High Ike Takes Hike

No need to beat yourself up over the senseless cocaine induced death of legendary bad boy Ike Turner. He lived the exciting and fun(too much?) filled life of a music superstar. Who wouldn't trade a little of that for a couple extra years? What you should be freaking out over is that somebody out there is selling blow to 76 year old men! Selling twenties at the local elementary school looks positively righteous in comparison. So let me be the first to propose a mandatory minimum sentencing guideline of 12 years for trying to explode some old person's heart. Law enforcement, if we could get a van outside the homes of Peter Fonda, Jack Nicholson, Keith Richards and Jerry Brown we may be able to prevent another celebrity aortal blowout.

Never, Never, Ever Sheikh A Bank?

TBP is back from winter holiday rested and ready to blow my reader away with ideas NPR will cover with extreme prejudice later this year.
One of the most significant developments in the flow international capital the last year has been the increasingly public behavior of Sovereign Wealth Funds. Hardly a week goes by without a multi-billion dollar oily cash injection to a major U.S. bank from some Arabian peninsular nation. In addition, some Asian nations, Singapore, China and Korea have also begun opening their hoards to a smaller degree. How will all this play out? The protectionist contingents are naturally/confusedly against investment by Arab nations on the grounds they, (a) are terrorists trying to destroy the companies from within or use them to launder money or blow us up, (b) are hairy, (c) will take control of our nation and turn our women into slavs, (d) are only in it for the money, (e) will somehow corrupt our beautiful economic system, (f) all of the above. Choice (a) seems odd because why would someone sink tens of billions of dollars into an economy just to blow it up? (b) is a legitimate concern and should be examined with an extremely fine tooth comb. (c), well from time to time gene pools just need to diversify themselves. (d), duh. (e), I really welcome all coherent arguments that by increasing the base of capital in our markets be it by a non-capitalist regime or some old Japanese lady who has been stuffing her mattress for the past 4 decades will affect the sanctity of our financial oceans. (f), I would not accept beer from someone making all of these arguments before midnight on a weekday. So how is this actually going to play out? Despite the money, our markets continue to falter due to a recession that lasts for an uncomfortable amount of time. This would mean that the value of the SWF's investments decreases, as they did not correctly choose the market bottom and will have to wait a while to recoup their money. No harm no foul, they knew the risks, hate the game not the player,we win, etc. Another possibility is that we are at or near the bottom and as markets recover their actions are rewarded handsomely with wealth and insight into how healthy financial institutions operate. The belated point I am trying to make here is how should this affect our discourse over investing Social Security into the markets? The arguments being made by protectionists, while not as loud have similar substance to those made by the left after Bush floated the idea of private accounts. I have a hard time imaging that these investments will not beat the return of our Social Security fund over the long run. Should we sit on the sidelines while others profit from our stability and transparency? Is it moral to do so? Were such a plan to be implemented, there would have to be the most stringent investigation of any possible fraud and subsequent indictment if found. We have to accept some fraud would creep in, though not prohibitively due to the large number of actors in the plan. Some individuals would be able to profit from relationships or bailouts as cronyism is a natural effect of life. But if Social Security is able to return market or near market results for the long run doesn't that greatly outweigh a minimal graft occurring? As we meander into the future let's try and not let stale ideologies dictate our beliefs but incorporate them with lessons unfolding right now.