Speculators Like This Government

Speculators like this Congress and administration. Unlike big media portrayal, successful speculators are not anything like wild gamblers. Instead, they watch for the signs that indicate which way a market is likely to trend and wait for confirmation of that trend. Major speculators like George Soros take relatively small positions ahead of the confirmation for a couple of reasons: (1) with the amount of money they trade, they cannot wait until the last minute to make their big moves and (2) they try to capture even larger profits. But they are not fools; they work hard to limit their risk.

So why do speculators like this government? Because this government is making it easy for them to reasonably predict the outcomes. History repeatedly reveals that a lot of national debt, increasingly large deficit spending, and an increasing money supply lead to higher taxes, a shrinking economy, and more inflation. Only politicians seem to believe that they can achieve different results by making the same poor decisions. Knowing this, speculators are already positioning themselves to take advantage of the results of today’s ill-advised federal economic policies. They will not cause these economic catastrophes, even though they will be blamed for them. They will merely take advantage of the setup given them.

So what about normal folks like you and me? Well, unless we take advantage of the same economic information and simple tools that are available to enable us to ride the coattails of the bigger guys, we’re going to see our hard fought gains evaporate yet again. If you work with a financial planner, I suggest that you meet with him/her to discuss action to take in the event of another major market downturn. If you do not work with a financial planner, or want to do a little personal research, I recommend taking a look at the resources provided by Martin Weiss and the Weiss Research Team. The basic information resources are provided at no charge. Read some of them, draw your own conclusions, and make your own decisions.

http://www.moneyandmarkets.com/

Main Street Economy

Weiss Research team member Mike Larson offers more great insights about the disconnect between government and main street economics. Washington has shot their load and emptied their barrels, and main street is left with an anemic recovery teetering on the brink of another downturn and continuing unemployment. Meanwhile, the Fed ponders its next move. Mike asks, "Who cares?" ("Pushing on a String... Again")

The truth is that the policies of both current and past administrations and Congresses have pushed us toward the brink of inevitable financial disaster. The willing complicity of many citizens to ignore Biblical principles for living have resulted in overindulgence, overspending, and over extension. These missteps will have to be brought back into line before things return to normal. We will have those in political power who try to grab even more power, but nothing will be fixed until Americans once again say, "Enough!"

During a recent trip, I saw a billboard sponsored by a local TEA Party chapter. It read, simply and profoundly, "America... Bless God." A good summation, indeed.

Immigration Hypocrisy

Here's the article...

"Cuban migrant found in styrofoam boat still with Coast Guard"

OK, here's the deal. Every day we have hundreds of folks spilling across the America-Mexico border. This administration is so ticked off about stopping this nonsense that they have the urge to sue Arizona for trying to protect their citizens from dangerous ILLEGAL immigrants.

But here is an immigrant (they call Cuban escapees "migrants" I guess) trying to get out of a truly oppressive regime, and the official American policy is to send him back.

Where's the Obama administration on this one? Where's the polished speech for immigration reform? We ought to get this poor guy to American shores and give him some of the best we can offer. Surely he deserves at least as much as the felons, drug lords, and armed "re-conquistadors" coming across our southern borders!

So if we don't send Cuban refugees back, Castro is going to be ticked at America? Oh, the horror of it all.

This country - no, let me correct that right now. Political leadership in this nation gets more screwed up with each passing day. I think that somewhere along the way, America has gone through the looking glass, 'cause everything's getting backwards.

(Photo: This is the boat he rode in on)

Rate the President

If you want, follow the link below to the CBS poll to "rate" the President. CBS emphasizes that this is not one of their "scientific" polls [yawn]. Nevertheless, the results are encouraging for those who would rather live in AMERICA instead of a twisted liberal version addicted to big government.

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Subject: CBS is letting you Rate the President

This is an older poll. But it's good to get opinions out there. Click the link and answer the questions!

CBS is letting you Rate the President

Here is your chance. Everyone should get a shot at this. Takes all of fifteen seconds and that is if you take a look at the results. First, I can't believe CBS is actually doing this.Second, that they're brave and honest enough to actually show the ongoing polling results.Take the poll yourself and when you submit your grading of how he is handling the top issues, a second page will come up showing you the current results of how America is voting. Remember, this ain't Fox doing this. This is mostly people who watch CBS. DO THIS! and pass it on.

http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2010/01/19/politics/politicalhotsheet/entry6116297.shtml?tag=

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Will This Ever Stop?

I'll get right to it...

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"No one will know until this is actually in place how it works." Senate banking committee chair Christopher Dodd, D-Conn., on the financial regulatory bill he helped craft. He added, "This is about as important as it gets, because it deals with every aspect of our lives." (cited in World, 7/17/2010, p. 16)
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Maybe someone else can provide some commentary, because I am speechless at such obvious empty-headedness.

(I know that the poster photo is not Sen. Dodd, but we keep getting closer to tyranny with idiotic legislation like this.)

Glorious Fourth

"Men must necessarily be controlled, either by a power within them, or by a power without them; either by the Word of God, or by the strong arm of man; either by the Bible, or by the bayonet." -- Robert C. Winthrop (1809-1894), speaekr of the thirtieth Congress, addressing the Annual Meeting of the Massachusetts Bible Society, May 28, 1849.

Have a Glorious Fourth!

Why America Wins

Leaving the political insanity behind for a moment to return to American exceptionalism and the reason why America wins...

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"The only difference is if a dog bites my ankle, it ain't going to hurt me." -- Army Sgt. Patrick Marziale, who lost a leg during service in Iraq, on how his life will be different with a prosthetic limb. (World, May 2009, p. 19)
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This is why America always wins: militarily, economically, and compassionately.

Now if we can only clear some moronic thinking out of the federal government and a few state governments, Americans can get back to work making this Great Nation, and subsequently the world, greater.

Have a Glorious Fourth!

Why We are in BIG Trouble

So another article about ludicrous politicians hits my desk today. They just never stop coming these days. Here she is, the House queen bee...

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Unemployment benefits are creating jobs faster than practically any other program, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said Thursday. Talking to reporters, the House speaker was defending a jobless benefits extension against those who say it gives recipients little incentive to work. By her reasoning, those checks are helping give somebody a job. "It injects demand into the economy," Pelosi said, arguing that when families have money to spend it keeps the economy churning. "It creates jobs faster than almost any other initiative you can name." ("Pelosi: Unemployment Checks Fastest Way to Create Jobs," FOXNews, 7/1/2010)
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Yep, we create jobs by snagging money from those who have jobs to pay for those who do not have jobs. There's a real big job-creator - ya betcha.

But Speaker Pelosi's absence of logical reasoning is not why this nation is in BIG economic trouble... or just BIG trouble. Speaker Pelosi has demonstrated over and over that she, like our president, has no clue about the reality of economics and the deleterious impact their pet liberal agendas have on the real American economy.

We are in BIG trouble because other Americans have voted her into office and retain her there. This means that many other Americans are as clueless about the workings of a real, live economy as she is, and they have bought into this insanity. We are in BIG trouble because many of our neighbors are actually voting for big government centralized economic policies. We are in BIG trouble because Americans are freely voting their way toward totalitarianism.

Troubling, isn't it?

Taxpayers Forced to Buy Junk

I just received and read this article and want to make many more citizens aware of it. I am angered beyond description. Amazingly, this points to an issue over which Democrats and Republicans are siding together in their concern and criticism.

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Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and then-New York Fed President Timothy Geithner told senators on April 3, 2008, that the tens of billions of dollars in “assets” the government agreed to purchase in the rescue of Bear Stearns Cos. were “investment-grade.” They didn’t share everything the Fed knew about the money... “Either the Fed did not understand the distressed state of some of the assets that it was purchasing from banks and is only now discovering their true value, or it understood that it was buying weak assets and attempted to obscure that fact,” Senator Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat and member of the Senate Banking Committee, said in an e-mail when informed about the credit quality of holdings in the Maiden Lane LLC portfolio. The committee held the April 3 hearing.... Billions of dollars in Fed loans -- some possibly involving subsidies for the biggest banks and corporations -- remain secret, and Congress is demanding more accountability from the Fed than at any time in its history. ("Fed Made Taxpayers Unwitting Junk-Bond Buyers," Bloomberg, 7/1/2010)

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I know that it's not easy reading through even these simple descriptions of the financial products involved (mortgages, derivatives, etc.). I get confused myself trying to follow it all. But the bottom line here is that even though Bernanke, Geithner, and others testified that the Fed was acquiring investment-grade debt during this bailout period, they failed to include details that the Fed, and consequently American taxpayers, is exposing itself to billions of dollars in below-investment-grade assets (ie, "junk").

The American people need to know this! Since I doubt that this is going to show up on the front page of the NY Times anytime soon, it is up to everyday folks like you and me to get this word out. So please pass this along (or at least the link to the article) to others on your lists.

Additionally, it would be beneficial to contact your Senators and Representative with information about this article and request that they demand an accounting of the Fed's actions.

While there can never be certainty about predicting the future, I think this contributes significantly to the reasons why America will not get through this economic storm unscathed, why we are headed into a "double dip" recession or worse, and why honest, hard-working, thrifty Americans are going to be severely punished for doing the right things all these years. I detest sounding so negative, but the odds keep stacking up in favor of some kind of catastrophic event. I'm not pretending to to know the magnitude, but it does not look as if it will be "business as normal" in America for awhile as long as these types of deceptions are going on.

Unlawful and Disorderly

Guess what organization is not in Toronto protesting the economic summit? That's right, the TEA party.

"Thousands protest summit in Canada; vandals smash windows, torch police cars" FOX News, 6/26/10

Yet all that liberals, democrats, and their Big Media minions can blather about is how "dangerous" all those TEA party participants are. Funny, I don't recall any TEA party gatherings breaking out into unlawful and disorderly conduct like vanadlizing property and torching police cars.

Alas, this has been the liberal, socialist, marxist, fascist way of doing things for quite some time. Alas, people still buy into their distorted and perverted worldview systems. Sad.

Sad But True

Oh no! Garfield's a democrat!

Sad but true.

Elitism at Work

It's a tough job forging mutual policy with international leaders like Russian President Medveded, so President Obama decided that a break from the routine was in order.

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Traveling by motorcade, the two presidents ventured to Ray's Hell Burger in Arlington, Va., a popular hamburger joint just outside the nation's capital. Obama ate there last year with Vice President Joe Biden. ("The Great Obama-Medveded Escape: Burgers," Yahoo News, 6/24/10)
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This would be fine if it did not present a perfect example of elitism at work. A significantly vocal and active segment of the constituency that President Obama and his party court seek to enact policy and law that limit or eliminate meat choices from American's diet...

"Why Not Change the Laws?"
"For Rep. Jared Polis, vegetarian meals would be healthy alternative to fatty school lunches"
"VeggieLawyers"

On top of this, Michelle Obama, with her husband's endorsement, is on a 10 billion dollar spending campaign to combat childhood obesity and diabetes...

"Let's Move Initiative Battles Childhood Obesity"
"Let's Move: Helping Parents Make Healthy Choices"

So let's see elitism at work:

President Obama campaigns among and solicits support from groups and organizations that want to restrict or eliminate meat from our diets.

Michelle Obama, with support from her husband, is spending our (taxpayer) money to encourage and teach American families to engage in healthier lifestyles which includes warning about the health risks associated with "fast food" diets.

President Obama decides that he wants to eat something other than what is prepared in the White House kitchen (we presume it is "healthy"), heads for a burger joint in Arlington, disregards the organizations from which he solicits support as well as his wife's initiatives, and chows down on a cheeseburger and fries.

Long after the rest of us are herded into eating tofu and rice cakes and drinking water, President Obama and those like him will be dining on steaks, burgers, and lobsters when they darn well please. Nice.

Facing the Music

The quarters from which America's beloved President Obama is receiving criticism are surprising. Criticism is coming from supporters...

Juan Williams of National Public Radio: "The problem here is this is an administration that, as Hillary Clinton famously pointed out [during the primary campaign], you may not want to answer the 3 a.m. call. These are guys who have tremendous vision about legislative achievements and specific things like healthcare, going forward on immigration, those difficult issues... But when it comes to the crisis, when it comes to the Gulf oil spill, the wars, the recession, they feel as if it's being imposed on them, rather than taking the helm. That's what Americans are sensing right now... Are you able to handle a crisis in a convincing way that inspires confidence? And so far, the president hasn't done that."

No disagreement there.

Nicholas Kristof in The New York Times: "Let's hope I'm wrong, but I fear that myopic policies by the Obama administration and its allies may lay the groundwork for a catastrophe in the Sudan."

Catastrophe in the Sudan? Nick, try catastrophe in America. But we do see your point.

Frank Rich, also The New York Times: "Unlike his unflappable temperament, his lingering failings should and could be corrected. And they must be if his presidency is not just to rise above the 24/7 Spill-cam but to credibly seize the narrative that Americans have craved ever since he was elected during the most punishing economic downturn of our lifetime. We still want to believe that Obama is on our side, willing to fight those bad corporate actors who cut corners and gambled recklessly while regulators slept, Congress raked in contributions, and we got stuck with the wreckage and the bills. But his leadership style keeps sowing confusion about his loyalties, puncturing holes in the powerful tale he could tell."

Not even the liberal lingo and slant can buoy the president up.

And how about this from no less than Maureen Dowd? "Now that some in the press have turned against him, Obama is proving very thin skinned... It hurts Obama to be a crybaby about it, and to blame the press and the 'old Washington game' for his own communication failures... Obama was always aloof and distrustful of the press despite the fact that most adored him during the campaign."

So members of the liberal media are awakening to the reality of BHO that have been disclosed by conservative observers all along. Wonders never cease!

As much as I might have chafed at the liberal drivel from a Hillary Clinton administration, I honestly believe that she would never, ever be trying to sell out and destroy America like this president is doing.

Senator Chris Dodd

This is one of the reasons why Americans are facing unparalleled peril...

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Democrats Vote Down 5 Percent Rule

In a bid to stem taxpayer losses for bad loans guaranteed by federal housing agencies Fanny Mae and Freddy Mac, Senator Bob Corker (R-Tenn) proposed that borrowers be required to make a 5% down payment in order to qualify. His proposal was rejected 57-42 on a party-line vote because, as Senator Chris Dodd (D-Conn) explained, "passage of such a requirement would restrict home ownership to only those who can afford it."

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I can't add anything to this.

Market Updates

It has been awhile since I sent any market or financial updates. Plenty has been going on. My hope is that if you are concerned about any financial portfolio you have and are actively monitoring / managing it, you have at least signed up for the no-cost services provided by the Weiss Research team. If so, then anything I post in this message is redundant.

I was going to put together a list of recent links to the latest Weiss Research articles, but was unable to complete it. Lo and behold, procrastination paid off. This morning (Monday, 6/21/10), Martin Weiss did it for me. Imbedded in this morning's issue, 4 Urgent Warnings From The Most Unlikely Source, are links to every article I was going to compile. I love it when a plan comes together!

Just to demonstrate that the Weiss team is not the only source for sovereign debt concern, here is an article from John Mauldin's "Outside the Box" e-mail: "Print Baby, Print." Mauldin's sources tend to be a bit more on the academic side, but if you forge through it, you will see many similarities between the various sources.

These are times in which a lot of financial and market shifts are taking place. Neither our nation nor the world has faced the magnitude of dynamics (such as national debt) we are seeing today. Indications are that the more successful portfolios will need to adapt to these changing times in order to preserve capital and hopefully profit. The good news is that the products available to potentially accomplish this have been on the market a long time. They are not exotic financial instruments that are beyond all comprehension. They are market instruments that make it easier for the normal person to be able to participate in markets that were once available only to dedicated traders. For instance, natural resource markets used to be available exclusively to futures traders. Now, however, they are available to everyday investors and portfolios through Exchange Traded Funds (ETF) and Exchange Traded Notes (ETN). They are similar to mutual funds, only they are traded on exchanges like stock. Over the past few years, many ETFs and ETNs have come to market. So if you want to invest in oil or natural gas commodities, you can choose ETFs like USO or UNG. Same with gold & silver (GLD & SLV). You buy funds and notes that track major indices: Dow Jones Industiral average (DIA), S&P 500 (SPY), and NASDAQ 100 (QQQQ). You can even buy ETF shares that are designed to profit when markets fall; again, Dow Jones Industrial average (DOG), S&P 500 (SH), and NASDAQ 100 (PSQ). The good news is that these allow IRA accounts to profit from bear (down) markets, too.

Anyway, the key goal is to know what investments and trades make the best sense in the prevailing economic and market conditions. Regardless of who you choose to follow, make it a point to check your portfolio regularly to keep a sense of how it is doing and to try to keep from being completely blindsided. If nothing else, if the major markets take another 2008 major nosedive, even a move to the sidelines into cash can go a long way to preserve wealth and provide capital for new investments / trades in better conditions.

Well, I've gone on longer than I intended to. Hope this helps. Stay alert.

Our Lawyer-Politician

President Obama’s complete lack of leadership capability is on full display as the Gulf oil spill debacle continues unabated. The president is demonstrating that we have a lawyer-politician instead of a leader in the White House. The most he has been able to muster has been to follow the old playbook of the lawyer-politician: attempt to deflect criticism, demonize, and threaten. In a Bloomberg article from June 15 (“BP may lose oil leases”), there are indications that President Obama is considering taking steps to prevent BP from doing business in America. I do not see how this is helpful at all.

While this is not a call to absolve any of BP’s accountability in this disaster, the president of the United States of America needs to stop calling down threats and start working with all parties, BP included, to bring real solutions to the table. This entire incident highlights everything that is wrong with replacing American enterprise and exceptionalism with the liberal’s brand of big government. Instead of allowing the talent, ingenuity, and capabilities of Americans across the nation to provide solutions, everything must be funneled through the big government bureaucracy that is Washington, D.C. We are witnessing the expected consequence… worse than nothing is getting done. Yet, this is the same big government that wants to get bigger through healthcare, energy, and environmental policies. They are going to fix everything that is wrong with America, we are told. Yep, good luck with that.

Bringing Home the Bacon

This one's for those lovable folks at peta.

Medal of Honor Recipient Ed Freeman

An e-mail about Ed "Too Tall" Freeman has been circulating for years. Literally. While I agree with the intent of the forward, which is to highlight Americans' general disregard for true heroism in favor of shallow pop culture, the e-mail use has not been completely accurate.

I ran across the factual details and think it will make an appropriate "forward" this Memorial Day (5/31/10). The accurate portion of the circulating e-mail goes like this:

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'Ed Freeman... A True Hero'

You're an 18 or 19 year old kid. You're critically wounded, and dying in the jungle in the Ia Drang Valley, 11-14-1965. LZ Xray , Vietnam . Your infantry unit is out numbered 8 - 1, and the enemy fire is so intense, from 100 or 200 yards away, that your own Infantry Commander has ordered the MediVac helicopters to stop coming in.

You're lying there, listening to the enemy machine guns, and you know you're not getting out. Your family is 1/2 way around the world, 12,000 miles away, and you'll never see them again. As the world starts to fade in and out, you know this is the day.

Ed Freeman is coming for you. He's not Medi-Vac, so it's not his job, but he's flying his Huey down into the machine gun fire, after the Medi-Vacs were ordered not to come. He's coming anyway. And he drops it in, and sits there in the machine gun fire, as they load 2 or 3 of you on board. Then he flies you up and out through the gunfire, to the Doctors and Nurses.

And, he kept coming back...... 13 more times..... and took about 30 of you and your buddies out, who would never have gotten out.
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For his bravery under fire, Ed Freeman received the Medal Honor in a ceremony on July 16, 2001:

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GEORGE W. BUSH, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: Good morning, and welcome to the White House...

By all rights, another president from Texas should have had the honor of conferring this medal. It was in the second year of Lynden Johnson's presidency that Army Captain Ed Freeman did something that the men of the 7th Calvary have never forgotten. Years passed, even decades, but the memory of what happened on November 14, 1965 has always stayed with them.

For his actions that day, Captain Freeman was awarded the distinguished Flying Cross, but the men who were there, including the commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Bruce Crandall, felt a still higher honor was called for. Through the unremitting efforts of Lieutenant Colonel Crandall and many others and the persuasive weight from Senator John McCain, the story now comes to its rightful conclusion.

That story began with a battalion surrounded by the enemy in one of Vietnam's fiercest battles. The survivors remember the desperate fear of almost certain death. They remember gunfire that one witness described as the most intense he had ever seen, and they remember the sight of an unarmed helicopter coming to their aid. The man with the controls flew through the gunfire not once, not 10 times, but at least 21 times. That single helicopter brought the water, ammunition and supplies that saved many lives on the ground, and the same pilot flew more than 70 wounded soldiers to safety...

As a boy of 13, Ed Freeman saw thousands of men on maneuvers pass by his home in Mississippi. He decided then and there that he would be a soldier. A lifetime later the Congress has now decided that he's even more than a soldier because he did more than his duty. He served his country and his comrades to the fullest, rising above and beyond anything the Army or the nation could have ever asked...

Commander Seevers, I'll now ask you to read this citation of the newest member of the Congressional Medal of Honor Society, and it'll be my honor to give him his first salute.

COMMANDER GEORGE SEEVERS: ...The president of the United States of America, authorized by act of Congress, March 3, 1863 has awarded in the name of the Congress the medal of honor to Captain Ed W. Freeman, United States Army, for conspicuous gallantry and intrepidity at the risk of his life above and beyond the call of duty.

Captain Ed W. Freeman, United States Army, distinguished himself by numerous acts of conspicuous gallantry and extraordinary intrepidity on 14 November, 1965, while serving with Company A, 229th, Assault Helicopter Battalion, First Cavalry Division Air Mobil (ph). As a flight leader and second in command of a 16-helicopter lift unit, he supported a heavily engaged American infantry battalion at landing zone X-ray in the Idrang Valley, Republic of Vietnam. The infantry unit was almost out of ammunition, after taking some of the heaviest casualties of the war, fighting off a relentless attack from a highly motivated, heavily armed enemy force. When the infantry commander closed the helicopter landing zone, due to intense direct enemy fire, Captain Freeman risked his own life by flying his unarmed helicopter through a gauntlet of enemy fire, time after time, delivering critically needed ammunition, water and medical supplies to the Paceeds (ph) battalion.

His flights had a direct impact on the battle's outcome by providing the engaged units with timely supplies of ammunition critical to their survival without which they would almost surely have experienced a much greater loss of life. After medical evacuation helicopters refused to fly into the area, due to intense enemy fire, Captain Freeman flew 14 separate rescue missions, providing life- saving evacuation of an estimates 30 seriously wounded soldiers, some of whom would not have survived, had he not acted.All flights were made into a small emergency landing zone within 100 to 200 meters of the defensive perimeter where heavily committed units were perilously holding off the attacking elements.

Captain Freeman's selfless acts of great valor, extraordinary perseverance and intrepidity were far above and beyond the call of duty or mission and set a superb example of leadership and courage for all of his peers. Captain Freeman's extraordinary heroism and devotion to duty are in keeping with the highest traditions of military service and reflect great credit upon himself, his unit and the United States Army. (CNN Transcripts)

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Captain Ed "Too Tall" Freeman, American hero and Medal of Honor recipient, passed away in August 2008.

May God bless all of our Armed Forces personnel this Memorial Day.

Credit Crisis Warning

A quick update on new warnings sent by the Weiss Research team...

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Heads up people. Something very big is happening in the global credit markets — something you darn well better pay attention to.
The very same “Credit Crisis” indicators that were flashing red before the stock market meltdown of 2007-2008 — the ones Martin and I used to get our subscribers out of almost all stocks, and “short” the market via inverse ETFs — are flashing red again.
Pay attention and you might save your portfolio. Ignore them and you could get slaughtered. (Mike Larson, "Credit Crisis Indicators Going Bonkers Again! Batten Down the Hatches!" 05-28-10)

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Additionally, the Fitch's credit rating for Spain was downgraded this weekend, so the European sovereign debt issue continues to spread. Meanwhile, American political and government financial leadership continue to tell us that the economic recovery is still doing well. Who do you want to put your money on?

Weiss Ratings

I want to keep in front of everyone the market info coming from the Weiss Research team. Among the latest is their re-acquisition of their proprietary rating service. With that, Dr. Weiss comes out with guns blazing...

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Later this morning, Weiss Ratings is issuing a landmark press release, warning that 20 giant U.S. banks are still vulnerable to serious financial difficulties — and even failure. (I’ll name them in a moment.) ("Weiss Ratings: 20 Giant Banks Still Vulnerable," 05-24-10)

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Prior to that, Martin Weiss issued this interesting challenge to the other high profile rating services...

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Dear S&P, Moody’s, and Fitch,
You are the world’s three dominant rating agencies, largely controlling the ratings of bonds and debts issued by thousands of corporations, municipalities, and sovereign governments. I am the chairman of Weiss Ratings, an independent rating agency. And today, I challenge you to promptly take the bold action that you have so far avoided — to downgrade the long-term credit rating of the U.S. government in order to help protect investors and prod Washington to fix its finances. ("Weiss Ratings’ challenge to S&P, Moody’s, and Fitch: Downgrade the Long-Term Debt of the United States Before It’s Too Late," 05-10-10)

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Plenty more to be found at Money & Markets.