Brent Nyitray
Fairlington Blade
Let the mutherfuker burn!
jnc4p
Kevin S. Willis
Michigoose
lmsinca
markinaustin
Memetrics
novahockey
quarterback
ScottC
yellojktVital Statistics:
| Last | Change | |
| S&P Futures | 2431.8 | 5.3 |
| Eurostoxx Index | 388.7 | 2.1 |
| Oil (WTI) | 45.9 | -0.2 |
| US dollar index | 88.4 | -0.1 |
| 10 Year Govt Bond Yield | 2.22% | |
| Current Coupon Fannie Mae TBA | 103.47 | |
| Current Coupon Ginnie Mae TBA | 104.33 | |
| 30 Year Fixed Rate Mortgage | 3.93 |
Stocks are higher as the Fed begins its 2-day FOMC meeting. Bonds and MBS are down small.
Producer prices were flat last month on a MOM basis and are up 2.4% YOY. The core rate is up 2.1%, which is more or less in line with the Fed’s target. Note this index measures inflation at the wholesale level, not the consumer level which is what the Fed focuses on.
Small Business Optimism was flat in May and is still much higher post-election. Small businesses expect to make additional hires and increase capital spending, though earnings trends are still net negative. How about this? The net hiring activity (.34 workers per firm) is close to a 43 year high. The report shows that small businesses are increasing compensation to retain and attract workers, although finding quality, qualified workers is a problem – the second biggest one. Taxes and regulation were #1 and #3. A year ago, taxes and regulation were #1 and #2, with poor sales coming at #3. It looks like wage inflation is building at long last, which is exactly what the economy needs, although it will concern the Fed somewhat.
A better economy means lower delinquencies. 30-60 day DQs dropped down to 2000 levels, while LT DQs fell to a 10year low.
Last night the Trump Administration released its report on core principles for financial regulatory reform. Any changes to the regulatory system will be generally slow, as rule changes require comment periods and coordination between the different agencies. The Treasury Department principles don’t necessarily eliminate the Obama Administration’s regulatory regime, but they sand down some of the more sharp edges and attempt to eliminate some of the unintended consequences. Ultimately, ending regulation by enforcement action will go a long way towards increasing capital availability. Needless to say, Democrats are panning the report, however that could be just partisan boilerplate posturing. The need to ease the regulatory burden on small banks is a bipartisan view. Changing the Volcker rule regarding proprietary trading is a different animal, as are changes to CRA enforcement and the CFPB.
Speaking of regulation, iServe Chief Communications Officer Mike Macari and I penned an article for the California MBA discussing regulation and how it is inhibiting housing growth. When regulatory costs tack on an extra 30% to the price of a starter home, it is difficult to make that starter home affordable for someone in their 20s or early 30s. I have said it before: the difference between 2% GDP growth and 3% GDP growth (or the difference between a “meh” economy and a boom) is housing starts. Starts should be around 2 million per year, and we are barely half that. Home construction employs a lot of people and generates a lot of ancillary jobs as well.
Filed under: Economy, Morning Report |
All Things in Moderation 
Trump should ignore the courts:
There are legitimate debates about the limits of presidential authority in every administration. It’s fair to question whether any president, of any party, should be able to engage in military action without Congress because the Constitution grants the legislative branch the authority to declare war.
But there can be no doubt whatsoever that President Trump is acting within his legal authority under the Immigration and Nationality Act which grants him the authority to “suspend the entry of all aliens or any class of aliens as immigrants or nonimmigrants” for as long as he thinks it’s necessary. Obama made use of this power to temporarily halt Iraqi migration. So have other presidents in the past.
Immigration is in the hands of Congress and the White House. It is not up to judges to decide who can come to America. Our entire system of immigration “discriminates” based on religion and national origin. It allots visas and refugee status based on national origin and membership in persecuted religious groups. If the judicial coup succeeds, elected officials will lose their authority over immigration.
http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/266925/president-trump-should-bypass-courts-travel-ban-daniel-greenfield
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Trump isn’t the person to have that fight. It would just make matters worse, if your concern is for actual fidelity to the Constitution & statutes.
He also can’t stop making problems for himself.
““I think he’s considering perhaps terminating the special counsel,” Christopher Ruddy said during an appearance on PBS’s “NewsHour.” “I think he’s weighing that option.” He also told PBS he thought doing so would be “a very significant mistake.””
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/jeff-sessions-set-to-testify-this-afternoon-before-senate-intelligence-committee/2017/06/13/ac5321bc-4fc6-11e7-91eb-9611861a988f_story.html
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jnc:
Trump isn’t the person to have that fight.
I think ultimately you are right. Unfortunately, while he is, by temperment, perhaps more willing than most to engage in the fight, he is intellectually/ideologically incapable of defending the effort from the inevitable progressive onslaught.
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He also has no principles that are discernible from his own immediate self interest.
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Agreed. That was one of my problems with him from day one of the primaries.
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Yeah, but Mark Steyn is never going to be elected president. 😉
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Interesting related read:
I don’t think Trump is sufficiently competent or charismatic enough with his own side to pull off a full Andrew Jackson.
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So, we’re back to Trump being a drooling retard and the evil genius Bannon has his hand up Trump’s ass and moving his jaws like he’s a ventriloquist’s dummy?
We go full circle on this monthly, can’t these morons come up with something original?
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Taibbi on Corbyn.
http://www.rollingstone.com/politics/features/taibbi-goodbye-and-good-riddance-to-centrism-w487628
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As noted at the time by Noam Chomsky – like Corbyn, much loathed by Quo-Nothing types as a hygiene-averse whiner who poisons young minds with unrealistic ideas…
Yeah, right. The primary criticism of Chomsky is that he poisons young minds with “unrealistic” ideas. Sure.
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The main thing I took from the piece was the self absorption of the media making their election reporting miss the big trends since Brexit.
Of course, it could be that they were acting as propagandists as well.
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Hawt blue on blue action.
http://acecomments.mu.nu/?post=370206
Gotta admit, the crazy is very compelling, sexually.
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The comments are fascinating.
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/6/14/1671719/-Republicans-rush-to-politicize-shooting-at-congressional-baseball-practice#view-story
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I’m surprised how much violence love needs to use in order to trump hate…
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“Republicans rush to politicize shooting at congressional baseball practice”
We’ll see if they can beat the Plum Line record that was set when Giffords was shot.
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that field is 4 minutes from my fire station. had i been on duty, guaranteed i’d have been dispatched.
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http://www.thesmokinggun.com/buster/james-t-hodgkinson/congressional-baseball-shooter-729035
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And just like that, a million journalists cannot figure out his motive.
It is almost as confusing as that Allahu Akbar trick people sometimes use to mask their motivations…
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But everyone knew that the Giffords shooting was tied to Sarah Palin using crosshairs in a campaign message.
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Yup, a right winger.
http://www.bnd.com/news/local/article156065789.html
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We have a winner! First lefty to blame Trump for a Bernie Bro shooter!
My heart goes out to all of those shot and their families. But words will not take away their pain, I only wish they were able to.
This vicious act is sadly the consequences of Trump and the GOP’s actions and words. Trump encouraging his supporters to Lock Her Up, and Kill Hillery. Trump’s demonizing minorities; the GOP robbing Americans of health care; conservatives spewing out insults against democrats. The worry and frustration of our country in turmoil and the anger it all generates has a consequence, and you are looking at that consequence in today shooting.
In the days ahead, we will have floods of politicians telling the country to Heal. Forget it. The only people in this country that can put this right are the conservatives and the GOP. They have to start governing this country to benefit everyone not just the 1%. They have to take the Russian inquiry seriously. They have to govern the words and actions of their own people to return us to stability.
Failure to do this will have an even bigger consequence for government and this country. And the consequences of nothing changing is, as billionaire Nick Hanauer put it, “They will be looking at a lot of pitchforks in the future.” He was right. Democrats cannot go on forever seeing the country they love laid bare and defenseless to foreign invasion and it’s people robbed of the necessities of life. To stand by and see the GOP accepting that Russia can violate our sovereignty at will, as nothing of any importance. So this this time it was the act of someone who was pushed over the edge, we all have that edge, just it takes a lot more for some others to fall apart.
http://www.dailykos.com/stories/2017/6/14/1671768/-Trump-says-shooting-suspect-James-T-Hodgkinson-is-dead#view-story
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“This vicious act is sadly the consequences of Trump and the GOP’s actions and words.”
And here I thought they’d blame Tim Kaine for urging folks to fight Trump in the street. Silly me!
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http://www.bnd.com/news/local/article156092134.html
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I don’t like Sanders but he did condemn this in the strongest possible terms on the floor of the Senate.
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Here’s what I don’t understand, if you believe your political opponents are Nazi’s and they hold seats of power, why is it wrong to kill them?
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why is it wrong to kill them?
Because the election system and free speech, assembly, and press, and the judicial rights of the accused are still alive. Take away due process, or free elections, or seize the press and the 2dA becomes real important.
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But if I think they’re Nazi’s and that Nazi’s are lethal to me and my kin, why am I not allowed to proactively defend myself?
Wouldn’t it be negligent to leave them in power? Why is how a Nazi acquired power relevant? They’re Nazi’s.
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Mark:
Take away due process, or free elections, or seize the press and the 2dA becomes real important.
If one believes the rhetoric of the left regarding the right in general and Trump in particular, then one should believe that the 2dA has already become real important, and things like today in Alexandria will look a lot more like necessary 2dA solutions than deplorable crimes.
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I remember the Giffords shooting and how some on the commentariat tied it to Palin – and I also remember that the shooter was a Charles Addams caricature of a nitwit. I hear the attempt by some in the right commentariat to make this loudmouth a “typical” Berner minion out for blood or revolution. Hell, Sanders threw the word “revolution” about a lot too freely for my taste.
I am absolutely certain that violence is unwarranted in a functioning representative government and I doubt whether any of you think it is, either. I think George is pulling my leg and Scott is criticizing the commentariat, although focusing on the left end of it, which is certainly well represented. I don’t have any problem with that focus, or focusing on the right end of it or the center, either [if there is one], so long as the sane conclusion is that the folks who espouse violence because they lost at the ballot box have totally missed the point of having representative government in the first place.
Far more powerful for me than the gobbledygook of fanboy violence was the appearance of these two Congressmen and what they had to say.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/videos/#219011
As for Trump himself, the wheels of justice turn slowly, but grind exceedingly fine. Patience. At worst, this guy could be around 8 years. Fewer years would be better. Patience will be rewarded in any case. Representative government may not work well but as Churchill said, it works much better than the other systems.
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Mark:
The difference between the Giffords episode and this recent one is that the notion that Loughner was associated with or motivated by conservative political leanings was invented out of whole cloth by the left. It was and remains a lie. That Hodgkinson is associated with and motivated by progressive political leanings is not just an invention of partisan propaganda. It looks to be pretty solid at this point. The two situation are not comparable.
I am absolutely certain that violence is unwarranted in a functioning representative government…
A pretty standard feature of progressive rhetoric is precisely that the US government is not a functioning representative government. The left’s entire schtick is that the political system has been captured and corrupted by “big business” and “oligarchs” like the Kochs who seek to “oppress” the average citizen, and especially certain, particularly “hated” victim classes. (Recall VP Joe Biden telling blacks that Republicans want to “put y’all back in chains”.) If one actually believes that – and the left wants you to believe it – then surely at some point violence does become warranted.
What I am certain of is that if I truly believed what high profile politicians and pundits of the left routinely claim about conservatives, republicans, and the political right, I would think that violence against them is justifiable.
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Literally every time.
http://www.timesofisrael.com/jewish-suspects-arrested-over-swastika-graffiti-on-synagogues/
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