Post - Election 2008

[Fel]

You know Securb, I know exactly where you're coming from with that. I myself am a big fan of sports cars. I don't drive big muscle, but I do drive an inline 6, which I'm about to sell for another inline 6. Both require a minimum 91 octane, so I get to pay the premium too. Fuel efficiency is second to performance, as far as I'm concerned, and driving should be a pleasure, not a torturous way of spending your time everyday.

That being the case, I do try to keep my level of bitching about gas prices to a minimum. It is a choice I made to stick with something fun to drive and a little harder on the gas. If I was really that worried about the price of gas, I'd have bought a Hyundai Accent and been on my way. But that's not the choice I want to make, so I accept the consequences. If I feel the economic pinch, I usually make other lifestyle choices to compensate (taking lunch to work instead of eating out everyday, not going to bars 3 times a week, renting movies instead of buying them, so on). Really, when you adjust your lifestyle, gas isn't so bad.

But again, we have it good. The rest of the world is hurting much more than we are right now. I say enjoy the cheap fuel while we still can. It won't be long before the world realizes that gasoline-powered vehicles aren't a sustainable mode of transportation anymore and do something about them. Unfortunately we're not in the position to change this ourselves, the economic forces at work do a great job of wringing every last ounce of usefulness out of gasoline before it will let us move on. (Anyone ever wonder what happened to the electric car? It didn't die because it wasn't viable...)

[Securb]

$4.29! On the way home tonight :mad:

[Securb]

This shit is going to get worse before it gets better wait until the crime rates rocket becasue people cant feed their kids.

DETROIT (Reuters) - General Motors Corp (GM.N) is expected to announce that it will stop production at four truck plants in North America, a Canadian union official briefed on the plan said on Tuesday.

GM Chief Executive Rick Wagoner is set to meet with reporters for an update on the automaker's restructuring plans before the company's annual meeting on Tuesday in Wilmington, Delaware.

The plants slated for closure are in Janesville, Wisconsin; Moraine, Ohio; Silao, Mexico; and Oshawa, Ontario, according to the Canadian Auto Workers union official, who asked not to be named.

[Speng]

That plant in Janesville has been there since 1919. You'd think it's survived this long it'd be safe from closure...nope.

[Securb]

This is funny as hell

http://www.youtube.com/v/qTkEpdyhW4U

[Securb]

It's official

[IceColdBeer]

we've been worrying so much about other countries that we built problems for our own country. It's time to start worrying about ourselves for a while until our economy settles down and we stop spending so much money on this "war"...which by the way isn't REALLY a war since congress never voted on it...but that's for another discussion.

[Speng]

we've been worrying so much about other countries that we built problems for our own country.

Exactly, we need to concentrate on the U.S. for awhile. Why are we sending all that aid all over the world when we have all kinds of crap happening right here? People that are hungry, homeless and just fucked up in general could use some of the billions of dollars we are sending to Pakistan.

[Securb]

A financial analyst fresh from a tour of construction sites in the Inland Empire is warning Wall Street of a "ghost town" where finished homes sit vacant and additional homes are still under construction.

"At several properties, there were a significant number of fully built homes sitting vacant along with a large number of additional homes still under construction," Sandler O'Neill & Partners analyst Aaron Deer wrote today after touring developments in Corona and Ontario. "At one master plan community, the entire development appeared to be vacant -- with the exception of crews working on new construction, it was a ghost town."

Median home prices in both communities have dropped sharply over the last year, declining 33.6% in Corona and 30.3% in Ontario, according to DataQuick Information Systems. In Corona, the median sales price fell nearly $200,000 from May 2007 to May 2008, dropping from $565,000 to $375,000.

More from Deer's note: "The homes all appeared to be empty, and there were no prospective buyers anywhere to be found. Surprisingly, the sales office was open ... but the woman working there had questionable English fluency. When asked how many homes had been sold in the past month she simply responded, 'Uh huh. Thank you. Yes!' and handed us some additional literature on the property."

More: "Perhaps the most interesting aspect to the development was what it revealed about the nature of the housing boom: that at the peak even the most undesirable and remote locations were worthy of expensive, high-end homes."

Overall, Deer's note on the California economy -- and the relative health of California-based banks and thrifts -- strikes a balanced chord, reporting that, while the "outlook remains gloomy," "the pace of new problems has slowed somewhat."
Other highlights:

• "Not surprisingly, the banks said they are seeing continued deterioration in their single-family residential construction portfolios."

• "In areas where developable land is scarce, namely San Francisco and west Los Angeles, markets are still holding up. Several banks noted very little, if any, deterioration in credit quality in these markets. Specifically, residential construction projects in San Francisco ... and western Los Angeles (mostly teardown/rebuild projects) are seeing stable prices despite slower activity."

[Fel]

Haha.... I'm looking at buying my first home in the next year or two.... I couldn't be happier.

Sucks for all the people getting bent over on this though.... the thing is, everything is temporary. If people can still pay their mortgages, they should just stay put. The value will return in a few years, once someone gets big oil out of the white house and starts cleaning up the economy.