LeBron, pro-sports, blathering & beyond...

I love LeBron James. I love watching him play. I love him because he flat-out dominates, and he does some things NO ONE before him has ever done on a basketball court. I love him because he's one of the best and most unique players to ever the play the game. And while I’ll concede that everything happening off the court currently is indeed nonsense, it doesn't take away from him having a lifelong respect for the game, being a true student of the game, a tireless worker on the court, a superb teammate and an extraordinary talent.

To be clear, LeBron’s #1 goal is to win a championship; preferably championships. It’s just plain silly to insinuate or think otherwise (he's apparently losing more than $20,000,000 if he leaves Cleveland, no matter where he goes). He’s already achieved pretty much every other goal there is in basketball, as well as life. He wants a championship like any other competitive athlete in any sport does. Can’t hate him for that. Feeding his ego and whatever other stupid assessments are being thrown about, with regards to his MO are either nonsense, or missing the point. Can we move beyond that now?

Since winning a championship is the goal, LeBron is simply looking at the best alternatives to facilitate that. In my opinion, if he goes to Miami or Chicago, he will most assuredly win at least one championship. If he stays in Cleveland he won’t; and if he goes to New York, it’s possible, however, it’s not a sure thing, like in the other places.

Personally, I SOOOooooo hope he doesn’t go to New York, for obvious reasons. Oh, not obvious? Okay, here’s why: because I love the guy, but I would have to stop supporting him and watching him play with the same passion I do now, because, well, he’d be playing for New York. And I, like the rest of America (NY residents excluded), hate all New York sports teams (although, I’ve always respected the Giants).

He’s a free agent, one of the best players in the NBA (as well as of all time), and he’s allowed to go (or stay) wherever he sees fit. These are the facts. Everything else is media & TV-induced mega-hype. Sure, he’s a star, and has an ego, as well as hundreds of millions of dollars, and is doing things a lot different than other people would, but who cares? With this ‘decision show’ he’s having, he’s also donating everything it makes to an awesome national charity. Let’s also not forget, that for every person who’s annoyed by the pomp & circumstance, there are ten who are WAY into it – or it wouldn’t be happening!

This brings me to my main point: I’m a bit shocked at all the whining and half-sincere blather I’m hearing this week about it all: LeBron not being a good role model, the NBA jumping the shark, “where are the league's values?,” “the game’s gone to pot!,” etc. These people talk about the current state of affairs in the NBA like it’s not going on in their favorite sport; like all other pro sports in America aren’t a mutated, dysfunctional mess also!

Peeps, news flash for you: every pro-sport in America is just as bad off and fucked up as the NBA, and has been for YEARS-ah. The games are a SHELL of what they used to be. Who you trying to kid? Don’t hate the players (unless they’re Kobe or NY players); first and foremost, hate the T.V. (and other mediums), advertisers, corporate sponsors and their desire to “win over the casual fan” of all these sports, for the sole purpose of making more money. After that, you can blame our economic model (capitalism), and the American people, themselves.

These are the entities who bastardized the actual game itself. The MLB, the NHL, NFL and the NBA have gone to shit the last 2 decades, and THIS is the real problem, not the pomp & circumstance, commercials, and dumb shows like LeBron’s having tonight. The games themselves have been compromised forever. The endless rule changes (for the worse), the post-season formats (and tv scheduling), the overtimes, and more, have turned all four major sports into an almost unwatchable affair.

If you still don’t think pro sports is more about entertainment than the actual competition, integrity of the play, and the game itself, then you don’t watch pro sports. The same goes for college sports these days. Hell, I have to go watch high school football games now, to see pure competition anymore. Enough with blaming the players, or whining about what sports are ‘becoming.’ They are ALREADY there.

Who are these people whining about LeBron and tonight’s show anyway? Are the throngs of people complaining even basketball fans? Probably not. Are they LeBron fans? Doubt it. Are they Kobe fans? Who are they exactly?

By the way, If they’re Kobe fans, they are hypocrites of the third kind: Kobe did the same thing in 2004 when he courted just as many teams, and took more time making a decision, for one. Even worse, the prima donna, selfish bastard did it when he was drafted by Charlotte, refusing to go anywhere but the Fakers. Why? So he could win championships! Worked out fine for him, no?

Let me say this now, for all the Kobe lovers/LeBron haters: NO one has more of an ego and selfish attitude off and ON the court, than Kobe (LeBron’s nowhere close to the personal dysfunction or terrible personality that Kobe embodies). While he is no doubt one of the greatest to ever play the game, and I’ll concede, more of a complete player than LeBron is (though I still think LeBron beats him one on one!), he is a total and undeniable punk and weasel.

And here’s another fact (and I suppose getting back to the root of LeBron’s decision today): If Kobe was on Cleveland, he’d have exactly no championships. If LeBron was on the Fakers, he’d have five championships.

In summary(!), LeBron is going to do what he thinks is best to get him some championships. It’s what ANYone would do, including you, reading this. You shan’t blame him for that. All the other absurdity and nonsense surrounding the decision is inconsequential. Completely. If you’re gonna be upset about all the hype, or ‘the game’ or what it’s become, be mad at those who made it that way. LeBron has nothing to do with that.

SCOTUS says we can outright buy politicians (instead of doing it secretly)

Now that the Supreme Court has decided money equals free speech, I'd like to suggest that Congresscritters, now legally purchased by corporations, adopt a new dress code. Something like these:




Now THAT'S transparency!

Freedom, YES! Capitalism, NO!

Great piece on NPR over the weekend, backing up what many of us have been saying for years: in a Capitalist society, you MUST have regulations, because greed trumps all else; Capitalism begats greed. Simply, people cannot be trusted. Therefore, they must be regulated. Until two years ago, Judge Richard Posner was a diehard 'free markets' guy. Our current recession/depression has woken him up. Click here or click on title of this post to hear the 5 minute interview. - sj

Worries Rise on the Size of U.S. Debt

this is a very good - and very accurate - piece on what the debt situation is shaping up to look like in America in the not-too-distant future; and the trouble that's in store. I say, "accurate" (these are not predictions, per se), because the Congrssional Budget Office is the "bomb" when it comes to analyzing these types of things. No one - and I mean no one - was more accurate with their analysis during the Bush years than the CBO. They're experts in the field, to be sure. I trust their information more than I trust Obama's team on matters such as these. - sj

The New York Times
May 4th
by Graham Bowley and Jack Healy

The nation’s debt clock is ticking faster than ever — and Wall Street is getting worried.

As the Obama administration racks up an unprecedented spending bill for bank bailouts, Detroit rescues, health care overhauls and stimulus plans, the bond market is starting to push up the cost of trillions of dollars in borrowing for the government.

Last week, the yield on 10-year Treasury notes rose to its highest level since November, briefly touching 3.17 percent, a sign that investors are demanding larger returns on the masses of United States debt being issued to finance an economic recovery.

While that is still low by historical standards — it averaged about 5.7 percent in the late 1990s, as deficits turned to surpluses under President Bill Clinton — investors are starting to wonder whether the United States is headed for a new era of rising market interest rates as the government borrows, borrows and borrows some more.

Already, in the first six months of this fiscal year, the federal deficit is running at $956.8 billion, or nearly one seventh of gross domestic product — levels not seen since World War II, according to Wrightson ICAP, a research firm.

Debt held by the public is projected by the Congressional Budget Office to rise from 41 percent of gross domestic product in 2008 to 51 percent in 2009 and to a peak of around 54 percent in 2011 before declining again in the following years. For all of 2009, the administration probably needs to borrow about $2 trillion.

The rising tab has prompted warnings from the Treasury that the Congressionally mandated debt ceiling of $12.1 trillion will most likely be breached in the second half of this year.

Last week, the Treasury Borrowing Advisory Committee, a group of industry officials that advises the Treasury on its financing needs, warned about the consequences of higher deficits at a time when tax revenues were “collapsing” by 14 percent in the first half of the fiscal year.

click here for rest of story

Sun Rises, Market Falls

another interesting, well-written analysis from last week's 538.com (visit their site via left sidebar), on Obama, the markets, politics of, et. al. indeed, everything from 538 is interesting and insightful. sj

Sun Rises, Market Falls

One of the more unapologetically idiotic notions being advanced by
certain conservative commentators is the idea that the poor
performance of the stock markets represents a negative reaction to
Barack Obama's stimulus package.

For one thing, the trading markets aren't gauges of overall economic
health. They are gauges of future anticipated profits for the large
corporations that make up their components. In the long run,
certainly, these two things should be correlated. But they needn't be
perfectly so: an oil price shock, for instance, is possibly good for
the profitability of Exxon, while being damaging to the economy at
large. Likewise, the announcement of a plan to take over and
turnaround Citigroup, perhaps a necessary evil for economic recovery,
would certainly not be good for Citigroup's shareholders, who would
probably get wiped out in the process.

That's not the the basis of my critique, however. Rather, it's that
this line of argumentation often cites "evidence" that flies in the
face of Finance 101.

Robust markets like major stock indices are fairly good at
incorporating information. They don't literally have to see an event
occur in order to "price in" its effects. On Wednesday, for example,
Barack Obama signed the stimulus package into law. Once this
occurred, the prospects for the passage of the stimulus rose to 100%.
But what had been the probability of the stimulus bill passing the
very second before Obama put pen to paper? Probably about 99.999999%,
accounting for the small probability of a hostile takeover by space
aliens in the intervening moments. The performance of the market in
reaction to such events tells us no more about how it feels about
them than it does to the rising of the sun.

To the extent that we can learn anything about the market's
preference for the stimulus, we'd instead need to look at those
moments where the passage of a stimulus package became more or less
certain, or its magnitude became significantly larger or smaller than
previously anticipated. In the article I linked to above, professors
Bittlingmayer and Hazlett claim to have isolated a couple of such
moments:

More pointedly, key political victories for the Team Obama spending
plan have not been viewed as buying opportunities on Wall Street. A
string of negative market reactions began with the December 18
announcement of a stimulus bill of $700 billion (Dow down 2.5%),
continued with the January 7 announcement that the actual plan would
be “on the high side” (-2.7%) and continued with last week’s 61-36
Senate vote supporting the Administration’s fiscal plan. The White
House victory and the new bank bail-out plan announced the following
day by Treasury Secretary Geithner were met with a 5% wipe-out in the
DJI, and a decline in Treasury bond yields, indicating a “flight to
quality.”

Bittlingmayer and Hazlett's memories turn out to be rather selective.
Take the December 18th date they describe in their article, when the
markets fell by 2.5 percent. On this date, according to the Wall
Street Journal Obama had outlined the broad parameters of stimulus
package "worth between $675 billion to $775 billion" to Capitol Hill.
Was this a surprise to the markets? Not according to contemporaneous
accounts of the market's activity that day, which do not so much as
mention the stimulus. Moreover, at this time, there were as many
complaints that the stimulus was too small as that it was too large.
As the Journal then reported:

"The biggest fear is that people will do too little," said one
Democratic leadership aide, "like a start-up that fails because it
didn't do enough."

Obama aides hope to keep the package below the trillion-dollar mark,
a psychological threshold that could carry political consequences, as
they fear being accused of adding too much to the country's long-term
budget deficit.

One could advance an argument, which would be no less unconvincing
than Bittlingmayer and Hazlett's, that the market was behaving badly
that day because it wanted more stimulus rather than less.

How about January 7th, the next occasion cited by Bittlingmayer and
Hazlett? Bittlingmayer and Hazlett's phrasing to the contrary, there
was no major "announcement" about the stimulus bill that day.
Instead, there were some off-handed remarks made by Obama at a
morning briefing on the economy, which were described by MarketWatch
as such:

President-elect Barack Obama said Wednesday that his proposals to
jump-start the economy must also build a stronger nation in the long
run. Obama said the size of the stimulus package hasn't yet been
settled in discussions with lawmakers, but it would likely be on the
"high side" of his team's estimates and lower than some economists
have been recommending. The latest guesses are that it will be about
$775 billion over two years.

That sort of carefully-parsed response is hardly the sort of "shock"
that is likely to have altered Wall Street's expectations about the
stimulus. Indeed, Wall Street had many better things to be worried
about that day between a plethora of dour economic news.

And how about November 24th, when Obama rolled out his economic
advisory team and prompted the Wall Street Journal headline "Obama
Signals Big Stimulus Plan"? Bittlingmayer and Hazlett forget to
mention this date. And little wonder why: the Dow had closed up by
almost 400 points.

The fact is, there have been very few surprises in the entire debate
over the stimulus package, the passage of which was more or less
inevitable from the moment Obama took office, and the eventual size
of which -- just under $800 billion -- was in line with the
expectations that the markets had held for weeks and weeks. The
nearest exception was probably on January 29th, when the initial
version of the stimulus passed through the House without a single
Republican vote, something which looked as thought it might
theoretically imperil the prospects of the bill passing in the
Senate. If the market was anti-stimulus, it should have loved this
news; instead it dumped about 230 points.

Disclosure of conflict of interest: I own some mutual funds. I'd like
to see 'em go up. I'm not an anti-Wall Street guy. I'm just anti-stupid.

Buffett Says Economy Will Be ‘In Shambles’ for 2009

Warren Buffet really is the man. Cool as a cucumber. But losing hundreds of millions of dollars over the course of 18 months has REALLLLLLlly got to hurt. From Bloomber's website...sj

Buffett Says Economy Will Be ‘In Shambles’ for 2009

By Rick Levinson

Feb. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Billionaire Warren Buffett said the economy will be “in shambles” for the rest of this year as financial firms take losses tied to reckless loans made during the housing boom.

The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index will probably gain in three-quarters of the next 44 years, just as it did in the period since Buffett took over Berkshire Hathaway Inc. in 1965, he said today in his annual letter to the company’s shareholders.

While Buffett and business partner Charlie Munger can’t predict how stocks will perform in 2009, they’re certain “that the economy will be in shambles throughout 2009 -- and, for that matter, probably well beyond,” he wrote.

Gross domestic product shrank at a 6.2 percent annual pace from October through December, the most since 1982, the Commerce Department said yesterday in Washington. Buffett said the consequences of the U.S. housing bubble are now “reverberating through every corner of our economy.”

Home purchases should involve an “honest-to-God down payment of at least 10 percent,” Buffett said. “Putting people into homes, though a desirable goal, shouldn’t be our country’s primary objective.”

Buffett endorsed efforts by the U.S. government to prevent the failure of financial firms including Bear Stearns Cos., which was sold to JPMorgan Chase & Co.

‘Immediate Action’

“Whatever the downsides may be, strong and immediate action by government was essential last year if the financial system was to avoid a total breakdown,” Buffett said. “Had that occurred, the consequences for every area of our economy would have been cataclysmic. Like it or not, the inhabitants of Wall Street, Main Street and the various Side Streets of America were all in the same boat.”

Buffett’s letter accompanied the release of Berkshire’s fourth-quarter results, in which net income fell 96 percent to $117 million on losses from derivative bets tied to stock markets. Berkshire shares have fallen 44 percent in the past year as the value of the firm’s top stock holdings dropped and losses increased on the derivatives.

By the fourth quarter of last year, “the credit crisis, coupled with tumbling home and stock prices, had produced a paralyzing fear that engulfed the country,” Buffett said. “A freefall in business activity ensued, accelerating at a pace that I have never before witnessed. The U.S. - and much of the world - became trapped in a vicious negative-feedback cycle. Fear led to business contraction, and that in turn led to even greater fear.”