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With markets on edge, journalists watch their words
So in most of the news, stocks have "slid" and markets "gyrated" but not "crashed." Companies have "tottered" and "struggled" rather than moved toward failure and bankruptcy.
One must not speak of crashes, failures, and bankruptcy.
"We're very careful not to throw words around like 'meltdown' and 'free fall,' " said Ali Velshi, senior business correspondent at CNN. "If someone wants to say the markets are in free fall, we'll discuss it first," he said, and the outcome is most likely to be a change in wording.
One must not speak of meltdowns and free falls.
" 'Crash,' 'panic,' 'pandemonium,' 'apocalypse,' those are the words we're staying away from," said Robert Christie, a spokesman for The Wall Street Journal, now part of the News Corporation.
One must not speak of crash, panic, pandemonium, and apocalypse.
At the same time, no one wants to be seen as minimizing the danger. The Journal's front page has called this the worst financial crisis since the Depression, and each day last week it carried banner headlines the entire width of the page — the first such headlines since September 2001.
Oh oh. I've been saying those words. Why do I suddenly feel like I've summoned an Army of Darkness?
Wiseman: When you removed the book from the cradle, did you speak the words?
Ash: Yeah, basically.
Wiseman: Did you speak the exact words?
Ash: Look, maybe I didn't say every single little tiny syllable, no. But basically I said them, yeah.
Oh yeah, that's why.
Real Estate Newsletter Articles this Week: Existing-Home Sales Increased to
4.15 million SAAR in November
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At the Calculated Risk Real Estate Newsletter this week:
[image: Existing Home Sales]*Click on graph for larger image.*
• NAR: Existing-Home Sales Increase...
12 hours ago
8 comments:
You have to laugh or scream. . . although I'm not sure who the press thinks they are fooling with this kind of nonsense. But then maybe the financial markets and Wall Street DO function like Wile E. Coyote who manages to defy gravity until he makes the mistake of looking down. As long as they don't say "those words" everything will just keep going.
The mass media's job is to sell butt wipe paper, getting facts straight has nothing to do with the T.V./newspaper publishing industry.
The emphasis is on how fast the financial system can recover so that lending will be restored to prior levels. The dead body in the room is our collective debt, no amount of new debt gov't or otherwise makes it go away.
kwark,
You have to laugh or scream.
Things ain't what they used to be. - Hendricksson (Peter Weller), Screamers, 1995
anonymous,
The dead body in the room is our collective debt, no amount of new debt gov't or otherwise makes it go away.
One must never mention the multi-trillion dollar elephant in the room. That's worse than saying crashes, failures, bankruptcy, meltdowns, free falls, panic, pandemonium, AND apocalypse all in the same sentence. You know, like I just did. Oops.
"Meltdown" Update
"We're very careful not to throw words around like 'meltdown' and 'free fall,' " said Ali Velshi, senior business correspondent at CNN.
Here's a search for "meltdown" in the news.
http://news.google.com/news?source=ig&hl=en&um=1&tab=wn&nolr=1&q=meltdown&btnG=Search+News
41,656 hits! Just think how bad it would be if they didn't avoid the word meltdown, lol.
To put it in perspective...
http://news.google.com/news?source=ig&hl=en&um=1&tab=wn&nolr=1&q=candy
Just 18,950 hits for "candy" in the news, even as we head into the Halloween season, lol.
It gets even better though. Let's look at the top candy article (as seen when I searched).
White Rabbit brand Chinese candy contaminated: Asian health officials
http://www.cbc.ca/consumer/story/2008/09/24/whiterabbit.html
A popular brand of Chinese candy sold in Canada contains trace amounts of melamine, say health officials in Singapore and Hong Kong.
Look at my profile.
You've just inherited a manufacturing plant that specializes in plastics. What are you going to make?
I suspect I'd be making an apology. Might just as well start contacting the lawyers. What are the odds I'd inherit a melamine plant though? Talk about bad luck!
The question was generated automatically by blogger when I started this blog. That Chinese melamine shows up in the strangest places!
Stag,
http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/09/26/business/26bailout2.php
“If money isn’t loosened up, this sucker could go down.”
Apparently, Bush didn't get the memo on wording. HAHAHAHA! I just can't stop laughing.
I only have a passing understanding of Bush speak, but I think: sucker = illusion of prosperity.
We really are subprime.
MAB,
“If money isn’t loosened up, this sucker could go down.”
Good grief. Are you sure he said that though? It's a complete sentence. Nevermind, that's him.
How does one loosen up money? Is there some sort of money loosening up device?
Stag,
Is there some sort of money loosening up device?
Absolutely. Helicopters and printing presses come to mind. However, the device dujour is a combine bailerouter. It basically separates good assets from bad assets. The bad assets get repackaged so they look better though in reality they are still the same bad assets. The upshot is that the good assets look more gooder and allow for a better bonus harvest at years end.
The next product cycle will debut the combine bonus harvester. This puppy will allow uninterupted and perpetual bonus harvesting for decades. It's nick-named the grim reaper.
MAB,
The next product cycle will debut the combine bonus harvester. This puppy will allow uninterupted and perpetual bonus harvesting for decades. It's nick-named the grim reaper.
I'll take Things Not to Say to the Grim Reaper for $50.
http://www.mwscomp.com/movies/mol/m-13-vii.htm
Now, look here. You barge in here, quite uninvited, break glasses, and then announce, quite casually, that we're all dead. Well, I would remind you that you are a guest in this house...
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