21 Saturday Mar 2009
Posted in Blogging, Competitive Shooting, guns, IDPA, RKBA, self defense, Shooting
Update: Gary decided to use WordPress instead of Blogger.
Gary has started a blog called Prescott Shooters. It’s about firearms, shooting (bullets, not images), RKBA, and related subjects. He’s going to post lots of photos, some of which are photoshopped. Check it out.
20 Friday Mar 2009
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We went to Phoenix on Thursday to visit friends. I took a few photos from the car (Gary was driving) going south on I-17 of the high desert. It was quite green. One of these caught some water in the creek (Aqua Fria?) just north of Black Canyon City.
18 Wednesday Mar 2009
Yahoo Finance reports:
The U.S. Federal Reserve on Wednesday, in a surprise move, said it will buy up to $300 billion worth of longer-term U.S. government debt over the next six months …
This is outright money printing, and in time will devalue the dollar and any assets held in dollars.
Update 3/20/2009: Here’s Richard Russel‘s take on this from his 3/19 post (subscription web site, well worth it IMHO)
Russell Comment — They’re calling it “The Rambo Fed.” Bernanke is not fooling around any longer. He’s playing all his cards. He’s going to put a floor under housing and boost asset prices in an all-out attack on the bear market. Bernanke wants to drive mortgage rates down and refinance housing at 3-4%. On the news, the dollar swooned, the Euro surged, the long T-bond exploded higher by six points, and the yield on the ten-year Treasury bond sank to 1.51%. Whew, what a day and what an announcement.
Late comment — We’ve now entered into the what I call “the land of unintended consequences.”
Here’s Peter Schiff’s take. Who’s he? Just someone who predicted the financial crisis about a year before it happened!
There is an old adage on Wall Street that no one rings a bell at major market tops or bottoms. That may be true in normal times, but as many have noticed, we are now completely through the looking glass. In this parallel reality, Ben Bernanke has just rung the loudest bell ever heard in the foreign exchange and government debt markets.
While nearly every facet of America’s economy has been devastated over the past six months, our national currency has thus far skipped through the carnage with nary a scratch.
This week the Federal Reserve finally made clear what should have been obvious for some time – the only weapon that the Fed is willing to use to fight the economic downturn is a continuing torrent of pure, undiluted, inflation. The announcement should be seen as a game changer that redirects the fury of the financial storm directly onto our shores.
In its statement, the Fed announced its intention to purchase an additional $1 trillion worth of U.S. treasury and agency debt. The purchases, of course, will be made with money created out of thin air through the Fed’s printing presses.
Now that the Fed has recklessly shown its hand, the mad dash to get out of Treasuries and dollars should not be far off. The more the Fed prints to buy bonds the less the dollar is worth.
His conclusion:
With such a policy in place, America has now become a banana republic. It won’t be too long before our living standards reflect our new status. Got Gold?
17 Tuesday Mar 2009
Posted in internet
There’s a plug in for Firefox and IE that prevents Google from using behavioral tracking to send you advertisements. http://www.google.com/ads/preferences/plugin/
This short article describes what you can avoid. Here’s a more detailed article.
Go here to opt out of other tracking networks.
17 Tuesday Mar 2009
Posted in birds
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There’s a pair of woodpeckers, ladder backed woodpeckers I think, that frequently visit. They make quite a bit of noise when they pound on the wood pole seeking insects to eat. The red ‘hat’ on its head identifies this one as a male.
Woodpecker on Utility Pole
Dagny's Desk 