So S&P downgraded the credit rating of the US from AAA to AA+. What are the implications? I think, nothing. Rating agencies such as S&P might be applicable for companies and even governments but when you’re talking the US it’s different. Japan and China, with their huge holdings of US debt won’t really base their own rating and pricing from some rating agency. And in self interest, they certainly won’t simply let their holdings lose value which would be the case if yields rise due to the ratings downgrade. These large holders are the rating agencies when it comes to the US. Already Japan has indicated that their confidence is unchanged and China with it’s bigger holdings is likely of the same mind.
Month: August 2011
Back when I was a kid, I watched bit and pieces (or maybe I just recalled bits and pieces) of an animated TV series called Star Blazers. Later I learned that it’s called anime (but before that, Japanimation) and that in Japan it was called Space Battleship Yamato. It was an interesting series and really captured my imagination back then. So when I heard that there was going to be a live action version, I was very excited.
I finally finished watching it today and it was great. It captured and condensed the story (based on aforementioned bits and pieces) of the animated series very well. The production quality was unexpectedly good, reminiscent of Battlestar Galactica but not overdone like in the new Star Wars movies. There were some awkward acting, including that of Meisa Kuroki (but since she’s kawaii, I can overlook that).
In the movie, Earth is under attack by aliens called Gamilas, irradiating it with a constant bombardment of radioactive asteroids. To save Earth, an battleship is sent out to a remote planet called Iskandar where an anti-radiation device is supposed to be located. Beset by Gamilas at all twists and turns, the crew retrieves the device and eventually returns to Earth, finally ending with a blaze of glory, a big kamikaze bang befitting a Japanese battleship. Somehow it gave me a feeling of fulfillment and satisfaction rather than a feeling of waste. Now that’s a good ending.
Today was a bloodbath in the market. Everything was red. I was actually expecting it to go down but for the wrong reason. I was thinking that if the debt ceiling will be raised, and it was, then there would be a measure of recovery in the US market. It had been going down for some time due to uncertainty brought about by the prolonged debate on raising the debt ceiling. And once that uncertainty is lifted, I was thinking some capital would flow back. But it seems the reason for the bloodbath is that with the uncertainty lifted, the shape of the economy went fore into the picture and it wasn’t good. So downward the US market continued. Enough to jitter everyone else.
Support asked for a list of log entries that indicates that the system unusable and require immediate action. So we provided them a list of fatal exceptions. The next question was stupefying: How many times should the exception occur before immediate action is taken? First, those are fatal exceptions. Fatal. Get it? The system is dead. How many time does it have die? Second, it’s immediate action. Immediate. Do it right away.
I had to go on leave from work today due to lower back pain. Looks like I’ll have to stop carrying Jeanne. She’s gotten rather heavy. It’s past due time to start using the stroller. Lifting it in and out of the trunk is also a potentially back-breaking endeavor. But it’s definitely way lighter than Jeanne. I’m ruing the days when I’d lug heavy backpacks up hills.