Eat My Fallout

I’m bouncing out of nuclear explosions here, as CCJ is up another 10% today. UEC is trailing, up about only 2%. AWK and physical silver are also doing well, up more than 2% themselves. Why, everything else I own is green too, as I crush the markets with impunity.

On top of that, I’m in a good mood, as I had a great weekend, which included shooting craps at MGM casino and a bottle of Glenlivet Scotch.

And on the issue of MGM; I sold out of my position because of fear that Japan would cause the treasury market to melt down. I already miss it…

You can expect me to re-buy my shares, probably after the proceeds from my stint in uranium miners comes to a glorious close.

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Oh, in case you missed the spectacle, I am partially long CCJ and UEC (5% each, not a full position in my eyes), since uranium is awesome. My cash position stands at 10%.

The reasoning goes something like this: you people are over reacting, so I’ll be buying up the energy source which runs much of your grids, cheap.

Most people jumped into alternative energy, coal, and natural gas, on the assumption that this was the end of nuclear prospects. However, you do not build a coal firing plant or natural gas plant any faster than you build a nuclear reactor. And alternative energy has its own limitations when it comes to implementing. So for the meantime, there’s really no room to deviate from using nuclear fuel.

As to the health prospects of the Japanese unfortunate enough to be around the reactors, we still don’t know what’s being flung into the air. I slaughtered the description of particles yesterday, confusing them, but then I was going from the top of my memory. Allow me to correct those errors here.

Alpha emitters, like uranium, have an incredibly short Linear Energy Transfer. This makes them both incredibly safe to be around, and incredibly dangerous to ingest. On their own, touching them will not generally harm you as the energy being given off will not penetrate the depth of your skin. If they get inside of you, however, a very large amount of energy can be delivered directly to your most vulnerable organs, causing great damage. Incidentally, their interaction distribution is also finite in length (I thought it was the gamma ray) which means that with 100% certainty, there exists a length after which no radiation will be left to interact (called a Bragg curve).

So, if uranium is presently being thrown inland to where the Japanese grow their food, or if any people are unlucky enough to breathe too much in, they’re pretty fucked.

However, we don’t even know that it is uranium fuel (as in uranium 235 or 234) that is being emitted. Consider:

1. Spent uranium (like that in the storage pool) has oxidized and contains much lower levels of uranium 234 and 235. Oxidized uranium is apparently more stable and not as easily absorbed by the body, (only .5% of oxides will be absorbed, as they are not water soluble). Uranium passes quickly through the digestive track, exiting the body in short time.

2. In general, oxidized uranium is safer than regular uranium. If the amount being kick up in the reactor is sufficiently small, then the extreme heat combined with oxygen may neutralize much of the danger in short time.

3. Readings of radiation levels have been well within acceptable Equivalent Dosage limits.

4. Readings may be from Beta particles or Gamma rays, which do not have the long term consequences of Alpha emitters, when released into the environment.

Combine that with the consequences from Chernobyl (way over estimated), the lack of quickly implemented substitutes (Europe doesn’t have a lot of choices at this moment), and the fact that almost half of all Americans surveyed have expressed support for nuclear power, and you’re looking at a good buying opportunity.

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It has been a busy March, no one will argue that.

Libya and Japan happening side by side has made for a nearly impossible to navigate landscape. Everyone’s at risk of taking damage here. However, hopefully things will abruptly settle down next week.

I definitely didn’t believe that the U.N. would actually move against Libya. However, with Qaddafi busy crushing the remains of the opposition, it’s not much of a move. Unless Qaddafi’s forces are completely dependent on air strikes, well…let’s just say they only have one town left.

Maybe Libyans will pull an Iraq on Qaddafi, effectively turning the country into a guerilla nation?

Meanwhile, the U.N. nuclear watchdog group raised the warning level of the Japanese nuclear situation today to 5, which I guess means core damage and potential long term consequences. While I don’t want to minimalize the seriousness of this, for the Japanese, in hindsight I think the bigger issue was the damage caused by the tsunami, not some radiation.

Just as an observation, people tend to overestimate the damage from small, complicated things, and ignore the big issues dangling in front of their faces. Ignore the nuclear issue, and you’ll see the U.N. scrambling to devalue the Yen, as the world needs the Japanese to be fine almost as much as Japan does.

U.S. debt yields spiking is bad news for just about everyone right now. I could see global markets pull back viciously if anything happens to the ability of the U.S. to raise money. Keep in mind, most of the world’s nations are holding our notes, and they all hold the dollar as reserves. U.S. credit speculation is not a headache anyone can afford right now, as it would flesh alive currency markets and governments alike. The resulting austerity and loss could in turn flesh consumers. Which in turn fleshes business. Even precious metals may take a temporary set back, as people scramble to settle debts (although that space would likely prevail).

Watch the communications among global leaders as they try to sort out a deal that doesn’t involve Japan selling treasuries. Ignore the rest of the headlines.

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Look, forgive my obstinacy, but despite having devolved to a cash position yesterday by way of selling out of MGM, NRP, and TLP, I did so purely because of appreciation on what a Japan meltdown could do to other traders and investors. I am obligated to hold some cash, with the possibility of unattended bond auctions creating ramping yield environments, so that I might buy said auctions. I am obligated to sell a company like MGM when questions about global trade are put on the plate. And, yes, I am obligated to take profits from a very successful two years of strategy, when it looks like the dollar is suddenly, miraculously undervalued (by no means of its own, of course).

However, despite taking a few steps back, I still like all the positions in my portfolio. Even the ones I sold. Cash, at this point, is an insurance policy, not a policy unto itself. I might refrain from repurchasing TLP or NRP, but MGM is still in the deck, provided this blows over.

On to a more pressing issue, let me remind you in the audience that you are not nuclear physicists. I’m hearing some pretty outlandish claims here, which I can easily spot as being false. For instance: Chernobyl.

Chernobyl is perhaps the most over hyped event to have occurred in human history. When it transpired, no prediction of human casualties was high enough to accurately assess the situation. Whether it was hundreds of thousands or hundreds of millions, the number of deaths resulting from the incident was to be unparalleled.

As of 2005, a staggering 56 people had died as a consequence of Chernobyl, and meanwhile, cases of cancer attributed to the accident (from which there is a 99 percent survival chance) are both:
• Below original estimates, and;
• Unreliable, since before the accident, records of cancer in populations are sketchily kept, at best.

There was a fairly excellent collection of essays by Dr. Michael Crichton on the issue, as I recall, but upon checking his legacy site, I find that they have been removed in ominous fashion. So instead, I’ll just link to this article from the Times in 2005.

You see, I know most of you are full of shit. You cannot tell me the difference between an alpha emitter, a beta emitter, or a gamma emitter. You have no idea what a nuclear plant uses, and hence no idea what is being thrown into the air. And depending on what that material is, the consequences of coming into contact with it vary. In some cases, you could swallow the fucking stuff, and it would cause you less harm than if it were a short distance away from you.

If that last statement makes no sense to you…that’s exactly my point. Calm the fuck down. You people talk about nuclear energy like a 14th century clergyman talks about witchcraft.

Nuclear energy will still have a place in the future, and if the Greenpeace lot skip around much harder, I’ll be putting cash next to mouth, in force.

And good day to you, sirs.

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I locked in the rest of my former positions, selling off all shares of MGM, TLP, and NRP.

I’m holding the new ones, AWK, AEC, CLP, and BG. Also, my silver position, obviously.

The problem for me is that cash is definitely not king, just a low priced bet. There’s no safe haven left, unless you’re willing to buy precious metals at these levels.

Update: I ran the numbers, and have about a 26% cash position in my portfolio. That corresponds to about a 20% cash position net, when you throw silver back into the mix.

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In a logical progression, which I’ve been expecting for some time now, Michigan’s most self entitled have suddenly awoken, up in arms over the new budget being proposed by Rick Snyder.

As I said, this is no surprise to me; I’ve been waiting for it day and night since Wisconsin kicked off the party by slamming unions.

An attack on unions anywhere could challenge the unions nationwide. And nowhere in this nation are unions thicker, dumber, and more obstinate than in the state shaped like a hobo’s glove.

I should know; I’ve lived here my whole life.

I have had the unenviable pleasure of watching our state’s self centered bullshit spiral now for literally decades. I talk with the aged then-70’s revolutionists who are now teaching my state’s youth. I’ve passed by the limestone monuments that the entitlement culture erected to themselves on Detroit’s coastline. I’ve shaken my head for years as their members complained how no business wants them and their unappreciative and rigid demands.

And so, it was inevitable that when this snowball started rolling down the hill, it would eventually blast through Lansing, MI. on its way to Detroit.

From the Detroit FreePress:

LANSING – More rallies are planned at the Capitol this week to protest Gov. Rick Snyder’s budget and tax plans, and labor union leaders warmed up the stage today by denouncing what they called tax breaks for big businesses at the expense of families, seniors and school children.

A rally of seniors Tuesday is to be spearheaded by AARP Michigan, which has arranged nine busloads of 400 seniors. The “It’s not Fair!” rally is certain to focus on Snyder’s proposal to end income tax exemptions on pensions.

Wednesday, another union-led rally is planned, similar to several in recent weeks, the largest a Feb. 26 rally to show sympathy for protesters in Wisconsin opposed to moves there to eliminate collective bargaining rights for state workers.

Nothing here should really surprise you much; same self entitled crap that gets spewed anytime a “sacrosanct” benefit is cut or reduced, anywhere in the country. All the same talking points, even.

However, where the Michigan variation of this culture stands out is in its blatant stupidity and subsequent willingness to phrase obviously ludicrous propositions as if they were matter of fact principles.

Confused? Let’s bring up a later statement of this news article to make my point:

Among those promoting the seniors rally Tuesday is Mary Lee Woodward, 63, of Oxford. She started a Facebook page to drum up opposition on Feb. 17, the same day Snyder unveiled his budget plan.

She said she’s a GM retiree who’s especially angry over his proposal to tax all of her pension.

Okay, so far so good. A Michigan GM retiree who has a tax free pension and thinks she shouldn’t have to pay up. Not notable. But where does this woman stand out, that I would bring her up?

“I bought a new truck and a house,” Woodward said. “If I have to pay tax on my pension, I’m going to lose my truck.”

Did you catch that?

Glossing over what a 63 year old woman is doing buying a house on nothing but a pension, or the fact that plenty of other states in this country do tax pensions, let’s just skip straight to the point where she wants an entire state of almost ten million people to scream to a halt and suffer so that she can keep her brand new fucking-automobile.

And just why is it, then, that if her pension gets taxed she will lose her new car (many people here are losing the home and the car) in the first instance?

Because she, like the distinguishable preponderance of every union member I’ve ever met in my life, is absolutely terrible at budgeting and planning.

They’ve spent their days running their budgets to the hilt – 100%, flat lining, running on empty, burning the motor, spinning the wheels…call it whatever you want. They have zero maneuvering room in their day to day lives. If this were poker, they ante up, every single time.

And if anything goes wrong, they get completely wiped out.

Except, they do it in a way that is completely, terrifying, numbingly afraid of any perception of “risk.” Of their cash flow, which they are spending up dry every single day of every single week of every months, without even a penny to spare, they aren’t even bothering to take gambles that could maybe, possibly pay off.

I mean, if a see a gambler, maybe he hits it big in slots. If I see someone blowing their life savings on speculative penny stocks, at least the potential payout is thousands, tens of thousands, millions even – to one. Sure, they’ll likely lose it all, if not today then tomorrow. But there is that lingering, almost unimaginably imaginable chance that it could happen.

And that’s what’s instead so pathetic about these kinds of people.

Here, you have someone who at every moment could lose it all, so if you even debate changing anything in the slightest (shy of just handing them more money, of course) they immediately jump to charge, claiming you hate them, children, pets, Jesus, what have you…because if they fail and anything deviates AT ALL, then it’s game over.

But the best case situation is that they come out on par.

And they run this gamble in the same world where just this week revolutionaries are burning the Middle East to the ground and Japan gets half of its shoreline crushed by a tsunami.

But the worst part of it is definitely the selfishness; the persistent demand that everyone else drop their own ambition, goals, and dreams to shelter them.

That’s the great irony here; you may not have caught onto it yet, if you live anywhere else. But here, in Michigan, we’ve had the pleasure of seeing this cycle through. Most of the states with overly influential entitlement programs have only been driven to the brink of bankruptcy.

Here in Michigan, on the other hand, we’re bankrupt. Our state’s been in a recession for over a decade, even while the rest of the world enjoyed the bounties of the greatest bull market bubble we’ve ever seen. That angle lets you glimpse what’s going to happen in other, similar situations now being set up across the country.

It’s sort of like tomorrow’s news, today.

So what’s so ironic about entitled people and just how is it that they’re selfish?

Most people who have something have it because they sacrificed for it. They spend sometimes literally decades striving for that goal. And, while they’re striving, they often do so in a state of wanting.

Pampered offspring of the rich aside, I don’t know many successful people who just fell into lavishness. There’s usually a period of time there when they have less than everyone around them.

When you think about it, it’s obvious why.

In order to save up for big plans, the tradeoff is what you have in the moment. And, since ultimately big plans entitle risks that can leave the practitioner without anything they put into those plans, the act of success very much entails being more content with having less. If you aren’t willing to rent and eat lower quality food, forgo those fun thousand dollar toys, the new car, the new furniture, the new…stuff; well then, you’ll likely never make it very far.

So many of the wealthiest people could be by themselves in a modest setting with very few worldly possessions and, while perhaps striving for more, would still be perfectly happy.

If the endless insults against the “unquenchable greed” of the wealthy have ever caused you to hesitate, it is perhaps that you understood this fact. Many of the world’s richest people are also quite sensible.

Not so with the men and women who are out and about protesting today. They aren’t happy unless they have all of their little bronze fantasy. It must be the four new cars, the house, the ten acres of land, the ATV’s and the snowmobiles and the new golf clubs…and the “everything”.

Miss any of it, and they become disgruntled, dissatisfied, discontented. If any piece of it is missing, then they are genuinely unhappy.

And so these kinds of people are both very greedy AND shit ass poor. Which is the worst sort of depravity there is.

And believe me when I say, they use their near poverty as part of their argument. “Why are you just beating up on poor little old me, with only my small house and few cars and couple million friends who are in the same boat?” It’s not like any one of them has anything substantial.

And that is where the irony comes.

What is greed? Is it what a man has?

Or is it what a man can’t live without?

Really, in that both groups grabbed as much as they could without ever genuinely risking themselves and their positions, I see little difference between the kind of greed that was present in the likes of a Stanford or a Madoff and the kind of greed present in the several million twittering union members across this country, unless it’s this:

Sure, Stanford and Madoff sold out. But at least they exchanged their integrity and their soul’s damnation for a lifetime of unequivocal power. Compare that with these budget busting assholes, who’ve sold their integrity for a four bedroom house and a truck.

And in trying to hide their own willingness to keep what they never sacrificed for, along the way of this entire lengthy process, which is just now ensuing, you can expect them to continue trying to label everyone else as more greedy than they.

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