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1/7/2006

'Truthiness' Is Word of the Year :.

A panel of linguists has decided the word that best reflects 2005 is "truthiness," defined as the quality of stating concepts one wishes or believes to be true, rather than the facts.


1/6/2006

Off Topic: Any FOREX Traders Out There?

If you're not into trading the global financial casino, please skip down to the next article.

I'm looking for advice from any experienced FOREX traders out there. None of the tools I used to make money with daytrading stocks circa 1998-2000 (stochastics, moving averages, moving average crosses, MACD, support/resistance antics, etc., etc.) seem to work. It doesn't appear to be worth it to try to range trade these things. I happened to be watching EUR/USD the other day when that thing had the biggest one day move in something like five years. That move seemed to behave, probably because the thing was clearly trending. Buy the dips, take some PIPs, repeat. But when they settle into consolidation mode, it's not fun.

Ok, here's where I need help: I'm only interested in taking 10 to 15 PIPs at a time on momentum cranks. I'm looking for a tool to help me buy or sell only those moves that get the juice for a few minutes, while avoiding the crappy fake outs and noise, which is most of this market to begin with. All I'm after is 10 to 15 PIPs (net profit) per day on 1 lot deals! It's bum change! That's not too much to ask, right? * chuckle * Any ideas?

So far, I've seen nothing that would get me to trade this thing with real money, but the simulator account is free.

DISCUSS


1/5/2006

Boise Sky Anomalies :.

Par for the course, I'd say. I mean, what else can anyone say? I'm sure experts at some university will have a simple explanation for this. A mass cow fart emission, or something. Not to worry. Fill your baskets at Walmart and go about your business. Only crackpots and lunatics think this could be anything out of the ordinary...



Welcome to Stanton! :.

While you may feel the need to wash after reading the O.C. Weekly, the rag occasionally prints articles worth reading. Just be warned: The publication is 90% advertising. Ads for every conceivable plastic surgery procedure. Ads for people with LOTS of tattoos. Ads for depression treatment. Ads for hookers, etc.

Now that I've presented my disclaimer on the O.C. Weekly, behold, the real estate market in Orange County:

Stanton. Beautiful, beautiful Stanton. Home of Venus' live nude ladies, "theaters" that feature bruised, hollow-eyed girls waving their clean-plucked naughty bits in the air, and a plethora of pawn shops where I like to do my Christmas shopping.

Stanton is the place the rest of us here in Orange County make fun of when we're tired of mocking Fontana.

Stanton-let's face it-is a nasty, stinking hole, and therefore the perfect place for your first-time home-buying needs.

...

Burd seemed like a swell guy. I'd met him at an open house for a sprawling five-bedroom in Stanton, desperately in need of updating, that was listed for $649,000. Two months ago, a smaller house across the street sold for $630,000, but this listing wasn't even getting lookie-loos.

"This market's almost done, Rebecca," he told me frankly. "It can't go much further."

"But what about all those people who said the market might stagnate, but California real estate never crashes?

Yeah, Burd said, that's what they said back in '89... If you can weather that kind of downturn because you're planning to stay in your house for the next 40 years, and you don't have any balloon payments coming due at just the time the market's dropped, that might be fine. But if you're counting on this tulip craze continuing, just remember: a house can't quadruple in value every five years indefinitely. If it did, that would mean in five years, our Stanton townhome, already beyond the reach of almost everyone in the county, would be worth $1.6 million. And do you really think that's going to happen?

Burd did have some good advice for me, though: he told me I should get married. "Find a rich old guy who won't live that long," he said sunnily. "You're a good-looking girl!"



NSA Whistleblower Asks to Testify :.

Since the U.S. government has "highly classified Special Access Programs" to deal with people like Mr. Tice, I would suggest avoiding trips involving airplanes. Unfortunately, random acts of violence, car crashes, suicides and heart attacks are quite common...

It probably makes more sense for Them to let him live, say what he has to say, and sit back as the entire matter is quickly forgotten:

A former National Security Agency official wants to tell Congress about electronic intelligence programs that he asserts were carried out illegally by the NSA and the Defense Intelligence Agency.

Russ Tice, a whistleblower who was dismissed from the NSA last year, stated in letters to the House and Senate intelligence committees that he is prepared to testify about highly classified Special Access Programs, or SAPs, that were improperly carried out by both the NSA and the DIA.

"I intend to report to Congress probable unlawful and unconstitutional acts conducted while I was an intelligence officer with the National Security Agency and with the Defense Intelligence Agency," Mr. Tice stated in the Dec. 16 letters, copies of which were obtained by The Washington Times.

The letters were sent the same day that the New York Times revealed that the NSA was engaged in a clandestine eavesdropping program that bypassed the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) court. The FISA court issues orders for targeted electronic and other surveillance by the government.

President Bush said Sunday that the NSA spying is "a necessary program" aimed at finding international terrorists by tracking phone numbers linked to al Qaeda.



GOP Leaders Ridding Themselves of Money Linked to Abramoff :.

* yawn * Corrupt politicians... Imagine my shock:

From the Oval Office to Capitol Hill, prominent Republicans scrambled Wednesday to shed campaign contributions linked to disgraced lobbyist Jack Abramoff, as his guilty pleas in fraud and corruption cases opened a painful debate within the party over its leadership and direction.

President Bush, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, R-Texas, and DeLay's temporary successor in that post, Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., joined a lengthening list of politicians whose campaign committees have returned or donated to charities money they received from Abramoff, his associates and his clients.

More lawmakers were expected to follow suit in what was becoming a stampede by lawmakers to distance themselves from a lobbyist who once enjoyed easy access to Washington's corridors of power.

The cloud surrounding Abramoff grew Wednesday when he pleaded guilty in Miami to federal fraud charges arising from his purchase of SunCruz, a Florida gambling boat fleet. Tuesday, he pleaded guilty in Washington to three federal felonies stemming from his lobbying activities.

Anxieties on Capitol Hill are mounting because Abramoff -- once a key player in a lobbying project that DeLay built into a powerful tool to help maintain Republican majorities in the House and Senate -- is cooperating with federal prosecutors in a wide-ranging corruption investigation. The probe is focused on whether at least a half-dozen members of Congress and several aides traded legislative action in return for lavish trips, gifts and campaign contributions orchestrated by Abramoff.


1/2/2006

Get Ready for Trillions of Dollars Worth of ARMs to Start Floating :.

Make your time:

You know those cheap mortgages that everybody's been getting to speculate on housing? Where somebody at the other end of a toll-free phone will lend you $200,000 and your payment will only be $678 per month?

Lenders who started making those teaser-rate loans a few years ago are getting ready to charge real-world payments on them.

Starting in 2006 and accelerating into 2007, as much as $2.5 trillion worth of the fancy mortgages called "hybrids" are coming to the end of the free-lunch part of the deal.

...

The best-case scenario for the future, the one from the real estate agents, is that prices will level out to single-digit appreciation rates.

Assuming that scenario, some would-be investors -- those who took out highly leveraged loans with extremely low payment options -- could soon find themselves owing more on a house than it is worth.

That's called being "upside down" in a loan.

Many more will simply find that their monthly bill has instantly risen by roughly the amount of a car loan.



Porn Star Attends Republican Fund-Raiser :.

This is an oldy, but a goody.

This is for all the "Christians" out there who support the Republican party. Family values, etc.:

Porn star, political candidate. And now you can add one more line to Mary Carey's resume: Republican booster.

Carey was in Washington on Tuesday to attend the President's Dinner, an annual fund-raiser put on by the National Republican Congressional Committee and the National Republican Senatorial Committee.

A few hours before the dinner, Carey met with reporters to show off her evening gown and talk about a Republican lunch she and her boss, adult film executive Mark Kulkis, attended.


1/1/2006

Russia Starts Reducing Natural Gas Deliveries to Ukraine :.

MOSCOW Russia's natural gas monopoly Gazprom has begun reducing pressure in its lines to Ukraine as the deadline for stopping sales to the country loomed.

Gazprom says it's stopping natural gas sales to the country of 48 (m) million people because Ukraine refused a demand to pay more than quadruple the price for Russian gas.

Gazprom provides about half the gas consumed in the European Union and some 80 percent of that amount is sent in pipelines that cross Ukraine. The price dispute has raised wide concerns that European supplies could be affected.

Ukrainian officials have said the country has sufficient gas reserves to weather a Gazprom cutoff for at least several weeks, but have declined to specify how much it has in reserve.




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