I figure that he will be sworn in before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, and lie about what he and his staff did, because he’s Goldman Sachs, and knows that there are no consequences for this if you are Goldman Sachs.
Year: 2009
Economics Update
Slow news day on the economic front.
We are seeing a big drop in lending by the SBA to small businesses, largely because in the SBA guaranteed program are refusing to lend.
Additionally, we are seeing the Federal Reserve’s plan to purchase mortgage backed securities opening much smaller than originally stated, $20 billion, as opposed to more than $100 billion.
I think that a lot of this is because the relaxation of accounting rules make it easier for executives to write themselves big pay checks with all the crap remaining on their books priced as gold, or if not gold, at least copper.
In any case, the dismal job numbers, are driving concerns that the economy has not yet hit bottom, which drove the dollar up, and oil down.
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot!?!?
Palin is resigning as governor of Alaska to focus on running for President effective July 25. (see also here)
It appears that she thinks that she needs more than 2 years to run for President, her term expires in 2010.
3½ more years of Palin….Great googly moogly!
I cannot imagine that anyone out there with a smidgen of sanity views this with anything but dread, except, perhaps, Jon Stewart, Dave Letterman, Jay Leno, Conan O’Brien, etc. and their staffs, who find writing satirical monologues that much easier.
Eric Boehlert and Bill Kristol Are Both Wrong
Eric Boehlert agrees with William Kristol when he says that Todd Purdum’s piece must be wrong when he says that it’s simply not possible that multiple individuals would have concluded that she had Narcissistic Personality Disorder.
First, my background: I lived in Alaska from 1963 to 1969, I was 7 when I left, and my father worked at various levels in the state and local government, being the head of planning for Governor Bill Egan, and head of the State Charter Commission.
He maintains the friendships that he made there, and as such, he is in touch with many people who are very much a part of the political scene there, particularly on the Democratic Party side.
The other thing to realize is just how tiny the political scene is there. Everyone knows, and meets, everyone else on an almost daily basis when the legislature is in session, so if one person made a comment, like “I was looking through the DSM IV, and ‘Narcissistic Personality Disorder’ matched Palin to a ‘T,” it could rapidly become a talking point.
This makes this story likely, but the email that I got forwarded to me by my dad pretty much makes it a almost certainly true.
I would note that my dad quoted this individual to me in October saying essentially the same thing.
—– Forwarded Message —-
From: ——-
To: Mr Ron Saroff <——–>
Sent: Thursday, July 2, 2009 8:31:38 AM
Subject: FW: Politico.com:Further amusement –this time amongst the R’s. Lots of bad substantive stuff to say about Palin, but frankly I think the sexism is disgusting from both parties and elsewhere.
Check out this page:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0609/24392.html
I was one of the people who told TP [Todd Purdum] Sarah had a narcissistic personality disorder! And he told me I wasn’t the first to say it.
Thank you,
THE POLITICO
Politico.com
This once again shows that you cannot go wrong betting against William Kristol.
Jon Stewart is a F%$#ing Genius, Part e∫ee
John Stewart noting that Dick Cheney is objecting to Dick Cheney’s Iraq pullout plan.
It’s Bank Failure Friday on Thursday!
Great Googly Moogly! 7 Banks, 6 of them in Illinois, shuttered by the FDIC on one weekend.
July 2 is literally the middle of the year, day 183, and we are now on a pace to break 100 for the year.
And here they are, ordered, and numbered for the year so far.
- John Warner Bank, Clinton, IL
- First State Bank of Winchester, Winchester, IL
- Rock River Bank, Oregon, IL
- Elizabeth State Bank, Elizabeth, IL
- First National Bank of Danville, Danville, IL
- Millennium State Bank of Texas, Dallas, TX
- Founders Bank, Worth, IL
Least Surprising News of the Day
Why Do Right Wingers Hate America
Former CIA employee, and torture apologist, Michael Scheuer goes on Glenn Beck’s show on Fox, and says that Americans need to die from a terrorist attack:
Scheuer: The only chance we have as a country right now is for Osama bin Laden to deploy and detonate a major weapon in the United States. Because it’s going to take a grass-roots, bottom-up pressure. Because these politicians prize their office, prize the praise of the media and the Europeans. It’s an absurd situation again. Only Osama can execute an attack which will force Americans to demand that their government protect them effectively, consistently, and with as much violence as necessary.
Beck: Which is why, I was thinking this weekend, if I were him, that would be the last thing I would do right now.
But understand, this is not unpatriotic. You can wish all manner of horrors on this country, but as long as these horrors might serve a specific political agenda, you’re not being unpatriotic. Unpatriotic is a public health care plan. Unpatriotic is a judge modifying subprime mortgage loans to keep a roof over someone’s head. Unpatriotic is phosphate free detergent. Patriotic is wishing for a terrorist attack on the United States.
Why should we listen to these people about anything. They hate America and Americans.
Osama, Take Me Now!
Have Americans become so slovenly that the mere act of flicking one’s wrist while holding a laser pointer is too much effort?
(Click pic for vid)
Why Americans Favor the Public Option
Monty Python Explains:
H/T Fighting Liberals for the vid.
Goldman Pushes Back on Taibbi
Felix Salmon looks at the response from “the top flack at Goldman Sach” (his words), and basically goes with Taibbi’s assessment.
Matt Taibbi’s response is even clearer: he notes that Goldman does not actually deny anything in their “denial”, and further notes that Goldman refused to respond ot his inquiries.
One Penny on the Dollar
United Western Bancorp just sold mortgage backed securities with a face value of $47.3 million for less than that, $378,000.00 was paid, whcih comes to 0.88%.
Great googly moogly.
How Barack Obama F%$#s the Progressive in Congress
Case in point, freshman Representative Tom Perriello, who was aggressively lobbied to vote for the cap and trad bill, he thought that it was a sellout, and originally intended to vote against it, and is now being targeted by the GOP on this vote.
On the other hand, blue dogs, like Gene Taylor, were allowed to vote their campaign dollars “conscience”, and were not aggressively lobbied.
Perriello’s margin in his campaign, just 727 votes, while Gene Taylor, “He won 74.6% of the vote in 2008, and 79.8% in 2006.”
This is about campaign money. Rahm Emanuel and His Evil Minions™ think that the blue dogs are critical in getting big money campaign donations, and that if you have to sacrifice a few progressive Dems to secure that, they don’t raise the big bucks, so screw them.
Economics Update
Scary Picture of the DayH/T Calculated Risk
Today is the official unemployment numbers, and they are worse than expected. Non-Farm payroll fell by 467K, and unemployment (U-3) rose to 9.5%.
For those of you following the more expansive, and to my mind, more accurate, U-6, it rose to 16.6%.
Unemployment is hitting new highs in the Euro zone too, which is why the ECB is keeping its rates at 1%.
It’s no wonder that a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey showed that people are getting more pessimistic about the economy.
We do have a bit of good news, with factory orders rising in May, and
mortgage rates falling this week.
In energy, both crude oil and wholesale gasoline prices fell, on the weak employment numbers and expanding inventory.
The investor flight to safety has strengthened the dollar.
Time for a Blogger Ethics Panel
It appears that the Washington Post is selling access to, for sums in excess of $25,000.00, access to the “powerful few” in DC:
For $25,000 to $250,000, The Washington Post has offered lobbyists and association executives off-the-record, nonconfrontational access to “those powerful few”: Obama administration officials, members of Congress, and — at first — even the paper’s own reporters and editors.
The astonishing offer was detailed in a flier circulated Wednesday to a health care lobbyist, who provided it to a reporter because the lobbyist said he felt it was a conflict for the paper to charge for access to, as the flier says, its “health care reporting and editorial staff.”
It appears that WaPo executive editor Marcus Brauchli has circulated a memo saying that members of the news department are prohibited from attending, which is unsurprising, since they got caught.
Normally, I wouldn’t expect journalists to turn down free food.
What Digby Said
Today the ACLU and many bloggers who are concerned with the fact that the United States tortured prisoners and apparently has no intention of holding anyone responsible for it are blogging about a little known fact about the issue: the US Government didn’t just torture a bunch a prisoners, as bad as that was, and as horrible as it remains for those who survived it. The United States tortured many prisoners to death. This does not seem to be common knowledge, but the evidence is quite clear that this happened. Torture and death by torture was not isolated.
It should be noted that if the prisoner died, they were violating even the repulsive standards of Bybee and Yoo.
Why We Love The Rude Pundit
Just go read his takdown of Governor Sanford.
It is even better than Jon Stewart’s take-down of the Governor.
RIP Usenet
I don’t have the full details, but it appears that the RIAA has won a major court case against Usenet.com.
Based on the description in the article, it would appear that any ISP hosting Usenet would be deemed infringing.
Latest Phony GOP SH%$ Storm
They are claiming that the EPA is suppressing climate warming skeptical reports from one of their employees, Al Carlin.
There are, however, a few problems:
- He’s an economist not a scientist.
- He was never asked the reports, this is a hobby that he does on the side, and then he writes memos about them.
- The report has been by a NASA climatologist as, “a ragbag collection of un-peer reviewed web pages, an unhealthy dose of sunstroke, a dash of astrology and more cherries than you can poke a cocktail stick at.”
- He’s never been a part of the climate change working group.
So basically, he’s the nutcase you ignore on an email listserv.
She’s persona non grata in Palm Beach
Pity Ruth Madoff. She’s going to have to live the rest of her life on just $2.5 million in cash:
Ruth will be left with just $2.5 million in cash by federal authorities under that deal.
“In the deal, she lost everything. She’s lost everything she holds dear,” said one source. “She’s lost her husband. She has no friends.”
“She’s persona non grata in Palm Beach, everywhere she cared about. She’s a beaten woman. There’s nothing left on the carcass to take,” the source said.
(emphasis mine)
$2½ million and PNG in Palm Beach!
The horror.