Month: September 2008

Long Term Capitol

by digby

Marci Wheeler catches an interesting little aside in today’s Roll Call article about the latest White house meddling… er management, of King Henry’s snow job:

Hidden in an article reporting that Cheney’s going to go hunt up some support for the $700,000,000,000 bailout is this admission that the Bush Administration has been sitting on it for some time:

Fratto insisted that the plan was not slapped together and had been drawn up as a contingency over previous months and weeks by administration officials. He acknowledged lawmakers were getting only days to peruse it, but he said this should be enough. [my emphasis]

If the Bush administration has been formulating this plan for months and never breathing a word to lawmakers about it, then there is a much bigger story here than we know. This is being presented as a response to an unpredictable crisis. If that’s not the case then perhaps some of the conspiracy theories that are floating around are actually true.

Let’s hope Fratto is blowing smoke. This bail out plan is being sold as an emergency measure requiring extraordinary powers. If they saw this coming and this is the plan they had waiting in the wings, then we are dealing with something quite different than what we are being told.

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Watch The Lobbyists

by dday

The scene on Capitol Hill looks confused to me. The refrain from the morning papers is that progress is being made toward a bailout bill, and yet the Congress is at odds with the White House on key points, Congressmen are at odds with one another, conservatives don’t appear to be going along, liberals don’t appear to be going along, rank-and-file Democrats have their own ideas…

I think the best practice here is to follow the lobbyists. I know there are less of them out there because John McCain’s campaign is in full swing, but there are still enough of them swimming around. And if you do that, it becomes clear that Chris Dodd’s plan is rapidly becoming the basis for the legislation – otherwise they wouldn’t be working so hard to defeat key elements of it.

One financial services lobbyist said his group was keeping a flow chart to try to keep track of who on Capitol Hill was pushing what.

“It ebbs and flows,” the lobbyist said. “It literally changes by the hour.”

Added Josten: “I think every 10 minutes, something changes here. I think they are wrapped up in it. It’s hard to tell what’s in, what’s out.”

One congressional reaction that emerged — Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd’s (D-Conn.) response to the rescue package — wasn’t favorable to many of K Street’s banking clients, who oppose one provision in particular: giving bankruptcy judges the power to lower mortgages for distressed homeowners.

“We are vigorously opposing that,” said Steve Verdier, a lobbyist for the Independent Community Bankers Association (ICBA). “If that happens, then the mortgage rates for other consumers are going to go up.”

It’s hard out there for a corporate lobbyist. By the way, if mortgage rates were to go up because homeowners facing foreclosure were to get their rates lowered, then they should really go up if the home goes into foreclosure and the bank is left with a worthless piece of paper. Yet they refuse to value their assets, and clarity is obviously the great killer of their fantasy.

Sen. Dodd is chairing a hearing right now with President Paulson, who is talking a lot of gibberish with a hint of dire warning. He has a nice suit on, so I expect half the Democrats on the panel to hide under their desks. CNN is carrying it live. This is very fluid right now.

…somebody might want to ask Paulson how much his plan would help his buddies at Goldman Sachs.

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Congratulations, Alex Ross

by tristero

Alex Ross, music critic for the New Yorker, has won a MacArthur Fellowship. He deserves it. Read “The Rest Is Noise”, his history of 20th Century music, and you’ll agree. I have some questions with his emphasis on the influence of Shostakovitch and Britten over the avant-gardists, and some other issues, but there is no denyng the brilliance and focus of his writing. He knows exactly what he is talking about, he really hears music and hears passionately as well as rationally. Ross knows how music works. There are very few musicians, even composers, I would say that about.

Congratulations, sir. Now, back to work with you!

Uhm, Not Helpful

by digby

Bush seeks to assure leaders about bailout plan

Also not helpful.

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I Thought They Didn’t Care What The Media Filter Said

by tristero

UPDATED AT END

Get out the 700 billion smelling salts! Somebody hurt McCain/Bush’s feelings and they just might swoon under the stress:

Sen. John McCain’s top campaign aides convened a conference call today to complain of being called “liars.”

Well! I think Dick Cheney has the proper response to this:

Fuck yourself.

Speaking of Cheney, where is the schmuck these days? Out shooting more of his friends?

UPDATE: As you can tell, the New York Times is deeply biased towards Obama:

Who says bullying and intimidating the media doesn’t work?

Heres the link to Seelye’s McCain fluffing and also to Broder’s bunk. By the way, in case you didn’t know, Seelye likes to lie to help Republicans. A lot.

Financial Skigamadoo

by digby

Ok, I just heard the scariest thing I’ve heard all week, and that’s saying something. Chris Matthews, Richard Wolf and Lynn Sweet were discussing the crisis and all seemed to agree that neither Obama or McCain are competent to make decisions about the economy and that we are very, very lucky to have Hank Paulson running things because he’s a really smart guy and he’ll fix it.

Matthews: I’ve been so impressed by Lincoln’s words this week — government of, by and for the people. It isn’t government of, by and for the people. This is being decided, the biggest issue of our time, this economic crisis, the worst, according to the wall Street Journal,since the 1930s, by people so much bigger headed than most voters, than most members of congress, certainly than me. This is being decided by people like Hank Paulson.

THANK GOD this president has this secretary of treasury and not the one other ones he had before, perhaps. But Richard, the people can’t vote on things like this.

Wolf: (nods sagely)

Matthews: We can’t understand it. I’m one of them. I don’t get it. What are all these derivatives and all this short selling and all this complicated financial … skigamadoo or whatever you call it. What is it?

Wolf: Even the candidates have problem getting through this alphabet soup. I mean, they’ve both mangled the players and the key terms of those involved here. Are they talking about firing the right person when he talks about Chris Cox? Is it Fannie Mac or Freddie Mae?

Matthews: I’m just wondering if it’s above our pay grade? I think Carly Fiorina may have been right. These guys can run for president but they can’t be Secretary of the Treasury.

Matthews: Even elected presidents can’t master this financial game. It’s too complicated. Shouldn’t they come out and tell us who their economic team’s gonna be? … The reason I ask is because we saw the president this week and Bush has all the native intelligence you can have. He doesn’t want to touch it because for a layman to start talking about the economy right now is very dangerous. Right Lynn?

Lynn Sweet: It’s tough. It’s interesting because who would have thought that his treasury secretary would emerge from this crisis…

Matthews:the third secretary, two are gone…

Sweet: Right. That he would emerge from this looking as the strong person in the administration, who’s pulling it together. And we’ll see if the congress gives him the power to run the economy.

Matthews: Is congress willing to make him King Henry as they put on the one of the magazine covers?

Wolf: the cover of Newsweek…

Matthews: Will they let him be King Henry?

That’s obviously the right question. But these villagers don’t even blink at the concept — indeed, they appear to think that the congress should let Paulson be King because he’s so much more “big headed” then them. And they think this because they assume that the American people are as stupid as they are and just want daddy to fix things for them so they can go back to talking about lipstick and blow jobs, which is all they really understand.

Chris Matthews makes five million dollars a year. And he can’t be bothered to read a fucking primer on the current financial crisis so that he can speak competently about it? Why is he on my television?

And the other two (although Sweet looked quite uncomfortable with this idiotic conversation, I must say) pretended that Obama soundsw just as moronic on the economy as Matthews and McCain, which it is patently untrue. Obama clearly knows what a derivative and short selling is and he knows what that Fannie Mae isn’t Fannie Mac. It’s nonsense. Maybe Chris Matthews is too ignorant to even know the basics of the modern financial world despite his vast wealth, but Obama isn’t and he certainly doesn’t need to appoint a “king” to run our country for us.

This is the thinking that led to Bush seizing the presidency in 2000. The media panicked and starting speaking in tongues and rending their garments about how all hell would break loose if the race wasn’t decided immediately. It happened again with Iraq. At this point, whenever they start talking about how time is of the essence and we need to “trust them,” watch your wallet.

I think Matthews very much represents the political establishment on this. THANK GOD we have a rich and successful wall street wizard in charge of guarding my investments. But their gratitude may be a bit misplaced. As Paul Krugman (another very smart guy) wrote this morning:

Some are saying that we should simply trust Mr. Paulson, because he’s a smart guy who knows what he’s doing. But that’s only half true: he is a smart guy, but what, exactly, in the experience of the past year and a half — a period during which Mr. Paulson repeatedly declared the financial crisis “contained,” and then offered a series of unsuccessful fixes — justifies the belief that he knows what he’s doing? He’s making it up as he goes along, just like the rest of us.

Sorry Tweety. There’s no omniscient daddy out there who can scare away the boogeyman in your closet. And if there is one, it sure isn’t the guy who’s spent the last 18 months shouting drunken assurances from the living room that he told the boogeyman to go away and telling you to just go to sleep. The boogeyman is real and daddy’s lying on the couch telling you to go to the kitchen and get him another beer.

creepy:

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This Week In Torture

by dday

Just because there are other things happening in the world today, I wanted to highlight some recent developments in the moral outrage that is this Administration’s practice of torture.

Today an appeals court ordered the Defense Department to release all known photos depicting detainee abuse by US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Seymour Hersh and others have noted for years that the images from Abu Ghraib are just a sampling of the evidence that the military has in their possession, and now the government must release them. Kudos to the ACLU for having the persistence to uncover what has been done in America’s name; this ruling is significant for the future of Freedom of Information Act requests in general as well as revealing the truth about torture in particular.

A few days back, the American Psychological Association prohibited its members from participating in any detention facility that requires them to operate in violation of international law. This is a major ruling from the APA, and it came from a vote of its membership. They had been at the forefront of

The APA was the focus of attention when it was revealed during military commission hearings in Guantanamo this summer that military psychologists belonging to Behavioral Science Consultation Teams (BSCTs), known as “Biscuit teams,” took part in crafting the techniques used to torture and mistreat prisoners there.

The ACLU’s Jennifer Turner, who observed Mohammed Jawad’s hearing, where much of this information about the role of military psychologists was revealed, wrote in August:

Since 2002 BSCT psychologists have evaluated prisoners’ fears and psychological weaknesses to craft individualized blueprints for torture and other mistreatment, which they passed on to the interrogators. For instance, a Guantánamo psychiatrist advised interrogators to exploit one detainee’s severe phobia of the dark by deliberately keeping him almost totally in the dark.

Of course, those psychiatrists who have resigned from the APA will continue to staff the BSCT teams at Guantanamo and elsewhere. And I’m sure the military is paying handsomely for them.

This is of course supposed to be John McCain’s major break with George Bush. The old warrior, his body broken from torture at the hands of the Viet Cong, stood up and said no to his party and extracted major concessions from the President. Except it’s all bullshit.

McCain served four years in the House and has been in the Senate almost 22 so far. But he, too, has authored fewer than a half-dozen major laws. Trying to fix immigration counts for something, but nothing passed. So while McCain deserves credit for the landmark 2002 McCain-Feingold campaign-finance reform bill, the only other major law on which his office says his “name appears” (Palin’s standard) is the “McCain Amendment” prohibiting torture in the armed forces. But that has little meaning because of a bill this year, supported by McCain, that allows torture by the CIA. Under longstanding government practice, military intelligence officers can be temporarily designated as CIA officers (“sheep-dipped” is the bureaucratic lingo) when they want to go off the Army field manual. In other words, the government can still torture anyone, any time. McCain caved on an issue he insists is a matter of principle.

It’s the ultimate act of dishonor for McCain to knowingly allow Americans to do unto others what was done unto him.

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Begging Your Kind Attention

by digby

It looks like Paulson has come up with a new version of the plan, via Chris Hayes:

Dear American:

I need to ask you to support an urgent secret business relationship with a transfer of funds of great magnitude.

I am Ministry of the Treasury of the Republic of America. My country has had crisis that has caused the need for large transfer of funds of 800 billion dollars US. If you would assist me in this transfer, it would be most profitable to you.

I am working with Mr. Phil Gram, lobbyist for UBS, who will be my replacement as Ministry of the Treasury in January. As a Senator, you may know him as the leader of the American banking deregulation movement in the 1990s. This transactin is 100% safe.

This is a matter of great urgency. We need a blank check. We need the funds as quickly as possible. We cannot directly transfer these funds in the names of our close friends because we are constantly under surveillance. My family lawyer advised me that I should look for a reliable and trustworthy person who will act as a next of kin so the funds can be transferred.

Please reply with all of your bank account, IRA and college fund account numbers and those of your children and grandchildren to wallstreetbailout@treasury.gov so that we may transfer your commission for this transaction. After I receive that information, I will respond with detailed information about safeguards that will be used to protect the funds.

Yours Faithfully Minister of Treasury Paulson

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Dear John McCain

by tristero

Dear John McCain,

Like many concerned Americans, I have signed up to drive voters to the polls on Election Day. In my case, I’m driving to Pennsylvania after I vote here in Manhattan.

Now, as you may know, New Yorkers have a pretty good mass transportation system so I have many, many friends who don’t own cars; they never needed one. However, they, too, would like to drive voters to the polls.

So I was wondering: Could my friends borrow twelve of your 13 cars for a day? I give you my solemn word they’ll all be returned in the condition we found them. And we promise, no matter how expensive it is, we’ll fill ’em back up when we’re done.

Looking to hear from you soon.

Your friend,

tristero

ps I sent this to your campaign website. Would it be better if I addressed future correspondence to your home? Which one(s)?

UPDATE: In case you’re wondering, yes, I really did send this letter. I’ll let you know if I hear from him. If he is willing to lend his cars to me, we’ll hold a raffle on this very site to see who gets to borrow them on Election Day! But I wouldn’t hold your breath if I were you.

Untidy

by digby

Moral hazard? Nah.

Up to 10,000 staff at the New York office of the bankrupt investment bank Lehman Brothers will share a bonus pool set aside for them that is worth $2.5bn (£1.4bn), Barclays Bank, which is buying the business, confirmed last night.

The revelation sparked fury among the workers’ former colleagues, Lehman’s 5,000 staff based in London, who currently have no idea how long they will go on receiving even their basic salaries, let alone any bonus payments. It also prompted a renewed backlash over the compensation culture in global finance, with critics claiming that many bankers receive pay and rewards that bore no relation to the job they had done.

A spokesman for Barclays said the $2.5bn bonus pool in New York had been set aside before Lehman Brothers filed for chapter 11 bankruptcy in the United States a week ago. Barclays has agreed that the fund should continue to be ring-fenced now it has taken control of Lehman’s US business, a deal agreed by American bankruptcy courts over the weekend.

Barclays is paying $1.75bn for the US operation of Lehman and is keen to retain its best staff. It said it had made no promises to individual staff members about how much they will receive but that the bonus fund would be paid out. In addition to the $2.5bn cash pool, Barclays is also in negotiations with about 30 executives it considers to be Lehman’s best assets and plans to offer them contracts worth tens of millions of dollars.

I keep hearing about how those stupid home buyers should have known they were taking a risk they couldn’t afford and need to be held accountable or the system falls apart. And then you see this.

I’m listening to John Harwood right now on MSNBC express shock that Obama is refusing to drop all plans to reform the health care system or invest in the future in light of this crisis. Isn’t that special? The new consensus is that after the hideously expensive Bush era fuck-ups, the only “responsible” thing to do is devote the country to paying back their debt. Again.

Bush has been the most successful president for the aristocracy in American history. He opened up the federal treasury to his rich friends, and they looted it like a Bagdad museum for nearly eight long years. Now that it’s been stripped bare to the point that its going to cost trillions to even stabilize the thing, the Village has decided it’s time to sober up and stop all this profligate spending. How convenient.

This is very similar to the arguments that were made 16 years ago when once again the establishment decided that the bill for Republican malfeasance would come due during a Democratic administration, thus foreclosing the possibility of solving many of the long term systemic problems that plague ordinary Americans. Heads they win, tails you lose. It’s quite a racket.

But, at the very least, can we hear no more from Republicans about fiscal responsibility? Is it too much to ask that every time they say such a thing, that every opponent gets right in their face and starts yelling about Bush and Cheney and the catastrophic failure of Republican governance? I suppose it is. But until they do that, over and over again, the Republicans will be allowed to spend the country into oblivion, reward their rich friends with all your hard earned money and then morph into fiscal scolds the minute the Democrats take power, thus denying the people any sort of normal first world safety net. That’s the pattern and it looks to me as if it’s highly likely to replay itself once again unless the Democrats learn how to play this game.

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