A new trade bill has been introduced in the Senate. Hopefully this will not be yet another good piece of legislation that goes to committee to die.
According to Senator Sherrod Brown's Press Release: The TRADE ACT would:
Require the Government Accountability Office to conduct a comprehensive review of existing trade agreements with an emphasis on economic results, enforcement and compliance, and an analysis of non-tariff provisions in trade agreements
Spell out standards for labor and environmental protections, food and product safety, national security exceptions, and remedies that must be included in new trade pacts
Set requirements with respect to public services, farm policy, investment, government procurement, and affordable medicines that have been incorporated in trade agreements
Ya know, duh, yes, slave labor is the ultimate capitalism, the ultimate globalization....
but I cannot make this stuff up, look at how CNN words the article title that is really a report on global slavery, almost as if that's just a good thing.
U.S. consumers expect prices to rise 7.7 percent in the coming year, according to the Conference Board, a research company. Investors expect inflation over the coming decade to average 3.4 percent based on bond market data analyzed by the Cleveland Fed. That is well above the Fed's unofficial target of about 2 percent
In a diary over the weekend entitled, Countdown to $100 Oil ?!? Subsidies, hoarding, and bailing out billionaires, I took the contrarian position that oil is more likely to re-cross to the downside the $100 a barrel price, before it hits $200 a barrel. I cited evidence of hoarding on tankers, the Fed's realization that destroying the dollar might be a bad thing, and most of all, intense pressure being applied to Asian governments' subsidies of consumer oil prices in support of that position.
Today, with the price of a barrel of oil at the moment at $123.75, comes fresh evidence that those oil subsidies are collapsing. It turns out the laws of supply and demand work on the other side of the globe too.
A news article came out yesterday that received almost no attention. Yet its significance cannot be overstated to those still hoping for a large drop in energy prices.
Hedge-fund managers and speculators reduced bets on higher oil prices by 80 percent since July as crude futures rose to records and U.S. regulators started investigating trading, government data show.
So-called speculative net long positions fell to 25,867 contracts on the New York Mercantile Exchange in the week ended May 27 from a record 127,491 on July 31, according to a U.S. Commodity Futures Trading Commission report on May 30.
Quite simply, this destroys every single sound bite you've heard out of Washington and the mainstream news media over why energy prices are so high.
You hear a lot of buzz words these days about shady deals and speculation on oil futures. So, what exactly is this Enron Loophole so many refer to which allows all of this trading on energy to go on with no accountability or regulation?
it has been widely understood that, unless properly regulated, futures markets are easily subject to distorting the economic fundamentals of price discovery (i.e., cause the paying of unnecessarily higher or lower prices) through excessive speculation, fraud, or manipulation.
General Motors Corp., struggling to return to profit amid record gasoline prices, said it will close four truck plants, make more small cars, and may drop its Hummer brand of large sport-utility vehicles
If there was ever a sign that the housing market was nowhere near a bottom, this has got to be it. We aren't talking about Detroit or Cleveland here. This is San Diego. We aren't talking about some slumlord's shack. These are new homes.
Am I pointing this out because it is a great deal? Not even close. This is a clear sign that home prices will fall much further.
Allow me to explain.
No matter how bad you've heard the housing market is, the truth is much worse.
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