Month: August 2010

Breaking: Obama Breaks Iraq Withdrawal Promise

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The news is out, and the State Department has announced that they have declared victory but we will not be leaving.

You see, there are no more combat troops, just, “50,000 advisers,” along with something like 85,000 mercenaries contractors, or about 1 per every 200 Iraqis.

And this is what these folks will do:

So will all the troops be coming home? Hopefully, but don’t bet on it. Recall that US troops remain in South Korea, six decades after the Korean War.

The 50,000 US troops left until 2011 will supposedly “advise and assist” and perform “anti-terrorism” missions and training. To this old war correspondent and military historian, that sounds an awful lot like the British Empires employment of native troops under white officers.

These remaining rebranded US “training” troops will likely be six armor-heavy combat brigades, backed by warplanes from US air bases in the Gulf. A US brigade withdrawn from Iraq will go to neighboring Kuwait. Most of the rest will transfer to Afghanistan.

You know, he doesn’t have to get through Congress, he can just do this, and he won’t.

I called this 2 weeks ago, and said that it would be a phony withdrawal.

Unfortunately, I was correct.

Barney Frank: Missing the Lede on the GSEs

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The headline, of course is that he is calling for the gradual elimination of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac:

“I think they should be abolished,” Frank said. “The only question is what do you put in their place. This is a situation where given the importance they had come to play in housing, you can’t tear down the old jail until you build a new one. And that’s a process that we’ve started.”

This is legitimately a big news story, but the rest of his proposal is far more revolutionary. He is a calling for an end to government subsidies to home buyers:

Frank went on: “I have been very critical for a long time that not everybody should be a homeowner. There are people in this society who for economic and frankly social reasons can’t and shouldn’t be homeowners. I do want some government help to build affordable rental housing.”

It’s this 2nd point that is a big deal. While the GSEs (Government Sponsored Entities) were a vanishingly small part of the housing bubble, as house prices exploded, their share of the market fell precipitously, what was a huge part of the market was the enormous subsidies made available to both home buyers, sellers, builders, and agents.

This distorted the market in some very profound ways, and it is very likely that if these measures had not been in place, we would have seen neither the bubble nor the crash.

We sacrificed our economy on the alter of home ownership.

Well F%$# Me.

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Pat Buchanan taking the moral high ground
Whiskey Tango Foxtrot?


Ted Olson says that Obama is Right


Howard Dean calls for the Islamic center to move

First, Pat Buchanan seizes the moral high ground, 7 words I never expected to say, when he takes Newt Gingrich to task for inappropriate Nazi references:

How do you get more attention than Sarah Palin, who’s very good at this, is to go two steps further. I mean, I think bringing the Nazis into the argument is always absurd in American politics because there is no valid comparison there. And secondly, you know, you bring that in and that’s all we start talking about.

Meanwhile, Ted Olson, Republican hatchet man, and survivor of a 911 victim, his 1st wife was on one of the planes, has said that Barack Obama was right to say that this is a matter of fundamental rights and values.

And while we are on the the matter of people taking counter-intuitive positions on this, we have Howard Dean calling for the Islamic center to move.

I’m not sure what brought on this uncharacteristic outburst of cowardice, but Dr. Dean is the individual here to whom the “wanker” tag implies.

We live in a world that resembles what The Onion would write, if they were on Bizarro World, and they dropped acid.

The Daily Show is the Best Journalism on TV Today*

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Seriously, the fact that Jon Stewart has so much material to work with makes me despair for the future of the Republic.

This sh%$ is not rocket science, and the idea that the press is not to call bullsh%$ over transparent bullsh%$ is not a mark of professionalism, it is a mark of cowardice, hypocrisy, and laziness.

In any case, on to the vid.

*Yes, my Geek Goddess, Rachel Maddow, is a close second.

Gr8 Practical Joke

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A few years back, some people in and around San Diego commissioned a sculpture of a surfer called the “Magic Carpet Ride”.

It’s been rather controversial amongst the surfers, who felt that the statue, “short of the macho image they thought their sport should project.”

As a result of this, it has been a target of of some pranks since it was unveiled in 2007.

This is, of course not particularly surprising, when you juxtapose a statue and a sub-culture that prides itself on being unconventional:

Ever since, the statue, known locally — and derisively — by local surfers as the “Cardiff Kook,” has routinely been dressed in different costumes by snarky locals. At various times, the statue of a young male surfer has been adorned with a ballerina’s tutu and luche libre wrestler’s mask, a woman’s bikini and other costumes, most recently a tennis outfit with racket.

That being said, about a month ago, some prankster has entered realm of the masters of the art.

He, and his minions, got jiggy late one night with some serious paper mâché. They encased the statue in the maw of a large Great White Shark,* creating the illusion of his being swallowed up by a gargantuan selachian.

This is up there in the “one for the ages” category, up there with Davidson HS senior Kyle Garchar, who got the fans from Darby high school to spell out “we suck” at the Darby-Davidson football game.

Brilliant, just brilliant.

*Actually, it might be big enough for C. Megalodon. That’s one big mofo.

Economics Update

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Click for full size

Capacity Utilization


Industrial Production
H/t Calculated Risk

Retail sales rose, but missed forecasts for July, the comment of an economist quoted in the story, “The numbers are consistent with a sluggish consumer profile,” is kind of well duh thing.

Hopefully the indications that the big banks are relaxing their lending standards for small businesses for the first time in 4 years.

This is good news, since banks have increasingly attempted to move small business customers from loans to corporate credit cards, where the fees and interest, and hence bank profits, are higher.

On the consumer side, credit card delinquencies fell to the lowest level this year, which could mean that more people are getting back on their feet (good), or that more consumers are deleveraging (mostly bad, see Thrift, Paradox of).

I’m inclined to believe that it is mostly the latter, particularly since bankruptcy filings hit a 5-year high in the 2nd quarter.

We are seeing some good news in industrial production and capacity utilization, which continue a relatively robust recovery, though a lot of this gain was increased electricity consumption from a record breaking July, though a fair amount is also autos which is an unambiguously good sign. (See also the chart pr0n)

The New York Fed’s economic activity index rose in August, but again, it missed forecasts.

In the land of the blithering idiots inflation hawks, the UK district is reporting that British CPI rose at a 3.1% annual rate, down from June’s 3.2% rate, which has the inflation hawk piggies squealing that they are missing the 2% target, but as Krugman would say, we are in a liquidity trap, we need more inflation so that real interests rates (interest – inflation) is low enough to foster growth.

I would go further than Krugman, and say that both the Bank of England and the Fed should have a 6-8% target inflation rate for the next 4 years or so.

And then we have real estate, where the market seems to be deflating like the Hindenberg* following the expiration of the home buying tax credit.

Housing starts rose, but fell well short of forecasts in July, home prices flattened out in June, and home builder confidence fell in August.

*I know that the Hindenberg did not deflate, it burnt and crashed. That’s my point of this mangled metaphor, OK?

The First Shoe Drops on Torture………

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Remember the torture tapes that the CIA had destroyed on the watch of Porter Goss, the most corrupt CIA chief ever?

Well, some of the tapes missed the degausser:

The interrogation of Ramzi Binalshibh, a key figure in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, was recorded several times while he was being questioned in Morocco by local intelligence officers, according to a U.S. official. The disclosure resolves a mystery over what are thought to be the only existing recordings from the CIA’s secret detention program.

The two videotapes and an audiotape do not show any use of what the CIA has called “enhanced interrogation techniques,” the official said. Human rights groups have described the CIA’s methods as torture.

“The tapes, which were made and found years ago, show a guy sitting at a desk answering questions,” said the official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because of ongoing investigations.

Still, the disclosure adds a new wrinkle to the public understanding of the documentation of the CIA’s detention and interrogation program.

The destruction of 92 videotapes depicting the harsh interrogation and confinement of senior al–Qaeda figures at CIA secret prisons around the world is the subject of a criminal probe. Jose A. Rodriguez Jr., the former head of the directorate of operations at the agency, issued an order to destroy the recordings in November 2005 as the CIA’s detention and interrogation program came under intense public and congressional scrutiny.

There are likely more tapes out there, and I would hope that the good (i.e. not-torturer) CIA agents who know where they are will get them to people who will do something (Yes, I know, Obama already said no prosecutions) about this.

Seeing as how one of the claims of the Binalshibh defense team is that he’s got a screw loose, these tapes may go a long way towards settling that issue as well.

The CIA claims that there was no torture harsh interrogation techniques in the tapes.

Normally, I Don’t Have Much to Say About Ball Players Who Retired Before I Was Born……

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But I have to note it that Bobby Thompson has died, he was 86.

Who was Mr. Thompson? He (on edit)is the Hall of Fame outfielder who (/on edit) hit the shot heard round the world:


If you are an American, you should know this one even if you don’t know jack about Baseball.

I have to guess that Olbermann will comment on this tonight, after all, how can he not?

Blago: A Swing and a Miss

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A hung jury on 23 of the 24 counts, and a conviction on lying to an FBI agent:

The jury is finally in on Rod Blagojevich — and the verdict is decidedly undecided.

A federal jury of six men and six women just returned a split verdict against the former governor, convicting him on only one of the 24 criminal corruption counts he faced.

Verdict reached: Blagojevich brothers arrive in court The Blago blog: Latest updates Complete coverage of the Blagojevich trial

The governor was found guilty of giving a false statement to federal agents.

In a courthouse where prosecutors win more than 90 percent of the time and after listening to a treasure trove of secretly recorded conversations, the jury couldn’t reach a unanimous decision on the other 23 counts.

So, the lesson here is that maybe US Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald is not all that, which I kind of figured when all he got out of Plamegate was Scooter Libby lying to federal officers (funny similarity there).

Actually, there is a broader lesson: Don’t talk to law enforcement if you think that there is the vaguest possibility that you are a target, even minor misstatements get thrown into the mix.

FWIW, I don;t think that Rahm will testify at the inevitable retrial, there is simply no “there” there.

I still cannot figure out how the prosecution screwed the pooch this badly, but I haven’t followed the minutiae, and most of what I have heard have been prosecution statements, so I won’t 2ndguess the jury.

IP and Protecting the Incumbent Players

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Once again, the Obama administration has gone for a maximalist position on IP, and they are looking at making radio stations start paying license fees to performers, aka a “public performance right”:

The recording industry scored a significant victory today with news that the Obama administration will provide its “strong support” for the Performance Rights Act. The bill would force over-the-air radio stations to start coughing up cash for the music they play; right now, the stations pay songwriters, but not the actual recording artists.

I will say that this is a basically fair, since web broadcasters, satellite radio have to pay these fees, and the status of Radio is a historical artifact dating back something like 70 years.

The record distributors love this, and the radio stations (rather unsurprisingly) hate this law.

This, in and of itself, is neither surprising, nor particularly interesting to me.

What is interesting is that the RIAA is trying to cut a Verizon/Google type deal on this:

Music labels and radio broadcasters can’t agree on much, including whether radio should be forced to turn over hundreds of millions of dollars a year to pay for the music it plays. But the two sides can agree on this: Congress should mandate that FM radio receivers be built into cell phones, PDAs, and other portable electronics.

The Consumer Electronics Association, whose members build the devices that would be affected by such a directive, is incandescent with rage. “The backroom scheme of the [National Association of Broadcasters] and RIAA to have Congress mandate broadcast radios in portable devices, including mobile phones, is the height of absurdity,” thundered CEA president Gary Shapiro. Such a move is “not in our national interest.”

This is really pretty absurd. If you have an MP3 player, you can play the song that you want, and not tune into the repetitive crap that comes out of the increasingly conglomerate dominated commercial FM airwaves, though I could see listening to a sporting event.

On a deeper level though, this is profoundly disturbing, because it shows how blatant the incumbents in various segments of our society have become in divvying up the spoils through as privileged participants in the legislative process.

If people really want to change the tenor of Washington, they should start by taking on this sort of corruption head on, and get to Republicans and Democrats calling each other names later.

What Lindsay “Majikthise” Said

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She writes on the impending retirement of Cathy Guiswite and notes that while Ms. Guiswite might be a bit of a feminist trailblazer, the character, a desperate woman obsessing about a husband and her thighs is not:

If “Cathy” has any feminist value, it can be subsumed under the maxim: “If you can’t be a good example, you can at least be a horrible warning.”

I would further note that Ms. Guiswite’s actual “feminist trailblazer” cred is pretty thin.

She is not the first female syndicated mass market cartoonist, that would have been Dale Messick, the creator of Brenda Starr.

Though to give Ms. Guiswite her due, she certainly was a trailblazer in coffee mugs, t-shirts, and other commercial knock-offs.

And Here Comes the Walk Back

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Remember when I said that, “I expect to see him [Obama] walking this back in some manner or another over the next few days, because, after all, that’s how he rolls?”

Well, he just walked it back (that was quick):

Speaking to reporters today, President Obama drew a sharp line under his comments last night, insisting that his defense of the right to build a mosque does not mean he supports the project.

“I was not commenting and I will not comment on the wisdom of making the decision to put a mosque there. I was commenting very specifically on the right people have that dates back to our founding,” he said.

So, to quote Chris Hayes on Maddow this evening, this is “Supporting the 1st amendment in principal, but not in practice.”

So long as Democrats, and Obama is the head of the Democratic Party in all the ways that matter, are willing to flee in terror of this kind of crap, this poo will continue to be flung.

H/t Digby.

A Bit of Meta

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There seems to be a problem with the “recent comments” widget, and recent comments are not showing up, unless someone from JS-Kit is posting, or so it seems.

If it keeps not working, I’ll rip out JS-Kit by the roots and go back to blogger’s rather brain dead comment managent, until I find something else.

As it stands right now, there are about 3 of my posts (1 apology and 1 test), and 1 post from a reader (Hi, John) on this post have not yet shown up.

Big Surprise, Harry Reid Chooses Cowardice Over American Values

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He’s called for the Lower Manhattan Islamic center to move:

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has now spoken out on the Muslim community center in New York — saying that while the organizers are free to construct the project, it should be moved somewhere else.

“The First Amendment protects freedom of religion. Senator Reid respects that but thinks that the mosque should be built some place else,” said a statement from Reid spokesman Jim Manley. “If the Republicans are being sincere, they would help us pass this long overdue bill to help the first responders whose health and livelihoods have been devastated because of their bravery on 911, rather than continuing to block this much-needed legislation.”

If he weren’t running against Sharron Angle, I’d be rooting for the Republican.

Of course, he is running against Sharron Angle, so I am merely ambivalent.

Of course, it’s so transparently craven that it probably hurt him more, but cowardice when it is both self-destructive and stupid appears to be a basic Democratic Party value.

What the Hairieriest Saroff Said

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On my brother’s all too infrequently updated blog, Stephen pointed out two articles that indicate why economics is called the “dismal science.”

He points to a Wall Street Journal article (get it through Google news, or you just get the first 2 ‘graphs) titled Hindenburg Omen Flashes Dread, where an obscure mathematical formula has somewhat dubious predictive powers:

The Omen was present at every market crash since 1987, but has also occurred many other times without an ensuing significant downturn. Market analysts said only about 25% of Omen appearances have led to stock-market declines that can be considered crashes.

So this doomsday equation has predicted something like 20 of the last 5 crashes.

The problem here is not one of economics, but rather of poor journalism.

The story is not “Astonishingly accurate algorithm predicts end of the world,” but rather, “Movers and shakers in financial markets spooked by bullsh%$ that is less accurate that checking chicken entrails.”

The second article, also from the WSJ notes that as interest rates hit record lows, companies are making record bond issues, particularly of the junk variety.

Of course if another crash is heading in, those junk bonds will be a bad investment, though if it doesn’t implode, an 8+% premium on government debt is a winner:

First Data Corp. sold $510 million of 10-year notes this week, at 9.125%, to pay down bank debt due in 2014. Peabody Energy sold $650 million of 6.5%, 10-year notes to pay off the same amount of higher-priced debt due in three years. MultiPlan Inc., a health-care cost-management provider, sold $675 million of notes this week, at 9.875%, to help fund a buyout of the company. Cott Corp., a maker of store-branded soft drinks, sold $375 million of debt at 8.125% to fund its purchase of another company, Cliffstar Corp.

But again, this is really not about economics, it’s about finance, greed, and human foibles.

To the degree that economics apply to finance, it is behavioral economics that applies: In order to understand markets, one needs to understand how they are irrational, which is in the rather quixotic juxtaposition of economics and psychology.