The Daily Middle

Archive for May, 2010

Wishing everyone a nice and long weekend wherever you may be going and with whatever you may be doing! We’re also on vacation here, so we just posted a quick Friday Funnies from The Onion. Enjoy the rest of your day!

Best Regards,

The Daily Middle Team

From: The Onion

WASHINGTON—After serving 12 years in the position, Motley, the official White House Jester, was beheaded Tuesday after delivering a poorly received jape about the spiraling national debt before President and Mrs. Obama.

“For crimes of great arrogance and cheek, His Idiocy the White House Jester has been sentenced to a swift demise,” White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs said following the death sentence. “Let it be heard over every city and suburb of this land that the National Debt is no topic for frivolity, and the mailed hand of Obama shall smite all offenders.”

Motley, who used his last words to beg in vain for Obama’s mercy, was executed on the North Lawn at the strike of noon.
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BP wants Twitter to shut down a fake BP account that is mocking the oil company. In response, Twitter wants BP to shut down the oil leak that’s ruining the ocean.

-Late Night with Jimmy Fallon

“Evidently the lesson of the U.S. government bailouts has not been learned. Bailouts do not, in fact, cannot make things better, they can only make things worse. Governments can pay for bailouts by increasing taxes which takes money out of the pockets of hard-working poor and middle class Americans and siphons it off into the bank accounts of failed bankers. Where governments get paid for bailouts through inflation; increasing the supply of money out of thin air and devaluing the currency. In this case the bailout firms who have used this new money to reap all the benefits while the poor and the middle class see increased prices and the purchasing power of their savings reduced.”

From: Newsmax

Support for repeal of the new national healthcare plan has jumped to its highest level ever. A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 63 percent of U.S. voters now favor repeal of the plan congressional Democrats passed and President Obama signed into law in March.

Before today, weekly polling had shown support for repeal ranging from 54 percent to 58 percent. Just 32 percent oppose repeal, according to the survey of 1,000 likely voters taken May 22-23.

The new findings include 46 percent who strongly favor repeal of the healthcare bill and 25 percent who strongly oppose it.

While opposition to the bill has remained as consistent since its passage as it was beforehand, this marks the first time that support for repeal has climbed into the 60s. It will be interesting to see whether this marks a brief bounce or indicates a trend of growing opposition.
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From: Business Insider

Since the financial crisis hit in 2007, unemployment has been one of the most talked about numbers in the media.

The US as a whole is hovering over the 10% mark and if you take a look at underemployment numbers, it becomes even grimmer. But keep the hope alive, because according to Bureau of Labor Statistics data, there are hundreds of cities in the United States that have kept their unemployment rate under 10% and that’s a good thing.

So who has done the best job of keeping unemployment to a minimum? Let’s examine the 20 cities where being out of work isn’t a huge concern.

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From: Commodity Online

Gold and silver bullion sales at the United States Mint have reached record levels in May 2010. With about a week left to go, more than 200,000 ounces of gold and more than 3 million ounces of silver have already been sold to the Mint’s authorized purchaser network, Coinupdate.com reported.

Authorized purchasers are able to buy bullion coins directly from the United States Mint. They subsequently resell the coins to other coin dealers, bullion dealers, or the public, and facilitate a two-way market for the coins.

For the month to date, the Mint has recorded sales of 142,500 one ounce American Gold Eagles and 61,000 one ounce American Gold Buffalo bullion coins. The combined sales of 203,500 ounces of gold already represents the highest monthly total for gold bullion sales during 2010. The previous high for the year was 117,000 ounces sold during April 2010, when the 2010 Gold Buffalo coins first went on sale.

TDM Tip: Be weary of where you invest in commodities such as Gold and Silver. Some online vendors or even T.V. advertisements will get you with the small text. Some companies do not give you the true value and quality when you invest your hard earned dollars. Consequently, we did some research and we found a company that we would recommend, should you be interested to invest, and that is GovMint.com

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Imus, “At some point there’s trillions of dollars of debt that we’ve got ourselves into. We’re going to have to pay it back to somebody right?”

Nouriel Roubini, “That’s absolutely the case. This crisis started with too much debt of the private sector; leverage, houses, financial institutions and corporates. We socialized it and put it on the balance sheets of the government. And therefore from now on there are only two or three options. Either we’re going to control spending and raise revenue through the budget deficits, or otherwise there are only two other options. Either inflate it away with inflation; that will be very damaging, or, default. And there is right now in a number of European countries, like Greece, is that the burden of the debt is so much, that they’re going to default on this debt. If we want to avoid the fate of Greece, the fault of inflation, then we have to really have fiscal discipline. That’s the challenge we’re facing in the United States and everywhere in the world.”

From: Mish’s Global Economic Trend Analysis

Smack in the midst of a “global recovery” tensions are heating up in Asia. Please consider Kim Jong II Orders Military to Get Ready for Combat

North Korean leader Kim Jong II ordered the country’s military to get ready for combat in a message televised nationwide last week following South Korea’s announcement that North Korea torpedoed the South’s warship.

South Korea’s President Lee Myung Bak said yesterday the country will push for United Nations censure against North Korea for the March 26 sinking of a naval ship, which killed 46 sailors. A multinational team concluded on May 20 that North Korea fired a torpedo to split apart the 1,200-ton Cheonan.

Tensions are rising in the Korean peninsula following the report, with both sides threatening counter-measures should they come under attack. South Korea plans to define North Korea as its “main enemy” when it maps out military strategy, Yonhap reported today, citing a government official it didn’t identify.

South Korea’s Won Sinks to 8-Month Low
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From: USA Today

Paychecks from private business shrank to their smallest share of personal income in U.S. history during the first quarter of this year, a USA TODAY analysis of government data finds.

At the same time, government-provided benefits — from Social Security, unemployment insurance, food stamps and other programs — rose to a record high during the first three months of 2010.

Those records reflect a long-term trend accelerated by the recession and the federal stimulus program to counteract the downturn. The result is a major shift in the source of personal income from private wages to government programs.

The trend is not sustainable, says University of Michigan economist Donald Grimes. Reason: The federal government depends on private wages to generate income taxes to pay for its ever-more-expensive programs. Government-generated income is taxed at lower rates or not at all, he says. “This is really important,” Grimes says.
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