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written by Arnaud , April 10, 2007

Lawyers turned Scientists

So the renown 5 scientists of the US Supreme Court have settled the matter: carbon dioxide is a pollutant and hence can, and need to, be regulated by the EPA. Let me hold my breath on this one; I would not want my lungs to blow out some more pollutant into the atmosphere. As a matter of fact, for good measure, and with the noble aim of saving the planet, I think I'll go shoot my dog and the neighbor's wife. They pollute too much.

I really can't wait to see the EPA requests all US cows be executed since their dong produces so much global warming gases.

How about regulating 4th of July BBQuing and all kind of chimney fires. On Summer and Winter Olympics years, those whose house number is even can have a cook out party on Independence Day. On other years, the other side of the street can have a party.

How about forbidding mother nature to let trees grow; when they die, they produce carbon dioxide.

How about we nuke China and India altogether to prevent 2.5 billion people from breathing and emit CO²?

The 4 lawyers left on the USSC should really insist that Congress either sticks to pushing through Lawyers only or that a scientist (litmus?) test is passed by the nominees.

Arnaud

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written by marketreflections , April 24, 2007

The capitalism’s enemy: not Marxism, but “climate change”

The death of Yeltsin, unlike the picture in which he stood atop a tank, defing the August coup attempt of 1991, did not get much attention from international media.

And Gorbachev, once the boss of Yeltsin and everybody else in the Soviet Communist Party, has been largely forgotten these days, so is his once famous “glasnost” (liberalization, opening up) and “perestroika” (reconstruction), etc

If going back to August 1991, we will be probably more interested in checking out the indexes:
August 1991

Dow: 3016
S&P: 387
Nasdaq: 525

After Lenin, Stalin, Khrushchev, Brezhnev, the Soviet CP collapsed under the 4th or 5th generation of leadership of Gorbachev, almost as John Foster Dulles had predicted.

Dulles was a cold war warrior. He predicted that, by the third or fourth generation, Communist party leaders would lose their communist zeal and gradually change color, allowing their people to become free. Dulles enunciated the policy of "peaceful evolution" rather than war as the means to free the "enslaved people" in the Soviet Union, China and other communist nations. He was US secretary of state from 1953 to 1959. Of course, he didn’t anticipated that Chinese people, still under the CCP’s leadership, are now just as “free”, good and crazy in making money like everybody else, if not “crazier”.
From 1953 to 1959:
Dow: 278-601
S&P: 24-56

The “hot war”: Vietnam war, 1959 to 1975
From 1959 to 1975:
Dow: 601-768
S&P: 56-83

From the end of Vietnam war to the “The Fall of the Berlin Wall”: 1975 to 1989
Dow: 768-2692
S&P: 83-363
Nasdaq: 70-472

And the “new global capitalism”: 1989-present
Dow: 2692-12953
S&P: 363-1480
Nasdaq: 472-2524

When would “hot” or “cold” war return?
Not in the foreseeable future. CCP just recently declared that China will be busy with its current style “young socialism” for at least 100 years, as it just passed the “property rights law”, in which all land is owned by state representing all people, but some of it will be leased to those who can afford, and the lease will be automatically renewed every 70 years. So, don’t worry, just stay focused at making money.
The war is now between capitalism and “mother nature”
Having overwhelmed its Communist foes and prospered globally with a few different “brands”, particularly the famous “Chinese socialist style”, the capitalism now find its new enemy is environment.
“Fit to survive”. Capitalism survived Marx’s revolution call by creating a middle class, and recently it has received an “environmental call” from US Supreme Court, when the Court has ruled that the EPA has the authority to regulate carbon dioxide emissions, on Apr 4, 2007
The US Supreme Court’s ruling is historical, and it is “The Roe vs.Wade of Alternative Energy(thepanelist.com):
“The 5-4 decision has been widely criticized, with some calling the move an act of "judicial imperialism". Article III of the Constitution states that the courts should not meddle in executive branch authority, and in revoking EPA policy, the Supreme Court has showed no modesty. Critics argue that the decision is similar to the Roe vs. Wade abortion decision, where judges decided they must save the people from themselves. In a nutshell, the Supreme Court ruling states that global warming is too important to be left to an elected president or Congress.”
In a sense, the US Supreme Court, just like CCP, believes that capitalism has to be “managed” sometimes.
“Green and clean energy” is gaining unprecedented momentum now everywhere: economically and politically, domestically and internationally.
If internet is a “legacy” of “cold war” and has hit “big”, what about “green and clean energy” in the euphoria of global capitalism? I don’t believe that “green and clean boom” will be as crazy as “internet boom”, but the momentum behind it is hard to be overestimated.
Marketreflections.com