To be fair to the good burghers of Dunedin (though I’m not feeling very charitable at this moment), they are not the only people in the world doing stupid things right now with other people’s money.

Sports stadiums seem to hypnotise local politicians. All around the world they lose their senses whenever a much-loved sports team asks for subsidies or grants for a fancy concrete and glass monument. In America the pressure is even greater because sports franchises there are mobile and threaten to jump to other cities if they don’t get their big toy. It happens too in Australia (the Telstra Dome in Melbourne and the ANZ Stadium in Sydney are both bankrupt) and Britain (Google “Wembley Stadium” and “delay” to find 44,800 links in 0.33 seconds for a laugh).

Dunedin City Council doesn’t even have the imminent threat of the Highlanders departing as an excuse. The Highlanders are unlikely to

…

Rick Pendergraft says we won’t see an economic recovery before one of the housing, auto or labour markets stabilize. Friday’s nasty unemployment data and earnings reports from GM (NYSE:GM), Ford (NYSE:F ) suggest that our hopes are resting on real estate.

This from Investor’s Daily Edge:

Now that the election is over instead of focusing on what is going to happen over the next 10 weeks until the inauguration, I thought it would serve our readers better to look further out.  Over the next 10 weeks there are going to be numerous news items that will affect the market.  Traders will analyze each cabinet nomination, especially the selection of Treasury Secretary.  There are two more employment reports due out before the inauguration, the holiday shopping season, and the next earnings cycle will start before January 20.

Right now, everyone wants to know how President Obama is going to turn the economy