part 2

4. The ugly news today is the rising unemployment in 43 states with 4 states marking new records as Wallstreet dies in vanity with record pays although some try to water it down like Goldman for political correctness. Keep in mind this are still the phony numbers just last month they eliminated over 600k from the statistics - real unemployment in U6 terms is rather at 23% - still rising.

excerpt

Unemployment rose in most states in December—even breaking records in a couple of states—a reversal from previous months when states showed improvement, according to government data released Friday.

Woman filing for unemployment

Joblessness in four states—South Carolina (12.6 percent), Delaware (9.0 percent), Florida (11.8 percent) and North Carolina (11.2 percent)—and the District of Columbia (12.1 percent) reached record highs.

In all, 43 states and the District of Columbia saw their rates increase last month, while four states reported a decrease and three states had no change in their unemployment, according to the Labor Department.

The December data is a reversal from the previous month, when 36 states reported lower unemployment.

Earlier this month, the government reported that the national unemployment rate remained at 10.0 percent in December.

Michigan, again, had the highest jobless rate in the nation, though it eased to 14.6 percent from 14.7 percent in November.

“We haven’t seen much movement for the past couple of months,” said Rick Waclawek, director of Michigan’s Bureau of Labor Market Information and Strategic Initiatives.

Behind Michigan, Nevada had the second highest rate in the country with 13 percent, followed by Rhode Island (12.9 percent) and South Carolina (12.6 percent.)

North Dakota had the lowest jobless rate in country at 4.4 percent in December, followed by Nebraska and South Dakota at 4.7 percent each.

5. Bernanke's second term is gettin shaky as more Dems join the No Vote camp - I recommend also reading the comment. Summers wanted Bernanke's job anyway - firing him would be used to make him the black sheep but on the other hand he may know to much ugly stuff to blame him about Paulson and Geithner. That Buffett steps up again to defend someone who has proven to be one of the evil Rockefeller puppets as a Harvard Professor he can not be to stupid to understand all the mistakes he made - they rather may be the result of deliberate action .

Rosenberg With Observations On The Last Fed Chairman Resignation

With each passing day it seems that the impossible is about to happen, and Bernanke may very well not get the necessary 60 votes he needs from an increasingly skittish Senate. Our advice to Mr. Bernanke - resign with what is left of your integrity (and we use the word loosely) intact. As this week has shown that the impossible seems again to occur all too often, here is Rosie with observations of what happened the last time a Fed chief decided to take the high road out:

AS IF WE NEED ANYTHING MORE TO WORRY ABOUT

Greece. Portugal. Ireland. China tightening. Bank bashing. Foreclosures. The housing and mortgage market. Jobs. The Fed’s exit strategy (if it happens). And now we have Ben Bernanke’s confirmation hearings in the Senate and this is not a ‘done deal’. His current term as Fed Chairman ends on January 31 and a vote has been delayed until next week at the earliest – and he needs 60 supporters and a few Democrats have already said publicly that they will not support his reappointment and therefore he will need GOP help. Volatility is still very cheap even after yesterday’s jump.

The last time we had a sudden and unexpected turnover at the Fed was back on June 2, 1987 when Paul Volcker surprisingly announced his resignation. That day, the S&P 500 slipped 0.5%, which was a big deal then since we were in the throes of a major rally, the yield the 10-year note surged 27 basis points, the VIX index jumped 5%, the DXY was crushed 1.2% and gold rallied 1.3%. Keep that in your back pocket just in case.

We sure are keeping it in our back pocket.

From Wiki:

Chairman of the Federal Reserve

Paul Volcker, a Democrat,[5] was appointed Chairman of the Federal Reserve in August 1979 by President Jimmy Carter and reappointed in 1983 by President Ronald Reagan.[6]

Volcker's Fed is widely credited with ending the United States' stagflation crisis of the 1970s. Inflation, which peaked at 13.5% in 1981, was successfully lowered to 3.2% by 1983.

The federal funds rate, which had averaged 11.2% in 1979, was raised by Volcker to a peak of 20% in June 1981. The prime rate rose to 21.5% in '81 as well.[7]

These changes in policy contributed to the significant recession the U.S. economy experienced in the early 1980s, which included the highest unemployment levels since the Great Depression. Volcker's Fed also elicited the strongest political attacks and most widespread protests in the history of the Federal Reserve (unlike any protests experienced since 1922), due to the effects of the high interest rates on the construction and farming sectors, culminating in indebted farmers driving their tractors onto C Street NW and blockading the Eccles Building.[8]

Nobel laureate Joseph Stiglitz said about him in an interview:

Paul Volcker, the previous Fed Chairman known for keeping inflation under control, was fired because the Reagan administration didn't believe he was an adequate de-regulator. .[9] "

From LD:

Like the modern Republicans, Reagan had run on his claims that he wld be a fiscal conservative and an inflation fighter. Stockwell's book details how the "fiscal conservative" claim quickly went to sheiser; Reagan initially supported Volcker but as R realized that higher interest rates tamped down the economy he began packing the Fed with governers who would loosen the monetary reigns. As Wiki recounts, Volcker's efforts to reign inflation in by raising rates to as high as 20% was the subject of huge protests. I recall people paying 22% on home mortgages. (And these policies along with several other errors probably cost Jimmy Carter the election, much to the delight of the Republican party)

Deregulation was an excuse but in truth the Fed Chairman has no power of regulation. A typical bit of BS from the right. Faced with a packed set of reserve chairman below him appointed by Reagan with the specific purpose to disagree with him, Volcker left the Fed.

The cost of Reagan's de-regulating the S&L industry has been put at $400-$600 billion, money never repaid.

The tax cut ideas have been fiscal disasters. In the 1980's, although inflation was out of control, at the time most local and state governments were flush with cash. Books by David Stockman and Bruce Bartlett, members of the Reagan administration, explain what actually happened to the tax cut policies, in the short run and long run respectively.