METASTISIS

Grim headlines greet the business world today as the numbers indicate ordinary Americans, already up to the eyeballs in the black-water of gnarly old debt, have begun to rein in some of that profligate consumption-- Retailers certainly felt the penny pincher's wrath in April blaming the slowdown on rotten weather and the Easter calendar (give us a break!!) with only a few proud brave merchants unafraid of facing the obvious link between skyrocketing gasoline prices and the dissipation of disposable income-- Credit cards were still not enough to add sparkle to wallets almost totally devoid of cash as gasping retail wizards endured a ghastly record decline--


Bugaboo Wal-Mart's decline (3.5%) down-roared at a clip three times analysts' prognostications (1.1%), not, to say the least, a small-time discrepancy, and was met with all manner of arcane excuses including weak merchandising techniques as if window-dressing and rack placement failed to trick enough consumptives into the store-- J C Penney's same store sales sailed into negative territory (2.7%) more than tripling analyst expectations(0.8%)-- Gap gave the old heave-ho to its Ceo to stanch its acute hemorrhaging but found its trite blame-the-quarterback strategy unremittingly ineffective with southward sales torching bottom lines down 16%-- Abercrombie & Fitch's sales pitched their penny into the gathering gloom posting 15% declines over projected estimates of a hefty, in its own mistaken right, 7.4% -- Amazingly Wall Street's blind-leading-the-blind analysts failed to proximate even remote ballpark figures finishing dead-on the Mendoza line, correct on only two of every ten calls-- No wonder people are throwing their diminishing money at the Market, especially given data-glows too good to be true-- Facts are such trifling obstacles to the Dream and besides Goldilocks said the porridge would be OK!! but admitted a less than sanguine short-term caveat concerning pet food from China--


Well, stocks met this morning's less-than-stellar news with a considerably leaden slump-- The grandiose canard of recent record highs not so mysteriously driven by corporate stock buy-back programs in the Market must be disconnected from the real economy, where-ever that may be, as the import price trend up-surged, trade deficit gaps sharply and broadly expanded, and both gasoline and oil prices jumped due to worries over insufficient fuel inventories at the outset of the summer driving season-- Housing troubles continued to the drumbeat of sub-prime metastasis, spreading more foreclosures and less sales across the monopoly board--Analysts and Housing Ceo's were confident the hissing collapse of the housing bubble had bottomed last November-- Now the rich burbs of New York are feeling the relative squeeze-- Do not cross Go!-- Do not collect $200!!!--


At the all-time record Market top in 2000 a stock transaction that put $100 dollars in your pocketbook also put around 75 gallons of gasoline in the tank of your Firebird while a stock transaction at today's all time record high that puts $100 in your pocket only dribbles 38.5 gallons into the tank of your Yukon Deniali-- Somewhere the bang for the buck has gone MIA with the current chimerical run-up rally on Wall Street; Bubbleville, USA-- Feeble job creation numbers last month betray the happy-face economists and their professional optimissimo-- Running on empty..... Running scared!!!--

The long awaited oil bill idling away in the Iraqi Parliament seems to have less and less support as precious time ticks away on the Surge-- For several years Kurdish claims to sovereignty over the oil fields in the north have gone unchallenged largely because the undermanned forces of occupation had their hands busy in more violent sectors-- Suddenly un-enamored by reports American oil companies stand to reap most of the benefits of the oil bill, Kurdish tribal chieftains have opted for defiant stands-- Saudi King Abdullah has not rescinded his remarks tar-and-feathering the American occupation as 'illegal'-- Oil prices will not descend anytime soon--

On the political front the unabashed moral charade of the Organ Grinder's monkey, it was announced today, is coming to its exhausted and deflated end-- Prime Minister Tony Blair accepted his unapologetic fall from faux rectitude offering a tardy resignation to his many grateful subjects-- Unrepentant finality will not occur for a few months as the banty rooster of Downing Street decides to go out on a self aggrandizing note....oblivious to the world's dis-illusionment with his strident efforts to enable aggressive eternal war everywhere-- Unbelievably detached, quintessentially Hollywood-esque, nothing shy of a farewell world tour can suffice as a staged exit-- Dancing to the distant trumpet of a soured imperialism doomed by new world chaos, the vanity of victory will never envelope his efforts nor will it rescue his brokeback buddy--

Mr. Bush on the home-front fends off his own party's blunt-spoken analysis that the Iraq War is having a seriously deleterious effect on the Grand Old Party, not to mention those in the heat and dust of the Iraqi inferno itself-- Playing for time is now the most important game in DC and it does, well, help pass the time as ennui and downfall engulf the entire cast of characters-- Generals Petraeus and Odierno appear to be on different pages each seemingly extending surge deadlines off the cuff while Def-Sec Gates senses an urgency about Iraq that pressures the time-lines bobbing and weaving with every shift in the political winds-- The Decider is not The Coordinator and thus the War Czar job goes unfilled and hence unperformed-- Bush political fortunes risk a numbing paralysis devoted to incessant rear guard battles with the struggling hedging demies enmired by weak leadership in positions of authority and the snipers inside the politically endangered elements of his own party-- Plagued by a host of gnats while the economy, unrecognized and almost an afterthought, sinks--