Dagny Kisses Herself
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Has Obama shot himself in his own foot over gun control and has his aim begun to scare some in his own party facing re-election?
Obama may think of himself as a bit shot but when it comes to some key Democrat Senators they consider him way off target. (See 1 below.)
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Increased insider selling is an indicator that bears observation and even adherence but in this case the author does not appear alarmed because when he dug deeper into the figures and reports he discovered they were skewed by several large sales. (See 2 below)
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Truisms! (See 3 below.)
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Dick
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1)Obama's Gun-Control Misfire
The president figured Republicans who opposed his agenda would feel the heat. Instead it is Democrats, mostly in the Senate, who are sweating bullets.
Misfire, vi: The partial or complete failure of a firearm to operate as intended. See also: Barack Obama, gun-control politics.
President Obama's vast gun-control agenda, unveiled in January, was never designed to pass this Congress. Its purpose was to rile up Americans and inflict political pain on the party that stood in the way.
Two months later, liberals are indeed keyed up, and Democrats are indeed getting hammered. Ready . . . aim . . . whoops.
In Harry Reid's Senate, Republicans have serenely sat by as the president's sweeping plan goes nowhere—and all the attention stays on the dozen gun-rights Democrats that have guaranteed that failure. Mark Begich (Alaska), Mark Pryor (Arkansas), Mary Landrieu (Louisiana), Max Baucus (Montana) and Kay Hagan(North Carolina) in particular are up for re-election in red states next year, and they prefer political survival over Mr. Obama's political grandstanding.
Yet even "safe" Senate Democrats have, in the words of newly minted North Dakota Sen. Heidi Heitkamp, judged their president's proposals "extreme." Mr. Obama intended to lay the blame for the failure of his package on the House GOP, but the headlines instead accurately explain that his "assault weapons" ban and magazine-capacity limits have been tanked by his own party.
This has been accompanied by a humdinger of a Democratic brawl. Since Mr. Obama made guns a priority, Mr. Reid was obliged (a rarity) to cobble a majority of his party together for something. The bill he will soon introduce has, as a result, been watered down to little more than a bipartisan proposal to increase the penalties on the (already illegal) "straw purchasing" of guns, and perhaps some grant money for school security.
Liberals are furious, with California's Dianne Feinstein unloading on her party for not including the gun ban. Their pushback has put in doubt even enhanced background checks (which Democrats once crowed were a slam-dunk issue against the GOP), since liberals are digging in, demanding provisions that gun-rights Democrats can't abide. And their anger has compelled Mr. Reid to allow Ms. Feinstein and Co. to offer amendments, guaranteeing that his more vulnerable members take some tough gun votes.
Republicans? What Republicans?
The Feinstein rage has been matched by that of liberal groups. As they've watched their dreams slip away, they're taking aim at the politicians they feel they have the best shot at turning: Democrats.
Two top Democratic donors (Buzzfeed.com Chairman Kenneth Lerer and tech guru David Bohnett) last week informed the party that they'd no longer give to any Democrats who wouldn't support comprehensive background checks, and they'd encourage more donors to impose that litmus test. Since the only Democrats likely to need cash in 2014 are those most likely to get whacked by their red-state voters for taking orders from liberals, this ought to prove interesting.
And there's New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, who will eagerly, and with vast sums of money, attack anyone who doesn't agree with his obvious and perfect brilliance (on soda and breast milk and firearms). His group, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, is throwing $12 million into ads pushing gun control in 13 targeted states.
Only one state features a Senate Republican who is up for re-election in 2014 and might feel gun-control pressure (Maine's Susan Collins). By contrast, the ads are running in five states where Democrats need to hold a Senate seat, and in several more where newly elected Democrats like Ms. Heitkamp are trying to prove their red-state bona fides.
The hard truth for any liberal group is their only real mileage is in attacking fellow Democrats. Most of the Republicans who would have felt vulnerable on guns (say in the Northeast) were wiped out in recent elections. The few who remain, like New York Rep. Peter King, are already on board with gun control.
It is Democrats, mostly in the Senate, who are sweating bullets. Despite the White House campaign, despite the (often misleading) polling, despite the media attention on new gun restrictions in New York and Connecticut, senators like Messrs. Pryor and Baucus know their own red-state voters remain ardently pro-Second-Amendment. In 2013 alone, post Newtown, 10 states passed 17 laws expanding gun rights.
Many Democrats are now wedged between voters who demand their views be honored and groups like Mr. Bloomberg's that intend to punish them for doing just that. The New York billionaire threw $2.3 million into an Illinois special primary last month, to help a gun-control Democrat defeat a gun-rights Democrat. His super PAC is boasting the race will be its model for future elections.
The White House is sticking to its crumbling political line. Obama senior adviser Dan Pfeiffer this week told Politico—with a straight face—that Republicans will face "significant consequences," including that they may "lose the House" if they choose to "block" gun legislation.
Block what? This is the Democrats' party, and they've yet to convince their own members to attend. What Mr. Obama has done is resurrect a toxic issue that's exposed the sort of internal rift that Democrats have sought to avoid.
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2)
| These Insiders Are Fleeing the Market... Should You Too? | ||
| By Alexander Green, Chief Investment Strategist | ||
The financial media is full of scary new reports indicating investors should cut back on
stocks or flee the market altogether. The reason? SEC data show a high ratio of insider
selling.
I've been following insider activity in the stock market for decades, and while officers and
directors are the epitome of "smart money," the mainstream media - as usual - is painting an incomplete picture.
Let's start with the facts. In recent weeks, insider selling has outnumbered insider buying
by a ratio of almost 10-to-1. That's the most bearish reading in almost 15 years.
Moreover, insiders are generally worth paying attention to. Not only do they know more than we do about their employees, customers, suppliers and competitors, but they have access to all sorts of material, non-public
information like the direction of sales since the last quarterly report, the gain or loss of major customers,
the pending settlement of litigation, new products and services in development, and so on. That can't help
but give them an unfair advantage when they transact in their own stock. It's also why the SEC requires
them to file a Form 4 (electronically and within two business days) detailing how many shares they bought
or sold, on what date, and at what price.
Sometimes when the insiders are bailing out en masse, it is indeed a negative commentary on the
prospects of a business. Other times it is because they are diversifying their portfolios, paying for an
expensive private school or maybe even getting a divorce. Bill Gates has been a regular seller of Microsoft
for more than 20 years. Not because he doesn't like the company but because he has almost his entire net worth tied up in it.
However, a fuller understanding reveals the recent ratio of insider selling is nothing to get alarmed about. A
high percentage of sales in recent weeks were the result of just a few insiders selling a huge number of
shares. The first week of March, for example, John Schreiber, a director of General Growth Properties
(NYSE: GGP), sold 18 million shares worth $356.4 million. Officers and directors ofFleetCor Technologies
(NYSE: FLT) sold $400 million worth of shares. Directors of Charter Communications (Nasdaq: CHTR) sold
more than $550 million worth. If I were a shareholder of these companies, I would take a closer look and check
things out. But the sheer size of these sales skews insider data and says nothing about how the vast majority of
insiders feel about the market.
Of course, insiders don't know any more about the future of the economy or the entire stock market than
you or I do. They are experts on their own companies' prospects, not the direction of the whole S&P 500.
If you see insiders bailing out of their own stock, it's at least a reason for concern and perhaps a reason to
lighten up on your own shares. But as I mentioned, there are legitimate reasons for insiders to sell their
shares that have nothing to do with the outlook of the company.
The time to really pay close attention, however, is when you see insiders piling into their own companies'
shares with their own money at current market prices. As buy signals go, it doesn't get much better than
that.
Dozens of academic studies have confirmed that companies under heavy accumulation by the officers and
directors who oversee them tend to outperform the market averages by a wide margin.
So if you're looking to put fresh money to work, a good place to start would be companies experiencing
significant insider buying. That's the kind of news worth listening to...
Good Investing, Alex
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3)These following words of wisdom need to be sent to Obama and every
member of congress and everyone on your list!
If the dumbmasses in what once a great country, my America, do not wake
up in 2012, we are gone and will have to learn Chinese and or Greek as a
second language!
Chuck
Here tis,
“All forms of government destroy themselves by carrying their basic principles to
excess—The democracies become too free in politics and economics, in morals,
even in art and literature, until at last even the puppy dogs in our homes rise up on
their hind legs and demand their rights. Disorder grows to such a point that a
society will abandon all its liberty to anyone who can restore order.” -
Plato - approximately 400 B.C.
"The budget should be balanced, the treasury should be refilled, public
debt should be reduced, the arrogance of officialdom should be tempered
and controlled, and the assistance to foreign lands should be curtailed lest
Rome become bankrupt. People must again learn to work, instead of living
on public assistance.”
Cicero, 55 B.C.
The experience of the past leaves little doubt that every economic system must
sooner or later rely upon some form of the profit motive to stir individuals and
groups to productivity. The first biological lesson of history is that life is
competition. Competition is not only the life of trade it is the trade of life.
From "The Lessons of History" - Will and Auriel Durant
To say that everyone in America has a “right” to health treatment is of
course to say that everybody in America has the duty to provide health
treatment. Health care is defined as somebody else paying for it.
Wm. F. Buckley Jr. - Nat’l Rev. - 7-6-98
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THE TEN CANNOTS – By Rev. William J. H. Boetcker Originally
published in 1916
1 - You cannot bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift.
2 - You cannot help small men by tearing down big men.
3 - You cannot strengthen the weak by weakening the strong.
4 - You cannot lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer.
5 - You cannot help the poor man by destroying the rich.
6 - You cannot keep out of trouble by spending more than your income.
7 - You cannot further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred.
8 - You cannot establish security on borrowed money.
9 - You cannot build character and courage by taking away men’s
initiative and independence.
10 - You cannot help men permanently by doing for them what they could
and should be doing for them-selves.
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