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West Texas Crude will open just above $21 a barrel on Monday morning. Maybe I’m wrong, but from my take after the coronavirus quarantine comes to an end the NBA story in Oklahoma City will be if this market can sustain an NBA franchise with U.S. domestic oil in the tank to this extent.

Again, google the market cap values of both Continental and Devon from 2012 and in 2020. Also consider both Chesapeake and Sand Ridge are basically history.

This is not the economic portfolio the city presented to David Stern when the viability of the NBA in Oklahoma City was being mulled by the NBA Board of Governors.

We also have to consider the likelihood of this season being finished is becoming less as every day passes.

For me being someone who is equally interested in sports and economics this has suddenly become a fascinating story as the perfect storm hit Oklahoma City at just the wrong time.

Can Oklahoma City as a small market one pro sports town absorb the worst trend in oil in my lifetime?

I’m stunned the white trash rabble Tiger King Netflix film is the state’s primary story line as the price of oil could fall to $10 a barrel this week. That in itself may tell the story of why Oklahoma continues to struggle to achieve overall economic diversity as opposed to being a one trick pony market economy.

To me it shouts one thing… no real vision or leadership from state government. No vision on how to take Oklahoma to the next levels educationally and economically.

Let’s put this in caps….YOUR STATE GOES AS YOUR EDUCATIONAL SYSTEM GOES.

It’s genuinely sad how this state never learns this axiom. Never learns and never escapes the boom/bust cycle of which Sam Anderson wrote about in Boom Town. Great book by the way.

Perhaps Jim Traber can pull himself away from the Joe Exotic inbred dysfunction and talk economics on his show this week. I know he has to be better than what he showed last week. We can get that bullshit from the Flashboys at Daily Thunder. Other than the two chicks Olivia and Glenda ….I’m not reading much which is salvageable.

Dear Intervention Diary…Day 4

Oh, wait…that’s for Melania’s diary I do for her on here….which BTW I might update tomorrow.

Anyway, Day 4….dearest Slovenian diary. The wife is at the family ranch in Seminole while Pauli the diva lab and I are watching the fort at the mini ranch in Deer Creek.

I should have done this intervention a very long time ago. I can’t even remotely articulate how not listening to Donald Trump say incredibly stupid things on the cable news networks has brought back the old Mike. I literally feel like a new man.

Mindy told me to make sure and not smoke any cigars in the house while she was gone and therefore I’m on the couch next to Pauli with a lit Cuban watching this Garth Brooks special on PBS….which is very good.

Garth just sang probably my favorite ‘story’ song of all-time…Operator by the late Jim Croce.

Garth did a fine job, but nobody sings this song about a previous relationship which I just love….like Jim Croce did. I love the story of the song.

Taxi by Harry Chapin would be a very close second in this same category. So odd both guys died in air plane crashes.

This is not fake news or some Deep State prophesy by me on my blog.

Ben Beranke is a Republican. He succeeded Alan Greenspan as the chair of the Federal Reserve. Greenspan was appointed by Reagan and Beranke was appointed by Bush 43 and served two terms as Fed Chair from 2006-2014.

Beranke was in charge during the financial collapse in 2008 which occurred under the watch of Bush 43. To Barack Obama’s credit when he became president he was smart enough to work with Beranke and give some continuity to policies which stabilized the economy.

Unlike the current POTUS who now runs his reality television show from the White House, Obama didn’t threaten or publicly embarrass his Fed Chair. Obama, unlike the orange-haired reality television star, understood there is some nuance required in dealing with monetary issues and the markets.

Beranke was succeeded by Janet Yellen who was succeeded by current Fed Chair Jerome Powell.

This video above is Ben Beranke giving his very brief take on the current situation in our country from a view of a former Fed Chair.

I would add this since this is Oklahoma and the collapse of the oil industry will make the situation in Oklahoma even tougher than for the rest of the union… the oil collapse wasn’t from the virus, it was brought on by the Saudis and Putin. A very bad perfect storm for Oklahoma. And this fact must be noted in Oklahoma as I think what we’ll see here hopefully won’t be a complete replay of the Penn Square collapse in the early 80’s, but will be much tougher in Oklahoma specific than the rest of the country because of a regressive state government and a shaky educational system.

Real estate values in Oklahoma would be my first marker to follow closely in the coming months and then of course businesses which go under as a result of oil possibly going below the $10 a barrel bench mark.

Upon further evaluation I’d wait to buy Continental Resources at $5 dollars a share or even lower. In some market locales the price is already under the $10 dollar benchmark.

In closing, ignore what the current POTUS is saying in regards to the Easter date reopen nonsense and make very cautious smart decisions based on the advice from experts like Dr. Fauci.

Oklahoma probably as much as any state in the Union is in for a very tough road back. Very tough. Staying home another two weeks isn’t going to change that fact.

Ignore the POTUS and heed the advice from the experts. Even Trump surrogate Governor Kevin Stitt is trying to tell you this by his most recent decisions.

Be exceedingly kind to others and be an ambassador of the Golden Rule every day as we work our way back through this disaster.

For three days now I haven’t seen or listened to the idiot who goes by the name of Donald Trump. I would compare it to a soul cleansing process. I’m actually beginning to feel somewhat human again. As I reach an advanced stage of this shall we say spiritual rebirth…I won’t even have to mention his name.

This will be about me taking my plane of awareness above and beyond.

I won’t need to mention his tiny little hands. I won’t have to comment on his orange hair. And I won’t feel any need to drag to Melania into any of this.

None of that will be me.

Walk in the park.

A very good show today. Michael had medical experts from Harvard, Yale, and Stanford debating the pros and cons of an all out national quarantine.

I’m done watching both MSNBC and Fox in that I don’t perceive either as viable sources of objective information. This isn’t a time for cheer leading, but rather a time for measured scientific data to make the right decisions for our country.

I’m not an expert in this field. I clearly value the opinions of the experts coupled with nuanced common sense.

We in Oklahoma have no clue whatsover of the data in our state because as of Wednesday only 838 tests had been administered in the entire state. There is not enough data to make an informed decision. We are flying blind without instruments.

I would guess the same states which completely deny climate change to any degree are also denying the seriousness of this situation.

Governor Kevin Stitt actually made what I thought were some intelligent comments earlier in the week which pleasantly surprised me. Some more stringent measures were added this week in Oklahoma as somehow the state was able to peel itself away the Joe Exotic saga on Netflix.

Sigh.

The question this week was if the U.S. should implement a nation wide quarantine. Keep in mind, the audience on this show isn’t a left wing watering hole. It’s more for moderates and independents like myself. Like me, Michael used to be a member of the Republican Party.

The results of the poll were 84% voted yes for a more cohesive national quarantine while 16% voted no.

Tomorrow… I’m going discuss former Fed Chief Ben Beranke’s comments this week on how this situation more accurately is a national disaster rather than an economic depression. I think this is key in making decisions right now.

Hope you bought some Boeing at $90 and some Continental Resources at $7 longer hold position.

Be safe and be sound in your decision making.

I didn’t watch cable news today. Didn’t do it and I haven’t ranted once all day in reference to Donald Trump.

Master of my domain. Walk in the park… Orange Hair Boy.

Step 1: Except for Smerconish and Fareed, stop watching cable television and start listening to music again.

I want to think about this today and write about it this evening after more introspection on this topic. The answer of course is yes. But I just want to make sure I think this thru logically to its conclusion.

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So I thought about it all day and into the evening. I even had two different conversations with two friends of mine whose opinions I value greatly.

Here’s the thing…the Trump base in Oklahoma would clearly abandon the concept of gravity if Trump told them to do so. Not even close. Probably by a seventy to eighty per cent margin in Oklahoma.

But here’s the big picture… me ranting about Trump and his followers on my blog is futile. It is what it is. It’s not changing and it wouldn’t change if Tom Friedman from the NY Times was ghost writing on my blog.

It’s the pragmatic reality of the situation.

I mean…I’m sixty-two years of age and I may have eight to twelve more years to live. This is the world I live in. Who knows….four years from now these Trump people could very well be endorsing Mike Tyson, Roger Stone or Charlie Sheen for president. It could actually be worse.

But bigger picture—with the time I have left on this earth I need to work on evolving my own relationship with God within the concept of being kind and preparing for the next level of my soul.

I can’t allow Donald Trump to drag me down to his level. I have to be above that in my daily life and on my blog.

I have to look for the good in every person I come in contact with…even those who no longer believe in gravity.

Not a complex question and an even easier answer.

Because the current American Evangelical Christians as we know them are the most shallow, hypocritical, bull-shitting phony tea-sippers the world has ever encountered.

I hope that wasn’t vague or ambiguous.

Because even a dimwit like Trump knows these people are money in his political bank come this November.

As per my Saturday Smerconish question…Trump knows these Birthers and others especially in the eighteen states I circled in red will be all in on this Easter nonsensical date of his which Dr. Fauci has already nixed.

What do we do with these people?

Could we possibly steer them back to England with the excuse they’ve been religiously persecuted in Obama’s America?

Can we imagine in any possible dumpster fire universe that the ‘human’ above could evoke the holiday of Easter and get away with it?

Only one. The one with the eighteen states, which BTW, are an enormous cash flow liability and the one I listed on Saturday with almost stunning prescience.

Trump’s first real jobs report of his presidency incoming.

I just wanted to take a look back this morning to just kind of remember happier days in Oklahoma City. I’m not sure if people in this state fully understand the ramifications of oil at $25 a barrel, but they will in the coming months.

I’m just optimistic we do get to see this Thunder team this late May or June play again and watch them compete in a playoff series.

I watched this video and it seems like this happened a lifetime ago.

What a great story Oklahoma City got to be a part of front and center on the national stage.

I’m taking a break on the markets today. Tomorrow a jobs report comes out and that will be the first real bell-weather economics wise as to where the U.S economy is at right now.

In 2011 the average price per barrel for West Texas Crude was $94.88. In 2012 the average was $94.05 per barrel. Oil closed at slightly over $23 per barrel yesterday.

Devon and Continental were each companies valued around $80 billion each back in 2012. They could each be bought for around $5 billion right now. I wonder if the average Oklahoman understands the trickle down consequences of this fact.

Oklahoma City has some very significant challenges ahead beyond beyond NBA basketball.

Look out for the elderly and be especially kind to your neighbors.