Stephen Payne, a lobbyist with close ties to the GOP, is selling access to Bush, Cheney, and Rice for contributions to the Bush Presidential Library.
He sits on Bush’s Homeland Security Advisory Council.
Video at link of him soliciting bribes.
Month: July 2008
Curt Weldon, and a Lot of People Around Him, Are Going to Jail
Cecelia Grimes, a lobbyist with very close ties to Curt Weldon, has been charged with destroying evidence related to the investigation of former Congressman Curt Weldon’s corruption. Among other things she:
- Threw out her blackberry in a trash can at a Arbys.
And in her trash at home, she threw out:
- Grand-jury subpoenas
- Amtrak receipts
- American airline boarding passes
- Fourteen RSVP cards for a dinner honoring Weldon, which call for responses to be sent to Grimes.
Which the FBI recovered from her garbage.
If she doesn’t sing, she will be going to jail for a very long time….My guess is that she will sing, and Weldon will do time, but I’m an optimist.
Previous posts on Weldon’s slime here.
Minnesota Senate Race Update
First, Rasmussen Reports™ shows Franken having his first lead on Coleman: 42% for Coleman to 44% for Franken, and Jesse Ventura is now saying that he is not running for Senate.
Generally both good for Franken, I think.
American Psychiatric Association Major Recipient of Pharma Money
Interesting how what is supposed to be a independent non-profit organization is the recipient of large amounts of money from groups that have a fiduciary interest in one form of treatment.
Obviously, this is a legitimate reason to doubt the independence of the organization on issues related to the use of psychiatric drugs.
Hey! NSA!!! Surveill This!!!
Tangimoana, Omaka, Renwick and Punawai
Fannie and Freddie Update
First, let’s look at the analysis of the shrill one, Paul Krugman in the New York Times. He notes that they will almost certainly need some level of bailout, as they are simply too large to be allowed to fail, and that most of the post 2000 craziness in the real estate market was as the GSE’s as bystanders, since regulators hold them back.
Atrios disagrees with the idea that thay are too large to fail, and says that they should fail, at least from the perspective of their shareholders, that these organizations can be reconstituted as fully government entities, as Fannie was until the late 1960s.
The support of (re)nationally is the general opinion of the blogosphere cognoscenti turns out to be pro-nationalization too, and, on the Marketplace radio today, I heard wingnut “economist” Amity Shlaes suggest the same thing, only she suggested that the “healthy” parts be re-privatized, leaving the taxpayers holding the bag for the bad parts.
It turns out that there is actually no disagreement, as Krugman endorses nationalization too in this blog post. It just did not make the cut in the limited space in his Times OP/ED.
He also notes that as the housing market inflated, the GSE’s became a smaller part of the market (chart pr0n):
In any case, it’s clear that the statements by the Fed and the Treasury Department have stabilized things, at least for now, as Freddie Mac, clearly the weaker of the two GSEs, just successfully sold $3 billion in short term debt, $2 billion for three-months at 2.309% and $1 billion six-monthsat 2.496%. the company said.
On the other hand, we have a number of investors saying that they are basically insolvent, including George Soros and Jim Rogers, and Goldman Sachs is predicting at least another 35% stock decline.
As a bit of interesting historical information, the Washington Post has a nice article about how the GSE’s built, and used, their lobbying clout to prevent restrictions and capital requirements from being increased.
Well, they got what they wished for, much to their unhappiness.
New York City Develops Its Own Poverty Calculation
My guess is that the city’s numbers are more accurate than the federal poverty numbers, because they consider things that the feds don’t, like medical expenses.
The number in poverty is 23%, as opposed to 19% under the federal numbers, and of course, some wanker at the American Enterprise Institute was quoted as saying that the poor are, “a lot better off than they were 20, 30, 40 years ago”.
Yep, let’s go back to outhouses and cholera for the poor, just to be fair.
Economics Update
I’ve split off the GSE’s from this, along with the some other items that need more thought, so this is a short one: Oil flat, gasoline and diesel hit new record, and the dollar strengthened.
Too True
Magazine’s ‘satirical’ cover stirs controversy – Yahoo! News
Well, the New Yorker just put our a new issue, and the cover is something else.
David Remnick, the editor of the New Yorker, defends the cover as “Satire, Meant To Target “Distortions And Misconceptions And Prejudices” About Obama.”
So a cartoon showing Barack Obama in Muslim garb, with a flag burning in the fireplace, bin Laden’s portrait on the wall, fist bumping with an AK-47 toting Michelle Obama is satire.
It may have been intended as such, but it’s not satire…or at the very least, it’s so poorly done that the satire is invisible to the observer, even one who is familiar with the magazine.
Interestingly enough, I think that the strongest critique, albeit an unintentional one, is a comment made by Jonah “Doughy Pantload” Goldberg in the National Review Online, he says that, “It’s almost exactly the sort of cover you could expect to find on the front of National Review.”
Well, yes it is, but the long term racism of the National Review is well known. William F. Buckley was supporting segregation into the 1970s.
We expect the National Review to be this stupid and racist. We don’t expect the New Yorker to be this stupid or racist.
Speaker of Kuwait Parliament Calls US “Provocative”
This is a remarkable statement from a member of the Kuwaiti government.
They are concerned that the US will take unilateral military action against Iran, which would destabilize the region.
This is of particular note because Kuwait is the strongest Arab ally in the region, and firmly Sunni and hostile to Iran.
When you’ve lots Kuwait, you’ve lost everyone.
Afghanistan is Getting Much Worse
This was not a lucky shot or roadside bomb…this was a deliberate can extensively planned assault that killed 9 US troops.
They assaulted this base base with a large number of insurgents over a period of hours (see also here).
This sort of large and well organized operation shows a capability that the Taliban has not demonstrated before, and I can’t help but think that this is a prelude to a more ambitious operation.
Citi’s Off Books Entities
Here’s am interesting take on the financial health of Citigroup.
The new CEO says that shrinking its $2.2 trillion balance sheet is a priority. By this he means that he wants to minimize potential liabilities, but he neglects to mention an additional $1.1 trillion in entities that are off the balance sheet, in things like trusts, financing vehicles, and CDOs.
The US system needs a major clean up and some sunlight, but companies like Citi resemble vampires, or at least some suffering from severe porphyria.
Showing the light of day to these financial concerns will kill many of them.
War Crimes Arrest Warrant Requested for Sudanese President
So, we now have the official public request.
I think that the immediate result will be a massive increase of violence directed toward the UN peacekeepers, and Chinese vetoes against anything further in the security council.
Obama’s New York Times OP/ED on Iraq
I suggest that you read it and draw your own conclusions.
As for me, the “residual force” thing gives me the willies.
Harry Reid Finally Asks John McCain to do His Job
I’m kind of wondering what took them so long. “Missing too many votes” is a classic Republican attack, and calling McCain AWOL should be effective.
Iraq Status of Forces Negotiations Bog Down
There are now reports that the negotiators have given up on a long term status of forces agreement in Iraq.
It appears that the Iraqis want a time table, and Bush and His Evil Minions™ are unwilling to do that, so they will patch something together short term, and the next president will handle what happens next.
Fed to Tighten Mortgage Rules
It looks like they are going to fix some things, particularly pre-payment penalties on abusive loans, requiring escrowing taxes, etc.
It’s not much, but it’s a start.
Noriel Roubini Nails the Core Problem
While writing on the impending bailouts of the GSEs he notes that:
The reality is that the U.S. has invested too much – especially in the last eight years – in building its stock of wasteful housing capital (whose effect on the productivity of labor is zero) and has not invested enough in the accumulation of productive physical capital (equipment, machinery, etc.) that leads to an increase in the productivity of labor and increases long run economic growth.
This is exactly the problem.
In fact the problem is more general. Our economy is no longer producing goods and service of value as a means of activity. Instead it is moving towards arbitrage, and at some point, there will be too many balls in the air for it to continue.
For all I know, it may already have happened.
Senate Passes Mortgage Legislation
Bush is threatening a veto, but given the current economic and electoral environment, I doubt that it will actually come to that.