August was a fairly good month as I raked in ~$3500 with about 8 trades or as I like to think of it,  8 clicks of the mouse across a couple of electronic accounts.  It’s really not that hard to make money once you have some good working capital.    There are many ways to rake in cash out there but the allure of a brokerage account has been that it can be done in minutes with a click of  a mouse.

The best part of the cash flow, however, is that it gets reinvested back into the “system” to earn more cash and hopefully, with time will grow enough to become a primary source of income to live on.    Unfortunately, it is becoming very time consuming to keep up with my blogs and I may soon have to make a choice about the future of continuing on with them.

Oddly enough, deep inside, I’ve always known that the time would come when I would have to choose between focusing on simply making money vs. making money+ blogging about it.    It does get fairly lonely at the “top” and there aren’t too many capitalist bloggers out there sharing knowledge.    It is impractical to get people like Warren Buffet or Donald Trump to blog daily about their activities and while I’m nowhere near their financial league,  it is easy to see why they don’t blog; their time is simply better spent earning the money and enjoying the fruits of their labor.

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If I could change one thing in the high school educational system it would be to require Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged to be required reading for any graduating senior.   Fortunately, at least one college is now going to make it required reading,

April 11 (Bloomberg) — Ayn Rand’s novels of headstrong entrepreneurs’ battles against convention enjoy a devoted following in business circles. While academia has failed to embrace Rand, calling her philosophy simplistic, schools have agreed to teach her works in exchange for a donation.

The charitable arm of BB&T Corp., a banking company, pledged $1 million to the University of North Carolina Charlotte in 2005 and obtained an agreement that Rand’s novel “Atlas Shrugged” would become required reading for students. Marshall University in Huntington, West Virginia, and Johnson C. Smith University in Charlotte, North Carolina, say they also took grants and agreed to teach Rand.

I’ve written at least a half dozen posts relating to Ayn Rand’s books and philosophy here, here, and here and with four airlines going bankrupt and others struggling to maintain their planes, the events are simply snapshots right out of the book.

I’m glad to see this happening as it certainly is needed with today’s myopic generation Y and beyond.

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Chaps, this is just incredulous! This government needs to sort out its priorities pronto because what I’m reading about this so called “stimulus package” is disconcerting in that I won’t be getting a single dime back! According to the Associated Press,

The rebates would phase out gradually for individuals whose income exceeds $75,000 and couples with incomes above $150,000, aides said. Individuals with incomes up to $87,000 and couples up to $174,000 would get partial rebates. The caps are higher for those with children.

Well, if the bloody politicians want to play it like that then I, ala John Galt, will REFUSE to buy and goods or services with my vast disposable income from now until January 1st, 2009. I shall not buy a new 52″ LCD TV nor shall I buy a 24″ iMac nor shall I buy Mac-mini’s, iPods, nor any other gizmo for the rest of the year!

As a matter of fact, I will now DEFINITELY take my next vacation outside the US and I will definitely fly on British Airways or Air France or some other non-US based carrier and make sure it is an AirBus plane while I’m at it.

After busting my arse for the last year, my reward for all my hard work is to subsidize the sea of mediocrity in America. What a cruel joke!

Brothers in arms, I ask that you join me in shunting these inept politicians by refusing to buy any consumer goods over the next 12 months! Viva la liberta!

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It’s very tragic that a bridge in Minneapolis collapsed yesterday. Oddly enough, I wrote this post almost exactly a year ago concerned about the sad deteriorating state of infrastructure in America in my “John Galt” series of posts.

I even went so far as to specifically state that bridges were in sad shape based on a 20/20 news program about the poor maintenance of the bridging system throughout the US. The problem doesn’t stop there though, Alaska Oil Pipeline is aging, power outages (energy shortages) black outs and rolling brown outs, etc. The estimated cost of repairing all of these infrastructure issues falls into the $1.6 trillion dollar range. Factor in 80 million boomers on the dole (social security, medicaid, medicare) and throw another $2 trillion into that fiasco along with the 500 billion (and climbing) “spent” in Iraq and you really have to wonder what kind of America your kids will grow up in.

The only thing you can do about it is to get rich as quickly as possible so you can buy yourself some options, perhaps options in a foreign country……by the way, Who is John Galt?

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This is my fourth post pulling recent headlines and comparing them to the scenario Ayn Rand paints in her book Atlas Shrugged. The first, second and third posts illustrated American Infrastructure calamities but today I will talk about Venezuela.

Hugo Chavez recently announced that he is going to nationalize the Telecomm and Power Industries in his country.

“We’re moving toward a socialist republic of Venezuela, and that requires a deep reform of our national constitution,” Chavez said in a televised address after swearing in his Cabinet. “We are in an existential moment of Venezuelan life. We’re heading toward socialism, and nothing and no one can prevent it.”

Hugo Chavez was a freely elected leader of Venezuela and the people there elected him to office so I can only surmise that they agree with his philosophy and ideology. We can already see, however, the immediate effect of his announcement. The exchanges stopped trading some of Venezuela’s key stocks and capital will start fleeing the country. Chavez has made similar statements with regards to the oil industry and capital may flee those industries as well. What will be left in its place is desolation and poverty similar to what you see in Cuba.

I can only hope that a Juan Galt lives somewhere in Venezuela. Quien es Juan Galt?

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I wrote about failed power utilities, failed pipelines in a few other posts and I always end the post with the question, “Who is John Galt?” The question is from Ayn Rand’s Atlas Shrugged and I’ll comment again at the amazing parallels between the book and what is happening in America and around the world today. It appears that some of the main stream media is beginning to take a look at the problem and perhaps asking the same question (in a different way).
The Seattle Times reports

By Chuck McCutcheon

Newhouse News Service

WASHINGTON — A pipeline shuts down in Alaska. Equipment failures disrupt air travel in Los Angeles. Electricity runs short at a spy agency in Maryland.

None of these recent events resulted from a natural disaster or terrorist attack, but they may as well have, some homeland security experts say. They worry that too little attention is paid to how fast the country’s basic operating systems are deteriorating.

“When I see events like these, I become concerned that we’ve lost focus on the core operational functionality of the nation’s infrastructure and are becoming a fragile nation, which is just as bad — if not worse — as being an insecure nation,” said Christian Beckner, a Washington analyst who runs the respected Web site Homeland Security Watch (www.christianbeckner.com).

The American Society of Civil Engineers last year graded the nation “D” for its overall infrastructure conditions, estimating that it would take $1.6 trillion over five years to fix the problem.

I recall viewing a 20/20 broadcast on bridges not being maintained properly and that over the next 20 years, bridges would start falling apart and killing many people. That program aired about 15 years ago and here we are today talking about the decaying infrastructure. Back then, the problem was going to cost over 100 billion to fix, and I can only imagine that it would cost at least five times that to begin to fix the problem today. I urge you to buy a copy of Atlas Shrugged and read it numerous times. Perhaps you’ll join me in asking, “Who is John Galt?”

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As commented earlier, I was intriqued to learn that we’ve been having blackouts in the wealthiest country on the planet. Today, we hear news that British Petroleum shut down 8% of US oil production because of leaking pipes. Is this totally absurd or what? According to the latest filings, BP made 6.11 billion in PROFIT this past quarter. Six BILLION in profits and these guys can’t maintain pipelines?

Once again, so many questions….

Why wasn’t the pipeline maintained?

Why wasn’t it inspected more frequently?

Where does all this profit go?

Where is the uproar over the continued deterioration of industry?

and lastly,

Who is John Galt?

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For those of you who have never read Any Rynd’s Atlas Shrugged, I highly recommend the book. Although the book is fiction, there are some uncanny parallels to what happens to Americans in the book with what is going on in the world today. I’ve been reading about the heat wave hitting the MidWest and Northeast and came across an article from United Press International:

New York utility giving $3 blackout credit

“In testimony before a state Assembly committee, Con Ed CEO Kevin Burke said the utility would not increase its usual reimbursements to customers who lost perishable goods in the blackouts — $350 for residential customers and $7,000 for businesses.

It was the second day in a row Burke was questioned by lawmakers seeking reasons for a blackout that left parts of northwestern Queens in the dark for days.”

There were similar blackouts in St. Louis as well. There are so many startling things to question here:

Why are the blackouts happening?
Why don’t the utilities and engineers really know what is causing them or do a better job to prevent them?

Why isn’t the general public more skeptical and demanding some answers?

What does it say when the world’s most powerful and industrialized country can’t keep the lights on?

and lastly,
Who is John Galt?

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