Morning Folks!!
1 year from today the United States will have the most anticipated election in history. Both the Presidency, Congress and Governors. Our politics is more polarized than anything I have seen in my lifetime. But that is in Washington D.C. The rest of the country are having a serious discussion about the future and that is a good thing. A plurality of opinion would be a good thing. We'll see.
But either way, you will likely never witness another year like the one that starts today. So what does this have to do with domains? Everything! First of all when you have an election year there is a lot of money flying around and that money is flying low. Meaning you can get some of it.
You have certain pieces of a puzzle based on what you already know. The job we all have is filling in the missing pieces before others identify it and then figure out a way to benefit from it. Whether it be in domain names or pigs feet. It really does not matter.
One morning very soon we will wake up and hear 15 are dead and one city somewhere is on fire. That will happen right here in the USA and it will happen in the next 365 days. OK, that may or may not be something that unfolds. But if I assume it will, I can base decisions on that. Right or wrong. This was just an easy example. It can play out in 1000 different ways and the road ahead is going to be like nothing you have ever seen before.
The USA and therefore much of the rest of the world are suffering from a U.S. economy that is PURPOSELY being strangled while the rest of the government is being looted at every stage and every corner with folks that should be in jail.
I am a numbers guy. The numbers paint a different picture than anything politicians can say. $15 Trillion debt and rising at a pace that is incomprehensible is going to produce something none of us want to see. Each DAY of delay as the noose tightening around our necks. There is a breaking point. You will see that in the next 365 days more and more vividly.
I mean for those that want to save the world....did you ever sit there and see how many billions a WEEK we are paying just in interest? Gee, how many schools could you build with that interest going to China? btw....China is booming and building and progressing.
The high school there in the capital got the best test scores of any high school in the entire world. In the WORLD. China is #1 in education while the USA is declining faster than I can write this. They have a simple secret. They teach kids to EMBRACE LEARNING and then they get the hell out of the way and let them learn.
So fasten your seat belts. Start thinking how things will unfold. The WORLD is in crisis and few strong leaders leading the way. Unless Ahmadinejad, Chavez and Putin are your idea of leaders. The balance of power is shifting and the only ones stepping up to seize that opportunity are the bad guys.
So I submit to you that never before in our lifetimes has so much on the line with elections just 1 year from today. You will see positioning, sabre rattling, invasion, bombings, riots, fires, property loss and very big decisions to make just where to draw the line. Chaos is coming.
And there is a parallel in history that I see. But even parallels have huge differences. But the similarities give you a tiny window to see how things will unfold. You just have to factor in all the changes of mankind since that point and meld them all together with new players on the same field.
Have a GREAT Day!
Rick Schwartz
jp
Something I recently discovered is that apparently the US has a policy that they only borrow money in US currency, so all that debt we have is in USD, not Chineese currency. So if our money becomes worthless, which is somewhere along the end of the doom and gloom line, then our debt (albeit would still impossible for us to repay) would also become of no value. So any country that lives/flourishes off the interest, and our ability to buy from them has a pretty strong interest in our money not becoming worthless. Its a tangled web and only time is going to untangle it. If your predictions come true then I think the most concerning thing is that I imagine it will take much more time than a year to untangle all this, so if all that happens in one year then that may be just the tip of the iceberg. Nobody will no for sure until the empire is gone and in the history books.
Dave Wrixon
China may be getting a whole load of interest but their capital is going up in smoke as the US Dollar disappears down the toilet. It is hardly a wonder they are not keen to let the Yuan depreciate, or lend to Greece. They already learnt their lesson the hard way lending to the US.
Bill
Currency may be the least of our problems. When economies collapse, wars often follow. With the number of Americans with their heads still in the sand, I’d say it’s almost inevitable. All that has to be decided is who we call our enemy. Pogo said”We have met the enemy, and he is us.” Too bad Pogo ain’t around anymore.
Gazzip
Well said, I couldn’t agree more.
The shit is hitting the fan.
The next war is big Iran, lets hope China doesn’t jump in to help them.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2056873/Iran-attack-drawn-UK-US-Middle-East-tensions-rise.html
luizh
During the Great Depression that started in about 1929, the government invested in monumental buildings, generating many jobs, it revived symbolically the hope of the population. Now a days a financial collapse is more controllable so there is greater integration among the nations of the world. The economic crisis almost always is caused by a greedy rich minority ,they just want to earn money and it needs to be fought by the American people. In reality, it might have been simpler if we had started from scratch, but I now think you must proceed on the basis you already have.Good article!
Matthew
There is only one candidate interested in America AND predicted all this….and that is RON PAUL.
Herman Cain – Former Federal Reserve Official
Newt Gingrich – Member of the Council on Foreign Relations
Rick Perry – Member of the Bilderberger Group
Mitt Romney – Obama Lite with ties to ALL the global organizations.
Obama – Shill for the NWO
Tis obvious people…WAKE UP!!!!!!!!!!!11111
richard
Things in China are not as rosy as they appear though. Economic data, whatever it is worth, points to a slowdown in china and you cant take a hard landing off the table for the chinese or anyone else.
When push comes to shove fiat currencies are ultimately backed by both gold reserves and military might imo. I cant fathom how the dollar euro carry trade continues at these exchange rates given the turmoil, the only thing that makes sense is that the euro is pricing in the fact that euro countries combined hold more gold reserves combined than the us.
There is little doubt that war will be necessary to ultimately get out of this self induced irrational debt exuberance the fed and tbtf banking cartel has bestowed upon the people.
All that being said, i disagree with your opinion on occupy wall street. The people are fed up with the banks getting free money from the fed while everyone else suffers. I see occupy wall street protesting against the current deranged policy of trying to create a wealth effect in order to kickstart the economy. The policy has failed for 3 years now with unemployment not budging; the savers have been penalized for coming on 4 years now with zero interest rate policy (zirp). The people are starting to finally wake up and realize they are pawns being gamed so the rich can get richer at their expense.
RK
I can’t argue on what might happen within the next year, but figured I’d let you guys know that actually the biggest holder of the US national debt is US government itself(around 52%), a lot of debt is held by the US banks and households. Out of the foreign governments who hold the debt China is actually not even on the first place. The first place belongs to Japan.
Bill Roy
God almighty. I never knew there were so many defeatists in the domaining community.
Right, first things first. Sure China is the financial power house at the moment, the US and Europe gave China the ends to gain the dominant financial position. Me, you, and everybody else in the west who thought it was great buying things cheaply and importing them from China are the reasons that ‘we’ are broke and China isn’t. What is more is that the people who should have been able to see this are clearly represented by ‘domainers’ as a group, we are the entrepreneurs of our generation!
Look China has beat us at our own game, they used extremely cheap labour from a huge labour force to produce the goods that ‘we’ willingly bought from them. China did what we all hope to do. So stop this damn stupid bemoaning about China (or India, or Brazil, or anyone else for that matter) and get back to doing what ‘you’ think you do best, be entrepreneurs!!!!
For those that think Obama has been a failure perhaps you had better look at what he has had to deal with, just like Cameron here in the UK, massive debt, a recession, now a world in financial mess, and yet they have kept it together, and that against the backdrop of a whole army of nay sayers who think that some sweeping change would be a panacea to all the problems. If you want to find someone to steady the ship then look at our respective leaders. Both the President and the Prime Minister are steering us through these times against the backdrop of minorities for their own parties in Congress and Parliament respectively, and guess what, it was us the people who created those situations as well!
Now if you are not up to being entrepreneurs, if you cannot find a solution to a problem, if you just want to give-up and/or point a finger of blame at someone else because that is the easy thing to do then you have lost the plot, or rather you did not have what it takes to understand the plot in the first place. But, for those who see the problem, don’t blame others, don’t belittle those who succeed, and who work their bloody socks off – well to those I will say that the morrow is yours, and deservedly so.
Yes there could well be civil unrest, the US has its fair share of nutters just like any other country, look at your modern history for examples. But I do not think that over 306 million people will fall into the extremist grasp very easily.
Oh and one last thing, a millionaire should never ever pay a smaller percentage of their income than someone earning less than them, that is just abhorrent in the extreme, and I particularly refer to those that fund political parties with their wealth. And I hope to be and fully expect to be a millionaire within the year, it is called social responsibility.
Bill Roy
Last paragraph should read:
‘Oh, and one last thing, a millionaire should never ever pay a smaller percentage of their income in tax than someone earning less than them, that is just abhorrent in the extreme, and I particularly refer to those that fund political parties with their wealth, it is called social responsibility. (And I hope to be and fully expect to be a millionaire within the year.)
jrb
Last thing the world needs is another war, hopefully for the sake of our kids they find another way out. Governments need to spend less, borrow less, tax more, and we all need to learn to live with less until this gets solved. Time to pay the piper.
Matthew
@ Bill Roy –
Nigel Farage has predicted all this in Europe. Your people would be wise to listen to him. Instead, liberal statists all over seem hell-bent on re-distributing everyone elses wealth. As Thatcher said,…”the problem with communism is, eventually you run out of other peoples money”. National identity and sovereignty should not be sacrificed so that TPTB can bring in a NWO.
Peter
” for life is a passionate tiger, with far too ready a fang.”
Great blog Rick.
Gene
You’ve covered a lot of topics over the years, which I certainly appreciate (most of which I agreed with, some I didn’t). But this post is the most accurate – and important – of all of them.
2012 will be all about politics and elections – which aren’t, necessarily, one in the same.
I’m ever hopeful, but it will be a scary year, and one that will keep news junkies and investors busy 24/7. For domain name investors, this will be the year where the quick (registrants, developers, and sellers) will be rewarded.
OWS will end very badly, I’m afraid to say.
I say this as one who’s office is located in the area of Zuccotti park; and one who watches this circus several times per day from 25 feet away. It’s coming to a head within a week or two.
And the battle that’s ultimately emerging is between the Productive Class and the Unproductive Class. The former are sick of supporting the latter – and sitting by passively is no longer an option.
SL
@Gene: The distinction you’re missing in your arrogant characterization is that many of the”Productive Class” have fallen into the”Unproductive Class” in the last few years. The anger at the banks should boil down to one issue, that of loans to kickstart the economy again. It’s the only way out.
But it appears that things are changing somewhat because of the pressure exerted across the country. Here’s one example of the Big bank/Small bank issue, the denial of small business loans to well qualified applicants:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/11/04/small-businesses-switching-from-big-banks-to-local-banks_n_1070547.html
Bill Roy
Matthew I am amongst the biggest Euro-sceptics on here, I am not in favour of the EU, the Euro as a currency is an idiotic idealistic joke with no firm foundation (fellow members of DNF will know my views on this subject and will know I am a Conservative).
Now when you start talking about Mr. Farage I would suggest you look at ‘all’ his and his party’s so-called policies and then decide just how good his version of the future would be. As for quoting one line of Thatcher it is on the same par as baking a Christmas pudding by just reading one line of the recipe, and a Christmas pudding served up which consists solely of uncooked flour is just not worth it!
I totally agree that ‘National Identity’ is important, but who decides what is included and what is not? As for national sovereignty we are constantly negotiating this away and/or retrieving it through diplomatic alliances and treaties, there is nothing new in this. The difference with the EU is that they are trying to demand that such are forever binding, something that is totally absurd and has been shown to be such by the Greek mess over the past week, for one great thing has emerged from this, and that is that countries can leave the EU if they wish – something that had up until this week been strenuously denied by Brussels and the Europhiles. Britain has won this week because of this, now the EU is measurably weaker.
jp
As Richard so accurately said, essentially currency is backed by gold, and more importantly GUNS. So the US is in troublebe because we have a borrowing problem. So what happens When we dont pay back a creditor (like China)? They are gonna be pissed, and their country is gonna be in a bad way. It’s realistically to think they will want to kick our ass (same goes for other countries as well). Just hope that in the bottom line that we have the bigger and better guns to back our currency. Pulling a big gun alone has the power to stop a fight dead in it’s tracks. Govermnet needs to cut back spending but not on military. Military is the greatest asset for a country to have, just not as obviously useful every day as some other assets but it is and more. Dismantling the military, although lovely in nature, would be a grave mistake, we need those big guns just as much as we need the money.
I also think by the way that we are quite a ways off from looking out the window and seeing the streets on fire. Although I sound pretty carried away in this comment, I wouldn’t get to carried away here.
David
We are doomed. Doomed I say.
Josh
“I’d let you guys know that actually the biggest holder of the US national debt is US government itself(around 52%)”
Which means, they (the Federal Reserve) are just printing money and”lending” it to themselves (the US). We’re monetizing our own debt. The results will prove catestrophic. It’s but one reason I’ve been in gold since it was 700s and silver since it was in the 11’s.
Gazzip
“As Richard so accurately said, essentially currency is backed by gold, and more importantly GUNS.”
The US dollar is a fiat currency and since about 1971 has not been backed by Gold, its backed by faith and a promise to pay the bearer.
Bernanke has printed so much of it the value is nowhere near what it was.
That is the reason why China, India, Russia and others are buying tons of gold at the moment, the faith of the dollar as a world currency is in question.
Pablo
So how will this impact domains? And TLD’s?
Bill
@RK, afraid you’re wrong about the largest foreign holder of US debt. It is China, not Japan, at least according to the US Treasury website (if you trust them!). The positive thing about so much debt being held domestically is that it’s not only China who will get shafted when the dollar crashes, but anyone depending on US social security, Medicare, food stamps or other federal assistance. It won’t be pretty.
peter
and what is the effect on the domaining industry?? where is it heading towards??