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Post by ♥ COVID-19♥ on Sept 14, 2007 15:28:11 GMT -6
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Post by Kawaii Kaiju on Sept 14, 2007 15:46:49 GMT -6
I happened across that kid a few weeks ago, and he was laying in a kiddie pool full of Britney memorabilia talking about how she was going to make a huge come back and be a big star. He might be a bigger sensation right now than she is!
Video bloggers, gotta love em!
Zilla (who prefers MarkDay)
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Post by ♥ COVID-19♥ on Sept 14, 2007 15:58:33 GMT -6
That video I never saw (thankfully).
Howard Stern interviewed him the other morning on his radio show and the kid sounds very calculated -- not *quite* the nut case you might expect from this video, but his admiration for Brit does seem (at least somewhat) sincere. It appeared that he is trying to do just about anything he can to be famous himself, thus the video.
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Post by Irish Stu on Sept 14, 2007 16:00:25 GMT -6
I'm not sure who needs the most help, Britney or that kid.
Simon
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Post by Exildo Wonsetler Briggs III on Sept 14, 2007 16:08:19 GMT -6
That kid.
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Post by Merlot Joe on Sept 14, 2007 23:50:59 GMT -6
I bet he likes Michael Jackson also.
Poor bastard needs to be shot and put out of his misery!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!Just kidding, but he does need some help.
Joe.
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Post by pixiedust on Sept 15, 2007 10:42:17 GMT -6
Me thinks that was his idea...
was on the Today show or something like that...
Ahhh, the media response...
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Post by Chicago Jake on Sept 15, 2007 23:09:20 GMT -6
I saw this video on two different cable news shows tonight. Whoever this pinhead is, he knows how to promote himself.......Jake (who thought it was a chick when I first saw the video)
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Post by Irish Stu on Sept 16, 2007 4:19:57 GMT -6
who thought it was a chick when I first saw the video) So did I. Simon |
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Post by innit Geezer on Sept 16, 2007 5:34:41 GMT -6
I thought it was a woman too. It reminds me of the desperation I'm now seeing in my carpet rep's. Since the real estate fallout, these people have been steadily visiting their contract/retailer base.
I feel somewhat cornered in my office when they start spewing the virtues of their product line and what I can do to jump start sales again. The home/office improvement business here stopped cold in August.
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Post by jo on Sept 16, 2007 7:06:27 GMT -6
I feel somewhat cornered in my office when they start spewing the virtues of their product line and what I can do to jump start sales again. The home/office improvement business here stopped cold in August. Unfortunately, it probably is going to get worse before it gets better. The subprime fallout will continue for a while, since lots of these mortgages will come up for renewal at much higher rates in the next 2 years. The housing market in the US is due for a bad time, and may bring the US into a recession if enough people stop spending because the value of their homes keeps going down. Hopefully, it won't come to a recession, let's see how creative the Fed gets this week. Gary, is this affecting you or just your reps? I hope you are doing OK businesswise........................Jo |
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Post by innit Geezer on Sept 16, 2007 7:37:37 GMT -6
The local general construction industry is nearly stopped. New York City is mostly unaffected at this time but my projects typically are in the northern suburbs where the real estate sales have been in trouble.
The rep's are from a mix of companies that supply me with commercial and residential material. They have desperation in their voices when they tell me how good their products are. I listen and let them talk but if people are holding back spending or can't spend because of a rising mortgage there's nothing I can do. I want business too!
The problem is different here (very locally). The real estate taxes doubled in the last 2 years and there has been a large spike in defaults. Geri works in a local bank and she's flooded with calls from people that can't make payments because of the taxes, not bad loans.
When we were looking for a house 5 years ago, if you weren't the first one at the door it usually meant no deal. Geri once called me from her cell phone when she saw a great house for sale. We arrived 30 minutes later, got a tour and offered the full price. The broker said "sorry, you'll be next on the list." I offered more money but all that did was up the house for the people ahead of us, so the brokers claim.
The economy is bad here.
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Post by jo on Sept 16, 2007 8:40:59 GMT -6
What's happened in the mortgage area is the fault of all those mortgage companies (ie Countrywide) and banks who threw out generally accepted ways of underwriting mortages (debt to income ratio) and gave mortgages to many people who should never have qualified. Because housing prices kept spiralling up, the rationalization was that if someone defaulted, their house could be sold for more than the debt anyways. 100% mortgages with no down payment and interest only payments were handed around like candy at Halloween. With interest rates at historic lows, teaser rates hooked the homebuyers into signing on the dotted line, even though many didn't understand that their rates would go up dramatically in a few years.
Then investmens banks made the matter worse and propelled the subprime issue out of the US and into the rest of the world by packaging these subprime mortgages as mortgage backed securities, basically high coupon bonds backed by the risky mortgages. The rating agencies, in collusion with the investment banks, rated these as AAA bonds and many overseas banks, hedge funds, pension plans, etc bought these bonds because they met their investment criteria of high grade bonds. Now the problem is no one knows who has this stuff, how much they have, how much will default, etc. Banks have stopped lending to each other in case they get stuck with some of this crap and there arose a worldwide credit liquidity problem in August that is still working its way through the system today (the latest casualty is a British bank that is having a run on its cash the likes of which have not been seen since the depression). This issue will get worse before it gets better, but the world banks have been trying to remedy the problem by injecting massive amounts of liquidity to ensure the banking system keeps working.
The Fed is trying like hell not to succumb to lowering the fed rate (it has lowered the discount rate and also poured billions into the credit system) because this will just bail out the dorks that started the problem in the first place. The only way to make sure this doesn't happen again is to have enough of these geniuses who came up with this creative way of packaging junk as gold go bankrupt so no one is ever tempted to get "creative" again. I think there will be inquiries into both the investment banks who packaged these bonds and the rating agencies who allowed them to go out with the highest ratings and hopefully the punishments will be severe enough to stop this from happening again. The banking system has to get back to basics and transparency of products has to become the number one priority. (BTW, Canadian banks didn't get caught up in this game just because of that......they are federally chartered and the requirements on them are very strict. Subprime mortgages are practically non-existent here due to the strigent rules about lending.) Investors shouldn't be tempted to buy the US financials no matter how good the share price looks because these companies will take a double hit........first,they will have to take a lot of this crap on their balance sheets, hurting earning in the coming quarters. Second, most of their profits in the last 5 years came from selling this junk and this revenue will disappear, so how will they replace this income?
I admire Bernake for trying to stay the course and not bail out the idiots who created this mess, but I fear he will be pressured to lower at least a quarter point on Tuesday. He knows that inflation remains the hidden beast out there, but there is so much clamoring for him to lower the rate (as did Greenspan before him, who probably inadvertently created the conditions ~ low interet rates ~ for what is happening now) that he may not have a choice. Watch for the US$ to fall if rates go much lower than a quarter point and start buying gold!
Gary, good luck to you and everyone involved in the housing/renovation business in the next few years. It's going to be tough.
JO (hope I didn't bore too many people, this has become the focus of my work lately, and I still can't understand how things were allowed to get so out of control that we are seeing bank runs in 2007! Alas, greed is a powerful motivator (see 2000 and the tech debacle) and people always seem to want the big scores and forget any lessons learned in the past, no matter how recent. OK, off my soapbox now..........Enjoy this lovely Sunday!)
Jo
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Post by innit Geezer on Sept 16, 2007 8:55:03 GMT -6
That was a great post Jo. I enjoy when you speak about your field. Always listen to a professional!
Time will tell...
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Post by Kawaii Kaiju on Sept 16, 2007 9:28:26 GMT -6
That was a great post Jo. I enjoy when you speak about your field. Always listen to a professional! Time will tell... Especially when they are speaking from passion and you get the words for free  Zilla (who also enjoys when Jo speaks about her field) |
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Post by Chicago Jake on Sept 16, 2007 10:46:11 GMT -6
Yes, thanks for the dissertation, Jo! I enjoyed it.......Jake (hoping that this will lead to rising rents; my tenants are getting off way to easy these days)
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Post by jo on Sept 16, 2007 11:13:31 GMT -6
Yes, thanks for the dissertation, Jo! I enjoyed it.......Jake (hoping that this will lead to rising rents; my tenants are getting off way to easy these days) You are so cute! |
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Post by Cherbunny on Sept 16, 2007 15:38:07 GMT -6
What a creepy video. Check out Part 1. He states that if Brit kills herself, he'll jump off a building and do the same. Personally, I think he should get an MTV award (or something like it) for the best dramatic acting on the internet. |
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Post by Irish Stu on Sept 17, 2007 8:35:37 GMT -6
Seth Green's reply is hilarious :
Simon
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Post by Chicago Jake on Sept 17, 2007 8:56:17 GMT -6
Leatherface weighs in, too.
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