STOCK MARKET WATCH, Thursday November 11

[ozymandius]

Source: du

STOCK MARKET WATCH, Thursday November 11, 2010

AT THE CLOSING BELL ON November 10, 2010

Dow 11,357.04 +10.29 (+0.09%)
Nasdaq 2,578.78 +15.80 (+0.61%)
S&P 500 1,218.71 +5.31 (+0.44%)
10-Yr Bond... 2.68 +0.01 (+0.45%)
30-Year Bond 4.22 -0.03 (-0.75%)

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Market Conditions During Trading Hours

Euro, Yen, Loonie, Silver and Gold

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Handy Links - Market Data and News:Economic Calendar    Marketwatch Data    Bloomberg Economic News    Yahoo! Finance    Google Finance    Bank Tracker    
Credit Union Tracker    Daily Job Cuts

Handy Links - Economic Blogs:
The Big Picture    Financial Sense    Calculated Risk    Naked Capitalism    Credit Writedowns
Brad DeLong      Bonddad    Atrios    goldmansachs666    The Stand-Up Economist

Handy Links - Government Issues:
LegitGov    Open Government    Earmark Database    USA spending.gov

Handy Links - Videos:
The Coming Collapse of the Middle Class    Charlie Rose talks with Roubini    Charlie Rose talks with Krugman
    William Black: This Economic Disaster    Bill Moyers with Kevin Drum and David Corn

Bush Administration Officials Convicted = 2
Names: David Safavian, James Fondren

Bush Administration Officials Charged = 1
Name(s): Richard Lopez Razo

Financial Sector Officials Convicted since 1/20/09 = 11

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This thread contains opinions and observations. Individuals may post their experiences, inferences and opinions on this thread. However, it should not be construed as advice. It is unethical (and probably illegal) for financial recommendations to be given here.

Read more: du

[ozymandius]

1. no goobermental reports today n/t

[Demeter]

7. Aren't the Markets Closed Today?

Good morning Ozy!

[ozymandius]

9. Not stocks. Bonds, yes.

Stock index futures slip as earnings eyed

(Reuters) – Futures for the S&P 500 were down 0.5 percent, Dow Jones futures were 0.2 percent lower and Nasdaq futures were down 0.7 percent at 1005 GMT.
U.S. federal government and bond markets were closed for Veterans Day.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20101111/bs_nm/us_markets_stocks

[AnneD]

22. Morning Marketeers...

:donut: and Lurkers, Somehow the fact that the stock market is open and the bond market is closed is an interesting Karmic statement, esp when you consider that war profiteers in the stock market make money and historically the bond market that actually pays for the wars are closed. As a sister in arms, I want to salute all my brothers and sisters. :patriot:

I am dusting off the resume. I was renewing my CPR instructor's card yesterday and actually was offered a part time job. It is not steady but it pays well. If I get additional training, it would open up even more chances to teach. I think that I would like to keep my hand in this as it is something that pays well and I could do indefinently. That would make for wonderful part time work in retirement.

I am putting out feelers ay MD Anderson and I hope to start looking in earnest after January. I am looking in general, but that is my target. It would boost my retirement pension and all. At worst I will seek a transfer, but that is really the last thing I want to do.

Have to dash out, have a great day.:hi:

Happy hunting and watch out for the bears.

[TalkingDog]

24. on that note: Found this poking around the tubes this morning

http://clearstation.etrade.com/cgi-bin/bbs?post_id=9552993&Refer=

Does not look.....hopeful

[DemReadingDU]

25. What goes up, will come down

[Po_d Mainiac]

67. That is called

un-started/unfinished roads, bridges, water/sewer upgrades, schools, fire trucks, etc....rinse-repeat

It's also called UNEMPLOYEMENT :grr:

[ozymandius]

2. Oil jumps above $88 in Asia as US stockpiles fall

BANGKOK – Oil prices jumped above $88 a barrel in Asia on Thursday, boosted by news that U.S. crude and gasoline stockpiles declined last week in a sign of improving demand for fuel.

U.S. commercial crude inventories fell by 3.3 million barrels to 364.9 million barrels for the week ending Nov. 5, the Energy Department said Wednesday.

The government also said gasoline inventories declined by 1.9 million barrels to 210.3 million barrels while demand over the past four weeks was up slightly, averaging 9.1 million barrels a day. That's an increase of 1.8 percent from the year earlier period.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/oil_prices

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Yet, the amount of oil in storage remains well above average for the season even though inventories fell.

[xchrom]

3. recommend

[Festivito]

4. Debt: 11/09/2010 13,727,147,399,038.59 (UP 1,980,639,855.13) (Tue)

(Down some. Good day.)
Guys, don't create hospital emergencies and forget to tell me.
(Debt under Obama seems to jump up big then drop slowly maybe up a little and down a little for days--repeat.)
= Held by the Public + Intragovernmental(FICA)
= 9,135,403,570,564.55 + 4,591,743,828,474.04
DOWN 5,858,868.46 + UP 1,986,498,723.59

Source: Debt to the penny:
http://www.treasurydirect.gov/NP/BPDLogin?application=np

THINKING IN BILLIONS: Think 3 or 4 dollars per billion in a 311-Million person America.
If every American, man, woman and child puts in $3.22 THAT'S 1B$, and $3,218.88 makes 1T$.
A family of three: Mom, Dad, Child: $9.66, ABOUT TEN BUCKS for a 1B$ federal program.
I hope that is clear. However, I'd suggest using $3 per 1B$ to underestimate it.
Use $4 per 1B$ to overestimate the cost when thinking: Is the federal program worth it?
Aid to Dependant Children: 2B$/yr =$8/yr(a movie a year) Family of 3: $24/yr(an hour of bowling)

PERSONALIZED DEBT:
Every 12 seconds we net gain another American, so at the end of the workday of the report, there should be 310,666,592 people in America.
http://www.census.gov/population/www/popclockus.html ON 10/04/2010 04:37 -> 310,403,677
Currently, each of these Americans owe $44,186.11.
A family of three owes $132,558.32. (And that is IN ADDITION to their mortgage.)

ANALYSIS:
There were 22 reports in the last 30 to 32 days.
The average for the last 22 reports is 5,140,677,651.08.
The average for the last 30 days would be 3,769,830,277.46.
The average for the last 32 days would be 3,534,215,885.12.
There were 252 reports in 365 days of FY2007 averaging 1.99B$ per report, 1.37B$/day.
There were 253 reports in 366 days of FY2008 averaging 4.02B$ per report, 2.78B$/day.
There were 75 reports in 112 days of GWB's part of FY2009 averaging 8.03B$ per report, 5.38B$/day.
There were 174 reports in 253 days of Obama's part of FY2009 averaging 7.33B$ per report, 5.07B$/day so far.
There were 249 reports in 365 days of FY2009 averaging 7.57B$ per report, 5.16B$/day.
There were 278 reports in 405 days of FY2011 averaging 6.54B$ per report, 4.49B$/day.
Above line should be okay

PROJECTION:
There are 803 days remaining in this Obama 1st term.
By that time the debt could be between 14.8 and 17.9T$.
It could be higher. It could be lower.

HISTORICAL:
President's term begins and ends on Jan 20.
(Guess who might want to hide the Reagan Bush years. Jan 20 data is missing before 1993.)
01/20/1993 _4,188,092,107,183.60 WJC Inaugural
01/22/2001 _5,728,195,796,181.57 WJC (UP 1,540,103,688,997.97)
01/20/2009 10,626,877,048,913.08 GWB (UP 4,898,681,252,731.43)
11/09/2010 13,727,147,399,038.59 BHO (UP 3,100,270,350,125.51 so far since Obama took office.)

FISCAL YEAR DEBT CHANGE, Sep 30 prior year to Sep 30 named year:
(One "* " for each 40B$ reached)
FY1994 +0,281,261,026,873.94 ------------* * * * * * * WJC
FY1995 +0,281,232,990,696.07 ------------* * * * * * * WJC
FY1996 +0,250,828,038,426.34 ------------* * * * * * WJC
FY1997 +0,188,335,072,261.61 ------------* * * * WJC
FY1998 +0,113,046,997,500.28 ------------* * WJC
FY1999 +0,130,077,892,735.81 ------------* * * WJC
FY2000 +0,017,907,308,253.43 ------------WJC
FY2001 +0,133,285,202,313.20 ------------* * * C&B
01-WJC +0,053,598,528,417.78 ------------* WJC 31% of FY, 40% of FY-Debt
01-GWB +0,079,686,673,895.42 ------------* GWB 69% of FY, 60% of FY-Debt
FY2002 +0,420,772,553,397.10 ------------* * * * * * * * * * GWB
FY2003 +0,554,995,097,146.46 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * GWB
FY2004 +0,595,821,633,586.70 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * * GWB
FY2005 +0,553,656,965,393.18 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * GWB
FY2006 +0,574,264,237,491.73 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * * GWB
FY2007 +0,500,679,473,047.25 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * GWB
FY2008 +1,017,071,524,649.92 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * GWB
FY2009 +1,885,104,106,599.30 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * B&O
09GWB +0,602,152,152,000.60 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * GWB 31% of FY, 32% of FY-Debt
09-BHO +1,282,951,954,598.70 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * BHO 69% of FY, 68% of FY-Debt
FY2010 +1,651,794,027,380.00 ------------* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * BHO
FY2011 +0,165,524,368,146.80 ------------* * * * BHO
Endof11 +15,072,620,499,842.50 ------------| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | per 1B Too much to predict at this time.

LAST FIFTEEN REPORTS OF ADDITIONS TO PUBLIC DEBT(NOT FICA):
10/20/2010 +001,330,613,152.94 ------------*********
10/21/2010 -003,241,964,507.19 --
10/22/2010 -000,039,023,333.21 ----
10/25/2010 +000,057,456,608.35 ------------******* Mon
10/26/2010 +000,564,111,327.93 ------------********
10/27/2010 +000,111,394,550.30 ------------********
10/28/2010 -000,237,760,056.32 ---
10/29/2010 +010,778,095,157.00 ------------**********
11/01/2010 +063,143,305,537.83 ------------********** Mon
11/02/2010 +000,562,237,098.37 ------------********
11/03/2010 -000,042,244,820.71 ----
11/04/2010 +002,136,844,217.63 ------------*********
11/05/2010 -000,209,791,147.70 ---
11/08/2010 -000,059,969,255.93 ---- Mon
11/09/2010 -000,005,858,868.46 -----

74,847,445,660.83 Total of 15 above reports.

Heavy borrowing seems to start after 09/18/2008 while Bush was in power JUST BEFORE fiscal year end.
Bush admin borrowed $962,245,245,654.01 in those last 124 days in office crossing two fiscal years.
$360,093,093,653.42 in last 12 days of FY2008, and $602,152,152,000.59 in subsequent 112 days before leaving office.

For a prettier and more explanatory view of our nation's debt:
http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock
http://www.usdebtclock.org/
DUer primer on National debt

(Debt to the penny keeps changing. Stuff is missing. Best to keep our own history.) LAST REPORT:
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_mesg&forum=102&topic_id=4608780&mesg_id=4608798

[ozymandius]

5. Commission leaders say cutting deficit will hurt

The details that have emerged come as no surprise. While the wealthiest in our society will not have to shoulder so much burden in cutting the deficit, current recipients are expected to shoulder the burden of balancing the budget with a reduction in benefits. The Cat Food Commission has spent these many months thinking of ways to live up to its nickname.

Besides Social Security, Medicare spending would be curtailed. Tax breaks for many health care plans, too. And the Pentagon's budget as well in a plan that attaches $3 in spending cuts to every $1 in tax increases.

Yes, by all means, cut the Pentagon. Start with a 50% reduction in discretionary defense spending. That's a no-brainer. Consider that the United States has been at war for nine years despite the fact that the U.S. armed forces are the most technologically advanced, the most tactically powerful, the best financed collection of forces the world has ever seen. Yet, in Iraq, we have been swamped by the remnants of a previously fourth-rate military power. Clearly the aforementioned superiority is not all that "superior." Afghanistan: the same.

Back to the idiocy of the Cat Food Commission proposals:

The plan would gradually increase the retirement age for full Social Security benefits — to 69 by 2075 — and current recipients would receive smaller-than-anticipated annual increases.

Smaller-than-anticipated increases? Even when there's no increase in COLA? Raising the age to receive full benefits to 69 means that college graduates will compete with their grandparents for jobs.

Equally controversial, it would eliminate the current tax deduction that homeowners receive for the interest they pay on their mortgages and impose a 15 cent-a-gallon tax on gasoline.

Regressive much? This will simultaneously make home ownership punitive by removing the interest rate deduction and the gasoline tax will act like a tax on all goods that are transported. A tax so extreme will financially cripple those who cannot afford it.

The insults do not end.

For most Americans with job-based health coverage, the biggest change would be to limit or eliminate altogether the tax-free status of employer-provided health benefits, which would provide a stiff nudge to force people into cost-conscious insurance plans.

In other words: people would be forced to buy junk insurance.

Then we move on to tax rates. That all by itself will mean that corporations pay significantly less tax. (Remember that, with loopholes, Goldman Sachs paid into the system at a 1% income tax rate in 2009.) The wealthiest individuals in our society would pay a top rate of 23% - down from the current top rate of 35%. That recommendation from the Cat Food Commission reflects their serious concern -- over their own finances as lower the income tax rate would be greatly appreciated by every member, quite personally.

I will end by expressing my sentiments to the Cat Food Commission's efforts and their barbed wire priorities in the most dignified way possible. To one and all: Fuck Thee.

[ozymandius]

6. You folks try to take it easy, please.

I was up late working on school bidness and am running short on sleep. But the Cat Food Commission's proposals have me fully awake and my blood pressure pumping.

:donut: Time to think of other things like work. Later...

:hi:

[boomerbust]

18. Being a Obama supporter

I am just about to the point to tell the President to go fuck himself. Sarah Palin here we come.

[boomerbust]

19. Is anyone listening to Harold Ford on CNBC?

This guy is a Democrat? What a piece of Blue Dog shit.

[boomerbust]

23. Up next on CNBC- William Cohen

"Outsourcing is not always evil". Time to face facts folks, we've been sold down the Shanghai River.

[TheWatcher]

29. Although I agree with your sentiment, CNBC is Propaganda and not worth your time.

That channel is a pure no-fact spin zone.

Best avoided by all thinking persons. :)

[Dr.Phool]

47. Why would anybody listen to that worthless piece of shit anyway?

Sorry (No I'm not), still bitter from 2004 congressional run.

Sometimes I wish there really was a hell, to send assholes like him.

[Demeter]

56. Barack Obama, Phone Home By FRANK RICH

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/07/opinion/07rich.html?_r=1

...In the 1946 midterms, the unpopular and error-prone rookie president Harry Truman, buffeted by a different set of economic dislocations, watched his party lose both chambers of Congress (including 54 seats in the House) to a G.O.P. that then moved steadily to the right in its determination to cut government spending and rip down the New Deal safety net. Two years after this Democratic wipeout, despite a hostile press and a grievously divided party, Truman roared back, in part by daring the Republican Congress to enact its reactionary plans. He won against all odds, as David McCullough writes in “Truman,” because “there was something in the American character that responded to a fighter.”

Surely there are dozens of supporters reassuring Obama with exactly this Truman scenario this weekend. But if he lacks the will to fight, he might as well just take his time and enjoy the sights of Mumbai.

[Demeter]

8. Bush: My conscience is clear on financial crisis

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/bush-my-conscience-is-clear-on-financial-crisis-2010-11-10?siteid=YAHOOB

Former President George W. Bush on Wednesday defended his record of oversight of banks and argued that his conscience is clear when it came to the massive financial crisis that shook the economy to the brink in the final days of his presidency.

“I don’t think this was a matter of overregulation or lack of regulation. It was a matter of poor judgment by Wall Street and others. And -- but no question the housing bubble was fueled by government policy, and that is the result of people and Congress refusing to regulate Fannie and Freddie,” Bush said in an interview on NBC TV. “So my conscience is clear when it came time to recognize an impending problem.”

Bush, who was president from 2001 to 2008, argued that he recognized the looming problem of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, but his efforts to regulate the two housing refinance giants were ‘thwarted by powerful forces’ on Capitol Hill.

In the final year of Bush’s presidency, in 2008, the country lost roughly 2.6 million jobs, according to the Labor Department; the financial institution Lehman Brothers collapsed causing collateral damage to the markets and a Congress under duress approved an unprecedented $700 billion bailout package injecting billions of dollars of taxpayer-backed capital into banks as a means of stabilizing a faltering financial system...Also, in late 2008, at the peak of the credit crisis, the government put Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac into a conservatorship, also in an effort to stabilize the markets....
During Bush’s presidency, the notional over-the-counter derivatives market ballooned from roughly $88 trillion in 1999 to $592 trillion at the end of 2008, and has been widely charged with helping to drive the meltdown. The opacity of this market led to a $180 billion bailout of American International Group Inc., an insurance giant that was also a major derivatives vendor....

“And this -- the hardest thing for me was not whether or not blame was assigned. The hardest thing for me was to explain to hard-working Americans why we were using their taxpayers’ -- their money to prop up those who they were blaming for the crisis,” Bush said.

W: THE LEGEND LIVES ON. ARTICULATE AND INTELLECTUALLY AS POWERFUL AS EVER.

[rfranklin]

12. It takes a village idiot...

to dole out such horse puckey.

[Tansy_Gold]

31. His conscience is clear because

he has no conscience

He is a moral vacuum, defying all the laws of physics. A perfect, total, and complete absence of Any.



TG, NTY

[Demeter]

36. BUSH DEBUNKED: Exposing the Dirty Truth That Bush's New Memoir Tries to Cover Up

http://www.alternet.org/story/148803/exposing_the_dirty_truth_that_bush%27s_new_memoir_tries_to_cover_up?page=entire

HE SAID, THEY SAID...

[Demeter]

48. Hilarious Bushism Reveals He Didn't Want to Vote for McCain, Would've Endorsed Obama

http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/326638/hilarious_bushism_reveals_he_didn%27t_want_to_vote_for_mccain%2C_would%27ve_endorsed_obama/#paragraph3

Financial Times reporter Alex Barker has revealed a hilarious Oval Office conversation between then-president George W. Bush and a group of British dignitaries in the lead-up to the 2008 election.

Knowing that Dubya had recently endorsed John McCain as his successor, the visitors, being their polite British selves, said something diplomatic about the Arizona Senator. According to two people who were present that day, the former president shocked the group, which included then-Prime Minister Gordon Brown, by saying:

I probably won’t even vote for the guy. I had to endorse him. But I’d have endorsed Obama if they’d asked me.

[Demeter]

10. Social Security cuts are coming for "virtually every American alive and those yet to be born."

EMAIL

And for what? Corporate tax cuts.

Seriously: the co-chairs of President Obama's deficit commission want to cut Social Security benefits for everyone making more than $25,000 a year. And then lower corporate taxes to just 26%.

Every member of this commission, every member of Congress, and President Obama himself must reject these insane ideas. We're starting an emergency petition to President Obama and his Catfood Commission to take Social Security cuts off the table.

Sign our petition to President Obama and his Catfood Commission: hands off Social Security. Click here to add your name:

http://action.firedoglake.com/page/s/HandsOff

The proposed cuts to Social Security are so deep, for so many people. This is a direct attack on America's middle class for the benefit of Corporate America.

These ideas are so awful, sixteen other members of the Catfood Commission didn't want to touch it. Problem is, this is the "starting point" for discussions. This will be negotiated, and many of these awful ideas could be in the final proposal. We need to stop it now.

It's bad enough to even think about cutting Social Security - but to do it to pay for corporate tax cuts? That's insane.

This is President Obama's commission, and he has the power to shut it down. The other commission members can put their feet down and say no to Social Security cuts. Let's make them do it.

Say "Hell No" to Social Security cuts.

Thanks for all you do to protect Social Security.

Michael Whitney
Firedoglake.com

1. Statement of Eric Kingson, Co-chair, Strengthen Social Security Campaign. 11/10/10
2. "Fiscal Commission Recommendations: VA Co-Pays, Top Tax Rate 23%" David Dayen, Firedoglake. 11/10/10 http://fdl.me/9DQmLx
3. U.S. Debt Proposal Would Cut Social Security, Taxes, Medicare. Bloomberg News, 11/10/10 http://fdl.me/aaTRoL

[rfranklin]

13. It hardly matters what the corporate tax rate is set at....

No corporation pays anywhere near that.

[tclambert]

35. Sure it does! But it's the corporate tax rate set in the Bahamas that matters.

Who would have thought so many corporate world headquarters could be run by one guy at a folding card table? Yet those same "foreign" corporations get to donate unlimited anonymous dollars to American political campaigns. Is teh stoopid burning yet?

They say addicts have to hit bottom before they will admit they have a problem and seek help. Well, America is addicted to the Teh Stoopid.

[Demeter]

38. America Is Addicted to the Con

There's no support among the Economic Elite for the rule of law, since they got where they are by bending, breaking or erasing the laws under which they expect the rest of us to suffer. (Draft Dodging, anyone?)

Hence, the Economic Elite must be removed from the equation, and unless there is a grassroots political movement (like something big enough to sweep a black man into the White House?) it will have to be a violent revolution. I'm not happy about this. I have kids, and I'd like to have grandchildren. But there it is.

[Demeter]

40. For the Grassroots Organizing...

http://progressivesforobama.blogspot.com/2010/11/setting-aside-despair-time-for-left-to.html

[Demeter]

46. 10 Rules of Populist Power -- The Progressive's Guide to Raising Hell

http://www.alternet.org/story/148761/10_rules_of_populist_power_--_the_progressive%27s_guide_to_raising_hell

Rule 1: Forcing Opponents to Make Mistakes Is the Goal of Effective Advocacy for Change; Promoting Issues Is Not Enough (LIKE NATIONAL ROMNEYCARE?)

...Every campaign for real change must (1) define an opponent; (2) be waged to trip up the opponent; and (3) be ready to create change from the opponent’s mistakes...

Rule 2: To Make Big Changes, Target the Little Things and a Few People

Rule 3: Simple Moral Sentiments Can Change the World When Public Opinion Propels Them

Rule 4: Forget Sun Tzu: The Bigger the Fight, the Better the Odds; Fight Even If You Cannot Win Today, and Someday You’ll Win without a Fight

Rule 5: Creating the Record Creates the Seeds of Change

Rule 6: Keep It Human, Put People First

Rule 7: Make It Personal for Decision Makers

Rule 8: Seize the Moment—Don’t Pick Your Time, Have the Goods and Let Your Time Pick You

Rule 9: Exploit a Powerful Opponent’s Fear of Falling to Achieve Victory without Combat

Rule 10: Don’t Worry about Your Seat at the Table; Find the Rock to Throw through the Window

THIS IS A LONG, MUST READ ARTICLE

I CANNOT THINK OF ANY DEMOCRAT WHO FOLLOWS THESE RULES,AND DAMN NEAR EVERY GOP CAMPAIGN DOES!

[DemReadingDU]

16. The military, defense, Pentagon budget needs to be cut too

[Tansy_Gold]

21. "This is the starting point" really means

This is where Obama will start negotiating from and then it will get worse.

y'know, folks, I think most of us here have been relatively pragmatic and realistic. We've faced the shortcomings of the dude at 1600 and yet we've acknowledged that anything the other side could put up in two years would be infinitely worse so we'll probably hold our noses and vote for tiny-bit-lesser of two really smelly evils.

But I have to tell you, fellow SMWers, I'm seeing less and less and less difference between the current administration and the teabaggers, because the teabaggers are running the show.

I'm not sure, but I think virtually all of Obama's big campaign promises are now dust. Iraq is drawn down but ongoing. Afghanistan is pushed out to 2014 (aka infinity). Tax cuts for the rich continue. No public option. DADT still securely in force.

Have I missed anything?

I am sick at heart today.

Back in that infamous thread from 24 November 2008 I believe I actually came out and called Obama a liar, and of course I got shredded for it. Over the months I've probably hedged on that a little bit, in the spirit of civility, and I've never said I wouldn't vote for him in 2012. Who knows what will happen by then anyway? And I know that the whole issue of a primary challenge tends to seriously hurt incumbents. But what the hell else are we supposed to do?

I think MSNBC realized their public was furious over the Olbermann thing, and maybe the petitions helped resolve that situation. I'm not sure -- I've been too fuckin' busy to watch the tv. More than likely, too, the idea of ousting the man who made their network gave them some pause. But even so, there is value in citizen action and I just don't know how to mobilize it to get progressive issues back on the table.

Obama, unlike the boy who cried wolf, seems to be signaling all clear -- mission accomplished?? -- just before the catastrophe strikes. He seems totally and completely out of touch with anything approaching real world reality. There's a political pseudoreality he seems to have sunk into and is determinedly ignoring anything outside it. Perhaps he thinks he's safer there, and perhaps personally he is. But I wonder how long that bubble can hold.

I've read that the proposal for Social Security cuts would only affect those who make over $25,000 a year. That would leave me safe from cuts, and I suppose I could be like those who have benefited from HCR and say how wonderful it is. But I hope you all know me better than that. ANY cuts to retirees or the disabled or to anyone should be as totally off the table as impeachment of George W. Bush, investigations of potential crimes against humanity committed by Richard Cheney, as off the table as single-payer health care coverage, as off the table as repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell.

I think we thought we had a real leader for The People in Candidate Obama. I think we were lied to.




Tansy Gold

[zogofzorkon]

27. I think we were conned, scammed, bushwacked, setup, suckered,

blindsided, and fucked over. There might have been some lies involved.

[Tansy_Gold]

30. Yeah, there might've. Maybe.

It IS possible.

:sarcasm:

and

:hi:


TG, NTY

[hamerfan]

28. Tansy in 2012!

Common sense ain't so common, but she has plenty to get her there!
As always, thank you for the brilliant insight/commentary.
hamerfan

[TheWatcher]

32. Tansy/Kucinich 2012. Where do I sign up?

:)

[Demeter]

45. You Just Did--and Welcome! Although Kucinich Will Have to Take

another post--AnneD is the declared VP candidate.

I bet he'd be great in the Executive Branch...

[TheWatcher]

52. I Second AnneD for VP.

But we must have Kucinich in the cabinet somewhere.

I would ask who the head of The Fed would be, but I have a sneaking suspicion one of their first acts when elected to office would be the dismantling of it.

:evilgrin:

[AnneD]

62. maybe this will finally shake people...

out of their apathy and onto the streets. I want the real Obama back..the one that campaigned a couple of years back. Not the one that sold the middle class down the river, if I can use that expression.

George Bush had an excuse-his coke addled brain barely had enough neurons to support his autonomic nervous system, let alone make intelligent decisions. Chaney was the brains in that outfit.

Obama has no excuse in my books. He is burning the very bridge that helped him get to where he is today. I didn't expect a miracle, but I didn't expect him to roll over for WS and the banks.

Of all the votes I have cast, he has been my greatest dissappointment to date, and I admit to voting for Nixon. At least with Nixon I got what I expected and when he stepped out of line he was smacked back down. The wrong folks are being tried and thrown in to jail these days.

There IS no more justice.

[Demeter]

11. Bank of America Is in Deep Trouble and There May Be Financial Disaster on the Horizon

http://www.alternet.org/story/148817/bank_of_america_is_in_deep_trouble_and_there_is_financial_disaster_on_the_horizon

Will Bank of America be the first Wall Street giant to once again point a gun to its own head, telling us it'll crash and burn and take down the financial system if we don’t pony up for another massive bailout?

When former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson was handing out trillions to Wall Street, BofA collected $45 billion from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) to stabilize its balance sheet. It was spun as a success story -- a rebuke of those who urged the banks be put into receivership -- when the behemoth “paid back” the cash last December. But the bank’s stock price has fallen by more than 40 percent since mid-April, and the value of its outstanding stock is currently at around half of what it should be based on its “book value” -- what the company says its holdings are worth.

“The problem for anyone trying to analyze Bank of America’s $2.3 trillion balance sheet,” wrote Bloomberg columnist Jonathan Weil, “is that it’s largely impenetrable.” Nobody really knows the true values of the assets these companies are holding, which has been the case ever since the collapse. But according to Weil, some of BofA’s financial statements “are so delusional that they invite laughter.”

Weil points to the firm’s accounting of its purchase of Countrywide Financial -- the criminal enterprise at the center of the sub-prime securitization market. Bank of America, Weil notes, hasn’t written off Countrywide’s entire value. “In its latest quarterly report with the SEC,” he wrote, “Bank of America said it had determined the asset wasn’t impaired. It might as well be telling the public not to believe any of the numbers on its financial statements.”

[xchrom]

14. wait. what? -- the countrywide asset wasn't impaired?

how? how could they figure that?

has accounting changed that much since i was young?

[Demeter]

34. Accounting! We Don't Need No Steenkin' Accounting!

After all, we can create our own reality, now...

Last night was the Budget & Finance Meeting, 2.5 hours' worth, at which I learned two more facts from the past:

Every time the Board made a decision at a meeting, the ex-President changed it the next day, and the management company let her, because they had written in the contract that she had the last word...even though the management company had attended that very meeting and heard the board decisions...is it any wonder that we want to be self-managed? That we designated the person least likely to lift a finger to be the Last Word person, and passed a rule prohibiting this ever happening again? And I am SO GLAD that the management company rep retired because I'd hate to be arrested for assault.

This de facto dictator cost us so much in time, money and goodwill that we lost several millions and several years, but she couldn't do it alone. Not only did she have the management company suborned (in effect) and the staff under a gag order, she had willing accomplices on the board, all of whom have conveniently sold out and moved away, some as far as Arizona (Tansy beware!)

I also found out that a previous Treasurer was "fixing" up stuff so she would have to get hired in the office to sort it all out...that never happened, but it will take us years literally to undo the damage.

You know what this means? I will never be able to "retire"...I am the last or most experienced board member of that era. I don't dare leave, and I'm not sure any set of rules can keep it from happening again.

Talk about seeing your life flash before your eyes....

[tclambert]

37. Announcement from the Dean: Accounting has been moved to the Creative Writing Department.

That is all.

[Tansy_Gold]

39. Just for your information and amusement

As a candidate for President, I have an associate's degree in accounting and have published (with real royalty publishers, not online, not vanity) a number of real novels.

Therefore, unlike MOST candidates for president, I KNOW THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN ACCOUNTING AND CREATIVE WRITING!!!


Tansy Gold, NTY

[Demeter]

42. And which one pays better, Tansy?

Demeter, who gets nothing but peace of mind at her UNpaid accounting job, for which she is eminently Unqualified, but has a CPA to back her up....

[DemReadingDU]

44. Corruption is the System

Demeter, you're doing what you can to fix your condo, and we are doing what we can to fix our village. But it's going to take years and years. I don't know about your situation, but in our village, many people think of us as enemy combatants, and why do we keep bringing up things that make our village look so negatively. Well, duh. If people would pay attention, they would know what is going on. Sheesh.

[Demeter]

43. Soft Landing for Bankers, Hard Times for Everyone Else

http://www.truth-out.org/jim-hightower-soft-landing-bankers-hard-times-everyone-else64982

I've seen some truly amazing feats of magic, but here's one that beats them all. Right before your eyes, this thing rises into the air on its own, with no wires or mechanical devices giving it lift. And it hovers there effortlessly.

But it's not magic, for magic is an illusion, and this gravity-defying phenomenon of perpetual levitation happens to be real. What is this "it" that keeps floating up, up, up? The annual bonuses paid to Wall Street's top bankers.

By the laws of economics, if not physics, those bonuses should fall to earth this year, because the bankers have performed poorly. Trading is down, profits are flat (despite being given trillions of dollars in almost-interest-free money through the back door of the Federal Reserve), firms are handing out pink slips to lower-level employees, and the blatant greed of bank honchos have ruined the public reputations of their financial outfits.

Who cares, shriek the big-shots, we make our own laws -- it's bonus time, baby, so grab all you can! Sure enough, the CEOs of Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, JPMorgan Chase and others have set aside billions of dollars to flood their executive suites with bonus cash at the end of this year -- money that rightfully should go to shareholders....

[Demeter]

49. 9 Most Disgusting, Absurd CEO Perks

http://www.alternet.org/newsandviews/article/326943/9_most_disgusting%2C_absurd_ceo_perks/

1. $772,000 to Dig Millionaire Out of Underwater Mortgage (TIMMY, IS THAT YOU?)

2. $391,000 in Tax Prep

3. $110,000 in Attorney Bills (TO NEGOTIATE ONES STARTING SALARY, NO LESS)

4. $1.3 Million to Move

5. $724,000 for Car and Driver

6. $639,000 in Aircraft Use

7. $2.5 Million in Tax Reimbursement

8. $1.4 million in Security Services

9. $216,000 in Club Memberships

See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/akeGx4

[Ghost Dog]

15. Euro Weakens on Debt Concern; U.S. Futures Fall, Copper Gains

Nov. 11 (Bloomberg) -- The euro weakened and Portuguese bonds fell on concern indebted nations may need bailouts, while U.S. index futures dropped after Cisco Systems Inc. said profit will miss analysts’ estimates. Asian stocks rose and commodities jumped as China’s credit rating was increased.

The euro weakened against 14 of its 16 most-traded counterparts at 11:25 a.m. in London. The extra yield investors demand to hold Portuguese 10-year bonds instead of benchmark German bunds climbed to a record 472 basis points. Standard & Poor’s 500 Index futures sank 0.2 percent as Cisco plunged 11 percent in pre-market U.S. trading. The Stoxx Europe 600 Index fluctuated, while the MSCI Asia Pacific Index rose 0.3 percent. Copper jumped to a record and oil climbed to a two-year high.

Investors must share the cost of sovereign debt restructurings, French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde said yesterday, backing a German call that helped drive yields on so- called peripheral bonds to record highs. ...

“Lagarde’s comments mentioned restructuring, and that’s another nail in the coffin” for peripheral debt, said Steven Major, global head of fixed-income research at HSBC Holdings Plc in London. “There’s still a big constituency of investors and traders who have not recognized until now that restructuring could happen.”

/... http://noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=arn8MgKcaRN0&pos=2http://noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=arn8MgKcaRN0&pos=2

[Ghost Dog]

20. Ireland.

... Meanwhile, the end of a decade-long property boom, fanned by reckless bank lending to developers and home buyers, plunged Ireland into the worst recession since at least 1947.

The economy shrank 3.5 percent in 2008 and 7.6 percent more last year, and is expected to contract by 0.3 percent this year, according to the International Monetary Fund. The unemployment rate shot up to 13.6 percent in October from 4.7 percent three years earlier, Ireland’s Central Statistics Office reported. Commercial property prices have fallen 59 percent since September 2007, according to an index compiled by London-based Investment Property Databank.

The extra yield investors demand to hold Ireland’s debt rather than German bunds has more than doubled in the last three months and now stands at 6.20 percentage points, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The government laid out a plan last week to cut spending and raise taxes by as much as 6 billion euros in 2011.

“It was the banks doing crazy loans, it was borrowers taking crazy loans and a failure by government and regulators to do their jobs properly,” said Sean Kay, a professor of politics and government at Ohio Wesleyan University in Delaware, Ohio, who spent three months this year in Dublin interviewing officials for a book. “There was no adult supervision.”

/... http://noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601109&sid=aEzBmzzOjxE8&pos=11


... What’s the difference between Irish Debt and US Debt trading besides currency denomination? That is, why are Irish yields rising dramatically and US yields not? After all, both nations have a large stock of government debt, a not insignificant portion of which was necessitated by bail-outs of highly leveraged banks and are running substantial continued deficits (admittedly the expected Irish deficit is roughly 3 times the US's relative to GDP). Why are Irish yields so sensitive to news of additional deficits while US yields remain stable?

The French refer to this conundrum as the “exorbitant privilege” of the US. If Ireland were to announce a policy of Irish Central Bank monetization of the next 9 months of debt issues, Irish Debt would, I suspect, crash more severely than it has. Yet, this is just what the Fed announced last week. It’s good, it seems, to issue the world’s reserve currency.

...

At some point in all markets, the metaphoric rats leave the sinking ship. In the Irish 10yr, it seems 6% was the yield of no return. Leveraged owners of the debt started to flee (sell) while Ireland’s financial needs grew (due to, if for no other reason, higher borrowing costs) and debt sales begat more debt sales.

...

Of course, when the feasting has been very good for a long time and when a rat might fear repercussions from leaving early, a wise rat might wait until other rats left safely before leaving himself. A wise bond trading rat might watch US yields and flee when they rose above some level, say 4% in the US 10yr. An even wiser rat, having decided the meal was not to his liking (or so I understand the debt rating downgrade from a Chinese rating agency), might sell while the selling was good, say while the ship’s owner (the US) was buying.

/... http://seekingalpha.com/article/236179-what-s-the-difference-between-irish-and-u-s-debt-trading?source=hp_wc&wc_num=1


... So if the current Irish Fianna Fail government is looking into its own past for the experience with creative readings of debt obligations, it’s not a happy one. Indeed, our current prime minister and minister for finance are the classic practical men, who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence, but doubtless are sufficiently steeped in party lore to be affected by this history.

Instead, the energy for creative reading of debt obligations goes into creative accounting. See for example the department of finance’s explanation of the “promissory notes” — the IOUs that it has parked in two zombie financial institutions (along with one in long-term intensive care) to keep them from being wound up. Essentially what is going is that €31 billion in IOUs will be financed by annual cash flow borrowing of €3 billion, but the accounting hit from interest on the debt is being postponed for a couple of years.

And it’s not meant to fool the markets or the European Commission, as the shift is within the window of the previous commitments to both that the deficit will come down to 3 percent by 2014. Rather, it’s designed to get a little extra wiggle room in this year’s budget, while leaving the postponed interest headache to what will most likely be an alternative government.

So back to those ironies. In the heady days of the Celtic Tiger, the government probably saw itself with a clear path to stay in power all the way to what would be a lavish celebration of the 1916 Easter Rising and their own political ancestry in it. But when 2016 rolls around, the government of the day will be only half way through billions of euro in interest payments, mostly due to an entity called Anglo Irish Bank. In 1932, DeValera was playing the long game and didn’t see the costs of a little debt trickery as the end of the world. In fact, it remained politically powerful a year later, as this excellent Time Magazine report from 1933 notes (bonus: you get to see what great writers Time had). Now, DeValera”s visage looks on as his political descendants are prisoners of debt.

/... http://fistfulofeuros.net/afoe/irelands-77-year-political-cycle/

[Ghost Dog]

17. G20 struggles in Seoul as Irish crisis hits market

* Negotiators wrangle over G20 communique wording

* Greenspan says U.S. pursuing weak dollar policy

* Deep divides remain on currencies

* Euro zone periphery led by Ireland hit hard

SEOUL, Nov 11 (Reuters) - The Group of 20 meeting on Thursday struggled to agree on meaningful action to rebuild the global economy as a crisis erupted in Ireland, pushing its bond spreads out to a record over Germany, and infecting Spain and Portugal.

...

At the summit, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barosso said that the European Union had the tools to help Ireland, but did not commit to a fresh course of action that could reassure nervy investors. ...

The G20 summit, billed as a forum where rich nations struggling with the recent global financial crisis could ink a new world order with emerging economic powerhouses like India and China, appeared set to agree to little of substance, as policymakers preferred to avoid damaging rows.

/... http://www.reuters.com/article/idUSN1012137820101111

[Demeter]

54. they will do anything to kill Ireland dead

I wonder how much London is involved in the effort...a continuation of hundreds of years of Britain's fight against the Emerald Isle? And WHY, in God's name, why?

[burf]

26. I don't know if this has been addressed

yet here at SMW.

Wall Street Collects $4 Billion From Taxpayers as Swaps Backfire

Nov. 10 (Bloomberg) -- The subprime mortgage crisis isn’t the only calamity Wall Street created that’s upending the finances of U.S. states and cities.

For more than a decade, banks and insurance companies convinced governments and nonprofits that financial engineering would lower interest rates on bonds sold for public projects such as roads, bridges and schools. That failed promise has cost more than $4 billion, according to data compiled by Bloomberg, as hundreds of borrowers from the Bay Area Toll Authority in Oakland, California, to Cornell University in Ithaca, New York, quietly paid Wall Street to end agreements since 2008

http://www.businessweek.com/news/2010-11-10/wall-street-collects-4-billion-from-taxpayers-as-swaps-backfire.html

The article goes on to show how states and municipalities are getting screwed by Wall Street. I dunno why I should be surprised by this but it sure as heck still pisses me off. Where is the reporting of this by the corporate media? I have to agree with Tansy's post upthread about the leadership of our current president. Maybe he will again give a stirring speech about the "fat cats" and his disdain for them. Yeah, that will do the trick!

[Demeter]

33. Foreclose on the Foreclosure Fraudsters, Part 2: William K. Black and L. Randall Wray

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/william-k-black/post_1115_b_772820.html

Let us deal with the "borrower fraud" argument first because it is the area containing the most erroneous assumptions. There was fraud at every step in the home finance food chain: the appraisers were paid to overvalue real estate; mortgage brokers were paid to induce borrowers to accept loan terms they could not possibly afford; loan applications overstated the borrowers' incomes; speculators lied when they claimed that six different homes were their principal dwelling; mortgage securitizers made false reps and warranties about the quality of the packaged loans; credit ratings agencies were overpaid to overrate the securities sold on to investors; and investment banks stuffed collateralized debt obligations with toxic securities that were handpicked by hedge fund managers to ensure they would self destruct.

That homeowners would default on the nonprime mortgages was a foregone conclusion throughout the industry -- indeed, it was the desired outcome. This was something the lending side knew, but which few on the borrowing side could have realized.

The homeowners were typically fraudulently induced by the lenders and the lenders' agents (the loan brokers) to enter into nonprime mortgages. The lenders knew the "loan to value" (LTV) ratios and income to debt ratios that they wanted the borrower to (appear to) meet in order to make it possible for the lender to sell the nonprime loan at a premium. LTV can be gimmicked by inflating the appraisal. The debt to income ratios can be gimmicked by inflating income. "Liar's" loan lenders used that loan format because it allowed the lender to simultaneously loan to a vast number of borrowers that could not repay their home loans, at a premium yield, while making it look to the purchaser of the loan that it was relatively low risk. Liar's loans maximized the lender's reported income, which maximized the CEO's compensation.

The problem is that only the most sophisticated nonprime borrowers (the speculators who bought six homes) (1) knew the key ratios they had to appear to meet, (2) had the ability to induce an appraiser to inflate substantially the reported market value of the home, and (3) knew how to create false financial information that was internally consistent and credible. The solution was for the lender and the lender's agents to (1) instruct the borrower to report a certain income or even to fill out the application with false information, (2) suborn an appraiser to provide the necessary inflated market value, and (3) create fraudulent financial information that had at least minimal coherence...

[Demeter]

41. Energy Committee Chairman Candidate Says God Promised no More Catastrophic Climate Change after Noah

http://www.juancole.com/2010/11/energy-committee-chairman-candidate-says-god-promised-no-more-catastrophic-climate-change-after-noah.html?rainbow

oh! well, that's all right then....carry on!

[tclambert]

66. You cannot reason with people who believe the Noah's Ark story.

My retarded friend asked, "What'd they do with all the poop? I saw this elephant at the zoo one time, and it pooped, and the poop was HUGE!"

Logistically, Noah's Ark wouldn't work. Food, fresh water, fresh air, and waste removal for that many animals for about 11 months (it rained for 40 days and 40 nights, and took even longer to drain) would take more space and manpower than they had available. Bilge pumping or bailing for a wooden ship that size--also not doable. The true believers just wave their hands and say, "Praise the Lord, it's another miracle!"

And my friend asked, "Did Noah forget the unicorns? Oh, and what did the tigers eat?"

To which I replied, "Unicorns."

[Po_d Mainiac]

68. shitfaced

[Demeter]

50. Hedges: A Collapsed Economy, Hateful Conservatives and Ineffectual Liberals Are a Recipe for Fascism

http://www.alternet.org/story/148778/hedges%3A_a_collapsed_economy%2C_hateful_conservatives_and_ineffectual_liberals_are_a_recipe_for_fascism

...More than half of those identified in a poll by the Republican-leaning Rasmussen Reports as “mainstream Americans” now view the tea party favorably. The other half, still grounded in a reality-based world, is passive and apathetic. The liberal class WASTES ITS ENERGY imploring Barack Obama and the Democrats to promote sane measures including job creation programs, regulation as well as criminal proceedings against the financial industry, and an end to our permanent war economy. Those who view the tea party favorably want to tear the governmental edifice down, with the odd exception of the military and the security state, accelerating our plunge into a nation of masters and serfs. The corporate state, unchallenged, continues to turn everything, including human beings and the natural world, into commodities to exploit until exhaustion or collapse.

All sides of the political equation are lackeys for Wall Street. They sanction, through continued deregulation, massive corporate profits and the obscene compensation and bonuses for corporate managers. Most of that money—hundreds of billions of dollars—is funneled upward from the U.S. Treasury. The Sarah Palins and the Glenn Becks use hatred as a mobilizing passion to get the masses, fearful and angry, to call for their own enslavement as well as to deny uncomfortable truths, including global warming. Our dispossessed working class and beleaguered middle class are vulnerable to this manipulation because they can no longer bear the chaos and uncertainty that come with impoverishment, hopelessness and loss of control. They have retreated into a world of illusion, one peddled by right-wing demagogues, which offers a reassuring emotional consistency. This consistency appears to protect them from the turmoil in which they have been forced to live. The propaganda of a Palin or a Beck may insult common sense, but, for a growing number of Americans, common sense has lost its validity...

Commerce cannot be the sole guide of human behavior. This utopian fantasy, embraced by the tea party as well as the liberal elite, defies 3,000 years of economic history. It is a chimera. This ideology has been used to justify the disempowerment of the working class, destroy our manufacturing capacity, and ruthlessly gut social programs that once protected and educated the working and middle class. It has obliterated the traditional liberal notion that societies should be configured around the common good. All social and cultural values are now sacrificed before the altar of the marketplace...

The old left—the Wobblies, the Congress of Industrial Workers (CIO), the Socialist and Communist parties, the fiercely independent publications such as Appeal to Reason and The Masses—would have known what to do with the rage of our dispossessed. It used anger at injustice, corporate greed and state repression to mobilize Americans to terrify the power elite on the eve of World War I. This was the time when socialism was not a dirty word in America but a promise embraced by millions who hoped to create a world where everyone would have a chance. The steady destruction of the movements of the left was carefully orchestrated. They fell victim to a mixture of sophisticated forms of government and corporate propaganda, especially during the witch hunts for communists, and overt repression. Their disappearance means we lack the vocabulary of class warfare and the militant organizations, including an independent press, with which to fight back...


EMPHASIS BY DEMETER

[Dr.Phool]

51. I just bought Hedges new book.

Haven't cracked it yet, but it sounds good.

[Demeter]

53. DIVE! DIVE! DIVE! DOWN 100 POINTS FOR AN HOUR, AND COUNTING

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FZ08vMNMN0c&feature=related

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mMLM30EcFVk

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tGKzxZ31QcM&feature=related

A LITTLE MILITARY JINGOISM FOR THE DAY...I'VE ALWAYS LIKED THE IDEA OF SUBS, AND THE TV PORTRAYALS, ALTHOUGH I'D PROBABLY BE TOTALLY CLAUSTROPHOBIC ABOARD.

YOU WOULDN'T BELIEVE HOW MUCH FOOTAGE OF SUBMARINES IS ON YOUTUBE!

[Demeter]

55. Taking On a Second Mortgage to Pay the Foreclosure Lawyer

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/11/07/business/07lawyers.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=tha22

For some Florida residents, the price of getting out of foreclosure will include taking on a second mortgage — payable this time to their lawyers.

The new mortgage, which takes effect only if the foreclosure is dismissed and the homeowner’s debt to the bank is reduced, is controversial among defense lawyers, some of whom call it “creepy” and “crass.” Yet even they acknowledge it offers a solution to a vexing question: How do they get paid?

After recent revelations that banks were sloppy in processing many foreclosures and in some cases lack standing to seize a house, potential clients seeking to challenge their lenders are flocking to lawyers. But while these distressed homeowners might have a case, they generally lack the resources to pay legal fees. Being in foreclosure usually means being broke.

“We thought, ‘Why don’t we use a bit of ingenuity to find an affordable way to represent them?’ ” said Peter Ticktin of the Ticktin Law Group in Deerfield Beach, Fla. “It’s a new model, a new paradigm.”

IN OTHER WORDS, HOW CAN WE PLUCK HIS GOLDEN GOOSE?

WHAT IS IN THE WATER IN FLORIDA, BESIDES BP OIL PLUMES AND COREXIT?

[Demeter]

57. Obama's Biggest Mistake: Selling Out to the Bankers By James K. Galbraith

http://www.alternet.org/story/148770/obama%27s_biggest_mistake%3A_selling_out_to_the_bankers


I DON'T KNOW IF IT'S HIS BIGGEST MISTAKE...AFTER ALL, THERE'S TWO MORE YEARS TO GO....


....The original sin of Obama’s presidency was to assign economic policy to a closed circle of bank-friendly economists and Bush carryovers. Larry Summers. Timothy Geithner. Ben Bernanke. These men had no personal commitment to the goal of an early recovery, no stake in the Democratic Party, no interest in the larger success of Barack Obama. Their primary goal, instead, was and remains to protect their own past decisions and their own professional futures.

Up to a point, one can defend the decisions taken in September-October 2008 under the stress of a rapidly collapsing financial system. The Bush administration was, by that time, nearly defunct. Panic was in the air, as was political blackmail -- with the threat that the October through January months might be irreparably brutal. Stopgaps were needed, they were concocted, and they held the line.

But one cannot defend the actions of Team Obama on taking office. Law, policy and politics all pointed in one direction: turn the systemically dangerous banks over to Sheila Bair and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation. Insure the depositors, replace the management, fire the lobbyists, audit the books, prosecute the frauds, and restructure and downsize the institutions. The financial system would have been cleaned up. And the big bankers would have been beaten as a political force.

Team Obama did none of these things. Instead they announced “stress tests,” plainly designed so as to obscure the banks’ true condition. They pressured the Federal Accounting Standards Board to permit the banks to ignore the market value of their toxic assets. Management stayed in place. They prosecuted no one. The Fed cut the cost of funds to zero. The President justified all this by repeating, many times, that the goal of policy was “to get credit flowing again.”....

[Demeter]

58. Hedge Funders, Wealthy Sent Secret Campaign Cash to Derail Wall Street Regs

http://blog.aflcio.org/2010/11/05/hedge-funders-wealthy-sent-secret-campaign-cash-to-derail-wall-street-regs/

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We’re starting to find out where some of the tens of million of dollars in secret corporate campaign cash came from and what the donors were after . No surprise—Wall Street hedge fund managers, who teamed up with extremist groups run by Karl Rove and others, according a new report from NBC News.

A tightly coordinated effort by outside Republican groups, spearheaded by Karl Rove and fueled by tens of millions of dollars in contributions from Wall Street hedge fund moguls and other wealthy donors, helped secure big GOP midterm victories Tuesday, according to campaign spending figures and Republican fundraising insiders.

The two biggest spending groups behind the barrage of attack ads and mailings against Democrats were both founded by Rove and former George W. Bush White House insider Ed Gillespie—American Crossroads and Crossroads GPS. Combined reports NBC, they spent $38 million.

A substantial portion of Crossroads GPS’ money came from a small circle of extremely wealthy Wall Street hedge fund and private equity moguls, according to GOP fundraising sources who spoke with NBC News on condition of anonymity. These donors have been bitterly opposed to a proposal by congressional Democrats — and endorsed by the Obama administration — to increase the tax rates on compensation that hedge funds pay their partners, the sources said.

Read more here: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/39995283/ns/politics-decision_2010

[Demeter]

59. Obama Should Create Jobs by Executive Order

http://www.truth-out.org/obama-create-jobs-executive-order64901


On May 6, 1935, with the country in the midst of the Great Depression and with indirect efforts to create jobs having not moved the needle of unemployment rates, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 7034 and appropriated $4.8 billion for the Works Progress Administration (WPA). The WPA put millions of Americans to work constructing buildings, painting murals to decorate them and performing plays for audiences that had never before seen a dramatic production. In the process, many were saved from poverty and starvation and the economy began to revive.

Although Congress, as part of the New Deal, had appropriated money specifically for relief, FDR decided to use the money for a direct jobs program by issuing a presidential executive order. This executive order described the agencies to be involved in the program, its structure and procedure for application and allocation of jobs.

The WPA was quickly implemented. By March 1936, 3.4 million people were employed and an average of 2.3 million people worked monthly until the program ended in June 1943. During its existence, the WPA employed more than 8,500,000 different persons on 1,410,000 individual projects and spent about $11 billion. The average yearly salary was $1,100, a living wage at the time. During its eight-year history, the WPA built 651,087 miles of highways, roads and streets. It constructed, repaired or improved 124,031 bridges, 125,110 public buildings, 8,192 parks and 853 airport landing fields.

Today, our infrastructure is crumbling and loss of revenue is forcing many cities and states to cut basic services. About 15 million people have become unemployed since the crisis hit in late 2008; a million and a half of them are construction workers. The need for a direct jobs program is either as great, or even greater, than during the Depression.... Can the president directly create jobs by executive order? The answer is a resounding yes. Remember when the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008, which created the $700 billion Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) was passed, one of the purposes was to preserve homeownership and promote jobs and economic growth...Much of the TARP money has been repaid and the administration refers to the profit on the payments. If one assumes an average cost of one job is $50,000, six million jobs could be immediately created for $300 billion. Twelve million jobs could be created for $600 billion. Because this is already appropriated money, Congressional Republicans could not block it...This bold program would contrast markedly with prior stimulus bills, which were indirect and whose effects have been too slow to manifest themselves...

[Demeter]

60. Rebooting the American Dream - 11 Ways to Rebuild Our Country: Back to the Future

http://www.truth-out.org/thom-hartmann-rebooting-the-american-dream-07112010

On April 14, 1789, George Washington was out walking through the fields at Mount Vernon, his home in Virginia, when Charles Thomson, the secretary of the Continental Congress, showed up on horseback. Thomson had a letter for Washington from the president pro tempore of the new, constitutionally created United States Senate, telling Washington that he’d just been elected president and the inauguration was set for April 30 in the nation’s capital, New York City (1). This created two problems for Washington...The second problem was finding a suit of clothes made in America...Washington couldn’t find a suit made in America because in the years prior to the American Revolution, the British East India Company (whose tea was thrown into Boston Harbor by outraged colonists after the Tea Act of 1773 gave the world’s largest transnational corporation a giant tax break) controlled the manufacture and the transportation of a whole range of goods, including fine clothing. Cotton and wool could be grown and sheared in the colonies, but it had to be sent to England to be turned into clothes.

This was a routine policy for England, and it is why until India achieved its independence in 1947 Mahatma Gandhi (who was assassinated a year later) sat with his spinning wheel for his lectures and spun daily in his own home. It was, like his Salt March, a protest against the colonial practices of England and an entreaty to his fellow Indians to make their own clothes to gain independence from British companies and institutions.

Fortunately for George Washington, an American clothing company had been established on April 28, 1783, in Hartford, Connecticut, by a man named Daniel Hinsdale, and it produced high-quality woolen and cotton clothing as well as items made from imported silk (2). It was to Hinsdale’s company that Knox turned, and he helped Washington get—in time for his inauguration two weeks later—a nice, but not excessively elegant, brown American-made suit. (He wore British black later for the celebrations and the most famous painting.)

When Washington became president in 1789, most of America’s personal and industrial products of any significance were manufactured in England or in its colonies. Washington asked his first Treasury secretary, Alexander Hamilton, what could be done about that, and Hamilton came up with an 11-point plan to foster American manufacturing, which he presented to Congress in 1791. By 1793 most of its points had either been made into law by Congress or formulated into policy by either President Washington or the various states, which put the country on a path of developing its industrial base and generating the largest source of federal revenue for more than a hundred years.

Those strategic proposals built the greatest industrial powerhouse the world had ever seen and, after more than 200 successful years, were abandoned only during the administrations of Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, and Bill Clinton (and remain abandoned to this day). Modern-day China, however, implemented most of Hamilton’s plan and has brought about a remarkable transformation of its nation in a single generation....

[Demeter]

61. Gotta eat, wash, and do the daily bread thing

That ought to keep you all busy for a bit...

What about the weekend thread, though? Any ideas, suggestions, requests? Anybody want to guest-host, even? After all, the latest Harry Potter film opens this weekend...and I'm hosting a dinner party Sunday (you are all invited) at the condo clubhouse...

[AnneD]

63. A virtual party sound good....

a nice poo poo platter, some one to bring finger food.

Let's have a mad hatter tea party and roast the winners.:evilgrin:

[Demeter]

70. Oy!

through the looking glass, again?

virtual dinner.....I'm thinking......

[Ghost Dog]

64. 'Therefore, We Are All The Bag Man'

In an America in which the former president can boast on television that he approved the water-boarding of U.S. prisoners, it can hardly be a shock that following a lengthy investigation, no criminal charges will be filed against those who destroyed the evidence of CIA abuse of prisoners Abu Zubaydah and Abd a-Rahim al-Nashiri. We keep waiting breathlessly for someone, somewhere, to have a day of reckoning over the prisoners we tortured in the wake of 9/11, without recognizing that there is no bag man to be found and that therefore we are all the bag man.

President Barack Obama decided long ago that he would "turn the page" on prisoner abuse and other illegality connected to the Bush administration's war on terror. What he didn't seem to understand, what he still seems not to appreciate, is that what was on that page would bleed through onto the next page and the page after that. ...

/... http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2010/11/-therefore-we-are-all-the-bag-man/66422/

(And, yes, this has to do with (global) economics). Posted mainly for the flavour of the comments there on this.

[Dr.Phool]

65. WTF? I go out for a 3 margarita lunch, and you guys kill the economy!

OK, maybe it was six. But, it's a dog friendly place, and I took the pooches with me. And the wife. She's already passed out.

[Demeter]

71. I thought you were on a diet, doc!

Was this a plan to soften the wife up?

Dog friendly, hmmm?

And for what it's worth, I did NOT kill the economy. I even bought lunch.

[TexasObserver]

69. The stock market slipped the past couple of days, but remains a positive.

Since the markets bottomed out in March of 2009, shortly after the president took office, we have seen stock values soar 70%. If one invested $100,000 from their 401K in March, 2009, it would be worth approximately $170,000 today.

A look at the stock market graphs since then show a steady rise in values.

This is good news for Democrats, and good news for anyone with a 401K.

I expect the DOW to remain comfortably above 11K this year and break through 12K next year.

It's been a good year for the stock market. Hopefully, next year will be better.

Sustained increases in the stock market can only help new job formation in the long haul.

[tclambert]

72. I agree with everything except the last line.

I'm not sure a cause/effect relationship exists between the stock market and job formation, and if there is, which is cause and which effect. I tend to think job increases would lead to a higher stock market, because more people would have 401Ks and the like, but stocks have often gone up on layoff news. I expect the stock market and jobs to do better in the coming year as the economy slowly grows. A strong jobs program would likely benefit both the economy and the stock market. Unfortunately, hundreds of Republican congresspeople stand in the way.

How much your $100K from March, 2009 would be worth today of course depends what you invested in. If you had invested in Ford on March 5th, 2009, you might have $900K today. (It went from $1.70 to $16.61. Hindsight. Sigh.)

[TexasObserver]

73. My biggest concern for 2011 is with deficit reduction.

I don't think the markets will reflect it until the House is securely in GOP hands and actually pushing deficit reduction by votes. By spring/summer I suspect we will see some nervousness about deficit reduction advocates. If the GOP can cause the recovery to falter in 2011 or early 2012, they'll set up a big victory for 2012.

Of course, when the FED can infuse hundreds of billions at will, there's always that.