Eric Cantor's strange view of the world

WTFAH?

“Eric Cantor’s Foreign-Policy Ideas Would Consign Us to Perpetual War”, at least that is the headline of the post by Conor Friedersdorf. http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/02/eric-cantors-foreign-policy-ideas-would-consign-us-to-perpetual-war/284028/

If this is true and as of yet I have nothing to indicate that it is false, it is a pretty damming position to take, but not really that unusual from someone who them self or for that matter their children have never been volunteered (Drafted) or just out right volunteered to go in Harms Way. It is easier to send someone else off to the unknown, then for you or your love ones to sent off on that journey, especially given that there is a chance that you might be returning home in a flag draped container via Dover AFB. (AKA be the first on your block have your son brought home in a box)

For me it is a little more than a bit upsetting. But it is pretty much what would I expect from an individual who so far has spent their entire adult life either in school, or working in the office (his fathers company) or in the office of an elected official, or in an elected office.

As I said it is pretty much what I would expect, but it is not what I am willing to accept.

I am sure that he is smart (went to some of the right schools), that he loves his wife and his children and that they love him after all he is husband and father, but that can be said about many men now and in the past. Eric might even like the dog and the cat, and the dog likes him back and the cat just plain tolerates him (its a cat thing). I suspect that his is considered to be a pillar of the community. Enough of the voters in Virginia 7^th Congressional district have repeatedly consider him an honorable man (they voted for him, of course with only 58 percent of popular vote it appears some of the shine to disappear) For that matter he has convinced enough of his fellow party representatives make him not only Republican House Minority Whip, but the Republican House Majority Leader. All of this before he turned 50 years old, I sure his parents are proud.

Just like the many citizens of Rome who at one time considered Marcus Brutus to be an honorable man, until that fateful day, I suspect that Eric Cantor is not that far behind Marcus Brutus in that his lack of honor is showing more and more each day. (Beware the idles of January John Boehner maybe one should just quit while you are on top).

So Citizen, the question before us is that at the end of the day do we want or need an individual who would consign the Fathers and Mothers, Sons and Daughters, Brother and Sisters of this country via his Foreign Policy Ideas to Perpetual War?

Question of the Day 18 Feb 2014

Are Bitcoin, Zerocoin, and Dogecoin the Tulips of our day?

Especially given a the recent quote by Zerocoin developer Matthew Green

“if people will put money into Dogecoin, they'll put it into anything”.1

Historically they have. Kinda sounds like tulips to me or maybe stock in company known officially as “The Governor and Company of the merchants of Great Britain, trading to the South Seas and other parts of America, and for the encouragement of Fishing”. But more commonly referred to as “The South Sea Company”.

1. Greenberg, Andy (13 January 2014). "Bitcoin Anonymity Upgrade Zerocoin To Become An Independent Cryptocurrency". Forbes (Forbes Inc.). ISSN 0015-6914. Retrieved 2014-01-30.

Current Employment Statistics (BLS)

I received a post from an investment advisor Mr. Steve Reitmeister, making very discouraging remarks about the differences between BLS statistics as compared to the ADP statistics. These remarks to me indicate a rather limited knowledge about the various systems and how they relate to a business.

I own and operate a business and we just happened to be one have the 144,000 business and government agencies that the BLS samples, additionally we do use ADP for our payroll.

First and most important, accuracy and timeliness of our data to ADP is critical and essential, without it my employees do not get paid in a timely and accurate manner. Second and not so important, my data to the CLS CES survey is not critical or essential to the operations of my business, it is done as a civic duty.

That all said, let me reflect a little about my business. First I still employ the same number of individuals as I did last year, but and it is an important but, I have slashed my G&A, how I did this was by either moved individual from my back office to production positions, or a let back office individual go and hiring individuals to fill offsetting positions in production.

The workload on the back staff nearly doubled, which resulted in a reassessment of priorities for those who were left, and a side note compensation for the “survivors” or “the walking dead” as they call themselves was increased reflect the addition duties thrust upon them. Priorities were adjusted, what we have to have changed, what would be nice to have changed, and what we could live without changed. Additionally we have started to use temporary contractors on a very limited basis to perform certain task are one-shot events (yearly inventory audits).

As a consequence we really only make an attempt to make sure that our response to the BLS survey is accurate about once a quarter, the rest of the time we just change the date and send in the previous months report. On the other hand we make every effort to provide timely and accurate input for our payroll, again as before our business depends on it.

So for Mr. Steve Reitmeister to get all balled up on the numbers the BLS supplies is rather immature and to some extent indicates his fundamental lack of understanding on how the data associated with this report is generated and gathered. Given that there are no immediate or even long-term repercussion associated with lack of accuracy of the data or for that matter timeliness that my business provides voluntarily to the BLS the report should really be taken with several grains of salt.

Additionally your tax dollars were not used in the generation of the data provided to the BLS for this report. It is a classic case of GIGO.

Learning to be still

One of the hardest lessons to learn about investing is to be still.  Learning how not to get caught up in news and most importantly the noise of the moment.  Learning how to wait for the shot.  Learning how to control your breathing.  Learning how to slow things down.  Remembering that it is the long game you are playing.

I have several friends who at the present time who have “Buck Fever” they have seen the stock market on a tear for the last year, and they want to jump in with both feet.  I can tell this from the nature of our conversations and e-mails.

They want to know how much I have added to my various investment positions.  They are surprised when I state that I have not added significantly to any position, but instead I have readjusted some of my position (Take Profits), and given the current conditions I plan to readjust some more in the very near future, after 1 Jan 2014.  Additionally I will not be in too much of hurry.

Their response to this is “Are you crazy?”  My reply is hardly!  They want to know what I am seeing that they are not.  I tell them that we are all seeing the same thing, but that it how we processes it, especially in terms of the various lessons that we have learned to date in our lives and the particulars of our portfolio.

My decisions are based on the particulars of my portfolio, the condition in the market, and my age, and finally my sense of intuition, and when do I want to pay the tax due on any gains.  After 1 January the taxes are due on 15 April 2015, rather then 15 April 2014.

The first two (Market and Age) are easy to explain, the third (intuition) shapes my appetite for risk, and is an enigma, the fourth well it the Wimpy rule (I will gladly pay you next Tuesday).

I tell them that what may be good for me may be bad for them.  To a person they all want a list of reasons why at this time I am doing what I am doing with my portfolio.  So in an attempt to comply with their request here goes.

First reason is that the object of the exercise as always is the buy low and sell high.  At the present time the market is high (especially when compared to my basis), will it go higher (I hope so, that is why I have money in the market)?  Yes.  When?  (I do not know.)  The flip side is can the market go lower? Yes.  When?  (I do not know.)

Second the amount of the unrealized gain in my portfolio is quite high, which is good, but one does needs to capture your long-term gains when and if you can and if it makes sense, in context of carried capital losses.   At the present time it for many of my taxable investments it does not make sense for me, although for some of my tax deferred investments this is not the case since in the end they some will be taxed as ordinary income when the funds are withdrawn, some will not be taxed at all (You have to love the Roth).

Third is that everyone seems to be buying stocks, so maybe it be time to be selling stocks.  On the other hand everyone seems to be selling bonds, and so maybe it might be time to start looking at increasing my position in bonds, again if and when the conditions are favorable to me.  (Yes I know that QE is coming to an end and Bond prices should drop as interest rates rise, but sometime a good deal is a good deal).

The fourth reason is “Reversion to the mean”.  This 2013 is a gross outlier, it is not normal, and it is at least a 2 Sigma event.  Will next year be the same?  Highly unlikely, the law of large numbers is not in my favor.

All systems are self-correcting; you may not want to be around for the correction, especially if you just dumped a large amount of your net worth into the market just before it tanked.  So a slow and steady approach is required (Aim Small Miss Small).

Fifth reason is that I am starting to see articles in the press that “This time is different”.  Unless there was some fundamental shift in the fundamental laws of the universe during one of the nights while I was sleeping, it is not going to be different this time, in the end the results are going to be the same, it is that the timing of the events that will be different.

Sixth, the rate of contact by various brokers has been increasing, either by phone or e-mail.  Most just want to help me in this time of uncertainty.  How thoughtful, caring, and nice on their part (Their mother would be proud of the concern for the plight of others).  The calls go unanswered and the e-mail are deleted, and in some cases the filters for my e-mail are adjusted.  My though on brokers has been discussed in other post.

Seventh reason is more technical in nature and it has to do with CAPE for the market as of 1 November 2013 stands at 25.16, 6 January 2014 it was reported to be 26.07, and quite frankly this is getting in the nosebleed range, and if it gets much higher (27-30) it will be a rectal bleed.

One would need to hold one share of the SP-500 for 25 years for the current earnings to equal a price of that one share.  I know how old I am and 25 years is very close to end of my estimated actuarial lifetime.  This is one of the particulars of my situation alluded to earlier in the article.

At the end of the day I will still have money on the table and in the game for in realty that is the only way to make money.  I will have a little of my unrealized gain and put it in my pocket waiting for the next opportunity to buy.

I tell them that I continue to reinvest dividends, I have minimal amount of programed purchases, and that I continue to watch for other purchase opportunities, and if and when they present themselves, I will act.  But at the present time they are not forth coming, so I have consigned my self to be still and will wait to take my shot, since the basic rule for this endeavor as stated earlier is to buy low and sell high.

DOD and the National Guard

The show down continues between the several states in particular Texas and the Department of Defense.

So what is the SECDEF suppose to do?  Well the first thing he might do is revoke or remove the ability of the affected National Guard’s from enrolling, modifying, or issuing any DOD ID cards.

If Guard members from the affected states have issues with their existing ID cards as they apply to or for access to Federal Facilities or programs they and or their dependents will have to go to a DOD facility, not a state facility to have these actions performed.

For example in Texas if a Guardsman or his family member needs a new ID card they would have to go to their nearest Federal Military Reservation.  That could be Fort Sam Houston, Randolph AFB, Lackland AFB all now known as Joint Base San Antonio, or Fort Hood, or Fort Bliss, or Dyess AFB, or Goodfellow AFB, or Laughlin AFB, or Sheppard AFB.  They might even be allowed to receive this service at Cannon AFB, or Holloman AFB (both in New Mexico), or even Altus AFB (Oklahoma) or Barksdale AFB (Louisiana).  That would be up to the SECDEF.

Depending on the state there should be at least one site in which a Guardsman and or their family member could go to for their credentialing matters.  They might have to drive a few hundred miles, but nothing is too much for these individuals when it comes to defending states rights.

But this is just the tip of the iceberg and I am sure that the various states would or could  find other issues to drive a wedge between the state and federal government.  Politians are a very creative lot, although for many members they appear rather shortsighted group.

But this does raise a deeper question concerning the various National Guards, and in particular Texas.  For many officers in the guard they hold dual commissions, one federal and one state.  There are officers of the Texas National Guard that only hold state commissions.  For all officers their oath of commissioning for Texas states as follows

“I ______________________. Do solemnly swear that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the State of Texas and to the United States of America; that I will serve them honestly and faithfully against all their enemies whomsoever, and that I will obey the orders of the governor of Texas, and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to the laws, rules and articles for the government of the military forces of the State of Texas”

Title 4 Subtitle C. Chapter 432, Subchapter A, Sec. 431.007 Texas Statues.

The officers in the New York National Guard and most other states, their commissioning oath is as follows

I, ______________________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of State of New York against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the Governor of the State New York, that I make this obligation freely, without an mental reservations or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the Office of  _________________ in the Army/Air National Guard of the State New York upon which I am about to enter so help me God.

NGB 337 20060801/

State of Oklahoma requirements

§4445. Oath of commissioned officers. 
Oath for National Guard Officers. Each commissioned officer, before entering upon the duties of his office, shall take and subscribe to the following oath, or such other oath as may be required by National Guard Regulations:

"I .........., do solemnly swear that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States and the Constitution of the State of Oklahoma against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the Governor of the State of Oklahoma; that I make this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion, and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office of ......., in the National Guard of the United States and the State of Oklahoma upon which I am about to enter, so help me God." 

Laws 1951, p. 116, art. 3, § 5, eff. May 16, 1951. 

But for those who hold dual commissions, and typically their federal commission was their first commission the first oath that they recited was

“I _______________________, having been appointed an officer in the Army of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of __________ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I this obligation freely, without any mental reservations or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God.”

DA Form 71, 1 August 1959.

There are two aspect of the Texas National Guard Officers oath that just does not sit right with me and those passages are
 

“ I will bear true faith and allegiance to the State of Texas and to the United States of America”

“I will obey the orders of the Governor of Texas”

The first passage the order of precedence is important the individual is swearing allegiance to the State of Texas and almost as an after thought to the United States of America.  In the law, the order of objects is everything.  When there are two possible conflicting demands required by a contract typically the first one cited takes precedence over the latter.

Not to put too fine of a point on the subject but this second passage from the Texas Oath is even more disturbing in that reminds me of a line from the Reischwehreid.  This was the oath sworn by Wehrmacht officers and soldiers and German civil servants for the years 1934 to 1945.   Which was an oath of loyalty to the

“Leader of the German empire and people,”

Granted the Texas Oath unlike the Reischwehreid actually stops at requiring the applicant from reciting or naming the current governor by name when they take the oath, but in the end that is not really a fine distinction.  The Texas Oath could only have been better if had the applicant renounce any and all previous oaths of allegiance, but I suspect that would have resulted in bad Juju coming down on the State of Texas by the federal government.

The Federal Oath of Allegiance states that the candidate is to “support and defend the Constitution of the United States”.  It is not an Oath of Allegiance to a particular state, or branch of government, and especially not to particular office or officer of the government.  It is accepted that the document (Constitution of the United States) is lawful, and that any orders to defend of the document are lawful.

For majority of the states their required Oath for Officers in their respective National Guards is first an allegiance to the Constitution of the United States, then to the Constitution of their respective state, and if so stated to orders of the President of the United States and then to the orders of their respective Governor.

So as I read the Texas Oath, an officer in the Texas National Guard first allegiance is the State of Texas, and then to the United States of America, and that they are to obey the orders of the Governor of Texas and those officers appointed over them.  The oath is silent as to order from the President of the United States.


There is no requirement in the oath for Texas to determine whether the orders are lawful either under the State of Texas Constitution or even the United States Constitution since the candidate has not explicitly sworn any allegiance by this Oath to support or defend the Constitution of the United Stares or for that matter the Constitution of the State of Texas, they have only sworn an oath to defend Texas, and then the United States of America, and explicitly accept orders from the Governor, and his appointed officers.

This is very disturbing, given this Officers Oath for the National Guard in Texas.  The next question should be whether United States Government via the Department of Defense actually providing funds to this organization?

Benchmarking

One of my past employment function I was a Quality Assurance Engineer, and one of the critical aspect of my function was benchmarking our processes to our competitors, because I know that I am not one of the smartest guy’s in the room, and that plagiarism is the most since form of flattery, and this is especially true for my investments.

So when I come across an article in the various publications that provide data on how well programs administered by professional managers have performed, I add it to my list of benchmarks for comparison to my investment performance.

Such an article was this one recently posted on the Bloomberg.com by Martin Z. Braun and Henry Goldman, 2013-05-31, concerning the New York City Pension, Larry Schloss the Chief Investment Officer and the search for in-house investment managers.

In the article some performance numbers for 5 pension/retirement funds were cited.   The New York City Pension, Ontario Teacher Pension Fund, California Public Employees’ Retirement System, Pennsylvania Public School Employees’ Retirement System, and New Jersey’s Pension Fund.

The article reported that the New York City Pension since 2003 has averaged 8.0 percent annual return.  Ontario Teacher has averaged 9.6 percent annual return since 2003.  No end date for this 10-year performance figure was cited in the article. California Public Employees 10 year annual return cited was as of 30 June 2012, and it was reported as 6.1 percent.  Pennsylvania Public 10 year annual return as of 30 June 2012 was cited as 7.2 percent.  Finally the New Jersey Pension 10 year annual return as of 30 June 2012 was reported as 6.4 percent.

These funds are either managed internally, some split between internal and external managers and in one case entirely externally managed.  My portfolio is managed internally.

Well how did I do compared to the professional money manager?  For the period 1/1/2003 to 5/30/2013 my portfolio IRR as calculated by Quicken, was 10.35 percent, for the period 1/1/2003 to 1/1/2013 my portfolio IRR was calculated to be 9.80 percent.  My portfolio performance 7/1/2002 to 6/30/2012 calculated to be 8.90 percent.

Compare that the to reported 8.0 percent for New York City either number is not bad.

Compared to Ontario Teacher Pension reported 9.6 percent, again either number is on par with the professionals.

When I compare my portfolio performance for 10 year period ending 6/30/2012 to reported 10 year annual returns of 7.2 percent for Pennsylvania, 6.4 percent for New Jersey, and 6.1 percent for California pension plans I gain some confidence and validation in the investing strategy that I have chosen for these past 40 years.

By way of another comparison according to calculations provided by following web site http://dqydj.net/sp-500-return-calculator/ the SP 500 annualized return including dividends reinvested for the various periods are as follows.  For the Period July 2002 to June 2012 inclusive the site reported an annualized return of 5.984 percent.  For the period January 2003 to January 2013 the annualized return calculated was 7.256 percent.  For the period January 2003 to May 2013 the annualized return calculated was 7.971 percent.  For easy of comparison I decided to put it into a table

	Jul 2002-Jun 2012	Jan 2003-Jan 2013	Jan 2003-May 2013
SP-500	5.984	7.256	7.971
Mine	8.90	9.80	10.35
Pennsylvania	7.2
New Jersey	6.4
California	6.1
Ontario		9.6	9.6
New York		8.0	8.0

So how did the professional do against the just the SP500. Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and California did provide more of a return than the SP500.  In the case of Pennsylvania significant majority of their return was just from the SP500.  In the case of New Jersey and California almost all of their return was just from the SP500.

The Ontario Teacher Pension did out perform the SP500 but again I would suspect that a majority of their return was just from the SP500.

In the case of the New York City Pension which slightly out perform the SP500.  I would say just like New Jersey and California almost all of their return was from the SP500, note this fund was managed externally by professionals.

Not a single one of these pension to any degree out perform the market as represented by the SP-500 to any exceptional degree including mine, and why should they, it is one of the basic benchmarks that I know I use and I suspect that the respective management of the various funds use to compare their performance with.

	Jan 2002-Jun 2012 Percent SP-500	Jan 2003-Jan2013 Percent SP-500	Jan 2003-May 2013 Percent SP-500
Mine	66.0	74.0	77.0
Pennsylvania	83.0
New Jersey	94.0
California	98.0
Ontario		76.0	83.0
New York		91.0	99.6

In all fairness these various pension funds, they have a great deal more monies to invest compared to what I have to invest, and that any major movement of capital by them will typically affect the market in observable way.  Any major movement of capital by me would be very insignificant to the market, I just do not have that much, and additionally I take great pains to keep any movements small.

The Pension funds have to content with monthly retirement payments to make, but this should be offset by monthly retirement contributions being made, and at the end of the day I would suspect that this aspect of their management activities is pretty much of a wash.

Finally they have to content with numerous individual account holder making allocation changes, but many if not all have instituted rules that limit how many such events an account holder can perform in attempt to reduce this source of volatility.

My investment strategy has been for the most part very simple, one to be invested, and two to be invested in various low cost/fee broad index funds.  Allocated between Stocks and Bonds on average with roughly 77 percent allocated to Stocks, and 23 percent Bonds.  The Stocks are further allocated between Large Cap Indexes, International Stocks Indexes, and Small Cap Indexes.  The Bonds are allocated between Total Bond Indexes, Long Term Treasuries, Inflation Protected Treasuries, and High Yield Commercial.

Nothing fancy, nothing exotic, and nothing that really requires a great deal of tinkering on my part.

During the course of generating this post I decided that I would be an excellent candidate to manage the City of New York Pension Fund.  So with that thought in mind, here goes.

Dear Mr. Schloss;

With all due respect I am submit my name for consideration to manage the City of New York’s Pension Fund.  I have presented data in this post to indicate that my performance is just as good if not better than what you have received to date.

The salary discussed in the Bloomberg article is quite acceptable.  We would have to hold discussions on other aspects of an employment contract, but nothing that I would suspect that we couldn’t come to some mutual beneficial agreement.  Mr. Schoss my investment method is not rocket science, even though at one time I was a rocket scientist.  My investment method is Open Source, can be found on the Internet with a little searching, and completely transparent.  If you are not so inclined to research my method please E-Mail me and I will provide you with a copy, electrons are free.

Thank you for allowing me this opportunity applying for this position.

Target Luxembourg

It will first start as trickle, and then it will grow to the size of a brook, then as other brooks join it will grow to the size of a creek, and then as other creek join it then a small river, and as the small rivers join together a large continent draining river.

The trickles are just starting in Luxembourg, a country known for it’s banking, but not much else.  Luxembourg is a country with banks deposits in significant excess of its gross domestic product, just like Cyprus.  But just like Cyprus, Luxembourg cannot print enough physical currency to cover the entire electronic Euro currently held/deposited within the various disk drives of its banks.

Cyprus banks had deposits greater 10.8 times the GDP of the country.  Luxembourg banks according to IMF in 2011 held deposits greater than 20 times the countries GDP.  I suspect that deposit growth has been greater than Luxembourg GDP growth, meaning that deposit to GDP is even greater today.  If you think Cyprus is bad, just wait.  The “ChubbChubbs” are coming.  It will sweep over the continent, each of the weak sisters being picked off one by one, as they succumb to monetary forces at work.

It was a good wave to ride while it lasted by the shore is close at hand the wave is starting to break lose form, it is really had to keep on your board in the spray and foam of a crashing wave.  The smart surfers would have already pitched out, looking for the next wave.

So the really smart money is starting to slowly move those electronic Euro’s out of Luxembourg.  I suspect a significant percentage of those electronic Euros’ that are being moved are also being converted to electronic Dollars.  Given that of all the various world currencies that are convertible and not illiquid, and that have enough GDP to cover deposits being held within the confines of their banking system, the United States is it.  At this time the exchange rate is rather favorable for jumping out of the Euro, not as good as it was a few weeks ago, but it is only going to get worse in the coming months.

Some of electronic Euro’s are staying in Europe.  These electronic Euro’s are just going to other location in Europe, which for the moment appear to be safer.  The reason for this is that individuals and companies need to cover operating expenses within Europe.  But where to put those funds is the solvency question?  As I look upon the GDP landscape the only European country with enough GDP to cover this flood of electronic Euro’s is Germany.

Another possible location is Switzerland, but even the Swiss have limits how many Euro’s they are willing to accept at the current exchange rates.  A big large flow of Euro will destabilize their currency something the Swiss National Bank is battling everyday, but even their reserves are limited.

As stated in the CNBC article "The Insanity of the Cyprus Crisis".  The ECB is not the FED.  The ECB on its own has no ability to print money to rescue failing banks.  The ability to print money falls to the various member National Country Banks that are members of the ECB who issue money in the name of the ECB.  The ECB is responsible for just 8 percent of the notes issued the various National Country Banks.  The National Country Banks are responsible for the remaining 92 percent, and the bad news it that their responsibility is limited to only those notes that they physically issued.  The majority of the printing of Bank notes his handled by each member country.  There is a country code printed on each note.  For those who are interested “G” is the code for Cyprus.

The European Banking Authority, which has some limit responsibility in regulation bank the majority of the authority rest with the respective nations and their respective agencies, does not have the authority to borrow money (issue bonds) to rescue these failed banks, since it does not have any taxing capacity to back up any bonds.

What individual/corporation would put their electronic Euro’s in Italian Banks, Spanish Banks, Portuguese Bank, French Bank, Belgium Bank, or Dutch Bank?  If I were a citizen of any one of the afore mentioned countries, I would be giving serious consideration to a minimum the amount of funds held in a bank.

The next question is when is a Euro note not a Euro note.  Some would say that it is any such note with a Country Code of “G”, after all 92 percent of that note is backed by the full faith and credit of the Government of Cyprus.

We have gone from “one for all and all for one”, to “one for some of us and some for some of us”, the finally step will be “one for me and nothing for the rest”.  It will be a very interesting summer, as another one bites the dust.