another site
What ended Dec. 13 as a car chase in Peachtree City and snarled traffic began a day earlier when a 70-year-old man in southeast Coweta County stabbed his 41-year-old son. Coweta County deputies on Dec. 13 located the man in Peachtree City and disabled his vehicle when it crossed the median on Ga. Highway 74 and put oncoming drivers at risk.
via The Citizen http://www.thecitizen.com/articles/12-18-2013/1-arrest-friday-ptc-car-chase
A Fayette County grand jury declined to indict four people Friday on racketeering and related charges stemming from alleged fraudulent invoices submitted to the Clayton County DUI Court by one company in Tyrone and another located in College Park.
via The Citizen http://www.thecitizen.com/articles/12-18-2013/fayette-grand-jury-declines-indict-clayton-top-cop-3-others
McIntosh High School cheerleaders recently brought home the Ga. High School Association State 5A Cheerleading Championship. Cheerleaders and coaches were recognized at the Dec.16 meeting of the Fayette County Board of Education. Pictured from left are coach Barry Garner, coach Shannon Bednarowski, head coach Julie Goss, Tyler Hicks, Jade Allen, Haven Clark, Maisy Mustic, K.T. Thompson, Megan Dietrick, Beth Walters, Shannon Hinds, Mary Sousley and Catie Caller. Photo/Ben Nelms.
via The Citizen http://www.thecitizen.com/articles/12-18-2013/big-cheer-mhs
Submitted by Lance Roberts of STA Wealth Management,
There is a rising belief that when the Federal Reserve begins to taper that interest rates are set to rise. It is believed that as rates rise due to stronger economic strength that the stock market will act as a hedge against falling bond prices. Recently, Blackrock attempted to answer this question by stating:
"Most investors fear rising interest rates. But perhaps more than the others, bond investors fear the loss of portfolio value that may occur when interest rates rise. Which begs the question – are there alternatives to bonds that might offer income and behave better in a rising rate environment? Indeed, global dividend stocks offer a compelling potential of income and outperformance in rising rate environments."
It is important to understand the underlying dynamic at play here which is that as interest rates rise – stocks will rise in price offsetting the decline in bond prices. The chart below from Blackrock attempts to prove their case by showing a comparison between stocks and bonds.
However, is that really the story? The problem with the data is that it is very selective in its construction. What the chart doesn't discuss is what happened next.
The chart below shows the 10-treasury rate from 1957 to present versus the S&P 500. I have also noted with vertical dashed lines, the peaks in interest rate increases along with major economic events and recessions. (Note: I have also noted the two relative market patterns of the current and previous secular bear markets.)
If you look at the chart closely a much different picture emerges from Blackrock's analysis. As you will notice in almost all cases when interest rates rose sharply there was either a subsequent economic shock, recession and/or fairly significant market decline.
In order to more clearly show the analysis I constructed the following table which lists the start and end date of significant interest rate increases and the subsequent market selloffs.
Importantly, historically speaking the market has tended to have corrections in conjunction with rising rates as the economy was negatively impacted. However, during the most recent history the negative impact was delayed by market momentum and liquidity driven booms. Eventually, the market and economy, in all previous cases, has given way to the impact of higher rates.
The current rise in rates is the second largest in history on a percentage basis at 83.66% versus 85.59% during the 1976-80 period. That previous spike in rates led to a 15% decline in the market in the middle of that spike.
The recent rise in rates has already started to negatively impact the housing market and most likely the economy as we see deflationary pressures rising. However, as I have recently discussed in "3 Myths About Rising Interest Rates:"
"The first misconception is that when the Fed tapers its ongoing liquidity program; interest rates will begin to rise. However, there is no anecdotal evidence that would be the case as shown in the chart below."
"In fact, the recent rise in interest rates should have been anticipated as that has been the case during both previous programs. It was not until the programs began to 'taper,' and eventually end, that rates fell as money flowed out of risk assets in search of safety in the bond market. This fall in rates also corresponded to economic weakness and expectations of an increase in deflationary pressures.
When the Fed once again begins to remove its accommodative support from the financial markets it will likely lead to a further decline in interest rates as 'safety' is once again sought over 'risk.'"
Will stocks offer protection from rising interest rates? Historically speaking rotating from bonds to stocks AFTER the spike in rates has occurred was akin to jumping from the "frying pan into the fire."
     |
via Zero Hedge http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/zerohedge/feed/~3/2CliNErTw08/story01.htm Tyler Durden
Prohibitionists commonly
warn that it’s dangerous even to discuss legalizing marijuana,
whether for medical or general use, because such talk sends “the
wrong message” to the youth of America, encouraging them to smoke
pot. If so, you might expect that the legalization of marijuana in
Colorado and Washington, approved by voters more than a year ago,
would have a noticeable impact on marijuana use by teenagers. Yet
the latest
data from the government-sponsored Monitoring the Future Study,
released today, indicate that teenagers observed the momentous
events in Colorado and Washington, absorbed the deleterious message
supposedly sent by legalization, and continued smoking pot at
pretty much the same rates as before.
Looking at annual,
past-month,
and “daily”
use (meaning use on 20 or more of the previous 30 days) among
eighth-, 10th-, and 12th-graders, you can see there were some
slight increases and slight decreases, but none of the changes was
stastistically significant. “These findings should put to rest any
claims that reforming marijuana laws and discussing the benefits
will somehow contribute to more teens using marijuana,” says
Mason Tvert, director of communications at the Marijuana
Policy Project (MPP). “It’s time for prohibition supporters to stop
hiding behind teens when debating marijuana policy.”
Maybe not. Even though marijuana use among teenagers was
essentially flat in the most recent survey, USA
Today reports
that “teens are shunning synthetic marijuana, such as K2 and Spice,
but smoking more of the real thing”—I guess because that sounded
good. “Young people are getting the wrong message from the medical
marijuana and legalization campaigns,” drug czar Gil Kerlikowske
says in the USA Today story. “If it’s continued to be
talked about as a benign substance that has no ill effects, we’re
doing a great disservice to young people by giving them that
message.”
You have to give Kerlikowske credit (if that’s the right word)
for being completely undaunted by contrary evidence. It is true
that marijuana use among teenagers has been “drifting higher in
recent years” (as the University of Michigan researchers who
oversee the Monitoring the Future Study
put it). But this upward
drift began around 2007, whereas the first medical marijuana
law (California’s) was enacted in 1996. In between, past-month use
among high school seniors went up and down, but it did not exceed
the 1996 rate until 2011, 15 years after cannabis was first
legalized for medical use. It certainly does not look like
marijuana reform is driving increases in adolescent pot smoking. If
you dig a little deeper, comparing cannabis consumption trends in
states with and without medical marijuana laws, there is
little evidence that such legislation boosts pot smoking by
teenagers.
A press release from the anti-pot group Project SAM notes with
alarm that “one-third of high school seniors living in medical
marijuana states obtained their marijuana from someone else’s
medical recommendation.” That’s not terribly surprising, given that
70 percent of people who use narcotic painkillers for
nonmedical purposes report that they got the pills from a relative
or friend with a prescription. That does not mean the government
should ban the medical use of narcotics. In any case, the relevant
question is whether this sort of diversion increases overall
marijuana use among teenagers. If it did, there should be
discernible differences in underage consumption trends between
states that allow medical use and states that don’t. So far there
aren’t.
The potential for diversion to minors will be greater, of
course, in states where pot buyers do not need a doctor’s note. At
the same time, it will become more difficult for minors to purchase
marijuana directly as state-licensed stores replace black-market
dealers (assuming that transition is not
impeded by excessive taxation and regulation). On balance,
teenagers probably will find that pot is somewhat easier to obtain,
just as alcohol is currently easier for them to obtain (although
harder to buy from a retailer) than marijuana. I would
therefore not be surprised if legalization is accompanied by an
increase in marijuana consumption by teenagers, although not
because of the message it sends so much as the increased access it
brings.
No doubt prohibitionists like Kerlikowske will cite any such
increase as evidence that they were right all along. But logically
speaking, the potential for diversion to minors does not count as
an argument for criminalizing the production, sale, and use of
marijuana any more than it counts as an argument for criminalizing
the production, sale, and use of alcoholic beverages. And just as
with adults, there is potential here for
harm reduction if more pot smoking means less drinking.
Drinking, by the way, has been declining
among teenagers since 1997, and cigarette
smoking is less than half as common among high school seniors
today as it was in 1976 (a downward trend than continued this year,
despite the “gateway” threat
allegedly posed by electronic cigarettes). So even if
legalization of marijuana is followed by a short-term increase in
pot smoking by teenagers, prohibition clearly is not necessary to
address the problem of underage consumption. In fact, prohibition
makes it harder to distinguish between adults and minors by handing
over the business to retailers who never bother to card their
customers. Citing the steady declines in underage alcohol and
tobacco consumption, the MPP’s Tvert argues that “regulation
clearly works and prohibition has clearly failed when it comes to
protecting teens.”
from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/12/18/if-marijuana-legalization-sends-the-wron
via IFTTT
Prohibitionists commonly
warn that it’s dangerous even to discuss legalizing marijuana,
whether for medical or general use, because such talk sends “the
wrong message” to the youth of America, encouraging them to smoke
pot. If so, you might expect that the legalization of marijuana in
Colorado and Washington, approved by voters more than a year ago,
would have a noticeable impact on marijuana use by teenagers. Yet
the latest
data from the government-sponsored Monitoring the Future Study,
released today, indicate that teenagers observed the momentous
events in Colorado and Washington, absorbed the deleterious message
supposedly sent by legalization, and continued smoking pot at
pretty much the same rates as before.
Looking at annual,
past-month,
and “daily”
use (meaning use on 20 or more of the previous 30 days) among
eighth-, 10th-, and 12th-graders, you can see there were some
slight increases and slight decreases, but none of the changes was
stastistically significant. “These findings should put to rest any
claims that reforming marijuana laws and discussing the benefits
will somehow contribute to more teens using marijuana,” says
Mason Tvert, director of communications at the Marijuana
Policy Project (MPP). “It’s time for prohibition supporters to stop
hiding behind teens when debating marijuana policy.”
Maybe not. Even though marijuana use among teenagers was
essentially flat in the most recent survey, USA
Today reports
that “teens are shunning synthetic marijuana, such as K2 and Spice,
but smoking more of the real thing”—I guess because that sounded
good. “Young people are getting the wrong message from the medical
marijuana and legalization campaigns,” drug czar Gil Kerlikowske
says in the USA Today story. “If it’s continued to be
talked about as a benign substance that has no ill effects, we’re
doing a great disservice to young people by giving them that
message.”
You have to give Kerlikowske credit (if that’s the right word)
for being completely undaunted by contrary evidence. It is true
that marijuana use among teenagers has been “drifting higher in
recent years” (as the University of Michigan researchers who
oversee the Monitoring the Future Study
put it). But this upward
drift began around 2007, whereas the first medical marijuana
law (California’s) was enacted in 1996. In between, past-month use
among high school seniors went up and down, but it did not exceed
the 1996 rate until 2011, 15 years after cannabis was first
legalized for medical use. It certainly does not look like
marijuana reform is driving increases in adolescent pot smoking. If
you dig a little deeper, comparing cannabis consumption trends in
states with and without medical marijuana laws, there is
little evidence that such legislation boosts pot smoking by
teenagers.
A press release from the anti-pot group Project SAM notes with
alarm that “one-third of high school seniors living in medical
marijuana states obtained their marijuana from someone else’s
medical recommendation.” That’s not terribly surprising, given that
70 percent of people who use narcotic painkillers for
nonmedical purposes report that they got the pills from a relative
or friend with a prescription. That does not mean the government
should ban the medical use of narcotics. In any case, the relevant
question is whether this sort of diversion increases overall
marijuana use among teenagers. If it did, there should be
discernible differences in underage consumption trends between
states that allow medical use and states that don’t. So far there
aren’t.
The potential for diversion to minors will be greater, of
course, in states where pot buyers do not need a doctor’s note. At
the same time, it will become more difficult for minors to purchase
marijuana directly as state-licensed stores replace black-market
dealers (assuming that transition is not
impeded by excessive taxation and regulation). On balance,
teenagers probably will find that pot is somewhat easier to obtain,
just as alcohol is currently easier for them to obtain (although
harder to buy from a retailer) than marijuana. I would
therefore not be surprised if legalization is accompanied by an
increase in marijuana consumption by teenagers, although not
because of the message it sends so much as the increased access it
brings.
No doubt prohibitionists like Kerlikowske will cite any such
increase as evidence that they were right all along. But logically
speaking, the potential for diversion to minors does not count as
an argument for criminalizing the production, sale, and use of
marijuana any more than it counts as an argument for criminalizing
the production, sale, and use of alcoholic beverages. And just as
with adults, there is potential here for
harm reduction if more pot smoking means less drinking.
Drinking, by the way, has been declining
among teenagers since 1997, and cigarette
smoking is less than half as common among high school seniors
today as it was in 1976 (a downward trend than continued this year,
despite the “gateway” threat
allegedly posed by electronic cigarettes). So even if
legalization of marijuana is followed by a short-term increase in
pot smoking by teenagers, prohibition clearly is not necessary to
address the problem of underage consumption. In fact, prohibition
makes it harder to distinguish between adults and minors by handing
over the business to retailers who never bother to card their
customers. Citing the steady declines in underage alcohol and
tobacco consumption, the MPP’s Tvert argues that “regulation
clearly works and prohibition has clearly failed when it comes to
protecting teens.”
from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/12/18/if-marijuana-legalization-sends-the-wron
via IFTTT
When Gallup first began asking the
question in 1965 only 35 percent of Americans said “big government”
would be the biggest threat to the country in the future. Since
then, that number has soared to 72 percent in
Gallup’s most recent poll. In stark contrast, only 21
percent say “big business” is the greatest threat to the nation’s
future.
The prior record for “big government” was 65 percent in 1999,
but concern receded in the early 2000s in the wake of 9/11.
However, since 2009 with bailouts, stimulus spending, quantitative
easing, NSA spying, IRS targeting, AP wiretapping, and probably
most importantly the Affordable Care Act, concern has skyrocketed
more than 20 points to 72 percent.
Particularly surprising is that even a majority of Democrats (56
percent) agree that “big government” poses the greatest threat to
the nation’s future, even during the tenure of an incumbent
Democratic president. Nevertheless, substantially more Republicans
(92 percent) and independents (71) are concerned about the
expanding scope of government power. Significant differences in
partisan perception were not always common in American politics,
particularly during the Johnson, Nixon, Carter, and Reagan
administrations. Major differences emerged between 1986 and 2000,
and then again after 2005.
Today, only 21 percent of Americans perceive “big business” as
the biggest threat. While anxiety about corporations has fluctuated
over the past 50 years, Americans have consistently remained more
concerned about government power.
In the wake of corporate scandals in the early 2000s and
government’s response to the 9/11 attacks, anxiety over business
and governmental power coalesced. In 2002 38 percent of Americans
were most concerned about big business compared to 47 percent who
were concerned about government.
These data suggest that public worry over governmental power
will continue to fluctuate but will likely continue to rise. Not
only that, but the public will continue to identify government, not
corporations, as the country’s biggest threat.
Read more about Gallup’s poll
here.
from Hit & Run http://reason.com/blog/2013/12/18/gallup-record-high-72-percent-say-big-go
via IFTTT
Cleveland Elementary School music teacher Dana Lamb is making her mark on the music industry. Her song “You Should Dream” is currently number 5 on the iTunes chart. Lamb was honored Monday night by the Fayette County Board of Education.
“Dana Lamb and her song ‘You Should Dream,’ recorded by the Texas Tenors and used as the title song of their latest album by the same name, was released on iTunes Dec. 10, debuting at number 5 on the album chart,” said school system spokesperson Melinda Berry-Dreisbach, who described Lamb as a teacher who dared to dream.
via The Citizen http://www.thecitizen.com/articles/12-18-2013/fayette-teacher%E2%80%99s-song-soars-5-itunes-chart-0
I haven’t seen action in Bitcoin like we saw last night since earlier this year in the spring when the price went from $10 in January to $260 in April, and then crashed down to $50 before stabilizing in the $80-$120 range for months before beginning the latest parabolic move. I was so taken by the action in BTC China last night that I wasn’t able to sleep until 5am Rocky Mountain time, trying to buy what I could at the best prices possible. It was a crazy evening.
Yesterday I posted that while I thought BTC was at the lower end of the range at $650, there was the potential for some near-term headline risk. I thought that it might come from the U.S. banking system, but instead it came from China when they banned new renminbi deposits into the leading global exchange BTC China. While I am not saying that the price will now quickly launch to new highs, there was complete and total panic in the air last night. No question about that. In addition I tweeted that:
Remember at the peak, BTC China had a huge premium. Reasonable assumption near a low, BTC China would have a big discount. We see that now.
— Michael Krieger (@LibertyBlitz) December 18, 2013
Now I think we have a much more positive setup going forward, although a similar period of consolidation such as we saw earlier in this year is likely. The news out of China cannot get any worse, and BTC China as far as an exchange and price discovery mechanism is basically dead. The big risk now is that other nations take similar actions, but the sentiment is now sufficiently bad and people expect bad news. Last night represented the most BTC I have bought since the spring crash.
In light of all this a read posted going by the handle Anon Wibble provided an excellent comment and I have decided to republish it here. Would love to get reader feedback as well. Enjoy!
Bitcoin will prevail. This isn’t just another e-currency, this is an entire framework for communicating information and money unlike no other ever before. This is the biggest revolution since linux and the more you use bitcoin the better and more complex you realise it is.
Look at the following things:
1) bitcoin can do everything a bank can do
2) while it’s true that unlike credit cards, btc has no way to chargeback claims, also consider that in the past chargeback scams have defrauded business through payers likes paypal etc. Chargeback doesn’t prevent fraud at all, it moves the person being defrauded from one person to another. Also consider that escrow services do chargeback for far cheaper than credit cards do.
3) bitcoin isn’t just a currency it’s a protocol that can be used to exchange information, nowhere in the headlines is this even mentioned files and information can be exchanged through bitcoin nobody has even looked at this yet
4) JPMorgan wouldn’t have tried to patent their own version of bitcoin 170 times, if they didn’t think crypto currency wasn’t the future
from A Lightning War for Liberty http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2013/12/18/my-thoughts-on-last-nights-btc-crash-and-a-guest-post-on-why-bitcoin-will-succeed/
via IFTTT
Local residents can get a behind-the-scenes look on a global manufacturing firm located in Peachtree City starting Thursday on the Science Channel.
Sigvaris, which makes compression socks and hosiery, will be featured on the show “How It’s Made” Thursday at 9:30 p.m., Friday at 12:30 a.m., Saturday at 4:30 a.m. and Thursday, Dec. 26 at 10:30 p.m.
via The Citizen http://www.thecitizen.com/articles/12-18-2013/ptc-industry-sigvaris-featured-tv%E2%80%99s-%E2%80%98how-it%E2%80%99s-made%E2%80%99