we think we know what we're doing

 it don't mean a thing.

it's all in the past now, cause money changes everything. (c. Lauper / the Brains)

so what happened yesterday ? let me give a very basic explanation followed by very specific allegations.

normally we think of investing as buying stock ABC for $ 100 and eventually selling ABC for a price greater than $100....as Pat Garry would say  Buy low / Sell High.....but some people look at stocks and don't want to invest because they think the future is not bright for the ABC ( long term or short term). So their investment objective is the reverse , sell high / buy low , but how do you sell something that you do not own ?  on wall street you borrow it . 

simple example:  Eggroll  wants to buy ABC at $5 ,  Mac agrees to sell him 100 shares that he does not have. Mac borrows the shares from Schwab...........Schwab collects the $500 from Eggroll and gives Eggroll the  shares on behalf of Mac......Schwab keeps the $500 in an account for Mac until he settles the loan and gives them back their 100 shares. a week later ABC is trading at $3.50 ......Mac buys 100 shares for $350 , he gives schwab their shares and they give him his $500 ( he just made $150) Eggroll still has his 100 shares in a shoebox under his futon and he hopes someday that ABC bounces back.

Schwab charges Mac a fee for borrowing the shares , but where do they get their shares to give eggroll ? That's where MARGIN comes in......when a client trades on Margin they can borrow $$ from a brokerage based on the loan value of their portfolio, but they also enter into a rehypothecation agreement....which means the stocks that are used as collateral for the loan can be lent out by the brokerage firm....so schwab takes shares from their clients' inventory and uses them to give to eggroll, knowing that someday Mac will return the 100 shares and they will put them back in Matteau's account......In order for this whole merry go round to work, there has to be an abundance of shares available to lend/borrow......it's much more complicated than my example as there are hundreds of millions of stocks and shares in play everyday and rules on borrowing..... years ago , the stock loan dept was very powerful...as brokerages could lend shares to other brokerages in addittion to lending to their clients......so Morgan Stanley and Goldman both call schwab and ask to borrow 100 ABC , but schwab only has 100 ABC......who decides who gets the shares ? the stock loan dept.......and how did they decide ?  Ranger tickets in the skybox and a nice steak dinner usually did the trick.........ah but i digress.....today it's all computerized and tracked.

But the problem of availability is still an issue........

so if a hedge fund thinks ABC is going down they start selling short.......and selling more and more shares and borrowing from everyone on the street.......but if a brokerage can no longer lend the shares they must immediately call back their original loan ( a short squeeze) .......say Matteau wants his shares back for whatever reason...or an average Joe buys shares and does not want to be on Margin ( so the brokerage can NOT lend his shares) ...now the hedge fund HAS to give back the shares, but where do they get them if they can't borrow them ? they have to BUY them on the open market.....which makes the stock go up...........multiply that by 10,000 reddit nerds buying 100 shares each and the Hedge funds having to also BUY the shares to make delivery and you have 2 million shares traded in a previously a thinly traded stock, and that's how it  goes up 130% overnight.

now what happened at Robinhood ? ? 

well the allegations are that Stevie Cohen of the Mets lent his Pal at Citadell the money to cover his shares of Gamestock....legal.....and he used his influence to convince Robinhood to block the general public from buying GME until Citadell could cover their short....NOT LEGAL.

simple example.....yesterday at 9:30 if you were reading the wall street journal and following the GME story, you may have logged into Robinhood and said let me buy 100 shares of ABC because i know Citadell and others are being forced to buy ABC...and so the price goes up as demand increases....BUT....Robinhood said NO...and they blocked you from buying ABC until after the Hedge funds either bought shares to cover their shorts or were able to find someone on the street willing to lend them shares...and that of course,,,if accurate....is illegal.

side note... Citadell paid Janet Yellen 800K for giving a few speeches last year.......the White House is not concerned with the newly confirmed Treasury Secretary having such friendly ties to someone that will soon be under investigation...........imagine if this was Trump and Mnuchin ?

side note.....Joe Kennedy built his fortune as a whiskey bottlegger and stock scammer.....in 1928 he figured a way to sell more shares than actually existed in certain securities ( think the Producers, where 10 different people owned 100% of the plays proceeds...impossible) and when the company folded....well the stock certificates were worthless.......that lead to the Crash of 1929 and ensuing depression.......and when the market tried to come back they created the SEC to regulate the thiefs....and who was the first President of the SEC ? well yes of course it was Joe Kennedy.....takes a thief to catch a thief...

side Note.......Denny Forrest asked Steve Cohen on Twitter if he would be able to buy Beeeer at Citifield this year with his Bitcoin after it's worthless.

from the bob dylan radio theme on dogs  " one dog told another dog that he was crazy and should go see a physchiatrist........the second dog said he would love to, but he's not allowed on the couch.

happy friday , cheer up...we'll all be dead before long.

 

it takes a lot to laugh

 it takes a train to cry. (dylan)

so my master has been listening to the Bob Dylan Radio Theme Hour on You Tubes this past month and i must say this little doggie learns something new every episode.....Yesterday he listened to the Theme about TRAIN songs.

MIDNIGHT SPECIAL was an old folk song with traditional lyrics and was first recorded by Lead Belly in the 1930's....Creedence Clearwater Revival did a cover in 1969....that much i knew.....what i didn't know was the origin of the folk song.

to paraphrase Mr Dylan , there was a prison in the middle of nowhere in the vast state of Texas and there was a nightly train that passed the prison and would drop off new prisoners and occasionally pickup a newly released individual.  The train arrived between 11 and 1:00 a.m. and thus was dubbed the midnight special. The inmates laying in their bunks would see the headlight of the train reflecting on the prison walls and would dream of the Day it was THEM waiting outside the gates to be picked up and so it followed "Let the Midnight Special shine it's ever loving light on me"

I believe if you think of things, people, fellow dogs...their spirit is alive....even if you don't know them individually.....so the next time you hear the Midnight Special, think of those cats who were signing that hopeful ditty 100 hundred years ago in the desert of Texas, and remember.."if you ever go to Houston, well you better walk right"

LAST TRAIN TO CLARKESVILLE , ah the melody....the happy go lucky , silly sounds of the Monkees.....all the sang about was pretty girls and hilarious hijinks....well not exactly.

Mr Dylan pointed out that this was a song about the hopelessness and uncertainty that surrounded the Vietnam war. In this particular song the hero was shipping to out to war in the morning and was trying to see his girl before he left.

Cause I'm leavin' in the morning, And I must see you again

We'll have one more night together, 'Til the morning brings my train

and then the last lines, which loose their edge when Davey Jones sings them , unless you really listen ...and then you hear the sadness that stands out like fool in the rain

"and I don't know if i'm ever coming back"

good stuff and thank you Mr Dylan for taking the time to shine a new light on some lost forgotten songs on your show and for taking a new look at some classics we think we remember.

Take two

 And hit to right.

Today the 9-1 squids of Annapolis take on the 8-3 cadets of West Point in basketball........basketball?? 

That’s right ....2:30 on the cbs sports network....I have seen Navy play and they are very good .....I am curious to see Army today.

Vacation day note....the NCAA announced the amended schedule for the first two rounds of the tournament ( if you like to play Hookie like me and sit in a bar watching day games on a weekday).....the play in games are slated for Thursday March 19.......the first round is Friday/Saturday....... and the second round is Sunday Monday........so we will have 16 games on Friday and 8 on Monday.......all games are being played in the state of Indiana this year.....tip-off times have not been released but we should at least get a few 4:00 games on Monday ( maybe even a pair of 2:00)

In my memory, I will always see

But when I returned how my eyes have burned
To see how a town could be brought to its knees
By the armoured cars and the bombed out bars
And the gas that hangs on to every breeze
Now the army's installed by the old gas yard wall
And the damded barbed wire gets higher and higher
With their tanks and their guns oh my God what have they done
To the town I loved so well

Don’t know why

 The thought came to me,

But why I’m here I really can’t see, and now (Collins/Van Zandt)

In a year of the pandemic , with so much death around us every day......I don’t know why but for some reason this one bothers me..Donn Sutton passed away today at the age of 75....... I saw him on TV last year and made a mental note about how healthy he looked......great shape, great tan, California living ........seemed like a good guy too.......shame 

you let somebody do the dirty work

 Find some loser, find some jerk

Find some dumb ass do it all for free  ( Jagger/Richards)

woof woof

 canine friends....i lost 2 bones and 1 very special chew toy in the yard last summer....i can't remember where i buried them.....i must be getting old.....i'm 56.......8 in human years.....anyhoo , i could use some help next weekend digging holes and searching for treets......woof back if available.

rhubard tarts and other girly things

 Hi ladies......just wanted to let everyone know that i got some great recipes for Tarts from my sister and i plan on baking all day next saturday if anyone is interested.....also plan on making scented candles and drinking pinot noir ...lol....chow 

censorship is best

 i have found it increasingly difficult to post lately and i think that's part of lefts plan....to keep piling on until we become so exhausted that we give up........i'm not giving up.....some bullet points and observations.

there is an awful lot about what happened at the Capital on January 6th that needs to be investigated, but one point is indisputable.

One million people gathered on the great lawn (ellipse) in an effort to have a rally titled "Save our Country". If President Trump had stepped to the microphone and thanked everyone for coming and calmed everyone down and told them to go home peacefully and to keep trying to save our country or bring about change in their local communities by voting ...and to accept Joe Biden as their President.....do you think the rally would have even made the evening news ? Or would Norah odonnel (she doesn't deserve a capital O and ' ) and the other talking heads spent their 30 minutes gushing over the biden certification . ...honestly ask yourself......would cbs and abc give even 1/10th the coverage they gave to the sleepy floyd demonstrations ?

for 4 years the left cried and cowered and compared President Trump to Hitler and called him a fascist and or a racist....but the President did more to encourage free speech that anyone before him.....everyone was free to say anything good, bad or indifferent about him......professional sports teams regularly used our National Anthem as an opportunity to protest ...(that's a crime in some countries) people took to the streets and burned the flag ( try that in Moscow or bejing). The President absolutely criticized and mocked these people , but nobody was arrested for protesting peacefully or posting their displeasure ......and now , before he's even left office his message has been blocked on Twitter......and yesterday Apple and Amazon decided they would no longer carry the conservative free speech platform PARLOR..........because censorship is the solution to all our problems.

seriously though....the Corporations of this world have been selling us the rope to hang ourselves. what starts out as a convenience ( think ATM) becomes the norm and soon the only option ...and ultimately you are charged for the convenience you never asked for. Years ago when you ordered something online the Seller would ask if you wanted to leave your email so they could send you updates and coupons.....in 20 short years you can't even browse a site until you create a verified account with an email and phone number and home address ( maybe even date of birth), and we slowly , sometimes grudgingly; acquiesce ...........i ask all of my friends.....how many phone #'s do you know by heart ? ....so if say tomorrow the government imposed martial law in a section of the country....and the media refused to cover the story in the evening news.....and Apple wiped clean your contacts........who could you call ? how could you get the word out ?  ....now consider the Banks were in cahoots....and you could no longer log into your Chase account ......i'm sure you know your user name and password.....but do you have your bank acct # written down ? it goes on and on and on.....every time there is a blackout , i am reminded of just how dependent we are on technology .....and how easy it would be to use that dependence against us .......if the Leader of the free world can be censored, well you know the rest.

have you ever seen Pink Floyd the Wall ?  i played around and updated the lyrics a little bit just for the fun of it. ( original lyrics in parenthesis) 

To feel that warm thrill of confusion,
That space cadet glow.
I've got some bad news for you sunshine,
Pink isn't well, he stayed back at the hotel
And they sent us along as a surrogate band
We're gonna find out where you fans* really stand.

Are there any Heterosexuals (queers) in the theater tonight?
Get them up against the wall!
There's one in the spotlight, he don't look right to me,
Get him up against the wall!
That one looks Catholic (Jewish!)
And that one's is white (a coon!)
Who let all of this riff-raff into the room?
There's one (not) smoking a joint,
And another with spots!
If I had my way,
I'd have all of you shot!

USA USA USA

 the good guys beat the Canadian frogs 2-0 for the Gold Medal Last Night.......woke up at 3:30 to watch on tape .....Great group of Kids......Hockey in America has a bright future.

WHO ? that's WHO

 I've got a feeling twenty-one

Is going to be a good year
Especially if you and me
See it in together

I had no reason
To be over optimistic
But somehow when you smiled
I can brave bad weather

What about the boy?

USA 🇺🇸

 After dropping their opener 5-3 to the Putin’s.....Team USA rallied 3 straight wins by a combined score of 22-0..............onto the quarterfinals Saturday verse the gyro Slovakians.