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The Angry Bear

The COVID funding fiasco

At the Atlantic, Ed Yong reminds us that COVID has not disappeared, and that our governing institutions are hardly covering themselves in glory on this issue: This week, Congress nixed $15 billion in coronavirus funding from a $1.5 trillion spending bill, which President Joe Biden then signed on Tuesday. The decision is catastrophic, and as the White House has noted, its consequences will unfurl quickly. Next week, the government will have to cut...

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Despite OPEC shortfall, first global oil surplus of 360,000 barrels per day

RJS, Focus on Fracking; Oil prices went on another wild ride, but i’m going to copy what I wrote on the monthly OPEC report here. The oil surplus, albeit small, surprised me. If it was going to happen, it would be during the winter for most of the planet’s driving population. Note this is for February, before the Russian sh*t really hit the fan . . . February global oil surplus of 360,000 barrels per day is first in 13 months, despite OPEC...

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First Quarter ’22 Cattle & Ranch Report

Green grass is growing finally down south as some rainfalls are being received east of the Colorado River, not that Colorado River, the other one that moves through Austin, and has very little to do with it’s namesake. Grass growing in the spring brings on the grazing and let’s the ranchers get off the expensive feed. Now is also the time to sow sorghum for the herds to clear in the next few months. Net, net it’s still an expensive business to be...

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Weekly Indicators for March 14 – 18 at Seeking Alpha

by New Deal democrat Weekly Indicators for March 14 – 18 at Seeking Alpha My Weekly Indicators post is up at Seeking Alpha. The economic indicators are coming under pressure from both ends. The long leading indicators are being buffetted by inflation and the Fed, as interest rates generally rise, and the yield curve gets very tight. Meanwhile the coincident and short leading indicators have been hit by the exogenous event of the war in...

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Really Awful “Rhetoric”

Really Awful “Rhetoric”  “Rhetoric” in quotes because it may not be just that.  I have not been posting much, partly because I had a wedding for daughter, Sasha, last weekend, but also because I am seriously demoralized by the current situation, and every time I think I have something intelligent to say about the economics of it, that seems to keep changing, although I shall soon. Anyway, I have to get off my chest what I have heard from my...

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Russia / Ukraine tweets, logistics, public opinion, sanctions

First, a twitter thread on war reporting (click through if interested): A thread about how we report supposed victories in war (this one and others), why they dont matter nearly as much as people claim, and how they actually deceive us into understanding what really matters. Partly motivated by this @nytimes headline. pic.twitter.com/oGRK4Niac2— Phillips P. OBrien (@PhillipsPOBrien) March 20, 2022The pictures coming out of Ukraine have played an...

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Mixed Bag; Crude Oil, SPR, Oil and Product Supply, Distillates, etc.

RJS, Focus on Fracking, Commercial crude supply rise as SPR falls to 19½ year low, total oil + products supply at new 95 month low; exports of distillates at a 20-month high after largest drop in domestic demand in 18 months The Latest US Oil Supply and Disposition Data from the EIA US oil data from the US Energy Information Administration for the week ending March 11th indicated that even after a big increase in our oil exports, we...

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Why Is Germany Increasing Defence Spending ?

Recently we have learned that the Russian military is vastly less capable than anyone imagined. Also in three whole weeks Ukrainians have markedly reduced the capabilities of the Russian military. Therefore, naturally many governments (including the German government) have decided they must spend more on their militaries to face the Russian threat. This makes no sense. To deal with Russian Germany needs liquified natural gas terminals and...

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A Recipe for Failure

A government to consist of three coequal branches, the Legislative, the Executive, and the Judicial was chartered in that order by the first three articles of the U.S. Constitution. Three coequal in order to provide checks and balances on one another lest any one of them should become too powerful was the reasoning. Perfectly understandable, given the world of the late 18th. To have foreseen a time when one or more of the branches didn’t believe...

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Housing permits and starts: still an economic positive – for the moment

Housing permits and starts: still an economic positive – for the moment As you know, I consider housing, and in particular single-family housing permits, one of the very best long leading indicators for the economy. In the past year, however, there has been a unique divergence between housing permits and housing starts, necessitating some adjustments. In the past year, permits soared then sank, while starts held much more steady. The explanation...

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