UPDATE--dey's going fast!

another spring, another season, another rebirth.

as usual, i will put the tickets up one month at a time, since my travel plans are usually last minute, and i like to use the seats when i am visiting cali.

tickets can be transferred electronically, instantly and securely, for $4, via the giants' web site. you can pay me with paypal, or if we have done business before, just send me a check.

i am gonna be using the seats the last week of april and the first weekend in may. otherwise, all are available. including the exhibition games this weekend. for free. free.

the giants went to differential pricing this season, so i will list the literal face value for each date. price is always negotiable.

check the available games below. or the calendar to the right, and drop me an email.

Exhibition
Oakland Friday April 2 7:15pm
Seattle Sunday April 4 12:05pm

Atlanta
SOLD--Friday April 9 1:35pm--SOLD
SOLD--Saturday April 10 7:05pm--SOLD
SOLD--Sunday April 11 1:05pm--SOLD

Pittsburgh
SOLD--Monday April 12 7:15pm--SOLD
SOLD--Tuesday April 13 7:15pm--SOLD
SOLD--Wednesday April 14 12:45pm--SOLD

St. Louis
SOLD--Friday April 23 7:15pm--SOLD
SOLD--Saturday April 24 6:05pm--SOLD
SOLD--Sunday April 25 1:05pm--SOLD

Philadelphia
SOLD--Monday April 26 7:15pm--SOLD
SOLD--Tuesday April 27 7:15pm--SOLD
SOLD--Wednesday April 28 12:45pm--SOLD

Colorado
SOLD--Friday April 30 7:15pm--SOLD
SOLD--Saturday May 1 1:05pm--SOLD
Sunday May 2 1:05pm

monday april 26--Who is Lyndon Baines Johnson?

tuesday april 27--Who was Alexander 'spuds' Mackenzie?

wednesday april 28--Who was Gallileo?

thursday april 29--Who was Lord Tom Byron?

friday april 30--What are Lincoln Logs?

i have laid off the frequency of my econ rants. partly for my own mental health, partly to avoid reader burnout (the three people who read this mess; but a few more folks over at the sportsfrog.com/swamp indulge my ravings by reading them then taunting and making fun of me).

make no mistake. things remain dire, in my estimation. nothing at all has been learned by the leaders, actual and nominal leaders both. nothing at all has been done to define and fix the severe flaws in the economy that lead to the events of 2008-09. absolutely nothing.

the lehman 'revelations' released last week were simple confirmation of significant crimes that were well known on the inside, well suspected by outsiders. while i am slightly surprised at how much response to the black and white exposure of the frauds committed by dick fuld, erin callan, and most significantly tim geithner, i expect not much will result. either the rumpus will die down and the crimes ignored; or fuld will be sacrificed to temporarily sate the crowd with a criminal indictment, and timmy will be forced to resign. big fucking whoop. then the rumpus will die down.

i remain humbled at how long the charade can continue; how many months and years the insolvent banks can be kept alive with accounting and political lies (and a couple trillion of public money, wasted). but i have zero doubt the time frame they can keep it going is considerably shorter than 'forever'. and i remind myself that months and years are pretty damn short increments. compared to 1929-1940, or to the collapse of the french monarchy, and subsequent republic, or to the collapse of the russian empire of the 19th century. or their 20th century empire. berlin wall fell in 1989; the russian default was nine years later.

timing is a bitch. but once prepared, psychologically and fiscally, the waiting doesn't have to be the hardest part.

take away the stock market indices, and the treasury bond prices that refuse to die, every other factor remains dismal. unemployment. foreclosures and real estate prices, residential and commercial. tax collection figures. state and municipal finances, being literally choked to death by public employee unions demands and pensions, and stupid politicians who cannot count or see reality in front of their faces. and federal finances aren't so bright either. the tightrope being walked between printing and not printing has thinned to a thread. impossible to predict if a loss of balance, a snapping of the thread, or continued thinning to the point of nonexistence will be the mode of the failure. but easy to predict the subesquent gravitaional effect. (i think i stretched that metaphor just as thinly.)

we remain completely and absolutely destined for a fucking. yet nearly everyone is so calm and happy. weird.

most dates are available. i will have details soon, but drop me an email if you want seats. except apr 26-may 2 i will be out there, and using the tix myself.

h.reynolds.nyc@gmail.com

support for the housing market is the stated number one target for the government in their attempts to save the economy. literal trillions of dollars have been thrown at preserving the housing bubble. and there have been no shortage of recent crowing about how the housing market has stabilized.

wrong. fail. massive fail.

U.S. Economy: New-Home Sales Unexpectedly Fall to Record Low

By Bob Willis

Feb. 24 (Bloomberg) -- Sales of new homes in the U.S. unexpectedly fell in January to the lowest level on record, a sign that an extension of a government tax credit may not be enough to rekindle demand.

Purchases declined 11 percent to an annual pace of 309,000, below the lowest forecast in a Bloomberg News survey of economists, figures from the Commerce Department showed today in Washington. The median sales price dropped 2.4 percent from January 2009 and the supply of unsold homes increased.

there is no recovery. we remain in a depression. i am trying to hold back from daily posting of evidence of this truth. least you think i am cherry picking data to sell my book, peep this long term representation, and judge for yourself (from calculated risk, mish. NSA = non-seasonally adjusted:




using trillions of dollars of borrowed money to try to prevent housing prices from falling was unfair (favoring those who hold mortgages over those who would buy houses at the lower prices), and doomed to fail. not only was this loudly predicted, it is obvious to anyone with a cursory understanding of simple arithmetic, or of the history of government failed attempts to control markets. and we are stuck with the debt, and with the unintended (but also predictable) consequences.

do not believe the garbage our leaders and our media is shoveling. unemployment and housing prices/supply are simple, clear tells. the second great depression is underway.

don't believe me. here is someone who knows much better than me. cause he's not only a client; he owns the whole thing!

Greenspan Says Crisis ‘By Far’ Worst, Recovery Uneven (Update1)

By Joshua Zumbrun

Feb. 23 (Bloomberg) -- Former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said the financial crisis was “by far” the worst in history and called the recovery from the global recession “extremely unbalanced.”

The world economy has undergone “by far the greatest financial crisis globally ever,” Greenspan said today in a speech to the Credit Union National Association’s Governmental Affairs Conference in Washington.

Greenspan said that while the economy was in worse shape in the Great Depression, the recent financial crisis was potentially more harmful than that in the 1930s because “never had short-term credit literally withdrawn.”

Greenspan said that the gross domestic product may recover to the level of previous peaks earlier this year, even though traditional drivers of growth such as housing starts and motor vehicles were “dead in the water.” He also said small businesses show few signs of improving because lenders are struggling with commercial real estate mortgages.

The “extremely unbalanced recovery” is being led by high- income consumers and large businesses that are benefiting from a recovery in stock prices, he said

monday--what is the democratic peoples' republic of korea? sunan airport, who knew?

tuesday--what is 'democracy'

wednesday--what is gloucester, ma?

thursday--what is not france, but the good ol us of a?

friday--who is charlie chaplin?

a friend emailed me an article about the financial failure of this hospital. being reported as if it was news. it prompted this reply from me:

the closure of st. vincent's is, according to two insiders i've spoken to this week, a done deal. they are losing $3-5 million a month; that is after millions of state and federal subsidies as well as medicare and medicaid payments.

even patients with medicare/medicaid create significant dollar losses. the salaries of the people delivering care to those patients is not met by the payments from medicare/medicaid. and they have a huge percentage of patients with no insurance whatsoever.

otoh, society has come to expect free, readily available hospital care as a right. and if the halls aren't brightly lit or clean enough, those with insurance will just go uptown to another hospital, expecting the local hospital to meet the needs of their neighbors w/o insurance.

complete clusterfuck of an economic/payment structure in this industry sector. and the so-called health care reform from this president not only ignores the flawed structure, but first and foremost preserves the place of those who benefit the most from the flawed structure (pharmaceuticals and insurance companies).

and as the system cracks and pieces fail, people immediately fall back on sentimental notions from a nostalgic past that never existed, or was never sustainable.

such sentiment will not slow the cracks and the failures.

the catholic diocese of new york is nearly out of the acute patient care business in new york city. the last two hospitals they closed, st. joseph's and mary immaculata, both in queens, they just walked away from. shut the doors, auctioned off the equipment and the buildings. (i bought some of the equipment). eight hospitals down to zero, in the space of eleven years. the church at least recouped some cash on the real estate value (and will on that greenwich village property that won't be transferred to continuum).

in past times, the state of new york would throw tens of millions of tax dollars at this financial train wreck, to feed public outcry based on sentiment and entitlement expectations of free, unrationed health care. but today, the state is broke (and is blessed to have a governor who refuses to deny that harsh reality, even though no one will listen to him). and there is no money to throw down the drain. nor is there any tolerance for higher taxes (also blessedly).

the people and the political leaders are too child-like to rationally face the realities of the failed health care structure. the realities will assert themselves nonetheless. delayed, but not denied.