proponents was that we were not going to allow government enforcement of new gun laws. Period. If that meant we had to start using those same guns to put an end to government, then that was exactly what we would do. The feds, of course, buckled.

Rather than take the more dangerous and unifying direct route of federal legislation, gun grabbers have shifted strategies, isolating and targeting specific states they believe will be more pliable and easier to conquer. Connecticut and parts of New York, however, have shown that even people in the most socialist of states have no intention of complying with gun registration or confiscation. In Connecticut, only 38,000 high capacity magazines were registered according to the new gun laws, while approximately 2.4 million purchased through retail remain unaccounted for. Only 50,000 “assault weapons” were registered, while at least 300,000 remain unaccounted for. A sizable number of police are also refusing to enforce registration measures (some out of constitutional loyalty, and some out of a desire for self preservation), causing the state of Connecticut to back off of its hard line rhetoric.

I can say with full confidence that the conditions within Connecticut alone would lead to an open shooting war if officials actually attempt to enforce registration and confiscation. If Safe Act-style legislation or executive orders are ever enforced at a national level, I have no doubt revolution would follow.

The latest hotbed I have witnessed is the Bureau of Land Management attack on a cattle farmer in Clark County, Nevada owned by Cliven Bundy. The BLM has so far stolen over 500 cattle from Bundy on the grounds that the federal government owns the land his family has been using for grazing pasture for generations. The confiscation was implemented under the auspices of “protection for endangered species”. The species in this instance being a desert tortoise.

The methods used by the BLM resemble a militant raid, with hundreds of agents, helicopters, and even snipers at their disposal. Adding insult to injury and making the issue a national concern, the feds have also staged “First Amendment Zones” miles away from their activities to keep protestors away.

This may seem like a minor event, a tiff over cattle grazing or possibly property rights, but there is much more going on here.

Tyranny leaves lasting scars, and each tyrannical act results in an accumulation of wounds on the public psyche that do not heal. In the end, a single event can become a trigger to unleash a torrent of rage pent up in a population for years or decades. The fight for Cliven Bundy's farm has the potential to become such a trigger.

So far, federal abuses have been primarily toward Bundy's cattle, with confiscation ongoing and suspicions that a number of the cows are being killed. Here, protestors try to stop a truck from leaving the area which they believed might be carrying dead animals. Agents respond with dogs and tasers.

However, I believe that if this situation escalates into a Waco or Ruby Ridge brand of event, not only Liberty Movement residents of Nevada, but Liberty Movement champions across the nation will indeed finally throw down the gauntlet. What does that mean? It means they are going to start shooting.  Opposing groups can debate whether this is a good thing or a bad thing, but the reality is that one way or another, it is going to happen.

Discussions within the movement are far from apathetic. Hundreds of thousands if not millions of eyes are watching every move of the BLM right now, and they should be taking this fact very seriously.

The naysayers will claim that we don't have the will to take action. They are welcome to think whatever they like. But mark my words, Constitutionally minded Americans are not going to stand by and watch another massacre, nor a loss of gun rights, nor will we be entertaining violations of our freedoms for much longer. This society is on the edge of something. It's kinetic, or electric. It is not yet quite visible but it is there, reverberating in the atmosphere. My suggestion to our federal bureaucracy would be to do what they did during the gun debate, and quickly back away.

Of course, we all know they won't.

Do the elites want to stir up insurgency in order to give pretense for a larger crackdown? They very well might. But it is transparent in the way they try to mitigate dissent and offer placation that they do not want a rebellion larger than they can manage. I think it is far too late for that. I think they've pissed off too many people, instead of just enough people. I think that though most pretend-Americans will do nothing but watch in horror or hide in their hovels, the size of resistance to the tides of despotism is growing far beyond common realizations. And, when this resistance erupts, it will shock even those who fully expect it.

The sneaky way car insurers raise your rates

Car insurance companies charge higher rates if you’re poor, less educated or just plain lazy, two new studies show.

The companies calculate which customers are least likely to shop around after price increases and then slowly bump up their premiums, according to a letter two advocacy organizations sent to insurance commissioners nationwide. And less-educated drivers and those with non-professional, non-managerial jobs, which are often lower-paying, pay almost $1,000 extra in premiums, the New York Public Interest Research Group found.

“It’s clear that some people are being charged more for the exact same coverage, and those people come from low income backgrounds or communities of color. We think that presents a serious problem, possibly a civil rights violation,” says Andrew Morrison, campaigns director at NYPIRG and an author of the study.

Inputting fictional information for a 30-year-old single woman on the websites of four of the five largest auto insurers in New York, the group found that on average, a bank executive with a college degree is quoted at $1,247. A college-educated bank teller is charged $30 more. The rate increases by $200 or more for bank executives, tellers and retail cashiers who only have a high school diploma.

The quotes for this “30-year-old single woman” were taken from January to April, and based on a woman who drives a 2008 Honda Civic 7,500 miles annually and has driven for 14 years. Her home locations were across middle-income areas in New York, including Albany, Queens, Poughkeepsie and Staten Island.

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Obamacare: Saving money on your car insurance

Obamacare, the law that could save you 2% or more on car insurance? A study released Wednesday by the Rand Corporation finds that as more people gain health insurance, the costs of other types of insurance could go down. Jonnelle Marte reports. Photo: Getty.

Progressive gave the fictitious high school-educated retail cashier and bank teller quotes of $5,021 annually, $916 more than a woman with the same driving patterns who was a college-educated bank teller. Geico asked the less educated retail cashier to pay an average of 41% more than the college-educated bank executive. Progressive uses “many different rating factors, which sometimes include non-driving factors that have been proven to be predictive of a person’s likelihood of having a claim,” spokesman Jeff Sibel said in an email. Geico did not return requests for comment.

Advocates also say auto insurance companies are creeping up rates for consumers they deem less likely to shop around — a factor that isn’t associated with their level of risk. That makes a customer who has stuck around with the same insurance provider for years, despite rate hikes, more likely to see continued price increases.

“They’re maximizing profit by figuring out, how high can a rate go, prior to too many people leaving to make it not profitable,” says J. Robert Hunter, director of insurance at the Consumer Federation of America.

Sixty-three percent of auto insurance companies in the U.S. and Canada employ the practice called “price optimization” or plan to do so in the future, according to a survey of 73 representatives by Earnix, a company that runs a pricing analytics software.

“You can’t just charge people willy-nilly for certain things just because that’s what the market will bear,” says Birny Birnbaum, executive director of the Austin-based Center for Economic Justice and a former associate commissioner at the Texas Department of Insurance. “Price optimization is really just a fancy term for price gouging.”

The two consumer groups sent a letter to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners, urging them to ban the practice. The NAIC declined to comment for this story.

That letter calls out Earnix, the software company, for helping insurers set rates based on a consumer’s sensitivity to price changes. Meryl Golden, general manager of the company’s North America operations, said in an interview that insurers commonly make judgments on how customers will respond to rate changes and the company’s software offers an analytical, data-based tool to help reach those decisions.

“Every company is responsible for setting their prices and they make the decision of what their business goals are,” she says.

The insurance industry is seeing a “technical evolution” in pricing methods as data mining becomes the norm, and “responsible use of these techniques that imposes higher prices on truly risky behavior should be permitted,” according to a December 2013 report by the Treasury Department’s Federal Insurance Office.

“However, simply because data may be available regarding consumers does not mean that any data is relevant to determining the insurance premium they should pay,” the report reads.