Hard News by Russell Brown

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Hard News: Crash and Contempt

283 Responses

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  • Craig Ranapia,

    I am putting my money into scones.

    Not with my dentist bills you're not. Raisins in the scones, money in an old pair of pantihose under the mattress.

    North Shore, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 12370 posts Report Reply

  • Andrew E,

    I am putting my money into scones.

    Do you want to securitise those scones?

    174.77 x 41.28 • Since Sep 2008 • 200 posts Report Reply

  • Luke Williamson,

    I've been dying to get my hands on some of that dough to pay off my loans.

    Warkworth • Since Oct 2007 • 297 posts Report Reply

  • Ian MacKay,

    So just to be clear Russell: is it ok to prejudice someone's right to a fair trial (eg all Lockett's co-defendants) as long as there is enough public interest? I fear you have left too much dangling here:

    That is still the question to me. On a wider front the fundamental belief in "innocent until proven guilty" and "allowing due process", should be reasons to not publish. In this case of the Dom, it is authenticated documentation, where-as the Veitch and Peters the information was not. Perhaps all holds should be off. Publish whatever you like and call it "in the public interest."

    Bleheim • Since Nov 2006 • 498 posts Report Reply

  • Tom Semmens,

    Hey! Just because I can't afford to loaf around spell checking...

    Sevilla, Espana • Since Nov 2006 • 2217 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    I am putting my money into scones.

    I had a very good scone in 1990, it was my first. Since then, it's been one long, elusive search for another good scone, an eighteen-year long string of disappointment. So if anybody knows of a place that makes good scones, say in the lower North island (I'm willing to travel), I'd do my best to keep the stock ticking.

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Rich Lock,

    I am putting my money into scones

    I recommend spreading your investments across a rather more mixed portfolio.

    Doughnuts and lammingtons may not be a safe bet any more. Focus on core products such as custard and caramel slices.

    back in the mother countr… • Since Feb 2007 • 2728 posts Report Reply

  • Rich of Observationz,

    The Fed has no money for bailouts

    I think it's more that they don't wish to engage in unneccesary bailouts. Lehman wasn't seen as having a risk of causing domino failure in the financial system.

    Citigroup (for instance) would *have* to be bailed out, even if they had to double income tax to finance it.

    Back in Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 5550 posts Report Reply

  • Rich of Observationz,

    Fidel's does nice scones, but they're Marxist ones and you can't invest in them.

    Back in Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 5550 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    Fidel's does nice scones, but they're Marxist ones and you can't invest in them.

    Thanks Rich, I'll be trying them soon. Surely they'd accept some form of ethical investment for the good of the collective?

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Islander,

    Giovanni. my Nanna was Scots (born here, but still very Scots) and one of the first things she taught her gradnchildren once they'd reached 7, was how to make scones. Really easy! And you can make 'em savoury or sweet, with good white flour (or a mix of white wholemeal) and good butter, and girdle-cook 'em or oven bake...I still have a girdle-iron of Nanna's vintage...so whatever recession is coming, my scones are market proof-

    Big O, Mahitahi, Te Wahi … • Since Feb 2007 • 5643 posts Report Reply

  • Gareth Ward,

    Lehman wasn't seen as having a risk of causing domino failure in the financial system.

    There's plenty of discussion in the US around this point - if Bear Sterns were "too interconnected to fail", then how is Lehman not? General consensus seems to be that it's a combination of the measures the Fed put in place to mitigate the flood of cheap financial instruments and teh fact that they had to be seen to take a moral-hazard stand at some point.

    __I am putting my money into scones.__

    Do you want to securitise those scones?

    Ha. We've taken the highest risk/return components of the scone (raisins) and bundled them with historically more stable sprinklings, cookie dough and cake icing to create a much better risk/return performing (and cholestorol-inducing) CDO. Collaterised Donut Obligation

    Auckland, NZ • Since Mar 2007 • 1727 posts Report Reply

  • giovanni tiso,

    Giovanni. my Nanna was Scots (born here, but still very Scots) and one of the first things she taught her gradnchildren once they'd reached 7, was how to make scones. Really easy!

    That's funny, because that One Good Scone I Had was in Edinburgh.
    If you'd care to email me, I'm sure I could come up with a reciprocating recipe from my nana. (Not the sweets, though, because really her cakes were just garnished butter, and I don't want you to die young).

    Wellington • Since Jun 2007 • 7473 posts Report Reply

  • Just Milly,

    Lehman Brothers founded 1850 - survives 250 years - done in by the policies of Dubya and co in 8 years ! eeeek

    Since Jul 2008 • 17 posts Report Reply

  • Lyndon Hood,

    I've survived the collapse of some fairly major sponge cakes.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 1115 posts Report Reply

  • Just Milly,

    Barack Obama, March 2008. Sounds like sense to me.


    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cSuT5zN2SPI

    Since Jul 2008 • 17 posts Report Reply

  • Kyle Matthews,

    Doughnuts and lammingtons may not be a safe bet any more. Focus on core products such as custard and caramel slices.

    I suspect that given the current stories around Fonterra, you might want to stick away from milk products such as custard.

    There could be flow-on effects across their whole market after all.

    Since Nov 2006 • 6243 posts Report Reply

  • Josh Addison,

    I'm down the with Sullivan-Ranapia doctrine. Could these people get over their culture war and their novelty VP candidate and start acting like old-fashioned conservatives? Their chump champions have been wandering in the wilderness for eight years and the world is a bit scared.

    It's a couple of years old now, but John Rogers' I Miss Republicans post still seems appropriate, even if it does contain:

    How did they become the party of fairy dust and make believe? How did they become the anti-science guys? The anti-fact guys? The anti-logic guys?

    I'm not talking McCain, Hagel, Snowe, or Lugar, here, the cool hard-ass Republicans who still operate in the real world. I'm talking specifically about the guys running the party right now.

    (emphasis mine)

    Onehunga, Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 298 posts Report Reply

  • LegBreak,

    I thought that in Scotland the word “scone” referred to a type of physical activity normally occurring outside a pub at closing time.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 1162 posts Report Reply

  • Paul Litterick,

    Do you want to securitise those scones?

    I plan to use them as collateral in a leveraged buy out of French pastries, as soon as the Bourse collapses. As they say, no pain, no gain.

    Auckland • Since Nov 2006 • 1000 posts Report Reply

  • Rich Lock,

    It's a couple of years old now, but John Rogers' I Miss Republicans post still seems appropriate.

    I was about to post that up in another thread, given that Craig's (entirely sensible) position seems to be that the republicans need to spend a generation on the naughty step thinking about what they've done before they're fit to come and play with the adults again.

    He did a follow-up: he still misses republicans.

    http://kfmonkey.blogspot.com/2006/11/i-still-miss-republicans.html

    I thought that in Scotland the word “scone” referred to a type of physical activity normally occurring outside a pub at closing time.

    That, too.

    back in the mother countr… • Since Feb 2007 • 2728 posts Report Reply

  • Danyl Mclauchlan,

    Lehman Brothers founded 1850 - survives 250 years - done in by the policies of Dubya and co in 8 years ! eeeek

    I don't really think Bush had much to do with this. The investment banks provide a really terrible product (high risk, low return investment) for a really high price. They've been losing customers for years, so when the mortgage companies came to them with their brilliant idea to make money by giving away free houses they jumped on it and bet the payroll.

    Obama is insisting that the financial system needs more regulation; unless this regulation somehow cures stupidity and greed I don't see how its going to fix things.

    Wellington • Since Nov 2006 • 927 posts Report Reply

  • lloydois,

    Obama has a pitch perfect response to McCain re this today:

    Obama To McCain: "Senator -- What Economy Are You Talking About?"

    This morning we woke up to some very serious and troubling news from Wall Street.

    The situation with Lehman Brothers and other financial institutions is the latest in a wave of crises that are generating enormous uncertainty about the future of our financial markets. This turmoil is a major threat to our economy and its ability to create good-paying jobs and help working Americans pay their bills, save for their future, and make their mortgage payments.

    Today offers more evidence that too many folks in Washington and on Wall Street weren't minding the store. For eight years, we've had policies that have shredded consumer protections, loosened oversight and regulation, and encouraged outsized bonuses to CEOs while ignoring middle-class Americans. The result is the most serious financial crisis since the Great Depression.

    I certainly don't fault Senator McCain for these problems. But I do fault the economic philosophy he subscribes to. It's the same philosophy we've had for the last eight years - one that says we should give more and more to those with the most and hope that prosperity trickles down to everyone else. It's a philosophy that says even common-sense regulations are unnecessary and unwise; one that says we should just stick our heads in the sand and ignore economic problems until they spiral into crises.

    Well now, instead of prosperity trickling down, the pain has trickled up - from the struggles of hardworking Americans on Main Street to the largest firms of Wall Street.

    This country can't afford another four years of this failed philosophy. For years, I have called for modernizing the rules of the road to suit a 21st century market - rules that would protect American investors and consumers. And I've called for policies that grow our economy and our middle-class together.

    [...]

    It's not that I think John McCain doesn't care what's going on in the lives of most Americans. I just think doesn't know. He doesn't get what's happening between the mountain in Sedona where he lives and the corridors of Washington where he works. Why else would he say that we've made great progress economically under George Bush? Why else would he say that the economy isn't something he understands as well as he should? Why else would he say, today, of all days - just a few hours ago - that the fundamentals of the economy are still strong?

    Senator - what economy are you talking about?

    Sydney • Since Jan 2008 • 12 posts Report Reply

  • binary.heart,

    I understand that these people all have a right to a fair trial, and that right was clearly endangered by the publication of evidence that would be inadmissible in the arms charges they have wound up facing. But the defendants and their supporters were also making extraordinary claims on their own behalf

    In your blog post you seem to indicate that the Dom Post in printing selected parts of the document in November were in some way responding to misinformation by supporters, yet your evidence of this was published months after the 'Terrorism Files' report in the Dom Post.

    "There was far more expressed than that by some defendants and, more especially, surrogates such as John Minto.

    You have conflated John Minto talking about the evidence from one set of intercepts about the defendant mentioned in his article, to being about all the intercepts. Minto makes it clear that he's talking very specifically here, yet you seem to ignore this. You've done this previously, I'm not sure why you continue to continue to misread the same article.

    By and large, I believe most of the criticism of the police at the time was because of their obviously heavy-handed approach in Ruatoki and the increasingly obvious wide-net that they had cast.

    And lets not forget this was despite the breathless reporting of IRA-style attacks and napalm which as I understand it did not come from the leaked affadavit, as I don't believe it was yet in the defence's hands.

    You might be outraged, but that's no excuse for confusing and clouding the situation further, particularly since your page impressions did so well at the time.

    Since Nov 2007 • 19 posts Report Reply

  • Simon Grigg,

    But then, as I said, I'm not an economist, so what do I know?

    Then again..what do they know:

    Lehman Brothers Holdings, Inc. (symbol LEH)
    ANALYST RECOMMENDATIONS
    =====================
    11-Sep-08 Citigroup: Hold
    10-Sep-08 Argus: Hold
    10-Jun-08 Wachovia: Mkt Perform
    10-Jun-08 Credit Suisse: Neutral
    24-Mar-08 Oppenheimer: Perform

    from Yahoo Finance

    Just another klong... • Since Nov 2006 • 3284 posts Report Reply

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