Primary Obama Now

Primary Obama Now site has nice detailed editorial on Obama's betrayal of Progressive values, & why Progressives should support a Dem Primary challenger in the 2012 Presidential race

American Monetary Institute

monetary.org - American Monetary Institute. Prescribe the US Treasury to control the issuance of fiat money, as opposed to the quasi-public quasi-Wall $treet Federal Reserve.

DG rec links

This homie DG reads up on alternative media & conspiracy-related sites.

Here's a list he recommended.

Deep Capture

Gnostic Media

Tragedy & Hope

Tim Geithner incompetent work history

economist Simon Johnson article details Treasury Sec. Tim Geithner's incompetent work history. As of now, it appears Geithner is trying to block the possibility of consumer advocate/lawyer Elizabeth Warren to be the new Consumer Financial Protection Agency head, an organization that was Warren's idea! Johnson notes Geithner's blocking of Warren might be his "9th life" & for once Geithner's incompetence may hurt Geithner's career.

S Johnson's blog Baseline Scenario is bookmarkable.

Michael J Smith "The Ratchet Effect" of US bipartisan rightwing trend

Michael J Smith essay that claims that since 1968, the Fed Democrats function is to maintain the political spectrum position, whereas the Republicans always move it rightwards.

This is similar notion to Cenk Uyger's opinion that Obama is more conservative than Reagan.

Apparently Smith's essay is a chapter from a book he hosts on his site, as well as blog articles.

Rewards Checking

I stumbled upon this notion of Rewards Checking. Basically Rewards Checking type of checking account requires a customer to do the following each monthly banking cycle (which could be the calendar month, or some random dates like Feb 22 - Mar 21, for example):

1 do X amount of debit card transactions

2 possibly (depends on bank) do an additional action, such as a work pay direct deposit, or an automated monthly ACH-type payment

I'm a newbie to this Rewards Checking idea which I stumbled upon, but apparently for the last few years it has been superior as a short term savings method, in terms of APY & flexibility, when compared to money market acct, savings accts, CD, even Treasury's I Bonds CPI inflation-adjusted flavor of Savings Bonds (!).

mymoneyblog confirms that Rewards Checking is current best choice for short term savings

Another nice feature of Rewards Checking, is that they seem to be offered by small community banks & credit unions; not the 2 Big 2 Fail cartel mega-banks. Always dece to help a small fry out instead of a cartel bent on destroying the US economy, bonus!

Deposit Accounts , written by Ken - Bank Deals Guy. that follows what happens on Rewards Checking, thorough in depth nerd-style, as if it were a sportswriter reporting on the Vikings. You can look up by state, filtered by APY interest rate. There's many interesting & educational articles here; I think it will be a good ROI of your time to spend ~2 hrs reading articles here.

example weekly update article, which highlights changes in Rewards Checking rates from banks & credit unions, as well as the best current CD & Savings Acct rates (which are currently pwned by Rewards Checking).

article on how Rewards Checking even exists & is profitable.

1 the bank is giving you their portion of the ~1.75% fee a retailer like Kohl's or Progressive Insurance (Eg you buy $100 at Kohl's, Kohl's is giving Visa ~$1.75), etc, pays the debit/credit card company like Visa, who then share's it with the bank, who shares it with you.

2 banks use Rewards Checking as a "loss leader", get a happy new customer who then later on they might sell more profitable products like a car loan.

article on Debit Cards, Credit Cards, & Rewards Checking. Note that there are different type of debit card transactions

PIN - enter PIN

debit - enter PIN or signature

credit - signature

pay by phone (example, car insurance payment). Not sure what this counts as?

A particular count may count only some, or all, of these transactions towards the monthly requirement. My take is that if one gets a Rewards Checking account, 1 should try 1 of all types of transactions, then call bank Customer Service, & ask how many & which transactions have counted.

article listing 4 banks with avail to all USian residents, with 4.0% yield, with at least 25K max limits that get 4.0% yield.

Clark Howard article on Rewards Checking. Howard's co-sign on the notion is great; Howard seems knowledgeable & strongly pro-consumer ("I want you to save more, spend less, & avoid getting ripped off")

Some (probably inferior) alternatives to depositaccounts (Ken claimed that some of these sites only list vendors that pay the site a listing fee, so good vendors might be omitted)

Bank Rate

Checking Finder

Money Rates

Hit up comments with any info/experience you may have had wrt Rewards Checking.

Permanent Portfolio

The Harry Browne Permanent Portfolio (HBPP) is an investment asset allocation, which allocates 25% in 4 distinct non-correlated assets:

stocks - for prosperity

bonds - for deflation

cash - for recession

gold - for inflation

The Browne notion is that is impossible to predict/guess financial market events with any consistent skill, so it's better to have non-correlated assets that perform well as a total portfolio. Eg in the 1970s when stocks & bonds both declined, gold went up.

Supposedly since 1970s this portfolio has performed similar to an 100% stock portfolio, with the worst year being down ~15%, while stocks have been down ~50% at times.

mymoneyblog review

craigr's Crawling Road blog & discussion forum - many knowledgable gurus on here, veteran HBPP personal investors

UKer Clive/JF from crawlingroad forum site. Clive advocates for currency diversification, to hedge against domestic currency collapse. This is contra US "convential wisdom" that USD is somehow forever safe, & anything international is riskier, stupidly conflating stable rich countries like Canada or Germany or Japan (which might be safer than the US, at least for some years) with unstable countries like Argentina or Pakistan. This is also contra Harry Browne's own thoughts, of having 75% of the PP in USD-priced assets & 25% in gold.

US economic problems such as a trade deficit, budget deficit, unwillingness to cut profligate cartels such as the Military Industrial Complex. Also, many key assets such as oil & derivates being priced mostly in USD. Maybe in the future only 50% of oil will be priced in USD. Either of these issues could make it hard for the USD to get much stronger, with much risk of it getting weaker.

It seems that diversifying among global currencies would be "safer" than holding assets exclusively against any 1 currency.

Belgian Marc De Mesel, who like Clive shows (an extreme) example of domestic currency risk, with the 2008 Iceland PP

Boglehead's HBPP forum page

8 Lazy ETF portfolio reviews, which includes HBPP

Get Rich Slowly review

mymoneyblog

Great personal finance site mymoneyblog

fwd - I stumbled upon this free personal finance blog. Excellent free advice on IRA retirement accounts & other personal financial matters. The blogger is like a Consumer Reports, stays up on the rates/deals/hidden fees for the "custodian" IRA vendors like Vanguard, Schwab, Zecco, etc. Vanguard seems like a good deal as far as minimizing index fund Expense Ratios & having stable fees, without bogus hidden fees.

Amazing this is this guy is a 30 yo hobbyist, his real job is IT. I guess he loves to say follow money market & home loan rates, instead of a typical guy's hobby like say playing NFL fantasy football. My guess is that this hobbyist's free advice is probably superior than most personal financial planner "professionals"!

Finance quote & info sites

USian finance info sites for financial quotes/data, especially for assets with a ticker: ETFs, funds, individual stocks.

Google Finance - good graph feature, can quickly modify the time scale of the graph from intraday to multiple years. Would be nice if they included dividend-included returns

Morningstar - The Morningstar X-Ray is useful feature for slicing a portfolio (especially an broad index based portfolio) into asset allocation components - cash, bonds, US stock, non-US stock, other, not classified. It calculates weighted avg expense ratio. Especially equity stock components, which are broken down by geo regions like N America, Japan; industrial sector, stock type, & a 3X3 box for Valuation (Value/Core/Growth) X Size (Large/Medium/Small). For bonds & cash as a total group, it has a 3X3 box for Interest Sensitivity (Short, Intermediate, Long) X Credit Quality (High/Medium/Low).

Seeking Alpha - note has avg bid ask spreads & expense ratios clearly listed

Yahoo Finance - good for historical prices & dividends

D-Traxs funk music site

1970s & 80s funk music D-Traxs.

Mike Stathis

econ/financial markets writer Mike Stathis site

Kenneth C Davis Don't Know Much

historian Kenneth C Davis Don't Know Much site. Davis writes books about many topics, correcting popular misinformation.

Working Life

Working Life/Jonathan Tasini site on US worker issues

Hiway Credit Union

a friend/existing customer highly recommended Hiway Credit Union, as a great bank for personal finance use. Dude said their rates are dece, the service is dece, & it's reassuring that one can go in & talk to a real manager at the branch.

After all the fraud in 2008-9 Banking Crisis, imho I feel like investigating Credit Unions more.

1 thing I worry about is if Credit Unions enjoy FDIC protection, or if they have an alternate protection, is it dece enough. Hit up the comments if u have a take on this issue.

Common Good Bank

Common Good Bank is a new type of bank, whose leader was interviewed by Thom Hartmann. IMHO, from the interview, their steez sounds similar to a credit union, but apparently their are some differences.

Twin Cities Hip Hop

Twin Cities Hip Hop lists local MSP metro area shows, & the local artists that often do local shows, such as Atmosphere, Brother Ali, Leroy Smokes, etc.

Jim Sinclair's Mineset

commodity dealer Jim Sinclair blog, who Thom Hartmann recommends

economist Alan Blinder, offshoring expert

economist Alan Blinder, who does academic researching on the effects of offshore outsourcing on US economy.

Working Group on Extreme Inequality

advocacy org Working Group on Extreme Inequality

Garden of Life

Garden of Life website, vendor of food powder that my homie LA recommended. Dude is smart in general, is dude's hobby is to read up on nutrition & exercise. So I'm following the guy's advice.

Been taking this stuff Perfect Food Super Green formula, has 46 nutritious items, most of which would be impractical for me to buy at the local grocery (don't stock it) & eat otherwise, such as grass juice, kelp, obscure vegetables, etc.