What’s Up? – Cheney – Truth Serum – Exposing the “Sith” Lord – Darth Cheney; 4 overlooked facts; Col Wilkerson on the “Sith” Lord; Torture; Friday Funnies: Summer doldrums come early to US stock markets; Reading the Tea Leaves

Darth Cheney -Truth Serum 

• More Americans were killed by terrorists under his administration than any other.
• “American Don’t Torture” was at least as big a lie as Clinton’s “I didn’t have sex with that women.”
• Cheney /Bush authorized a massive torture system that include torture to find fictitious WMD’s in Iraq.
• The Cheney/Bush torture program was the (or a) major reason Islamic terrorism has grown. (unjust invasion if Iraq other major cause)

The Abu Ghraib torture photos (early 2004) basally put an end to the massive torture and rendition program. Participants became too fearful of retribution. Therefore, since the beginning of 2004 mainland America has remained safe without a huge torture program. See Steve Clemons/Larry Wilkerson editorial on Cheney for more. 

Col. Wilkerson , Secretary Powell’s chief of staff, is horrified at the damage Limbaugh and the “Sith” Lord(from Star Wars) Cheney is doing to his Republican party. 

Friday Funnies 

In keeping with a new tradition – keeping Friday funny – here’s Darth Cheney, err, Darth Vader video of him conduction the star troopers orchestra

STOCKS

AS ALWAYS, DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH BEFORE INVESTING

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“Capitalism Could Fail” is the headline story on CNBC this AM by noted bear Marc Faber

6 Insurance Companies got themselves over leveraged and will receive $22 billion in TARP $. WSJ story Insurance companies are a big part of the Shadow Banking system.

Technicals & Fundamentals

Prediction at beginning of week – Right now this looks like natural profit taking after a big run higher. I could develop into a reversal if volume increases. – Unless we have a major move higher we will end the week down.

Volume has dried up to a trickle. Looks like an ocean with no breeze. No breeze means no direction.

XLF - The ETF that tracks financials (mostly shadow banks ) after three down days rose (as predicted – see last two days) +3.34% in below average declining volume. Volume is NOT confirming the price move.

Taking your ownadvise – I did not buy FAS – as I urged short term day and swing traders – boy what a mistake. Would have made @10% and got out. 

With volume NOT confirming the price move – its hard to use XFL today as a short term forecast tool. But longer term bullish trend is still in place.

Market’s Major Mantra – Again If Shadow Banks go up – so will stocks. If Shadow banks go down so will stocks 

WTIC charts “Light Crude Oil”.(see chart) Notice after Oil hit a low @$37 a barrel in Feb. it rose to a range between $48 and $54 for over a month and over a month ago it broke out and two days ago reached a high of almost $60. 

Yesterday oil prices rose +0.76% to $59.42. The major resistance level is @$60 and a move above this would be bullish for stocks and bad for consumers. Summer driving season is around the corner and historically prices rise at this time.

BDI, The Baltic Dry Sea Index, that measures worldwide trade has reached a new high this year. The fact that prices to ship goods worldwide is moving higher is bullish for stocks.

Reading the Tea Leaves – Summer doldrums seem to have started early. The BDI & higher oil prices (secondary forecast tools) are both bullish. The overriding fundamental factor is Shadow Banks – So far they have pretty much got what they want from the Obama administration – Banks privatized gains and Taxpayers socializing losses. 

So after some more consolidation we’ll probably see a move higher. Of course unexpected news can change all this.

AS ALWAYS DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH BEFORE INVESTING !

WHAT’S UP? Thanks to all of you who wrote in comments and set the agenda for both SmackDown and Torture; The endemic of torture – accountability, your comments, definition, & its cost in American lives; Shadow Banks and the Stress test;  Flu Pandemic hits stocks; Major changes at GM;  Market – Technicals & Fundamentals.

TORTURE

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Definition of Torture

• The Spanish Inquisition waterboarded and we called it TORTURE (Frank Rich - Link)
• The Japanese waterboarded (WW 2) We executed those responsible and called it TORTURE (see ewanapt’s comments)
• The vicious dictator Pol Pot(Cambodia) waterboarded and we called it TORTURE
• The scum in North Korea waterboarded and we called it TORTURE
• The Cheney Bush administration waterboarded and we call it ”ENHANCED INTERROGATION TECHNIQUES.’

Commission on Accountability

The endemic and acceptance of torture has dramatically altered the moral character of our nation.

Torture authorized  by the Cheney/Bush administration was not used in one singlular Jack Bauer (TV show 24) moment but instead spread throughout the world.  Authorized torture approved by the government elites – from the 84 ghost prisoners to Gitmo to Abu Ghraib to Afghanistan – flourished throughout the world. See, Andy Worthington’sTen Terrible Truths About Torture

One of the greatest outrages of our time has been the change in America’s character to accept torture. Character and moral values used to be what separated us from Chairman Mao and al Quaeda.

Please join me and others  calling for an independent non partisan commission to examine and publicly report on their findings. See-

Commission on Accountability.org 

Dick Cheney

The Overlooked Cost in American Lives

Our use of  Torture killed  a whole lot of Americans “The reason why foreign fighters joined al-Qa’ida in Iraq was overwhelmingly because of abuses at Guantanamo and Abu Ghraib and not Islamic ideology,” says Major Matthew Alexander, who personally conducted 300 interrogations of prisoners in Iraq.”  

Torture and the “unjust” occupation/war in Iraq was the #1 recruiting tool for Islamic terrorists. who have and will kill thousands of Americans. See  ”Torture? It probably killed more Americans than 9/11″ -LINK

STOCKS

Technicals & Fundamentals

Mantra -Forget all about the major indexes - What happens to the shadow banks (financials) absolutely dominates stock  trading.

We are in the second 1/2 of earnings season.

Possible Flu pandemic negatively impacting markets throughout world.

Major changes coming out of GM. They are dropping major lines of cars and more.(breaking)

XLF - The ETF that tracks financials (mostly shadow banks) rose +2.24% Friday in increased volume.  Financials have lead this rally and if they  collapse so will almost all other sectors (see Positions section of blog on XLF) 

The XFL is consolidating between @ 9.4 & 11.3. XFL closed at 10.94. We are moving close to strong resistance level at @ 11.3.  This is the resistance level all Wall Street is watching.

BDI -Baltic Dry (Sea) Index has rebounded. (see BDI chart on side of blog) Translation – world trade is doing better.

Reading the Tea leaves – Stocks are in a tug of war-but the trend looks up. Here’s a CNBC article that agrees with this outlook. Technically we are consolidating, but there has been more upside days in big volume than downside days in big volume. Fundamentally the big event is the May 4th “Stress Test” announcement. Here some more info on the Stress Test.

Fearless Forecast.-  It’s hard to see the FLX break out above the 11.3 resistance level before the “Stress Test” on the shadow banks becomes public. But, at the rate the current administration is caving into the big banks a breakout seems likely after 5/4

AS ALWAYS DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH BEFORE INVESTING! 

What’s Up? – Your Smack Down List- 20, count them, 20 smack downs – you guys are angry – The HULK is on his way; The New Your Times – a phenomenal resource – Charts, graphs and data. Consumer Rights Legislation; Barney Battles Banks; David Brooks on Obamanomics; Tomorrow - Torture

     Your  SMACK DOWN LIST

Investor’s411 is sending THE HULK (Movie version above) to Smack Down the following people, institutions, & concepts that you selected. Instead of 10 Smack Downs YOU came up with 20. To see full list of comments & reasoning scroll down on this link.

1. Alan Greenspan
2. Hit & run Drivers
3. Hezbollah
4. Hamas
5. Inflating intelligence
6. Larry Summers
7. Ahmadinejad
8. Bush
9. Cheney
10. Rumsfeld
11. Tortures
12. Junk mail
13. trashing the environment
14. Former Senator Coleman
15. Minnesota going without representation
16. MN Governor Pawlenty
17. those who cut education
18. those who cut health care
19. N. Dakota sate legislature
20. those who discriminate

For those of you who missed out on Smack Down comments or thought we missed something - tomorrow’s #1 topic is TORTURE. There will be another Smack Down List next month.

AP photo Scott Appelwhite 

Consumer Rights Legislation

Barney Frank is leading the major consumer rights bill through congress . You can imagine how hard the Shadow Banks & Credit Card Companies are fighting this bill to aid consumers. Obama meeting with big banks today. NYT story

Say what you want about, Barney Frank, but he like Elizabeth Warren is one of the heroes fighting the big money Shadow Banks. No bank(s) owns Barney Frank The Republicans and many Democrats owned by the big banks killed his efforts for consumers last year. Check out his long but enlightening “Great Economic Hole” Speech of 2/4/09

Why the NYT’s is a Phenomenal Resource

* NYT has a graph and interactive chart telling Where Your $ Bailout Money Has Gone 

* NYT has another chart/outline on Our Government’s Total Bailout Tab

* NYT has another interactive chart on Pay at the Top (CEO’s)

Obamanomics

Obama’s landmark economic speech is reviewed by conservative NYT columnist David Brooks Also see April 15th blog post on Obama’s speech.

Tomorrow TORTURE

This is the #1 topic among the blogs. Want to lead the discussion? Send in your comments below.

STOCKS

Technicals & Fundamentals

Repeat from yesterday -Forget all about the major indexes - What happens to the shadow banks (financials) absolutely dominates stock  trading.

Earning season continues – Markets have already factored in most of the bad news into this earnings reports. Apple and Ebay did hit earnings home runs. UPS struck out

XLF - The ETF that tracks financials (mostly shadow banks) rose +0.91% in decreased volume.  Financials have lead this rally and if they  collapse so will almost all other sectors (see Positions section of blog on XLF) This leading index is the one to watch.

Short Term Outlook -(again a repeat) Second technical chink in the bulls armor appeared Monday – another big volume sell off.  Volume, the #1 confirmation factor of stock price moves. But Tuesday’s bigger volume (for FLX) means we are one again going up on the roller coaster and gives hopes to bulls.

Too early to make a call on which way this may break, but short term traders should pay attention. The Danger signs to watch for - more big price/volume decline  and/or stocks moving lower on no news or good news. Especially in the XLF

Reading the Tea Leaves - Look for a pull back this week or before the governments “Stress Test” becomes public May 4th. 

AS ALWAYS DO YOUR OWN RESEARCH BEFORE INVESTING!