THE TRASH NOVEL WE SHOULD BE WORKING ON

Posted on November 15, 2012 by markinaustin

Characters: 1] The evil but seductive twin sisters.

Imagine that they are sleeper agents for Hizbollah. One marries an Irish-American MD who is a sympathizer with the IRA and took a quickie course in intel gathering from Hizbollah. One marries the chief trader for American interests in Iraq, but sheds him when the Iraq War has no more useful intel.

2] The well meaning, but over-sexed former HS athlete and valedictorian, WP grad, reserve Major, and scholar/author, who we imagine learns of the evil twins through her time embedded with the CIA chief, who is too blind to have seen through them.

3] The we imagine honorable but manipulable CIA chief and generals who protect our land.

4] Jack Reacher [tm], who brings everyone to their senses, probably by slaying the evil twins, turning the Irish doctor, bedding the oversexed scholar, and redeeming the reputations of the honorable men, in some way I can’t figure out yet.

5] The Real Housewives [tm] of Tampa.

Some possible connections and plot turns:

Hizbollah was floating the couple in Tampa to lavish living in order to gain access to Central Command, but cut them off because of the War in Syria, or because they were not getting enough good stuff from the couple, who were having too good of a time.

Evil twin got so many wheels involved in her custody battle that Hizbollah shifted its financing to her.

Reacher [tm] first met the oversexed athlete/scholar/author when he was guarding a missile base in ND and she was a curious HS valedictorian. Didn’t have sex with her then but did have to remove her from the missile base.

Reacher [tm] is not Tom Cruise.

All twists and turns and perversions are welcome.

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Morning Report 11/15/12

Posted on November 15, 2012 by Brent Nyitray

Vital Statistics:

  Last Change Percent
S&P Futures  1352.6 -0.4 -0.03%
Eurostoxx Index 2456.5 -16.3 -0.66%
Oil (WTI) 86.54 0.2 0.25%
LIBOR 0.311 0.001 0.32%
US Dollar Index (DXY) 81.17 0.118 0.15%
10 Year Govt Bond Yield 1.61% 0.02%  
RPX Composite Real Estate Index 192 -0.4  

Markets are flat this morning after yesterday’s bloodbath in the S&P and Wal Mart’s miss, which is a negative sign for the economy. Inflation at the consumer level remained in the Fed’s comfort range, while initial jobless claims jumped to 439k.  This is heavily influenced by Sandy, so don’t read too much into it. The NY Fed’s Empire Manufacturing Survey was negative, but better than expected and higher than the previous month.s  The Eurozone officially entered a recession.  Bonds are down small while MBS are flat.

The Bernank is speaking on Housing and Financial Markets at 1:20 est today.

Freddie Mac discusses housing starts in its November 2012 US Economic and Housing Market Outlook.  

The FOMC minutes released yesterday showed the Fed is moving in the direction of providing explicit economic guideposts for monetary policy.  In other words, once unemployment drops to X%, we end QE. While they also expressed concern that the scheduled completion of Operation Twist may impact the economy, they did not announce a Treasury buying program.  The market does expect one, though. 

A House report on MF Global basically characterizes Jon Corzine as the “de facto chief trader” and blames his trades for the firm’s collapse.  The Democrats on the panel refused to endorse the report, basically proving (yet again) that the financial is political. 

The Washington Post has a good backgrounder on the shale gas revolution.  This has the potential to be a real long-term elixir for the economy.

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