Interesting week

In the past week or more there seems to have been a bit of over zealous speculation that we were going to have strong financial numbers come out. Mainly due to what the experts thought of as a good holiday season. Let's not mistake what "good" means. It was good to them in the sense that people still bought presents and the world didn't collapse. That's how fragile our economy is right now.

I don't get any sense of a stable economy when talking to people on "main" street. But as I have been saying, there seems to be a greater divide between what Wall street thinks and what is really happening to the average person. We're playing on two separate playing fields. It's easier and easier for Wall street to make it's money back than it is to put people back to work and figure out a health care system that will help the average American rather than use us a living ATM. I like that analogy. The health care system now, takes and takes from us like an ATM and never maintains it. The ATM could be in Beverly Hills or Compton, it still pays and the owner never has to take care of it, just keeps making money off of it. Every now and then the ATM will need some maintenance and instead of using the profits that they've been making doing nothing, the owner has the repairs made and then raises the transaction fee. There, I thought I was going to be talking about the economy but I somehow figured out our health care system and why it's broke.

Thank you, goodnight. I'm here all week, don't forget to tip your waitresses.

We'll I'll quickly get back on track. After anticipation of a healthier economy and fears that it would bring on inflation faster than expected, you saw rates move up. But when real economic numbers like housing purchases and refinance applications come out lower than ever, you see that we are still teetering on the edge of a very sharp knife. Don't push rates up too fast because you don't want to bring down one of the major pillars of economic recovery. Not just mortgage rates but businesses that utilize credit which right now are relying so much on low rates to be able to make a profit in this bad market. I think you need to see people back at work and the average man being able to spend more money before you start raising rates and worrying about inflation.

I'm anxious to see what the president's speech will do to the markets. If more and more news comes out negatively, it might help the president make a case for universal health care.