Usual Programming

I apologize for the political bent the past few days but it directly affects the economy and if we get to next Tuesday with no approved bill, hold your hats. One last point to note. Those who might get taxed more and who are complaining about it may want to think about how much more they might make if the economy were doing better. Moreover, they should think about how much worse they will do financially if the U.S. defaults, interest rates go up and the economy goes into another recession. See, some tax increase is not looking so bad right now.

And one last political spot for the night. I am not saying this info in the Washington Post is wholly accurate, as I have no idea on how to verify, but if it is, it is very interesting in terms of where current debt arose.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/obamas-and-bushs-effect-on-the-deficit-in-one-graph/2011/07/25/gIQAELOrYI_blog.html

But let's look at something more positive, like housing:

http://www.calculatedriskblog.com/2011/07/feds-williams-economic-outlook.html

Oops, that was a mistake. Seems the San Fran Fed President does not see it getting much better until the oversupply is taken care of 3-4 years from now, or perhaps 7 or more if things do not go so well. Yep, that's a bright note.

There were a couple of passing positive notes, like the best in four months in terms of new unemployment claims reported today, but these are highly variable so I, and apparently the markets, are paying little attention.

Disclosures: none