Russia's Rouble Collapsing as Oil Prices in Freefall

As the price of oil plummeted to below $60 a barrel on increased Saudi production, Russia's already sluggish economy took a significant hit when Russia's central bank announced they would increase the key interest rate from 10.5% to 17% in a drastic move announced earlier this week.

The move was done in part to halt the Russian Ruble's drastic slide against the Dollar and Euro- as of Wednesday afternoon, the Ruble was trading at just over 60 to the dollar [down from 68 prior to interest rate hikes- NANESB!] and just under 75 to the Euro.

Although Russia has been on the receiving end of lukewarm sanctions from the USA and European Union after Russia annexed the Crimea and parts of eastern Ukraine, it's apparent that the recently plummeting energy prices have played a role in Russia's latest economic crisis.

This leaves Putin with the difficult choice of trying to prop up the mostly resource-based Russian economy or continue his costly military campaign against the Ukraine [I'm of two minds on this- while I'm glad Putin's finally reeling after attacking a neighboring country unprovoked, let's also keep in mind that no matter how dangerous and belligerent a Kremlin flush with petrodollars was the Eastern Europe, an unstable Russia that feels it has nothing left to lose may end up being more dangerous to the region. Also, who's to say the contagion would be confined exclusively to Russia?- NANESB!].

A financial joke devised to poke fun at Putin comes true http://t.co/WNRH5tkHFo pic.twitter.com/3DigQSw7Qt

— The Political Hat (@ThePoliticalHat) December 16, 2014

Over the last several weeks, the implied rationale behind Saudi Arabia's increase in production was that they were attempting to undermine the fracking boom in the US and Canada, temporarily saturating the global market with cheap oil and making the labor intensive practice unprofitable for North American companies. While this strategy would mean the Saudis would lose money in the short-term, they would (in theory) benefit in the long run from reduced competition from oil shale in west Texas and North Dakota.

However, others have theorized that Russia was the intended target of a clandestine Saudi economic attack all along. With President Obama ignoring his own self-declared 'Red Line' in Syria and seeking rapprochement with Iran- despite the Islamic Republic's stated desire to obtain nuclear weapons- the Arabian kingdom has decided to act unilaterally and go after Syria and Iran's benefactor in Russia economically. If that is the case, then undercutting Russia's state-run Gazprom by flooding the global marketplace with cheap oil has proven devastatingly effective so far- moreso than tepid the tepid sanctions levied on Russia after invading the eastern Ukraine.

Whether it's to undercut Russia or the fracking boom in the USA, the Saudi strategy is sure to cause problems among other OPEC members who are just as reliant on oil as Russia and may not be able to ride out low prices like the House of Saud. Even more problematic for some OPEC nations such as Iran and Venezuela is that Russia is their primary benefactor.

The move by Russia's Central Bank comes a little over a month after Russia and China agreed to a lucrative $300B energy deal which would give China's quasi-state run China National Petroleum Corp a partial stake in west Siberian oil and gas fields. In October, China and Russia had signed an agreement to swap nearly $100B of currency, so China may be on the hook as well if the Ruble continues its collapse.

The rate increase has also triggered bickering amid Putin's inner circle and prompted many Russians swarming markets to buy goods before the prices went up.

Australia Scraps Carbon Tax

Australia, the twelfth largest economy in the world, has voted to repeal a costly and contentious carbon tax in a 39-32 vote in Australia's senate last month.

The former Labor government, while introducing a price on carbon, said the move would help slash emissions by 160 million metric tons by 2020. It offered voters billions of dollars in compensation through tax breaks and welfare payments for increased costs stemming from one of the most dramatic reforms ever attempted in the energy-reliant economy.

But after the global financial crisis took hold in 2008, followed by the end of a decadelong mining boom in 2012 that slowed growth and employment in the A$1.5 trillion (US$1.4 trillion) economy, Australian voters turned against climate laws—recognized by the International Energy Agency as model legislation for developed countries—blaming them for rising energy bills and living costs.

The World Bank in May produced a State and Trends of Carbon Pricing report counting carbon pricing programs in 40 nations and 20 regions worth a collective US$30 billion, while also singling out repeal plans in Australia as one of the biggest international threats to the rollout of similar programs elsewhere, given its example.

However, implementation of the carbon tax and other emissions laws proved costly for the then-incumbent Labour Party. Former prime-minister Kevin Rudd was unseated in an internal party challenge from Julia Gillard as his approval ratings plummeted due in part to proposed Resource Profits Super Tax which would've levied a tax of no less than 30% on mining companies should their annual profits pass an annual A$75 million threshold.

As leader of the opposition party, Tony Abbot warned the Australian federal government against spending millions of taxpayer dollars for an ad campaign in support of the Carbon Tax in 2011. During the 2013 elections, Abbot campaigned against Labour's carbon tax scheme, saying it increased energy costs and hurt small businesses.

According to 2011 figures from the US Energy Information Administration, Australia is the world's largest exporter of coal and 4th largest exporter of LNG. The demise of the Resource Profits Super Tax also is likely to increase investment and exploration in the Coober Pedy area of the Australian outback, which is believed to hold as much as 200 billion barrels worth of oil according to multiple reports from last year.

What Do Cattle, Porn Starlets, Toyota and Hot Sauce Have in Common?

They're all getting out of Dodge California and heading for greener pastures- in some cases, literally.

Beset by higher taxes, above-average unemployment and among the highest cost of living in the USA, it's no secret that Californians have been moving out of state annually by the hundreds of thousands in recent years. This should come as no surprise with recent scandals and corruption involving California's political class coupled with onerous, intrusive and often absurd regulations for businesses passed on the state, county and municipal level.

Sensing discontent among Californians and business owners, Texas governor Rick Perry rolled out the welcome mat for Golden Staters with a PR blitz, offering lower taxes and a lower cost of living than California as well as business incentives for those companies who set up shop in the Lone Star state.

Although incumbent California governor Jerry Brown crassly dismissed Perry's efforts as 'barely a fart', it appears as though the Lone Star State's lobbying has been producing results. At the end of April, Japanese automaker Toyota announced that they would be moving their North American headquarters from the Los Angeles suburb of Torrance to Plano, TX starting in 2016. The move by Toyota [NYSE: TM] is expected to consolidate 4,000 employees from marketing, manufacturing and corporate operations to the suburban Dallas facility. In 2003, Toyota broke ground on a plant near San Antonio that produces the Tundra and Tacoma pickup trucks.

On a smaller scale, Irwindale, CA-based Huy Fong foods- maker of the Sriracha hot sauce- has been locked in a legal battle with the city council after the council threatened to declare Huy Fong a nuisance and threatening them with fines or closure after receiving complaints from four households regarding the fumes resulting from processing chili peppers. Although Huy Fong CEO David Tran stated publicly that he has no immediate plans to relocate the Irwindale facility, the company welcomed a delegation of Texas lawmakers in May. A company spokesman said that relocation wouldn't be as straightforward for Huy Fong because local producers of Sriracha ingredients such as chilis and vinegar couldn't pull up and move to Texas with them. However, botanists working on behalf of Tran have begun examining the soil in parts Texas to see if it's conducive to growing the variety of chilis used in Sriracha sauce. There's also concern over variables in the Texas weather such as flooding, hurricanes, drought and hail as well as competing bids from within California and other states.

However, not all the businesses exiting California have decided to head to the Lone Star state. Once considered the hub of the adult entertainment industry, California's San Fernando Valley has been hit hard by the advent of online pornography. The number of permits to film in the San Fernando Valley plummeted after a law requiring adult film stars to wear a condom while performing went into effect late last year. The measure was a Los Angeles county ballot initiative that was approved by voters in 2012. In response to the measure, studios and actors shipped themselves a few hours up Interstate 15 to Las Vegas where the cost of doing business was lower than in California and there were no regulations to mandate the wearing of condoms. Industry insiders say that its much cheaper to rent out warehouses for filming or mansions or hotel suites to accommodate talent for the duration of a shoot.

Nor are all the Californians leaving the state two-legged. Thanks to an ongoing drought and the closure of a massive slaughterhouse in the Imperial Valley town of Brawley, ranchers in California have been selling off cattle to Texas, Nevada and Nebraska. According to Reuters research, at least 100,000 head of cattle have left California in 2014- including breeding stock that's going to slaughter. Higher feed and transportation costs have also put pressure on California ranchers, although ranchers elsewhere are facing similar problems.

Although defenders of the current business climate in California often cite the entertainment industry and Silicon Valley as being the state's economic backbone as well as the primary source of fundraising for the state's democrat party, Hollywood has been shipping jobs out of state due to increased production and filming costs within the state. Special effects firm Sony Pictures Imageworks announced at the end of May that their headquarters will be moved from Los Angeles to Vancouver, Canada for post production work. Over the last 20 years, the area around Vancouver, BC has been dubbed 'Hollywood North' as British Columbia offered studios tax credits for filming on location. Although the exchange between the US and Canadian dollar isn't as favorable as it was in the 1990s, a number of studios are still drawn there for post-production work and location filming [the area around Vancouver can pass for a number of other settings depending on the type of film or scene- NANESB!].

The state's Democrat-controlled legislature also recently passed a bill that would raise the state's minimum wage to $13 an hour by 2017 and is expected to be signed into law by governor Brown. While the bill raises entry-level wages, many employers will likely end up cutting their workforce and retailers or restaurants will close down locations or increase prices to make up for any increased operating costs.

More damning, none of these jobs or businesses will be coming back or are unlikely to be replaced by new enterprise. Although California sits on considerable oil reserves in the Monterrey Shale, wealthy environmentalists with considerable backing from the entertainment industry are seeking to ban the hydraulic facture drilling process that has been so effective in recovering shale oil and gas in Texas, North Dakota and Pennsylvania. Meanwhile, state and local lawmakers continue to busy themselves with legislation concerning transgender bathrooms for schoolchildren or banning plastic bags and simply assume that they can get whatever revenue they need from the next Silicon valley startup such as Facebook.

More 0bamacare Good News! Democrats Spin CBO Report Estimating 2 Million People Will Lose Jobs as Freeing Americans From 'Job Lock'

According to a Congressional Budget Office report released this week, 0bamacare is set to push roughly 2 million Americans out of the workforce over the next three years as their hours are reduced or they leave the workplace altogether to qualify for subsidies offered by 0bamacare.

Although part of those numbers are attributed to job cuts, the vast majority represent workers who decide it makes more sense to stay home or work fewer hours, weighing the higher taxes they pay in the workforce versus their qualifications for benefits if they drop out.

“CBO estimates that the ACA will reduce the total number of hours worked, on net, by about 1.5 to 2 percent during the period from 2017 to 2024, almost entirely because workers will choose to supply less labor — given the new taxes and other incentives they will face and the financial benefits some will receive,” the nonpartisan tax agency said in its economic outlook.

Although the White House and Congressional Democrats initially disputed the CBO's findings, many of them had revised their strategy shortly thereafter and claimed its actually a good thing that 0bamacare was providing Americans disincentive to work less or employers from hiring, citing the dreaded phenomenon of 'Job lock'.

Yes- that's the actual phrase House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi used.

“What we see is that people are leaving their jobs because they are no longer job-locked,” House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) told reporters after House votes Tuesday afternoon. “They are following their aspirations to be a writer; to be self-employed; to start a business. This is the entrepreneurial piece. So it’s not going to cost jobs. It’s going to shift how people make a living and reach their aspirations.”

Pelosi said she hadn’t “fully” seen the report, but, “this was one of the goals. To give people life, a healthy life, liberty to pursue their happiness. And that liberty is to not be job-locked, but to follow their passion.”

Using their line of reasoning, I guess I should actually be thanking the Democrats for freeing me from 'Job Lock' [not to mention 'paycheck lock'- NANESB!] for several months back in 2009. Come to think of it, maybe the Democrats can market the War on Coal as freeing most of West Virginia, eastern Kentucky and Western Pennsylvania from 'Job Lock'- assuming those jobs had something to do with mining or transporting coal.

I'm pretty sure I've seen this somewhere before: After Obama's promise to Americans of "If you like your health insurance, you can keep it" turned out to not only be untrue, but the 'Affordable Care Act' resulted in roughly 4.7 million cancellations of already-existing healthcare plans, the spin from Democrats and editorial boards at the New York Times and Washington Post was that those policies were 'junk' and the people who were previously happy with their 'junk' policies could shop around for another plan [often offering even less than the cancelled 'junk' policies for much more money- NANESB!] on the not-really-working healthcare.gov website.

Yet the Democrats and liberal pundits who somehow failed to go into detail on what made the millions of policies cancelled thanks to 0bamacare 'junk' are now opining what sort of jobs Americans find themselves 'locked' into- apparently involuntarily- when they could be spending that time with their family or pursuing a fulfilling career in interpretive dance [how exactly they still have a roof over their heads after being liberated from 'job lock' isn't really made clear- NANESB!].

Perhaps the most patronizing and insulting thing from the beltway pundits and liberal politicians who have most likely never worked a day of their life in the private sector is the assumption that Americans taking time off from work to be with family, switching jobs or quitting everything to pursue your dream job or start up your own business had never happened prior to the 2010 passage of 0bamacare. Even more dangerously, not only does the CBO report find this disincentivizes working full time but also tacitly promises success for those who strike out on their own thinking they have the Affordable Care Act to thank.

UPDATE 2/6- The Lonely Conservative points out that entrepreneurs 'liberated' from the drudgery of Job Lock could face an increase of as much as $20,000 for insurance if they cross the income level set out by 0bamacare guidelines (Calculated as roughly 400% of the Federal Poverty Level)

Greece in the Carribean- Puerto Rico Moves Closer to Defaulting on $70 Billion in Public Sector Debt

News out of Puerto Rico so disturbing that I thought I'd lead with a picture of basketball wife Evelyn Lozada at the 2012 Puerto Rico Day Parade in New York City to take the edge off.

Remember that whole 'Cyprus' or 'Greece' thing? Years of unsustainable public-sector spending coupled with lower than expected economic growth plunged both Mediterranean countries into economic chaos that threatened to trigger a domino effect throughout the Eurozone beginning in 2010.

The same factors that led up to the Greek and Cypriot economic crises have been at work in the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico and analysts say that the Caribbean island and US territory is moving towards a near certain default on more than $100 billion is public sector debt and unfunded pension liabilities.

A possible suspension on payment of the debt comes despite the progress Puerto Rico's Gov. Alejandro Garcia Padilla has made in raising taxes and reducing the territory's deficit.

Any such decision partly reflects legal complications arising under Puerto Rico's ambivalent status, which today makes a Chapter 9 filing for bankruptcy protection for local governments, such as the Detroit municipal filing last July, impossible. It also reflects the maths of a debt service burden that requires paying between $3.4 billion and $3.8 billion each year for the next four years. As doubts grow about the ability of the commonwealth to service that debt, the cost of doing so will inevitably rise.

"The numbers are untenable," said one restructuring adviser. "To issue new debt the yield would have to rise and where they can't raise new money they will have to stop paying."

If Puerto Rico is forced to take that step, the effects will ripple through the entire $4tn municipal bond market. Because the debt is generally triple tax free, in a world of zero interest rates demand is high and it is distributed widely, including in funds that imply they have no exposure to Puerto Rico.

Puerto Rico cannot really raise taxes much more, since the debt per capita is more than $14,000, while income per capita is almost $17,000, a ratio at 83 percent—that makes California, Illinois or New York—each at 6 percent—models of prudence. Meanwhile, at 14 percent, the unemployment rate is twice the national average.

While Congress could theoretically intervene and create an insolvency regime for the island [similar, in theory, to Detroit's city emergency manager- NANESB!] the current partisan divide in Congress would lead to considerable wrangling with the GOP likely prioritizing the island needing to uphold their financial obligations to creditors versus the Democrats giving priority to the pensions of unionized public sector employees on the island.

Municipal and general obligation bonds from Puerto Rico have enjoyed what's called 'triple tax free' status [i.e. they're exempt from federal, state and local taxes- NANESB!] and have proven attractive to investors, but starting last year ratings agencies have cut much of the bonds' credit ratings to one notch above junk in light of recent developments.

Adding to the island's troubles is the considerable outmigration that began back in 2000- well before the 2008 global economic crisis. Some estimates say the net population loss since 2000 is in the neighborhood of 144,000- many of them younger people going to school or looking for work in the United States.

In what is perhaps the surest sign that US taxpayers will be on the hook for the ongoing situation on Puerto Rico, the White house stated that they were not considering a bailout of Puerto Rico on Wednesday.

Public opinion in Puerto Rico in recent decades has swung from full independence from the USA to status quo to support for becoming the 51st state.

New York Governor Cuomo- Conservatives Have "No Place in New York"

It's not surprising that Governor Andy Cuomo feels this way- it is a little surprising that Cuomo would be this brash and up-front about his disdain for some of his fellow New Yorkers in an election year.


In an interview with Syracuse PBS affiliate on Friday, Cuomo stated that conservatives have "no place in the state of New York, because that's not who New Yorkers are".

The Republican Party candidates are running against the SAFE Act — it was voted for by moderate Republicans who run the Senate! Their problem is not me and the Democrats; their problem is themselves. Who are they? Are they these extreme conservatives who are right-to-life, pro-assault-weapon, anti-gay? Is that who they are? Because if that’s who they are and they’re the extreme conservatives, they have no place in the state of New York, because that’s not who New Yorkers are.

If they’re moderate Republicans like in the Senate right now, who control the Senate — moderate Republicans have a place in their state.

Shortly after the remarks were made public, Cuomo backtracked and his supporters claimed that his remarks were merely 'taken out of context', instead. Some supporters highlighted Cuomo's qualifier of 'extreme' and pointed out the Governor's praise of 'Moderate' Republicans who have more or less rubber-stamped some or all of Cuomo's agenda. Cuomo attempted to walk back his statements by saying that New Yorkers prefer moderate politicians of either party running for office only a few weeks after avowed socialist and Sandinista supporter Bill DeBlasio was sworn in as mayor of New York City.

By 'anti-gay', Cuomo is apparently referring to anybody who held similar views on same-sex marriage as Pope Francis or President Obama prior to his 2012 re-election campaign. Meanwhile, the NY SAFE Act, a hastily written and almost confiscatory gun law rushed through a closed-door session of the New York state assembly in the immediate aftermath of the December 2012 Newtown, CT school shootings has proven extremely unpopular upstate. Opponents point out the law does nothing to deter crime and makes criminals out of law-abiding citizens who own previously legal firearms while prompting manufacturers and businesses to move out of state because of the increased restrictions.

Another issue that has residents upstate irate at the son of Democratic former governor Mario Cuomo is fracking. New York's Southern Tier sits atop the Marcellus Shale natural gas formation- in fact, the formation is named after the village of Marcellus outside of Syracuse. However, while there has been drilling activity in Pennsylvania, Ohio and West Virginia, Cuomo has dragged his feet on the issue since his 2010 election. Although drilling for natural gas could give the Empire State's economy a shot in the arm- particularly the economically hard-hit Southern Tier- hardline environmentalists and celebrity activists such as Yoko Ono or actor Mark Ruffalo seem to have the ear of Gov Cuomo's office, regaling his staff with liberally embellished horror stories of artificial earthquakes and tap water bursting into flames due to fracking. As the celebrities, environmentalists and wealthy Manhattan progressives do there utmost to ensure that no drilling takes place in New York, upstate counties atop the Marcellus Shale have unemployment rates of around 8%. To his credit, Cuomo floated a compromise where drilling would be confined mostly to the Southern Tier counties of Broome, Chemung, Tioga, Steuben and Chenango but that was quickly overruled by environmentalists. While the Governor and state officials have made no official decision on fracking, observers believe Cuomo and other Democrats are waiting for a more politically opportune time after the 2014 election to make an unpopular decision.

Meanwhile, as landowners in the Southern Tier have been hit with a double whammy of an economy that's been in decline since the 1970s and some of the highest property taxes in the USA, Governor Cuomo has been fundraising in Hollywood- for his re-election bid as governor of New York.

Between the push for same-sex marriage, gun control and abortion while obstructing a surefire means of reviving the Southern Tier's long suffering economy for political expediency, Cuomo's actions as governor have made it abundantly clear that he believes conservatives (or even moderates who disagree with him) have no place in New York. his statements in Friday's PBS interview simply made it official.

[Hat tip- Lonely Conservative; The Mental Recession

Eastman Kodak Exits From Bankruptcy

Photography pioneer Eastman Kodak has emerged from their 2012 bankruptcy filing as a much smaller entity this week. Instead of selling film or photography products to consumers, the latest incarnation of Kodak will focus mainly on commercial printing as well as touch-screen sensor components for tablets and smartphones.

The new, smaller Kodak has shed the cameras, film sales and consumer photo developing that made it a household name, focusing on printing technology for corporate customers, touch-screen sensor components for smartphones and computer tablets, and film for the movie industry. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Allan Gropper last month approved Kodak’s exit plan, which cut about $4.1 billion of debt and left shareholders empty-handed.

“This is a totally new company,” Antonio Perez, Kodak’s chairman and chief executive officer, said in an interview. “When we created the new portfolio we were very aware of the fact that we were going to be late coming into this market. The only way that you could be successful coming in late is to come into the market with breakthrough technologies and very differentiated value propositions, and this is what we have.”

The new Kodak -- excluding units that have been sold or spun off -- will report about $2.5 billion in revenue in 2013, Perez forecast. It will have $167 million in earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortization, he said.

The Kodak brand remains “very valuable” in the imaging industry and will remain lucrative through licensing deals, Perez said.

“If it has to do with imaging, Kodak is a very strong brand all over the world,” he said.

Perez will continue as CEO for another year, or until his successor is elected. He will serve as a special adviser to Kodak’s board for up to three years, the company said in July.

Kodak's unsecured creditors received anywhere from 4¢ to 5¢ on the dollar and purchased shares in the emerging company through a rights offering. During the bankruptcy proceedings, Kodak sold off digital imaging patents for roughly $525 million to Samsung, Apple, Google, Amazon, Research In Motion, Facebook, HTC and Microsoft.

Earlier this year, Kodak spun off their personalized and document imaging to it's UK pension plan in a deal to settle nearly $3 billion in claims against the company. It also reached a deal with the state of New York to resolve environmental liabilities by contributing $49 million towards a trust. After trading for nearly 107 years on the New York Stock Exchange, Eastman Kodak was de-listed in January 2012 immediately after their bankruptcy filing.

Kodak was formed in 1888 in Rochester, NY by George Eastman who devised a business strategy where his company would sell relatively inexpensive cameras and making profits on items like paper, chemicals and film. The company became the dominant player photographic equipment and supplies company throughout the 20th century, although both Kodak and Japanese rival Fujifilm began steadily losing market share to digital photography after 2000.

Detroit Becomes Largest US City to File For Bankruptcy

Will the last one out of Detroit please turn the lights off?

Beset by years of mismanagement, corruption and a steep population decline, the Motor City became the largest US city to file for Municipal bankruptcy on Thursday.

The filing by a state-appointed emergency manager means that if the bankruptcy filing is approved, city assets could be liquidated to satisfy demands for payment.

Snyder had determined earlier this year that Detroit was in a financial emergency and without a plan to improve things.

was unable to convince a host of creditors, including the city's union and pension boards, to take pennies on the dollar to help facilitate the city's massive financial restructuring.

Some creditors were asked to take about 10 cents on the dollar of what the city owed them. Underfunded pension claims would have received less than 10 cents on the dollar under that plan.

The filing leads to a 30 to 90 day period that will determine whether or not the city of Detroit is eligible for Chapter 9 protection, and define the number of claimants who may compete for Detroit’s limited settlement resources. The petition seeks protection from unions and creditors who are renegotiating $18.5 billion in debt and liabilities, according to the Detroit Free Press.

To the protests of many on the Detroit city council, Michigan's Republican governor Rick Snyder appointed emergency manager Kevin Orr back in March to oversee Motown's finances. Orr was a Maryland-based attorney who resigned from the prestigious Jones Day law firm to take the Emergency Manager position.

Besides rapid depopulation and a massive public employee pension shortfall, the city of Detroit fell into further financial disarray when former Mayor Kwame Kilpatrick took office and started awarding overly-generous city contracts to unqualified friends and ran up more than $210,000 on a city-issued credit card for meals, travel and alcohol.

It should also be worth pointing out that Detroit hasn't had a Republican since 1962.

White House Makes War on Coal Official

Front end loader at work at the Jellico Branch National Coal loadout in Turley, TN in June 2009. BA Harrison photo

Well- at least Obama is following through on one of his campaign promises from 2008-



In a speech at Georgetown University this week, President Obama outlined plans to bypass congress and implement strict new emissions regulations on new and existing power plants throughout the USA. The proposals include shutting down the remaining coal plants in the USA through regulatory fiat and freeing up an estimated $8 billion in guaranteed loans to startup green-energy firms [such as Solyndra, Spectra-Watt or Evergreen solar- all of whom filed for bankruptcy or shipped production offshore- NANESB!].

The speech was basically a big middle finger to coal country and energy-producing states like Texas, North Dakota or Oklahoma. Senator Joe Manchin (D- WV) said that the President's proposals were essentially a declaration of war on the American economy in an interview after Obama's Georgetown address.

Similar proposals- such as a cap and trade system- couldn't make it through a House and Senate controlled by the Democrats in Obama's first term, which was why the President announced his intention to bypass congress with these new regulations.

The speech comes less than a year after the media and supporters of President Obama laughably denied that President Obama was even waging a War on Coal or that GOP candidate Mitt Romney would be more harmful than Obama for the coal industry. However, now that Obama has secured a second term, White House officials can openly declare "a war on coal is exactly what's needed" without having to worry about any immediate electoral consequences.

In recent years, the coal industry has been besieged by competition from oil and natural gas while simultaneously being targeted from the left by well funded and politically connected environmental groups. Although coal is also used in the steelmaking and cement making processes, roughly 40% of the electricity generated in the USA comes from coal-fired power plants. Metallurgic coal is also exported to China, South Korea and Europe for steelmaking there, proposed coal export terminals have been facing increased political opposition in the Pacific Northwest. In the traditionally coal-centered economies of western Pennsylvania, West Virginia and eastern Ohio, natural gas drilling in the Marcellus and Utica shales [along with the EPA's previous regulatory burden- NANESB!] has brought more pressure on the coal industry there.

While the Administration's focus on crippling the coal industry may have seemed to benefit the oil and natural gas industries at first blush, Obama also weighed in on the Keystone XL pipeline during his Georgetown speech, saying that the project wouldn't be approved if he determined that it increased carbon emissions. Backers of the pipeline cite a State Department finding from earlier this year transporting the oil sands from Canada by pipeline would emit less greenhouse gases than shipping it by rail.

Unlike President Obama's vaunted 'green jobs', hiring has been brisk around the oilfields in North Dakota and western Texas in recent years and parts of western and central Pennsylvania have seen economic growth due to exploration and drilling activities around the Marcellus shale.

Foreign Manufacturers Expressing Renewed Interest In Opening Shop in the USA

Reversing a decades-long trend of offshoring manufacturing, foreign companies have recently started to set up facilities in the United States- taking advantage of a productive workforce, a cheaper dollar and proximity to their largest customer base.

The trend is similar to foreign automakers who have been opening up plants over the last 30 years throughout the United States- primarily in right to work states in the southeast and Texas. However, this time around, these include foreign companies that specialize in electronics, aerospace, chemicals and energy.

In 2011, British-based Rolls-Royce began making engine parts here in Virginia and shipping them to Europe and Asia to be assembled in jet engine factories. That same year, Siemens, a German company, started making power-plant turbines in Charlotte, N.C., most of which it's shipping to Saudi Arabia and Mexico.

Faced with rising demand from airlines worldwide, Rolls-Royce decided to build a new factory in Virginia to make jet engine discs and ship them across the Atlantic rather than expand similar plants in the U.K. A big reason was to be closer to its customers in the Southeast. Boeing began making 787 Dreamliners in Charleston, S.C., in 2011 and Airbus is building its first U.S. assembly plant in Mobile, Ala.

CEOs of those companies "can see that you're making quality parts in super-modern facilities with the best working practices," says William Powers, chief financial officer of Rolls-Royce North America.

The company's gleaming, $170 million factory in rural Prince George employs 100 and looks nothing like the labor-intensive textile, tobacco or furniture plants that were the region's economic lifeblood decades ago. On a sprawling, spotless white factory floor, rows of hulking computerized machines cut and shape discs that cost $25,000 to $75,000 apiece. Workers are scarce. Two can operate eight machines at a time and 12 make up a shift.

Rolls-Royce is planning two more factories on the Prince George County site.

While automation is part of the story, the Southeast also offered Rolls-Royce a flexible work environment. In Virginia and other southern right-to-work states where union representation is low, factory employees typically can both set up and operate a machine, as well as run multiple machines.

By contrast, in the U.K. and elsewhere in Europe, collective bargaining agreements often limit workers at Rolls-Royce and other companies to single, repetitive tasks, increasing labor costs, Powers and Sirkin say. Partly as a result, from 2005 to 2010, worker productivity increased much faster in the U.S. than in western Europe.

Also contributing to faster U.S. productivity gains: The country was hit harder by low-cost competition from Asia, forcing manufacturers here to cut waste and do more with fewer employees.

The kicker is that many of these products aren't even destined for customers in the USA. For example, turbines made at Siemens' Charlotte, NC plant are usually destined for Mexico or Saudi Arabia. The engine blades made at the Rolls Royce facility in Virginia are used aircraft like the Airbus A-380.

It isn't just European or British conglomerates getting in on the action. China's Golden Dragon Precision Copper Tube- one of the world's largest specialty producers of copper tube for air conditioning and small engines- opened up a $100 million plant in Thomasville, AL employing as many as 300 people back in 2011.

The deadly March 2011 Japanese tsunami has also factored into various companies' decision to shift production. The widespread devastation the earthquake, tsunami and nuclear meltdown triggered snarled the supply chain for the automotive industry. Months after the tragedy, Bridgestone Corporation announced an expansion of their Aiken County, SC plant. However, Bridgestone isn't the only tire manufacturing company in the Palmetto state to expand their footprint- French competitor Michellin broke ground on a $750 million plant in Anderson, SC last year. The plant will make tires for heavy equipment such as earthmovers.

Banks in Cyprus Re-Open For the First Time in Two Weeks

After a shutdown of nearly two weeks, banks on the Mediterranian island of Cyprus re-opened on Thursday after the Cypriot parliament agreed to terms of a bailout from thr European Central Bank.

Branches were replenished with cash overnight and police were deployed amid fears of a run on the banks.

Some queues did form but the mood was calm, and the country's president thanked Cypriots for their "maturity".

The restrictions on the free movement of capital represent a profound breach of an EU principle, correspondents say.

However, the European Commission on Thursday justified the move, saying the "stability of financial markets and the banking system in Cyprus constitutes a matter of overriding public interest".

Information from the Central Bank of Cyprus released on Thursday showed that foreign depositors had already withdrawn 18% of their cash from the nation's banks during February, before the current crisis hit home.

The deal effectively wipes out Cyprus’s appeal as an international banking haven but saves Europe from cutting off support to one of the 17 nations that use the euro currency.

The deal reached with creditors makes Cyprus the first Eurozone nation to have capital controls imposed on depositors. The restrictions include prohibiting Cypriot nationals from travelling abroad with more than €1000, limits of €300 on daily withdrawls and a €5000 per-day limit on transactions by businesses. Experts say these capital controls could be in place for several months before being phased out.

Cyprus Popular Bank, which is also known as Laiki, will be shut down and assets transferred to the Bank of Cyprus. Losses on accounts with a balance €100,000 or more will reportedly be converted into shares of the Bank of Cyprus. Larger depositors have found ways around the nearly 2-week long bank closure by withdrawing funds from foreign branches of Laiki and Bank of Cyprus. Financial experts believe that most of the Russian funds in Cypriot banks when banks were closed across the island have since been repatriated.

One unusual outcome of the Cypriot financial crisis is the increased interest in bitcoin by depositors with money in Cypriot banks. The three year old virtual pseudo-currency was created by hackers three years ago and has increased in value some 87% since the EU and Cyprus began negotiating over the terms of the latest bailout.

Increased Demand for Guns and Ammunition Spark Jobs Bonanza in Firearms Industry

Looks like I was wrong- President Obama and the Democrats actually CAN take credit for creating some private sector jobs.

With the White House and Democrat-controlled Senate promising to take action on gun control- including a proposed "assault weapons" ban- civilians have been stocking up on guns, ammunition and parts for the last several months. Coupled with the recent Department of Homeland Security purchase of 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition, the increased demand has created a shortages and backlogs. In fact, the massive bulk purchase by the DHS has left local police departments across the country scrambling to find ammunition and paying more and waiting longer for the ones that do manage to find any.

The brisk sales has also had the unintended consequence of creating a significant jobs boom for gun manufacturers throughout the USA.

Mike Weddle, head of maintenance at Dynamic Research Technologies, an ammunition manufacturer in Albany, Mo., says he is adding 10 new hires to his staff of 35. DRT's machine operators make between $10 and $17 an hour -- a healthy paycheck in a region where it's tough to find a job and the cost of living is relatively low.

DRT currently cranks out 80,000 bullets per shift and operates two shifts per day. But that's not enough to meet demand. So Weddle is adding a third manufacturing shift and building an additional facility.

"Demand picked up a year ago -- it quadrupled," he said. "It just went crazy." He says .223 caliber ammo, which is for semiautomatic rifles, is particularly difficult to keep in stock.

DRT is a tiny part of an industry that employs about 240,000 nationwide, according to an estimate from Brian Rafn, who follows the gun industry for Morgan Dempsey Capital Management. And like DRT, many of the giants in the business of making guns and ammo are also expanding.

"Sturm, Ruger and Smith & Wesson have both added manufacturing capacity, which includes labor and shifts, in the past year," said Wedbush Securities analyst Rommel Dionisio.

Caleb Ogilvie, a concealed-carry instructor who works at Cabot Gun & Ammo in Cabot, Ark., said that employees at a nearby Remington plant in Lonoke are telling him that "they're running full swing up there, running 24-7."

Ironically, companies like Smith & Wesson, Colt, Mossberg and Ruger are headquartered in New England states where residents can't legally own some of the firearms those companies make. This has not gone unnoticed by officials in Mississipi and Texas who say they would gladly welcome the northern-based companies should they decide to move south. Colorado-based ammunition manufacturer Magpul has said their move out of Colorado is underway after Gov Hickenlooper signed a raft of gun control bills into law earlier this month.

Meanwhile, the northern Idaho town of Potlatch is attempting to do follow suit with some help from the Idaho department of commerce, Potlatch corp [NYSE- PCH] which owns property that housed one of their paper mills until 1981 and regional utility Avista [NYSE- AVA].

The move by PNW Arms was like a signal flare to business and political leaders in the town of 800 people, who were in the process of trying to determine what industry would be best to pursue.

"We were in the middle of doing our marketing plan at the time and decided that firearms is the niche we would recommend," said Gary White of Kennewick, Wash., a business marketing consultant who is helping develop the town's pitch to gun makers.

Potlatch, they decided, would go from timber town to gun town. It would try to lure firearms and ammunition makers, and plans also called for hunting-themed housing and retail development.

"It will help draw some out-of-towners and out-of-staters," Mayor David Brown said.

Potlatch went public in April with its come-hither pitch to gun makers.

"We've had two nibbles already and we haven't even tried," Swanson said.

Swanson acknowledged that gun manufacturers would not be welcomed everywhere. Even in Latah County, they might face opposition 15 miles away in liberal Moscow, where the University of Idaho is based.

"In Potlatch, they would be welcomed with open arms," Swanson said. "I have not heard a single person in Potlatch saying, 'We don't want them here.'"

White agreed: "If we proposed this in Seattle or Portland, I'm sure it would be entirely different. For Potlatch, Idaho, this makes absolute sense."

Busy State Highway 6 serves as the main street through the town, and the small business community actually has trouble finding workers, said Dale Spring, owner of Dale's Wagon Wheel Bar & Grill.

Spring wonders where the workers would come from for any new firearms factory. "There's no labor force," he said.

Many Potlatch residents work at the universities, or at one of the thriving private sector employers in the Moscow-Pullman area, he said.

Local economic development leaders believe good-paying jobs will draw workers.

The lure for manufacturers is the former lumber mill site, of which 26 acres is set aside for firearms and related companies, White said. The mill site is currently without buildings, but has nearby utilities, is flat and the town has plenty of water and sewer capacity, Swanson said.

Nationally, there has been a big jump in the popularity of target shooting, largely the result of a slew of television programs on that subject, White said. They expect Potlatch's plan to appeal to some of those people, he said.

The marketing effort is funded by Potlatch Corp, which still owns the mill site, by local utility Avista, and by local city and county governments.

There are relatively few publicly traded gun companies, but shares of Smith & Wesson [NASDAQ- SWHC] have gone up 7.85% since the beginning of 2013 and shares of Ruger [NYSE- RGR] are up more than 13% in the same timeframe.

China-Based Solar Giant Suntech Files For Bankruptcy

Once the largest manufacturer of solar panels, China's Sun Tech Holdings filed for bankruptcy last week after defaulting on a $541 Million bond payment this month.

Suntech said in a news release that a group of eight Chinese banks filed a petition for insolvency and restructuring of its main operating subsidiary in China in the Wuxi Municipal Intermediate People's Court in Jiangsu province.

Wuxi Suntech told the court it woudln't file an objection to the petition, Suntech said, adding that the court will decide whether to accept the petition in the next few days. If the petition is approved, Suntech will continue to produce solar products to meet customer orders, Suntech added.

The banks are owed as much as 7.1 billion yuan (US$1.14 billion) and include Industrial & Commercial Bank of China, Agricultural Bank of China and Bank of China, the official Xinhua news agency reported earlier.

The filing has triggered volatility that has rippled across China's renewable energy sector in the days following Sun Tech Holdings initiating bankruptcy protection. Shares of Sun Tech [NYSE- STP] closed down 28.81% since the March 20th filing while shares in Yingli Green Energy [NYSE- YGE] declined 13.89% since Wednseday and LDK Solar [NYSE- LDK] was down 6.87% since Tuesday.

According to industry observers, Sun Tech's path to bankruptcy in China was paved with numerous warnings and red flags. In June of last year, a representative at the Luxembourg-based, Sun Tech-controlled Global Solar Fund was accused of fradulently obtaining a guaranteed $680 million loan by pledging nonexistent German bonds as collateral. The following month, prosecutors in Italy filed criminal charges against  the Global Solar Fund for illegally building solar farms in Italy to milk that country's generous renewable energy subsidies.

A prosecutor in the southern Italian city of Brindisi has formally charged five of the fund's subsidiaries with illegal construction of solar power plants, accusing them of sidestepping the approval process in order to exploit Italy's generous renewable-energy subsidies.

The charges are that GSF subsidiaries failed to obtain the correct permit to build solar plants of more than 1 MW by splitting each park up into several smaller units that qualified for a less rigorous and faster permitting process.

In some cases, the GSF subsidiaries prematurely announced completion of construction on the plants in order to meet a deadline needed to qualify for incentives, court documents show.

The trial involving these five solar plants is set to begin on December 6.

Another 11 of the companies controlled by the fund are under investigation, and charges will be sought against them, said Nicolangelo Ghizzardi, the prosecutor handling the cases.

Sun Tech hastily reached a settlement with the Luxembourg-based GSF earlier this month in the hopes of raising enough cash for the $541 million bond payment they eventually defaulted on.

Cyprus Banks Remain Closed As Island's Economy Teeters on Brink of Collapse

Finance Ministers and Central Banks throughout Europe are keeping a close eye on developments in Cyprus this week as the Mediterranean Island nation's financial institutions have been closed down amidst a financial emergency and increasing protests from the public.

Cyprus’s central bank said lenders would remain closed until at least Tuesday amid growing speculation the Meditterranean island could become the eurozone member to exit the currency bloc.

Officials at the ECB were reported on Wednesday to be considering pulling the plug on Cypriot banks unless the country agreed to a new bailout package.

Jörge Asmussen, the ECB’s chief negotiator, warned that Cyprus’s decision to reject the terms of an €10bn (£8.6bn) bailout meant it could not guarantee support to domestic lenders for much longer.

“We can provide emergency liquidity only to solvent banks and... the solvency of Cypriot banks cannot be assumed if an aid programme is not agreed on soon, which would allow for a quick recapitalisation of the banking sector,” said Mr Asmussen in an interview with a German newspaper.

The European Central Bank's statement came after the Cypriot parliament unanimously rejected an European Union bailout that would have required a tax on depositor's savings accounts. Reportedly the initial terms of the bailout would've taxed accounts of €100,000 or less at around 5%, accounts between €100,000 and €500,000 in the neighborhood of 10% and accounts of €500,000 and more at 13%.

Cyprus has been a popular offshore venue for wealthy Russians to deposit their money in recent years, and the Cypriot finance minister is in Moscow negotiating with his Russian counterparts on a new deal that would see greater Russian involvement in the Cypriot banking and offshore energy sectors on Wednesday. Russia had earlier threatened to withhold any aid from Cyprus after being left out of the talks between the island nation and European Central Bank.

There are also an estimated 3500 British military personnel stationed in Cyprus- the UK dispatched a military transport loaded with €1 Million in cash in the event that cash ran out at the ATMs or debit cards stopped working on the island. The Ministry of Defense also stated that the personnel stationed in Cyprus will not have the option of their wages deposited in a British or Cypriot bank.

Cyprus- also a former British colony- is home to a number of retirees from the UK. The island nation also has historically close ties to Greece and the Cypriot economy took a massive hit when a significant portion of the Greek soverign debt held by Cyprus and others was written off last year

New Regulations May Lead to Collapse of New England's Fishing Industry

Gretchen Ertl- New York Times

The New England Fishery Management Council this week approved drastic cuts in the catch limit of cod off the coast of New England, adding the the already beleagured industry's woes.

The New England Fishery Management Council on Wednesday approved a year-to-year cut of 77 percent on the Gulf of Maine cod limit and 61 percent for Georges Bank cod.

The cuts come on top of a slew of other reductions, ranging from 10 to 71 percent, on the catch of other bottom-dwelling groundfish species, such as haddock and flounder.

Fishermen say now they're staring at industry collapse because they've been left with far too few fish for most boats to make a living.

"We are headed down the wrong course here, of exterminating the inshore fleet, for no good reason," said David Goethel, a New Hampshire fisherman and council member.

The cuts, in effect May 1, are expected to be backed by federal managers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. NOAA's top federal fisheries regulator, John Bullard, acknowledged the reductions will be devastating. But he said the fish stocks are struggling and the industry's steady, excruciating decline must be reversed.

"The first thing we have to do is put denial behind us," he said.

The cuts hit an industry that was crucial to the nation's early economy and remains imbued with the risk and romance of man versus nature -- depicted in the famous "Man at the Wheel" statue in Gloucester of a fisherman facing the sea.

The new low limits reduce the cod catch to just a fraction of what it once was and prevent fishermen from landing more plentiful species, such as haddock and pollock. That's because fishermen can't pull up the healthier groundfish without catching too much of the cod that swim among them.

An economic analysis by the council projected that the cuts would reduce overall groundfish revenues by 33 percent, from about $90 million in 2011 to about $60 million in 2013. But fishermen said the projection is far too optimistic.

"It's fantasy. ... I mean, I'd rather go to Disney World. I've got a better chance of meeting Peter Pan," said Goethel, who predicted the entire New Hamsphire fleet would be eliminated.

Fishermen have consistently disputed the accuracy of the science that drives regulation and that indicates the stocks are in bad shape. And they noted the industry has generally fished at or below levels recommended by science in recent years, but the advice has proven wrong.

"I've done everything they told me to do, and all of the sudden I come up here to a meeting today, and they're going to send me in a coffin out of this place," said New Bedford fisherman Carlos Rafael, who said he may have to sideline half of his fleet of 20 groundfish boats.

Federal regulators have been contemplating deep cuts or a near-total prohibition on cod fishing by New England's fishing, despite some uncertainty over whether or not there's a sustained decline of the cod population offshore.

Fishermen insist that there are plenty of cod and that the real problem is fuzzy science. They say the data are grossly inconsistent, pointing to a 2008 federal report that concluded that Gulf of Maine cod, though historically overfished, were well on the way to recovery.

The news is causing high anxiety in Massachusetts, where a wooden “Sacred Cod” has hung in the State House for more than 200 years and the fishing industry, though struggling, still figures prominently in the state’s identity.

“I can’t think of another fishery shutdown that would have the economic consequences of this,” said Steven Cadrin, a scientist at the University of Massachusetts, Dartmouth, who helped with the assessment.

From May 2010 to April 2011, commercial fishermen caught about nine million pounds of Gulf of Maine cod, according to the New England Fishery Management Council, earning more than $2 per pound on average.

Last year NOAA officials put more than 2100 square miles of prime fishing ground off limits to New England fishermen in a move to protect an estimated 90,000 harbor porpises. Despite their relatively abundant numbers, the species is under the protection of the Marine Mammal Protection Act.

Aussie! Aussie Aussie! Oil! Oil! Oil! Massive Outback Oil Find Could Make Australia Leading Energy Producer

Linc Energy Oil Rig in South Australia's Outback

With Australia Day right around the corner, Queensland-based Linc Energy announced a massive shale-oil find in the outback that could put Australia among the top energy producers in the world.

South Australia is sitting on oil potentially worth more than $20 trillion, independent reports claim - enough to turn Australia into a self-sufficient fuel producer.

Brisbane company Linc Energy yesterday released two reports, based on drilling and seismic exploration, estimating the amount of oil in the as yet untapped Arckaringa Basin surrounding Coober Pedy ranging from 3.5 billion to 233 billion barrels of oil.

At the higher end, this would be "several times bigger than all of the oil in Australia", Linc managing director Peter Bond said.

This has the potential to turn Australia from an oil importer to an oil exporter.

"If it comes in the way the reports are suggesting, it could well and truly bring Australia back to (oil) self-sufficiency," Mr Bond said.

State Mineral Resources Development Minister Tom Koutsantonis said there were exciting times ahead for SA's resources industry.

Mr Bond said there was the potential for a US-style "shale oil" boom in SA.

Shale oil extraction involves using new technologies to drill vertically and then horizontally for distances of more than one kilometre through shale rocks that contain oil.

The process was once prohibitively expensive but advances have created a new oil boom in the US.

Mr Koutsantonis said: "We have seen the hugely positive impact shale projects like Bakken and Eagle Ford have had on the US economy.

"There is still a long way to go, but investment in unconventional liquid projects in South Australia will accelerate as more and more companies such as Linc Energy and Altona prove up their resources."

Mr Bond said the potential in SA was "massive", but even at the lower end of estimates - about 3.5 billion barrels - it was still very large.

Shares of Linc Energy [ASX- LNC] soared by more than 30% in trading on the Australian Securities Exchange shortly after the find was announced on Thursday- an 18 month high for the company.

The find is centered around the South Australian outback town of Coober Pedy, which was founded as an opal mining town in 1915. Coober Pedy remains an active opal mining town to this day.

Presently, Australia has been drilling for oil onshore at the Cooper Basin- which straddles the South Australia/Queensland border- since oil and natural gas deposits were discovered in 1961. In addition to offshore projects off the northern coast of Western Australia, oil and natural gas production has taken place at the Amadeus Basin in the Northern Territory since the 1980s.

However, the find at Coober Pedy and South Australia's Arckaringa Basin could easily surpass the output from the oilfields located in the Cooper and Amadeus Basins. While some experts cautioned that the actual number of recoverable barrels of oil may be in the neighborhood of 3 or 4 billion barrels, the news was greeted with considerable fanfare in the Australian press- as even the more pessemistic estimates could still help the Australian economy considerably.

Taxpayers Take a Hit as Uncle Sam Prepares to Unload General Motors Shares.

Worth the paper it's printed on?

General Motors [NYSE: GM] announced earlier this week that it was purchasing back some 200 shares of their stock from the United States government. Although the deal is worth an estimated $5 billion, taxpayers are going to end up taking a loss on the auto bailout from nearly four yearsago that also saw Chrysler end up in an arranged marriage with Italian automaker Fiat.

The government got its shares as part of a $49.5 billion bailout of GM that began nearly four years ago. It saved GM from collapsing into financial ruin.

GM said it will pay $27.50 each for the 200 million shares, and it expects to close the deal by the end of the year. GM stock closed Tuesday at $25.49, and it shot up 7.1 percent in premarket trading Wednesday to $27.30.

However, the 'break even' price is said to be near $53 per share, meaning that the shares of General Motors would have to nearly double in order for the government to recoup their losses from General Motor's post-bailout IPO. As part of the initial terms of the bailout, Uncle Sam initially owned more than 60% of GM. General Motor officals said that part of the reason for the stock buyback from the Feds was to rid themselves of th 'Government Motors' stigma.

Canada and the province of Ontario also became stakeholders in GM during the 2009 bailout and officials announced they had no plans to divest their shares of GM in the short-term.

"We've always been clear about two things. One, that we will not have a fire sale - we will not sell the shares without getting the best value we can for Canadian taxpayers - and secondly, that we are a Conservative government. We are not interested in the long term in being shareholders in private corporations," [Finance Minister] Flaherty told reporters in Burlington, Ontario.

"Over time we do intend to divest. On the timing, I'll have to get back to
you."
Canada's federal government and the province of Ontario became shareholders of GM in 2009, when they contributed a combined C$10.8 billion ($10.89 billion) to a bailout to keep GM afloat. The U.S. government provided about US$50 billion.

Canada and Ontario's combined stake in General Motors is about 9%.

Amid Violent Protests, Michigan Becomes 24th Right to Work State

Michigan State Police in riot gear and LIUNA protesters in Lansing, MI. Mike Mulholland- Mlive.com

With the stroke of a pen, first-term Michigan governor accomplished what was once considered unthinkable in a state with strong ties to the nation's organized labor movement and signed into law legislation that made Michigan a right-to-work state.

At about 5:45 p.m., Snyder announced publicly that he signed the historic right-to-work legislation in private - hours after the bills won final approval in the House and five days after he joined with GOP legislative leaders to announce their plan to enact the controversial law.

"This is a major day in Michigan's history," he said during a news conference in the Romney building not long after signing the legislation. "Again, I don't view this as anti-union at all. I believe this is pro-worker."

The signings came as thousands of protesters and union members descended on Lansing, obstensibly to urge a veto of the legislation once it reached Gov. Snyder's desk. Union protestors also tore down a tent belonging to pro right-to-work group Americans for Prosperity- with people inside- and at least one protestor in an IBEW jacket was videotaped shoving and punching FOX News contributor Steven Crowder outside the collapsed tent. Apologists for the various union thugs laughably attempted to explain away both videotaped events as being 'provoked' by Americans for Prosperity or a 'false flag' where they sabotaged their own tent [shorter Union: "They totally deserved to have their tent wrecked, even though they did it to themselves!"- NANESB!].

[12/12 UPDATE- Not satisfied with simply tearing down a tent and assaulting Crowder, the braying mob apparently focused their energies on destroying a hot dog cart and hurling racial slurs at the cart's owner, Clint Tarver. Tarver was catering to the Americans for Prosperity tent that was ripped down to hoots and applause from the union crowd. The media also described the rampage protests as 'mostly peaceful'.]

Earlier in the day, state representative Doug Geiss [D- Taylor] promised on the floor of the State House that "there will be blood" if right-to-work was passed. The Michigan State House Democrats twitter account would later tweet Geiss' threat before deleting it. On Monday, President Obama slammed the state's right-to work legislation as he was speaking in Michigan to try and gain support for his proposed tax hikes, falsely claiming the two seperate bills making their way through the State House would eliminate collective bargaining altogether. Earlier this year, President Obama ripped right-to-work in a speech before big labor leaders like Trumka and Hoffa, but his supporters and economic team were all to willing to take credit for the jobs created in right-to-work states.

One commenter on Mlive.com succinctly charachterized Michigan's new right-to-work law as follows

Unions will now have to view their members as customers instead of just treating them as a revenue stream. That's about the only thing that changed today. Unions still exist. Employees can still organize. Employees can still engage in collective bargaining.

Gov Snyder's move came about 10 months after Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels signed right-to-work into law, making the Hoosier state the first 'rust belt' state to have right-to-work laws in more than 40 years. Snyder reportedly wanted to make Michigan as competitive as Indiana, which has added an estimated 43,000 jobs since the state passed right-to-work.

Growing up, we got a cursory introduction to the labor movement in the history books at school while unions like the Teamsters murdered 96 people at the DuPont Plaza hotel in Puerto Rico or various New England chapters of the Laborers International Union of North America maintained cozy relationship with the Patriarcha crime family out of Providence, allowing mobsters to engage in laor racketeering while raiding the union's pension fund.

Many of the unions protesting in Madison, WI last year lost much of their credibility when despite AWOL lawmakers and activist judges, laws limiting collective bargaining in Wisconsin were passed by Gov. Scott Walker despite massive, continuous protests on the grounds of the state capitol building. However, despite dire predictions of public employee unions like AFSCME or SEIU, the sky didn't fall and Wisconsin didn't turn into Mogadishu overnight.

Moreover, even without Tuesday's violent tantraum in mind, I have zero sympathy for unions that do things like help themselves to money from families of disabled people. I'm not certain it this is limited to Michigan, but hopefully this practise is dismantled ASAP.

The law will likely face a number of challenges and I would be very surprised if an activist judge somewhere along the way didn't attempt to overturn it by judicial fiat. Still, wouldn't it be ironic if after the rough years the auto industry has had lately, the new right-to-work law started bringing the auto industry back to its 'home' in Michigan?

Canada Actively Seeking American Workers Left Jobless by 'Obama Recovery'

Jeff McIntosh photo- Canadian Press

As the American economy continues to receive bad news amid Barack Obama's reelection and increasing concerns about the upcoming 'fiscal cliff', Canada has made it clear that it needs workers and is looking to the USA to help fill that gap [and I for one welcome our new Canadian overlords- NANESB!]

Much of western Canada is experiencing a shortage of skilled laborers- this is particularly true of the energy sector in oil-rich provinces like Alberta or Saskatchewan. Despite the fact that just under 30,000 Canadians made their way to Alberta from other provinces to find work in the last year, oil industry consultants believe they'll need more than 35,000 additional workers over the next decade for the oil sands alone. Moreover, companies will be losing a large number of worker due to attrition as statistics have shown much of the current workforce in the oil sands, exploration and refineries is middle-aged.

[...] the industry’s growth is far from certain.

“Labour shortage impacts could threaten investment, revenues and sustainability throughout the entire energy value chain,” said Peter Boag, president of the Canadian Petroleum Products Institute, which recently changed its name to Canadian Fuels Association.

The country’s energy sector industry directly employed 187,000 workers last year, and that’s set to grow exponentially.

“There will be no reprieve from current hiring challenges for oil and gas services as the sector will need to fill thousands of positions between now and 2015,” says HR Petroleum Council in a report. “Employee turnover is the sector’s greatest workforce concern as it escalates costs and exacerbates sector-wide labour and skill shortages.”

The oil sands are different in that they have to be extracted in a manner more reminiscent of mining for ore than drilling for oil. Although environmentalists opposed development of Alberta's oil sands, the oil has been naturally seeping into nearby bodies of water such as the Athabasca River for centuries. Although much less straightforward to extract, the mixture of sand, clay, water and bitumen locked in the ground are said to rival the conventional petroleum reserves of Saudi Arabia and Venezuela. Much of the oil sands activity is centered northeast of Edmonton around Fort McMurray, Alberta- a latter-day boomtown dubbed by some as 'Fort McMoney'.

As Canada continues to tap the vast energy reserves out west, employers and recruiters are looking beyond their own borders to help offset the shortfall of skilled workers- including the USA.

Since 2010, about 35,000 U.S. workers a year have been issued work permits, according to Canadian immigration statistics. That's up 13% from earlier in the decade. And that figure is expected to grow as provinces continue to loosen requirements for temporary foreign workers.

Rudolf Kischer, a Vancouver-based immigration attorney, said his firm can hardly keep up with the processing of work permits for employers hiring U.S. help.

"We're the busiest we've ever been," he said.

Many of those workers are heading to where the labor market is hottest: Edmonton.

Edmonton has become a staging ground for oil companies that include Canada's Suncor Energy Inc., Shell Canada Ltd. and Chevron Canada Ltd. The energy sector has in turn boosted industries such as manufacturing, home building and retailing.

With a population of about 812,000, Edmonton looks a lot like many American cities. There are large strip malls anchored by U.S. retailers such as Costco and Home Depot, and ubiquitous coffee shops — except here Tim Horton's doughnut shops outnumber Starbucks 3 to 1.

The biggest difference: The unemployment rate here is 4.5%, and "We're Hiring" signs are posted in almost every window.

Jobs near Fort McMurray, a remote town six hours north, are the best-paid; a welder can make up $37 an hour. (At present Canadian and U.S. dollars are almost equivalent in value.) But laborers must stay in barracks-style camps, which energy companies have upgraded to woo them. The best ones offer private rooms with flat-screen TVs, gyms, prime dining and wireless Internet access.

Workers spend as long as a couple of months at a stretch laboring before returning to Edmonton "moneyed up," as the expression goes around here. Workers then pump those dollars into the local economy.

The province of Alberta boasts a median household income of $83,000 compared with $50,000 in the U.S.

Andrew Hoggard, a 35-year-old auto mechanic who moved to Edmonton from Michigan in March, can hardly keep up with his workload. He puts in 12-hour days at a local Chrysler dealership, including some Saturday shifts.

Still, he's not complaining. In eight months, he's made $70,000. Back in Holland, MI, where he worked on commission at Nissan dealership, he relied on his parents to help him pay rent when the work slowed.

In British Columbia, an unprecedented construction boom has left the province short on workers. However, in southern California, even before the current recession there have been thousands of skilled tradesmen who remain unemployed, underemployed or are working outside their field altogether. This led to officials in Riverside County, CA to coordinate with Canadian delegations and organizations like the British Columbia Construction Association to hold a job fair slated for early December in Indio, CA.

“Some have not found work for the past four years in their trade,” said Tom Freeman, commissioner with the Riverside County Economic Development Agency’s office of foreign trade, which has helped set up a Dec. 4 job fair in Indio to recruit workers willing to move north.

Economic development specialists and others in the Coachella Valley have been very involved in what is called the “workforce mobility program,” with initial meetings taking place in Palm Springs and Desert Hot Springs, Freeman said.

The British Columbia Construction Association, which represents some 2,000 companies, will have a delegation at the job fair, as it has at similar job fairs held in Ireland and Scotland, said Abigail Fulton, vice president and an attorney with the association based in Victoria, British Columbia.

“We actually do the immigration work at no charge,” said Fulton, who noted the association is not looking for laborers but rather skilled tradesmen familiar with large commercial and industrial-type projects.

Along with competitive or even higher wages than companies are paying in the U.S., Canadian recruiters are touting steady work, retention bonuses, free universal health care and quality schools.

A flier sent out by Riverside County, the British Columbia Construction Association and the Canada California Business Council lists heavy equipment operators, iron workers, pipe fitters, mechanics, and mechanical and electrical engineers as among trades that are needed.

Of course, Canadian companies and recruiters aren't just limiting their search to the USA. Similar trade shows like the one set to take place in Indio have already been set up in Ireland and Scotland. Canadian officials have also been courting Polish immigrants in the United Kingdom, attempting to coax them into making the move to Canada. While this may sound like an unusual or way-too-specific niche, as of 2001 there are an estimated 980,000 Canadians of Polish ancestry [including Wayne Gretzky, Geddy Lee and William Shatner- NANESB!] and the UK's Office for National Statistics estimated there were an estimated 515,000 Poles either temporarily or permanently residing in the United Kingdom as of 2010.

UK Federation of Poles chairman Włodek Mier-Jedrzejowicz said he had been contacted by Canadian officials who said they were particularly keen on Poles able to fluently speak English.

While there are no doubt some drawbacks for Americans working in Canada [ie- you'd be taxed four times- US federal taxes, Canadian federal taxes, the provincial tax of wherever you live and the state tax of the last state you resided in before leaving- NANESB!] the Canadian dollar and the US dollar are roughly on par, interest rates for savings is slightly higher in Canada and provinces like Saskatchewan and Alberta enjoy more economic freedom than all but a handful of US states according to a Canadian think tank. A recent report from the Fraser institute also stated that Canada is among the top five nations in the world for economic freedom while the USA has plummeted from second place to 18th.

I find it interesting that when I was growing up, I remember that American liberals wanted the nation to follow Canada's lead as far as healthcare, military spending and gun control went. However, now that Canada is drilling for oil, sending troops to Afghanistan and rolling back gun control laws the liberals here in the USA aren't as keen to have the country be more like Canada.

Union-Sponsored Wal Mart Employee Black Friday Walkout 'Mostly a Fizzle'

A threatened Black Friday nationwide walkout by Walmart employees sponsored by Moveon.org, Occupy Wall Street and labor unions reportedly has done nothing to crimp the mega-retailer's sales on the busiest shopping day of the year.

Protests did take place at some stores, with SEIU members, MoveOn.org and Occupy Wall Street activists making noise, The Blaze reported, but very few Wal-Mart employees participated nationwide.

The Associated Press said that "nine people, including three employees, were arrested shortly after noon for blocking the street" outside the store in Paramount, Calif., but "more than 1,000 people" blocked traffic outside the store at one point in the protest.

"A union-backed group called OUR Walmart has said that it is holding an estimated 1,000 protests in 46 states. The exact number is unclear. Wal-Mart has refuted that estimate, saying the figure is grossly exaggerated and that the protests involved few of its own employees," the AP added.

Wal-Mart said that only 50 employees participated in the protests, but the United Food and Commercial Workers union disagrees, the Washington Examiner reported.

"It said 'hundreds and hundreds' joined in at events across the country," Sean Higgins wrote, but that number could not be verified.

"Even assuming the UFCW figure is correct, that is pretty small given that Wal-Mart is the nation’s largest employer, with 1.4 million people working at its stores," Higgins added.

A number of retailers, including Wal Mart [NYSE- WMT], didn't even wait for midnight on Thanksgiving to open their doors to hundreds of shoppers hoping to score Black Friday deals. Despite the threatened walkout sponsored by the United Food and Commercial Workers (UFCW) or SEIU, Wal Mart reportedly had their best ever Black Friday with an increasing number of transactions taking place online.

A number of both online and brick and mortar retailers such as Amazon, Wal Mart, Best Buy, Sears are expecting 'Cyber Monday'- the Monday the weekend after Thanksgiving- to be the single busiest online shopping day of the year.