Italy pledges reforms as Europe seeks to end debt crisis

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Italy pledges reforms as Europe seeks to end debt crisis
October 26, 2011 |  5:37 pm

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In an effort to convince European leaders that his country is capable of meeting its budget goals, Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi reportedly vowed Wednesday to raise the equivalent of $8 billion annually from asset sales, increase Italy’s retirement age and relax labor laws.

“We are aware of the need to present a comprehensive plan of reforms,” Berlusconi said in the letter that he presented to European Union leaders meeting at a debt crisis summit in Brussels, according to Bloomberg News. “We are aware that our debt is too high and our growth too limited.”

He said the asset-sales plan would be completed by Nov. 30, according to Bloomberg. But the letter provided few new proposals and failed to present the thorough plan European leaders are seeking to help end the debt crisis that has embroiled the continent for almost two years, the news agency said.

Berlusconi vowed to hike the retirement age to 67 by 2026, from about 65 currently for men, and overhaul labor market laws making layoffs easier, the news agency reported.

According to Dow Jones, Berlusconi planned to present a detailed plan for boosting growth by Nov. 15, and his overall reform plan would be implemented within in the next eight months.

The letter was to be discussed by  leaders of the 17-country Eurozone over dinner Wednesday evening, Dow Jones said.

European leaders generally struggled Wednesday to find an economic plan that would be in place by  next week’s key Group of 20 meeting in Cannes, France, where countries including China and the United States had hoped to hear a report of major progress.

Kauai remains a popular film location

Kauai has been a favorite film location since it stood in for Bali Hai in the 1958 movie version of "South Pacific." It has been Maui in the Adam Sandler-Jennifer Aniston romantic comedy "Just Go With It" (released this year), and it played the Caribbean in "Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides," the fourth of the Johnny Depp swashbucklers. Sometimes it even plays itself. In "The Descendants," which is to open next month, a father (George Clooney) takes his children to Kauai after his wife is incapacitated. "Every location is the real place," says co-producer George Parra. Here's a guide to movie sites (some on private property), with tips on how to explore them from film location manager Angela Tillson, who has been guiding film scouts around the island for 23 years.

Na Pali coast

What it is: Rugged cliffs in northwest Kauai. Not accessible by car — only by boat, foot or helicopter.

What it starred in: "Hop" (as Easter Island in the opening of this year's animated live-action movie); "Journey 2: The Mysterious Island" (as a mythical island in the not-yet-released "Journey" sequel); "Six Days, Seven Nights" (as Tahiti, 1998); "King Kong" (as Africa in the 1976 film); "Tropic Thunder" (2008, set in Vietnam). "Just Go With It" used aerial shots of the coastline.

How to see it: "Try seeing Na Pali by boat or on a guided kayak tour," Tillson says. "You don't want to go on your own unless you're an experienced kayaker because of the currents; you have to know how to land a kayak on the beach."

Info: Tillson says there are several good companies that can get you there. (She suggests Googling "Boat tours down Na Pali" for a list.) The cost for seeing Na Pali by boat or sea kayak, based on checks with several supplies, ranged from $139 to $229 before tax (depending on length of tour and what's included). Kayak tours generally are available from April to early September.

Hanalei Town, North Shore

What it is: Small, charming town in front of Mt. Namahana with waterfalls in the background.

What it starred in: "South Pacific," "Lilo and Stitch" (2002) and "The Descendants." In fact, the Tahiti Nui bar (5-5134 Kuhio Highway) plays itself in "Descendants," and Parra says it's a great watering hole, popular with locals.

How to see it: It's west of Princeville across a one-lane bridge. As you arrive in Hanalei Town, you feel as if you've traveled back in time.

Info: See Hanalei Town under North Shore on http://www.gohawaii.com/kauai.

Hanalei Bay and Hanalei, Lumahai and Blackpot beaches, North Shore

What it starred in: Hanalei Bay appears in "South Pacific," "Lilo" and "The Descendants." "Hanalei Bay is unique just by the enormous size of it, very raw and mostly untouched," Parra says. Two rental cottages belonging to the Hanalei Land Co. were used as locations in "The Descendants," and Tillson recommends them for lodging. (Nalu Beach Cottage rents for $750 per night or $5,000 per week, and the Kauikeolani Estate (a historic house previously called the Wilcox Estate) rents for $15,000 a week with a one-week minimum. Hanalei Land Co., (888) 900-1454, http://www.hanaleiland.com.

"South Pacific's" Nellie Forbush washed that man right outta her hair in nearby Lumahai Beach. Sailors sang "Nothing Like a Dame" at Blackpot Beach near the Hanalei Bay pier (adjacent to the St. Regis).

How to see them: From Hanalei Town, if you stay on Kuhio Highway, the next beach will be Lumahai Beach (a five-minute walk from the road). (Lumahai is unmarked, but you'll see cars parked along the highway). To get to Blackpot Beach, Hanalei Bay and the pier, you turn right on Aku Road off Kuhio Highway, then go one block and turn right on Weke Road (which parallels Hanalei Bay). The road dead-ends into the parking lot for Blackpot Beach and Hanalei Pier.

St. Regis Hotel, Princeville

What it is: Luxury hotel

What it starred in: Cast and crew of "Just Go With It" and "The Descendants" stayed at the hotel. The latter filmed scenes in the lobby and at the Princeville Fountain, the focal point of the main entrance to the Princeville area.
What it is: It's a narrow family beach off a protected reef with shallow water that seems like a lake when there's no surf.

What it starred in: "Honeymoon in Vegas" (1992). Tommy Korman (James Caan) showed off his Kauai home on Anini Beach to Betsy (Sarah Jessica Parker). Tillson says Anini is great for swimming because it's protected by a large coral reef.

Info: Anini Beach is four miles east of Princeville off Hawaii Highway 56.

Wailua River, Kapaa

What it is: The Wailua River traverses several ecosystems. You move from forested river banks and tall cliffs to lush green rain forest as you wind upriver. The Fern Grotto is downstream of where movies have been filmed.

What it starred in: Scenes for "The Lost World: Jurassic Park" were shot upriver from the Fern Grotto. Scenes from "Outbreak" (1995) and "Pagan Love Story" (the 1950 Esther Williams musical) were also shot here. Tillson recommends kayaking up the Wailua, Kauai's only navigable river.

Info: Kayak Kauai rents kayaks and offers guided tours along the Wailua River year-round for $85 (pretax) and down the Na Pali Coast from late April through August for $185 (pretax). (800) 437-3507, http://www.kayakkauai.com.

Coco Palms hotel ruins, Kapaa

What it is: Elvis Presley made Coco Palms famous in "Blue Hawaii" (1961). On Sept. 11, 1992, Hurricane Iniki destroyed it. Steven Spielberg and the cast and crew of the original "Jurassic Park" rode out the hurricane in a ballroom at the Marriott.) Several storm scenes in "JP" are actual footage of Iniki. "Pirates 4" chose this location because "it has the largest coconut grove on Kauai," says property manager and tour guide Bob Jasper.

Info: Coco Palms Tours, (808) 346-2048.

Waialeale Blue Hole area

What it is: At the base of Mt. Waialeale is a crater known as the Blue Hole. Mt. Waialeale is one of the wettest spots on Earth. Tillson recommends seeing it by helicopter.

What it starred in: The area just above the "Jurassic Park" gate (a leftover prop) was used for "Avatar" actors. They were learning how to walk in the jungle so their movements would appear realistic when they trekked through "Pandora," the fictional world that was created in James Cameron's movie.

Info: See helicopter tours below.

Allerton National Tropical Botanical Garden, South Shore

What it is: The Allerton section of the National Tropical Botanical Gardens (which includes the McBride Garden toward the mountain) is the area closest to the ocean.

What it starred in: Dinosaur eggs appeared between the giant roots of the Moreton Bay fig tree in "Jurassic Park."

Info: (808) 742-2623, http://www.ntbg.org/gardens/allerton.php; a tour costs $45 for adults (13 and older); $20 for those 8-12; visitors must be at least 8 years old. Reservations recommended.

Sites by helicopter

Several locations for "The Descendants" are on private property, including Kauai Ranch, Keipukai (which played Tahiti in "Six Days, Seven Nights" and was also used in "Jurassic Park II: The Lost World") and the Grove Farm (which was Vietnam in "Tropic Thunder"). Tillson recommends seeing these sites by chopper, along with the Manawaiopuna Falls in the Hanapepe Valley, seen in "Jurassic Park."

Info: Jack Harter Helicopter Tours, (888) 245-2001, http://www.helicopters-kauai.com. $259 for 60 minutes.

Island Helicopters (the only company that can land at Manawaiopuna Falls, (800) 829-5999, http://www.islandhelicopters.com. Waterfall landing tour starts at $308 ($269 and $39 for fuel for 75 to 85 minutes).

Prisoner swap with Israel emboldens Hamas

TEL AVIV — Captured Israeli soldier Gilad Shalit returned home Tuesday looking pale and rail thin to a country bracing itself for fallout from a prisoner swap that has emboldened the militant Palestinian faction Hamas.

A subdued Israeli homecoming ceremony for Shalit stood in stark contrast to the mood in the Gaza Strip, where buses carrying the first of 1,027 Palestinian prisoners to be freed as part of the exchange were escorted by heavily armed Hamas fighters.
Hamas declared Tuesday a holiday, and a mural depicted Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agreeing to the swap as a gunman kicked his face into the ground. A spokesman for Hamas’s military arm suggested that the group would continue to seek opportunities to seize Israeli soldiers.

As busloads of freed Palestinians arrived in the West Bank, residents waved Hamas flags, a rare sight in the Palestinian enclave where the rival Fatah wing has traditionally been more popular. The exchange appears to have undermined the standing of Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, leader of the more-moderate Fatah, while raising the profile of Hamas, which negotiated the exchange through Egyptian intermediaries.

Netanyahu said signing off on the deal had been “a very difficult decision,” and he alluded to possible challenges ahead. “I want to make it clear: We will continue to fight terrorism,” he said. “Any released terrorist who returns to terrorism” will be dealt with.

Shalit, 25, looked frail and dazed five years after Hamas fighters ambushed his tank, killed two of his comrades and dragged him into the Gaza Strip in 2006. The captive soldier had little contact with the outside world, other than occasional access to radio and television news in Arabic, his father said.

Shalit was visible only briefly Tuesday as he was hurriedly ushered from Gaza into Egypt through the Rafah crossing, plopped down for an interview with Egyptian state television and finally turned over to Israeli forces at a nearby border. Israeli doctors said Shalit showed signs of malnutrition and lack of exposure to sunlight but was otherwise healthy; his father said Shalit, who was 19 when he was seized, continues to suffer from shrapnel wounds received during his capture.

“I thought that I would find myself in this situation many more years,” Shalit said in the television interview, his only public remarks.

“He came out of a dark pit, a dark cellar,” his father, Noam, told reporters. “Gilad is happy to be home but finds it difficult to be around a large number of people, as he was held in seclusion for so many days and years.”

Shalit’s release removed one of the main sources of tension between Israel and the Palestinians and raised the prospect that the blockade Israel has imposed on the Gaza Strip for years could be eased. But it seemed unlikely that it would set a new tone for the bellicose relationship between Israel and Hamas.

Hamas leaders said they would continue to fight for the release of the more than 4,000 Palestinian prisoners Israel will have in custody after the 1,027 included in the exchange are free. The first of two groups, which included 477 inmates, was released Tuesday.
“The rest of the prisoners must be released, because if they are not released in a normal way, they will be released in other ways,” Mousa Abu Marzook, one of the movement’s top leaders said, according to the Hamas-linked Web site al-Qassam.

“Hamas’s popularity has skyrocketed,” said Wisam Salame, 32, an electrician in the West Bank. He complained that Abbas had never been able to win such a prisoner release. “Resistance is the only way to force the occupier to release prisoners and achieve our goals,” he added.
Akram Abdullah Kassem, one of the prisoners released in Gaza, said he was happy to be free after 10 years in custody, but saddened by the fellow prisoners he left behind.

“I’m demanding to the resistance not to spare any effort to kidnap more soldiers,” he said Tuesday. “The Jews only understand one language — the language of force.”

Sana Shehade, 36, one of the 27 women freed as part of the deal, called Shalit “my token to freedom.”

She said that as Shalit’s mother delighted in the reunion, she should keep in mind that there are thousands of “Palestinian mothers waiting to hold their sons.”

As the first images of the freed soldier were broadcast on Israeli television Tuesday morning, the prevailing mood among Israelis was a sense of relief. It was readily apparent, however, that the deal to swap Shalit for so many captured Palestinian militants came with significant risks.

“Today, we are all united in joy and pain,” Netanyahu told reporters at the Tel Nof air base, south of Tel Aviv, moments after Shalit was reunited with his family. He said the state had been compelled to sign off on the prisoner swap to retrieve a soldier “Israel had sent to the battlefield.”

As Shalit returned home Tuesday night, thousands of Israelis formed a human chain along the road that leads to his house. Some waved Israeli flags and held flowers, Israeli news footage showed.

A family spokeswoman said his mother, Aviva, had purchased all the ingredients to make his favorite meals. The soldier’s grandfather, Zvi Shalit, told Israeli media that Shalit appeared healthier than relatives feared he would be, but was in need of rest.

“Gilad spoke very quietly and said he was tired and wanted to sleep,” the grandfather said.

Special correspondents Samuel Sockol in Jerusalem, Islam Abdel Kareem in the Gaza Strip and Sufian Taha in Ramallah contributed to this report.

Sue Mengers dies at 79; top talent agent

Sue Mengers, an unapologetically brash talent agent who blazed a path for women in Hollywood and represented some of its biggest stars, died Saturday night at her Beverly Hills home after a long illness. She was 79.

For two decades, Mengers was one of the entertainment industry's most powerful agents, rising fast in a business dominated by men. She earned a reputation as a skilled negotiator who was both tough and uncensored in her style. She had a knack for putting together packages of talent, including authors, directors and stars, that produced box office blockbusters. In one coup, she landed three of her clients — Barbra Streisand and Ryan O'Neal and director Peter Bogdanovich — in the 1972 Warner Bros. comedy "What's Up, Doc?"

"Sue was a valued colleague and friend for many years," said International Creative Management Chairman Jeff Berg, who worked with Mengers for 16 years and was her boss at the talent agency. "She had an incisive wit, sharp tongue and great creative instincts."

Among the Hollywood luminaries Mengers also represented over her career were actors Faye Dunaway, Candice Bergen, Steve McQueen, Nick Nolte, Burt Reynolds and Cybill Shepherd, directors Sidney Lumet and Brian De Palma, and writer Gore Vidal.

"I worked with her when she was at ICM in her absolute heyday. She gave meaning to the word 'woman power,' " said longtime Hollywood agent and manager Joan Hyler. "She was arguably the most famous agent of her time. And the fact that she was a woman and fearless was quite extraordinary."

Born in 1932 in Hamburg, Germany, Mengers didn't learn English until she was 6, when her family immigrated to New York to escape the Holocaust. Her family settled in upstate New York, in Utica, where her father worked as a traveling salesman.

Mengers' father committed suicide when she was 11. She and her mother relocated to the Bronx, where her mother took a job as a bookkeeper. Mengers would attend Saturday matinees to escape the pain of losing her father and dreamed of one day becoming a star.

Ultimately, Mengers achieved celebrity in her own right. She was profiled on CBS' "60 Minutes," and served as the inspiration for the acid-tongued blond portrayed by Dyan Cannon in the 1973 whodunit "The Last of Sheila."

Mengers started her career in 1955, working as a receptionist at MCA Inc. talent agency, whose roster of clients included Jack Benny, George Burns and Gracie Allen, Marlon Brando and Montgomery Clift. She was later hired as a secretary at the theatrical agency Baum & Newborn, before landing a position with the William Morris Agency as a $135-a-week secretary.

Mengers left William Morris in 1963 when Tom Korman, a former Baum & Newborn colleague, invited her to become a partner in his agency, Korman & Associates.

"I never thought in my life I'd get a shot at being a talent agent — or even get out of the secretarial mold," Mengers told the Los Angeles Times in a 1993 interview by phone from her apartment in Paris. "We're talking 30 years ago. The only female role models around were literary agents wearing hats."

Her first client was actress Julie Harris, an accomplished Broadway star who was interested in appearing in the TV western series "Bonanza." Mengers contacted the producer, who commissioned a specially written episode for Harris.

In 1967, Mengers was spotted by Freddie Fields and David Begelman, co-heads of the then high-powered Creative Management Associates, which later became ICM. They asked her to head the company's legitimate theater department. A year later, she moved from New York to Los Angeles, where she became known for star-studded parties that were among the most coveted invitations in Hollywood.

"I never invited anyone who wasn't successful," Mengers told the New Yorker in an 1994 interview. "I was ruthless about it. It was all stars. I would look around my living room at all of them and even I'd be impressed with myself."

A 1973 Time magazine profile of Mengers, during the apex of her time as a Hollywood power broker, described the 5-foot, 2 1/2 –inch, 160-pound agent her as "a cross between Mama Cass and Mack the Knife. She has the soft, breathy voice of a little-bitty girl, the vocabulary of a mule skinner and the subtle approach of a Sherman tank."

Mengers was well aware of her brazen, direct style.

"I was tactless, contemptuous and made enemies needlessly," she said in the Los Angeles Times interview. "If I had to do it over again, I'd take on a bit more of the personality of (former Paramount Pictures chief) Sherry Lansing, who has the ability to make people feel good. I rolled in there like a tank … but in any revolution you have to do something to get their attention. Women don't have to act like that these days."

Mengers quit ICM in 1986, claiming she had burned out. Two years later, the William Morris Agency lured her out of retirement with a lucrative three-year contract to run the agency's worldwide operations. But she was unable to stop the defections of top talent that plagued the agency during that period, or sign new clients of her own. She left the agency in January 1991.

In her later years, even though she was out of the business, Mengers' pink home in Beverly Hills continued to be a salon for agents, movie stars, authors and filmmakers to talk shop over meals.

"At dinner she was a great raconteur. There was probably nobody funnier," said ICM agent John Burnham, who worked with Mengers at William Morris. "Woody Allen just marveled at her rapier wit and storytelling."

Mengers was married to Belgian writer-director Jean-Claude Tramont from 1973 (Streisand was her maid of honor) until his death in 1996. She leaves no survivors.

When she died Saturday, Mengers was surrounded by friends, including talent agent Boaty Boatwright, actress Ali MacGraw and Joanna Poitier, wife of actor Sidney Poitier.

"It's the end of an era," said "Twilight" producer Karen Rosenfelt, who was Mengers' secretary at ICM in the early 1980s. "She was a fiercely loyal friend and agent to her clients. She broke the glass ceiling for many women in the industry. She was a guiding light in my career."

NBA vets play ball at Loyola Marymount with lockout on their minds

Less than 24 hours after the NBA announced it was canceling the first two weeks of the season because no collective bargaining agreement had been reached, several locked-out NBA players were playing pickup games at Loyola Marymount on Tuesday, looking to stay in shape while assessing the situation.

Al Harrington of the Denver Nuggets, Corey Maggette of the Charlotte Bobcats and Earl Watson of the Utah Jazz said their support for their union remains steadfast. The players also spoke of how the lockout, now in its fourth month, is hurting other people dependent upon the NBA for their livelihood.

"It's bigger than us," Harrington said. "We affect a lot of people's lives. We affect the economy.

"We've been working on this for three years now. The negotiations didn't just start July 1. It started three years ago and it doesn't make any sense that we haven't found a common ground by now."

Harrington was a rookie with the Indiana Pacers during the 1998-99 season when the games didn't start until February because of a labor dispute.

In his view, the owners are "kind of playing us" in the belief that if players "miss a couple of paychecks" the union will be willing to accept any deal.

"If the league was losing so much money and you have all these billionaire owners who are great successful businessmen who are great at what they do, why did four teams sell for $400-plus million this year in a bad system?" Harrington asked. "So you've got those people spending that kind of money and they are going to buy into a league that's not doing well? It doesn't make any sense."

Actually, the most recent NBA teams to change hands were the Golden State Warriors, who were sold last season for an NBA-record $450 million; the Detroit Pistons, sold in April for $325 million, and the Atlanta Hawks, sold in September for $300 million.

Maggette said he wondered why the previous labor agreement that expired June 30 wasn't "extended maybe for another year" so they could be playing now.

He called the National Basketball Assn. the "National Business Association."

Like Harrington, Maggette said the lockout's impact extended beyond the players.

"The people that are doing concessions, they are not getting paid at all," Maggette said. "Forget about us, I'm thinking about them as well, because those are the people that are middle class or lower class trying to make it and they are not. And they are looking at us as the billionaires and the millionaires arguing about money. It don't look right."

Watson, a former UCLA guard, expressed concern for the "loyal workers" with the Jazz in Salt Lake City.

"Some of them are elderly and this is all that they have is NBA basketball," Watson said. "Our [financial] hit is major, but their hit [from the lockout] could almost be 80 to 100% [of their pay]. So we've got to think about things like that."

One player at Loyola Marymount said he hasn't been thinking much about the negotiations.

Metta World Peace (formerly Ron Artest) said he hasn't "really focused" on the labor strife.

In fact, World Peace showed up about 45 minutes after the players were done with their pickup game.

"I really haven't been depending on playing. I'm about to fight [mixed martial arts fighter Quinton] 'Rampage' [Jackson] in a charity event," he said. "I've been able to get ready for my boxing career early. And I'm working on a movie too. But if they play, I'll play."

Madoff victims die before checks for lost money arrive

It’s too little -- and for many, too late.

Victims of Bernie Madoff’s massive Ponzi scheme finally started receiving checks yesterday for their lost life savings -- too late for at least eight elderly residents of a Queens high-rise who died before their restitution arrived.

Many of the Madoff victims living in North Shore Towers in Floral Park saw their nest eggs wiped out by scams and were forced to move in with their children, dismiss their home health-care aides or get on emergency wait lists for nursing homes.

One elderly man took a job as a bagger at a local A&P to survive, while other heartbroken victims had to loot the savings they set aside for their children.
“He’s one of the most rotten men that has ever been created,” said Hilda Hausner, 94, of Madoff.

Hausner’s husband of 70 years, Harvey, died last year before the couple got back a penny from their lost $850,000 investment.

“He was my best friend. I’m not the first widow here, and I won’t be the last,” Hausner said.

The tiny woman is living off returns from bonds originally socked away for her three children -- until those run dry.

After years of clawing back profits from the scheme, Irving Picard, the case’s bankruptcy trustee, began mailing payments to 1,230 defrauded account holders Wednesday.

Eleven living Madoff victims -- with an average age of 88 -- remain in the towers, which was dubbed the Ground Zero of the Ponzi scheme when Madoff’s crimes were discovered in 2008.

Elderly residents of the 1,844-unit complex got sucked in through Edward Glantz, an accountant who lived in a penthouse at North Shore Towers for years, victims said.

The SEC busted Glantz, who died in 2007, for violating federal securities laws by feeding unregistered investor money to an accounting firm tied to Madoff.

“It broke everybody’s hearts,” said the son of elderly tower residents, who declined to reveal his name.

The 70-year-old man’s father died in 2009, just months after the scandal broke. His mother’s $850,000 in savings were erased, forcing her to sell the North Shore Towers apartment, go on Medicaid and check into a Manhattan nursing home.

“She’s suffering from the consequences,” the Sarasota, Fla., resident said.

The $312 million in last week’s disbursements is about 4.6 cents on the dollar of lost investments.

“It’s a beginning. It’s something,” said Judith Welling, a Battery Park City senior, who received a check yesterday for a portion of the $2.5 million she lost.

Future payments will be mailed out once appeals against Picard’s claims have been settled.

Only customers who didn’t withdraw all of their original Madoff investment are eligible for payouts, Picard said.

“It has been a terrible nightmare for these people,” said Jerome Reisman, a Garden City, LI, lawyer who represents 38 victims, a handful of who have died while waiting for a fraction of their hard-earned funds.

Think the economy's bad? 'You haven't seen anything'

Market pessimism is reaching a fever pitch, fueled by increasing belief that global policymakers either are powerless or inept when it comes to controlling the various headwinds confronting the economy.
With a bloody third quarter coming to an end and hopes that the final three months of the year will live up to their reputation as the market's best, now might be the time when confidence would be on an upswing.

But some of the market's top thinkers are releasing a chorus of dour predictions that, while allowing for the chance of a mild rally as 2011 closes, otherwise believe there is little reason for hope.

    *
      MORE: Market bottom in Sight?
    *
      STORY: Is U.S. economy flirting with 'modern-day depression'?
    *
      MORE: Faces of 'occupy Wall Street'

Bob Janjuah, the notably bearish fixed income analyst for Nomura Securities, believes that a market low is coming in October that could be followed by a late-year rise. But 2012 holds little but a bear-market roar that could take the Standard & Poor's 500 all the way down to the 700 range—a numbing 38 percent drop from current levels.

"The basic problems remain weak trend growth in the (developed market) world, which we think will continue for another three to five years, the policy errors (in our view) of the current set of policymakers, and the existing set of inadequate 'old world' policy institutions," Janjuah wrote in an analysis for clients.

As for investors in such a climate, Janjuah says they "should remain cautious, and focus on strong balance sheets and strong/robust business models."

Those types of comments are being echoed across the financial markets spectrum but perhaps most notably in recent days by the Economic Cycle Research Institute.

The ECRI is widely considered an impartial — and highly accurate — referee when it comes to discerning trends. At a similar point last year, when many also were anticipating another recession, the ECRI rebuffed those predictions.

For the months ahead, though, the ECRI's leading index is unwavering in its call for another recession, just two years after the last one officially ended. ECRI's head economist, Lakshman Achuthan, detailed the reasons for the coming recession in a CNBC appearance last week.

"It's important to understand that the recession doesn't mean a bad economy — we've had that for years now. It means an economy that keeps worsening because it's locked into a vicious cycle," ECRI said in research posted a few days ago. "Here's what ECRI's recession call really says: If you think this is a bad economy, you haven't seen anything yet."

Predictions for a bad economy, though, aren't really new.

Strategists such as David Rosenberg at Gluskin Sheff in Toronto have been pounding the table for months about another recession. He said Monday that only a decline in the savings rate has prevented one from happening already.

"We have to admit that we feel somewhat vindicated, having made this call nearly four months ago to howls of derision," Rosenberg said in his daily note Monday. "What we saw then and still see now is a full-fledged deleveraging cycle that has gone global."

For those who have intensified their negative outlooks, the conversion has much to do with a repeated inability of policymakers and politicians to come up with solutions to the European debt crisis as well as the jobs stagnation and other problems in the US.

"The various schemes for the European Financial Stability Facility are little more than a shell game to kick the debt can further down the road," Charles Biderman, CEO at the TrimTabs research firm, wrote. "How will shuffling the crappy debt of broke countries from broke banks into a leveraged 'special purpose vehicle' ultimately backed by the taxpayers of broke and nearly broke countries solve anything in the longer term?

"All it may do is postpone the reckoning and ensure an even bigger bust later."

TrimTabs is recommending investors be short the S&P 500 and financials in particular and go long consumer staples and industrials, while holding metals, commodities and inflation-protected bonds as well.

Such downbeat investor sentiment comes at a precarious time for a market facing conflicting historical trends.

The S&P 500 has averaged a 4.57% gain in the fourth quarter over the past 20 years, but that hasn't held up when the market has been negative heading into the end of the year. When the S&P 500 has been down for the first three quarters, as is the case this year, the index averages a 1.07% loss, according to Bespoke Investment Group.

Nick Colas, chief market strategist at CovergEx, called the quarter ahead the most important since the dark days of the financial crisis in 2008 and 2009, also citing failure from policymakers as the biggest concern.

"Political leadership is in short supply, as is consumer confidence," Colas wrote. "The former is necessary to address deficits in the US and euro zone stability. The latter is a missing precondition for sustainable growth."

And it's been that lack of growth potential that has continued to feed the bond market, pushing the benchmark 10-year note yield to record lows and feeding a bid for safety that doesn't bode well for stocks. Industrial metals, meanwhile, are caught in a steep selloff that also contributes to the recession sentiment.

"Despite the Fed buying, the 10-year has been unwavering in its signal for a meaningful slowdown," Quincy Krosby, market strategist at Prudential Financial, said in an interview. "The whole crisis during the summer — the downgrade, you name it — that 10-year has been saying, 'watch out.'"

Investors, then, are left to wait out a market that seems destined for a rough ride through increasing calls for recession.

"We hope to become manifestly, aggressively, stunningly bullish of equities," Dennis Gartman, hedge fund manager and author of The Gartman Letter, said in his Monday commentary. "Until then, we are sellers of rallies."

Meredith Whitney: We already are Europe

Meredith Whitney is not backing down from her position on state and municipal finances. They'll lead to further cuts in social services, which will fuel more social unrest.
Meredith Whitney pointed out that she was wearing red, white, and blue on stage at the Fortune Most Powerful Women conference on Wednesday, even though her message about the state of affairs in the U.S. is about as bleak as they come.

Whitney, CEO of the Meredith Whitney Advisory Group, sounded alarms about the increasing divide between the haves and the have-nots here in America – a situation that will almost certainly lead to more social unrest. When asked if we'll become Europe, she concluded: "We already are Europe."

The comparison can't be made on a financial level, she admitted, but at the social level it's similar. Some of the same issues that led to the Arab Spring movements and protests in Europe are becoming prevalent in the U.S. "It's us against them on every level," she said. "We have to raise the collective spirit in this country."

Full transcript of Meredith Whitney's talk at Fortune's Most Powerful Women Summit

We've already seen examples of this, such as the tuition protests last year in Berkeley, Calif., the teacher protests and New Jersey, and now Occupy Wall Street.

Whitney says our basic social services like education and health care are at risk because of the dire financial straits at the state and municipal level – an issue she's been highlighting for more than a year now. Her famous prediction on 60 Minutes that the U.S. would soon see "hundreds of defaults" at the local level has not come true yet, and she's taken a significant amount of criticism from the bond market for broadcasting such dire predictions.

When asked if we would see defaults soon, Whitney dodged the question, instead focusing on the implications on taxes, social services, home prices and demographics. Because states rely heavily on the federal government for support, they are effectively being cut off as the spigot closes in order to solve deficit problems at the federal level.

State revenues trickle down to municipalities, which means individual and corporate residents of the hardest hit states will feel the pain. As certain states become more attractive with lower taxes or better social services, a shift in demographics will emerge.

While she carefully avoided the word "default," Whitney clearly maintains her position that state and municipal finances are on the brink. "It's a runaway train," she said.