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Yesterday marked the end of Obama’s first 150 days at the helm of the U.S. of A. None of us doubted that Obama was a savvy and ambitious politician, but even we are impressed by the sheer number of new initiatives the president has undertaken. In less than five months, there are very few campaign promises he has failed to tackle.

One has to wonder, however, whether Obama may be failing to deliver on the biggest of his campaign promises – that of bringing change to Washington. Weren’t we supposed to see the end of politics as usual and of government waste and pork? Instead, we’ve gotten more of the same, with Ben Bernanke, Larry Summers, and their ilk still in charge and Geithner replacing Paulson. The doors continue to revolve between Wall Street and K Street, with the same cabal influencing policy....

This morning, as I was looking over dispatches from correspondents around the world -- from Ed in Alberta… Sadia in the UK… Baldy in Indonesia… the 'General' in Portugal...and Nitin in Katmandu -- I began to appreciate what it must have been like to be on the news desk during World War II. I am trying not to be overly pessimistic, but there’s no denying the mass of bad news coming to us from all fronts: the forces of collectivism are using the cover of the crisis they largely created, aided and abetted by capitalism’s quislings, to roll over the individual. Even so, contained within the dire reportage is also some very good news for you personally, and I’ll touch on that as well in today’s missive....

What a world I have returned to from my cloistered retreat at the beautiful Vivenda Miranda, scenically situated on a cliff outside of the quaint port town of Lagos, Portugal. Everything has changed. Everything is changing. The storm we have so long tried to help you prepare for is upon us. At this point, I can only hope you have your sails rigged for the storm now breaking, because time is running out. The violent volatility I warned of when last I wrote has arrived, with towering waves now rising up and smashing into the economy - and as an unavoidable consequence, our personal portfolios -- from all sides. Overnight the holders of my mortgage, WaMu, failed, the largest bank failure in history. This week, the golf course that I usually play on was taken over by the government... last week it belonged to AIG. As you don't need me to tell you, that same government now wants to spend over a trillion dollars to bail out Wall Street and to shore up the money market mutual funds - which have so far flown under the radar screen despite portfolios stuffed to the brim with bad paper. While no one was paying attention, U.S. automakers used their election year leverage to win approval for $25 billion in low-interest loans....