Flipping AK-47s in Ponzi Nation

The Wall Street Journal recently reported

Purchases of guns and ammunition are surging across the country. Nearly four million background checks -- a key measure of sales because they are required at the purchase of a gun from a federally licensed seller -- were performed in the first three months of 2009. That is a 27% increase over the same period a year earlier, according to the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

No one knows exactly what is behind the gun-buying craze

Not a mystery, of course, if you had bothered to tune into their sister network, Fox. Here are a few enlightening clips:

Fair enough, Second Amendment rights are at stake, many believe. Right? It is, after all, one of the few Constitutional rights still standing after the Darth Cheney years. And you never know when you might need an assault rifle or a militia in these times of thousands of hard core banking criminals roaming the country.

The WSJ goes on to report:

But it's also clear that part of the gun-buying rally is driven by people like Mr. Chambers who are buying weapons the way others invest in a hot stock. The buying is pumping up prices.

So we have a buying frenzy, driven by a fear being pushed by the media. Now, what does that remind you of?

It reminds me of the time I was staying in London for a few months in 2004 just as average house prices were nearing 7 times the average earnings. Almost every single channel was
filled with shows called things like, "Location, Location, Location" or "Property Ladder." Fear was the primary tool used in these programs to push property speculation -- fear of being left off the property ladder, fear of having to work for a living, fear of not making an apparently guaranteed, riskless fortune like your property speculating neighbor, whose 'property portfolio' probably included properties in then 'booming' markets like Spain (now crashing), Bulgaria (ditto), Estonia (ditto) and Latvia (ditto).

British buyers, of course, terrified of being left off the property ladder, were lining up for 120% mortgages at Bradford and Bingley (now dead) and Northern Rock (also dead, of the state owned zombie variety).

Back to the feverish speculation in that AK-47 pyramid:

Bert Collins, an Atlanta commercial real-estate manager, recently bought two AR-15 rifles for about $1,600 each. He's keeping one in its box, untouched, with the hope of selling it at a profit should Congress re-enact the law, which expired in 2004. "It's certainly a better investment than my 401(k) has performed," Mr. Collins said.

Note how saving for retirement and speculation are now considered one and the same. Mr. Collins' 401(k) performed so badly, of course, because his pension fund manager was part of the passive pool of ponzis called pension funds that bought the CDOs collateralized by our own property bubble scheme! We were smoking our own belly button lint.

It was a ponzi inside a ponzi scheme built atop a pyramid fraud.

And now we have nothing left but to flip some AK-47s.

Or, for those with less money to 'invest' . . . bullets.

Bubba Sanders, owner of Bullseye Supply LLC, in Brandon, Miss., said he has "a number of doctor clients whose financial advisers have told them to invest in ammunition. Beats the hell out of money markets and CDs. You can double your investment in ammunition in a year."

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Comments

[OdinsEye]

Barack Obama, 2003 questionaire:

-----------------

35. Do you support legislation to ban the manufacture, sale and possession of
a. handguns?

While a complete ban on handguns is not politically practicable, I believe reasonable restrictions on the sale and possession of handguns are necessary to protect the public safety. In the Illinois Senate last year, I supported a package of bills to limit individual Illinoisans to purchasing one handgun a month; require all promoters and sellers at firearms shows to carry a state license; allow civil liability for death or injuries caused by handguns; and require FOID applicants to apply in person. I would support similar efforts at the federal level, including retaining the Brady Law.

b. assault weapons?

Yes.

c. ammunition for handguns and assault weapons?

I would support banning the sale of ammunition for assault weapons and limiting the sale of ammunition for handguns.

[OdinsEye]

"Obama and Biden also favor commonsense measures that respect the Second Amendment rights of gun owners, while keeping guns away from children and from criminals. They support closing the gun show loophole and making guns in this country childproof. They also support making the expired federal Assault Weapons Ban permanent. " - White House website (January thru April, 2009, removed around the end of April)

[Aaror]

Just like the lottery, a tax on people who are not good at math...
Just don't tell them about Dutch Tulips or beanie babies.

[djkrlsn]

the more gun sales the better--and since ARs, AKs, SKSs, Mini14s, M1As etc are rather popular--the more sales, the better these guns meet the "common use standard" of Heller--and thanks to Clinton's 1994 bill--these rifles were rather popular before

[cylindar]

Phooey on the small stuff I think people should be building their own home made nuclear bombs just in case. I mean you never know when you will need one. Nasty neighbor, whatever. Everyone should have one.

[djkrlsn]

Another nuclear red herring by a gun banner--why is it that the only people that want nukes and wmds are the antiBOR folks?

[MocksNix]

See? Obama has helped the economy already! He's the gun lobby's own private stimulus package..
LOL!

[djkrlsn]

The law of unintended consequences in action for the Brady Campaign and the VPC

[STG 44]

Barack Obama has been named as the "Greatest Gun Salesman of All Time". If he accomplishes nothing else of value to our nation he will at least be remembered as a man who helped the American people to become better armed. I'm not quite sure of the point of the article but at least it's about guns and there are two good vids embedded in the story.

[jhNY]

Guns are so cool. And everybody that loves them is so darn smart!

[hidflect]

Finance needs to be institutionalized. If the government permanently took over the practice of lending for mortgages then the profit derived would eliminate the need for income tax. And the freed up speculative capital could go to REAL investment such as R&D/Technology. Or haven't you noticed that it took 60 years to go from the Wright Flyer to the SR-71 Blackbird and in the 60 years hence we got.. what? The Shuttle? Come ON! Take a look around your kitchen and note there isn't one device there that would be out of place in 1967. Capital speculation in finance over the last 30 years has not just bankrupted us, it has also sucked all the air out of the room for our own technological progress..­.

[ADVOCATE4ZPG]

"Latino" drugs selling is also reaching deeper into U.S. cities and towns. They seem to be more heavily armed than any, internal constabulary in the U.S.

[jhNY]

"Ordinary American" drug buying is likely the reason, unless you are implying that the dealers are forcing the users to buy drugs at gunpoint. And as to the relative armament strength of the adversarial parties, think again-- since 9/11, even l'il bitty towns in the middle of nowhere sport an armored car and full SWAT gear for everybody on the force.

[jhNY]

And even if you have to fire off some of your investment to drive off enemies, you at least get a little of the lead back when they counter-attack.