| Rimadyl For Dogs

Bold move or socialism?
The ax has fallen on GM chief Rick Wagoner’s neck. With one swing, President Obama put an end to Wagoner’s reign at the helm of the struggling auto giant. GM had asked the government for another bailout amounting to a further $16 billion in loans. Instead, the Obama administration pledged only to fund GM’s operations [...]

The ax has fallen on GM chief Rick Wagoner’s neck. With one swing, President Obama put an end to Wagoner’s reign at the helm of the struggling auto giant. GM had asked the government for another bailout amounting to a further $16 billion in loans. Instead, the Obama administration pledged only to fund GM’s operations for another 60 days while it develops a sweeping restructuring plan.

Obama’s team also took aim at Chrysler, pushing it toward a merger, and threatened bankruptcy for both Detroit giants.

What do you think? Is it about time the government took forceful action or do the moves smack of socialism? And why go after the automakers but leave the management at failing banks in place?

Source: feeds.reuters.com

Crisis reading: What’s in the book bag?
Readers of MacroScope who live in the northern hemisphere will be gearing up for some summer reading. James Montier, the market psychologist who is also an equity analyst at Societe Generale, has come up with his annual recomendations of what to read. The full list is here, but for the current economic and market crisis he [...]

Readers of MacroScope who live in the northern hemisphere will be gearing up for some summer reading.

James Montier, the market psychologist who is also an equity analyst at Societe Generale, has come up with his annual recomendations of what to read. The full list is here, but for the current economic and market crisis he has this to offer:

My favourite book in this category is Bill Fleckenstein’s ‘Greenspan’s Bubbles’ -- an excellent exposé of incompetence during Alan Greenspan's tenure as Fed Chairman. The next choice in this group is Whitney Tilson and Glen Tongue’s ‘More Mortgage Meltdown’. This book explains clearly how we ended up in this mess (and is based on the authors -- real time experience), and an added bonus is the insight into Tilson's investment process provided by the case studies. My final choice in this section is Jim Grant’s ‘Mr. Market Miscalculates’. I've mentioned this excellent book before, and I believe it deserves a place on all investors' bookshelves.

Montier got MacroScope thinking. There must be many more crisis books, or related ones, that are worthy of a read as the summer rolls in. How about John Kenneth Galbraith's 'The Great Crash, 1929' or Tom Wolfe's 'Bonfire of the Vanities', which still has one of the best descriptions ever of how bond traders make money.

So let's have your suggestions. What should you read to mark the crisis?

Source: feeds.reuters.com

Floating cities drift in from future
Jun 15 - The low-lying Netherlands has become a laboratory for innovative architectural designs aimed at utilizing the one thing they have in abundance - water.

Source: feeds.reuters.com

The sky is falling — or is it?
The economic sky might still be falling, but it looks like the folks playing the stock markets have their hard hats on. Either that or they may be on to something. If the recent run of gains for global equities continues, world stocks will mark their best month in a decade. A look at [...]

The economic sky might still be falling, but it looks like the folks playing the stock markets have their hard hats on. Either that or they may be on to something. If the recent run of gains for global equities continues, world stocks will mark their best month in a decade. A look at the MSCI’s all-country world stock index shows a gain of 8 percent this month. It has climbed nearly 18 percent over the past eight sessions. It’s enough to make you think someone has opened the gate and let the bull out. But investors are ever-cautious and few are jumping up and down with glee.