Housing numbers bad, weather or not

    The housing optimists' glasses were more than half full last week with the decent numbers on existing home sales.  The hope, false though it was, was for a positive report today on new home sales.
    Ooops.  In the words of Ian Shepherdson, chief U.S. economist at High Frequency Economics Ltd, the report is "just horrific."  He went on to blame weather across the country for the ugly January and February results.
    The decline is the steepest in the last seven years and would have been a lot worse if it weren't for all that irrational exuberance among buyers (and builders) in the south.  Whereas sales fell almost 27% in the northeast, they dropped just 7% in the south.
    We can't wait to hear the customary positive spin from the National Association of Realtors' mouthpiece David "Pants on Fire" Lereah.  He will find the flower on the dung heap.