The Voices in Frank's Head

A large number of Americans will soon be without a job or unemployment benefits now that Congress has refused to extend authorization for long-term unemployment benefits. Congressional Republicans claim that unemployment compensation hurts job growth. They say it makes people lazy and not want to work. At the same time, though, they also want to give billions and billions in tax dollar subsidies to oil companies, multi-national agribusinesses, and every other large corporation around. I suppose the solution, therefore, is for all of the unemployed people to form their own corporation. At which point in time, the GOP will then be willing to dump 10 times the cash on them as they would've gotten in unemployment benefits. They can call this new corporation the God Bless America Envelope Company. The first order of business for GBAEC will be to hire a handful of people to make envelopes or, more likely, contract that part out to someone in a Third World country. The company can ...

I just saw a TV commercial that attacked President Barack Obama over rising gas prices. Maybe now would be a good time to replay all of those Fox News clips from 2008 arguing that the President cannot control gas prices? Thanks, by the way, to Media Matters for putting all of those clips together  and comparing their 2008 coverage with their 2012 coverage.

History has a funny way of repeating itself. In the mid- to late-1990s, was we saw the Dot-com Bubble with internet companies with stock valuations that simply could not be justified by their fundamentals. I believe that we are seeing the same thing today with gold prices. From 1973 - 2005, gold traded in the $200 - $300 price range on a fairly consistent basis. In 2005, it began its surge upwards, with the real momentum beginning in 2009. Gold is currently trading at more than $1,600 per ounce, which is roughly 4.5 times its historic norms. Things are far from ideal in our economy or political sphere. However, there is simply no economic rationale for gold any higher than $700 - and even $700 per ounce is pushing it, in my opinion. I'm not ready to start shorting gold yet. I believe it will likely stay in the $1,600 - $1,700 price range for the next few months as various problems work themselves out, most notably Europe's debt crisis. However, I believe that gold...

A conservative acquaintance of mine posted on Facebook that, in his opinion, everyone who voted for President Barack Obama owed this nation an apology. Because I'm in an accommodating mood, I have decided to go ahead and honor his request. I apologize for voting for President Barack Obama in 2008. I apologize in advance for my intention to do such a thing again in 2012. I'm sorry that the War in Iraq is coming to an honorable end. I'm sorry that Obama bin Laden and several other key terrorist leaders are dead. I'm sorry that an economy, which  was losing 750,000 jobs per month when President Obama took office, has now had 19 consecutive months of private sector job growth. I'm sorry that DADA has been repealed and that our troops won't have to betray their integrity in order to defend this great nation. I'm sorry that President Obama actually responded to natural disasters and oil spills instead of just saying what a "heckuva job...

I've been listening to Congressman Ron Paul  talk about his campaign for the White House, what he would do if elected, and why we should do such a thing. While I admit that he is consistent and candid in his views, I also have to admit that I've come to the conclusion that there are basically two types of people who support his candidacy. Those who don't know much about Ron Paul; and Those who don't know much about history. For example, he argued that the mortgage crisis came about because we had too much government regulation. That's simply nuts. The fact of the matter is that we as a nation repealed a multitude of regulations that we designed to prevent such a thing from happening. If we hadn't done so, we still would've had a recession but it wouldn't have reached the levels that it is now nor would the mortgage crisis have ever reached the levels that it has. Thomas Hobbes  remarked more than four hundred years ago that, in its most n...

Occupy Wall Street is now in its tenth day. It is, by all accounts, larger than most of the events that the Tea Party has organized over the past two years. However, as I look through my local newspaper, listen to my local radio, and watch my local television, I see hundreds of different stories - but not a single word in any of them about Occupy Wall Street. Not a single one. The Tea Party, in contrast, has done smaller events that didn't even last a full day. However, they got lots of coverage from the news media. They were, in fact, the lead story on most days. The news media covered President Barack Obama's  efforts to get support for his jobs bill. That made page eight of my local newspaper. If the peaceful protesters in New York carried guns, maybe then the news media would cover the story. If the peaceful protesters in New York carried signs with racist or homophobic language, instead of simply saying "Wall Street Is Our Street", maybe then the...

It's official, ladies and gentlemen. Analysts at Standard & Poor's have proclaimed that the United States of America is now the finest AA+  nation on Earth . I am so proud!

The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended the day down 512 points , which is its worst performance since December 2008. The drop today basically means that the stock market has lost all of its gains for the year. All of this means that I'm afraid to look at my investment portfolio today. I know it's set up for the long haul and one bad day doesn't mean anything when you have a 20 year investment horizon. I firmly believe that if one's investments were sound the day before a stock market crash then they will, in all probability, remain so after said crash. Of course, the sad corollary to such a rule is that if one's investments weren't sound beforehand, one hopelessly screwed once a crash hits. Anyway, on days like this, I am reminded of the great investors who managed to get through the Great Stock Market Crash of 1929 without losing a single penny. How did they do it? They had good investments to begin with and they didn't sell during a panic. Instead, t...

I've come to the conclusion that I really ought to stop paying attention to what is happening around town. The local newspapers can essentially be summed as "Things that Mayor Dave Bing and Governor Rick Snyder  are doing that piss me off today." I'm tired of being this pissed off all of the time. It reminds me of the old adage that ignorance is bliss. If I simply forget that we have a local or state government, maybe things will be better for me. Nothing will be better in my neighborhood or in the surrounding area, but I can't help that. They seem determined to fuck things up and give lots of my money to their friends in the process. Bing and Snyder. There's a reason why their initials are "B.S." Collectively, they are the B.S. Twins.

I was flipping through Entrepreneur  the other day and noticed an article about the dramatic profits that "breastaurants" are able to bring in . These, of course, are restaurants that are inspired by the Hooter's model of good food and attractive waitresses in skimpy outfits. Would You Like Fries With That? I'm convinced that if someone were to open a restaurant like this in downtown Detroit and give it a sports theme, it would be huge. The place would capitalize on all of the traffic from the Detroit Lions, Tigers, and Red Wings games as well as any activity at Cobo, Hart Plaza, or elsewhere nearby. It would be huge. In fact, I remember a couple of years ago when Hooter's was fighting with the City of Troy (approximately 8 miles north of Detroit proper) for the right to open one of their restaurants there. Troy did not want them. When I saw the back and forth debate, I remember screaming at my television for them to forget about Troy and open downtown. Oh...

Forbes  has a post on the Taxgirl blog about a case involving taxes on a strip club. I've found that anytime one combines the subject of taxes and strip clubs, the result is always interesting and thought provoking. You can read all of the gory details here. In the meantime, if the folks at Night Moves in Latham, New York need an expert witness to help them sort out what is performance art and what isn't, I'm available and my rates are quite reasonable.

I have a video project for a client this week that uses stock photography and stock video extensively. I've used stock images before, but this is my first time using them this much (almost 30% of video is stock). I discovered something that's kind of shocking. A stock image of a generic blonde woman sells for $10 - $65 with any of the various stock vendors. A similar image with an African American face in the middle of it will sell for anywhere from $85 - $300. Needless to say, I wonder why this is true. There's a part of me that wonders if this is a part of the "Red Barn Phenomena." Why are so many barns painted red? Because red paint was the cheapest color. Why was red the cheapest color? Because so many farmers used red to paint their barns. Anyway, this is my theory on why black faces are so much more expensive in stock video and stock photography. If anyone stumbles across this blog and knows more about this subject than I, or simply has a different theo...

Dancing for Discounts I stopped by one of my local fast food restaurants today for lunch. I'll refrain from mentioning which one because I don't want anyone getting in trouble if the name were to show up in a Google Alert. Anyway, the 18 year old behind the counter gave me a senior citizen discount without me asking for it, which saved me 41 cents. There's a part of me that is offended to be thought of as a "senior citizen." However, there is also a part of me that realizes that if this happens to me another 48 times then I basically get a free lap dance.

The city of Barcelona, Spain voted recently to ban wearing bikinis anywhere other than swimming pools, beaches, adjacent streets, and beach walks. Anyone caught wearing such an outfit could face a fine ranging from 120 - 300 euros, which translates into $178 - $445. Kristen Can't Wear This in Barcelona Quite frankly, I'm not sure what part of this news disturbs me more. Is it the fact that there will presumably be fewer women wondering the streets of the second largest city in Spain in skimpy bikinis? Or could it be that I have now seen one more reminder of the fact that the Euro is worth 48% more than the U.S. dollar? It's really hard to say which one is more troubling to me. I might have to spend some more time looking at this photo of Kristen Bell  in a bikini and report back.

I thought of a new slogan for the Great Lakes State; one that brings us into greater compliance with truth in advertising laws. Welcome to Michigan. Our government sucks so badly, you'll forget how terrible our economy is. For those who prefer to continue our proud tradition of Michigan's state motto always being in Latin, this works out to be, "Ita imperio malo, quam grauis obliviscar oeconomia nostrae." I'm confident that the Michigan Legislature will endorse this idea.

Rachel Maddow  talked about the budget situation in Michigan rather extensively. Her comments are well worth listening to, in my opinion, regardless of where you happen to live.

President Barack Obama delivered what I believe to be one of the best State of the Union addresses I have heard in years this evening - and I say that as someone who has been watching them since the days of Jimmy Carter. (Yes, I was a nerd as a kid.) First, as a Detroiter, it was great to see newly elected Rep. Hansen Clarke at the State of the Union instead of his predecessor, Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick , mother/instigator for disgraced former Detroit Mayor Kwame M. Kilpatrick . As for the speech itself, I loved the fact that President Obama referenced the one million private sector jobs created in 2010. It's great to remind everyone that some good is happening, just not as fast as anyone would like. I couldn't help but notice that when the President proposed a five year freeze in government spending hardly anyone applauded. That is a shame. As a small business owner , I loved the President's idea of simplifying the tax code and lowering the corporate tax rate. I was ...

Every once in awhile, I hear a quote that so perfectly summarizes how I'm feeling at a given moment, I am compelled, it would seem, to emblazon it on the wall by my desk. Today, I came across such a quote. "A hero is no braver than an ordinary man," Ralph Waldo Emerson  once observed, "but he is brave five minutes longer." Today, I pray that each of us finds the strength to hang onto our bravery for those extra five minutes in whatever challenges we may face.

I forget, which political party was it that was in power during every major banking crisis since 1900? Oh, yeah - I remember.

Tony Hayward - FIRED Tony Hayward  has been fired from his position as chief executive officer of BP. In all of history, I don't think there has ever been a person who more richly deserved to be fired than Tony Hayward.