$100 Oil and $200 Votes

Something to keep in mind this morning, as you’re mulling over yesterday’s market results: Yes, the Institute for Manufacturing Index did clock-in at 47% for December—that's below the line of scrimmage.

(NOTE: Anything under 50 indicates contraction. So the manufacturing sector performance contracted last month. Hmmm...what happens in December each year? Christmas Holidays, maybe? Wonder how that impacts company output?)

Get this…For the past 74-months (since the bull run in oil began) the broader economy has expanded. What should that tell you about the high price of oil? $90 oil has been a sustainable price for the economy…and with the trickle-down effect, has boosted other areas as well.
We don't like it, no.
But we've been able to operate despite the price.

By the way, that $100 price was not the trading price for oil yesterday. Some clown on the floor spent $600 to get the magical, mythological price posted, and then it came right back down to trade at a lower price. Maybe he can tell his grandchildren he was the first guy to pop the cherry on the centennial price.
Big deal.
It was all about personal ego, and not economics.

Similarly, the housing “crunch” is the result of a few greedy, stupid financiers who thought they could bend lending rules to their advantage. The consequences will be borne by some of us, but over the long haul, we’ll get through it.

I prefer to focus on the fact that since November 2001, things have been percolating pretty well, despite increased energy prices.

What is up with David Letterman?
I thought the writers guild was on strike, not the union of people to use their brains to shave at least once a day.

Grizzly Letterman looked like he’d been living under a rock for the past two months…but his material wowed the audience last night as the kings of late night comedy, Letterman, Leno and Conan and Kimmel all returned to their studios for the first time since the writers’ strike began.

CBS should’ve sold a sponsorship to Schick…Letterman will appear clean-shaven within a few days…unless he’s arrested for loitering.

The Iowa Caucuses are today.
250,000 Iowans are expected to participate…and if you calculate how much money has been spent by the candidates who would be King, each vote could be costing about $200 apiece.
What a country.