Just another regulation – if it makes the world a better place, who cares what it costs?

The Dodd-Frank bill, which you thought had something to do with regulating the financial industry, requires that retailers and manufacturers investigate the source of the minerals used in their products and certify to the SEC that those are “conflict free”. 

Four minerals—tin, tantalum, tungsten and gold—are blamed for financing armed groups in the Democratic Republic of Congo and the surrounding region, and companies using any of these minerals are required to investigate whether they were mined from the area.

Companies that believe the minerals they use may have been mined in the area must file a report with the SEC saying what steps they took to verify the minerals weren’t taxed or controlled by rebel groups.

The companies don’t have to file a so-called minerals report with the SEC if their materials come from scrap or recycled sources. Companies that fail to verify their sources of supply still can sell their products, but may run the risk of having them shunned by consumers when they appear on lists linked to Central African violence

The SEC estimates that around 6,000 U.S. and foreign companies would have to comply with the minerals rule. However, companies that merely attached their brand or label to a generic product manufactured by another company wouldn’t be bound by the rule, according to an SEC fact sheet distributed at Wednesday’s meeting.

The SEC on Wednesday sharply raised its estimate of the rule’s costs to businesses, putting it at $3 billion to $4 billion upfront and more than $200 million annually. The SEC initially said it would cost companies just $71 million to comply with the rule.

The Congo’s a lousy place – always has been, and King Leopold didn’t help matters any, but is a bill purportedly drafted in response to the failure of AIG and Lehman Brothers the appropriate place to demonstrate solidarity with a select group of oppressed Africans? Far more important, how many regulations like this are imposed on businesses, large and small, in every area of commerce? Regulators don’t count businesses that never start, only the direct cost imposed on existing enterprises, but it seems clear to me that many entrepreneurs are shut down before they ever get their idea off the ground. And that kills jobs.

If Holder’s looking for mental defectives to staff his ranks, I found one

I’d have to be crazy to turn down such a fine case!

Whoever is representing this plaintiff need send Holder no resume, just a copy of the lawsuit. Woman suing Dallas Cowboys because, after sitting for two hours on a black marble bench in the sun, she discovered it had burned her tush. I suppose her lawyer could find her a job at the DOJ too.

This explains a lot

 

Your country’s in the best of hands

Holder’s Justice Department has been actively recruiting dwarves, cripples and mental defectives for its ranks of lawyers. Heck, I should dust off my resume and try to get a real job.

Price cut

34 Bote Road, originally priced at $2.795, has taken a second cut and is now asking an even $2 million. It’s 0.89 of an acre, with a house that probably won’t survive the next buyer (although it certainly could) and, technically, it contains two building lots. The trouble with that, and the trouble with this land’s original pricing, is that the second lot is mostly a rock ledge that fronts on Tomney Road and even if you blasted that ledge to allow access, your house would have to be placed smack in the middle of the back yard that makes this whole lot so attractive. Build there and you have two mediocre lots instead of one beautiful one.

So I think this is more valuable as a single over-sized lot: build a new house where the existing one stands and keep a great backyard. But that means you shouldn’t have to pay or at least, you wouldn’t want to pay, for two lots. The owner seems to be coming around to that way of thinking.

If you’re looking for a building site, this is a very nice one.

 

Two sales, of note for different reasons

That sports guy Ahmad Rashad (football?) sold his house at 622 Riversville Road for $1.600 million today, better than the $1.325 he paid for it in 1995 but much worse than his hoped-for price of $4 million in 2009. Looking at the tax card, it appears he put some big money into renovating this because there was a mortgage of $2.835 recorded against it a few years back. Ol’ Ahmad and I didn’t kick back and watch the tube together at his house – not often, anyway, so I don’t know much about its condition, but last time I posted on this property readers who were familiar with the place suggested that it hasn’t been lived in in a long time and is now pretty much a dump. Certainly its selling price would indicate that that’s a fair assessment.

1840 Lockwood Farm House, 86 Lockwood Rd

In Riverside, 86 Lockwood Road sold for $1.450 million. It asked $1.495 and went to contract in just 15 days so this was a hot commodity. Unfortunately, I fear that it sold because it sits on 0.48 of an acre and not for the charm of its 1840 construction. If so, this will make two of the old Lockwood farmhouses on this street to hit the dumpsters in just three years. That’s a shame.

The Messiah channels Dan Quayle

Can’t do math, can’t spell, what the heck did he learn during that childhood in Kenya?

The 57th state, O-I-H-O!

EBT Realty’s final sale

It’s Lockwood & Mead hereafter, so watch it! But yesterday Cathy Farricker sold 32 Meyer Place in Riverside for $1.650 million and thus closed the books on our old, unlamented name (Fudrucker may be feeling nostalgic – who knows? – but I won’t miss it).

Of interest, possibly, to those following Riverside prices, this house sold for $1.807 million in 2007, $1.650 in October, 2010 and again yesterday for that price.

Watch out, the left may rediscover religion next week

Mommy is soooo pissed at you!

With a potential hurricane possibly on track to slam into the Republicans’ convention party down in Tampa next week, can the religionists howling about God’s will be far behind? You know how it is: the left derides fire and brimstone preachers who attribute natural disasters to man’s bad behavior concerning homosexuality, abortion or maybe cross-dressing, but when it suits them, they’ll drag their earth goddess Mother Gaia out of her grotto and blame earthquakes, blizzards and hurricanes on man’s wicked ways.

Look for the kooks to see divine retribution for denying global warming and rejection of the one true religion if the storm hits. I’m not quite arrogant enough to believe that I can discern God’s will – people on the fringes suffer from no such modesty, so it should be a fun week.