Month: October 2010

Just Don’t Call It Sharia

by digby

From Kyle at Right Wing Watch I learn that Pat Robertson’s Christian Broadcasting Network is very upset at Islamic clerics’ primitive views toward women. And who can blame them? They really are awful:

A leading Muslim cleric in the United Kingdom said that it is “clearly” impossible for men to rape their wives, and it should not be considered a crime.

Sheikh Maulana Abu Sayeed, president of the Islamic Sharia Council in Britain, told the human rights Web site Samosa, “Sex is part of marriage. In Islamic Sharia, rape is adultery by force.”

“So long as the woman is his wife, it cannot be termed as rape,” he continued. “It is reprehensible, but we do not call it rape.”

Sayeed also claimed many married women who allege rape are lying.

And he’s not the only one:

Could you clarify some of the statements that you made … last year about marital rape?

I think that when you get married you have consented to sex. That’s what marriage is all about, I don’t know if maybe these girls missed sex ed. That doesn’t mean the husband can beat you up, we have plenty of laws against assault and battery. If there is any violence or mistreatment that can be dealt with by criminal prosecution, by divorce or in various ways. When it gets down to calling it rape though, it isn’t rape, it’s a he said-she said where it’s just too easy to lie about it.

Was the way in which your statement was portrayed correct?

Yes. Feminists, if they get tired of a husband or if they want to fight over child custody, they can make an accusation of marital rape and they want that to be there, available to them.

So you see this as more of a tool used by people to get out of marriages than as legitimate-

Yes, I certainly do.

Sharia law is just terrible and obviously way out of any mainstream thinking in America, and thank goodness the Christian Broadcasting Network is standing up against such archaic thinking.

Oh sorry. It turns out that second person is a fine American Christian and it’s a terrible mistake for me to confuse her with one of “them.” It’s political activist Phyllis Schlafly, enthusiastic endorser of GOP candidates and defender of Alan Grayson’s Reconstructionist opponent Daniel Webster. Obviously one can’t compare her in any way to a Muslim cleric.

Never mind.

.

Don’t Worry Your Pretty Little Heads About This Foreclosure Mess

by digby

Senior Editor CNBC:

I never thought I’d find myself typing those words. I’ve been a huge critic of Bank of America for years. I’m bearish on the financial supermarket model. I don’t think the acquisition of Merrill Lynch is working out. I still don’t understand the logic of buying Countrywide.

But Bank of America’s recent decline—down almost 10% this week—is driven by fears that the bank could be hit with huge liabilities for faulty mortgage pools. And I’m pretty sure that is not going to happen.

Why not?

Because the politicians will not let the financial stability of the largest bank in the nation be threatened by contractual rights. Not when there’s an easy fix available that won’t cost taxpayers a dime.

Here’s what is going to happen: Congress will pass a law called something like “The Financial Modernization and Stability Act of 2010” that will retroactively grant mortgage pools the rights in the underlying mortgages that people are worried about. All the screwed up paperwork, lost notes, unassigned security interests will be forgiven by a legislative act.

He sounds very sure of himself.

Anybody want to take the other side of that bet?

.

“Accidents Happen”

by digby

Our friends at AmericansforAmericaPAC have come up with a great radio ad blasting Rand Paul for his typically nihilistic worldview about workplace safety.

They could use some help getting this ad on the radio in Kentucky. It’s not super expensive but could be very effective. Paul is on the wrong side of this issue in mining country and people need to know about it.

.

Roid Rage Tea

by digby

The NY Times takes a look at the “new” GOP if they win big in this election:

Enough Tea Party-supported candidates are running strongly in competitive and Republican-leaning Congressional races that the movement stands a good chance of establishing a sizable caucus to push its agenda in the House and the Senate, according to a New York Times analysis.

With a little more than two weeks till Election Day, 33 Tea Party-backed candidates are in tossup races or running in House districts that are solidly or leaning Republican, and 8 stand a good or better chance of winning Senate seats.

While the numbers are relatively small, they could exert outsize influence, putting pressure on Republican leaders to carry out promises to significantly cut spending and taxes, to repeal health care legislation and financial regulations passed this year, and to phase out Social Security and Medicare in favor of personal savings accounts.

The article goes on to examine how many of these tea party candidates there are, and it’s fairly surprising: it appears that there are around 130 running for the congress, although most of them are in safe Democratic districts which they are not likely to win. But it’s fairly amazing that the Tea Party has that many people on ballots.

It also points out that the Senate candidates are likely hurting the party’s bid to take control of the chamber while the House candidates are helping, which leads them to the conclusion that they are going to have an outsized influence compared to their size. They are going to take credit for the win, if they pull it off.

Here’s how they will influence:

While there is no official Tea Party platform, candidates share a determination to repeal the health care legislation passed in March. They vow not only to permanently extend the tax cuts passed under President George W. Bush and to eliminate the estate tax, but also to replace the progressive income tax with a flat tax or a national sales tax. Several candidates advocate abolishing the Internal Revenue Service entirely.

Many have called for a balanced budget amendment. They oppose newly passed financial regulation, and oppose cap-and-trade of carbon emissions.

The candidates also promise to carry into office the Tea Party’s strict interpretation of the Constitution.

Paul Gosar, a dentist who defeated several other candidates, including the 2008 nominee, to win the primary in a Republican-leaning district in Arizona, told an interviewer that “adhering to the words of the founding fathers means putting the government role in the health care, the Department of Education, and yes, entitlements, all on the table for a constitutional examination.”

In a questionnaire for a Tea Party group, Steve Stivers, running for Congress in Ohio, said that only four departments — Defense, Justice, State and Treasury — perform “constitutional roles,” meaning “you could eliminate the Departments of Agriculture, Education, Interior, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation, Energy and others to return to a constitutionally pure government.”

Many candidates — Mr. Paul, in Kentucky, as well as many in the House races — have embraced a pledge to require Congress to indicate how any new legislation is authorized in the Constitution, and contend that the Constitution does not authorize many of the things the federal government does now. Republicans picked up this idea in their Pledge to America agenda.

And the article doesn’t even discuss the social conservative agenda, which is huge and accounts for a major portion of these people’s support and is at the heart of their worldview.

As for the practical effect, this will be seen as “the future” of the Republican party. It’s where the energy is and they (the grown ups?) are not going to be able to contain that as they go into a presidential cycle. There is simply no doubt that they are putting the already radical GOP on steroids and for at least the next two years they will be driving the train.

Now, normally I might go along with the idea that they will eventually reveal themselves as kooks and be rejected or that they will fall on their own engorged hubris. But these aren’t normal times. This country is in the midst of a much bigger economic crisis than we even realize from within the eye of the storm. And that’s when radicals have an opening.

It’s tempting to dismiss these people. But they are on the verge of taking over one of the two major political parties of the United States of America. That’s real power. And everyone should be more concerned about that happening, in this environment, than they are.

.

It Will Get Better

by digby

This says it all:

.

Draconian Measures

by digby

This foreclosure fraud scandal has erupted. And people are finally beginning to talk about how to fix the system. The solutions aren’t easy. Yesterday I talked about a real cramdown system to help people stay in their homes. Dday (who’s work on this has been amazing) fills that out with a bigger list of solutions:

They should be familiar to anyone reading here for the past year – fixing the predatory lending scheme known as HAMP, adding cramdown to it to provide a stick along with the carrot, having mandatory mediation or otherwise taking the loan modification process out of the hands of the banks (or doing something similar to NACA, writing binding agreements and bringing the lenders and borrowers together), or instituting right-to-rent. These are all very positive solutions that would provide benefits for homeowners rather than just the banks (though they would be aided as well – this would reset the housing market and both reduce foreclosures and much of the banks’ liability for their faulty processes).

In my post yesterday I mentioned Iceland’s rather radical solution. (They are proposing to wipe all debt clean and start over.) Here’s economist L. Wrandall Wray who’s been thinking along similar lines:

This is a complete mess. What President Obama must understand is that fraud is endemic at every level of the home finance food chain. We were long told that securitized mortgages cannot be modified because of the complexity involved—modification of most mortgages would require consent of the holders of the securities that each have a piece of the mortgage. But actually it is impossible to tell how many—if any—of these securities holders have a legitimate claim on any of the mortgages. Simply imposing a moratorium will not be enough—it will just give the banks time to manufacture false documents, encouraging even more fraud. Meanwhile, half of all homeowners with mortgages are already underwater or are within spitting distance of being underwater. Many of these are drowning because the epidemic of fraud perpetrated by financial institutions destroyed our economy and caused housing prices to collapse.

The President needs to try a different approach, consisting of the following series of steps: 1. Declare a national bank holiday that would close the biggest financial institutions—say, the top dozen or so. Send in the supervisors to examine their books to uncover fraud. Determine which ones are insolvent and resolve them. While resolving them, net their claims on one another (including derivatives). Do not allow any insolvent institutions to reopen, and do not use the resolution process to merge institutions (we don’t need even bigger “too big to fail” banks). Prosecute the crooks and jail the guilty. 2. Stop all foreclosures. Investigate and prosecute all institutions that have been selling or buying fake documents to be used in foreclosures. Prosecute the crooks and jail the guilty. 3. Announce that all homeowners who occupied their homes on October 1, 2010 will be allowed to remain in their homes indefinitely. Create a national mediation board to adjust all mortgage payments to “owner’s equivalent rent”—the fair value of rent for the home. Establish a fund to provide rental assistance to keep low income homeowners in their homes. 4. Give purported mortgage holders 30 days to produce the original notes; if they cannot find them, hand the homes over to the owner-occupants—free and clear of debt. 5. Create a process to allow securities holders to sue for recovery of value. This must be national—state courts will not be able to handle the case load. 6. Direct the GSEs to refinance mortgages at a low fixed rate. Mortgages would be provided against real estate appraised at fair market value to any borrower for a primary residence. The GSEs would pay holders of existing mortgages only current fair market value. Those holding these mortgages can seek redress through the process outlined in step 5. Only in the case of borrower fraud would the homeowner be held responsible for losses attributed to the refinancing. 7. There will be fall-out from losses. It is better to deal with the collateral damage directly than to prop up the control fraud banks. For example, pension funds hold toxic waste securities as well as equities in the control fraud banks, and by all reasonable accounting the Pension Benefit Guarantee Corporation is already insolvent. But it is better to directly bail-out pensions than to maintain the charade that fraudulently created securities have value. Bill Black likes to joke that economists are afraid to use the “F” word (fraud). The President must come to realize that there is no other word that can be applied to the US home finance system. Until we deal with the fraud we will never resolve this financial crisis.

Regardless of whether or not any of these things come to pass, there’s little doubt that this is a scandal of epic proportions that won’t be swept under the rug. I have zero ideas about how it’s going to play politically. It’s fraught with danger for Democrats since it’s happening right in the middle of the administration. But if they see it this time as a problem for citizens rather than a problem for banks and the markets, they might just find some political support for their actions.

Update: The bankers won’t make it easy. Here’s dday again:

[T]he banksters who committed these atrocities, who crashed the economy once and now maybe twice, who brought untold suffering upon millions if not tens of millions, think you punks are to blame.

Wall Street’s reaction to the allegations that some banks cut corners while foreclosing on 3 million homes since 2007: Pay your mortgage in the first place […] “If you didn’t pay your mortgage, you shouldn’t be in your house. Period. People are getting upset about something that’s just procedural,” said Walter Todd, portfolio manager at Greenwood Capital Associates. Some said the issue is one of personal responsibility for one’s own debts. “Everyone’s responsible for following the law. If we all don’t have to pay our mortgage, should we just stop paying taxes, too?” said Anton Schutz, president of Mendon Capital Advisers. “Your mortgage didn’t get to a robo-signer by accident, it’s because you’re not paying.”

That could be the most arrogant article I’ve ever seen in an American newspaper. These ingrates think they shouldn’t dare be challenged. And the line “everyone’s responsible for following the law” in the context of making excuses for not following the law is pretty rich.

I think Krugman’s puts it best in his column today:

To me, this evokes the days when noblemen felt free to take whatever they wanted, knowing that peasants had no standing in the courts. But then, I suspect that some people regard those as the good old days…

.

Chamber Of Whores

by digby

Dave Weigel scratches his head trying to figure out why the Democrats are pursuing this crazy “secret foreign money” and comes up with this:

1) Voters hate watching these ads. Yes, negative ads work. But voters, of their own volition, have expressed confusion and anger about negative ads at events for Democrats and Republicans that I’ve been covering. And attacking the sources, as I heard Michael Bennet do yesterday, is a way to side with the voters.

2) As good as the Chamber’s image is (witness how many times Chris Coons name-checked it yesterday), fear of the foreign is a powerful, powerful argument to traditional Democratic voters who think the party has abandoned them. I’ve talked to union voters here who are angry at the Democrats but plan to vote for their House and Senate candidates because they think the Republicans will outsource jobs. Foreign = bad. Just keep repeating it.

He’s probably right about both of those things. But I think it’s a little simpler than that. Here’s Greg Sargent:

[A] new poll commissioned by MoveOn, and done by the respected non-partisan firm Survey USA, strongly suggests that the issue may indeed matter a good deal to voters after all. The poll finds that two thirds of registered voters, or 66 percent, are aware that outside groups are behind some of the ads they’re seeing. This makes sense, since the issue has dominated the media amid the battle over the huge ad onslaught against Dems funded by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and Karl Rove’s groups. What’s more, an overwhelming 84 percent say they have a “right to know” who’s bankrolling the ads. And crucially, the poll also found that the issue is resonant when linked to the economy. A majority, 53 percent, are less likely to think a candidate who is backed by “anonymous groups” can be trusted to “improve economic conditions” for them or their families. People don’t believe these groups are looking out for their interests.

I would be surprised if the Democratic Party didn’t have similar poll findings.

BTW: Weigel mentions that the Chamber has a stellar image. It’s long past time that progressives did something about that.

.

Real Help For Real Voters

by digby

This is just great:

Do-It-Yourself Local Voter Guides

Your vote is powerful. But these ballots can be confusing! That’s where a voter guide can help out. Find a voter guide for your area, or create your own guide that other people can use. It’s easy.

Pass this around to your friends or put it on your Facebook page. There’s even a contest.

.

Planning The Impeachment

by digby

Talking Points Memo has a copy of a flyer put together by a group headed by Christian Reconstructionist Howard Phillips which lays out the case for Obama’s impeachment:

“This might be our last chance to save freedom in America.”

That’s the message a piece of direct mail sent out by the National Campaign for an Impeachment Inquiry, a project of The Conservative Caucus, which is calling — as their name would suggest — for the impeachment of President Barack Obama…

The flyer, obtained by TPMMuckraker, includes a “national ballot of 5,000,000 registered voters” on “Whether Congress Should Launch An Impeachment Inquiry Into President Barack Hussein Obama’s Assault On Our Constitution.”

“The purpose of this survey of 5,000,000 registered voters is to show pro-freedom, pro-Constitutional members of Congress that there is broad public support for the new Congress to conduct a full Inquiry into whether President Barack Hussein Obama has kept his oath of office to faithfully ‘protect and defend the Constitution of the United States of America’,” the flyer reads. Cited in the survey are Fox News’ Judge Andrew Napolitano and Sen. Jim DeMint.

You can read the flyer here.

This isn’t the first salvo in this. If you read this blog regularly, you’ll recall that my wingnut email chain sent me a while back had a long list of potentially impeachable offenses. Considering who we will be dealing with the House, I think this is the one they’ll go with:

Suggestions from Obama’s own Federal Election Commission documentation that he got at least $33.8 million for his campaign from disallowed foreign contributions, including 520 contributions from interests in Iran as well as $30,000 from the Hamas-controlled Gaza area.

After all the pooh-poohing of the Republican foreign contributions story, I fully expect that the beltway press will suddenly realize just how dangerous foreign contributions are and help the Republicans do a full investigation.

.

Glenn Beck: Senior Scammer

by digby

This is the ultimate Senior Scam:

If you have any doubt of the truthfulness of that argument, consider this: Glenn Beck is urging his listeners to donate money to the Chamber of Commerce. Now, the Chamber of Commerce is not simply an advocacy organization pursing an ideological agenda, like the National Rifle Association or the National Right to Life Committee. It is a trade association representing some of the largest corporations you can think of. Its board of directors counts among its members executives from Pfizer, Lockheed Martin, AT&T, US Airways, JPMorgan Chase & Co., IBM, and Verizon. It is The Establishment incarnate. And Glenn Beck is calling on his hardworking listeners to donate money to the Chamber. He is literally asking American workers to give their hard-earned wages back to their employers, so their employers can use that money to advocate a public policy agenda that benefits the rich at the (again: literal) expense of everyone else. It’s incredible. It’s such a twisted scheme that it’s easier to believe as a piece of performance art meant to mock right-wing pseudo-populism. Though if it was art, it would be dismissed as overly broad and heavy-handed.

Sadly, so many of the Tea Party followers who listen to Beck subsist on social security and really can’t afford this. Of course, they also object to any sort of consumer protections that might require Glenn Beck to reveal that he’s collecting money for wealthy corporate interests who don’t need it to do the work they are doing, so there’s nothing anyone can do for them.

This just makes me sort of sad.

.