How Michele Bachmann Bought the Ames Straw Poll | Unelected.org

Ron Paul Actually Soundly Defeated Bachmann and the Rest.

With the Iowa straw poll over we get the results highly hyped by the media as a victory for Michele Bachmann.  Bachmann won by 152 votes.  But consider this.

Bachmann outspent Ron Paul by a factor of about 10.  Spending 10 times as much included about $180,000 for providing free tickets to a Randy Travis concert with one catch.  The recipient of the free ticket must vote in the Straw Poll first to obtain the ticket.  She gave out something over 6,000 tickets so a victory over Paul of 152 votes seems meaningless in actual terms of how the people really feel. 

Sort of reminds me of the political rally in the movie “Oh Brother Where Art Thou” complete with a midget in a cowboy outfit. 

It is my understanding the Bachmann spent around $1 Million dollars on this media circus.  This process is reminding me more and more of Rome near the end of its run.  See the link below.

How Michele Bachmann Bought the Ames Straw Poll | Unelected.org

Dylan Ratigan For President

Dylan is know for his rants but this latest one is a Jewel.  

Today's Thoughts

 "There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose."  -John Maynard Keynes – (The Lavender Bolshevik ) speaking of monetary inflation

“It gets dug out of the ground in Africa, or someplace. Then we melt it down, dig another hole, bury it again and pay people to stand around guarding it. It has no utility. Anyone watching from Mars would be scratching their head.” - Warren Buffet- On gold

A man whom I much admire spent a lifetime and was awarded the Nobel Prize for his work in economics.  In order to understand economics one must also be a philosopher.  In order to succeed in this endeavor one must practice a moral self-discipline based on logic and reasoning.  Milton did this until he drew his last breath.  He was always the champion of self determination and always the first to defend liberty.  Too many fail to understand the inseparable relationship between man’s economic life and his liberty and freedom.  Milton did his best to spread the word in a manner even the common man could understand through a series of made for TV documentaries in 1980.  I doubt that many paid attention simply because of the condition in which we find ourselves over 30 years later.  Below I include Dr. Freidman’s words as best as I could transcribe for your consideration.  His words in quotations, mine in italics.

“The great depression was NOT a failure of private business but was produced by a failure government monetary policy. A  Failure of the Federal Reserve System to act in accordance with the intentions of those who established it.  It was a failure of the Federal Reserve, that despite the knowledge of many people in the system of the right course of action.
 

Why is the myth that private business caused the depression so prevalent?  The answer is simple; private enterprise has no press agent.  The Government has a great many press agents.  The Federal Reserve has a great many press agents.  Naturally, neither would ever 

admit nor claim that they had produced the great depression."

Herd's and the dangers of Following the Herd

With the volatility increasing in the market I think it approiate to remind everyone what panic and following the herd can lead to.  This picture is worth a thousand words.  Enjoy ..and ..  THINK.  

Technical Aspects of Market Failure

This is my analysis of what's happened so far in the current market decline.  The key was breaking the Neckline of this head and shoulder pattern at around 1260 on the S&P futures chart depicted here.  Classical failure of a neckline in these circumstances is for the decline to equal the distance from the Head to the Neckline.  That is about 125 points so one can subtract that from the point which the price broke the neckline for some idea of where a bottom my form.  That is around 1125 for the Mini futures.  Many times this marks the end of a trend. We have been in an up trend since early 2009 and had a similar market hiccup almost exactly 1 year ago.  The only difference technically is this one formed a clear H&S pattern.  Could this be the beginning of a trend change?  Very possibly this is the case.  Only time will tell,  However should this market manage to go up and penetrate that extended neckline now residing around 1265 it will have over come the failure and likely go on to make new highs.  Watching support, new resistance, volume and money flow will provide indications going forward.  Should be a very interesting Fall.

Click on chart to enlarge

AA+ Rating Not Low Enough

Peter Schiff says the U. S. debt is NOT risk free.  If that's the case then no State can be in any better shape nor can any Municipality.

Market Gap

Another test this time using YouTube.
It seems that uploading to YouTube first is the best way to publish a video here as the blur seems to be gone.
Any comments from the peanut gallery will be appreciated.  If this proves worth while I may do more screen captures maybe including some TA instruction type video.

This is all new to me so understand that 1. I have no clue what I'm doing and 2.  it's free.
At the bottom right of the video are four/4 arrows, if you click on that it will go to full screen and you can see the video much better.

Market Technical View

Let’s get this out of the way; I do not give investment advice nor do I claim to be any sort of investment advisor, what you do with your money is your business and your responsibility.

So, with that here’s a look at the ES or S&P E-mini futures taken Thursday August 4^th at 4:12 EST.  It is a daily chart and I have scribbled a few things for your enjoyment.

 

The solid red line running at an incline is simply a mean regression line of average price from March ’09 until today.  The thick black line below that is a trend line drawn from the low through the July and August lows in ’10.  This established a bottom for me to watch for serious failure or any oversold market conditions.  Notice that we have broken that trend for the first time in over two years.  May not be a big deal depending on your time frame but it is a big deal because something significant will certainly come out of this.

 

In trading futures I look at everything as an opportunity because I could cares less which way I trade.  Short is just as profitable as long and frankly the money is made quicker in short positions because failures are usually sudden and pronounced in an up trending market as is the case here. 

Click to Enlarge

Although we have broken this trend line it does not necessarily mean this market will collapse.  It very well could be that we get a nice correction and establish a new trend line or channel.  The next few days and couple of weeks will show us if that is to be the case. 

You will also notice another black line running across the top of the price and that is another trend line for the downside.  Together the two black lines form a wedge.  I like wedges because it is always fun to determine which way the break outs will occur.  Sometimes you get a ‘head fake’ in that the market takes a sudden move in one direction lasting but briefly then turns and with vengeance goes the other direction.  This has the effect of shaking out the weaker hands.  Stops a taken out, volume supporting the move declines and you’re off to the races without all the baggage of the weaker positions.  In futures it’s a zero sum game so once the losers are kicked out more potential losers climb onboard.  BUT, they won’t until the price action convinces them they are about to miss the boat.  By then it’s usually too late to realize any real profit unless they recognize what’s happening and stay the course.

 

The second chart is just a close up view of the same Daily but only running from December of 2010 until present.  Here you can clearly see the failure of the trend line.  Now I suggest that this trend line serving as a psychological support before this week will now have the same effect as a resistance over the next few days and maybe even weeks.  Should the price run up against this overhead barrier there will be a bidding war among traders.  Those bears will be selling hell out of it trying to keep price down and the bulls will buy trying to push price up.  This should really be fun and exciting except for one thing.  There’s a lot of money setting on the side and it is quite possible that the right people may “get the word” and turn on the money faucet to get this market running towards new highs.  That red dashed line I have on the close up chart is where I thing the most support will occur should price go that low.  It’s based on previous tops and lows plus a very strong price according to my harmonic Fibonacci grid (not shown).  That price resides at 1215.05.  At this time I see nothing from keeping the S&P futures from at least testing that price.  Right now it will struggle to break through 1259 on the up side and should it close above that the next target will be the 

Click to Enlarge

vicinity of 1270 on the way to test 1300 again.

Remember, new lows tend to produce further new lows and likewise new highs tend to produce further new highs.   Just consider your time frame as these patterns are fractal in nature.   

So, those are the scenarios as I see ‘em.  Ya puts ya money down and ya takes yer chances.