Mama Carol

ZC wears those rose colored, KOOL AID glasses. Everything looks better when you're wearing them and the news media is telling you some other BS that the government wants you to know. And FYI, it doesn't matter which party is in power at the time, if the news media says it, it's fact.

Regardless of who wrote it, it's an awesome essay.

If cold weather killed mosquitoes than they would not be the state bird for Alaska.

Yep, 20 years this year, right? Gee, we've had that kayak a long time. Bought the kayak in Smyrna. It was sleeting when we left there. By the time we got back to Powder Springs, almost two hours later (and yes, we went directly home), the roads were almost impassable.

My husband told me this news this morning and my immediate reaction was "oh s***, the last time this happened, we had the blizzard in March".

Germany and Brazil are two countries we need to start paying attention to and ASKING them how they accomplish what they are getting done. Both economies are growing. Germany would be much better off without the EU to draw off their success. As for Obamacare, I have only one word. If you remember it, you will know what we're looking at in the future. Ameriplan.

Yes, it has been that way as long as your health care premiums have been pre-tax.

In that case, the amount in the box that says "wages" (box 1, I think) should be different than the amount in the box that says "Social Security wages" (box 3, I think). You don't have federal tax withheld on the health insurance premiums but they are subject to Medicare and Social Security withholding.

That would be at Cooper Lake and the East West Connector.

Unfortunately, we are not yet "out". Are things better? Some of them, yes but still have a lot to do to be "out" of the recession.

I can't say enough nice things about Ryan Hale. He was the guy my employer did our SEP-IRA through and in the years since I have gotten to know Ryan pretty well. I highly recommend him.

Ran out of ++ today. Yours deserves one...or more.

Could be any of a number of things. Appraisers do that when getting comparables for property. Tax appraisers do that when gathering information for taxes. Insurance companies do that, as Tess said. Because your house is in full view when the street, it's not private property and it's NOT illegal for ANYONE to take a picture of it.

I'm with you on that statement about the coming glut in the healthcare field. I've been there and have seen it firsthand. I just hope it doesn't turn out like the field I used to be in, medical transcription, and we have a lot of people with student loans to pay back who have skills in essentially non-existent jobs now. I also agree with you that we aren't going to see a big improvement in employment. Companies simply aren't going to hire if they can barely afford to pay the people they have now. Sure, larger corporations may add some but probably no more than leave through retiremen

Jobs were added but if the unemployment rate "ticked up" that means jobs were lost and/or people just plain, simply stopped looking. When the unemployment rate "ticks down" things will be heading in the right direction. And I don't mean one month and seasonally adjusted. I mean six months in a row with REAL jobs. You know more like adding 157,000 jobs and having a loss of 5,000. Not losing more jobs than are being added. Again, fourth quarter employment numbers will not be known until fourth quarter payroll is reported.

Why would anyone believe that Mr Obama's policies are working if the AMERICAN President has little control over the economy?

Who was bashing? And bashing who?

Unbelievable how many of the companies listed on the NYSE are foreign owned companies. I found more than a dozen that I knew for a fact where foreign owned and that was before I finished the A's.

Actually, we have plenty of cash to buy the house. We don't need to qualify as we plan to pay in cold, hard cash. So, sorry to disappoint you on that. We also plan to buy another one when we sell ours. You know, maybe a beach condo or something. A weekend place. BTW, that cash didn't come from the stock market. It came from years of hard work. And yes, it should be tough as hell to qualify to get a mortgage. It was when we went to refinance in 1996, after we had paid off our house in 1995. Oh, did I mention that was 11 years early and was scheduled to be paid off in 2006?

Show of hands--who on here has been fortunate enough to have their WAGES increased due to this market uptick? Not talking interest or dividends, just WAGES. Anyone?

Ask me about running a small company. Ask Pubby. I could give you more names of people to ask. Name a business type and I'll point you to someone. Not a one of them are listed on the NYSE. NOT ONE. But alas, it would make no difference because you are the one with their head buried in the sand. After all, what in the world would ACTUAL SMALL BUSINESS OWNERS know about running a business? Guard Dad makes the most sense of anything I've read in this thread. I guess that's because he actually runs a small business. That means he hasn't got time to listen to those pa

New construction is limited now and should be until some of the foreclosed homes have been taken care of. There is no point in building more homes to sit vacant while perfectly good NEW homes sit vacant. And don't even get me started on the number of foreclosed homes sitting vacant. Just as a side note, my husband and I have looked at roughly 60 homes in the past 3 years. We've been in ONE that was not vacant and I think there were three that were not bank or government agency owned. The people involved in construction during the boom were doing what they did best--building homes,

Are these poor people who are investing or are they "the evil rich"?

How many really poor people do you know create jobs?