Archive for January, 2010
Turkey Point nuclear suspension
Florida Power and Light has suspended work on two new reactors at Turkey Point in an angry reaction to a decision by state regulators.
The company said it would immediately stop work on expanding the Turkey Point power plant, citing the “deteriorating regulatory and business environment” created by the Florida Public Service Commission. The nuclear project is one among $10 billion in investment that FPL said will now be cancelled.
PSC officials today rejected an FPL’s request to increase the rates charged to consumers – the way FPL had hoped to finance the investments. The company’s regulated base rate had not been reviewed since 1985, and although it has twice been allowed to begin collecting extra money to aid investment, a request to add a total of $1 billion to its income after 2011 was slashed by the PSC to just $75 million. “The decision was about politics, not economics,” said FPL Group chairman and CEO Lew Hay.
FPL will continue to work with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission to complete its licence application to build and operate two Westinghouse AP1000s, but has abadoned its ambition to build them by 2017 and 2019.
Full Story Turkey Point nuclear suspension.
Mutant HIV Wave Threatens Decades of Drug Progress, Study Finds
A wave of drug-resistant HIV emerging in the U.S. threatens to undermine progress made in treating patients in poor countries, a study published online by the journal Science found.
About 60 percent of drug-resistant HIV strains circulating in San Francisco can spur self-sustaining epidemics as patients who haven’t been treated spread them, researchers from the University of California, Los Angeles said in the study. About 75 percent of those strains are impervious to a class of drugs that includes those made by Pfizer Inc., Johnson & Johnson and Bristol-Myers Squibb Co., they said.
The mutant strains may reverse progress made in expanding treatment programs in poorer nations such as South Africa, where there is little access to back-up medicines when resistance occurs, researchers led by Sally Blower at the university’s Center for Biomedical Modeling said. Patients in developed countries are less likely to suffer because they have better access to alternative treatments, they said.
Full Story Mutant HIV Wave Threatens Decades of Drug Progress, Study Finds – Bloomberg.com.
Minnesota Twins stadium to recycle rainwater
The Twins have worked to make their new ballpark, Target Field, an environmentally friendly venue, and on Tuesday, the club took another step toward that goal by announcing a unique eco-sponsorship that will help them to reduce water waste.
The Twins and Pentair, a Minneapolis-based company that specializes in water solutions, are partnering to deliver what officials say will be a new standard for water use in sports facilities.
Target Field will feature a first-of-its-kind Rain Water Recycle System (RWRS) that will capture, conserve and reuse rain water. The system is estimated to reduce the need for municipal water at Target Field by over 50 percent, which should equate to saving more than 2 million gallons of water annually.
Full Story Minnesota Twins stadium to recycle rainwater.
Imus: Pat Robertson ‘should be put to sleep.’
Yesterday, soon after the devastating 7.0 magnitude earthquake hit much of Haiti, Rush Limbaugh took the opportunity to attack President Obama, saying the White House will “use this to burnish their…credibility with the black community — the both the light-skinned and dark-skinned black community in this country.” But televangelist Pat Robertson took it one step futher, saying the earthquake happened because Haitians “swore a pact with the devil.” Today on his Fox Business show, Don Imus went after Limbaugh. “One would think that you could just wait a few days – Rush – until you know you can run your fat mouth about it then,” he said. But Imus had some particularly harsh words for Robertson:
IMUS: You know, I’m not sure whether sometimes I’m ambivalent about whether I support the death penalty or not. I guess I do if I didn’t have to do it, but in his case, I’d pull the switch on him myself. I mean he should be put to sleep. How does that contribute anything? It’s insanity.
Watch it:
Full Story Think Progress » Imus: Pat Robertson ‘should be put to sleep.’.
Will Harold Ford Stand Up For Union Employees’ Jobs And Health Benefits Over Bank Bonuses?
Bank of America — which has been a recipient of up to $45 billion in government aid — paid out $3.3 billion in bonuses for 2008 performance and is expected to pay out bonuses “close to the levels of 2007” for performance in 2009. Meanwhile, the megabank brazenly laid off three dozen security guards from its New York City building last Thanksgiving, and stripped 130 of its guards’ families of health care coverage.
SEIU 32BJ — which represents the workers at Bank of America’s building — has sent a letter to possible Senate Democratic primary candidate Harold Ford, who is an executive at Bank of America in New York and one of the recipients of these bonuses, asking him to use his clout in the company to “ensure that the officers at your buildings are restored to their previous positions and have their full benefits restored“:
When you were a Congressman in Tennessee and running for Senate, you eloquently described the injustice of workers struggling to meet their basic needs while corporations generated record profits. [...]
Full Story Think Progress » Will Harold Ford Stand Up For Union Employees’ Jobs And Health Benefits Over Bank Bonuses?.
Poll: Americans think standing for principle is more important than bipartisan compromise.
On Christmas Eve, Washington Post columnist David Broder published a “pox-on-both-their-houses” column, lamenting that the health care reform package that was about to pass the Senate didn’t have any “signs” of “bipartisan support.” But the new Allstate/National Journal Heartland Monitor poll out today indicates that the public doesn’t agree with Broder’s concern about bipartisanship. Asked what actions elected officials could undertake to increase trust in them, a majority said that “making a stronger effort to stand up for principle” would help “a lot” while only 35 percent said more focus “on compromising with members of the opposite political party” would help “a lot”:
Full Story Think Progress » Poll: Americans think standing for principle is more important than bipartisan compromise..
Arctic permafrost leaking methane at record levels, figures show
Experts say methane emissions from the Arctic have risen by almost one-third in just five years, and that sharply rising temperatures are to blame
Scientists have recorded a massive spike in the amount of a powerful greenhouse gas seeping from Arctic permafrost, in a discovery that highlights the risks of a dangerous climate tipping point.
Experts say methane emissions from the Arctic have risen by almost one-third in just five years, and that sharply rising temperatures are to blame.
The discovery follows a string of reports from the region in recent years that previously frozen boggy soils are melting and releasing methane in greater quantities. Such Arctic soils currently lock away billions of tonnes of methane, a far more potent greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, leading some scientists to describe melting permafrost as a ticking time bomb that could overwhelm efforts to tackle climate change.
Full Story Arctic permafrost leaking methane at record levels, figures show | Environment | guardian.co.uk.
Obama Confirms Plan To Impose Fee On Big Banks, Calls Bonuses Obscene
Obama Announces Bank Tax, Seeks $117B Back From Big Banks
President Barack Obama told banks Thursday they should pay a new tax to recoup the cost of bailing out foundering firms at the height of the financial crisis. “We want our money back,” he said.
In a brief appearance with advisers at the White House, Obama branded the latest round of bank bonuses as “obscene.” But he said his goal was to prevent such excesses in the future, not to punish banks for past behavior.
The tax, which would require congressional approval, would last at least 10 years and generate about $90 billion over the decade, according to administration estimates. “If these companies are in good enough shape to afford massive bonuses, they are surely in good enough shape to afford paying back every penny to taxpayers,” Obama said.
Full Story Obama Announces Bank Tax, Seeks $117B Back From Big Banks.
Scott Ritter Charged In Child-Sex Sting
A longtime U.N. weapons inspector who blamed a 2001 sex-sting arrest on his criticism of the Iraq war has again been charged in an online child-sex case, and this time he was caught on camera.
Scott Ritter, 48, of Delmar, N.Y., engaged in a sexually graphic online chat with an undercover police officer posing as a 15-year-old girl nearly a year ago, police in northeastern Pennsylvania said. He then turned on a webcam and masturbated on camera, they charged.
Monroe County authorities traced the exchange to Ritter through a cell phone number he provided, and confirmed the match through photographs, according to a police affidavit. Charges were filed in November and the Pocono Record revealed Ritter's involvement on Thursday.
Full Story Scott Ritter Charged In Child-Sex Sting.
Stop the Chamber; I Want to Get Off! Group to Expose Candidates Accepting Funds From Commerce Lobbyists
It’s 2010. Do you know which corporate pocket your representative is in?
There is no better analogy for the outsize influence of corporations upon government than the behavior of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce of late. The “world’s largest business federation” has transformed itself into a lobbying machine for some of the nation’s dirtiest corporate crooks in a series of misleading campaigns against climate change legislation, affordable healthcare, the employee free choice act, campaign spending reform, corporate responsibility, consumer protection, and keeping social security private.
All the more reason to know who they’ve been wining and dining on the Hill.
Velvet Revolution, a nonprofit organization “dedicated to clean and honest government,” issued a statement today announcing they plan to target political candidates who accept contributions from the U.S. Chamber of Commerce.
The Exxon Clause
Will Congress Fold on Hydro Fracturing?
A curious note in a January 12 MarketWatch report alludes to the fact that executives from Exxon Mobil and XTO Energy will meet with Congress next week to, “discuss their merger plans.” For those following the natural gas story, Exxon Mobil’s acquisition of XTO–a company with large holdings in the Marcellus Shale–for $31 billion in December was big news. It was the company’s most ambitious move since it acquired Mobil in 1999. Shortly thereafter, it was revealed that a clause buried in the 76-page legal agreement essentially said that Exxon could back out of the deal if Congress regulates hydraulic fracturing to the point that it makes the process or similar processes, “illegal or commercially impracticable.”
According to the Wall Street Journal, William Hederman of Concept Capital picked up on the clause, which is filed under “company material adverse effect” in the 8-k filing form.
Hydraulic fracturing is a controversial method of drilling that pumps millions of gallons of water, sand, and chemicals into the well bore to shatter the rock and release the gas. In the last year, it has become the industry’s bete noire as it seeks to expand natural gas production in the northeast.
Full Story Adam Federman: The Exxon Clause.
Solving the Water and Energy Crisis … in One Swell Poop
Upwards of 3 million people die annually from diarrhea, dysentery, and parasitic diseases – all for the want of clean water. Meanwhile, each year in the water-rich United States, 2.1 billion gallons of the world’s most precious liquid are used, not to water thirsty crops or slake parched throats, but to flush human waste from home toilets to municipal sewers. While harvesting rainwater and recycling graywater are fine strategies, it’s time to get to the seat of the problem. We need a Toilet Revolution.
As frequently happens, the solution to this modern problem can be found in the recent past – and the Third World present. Jeff Conant, author of The Community Guide to Environmental Health, has traveled the world in search of the perfect “waterless toilet.” He found it in the Mexican town of Tepotzlan, which boasts hundreds of “non-traditional waterless” eco-loos. In the 1980s, Tepotzlan’s innovators got a boost when former UNICEF worker Ron Sawyer settled in to help the locals design a new generation of “eco-san” toilets.
While the practice of using human waste as fertilizer is as old as humanity itself, Tepotzlan’s eco-sanistas marked an engineering watershed when they found a way to separate feces from urine. A locally designed toilet seat harvests the fluids while allowing the solid wastes to fall into a dry compost toilet. (Not such a strange idea: The human body is designed to send solid and liquid wastes in opposite directions.) One immediate result of separating pee from poo is the elimination of the unpleasant aromas associated with the traditional outhouse.
Full Story Earth Island Institute | Earth Island Journal.
The End Of Entrepreneurship
Number Of U.S. Business Start-Ups Drop 24%, Leading Global Decline -
Politicians love to repeat that small businesses are the “engine of our economy.” But, according to a new report, that engine is in need of serious repair.
The number of new businesses launched in the U.S. declined 24 percent in the United States in 2009 and 10 percent in the 20 most affluent countries over the same period, according to the annual Global Entrepreneurship Monitor.
The GEM conducted 180,000 interviews in 54 countries in 2009 and found a year-over-year decline in the number of people around the world who thought there were attractive opportunities for business formation.
For an increasing number of people in the world's richest countries, the impetus to start a business was driven by necessity. But interestingly, a small number perceived an increase in opportunity during — and because of — the recession. Of this optimistic segment of survey respondents, Niels Bosma, the report's director of research, told the WSJ:
Full Story Number Of U.S. Business Start-Ups Drop 24%, Leading Global Decline.
Watch BofA CEO Defend Lavish Exec Bonuses
Bank Of America CEO Moynihan: ‘No Disconnect’ Between Lavish Exec Bonuses And The Crumbling Economy (VIDEO)
ABC News caught up with the nation’s top banking CEOs after they left Congress’s financial hearings and the contrite attitude they displayed to Congress regarding their role in bringing the U.S. economy to the brink was nowhere to be seen when reporter Jonathan Karl asked them about extravagant bonuses.
Bank of America CEO Brian Moynihan told Karl that he saw “no disconnect” between lavish bonuses for executives at bailed out banks during a very tough economic climate for the average American.
Morgan Stanley chairman John Mack , despite foregoing his own bonus, cryptically defended giving bonuses to his executives: “You have got to the deal with them, or I will deal with them.”
JP Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon wouldn’t answer.
WATCH:
Full Story Bank Of America CEO Moynihan: ‘No Disconnect’ Between Lavish Exec Bonuses And The Crumbling Economy (VIDEO).
As Wallets Open For Haiti, Credit Card Companies Take A Big Cut
Millions In ‘Transaction Costs’ Skimmed Off Relief Donations
American Express announced today that processing fees for any donations made to the 65 charities listed on this website between January 12 and the end of February will be rebated back to those charities.
As a massive human tragedy unfolds in Haiti, relief organizations are soliciting credit-card donations through their hotlines and websites. About 97 percent of these donations will actually make it to the designated organizations — but the other 3 percent will be skimmed off by banks and credit card companies to cover their “transaction costs.”
Thanks to this hidden fee, American banks and credit card companies are making huge profits — somewhere in the neighborhood of $250 million a year — off of people’s charitable donations, according to a Huffington Post analysis.
Full Story As Wallets Open For Haiti, Credit Card Companies Take A Big Cut.
Fixing an industry on steroids
Day One of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC) highlighted the testimony of an investment veteran who said the industry has long been on steroids – and called the commissioners to help build a system that doesn’t need to save the banks every decade or two.
Michael Mayo, managing director and financial services analyst at Calyon Securities (USA), said that the world has been investing in an “industry on steroids whose prior achievements were artificially enhanced.”
“We are now paying the price in what will likely be the biggest taxpayer bailout of US financial firms in history and, given the government borrowing, the biggest wealth transfer to the current generation from future generations,” he said.
Mayo, who worked at the Federal Reserve 20 years ago when it faced exactly the same problem at the time (how to help banks recover from the crisis then) said Wall Street has done an incredible job at pulling the wool over the eyes of government and others.
“There seems to be an unwritten premise that a healthy Wall Street as it is constituted today is necessary for the economy to work. Yet, the economy worked well before inventions of exotic instruments such as CDOs and with risk that was more obvious to see.”
Full Story Financial Standard – Fixing an industry on steroids.
Banksters & Congress: It Sucked My Soul To Watch This Spectacle
What is it about investment bankers that make them congenitally unable to understand why 99.99% of the rest of us want them boiled in oil? Actually, I’m not with the mob on this one, though I fully understand the public outrage. What is galling, though, is that even after blowing up the world, these guys are still unable to mouth the magic words:
“We’re sorry.”
If you’re a power broker, that’s just not part of the vernacular. At least it wasn’t true of the Wall Streeters who testified before the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission on Wednesday. They ostensibly were there to shed more light on the causes of the financial crisis (and hopefully, coax a little contrition out of them.)
Fat chance.
Full Story It Sucked My Soul To Watch This Spectacle – Coop’s Corner – CBS News.
Carbon Sequestration Markets and Community Forestry
“The land tells you what to do, and this property has taken over my life,” says Henrikson. “We need more people to develop that relationship—to fall in love with the land.”
Henrikson’s approach embodies a new way of thinking about our relationship with forests. For years he has been processing his own trees into trim and molding, sold through a broad network of local businesses. Five years ago he got his forest certified to Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) standards, a global system for eco-labeling sustainably managed forests and the products derived from them. He’s also made his farm into a destination for workshops, celebrations, and the conservation-curious. And, most recently, he’s developed a project to sell rights to the carbon sequestered on his property.
Full Story Carbon Sequestration Markets and Community Forestry :: Ian Hanna.
The Farm Bureau: Denying Climate Change, Undermining Labor and Losing Relevancy in 2010
The president of the American Farm Bureau Federation (AFBF), Bob Stallman, threw down the gauntlet on Sunday in his annual speech to his industrial cronies. What got him riled up? Not rising seed prices, superweeds, or the unpredictable weather farmers face due to climate change. Instead, the focus of his speech was the critics of synthetic agriculture: “Emotionally charged labels such as monoculture, factory farmer, industrial food, and big ag threaten to fray our edges,” he said. “A line must be drawn between our polite and respectful engagement with consumers and how we must aggressively respond to extremists who want to drag agriculture back to the day of 40 acres and a mule.” His strong remarks came following a letter signed by 47 scientists imploring the AFBF to enter into dialog about their denier position on climate change.
In addition to the havoc being wreaked on the environment, one of the biggest trespasses of industrial agriculture has been the elimination of millions of jobs, resulting in the emptying out of rural communities worldwide. The repercussions of the loss of opportunity for rural America has been tragic: many towns are now plagued by dilapidated schools and poor health services, and a rising epidemic of methamphetamine use and production has filled in where more beneficial small businesses used to thrive.
This emptying out was never better cataloged than in John Steinbeck’s great novel, The Grapes of Wrath. Written in 1939 after Steinbeck had researched and reported for years on the plight of the American farm worker during the early industrialization of agriculture, he captured the phenomenon thusly:
US 2009 Foreclosures Shatter Record Despite Aid
U.S. foreclosure actions shattered all records in 2009 and will do so again this year, with unemployment and wage cuts overcoming programs to remedy failing home loans, RealtyTrac said on Thursday.
A record 2.8 million properties with a mortgage got a foreclosure notice last year, jumping 21 percent from 2008 and 120 percent from 2007, the Irvine, California-based real estate data company found.
The loan failure rate — and thus the fallout for home prices and the economy — would have been even worse without foreclosure prevention programs and loan processing delays caused by sheer volume, the company said.
Full Story US 2009 Foreclosures Shatter Record Despite Aid | CommonDreams.org.
House Chairmen Say Health Care Deal Imminent
Two of the House’s most influential chairmen say that health care negotiations between the House, Senate, and President Obama have come so far, that they’ll be ready to send a package to Congressional scorekeepers this weekend.
Congress Daily caught up with Rep. George Miller (D-CA)–chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee–and Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY)–chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee–who both acknowledged that a compromise could be just around the corner.
“We hope to be able to send in the next couple days our changes to CBO,” Miller said (sub. req.).
Full Story House Chairmen Say Health Care Deal Imminent | TPMDC.
OPS: Oh goodie. Can’t wait to see that this piece of crap has in it now. Regardless of what’s in it you will be told to sit down, shut up, and like it.
What You’re Not Hearing about Haiti (But Should Be)
In the hours following Haiti’s devastating earthquake, CNN, the New York Times and other major news sources adopted a common interpretation for the severe destruction: the 7.0 earthquake was so devastating because it struck an urban area that was extremely over-populated and extremely poor. Houses “built on top of each other” and constructed by the poor people themselves made for a fragile city. And the country’s many years of underdevelopment and political turmoil made the Haitian government ill-prepared to respond to such a disaster.
True enough. But that’s not the whole story. What’s missing is any explanation of why there are so many Haitians living in and around Port-au-Prince and why so many of them are forced to survive on so little. Indeed, even when an explanation is ventured, it is often outrageously false such as a former U.S. diplomat’s testimony on CNN that Port-au-Prince’s overpopulation was due to the fact that Haitians, like most Third World people, know nothing of birth control.
It may startle news-hungry Americans to learn that these conditions the American media correctly attributes to magnifying the impact of this tremendous disaster were largely the product of American policies and an American-led development model.
Full Story What You’re Not Hearing about Haiti (But Should Be) | CommonDreams.org.
Our role in Haiti’s plight
If we are serious about assisting this devastated land we must stop trying to control and exploit it
Any large city in the world would have suffered extensive damage from an earthquake on the scale of the one that ravaged Haiti’s capital city on Tuesday afternoon, but it’s no accident that so much of Port-au-Prince now looks like a war zone. Much of the devastation wreaked by this latest and most calamitous disaster to befall Haiti is best understood as another thoroughly manmade outcome of a long and ugly historical sequence.
The country has faced more than its fair share of catastrophes. Hundreds died in Port-au-Prince in an earthquake back in June 1770, and the huge earthquake of 7 May 1842 may have killed 10,000 in the northern city of Cap Haitien alone. Hurricanes batter the island on a regular basis, mostly recently in 2004 and again in 2008; the storms of September 2008 flooded the town of Gonaïves and swept away much of its flimsy infrastructure, killing more than a thousand people and destroying many thousands of homes. The full scale of the destruction resulting from this earthquake may not become clear for several weeks. Even minimal repairs will take years to complete, and the long-term impact is incalculable.
What is already all too clear, however, is the fact that this impact will be the result of an even longer-term history of deliberate impoverishment and disempowerment. Haiti is routinely described as the “poorest country in the western hemisphere“. This poverty is the direct legacy of perhaps the most brutal system of colonial exploitation in world history, compounded by decades of systematic postcolonial oppression.
Full Story Our role in Haiti’s plight | Peter Hallward | Comment is free | The Guardian.
Keith Olbermann Quick Comment: Robertson blames Haitians for earthquake
This Video is from 13.th of january 2010
Rush Limbaugh and Pat Robertson can't help but put theire agenda onto this crisis, Rush politicizes it. Pat blames the people of Haiti. Even if you agree with these people on politics if you have a heart you should not agree with them on this.
Reid: It Was A Waste Of Time Dealing With Olympia Snowe
Hindsight’s 20-20, but Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid now thinks he and leading Democrats, at the behest of the White House, flushed months down the toilet courting Sen. Olympia Snowe’s (R-ME) support for health care reform.
“As I look back it was a waste of time dealing with [Snowe],” Reid is quoted as saying about the White House in a forthcoming New York Times Magazine piece, “because she had no intention of ever working anything out.”
That’s a harsh but understandable assessment. The White House was banking on Snowe’s support for months, both as a means of securing conservative Democrats’ support for the bill, and as a failsafe, in case Reid came up short on votes in the Democratic caucus. But after supporting the Senate Finance Committee’s reform proposal, Snowe was hesitant to support major changes to the legislation, which Reid needed to make to keep the progressive wing of his caucus from defecting.
Full Story Reid: It Was A Waste Of Time Dealing With Olympia Snowe | TPMDC.
OPS: The fact that it has taken Grandpa Shit-For-Brains THIS long to figure it out proves he is not fit for the job.
Mikey Hicks, 8, Can’t Get Off U.S. Terror Watch List
The Transportation Security Administration, under scrutiny after last month’s bombing attempt, has on its Web site a “mythbuster” that tries to reassure the public.
Myth: The No-Fly list includes an 8-year-old boy.
Buster: No 8-year-old is on a T.S.A. watch list.
“Meet Mikey Hicks,” said Najlah Feanny Hicks, introducing her 8-year-old son, a New Jersey Cub Scout and frequent traveler who has seldom boarded a plane without a hassle because he shares the name of a suspicious person. “It’s not a myth.”
Michael Winston Hicks’s mother initially sensed trouble when he was a baby and she could not get a seat for him on their flight to Florida at an airport kiosk; airline officials explained that his name “was on the list,” she recalled.
Full Story Mikey Hicks, 8, Can’t Get Off U.S. Terror Watch List – NYTimes.com.
Bailout Watchdog: Government Does Not Have Plan To Address ‘Too Big To Fail’
Of all the problems that plague TARP — including its lack of transparency and disclosure, shifting goalposts, and an unclear purpose — there’s one that has government auditors most concerned: the administration’s failure to articulate how it’s going to eliminate the implicit taxpayer-funded guarantees backstopping the nation’s biggest financial firms.
That’s one of the conclusions raised in a new report released Thursday by the Congressional Oversight Panel, detailing the challenges faced by the administration as it attempts to shut down the unpopular bailout program. Though slated to end in October, the government will likely continue to hold hundreds of billions of dollars in private assets beyond then. Unwinding those positions will be tricky. The panel wonders if the Treasury is up to the task.
Led by Harvard Law Professor Elizabeth Warren, the Congressional Oversight Panel was created by Congress to keep tabs on the bailout. Its monthly reports over the past year have kept an uncompromising critical light shined on the bailout. Its latest report was no different.
Fed Shuts Down Credit Card Practices Congress Forgot To Ban
The Federal Reserve announced Tuesday some new rules for the credit card industry, which will take effect Feb. 22 per the reform passed by Congress last year. The central bank is apparently looking to beef up its consumer protection credentials by prohibiting two practices that Congress missed.
While the new law will forbid arbitrary interest rate hikes on existing balances and over-limit fee traps, some worried the industry would simply pioneer more obscure tactics to soak consumers. The Center for Responsible Lending documented eight legal-but-sneaky practices in a report last December.
The Fed has just said no to two of those: “pick a rate” interest rates and variable rate floors. (Congress wrote the law, but it’s the Fed’s job to draw up the specific regulations that the credit card industry will follow when the law takes effect.)
Full Story Fed Shuts Down Credit Card Practices Congress Forgot To Ban.
Limbaugh: ‘We’ve Already Donated To Haiti, It’s Called US Income Tax’ (VIDEO)
Well, it didn’t take long for conservative firebrand Rush Limbaugh to use the crisis in Haiti to attack President Obama politically. On his radio show yesterday Limbaugh said the earthquake in Haiti will play right into Obama’s hands by allowing him to play up his “compassionate” and “humanitarian” credentials, and that the President will use this crisis to “boost his credibility with the black community.”
As if that weren’t enough, Limbaugh also pivoted off a caller who complained about Obama directing the public to the White House website to find charitable organizations operating in Haiti to promote a conspiracy theory that finding these charities via the White House website puts your money at risk of not reaching Haitians.
Limbaugh also seems to feel we’ve done enough already for Haiti: “We’ve already donated to Haiti. It’s called the U.S. income tax.”
WATCH:
Full Story Limbaugh: ‘We’ve Already Donated To Haiti, It’s Called US Income Tax’ (VIDEO).
Financial Crisis Commission Testimony, Day 2: Read The Latest Updates
FINANCIAL CRISIS INQUIRY COMMISSION UPDATES:
The Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission held its second day of hearings in Washington today. (Watch the hearing live here.) Today’s witnesses include Attorney General Eric H. Holder, Jr., Assistant AG Lanny A. Breuer, FDIC Chair Sheila C. Bair, SEC Chair Mary L. Schapiro and several state attorneys general and officials.
Click here to read HuffPost coverage of yesterday’s hearing featuring Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, Bank Of America CEO Brian Moynihan, Morgan Stanley Chairman John Mack, JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon and several banking experts.
UPDATE 9:47 A.M.:
The head of the panel didn’t waste any time asking the nation’s top law enforcement official about a 2004 FBI statement that the mortgage fraud “epidemic” could be contained.
Full Story Financial Crisis Commission Testimony, Day 2: Read The Latest Updates.
Haiti Earthquake Relief: How You Can Help
A comprehensive list of links and ways to get involved in relief efforts, detailed below.
An earthquake centered near the impoverished Haitian capital of Port-au-Prince caused the collapse of several buildings and an unknown number of fatalities Tuesday. The quake measured 7.0 on the Richter scale and at least 1.8 million people live within the area where the earthquake had its highest intensity.
President Obama said on Tuesday that his “thoughts and prayers” were with the people of Haiti. “We are closely monitoring the situation and we stand ready to assist the people of Haiti,” Obama said in a statement. The Obama administration said that the State Department, USAID and the U.S. military were working to coordinate an assessment of the situation and any possible assistance.
Huffington Post Impact is working to collect a comprehensive list of links and ways to get involved in relief efforts, detailed below.
Full Story Haiti Earthquake Relief: How You Can Help.
Retail Sales See Biggest Drop In 27 Years
The Commerce Department said Thursday that retail sales declined 0.3 percent in December compared with November, much weaker than the 0.5 percent rise that economists had been expecting. Excluding autos, sales dropped by 0.2 percent, also weaker than the 0.3 percent rise analyst had forecast.
For the year, sales fell 6.2 percent, the biggest decline on records that go back to 1992. The only other year that annual sales fell was in 2008, when they slipped by 0.5 percent.
The 0.3 percent decline in December was the first setback since September, when sales had fallen 2 percent. Sales posted strong gains of 1.2 percent in October and 1.8 percent in November, raising hopes that the consumer is starting to mount a comeback.
Full Story December Retail Sales Drop .3 Percent, 2009 Sales See Biggest Drop In 27 Years.
FDIC chief puts blame on Fed for crisis
Bair attacks failure to regulate subprime
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation laid much of the blame for the financial crisis at the door of the Federal Reserve at an inquiry that causes fresh problems for the US central bank.
Sheila Bair, chairman of the FDIC, which insures depositors against bank failures, said on Thursday that the Fed waited seven years to use fully its powers to regulate subprime lending.
Full Story FT.com / US & Canada – FDIC chief puts blame on Fed for crisis.
ACLU to challenge U.S. gov’t on seized laptops
The policy of random laptop searches and seizures by U.S. government agents at border crossings is under attack again, with a pair of civil rights groups seeking potential plaintiffs for a lawsuit that challenges the practice.
The American Civil Liberties Union is working with the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers to find lawyers whose laptops or other electronic devices were searched at U.S. points of entry and exit. The groups argue that the practice of suspicionless laptop searches violates fundamental rights of freedom of speech and protection against unreasonable seizures and searches.
The groups have the support of Electronic Frontier Foundation, which has argued in court that laptop searches are invasive because devices like laptops contain personal data, which people should be able to keep private. EFF has also argued that some searches have been conducted without suspicion.
“This lawsuit will not seek monetary damages for individuals who have been searched; instead, it will focus exclusively on fixing the unconstitutional policy,” wrote Jennifer Granick, civil liberties director and lawyer with the Electronic Frontier Foundation, in a blog entry on Wednesday.
Full Story Groups seek to challenge U.S. gov’t on seized laptops.
Goldman admits ‘improper’ actions in sales of securities
Goldman Sachs’ chief acknowledged Wednesday that the investment bank engaged in “improper” behavior in 2006 and 2007 when it made huge bets on a housing downturn while peddling as safe more than $40 billion in securities backed by risky U.S. home loans.
Lloyd Blankfein, Goldman’s chairman and chief executive, made the surprising concession at the opening hearing of the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission, a 10-member panel that Congress created to investigate and lay out for the public the causes of the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
Blankfein and senior officers of three other of the nation’s most prominent banks told the panel that serious flaws in their risk models and business practices contributed to Wall Street’s meltdown and the massive taxpayer bailouts that followed. The commission also heard testimony that the banks and quasi-government mortgage giant Fannie Mae recklessly took on as much as 95 times more risk than they could cover, and that Wall Street excels “at pulling the wool over the eyes of the American people.”
Full Story Goldman admits ‘improper’ actions in sales of securities | McClatchy.
US new jobless rise for second week
New claims for jobless insurance benefits in the United States rose for the second consecutive week amid persistent labor market concerns even as the economy recovers from recession.
The seasonally adjusted initial claims for unemployment insurance benefits in the week ending January 9 stood at 444,000, an increase of 11,000 from the previous week’s revised figure of 433,000, the Labor Department said.
Most economists had forecast that claims would be around 437,000.
The four-week moving average, a less volatile indicator than the week-to-week figures, however dipped by 9,000 to 440,750 from the previous week’s revised average of 449,750.
Full Story US new jobless rise for second week – Yahoo! News.
Obama staffer wants ‘cognitive infiltration’ of 9/11 conspiracy groups
In a 2008 academic paper, President Barack Obama’s appointee to head the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs advocated “cognitive infiltration” of groups that advocate “conspiracy theories” like the ones surrounding 9/11.
Cass Sunstein, a Harvard law professor, co-wrote an academic article entitled “Conspiracy Theories: Causes and Cures,” in which he argued that the government should stealthily infiltrate groups that pose alternative theories on historical events via “chat rooms, online social networks, or even real-space groups and attempt to undermine” those groups.
As head of the Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Sunstein is in charge of “overseeing policies relating to privacy, information quality, and statistical programs,” according to the White House Web site.
Sunstein’s article, published in the Journal of Political Philosphy in 2008 and recently uncovered by blogger Marc Estrin, states that “our primary claim is that conspiracy theories typically stem not from irrationality or mental illness of any kind but from a ‘crippled epistemology,’ in the form of a sharply limited number of (relevant) informational sources.”
Full Story Obama staffer wants ‘cognitive infiltration’ of 9/11 conspiracy groups | Raw Story.
Detroit Auto Show Small and Efficient Vehicles
Many of the 2012 model year vehicles achieve close to 40 miles per gallon on the highway, and the concepts of the future are almost exclusively next-generation hybrids or all-electric vehicles.
Every year dozens of auto shows around the world are used to showcase and refine new models and concepts. The 2009-2010 circuit is still the same showcase, but the products on display have changed drastically from years past. The North American International Auto Show, held in Detroit, is currently underway with small high mileage vehicles taking center stage.
Many of the 2012 model year vehicles achieve close to 40 miles per gallon on the highway, and the concepts of the future are almost exclusively next-generation hybrids or all-electric vehicles.
General Motors unveiled a new mini-car meant to compete against Daimler’s immensely popular Smart Fortwo. The Chevrolet Spark will be the smallest car in GM’s lineup and will be available in showrooms around the United States early in 2012.
Full Story Detroit Auto Show Small and Efficient Vehicles | Economy In Crisis.
Chamber of Commerce Offers More of the Same
With the predictability of a clock, U.S. Chamber of Commerce President Tom Donohue extolled the virtues of “free trade” in his group’s annual State of American Business Address, telling the audience that expanded trade is the Chamber‘s number one priority for 2010.
“Washington is sitting on pending trade agreements with South Korea, Colombia, and Panama,” he said, according to a transcript of his remarks. “If we fail to pass them, we will not only miss opportunities to create new jobs — we will lose existing jobs.”
Donohue claimed that failure to strike a deal with South Korea alone could result in the loss of 350,000 American jobs. Many, however, believe that a deal with South Korea could be a devastating blow for the beleaguered American automobile industry. In 2008, U.S. automakers sold just 7,000 American vehicles in South Korea, or less than one percent of the entire market. South Korean automakers Hyundai and Kia, by comparison, sold 53,000 vehicles in the U.S. in October 2009, according to Bloomberg News.
Full Story Chamber of Commerce Offers More of the Same | Economy In Crisis.
Televangelist Pat Robertson Says Earthquake Payback for Haiti’s “Pact With the Devil”
In remarks made on his TV program, Robertson claimed that Haitian slaves won their freedom by bargaining with the Devil, who just got his due. (With video)
SCROLL DOWN FOR VIDEO
Every disaster that befalls a nation — hurricanes, floods, terrorism, earthquakes — constitutes God’s punishment of a people gone astray, according to Pat Robertson, who famously blamed feminists for 9/11 and gays for Hurricanes Katrina and Andrew. In the case of Haiti’s devastating earthquake, he blames an ostensible deal that black Haitians made with the Devil in order to win their emancipation and independence from the French colonials who enslaved them. So, in Haiti’s case it might not be God who did the nation in, but rather the Devil calling in his chit.
From today’s edition of “The 700 Club”:
[S]omething happened a long time ago in Haiti and people might not want to talk about it. They were under the heel of the French, uh you know Napoleon the third and whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the Devil. They said we will serve you if you’ll get us free from the French. True Story. And so the Devil said “Okay, it’s a deal.” And they kicked the French out. You know, the Haitians revolted and got themselves free. But ever since they have been cursed by one thing after the other, desperately poor. That island is Hispaniola is one island. It’s cut down the middle. On one side is Haiti, on the other side is the Dominican republic. Dominican Republic is prosperous, healthy, full of resorts, etc.. Haiti is in desperate poverty. Same island. Uh, they need to have, and we need to pray for them, a great turning to God and out of this tragedy. I’m optimistic something good may come.
Because, of course, black people couldn’t possibly have the wherewithal to defeat their white oppressors without a little supernatural help — and it sure wouldn’t be coming from God, right?
Full Story Televangelist Pat Robertson Says Earthquake Payback for Haiti’s “Pact With the Devil” | World | AlterNet.
The Disaster of the Century: How to Help Haiti
A guide to the best ways your aid can go to use immediately to help save lives, protect the survivors and rebuild from Haiti’s ruins.
It is hard to imagine the enormity of the pain and tragedy caused by the earthquake in Haiti,which has left the capital city of Port-au-Prince in ruins. The damage is catastrophic; more than two million people have been affected, tens of thousands have died, and uncountable people injured. It is truly the disaster of the century.
We at AlterNet want to do all we can to assist in the saving of lives, the protection of the survivors and the rebuilding of a safe environment for all the people of Haiti. At this point, making financial contributions to the groups with strong track records seems the best avenue to take. From our earned advertising revenue in 2009, AlterNet will make a contribution of $250 to each of the groups listed below, totaling $2,000. Of course we need the money, but the people of Haiti are in such dire straits. They need it far more. We hope you can join us in making a contribution, even a small one, since literally in this case every dollar helps save lives.
There is also an important political action you can take by very strongly urging President Obama to Grant Temporary Protected Status to Haitians living in the US. (See more details below)
Full Story The Disaster of the Century: How to Help Haiti | World | AlterNet.
Why Can’t We Get Anyone to Ask a Wall St. CEO the Hard Questions?
Nomi Prins -
It is exasperating to watch the financial commission in charge of investigating last year’s finance disaster be easily distracted and deflected by the bankers who ripped us off.
Articles and blogs are flooding the net, summarizing and dissecting the opening Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission’s chat with the four CEOs presiding over the strongest (read: luckiest recipients of Federal generosity during their most troubled times) banks in the country, Lloyd Blankfein from Goldman Sachs, Jamie Dimon from JPM Chase, John Mack from Morgan Stanley, and Brian Moynihan from Bank of America (Citigroup didn’t make the cut).
But, Wednesday morning was an exercise in how prepped bankers can deflect less-prepped commissioners’ questions with seriously delivered circular reasoning. And, it was exasperating. (Les Leopold, Author of The Looting of America, provides an excellent detailed play-by-play of the morning’s events).
I have been writing about reinstating Glass-Steagall since I left banking in 2002, including how findings from the Pecora commission that investigated the most risky bank practices during the early 1930s, contributed to the creation of a more restrained banking landscape – where commercial banks take less risk and receive government support, and investment banks take more, and get zilch.
Rush Limbaugh wastes no time in politicizing dead Haitians
Less than twenty-four hours after Haiti’s most devastating earthquake in 200 years; which, when all is said and done, could result in over 100,000 deaths, Rush Limbaugh, instead of using his precious airtime to perhaps express grief and compassion for the countless victims of this horrific disaster, instead decided to blast the Obama Administration for its response.
Because, in Limbaugh’s bloated and bigoted mind, Obama has responded much, much too soon.
Mr. Limbaugh, why couldn’t that heart attack you pretended to have to further your anti-health reform crusade have been real? You would benefit the world far better mute in a hospital bed…or worse.
Full Story Rush Limbaugh wastes no time in politicizing dead Haitians.
Senators Call for Repeal of Insurers’ Antitrust Exemption
Senator Patrick J. Leahy, Democrat of Vermont and chairman of the Judiciary Committee, and 18 other senators on Wednesday sent a letter to President Obama and Democratic Congressional leaders urging them to repeal the limited exemption for insurers from federal antitrust laws as part of the final version of major health care legislation.
Mr. Leahy had put forward a proposal to repeal the antitrust exemption, which was approved by Congress in 1945, but it was dropped from the Senate version of the health care bill because of opposition from Senator Ben Nelson, Democrat of Nebraska, a former state insurance commissioner and insurance company executive.
Mr. Nelson said the exemption was needed to foster competition among insurers, a position that Mr. Leahy and others said they found dubious.
Full text of the letter at link…..
Signatories:
- PATRICK LEAHY Chairman Committee on the Judiciary
- JOHN F. KERRY United States Senator
- JAY ROCKEFELLER United States Senator
- JOSEPH I. LIEBERMAN United States Senator
- DIANNE FEINSTEIN United States Senator
- RUSSELL D. FEINGOLD United States Senator
- RON WYDEN United States Senator
- MARY L. LANDRIEU United States Senator
- CHARLES E. SCHUMER United States Senator
- MARIA CANTWELL United States Senator
- FRANK LAUTENBERG United States Senator
- BERNIE SANDERS United States Senator
- CLAIRE MCCASKILL United States Senator
- SHELDON WHITEHOUSE United States Senator
- ROLAND BURRIS United States Senator
- TED KAUFMAN United States Senator
- KIRSTEN E. GILLIBRAND United States Senator
- AL FRANKEN United States Senator
- MICHAEL BENNET United States Senator
Full Story Senators Call for Repeal of Insurers’ Antitrust Exemption – Prescriptions Blog – NYTimes.com.
Haiti quake: Survivors struggle while awaiting aid
Turning pickup trucks into ambulances and doors into stretchers, Haitians were frantically struggling to save those injured in this week's earthquake as desperately needed aid from around the world began arriving Thursday.
Planes carrying teams from China, France and Spain flew into the Port-au-Prince airport with searchers and tons of food, medicine and other supplies — with far more promised soon from around the globe.
Search and rescue squads from Iceland and Fairfax County, Virginia, had arrived the day before and some groups — from Cuba's government and Doctors Without Borders — used staff already in the country to offer aid immediately after the magnitude-7 quake struck on Tuesday.
Full Story Haiti quake: Survivors struggle while awaiting aid – Yahoo! News.
The Final Question: Who Will Pay for Health Care?
Robert Reich: -
There’s only one big remaining issue on health care reform: how to pay for it. The House wants a 5.4 percent surtax on couples earning at least $1 million in annual income. The Senate wants a 40 percent excise tax on employer-provided “Cadillac plans.” The Senate will win on this unless the public discovers that a large portion of the so-called Cadillacs are really middle-class Chevys, expensive not because they deliver more benefits but because they have higher costs.
The dirty little secret under the hood is that less than 4 percent of the variation in the cost of current health-care plans has to do with how many benefits they provide. Most plans that cost more do so because (1) a particular set of employees is older and tends to get sicker than the average set of employees (that’s true for a lot of old rust-belt firms), (2) the plan is offered by a small business that lacks bargaining clout with insurers (small businesses pay, on average, 16 percent more for the health insurance they provide, per capita), (3) the work that employees do subjects them to greater risk of medical problems (health-care workers, for example), or (4) most employees are women (who tend to have higher health-care costs than men because women are the ones who bear children). Plans could also cost more but deliver average benefits because (5) insurers in the area don’t face much competition (one main reason for the public option).
So by taxing so-called Cadillac plans, the Senate bill would actually end up taxing the Chevy plans of a large portion of the middle class. And as time goes by, a still larger portion, since the Senate plan is geared to the overall rate of inflation rather than to the (much higher) rate of increases in health-care costs.
Full Story Robert Reich: The Final Question: Who Will Pay for Health Care?.
The People vs. Cap-and-Trade
The public is largely unaware of a momentous battle about to be fought in Washington. The stakes are enormous. Yet the public has not been well informed.
Ignorance of the matter derives in part from the fact that the conflict was initiated via the highly charged issue of climate change. Climate is complex. People have different opinions about the extent to which humans are causing climate change. Fundamental belief systems are involved and discussion can be emotional.
Yet the core issue can be defined independent of climate. It concerns how society can phase out its addictive use of fossil fuels and move on, in the most economically efficient and equitable way, to a clean energy future. Conservatives, independents and liberals should be united in this fight.
Washington could define a path that would lead the world toward a clean energy future. And, incidentally, it would solve the climate problem – without requiring anyone to agree that there even is a climate problem.
Full Story The People vs. Cap-and-Trade | CommonDreams.org.
Tentative Deal Reached for Unions to Sell Out Middle Class
You could see this one coming down Sepulveda, ever since the Senate started doing carve-outs for individual unions to exempt them from the excise tax:
Unions tentatively struck a deal Tuesday to exempt collectively bargained healthcare plans from a tax on high-cost plans expected to be used to help raise revenue for the healthcare overhaul.
On the one hand, it’s the job of the unions to look out for their members. With the White House heavily promoting the Cadillac tax since the minute they got into office, it was going to be exceptionally difficult to beat the excise tax back.
But the reason that so many supported Richard Trumka’s tough stance (”We won’t support the bill if it doesn’t have a public option in it”) was because they were deeply affected by the outcome of the health care bill, whether they were in a union or not, and they rallied around his leadership. Without that broad support of the public cheering them on, they would not have had the ability to move the White House at all.
Full Story FDL Action » Tentative Deal Reached for Unions to Sell Out Middle Class.
Obama Bank-Fee Plan May Tap Voter Anger Over Bailouts, Bonuses
President Barack Obama will announce tomorrow his plan to impose a fee on the country’s largest financial firms to help recoup taxpayer bailout dollars and trim the federal budget deficit, an administration official said.
Obama will formally outline his proposal to raise as much as $120 billion at an event at the White House, according to the official who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The move may have a bigger political than fiscal impact. By including it in the budget message he will send to Congress next month, the president is tapping into public anger over the bailouts of the financial and auto industries, executive bonuses as well as the deficit.
Full Story Obama Bank-Fee Plan May Tap Voter Anger Over Bailouts, Bonuses – BusinessWeek.
Obama wants record $708B for military next year
President Barack Obama will ask Congress for an additional $33 billion to fight unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq on top of a record $708 billion for the Defense Department next year, The Associated Press has learned — a request that could be an especially hard sell to some of the administration’s Democratic allies.
The extra $33 billion in 2010 would mostly go toward the expansion of the war in Afghanistan. Obama ordered an extra 30,000 troops for that war as part of an overhaul of the war strategy late last year.
Military officials have suggested that the 2011 request would top $700 billion for the first time, but the precise figure has not been made public.
Full Story Obama wants record $708B for military next year – Yahoo! News.
House subpoenas AIG documents from NY Fed, Geithner
A congressional panel Wednesday subpoenaed documents on the US Federal Reserve bailout of insurance giant AIG in 2008, including from Timothy Geithner, the former New York Fed chief and current Treasury secretary.
Representative Edolphus Towns said his House Oversight and Government Reform Committee was seeking information on payments made to AIG counterparties — major global banks including Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Barclays, Bank of America, Deutsche Bank, and Societe Generale.
The panel seeks emails, phone logs and meeting notes from the New York Fed and Geithner, among others, on the discussions held ahead of the bailout decision.
Full Story House subpoenas AIG documents from NY Fed, Geithner – Yahoo! News.
House Rep floats bill to ban private security contractors
An Illinois House Democrat is planning to introduce a bill that would ban private security contractors, including Blackwater, from US military and intelligence operations.
Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D-IL) has circulated a letter among her colleagues asking them to co-sponsor the Stop Outsourcing Security (SOS) Act, which would “responsibly phase out the use of private security contractors for functions that should be reserved for US military forces and government personnel,” the letter states.
In the letter, obtained by investigative journalist Jeremy Scahill, Schakowsky suggests that the recent controversies surrounding security contractor Blackwater were among her motivations for proposing the legislation.
Full Story House Rep floats bill to ban private security contractors | Raw Story.
Army prosecutes single mother for refusing to deploy and put her son in foster care.
Spc. Alexis Hutchinson, a 21-year-old Army cook, refused to deploy to Afghanistan in November because she had no one to take care of her 10-month-old son. Hutchinson said when she brought her situation to her superiors’ attention, they told her that she would have to deploy anyway and place the child in foster care. “For her it was like, ‘I couldn’t abandon my child,’” her civilian attorney Rai Sue Sussman told the AP. After skipping her unit’s flight out of Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah, GA, millitary police arrested her and confined her to the base while prosecutors decided how to proceed. Today, the Army filed charges against her and, if convicted in a court-martial, she faces several years in prison and a dishonorable discharge:
A spokesman for Hunter Army Airfield in Savannah said Wednesday that Hutchinson has been charged with missing movement — for missing her overseas flight — being absent without leave, dereliction of duty and insubordinate conduct.
The stiffest charge, missing movement, carries a maximum penalty of two years in prison and a dishonorable discharge. … But first, an officer will be appointed to decide if there’s enough evidence to try a case against her
Full Story Think Progress » Army prosecutes single mother for refusing to deploy and put her son in foster care..
Pat Robertson Cites Haiti’s Earthquake As What Happens When You ‘Swear A Pact To The Devil’
Perverted & Senile
Haiti is now struggling to recover from a devastating earthquake that hit the island nation on Tuesday, with the death toll reaching far into the thousands. The disaster “left the country in a shambles, tangling efforts to provide relief to an estimated 3 million people who the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies said had been affected by the quake.” Many aid groups, however, are also struggling with their own dead and wounded employees.
Today on his 700 Club television show, Christian broadcaster Pat Robertson highlighted the tragedy and said that his network will be there “to help the people.” However, he then tried to offer an explanation for the earthquake, blaming Haiti’s own people for once making a “pact to the devil”:
ROBERTSON: [S]omething happened a long time ago in Haiti and people might not want to talk about it. They were under the heel of the French. Napoleon the Third and whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said, “We will serve you if you get us free from the prince.” True story. And so the devil said, “OK, it’s a deal.” They kicked the French out, the Haitians revolted and got themselves free.
Full Story Think Progress » Pat Robertson Cites Haiti’s Earthquake As What Happens When You ‘Swear A Pact To The Devil’.
‘Grassroots’ Opposition To Clean Energy Reform Bankrolled By Foreign Oil, Petro-Governments
Clean energy legislation passed by the House, now pending in the Senate, faces fierce opposition from the proprietors of fossil fuel companies, and much has been reported on how domestic oil and coal companies have flooded the debate with money, lobbying, and misinformation. These opponents of clean energy reform claim to be “standing up” for American jobs and security. However, according to an investigation by ThinkProgress, many of the lobbyists and right-wing operatives engineering the attacks on clean energy reform either work directly for petro-governments, or work for companies in the business of importing foreign oil:
– Nigeria’s Bayelsa State, the region of the country producing much of its crude oil, is registered with the Carmen Group as its representative in DC. The Carmen Group is run largely by lobbyist David Keene, who also manages the American Conservative Union. Keene has lobbied against clean energy reform and used his conservative organization to generate “grassroots” opposition to legislative efforts to move away from a fossil fuel based economy. Although the extent to which the Carmen Group “provide[s] general representation before the United States Congress” is unclear — as Justice Department disclosures indicate — the Nigerian state has lavished Carmen group lobbyists with $903,450 in payments since 2006. According to a report produced Monday by the State Department, Nigeria is at risk of becoming a haven for terror and extremism. In the past, Keene, the coordinator of the CPAC convention, has been caught auctioning off conservative grassroots support to his corporate lobbying clients for as much as $2 million dollars.
Full Story Think Progress » ‘Grassroots’ Opposition To Clean Energy Reform Bankrolled By Foreign Oil, Petro-Governments.
Why Obama Must Take On Wall Street
Robert Reich –
It has been more than a year since all hell broke loose on Wall Street and, remarkably, almost nothing has been done to prevent all hell from breaking loose again.
In fact, close your eyes and you could be back in the wilds of 2007. Bankers are still making wild bets, still devising new derivatives, still piling on debt. The big banks have access to money almost as cheaply as in 2007, courtesy of the Fed, so bank profits are up and bonuses as generous as at the height of the boom.
The only difference is that now the Street’s biggest banks know they are “too big to fail” and will be bailed out by taxpayers if they get into trouble – which means they have every incentive to make even riskier bets. And, of course, American taxpayers are out some $120bn, while millions have lost their homes, jobs and savings.
Full Story Robert Reich (Why Obama Must Take On Wall Street).
Economic Hit Man John Perkins Talks to BuzzFlash About Global Corporate Control and How We Can Stop the Coming Economic Meltdown
We’re headed for disaster. You’d have to be totally blind not to recognize that. So if we don’t change — if this crisis doesn’t force us to change — there will be more and more and more and more. And who knows what the ultimate outcome will be? If we continue to resist, we’ll disappear. I mean, you have to be sustainable at some point don’t you, by definition?
– John Perkins
* * *
Initially, John Perkins seems to be a character you'd love to hate. His tales of spreading exploitation and pushing World Bank loans across the planet as an “economic hit man” make him easy fodder. Perkins has been a member of a group that finds itself more and more unpopular every day since the implosion of Wall Street last year.
In his latest book, he introduces himself as one of the “'hired guns' who promote the interests of big corporations and certain sectors of the U.S. government.” He adds that though he had a “fancy title” his “real job was to plunder the Third World.”
This was Perkins' basic narrative in his wildly popular book, Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. But in his latest book, Hoodwinked: An Economic Hit Man Reveals Why the World Financial Markets Imploded — and What We Need to Do to Remake Them, he connects the plundering of the last three decades to the roots of today's economic crisis.
Giving corporations an outsized voice in elections
Voters stand to lose out if the Supreme Court treats political spending by businesses and other big-money players as protected speech.
Corporations are pitching a bizarre product — a radical vision of the 1st Amendment. It would give corporations rather than voters a central role in our electoral process by treating corporate political spending as protected speech. If this vision becomes reality, businesses and other big-money players will spend billions either hyping their preferred candidates or running attack ads against elected officials who don’t support their preferred agenda. Voters will be forced into a couch-potato role, mere viewers of the electoral spectacle bought and paid for by wealthy companies.
The Supreme Court’s decision in the hotly anticipated campaign finance reform case Citizens United vs. Federal Election Commission — which may be announced as early as Tuesday — will show whether a majority of the Roberts court is buying their argument.
The case may be the turning point in a concerted, decades-long ideological campaign — the “corporate free speech movement,” as Robert L. Kerr and other scholars have chronicled. As far back as 1971, Lewis F. Powell Jr. (whom President Nixon would shortly nominate to the Supreme Court) sent a confidential memorandum to his friend Eugene Sydnor Jr. at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce arguing that corporate interests needed to take advantage of a “neglected opportunity in the courts.” Because “the judiciary may be the most important instrument for social, economic and political change,” the memo said, the chamber and other corporate interests should develop a cadre of constitutional lawyers to file lawsuits and amicus briefs to push a corporate-friendly legal agenda in the Supreme Court.
Full Story Giving corporations an outsized voice in elections – latimes.com.
Wal-Mart: the US retailer taking over the world by stealth
It has beefed up its green credentials, but Wal-Mart’s stance on unions and sheer global scale still provoke as much fear as admiration
It hardly shrieks of billion-dollar glamour. The US nerve centre of the world’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart, consists of a collection of low-slung prefabricated buildings along a four-lane highway in north-western Arkansas. Wal-Mart’s head office is hundreds of miles from the nearest big city. It isn’t even handy for the state capital, Little Rock, which is three and half hours’ drive away.
But hopeful merchants beat a path from all corners of the world to hawk their wares here, in a series of bare Perspex rooms along a “supplier corridor”. Staff work in spartan cubicles and reminders of the retailer’s low-cost culture are constant – in an employee lounge an honesty box invites payment for tea and coffee with a blunt message: “Drinks are not free.”
It was nearby, in the main square of the modest town of Bentonville, that Wal-Mart’s founder, Sam Walton, opened a discount store, Walton’s Five and Dime, in 1951. That shop, now a museum, helped spawn a retail empire that spans 8,100 stores in 15 countries generating $401bn (£248bn) of revenue annually. With a market capitalisation of $210bn, Wal-Mart is worth as much as the gross domestic product of Nigeria.
Full Story Wal-Mart: the US retailer taking over the world by stealth | Business | guardian.co.uk.
Bring Back Glass-Steagall
Banks that behave like hedge funds don’t deserve guarantees.
Last month, Sens. Maria Cantwell and John McCain proposed a measure that would revive parts of the old Glass-Steagall Act, the 1933 law that separated investment from commercial banking. After having been diluted many times over the years, Glass-Steagall was largely repealed in 1999, permitting a wave of consolidation in the financial industry.
The latest crisis has provoked a new debate over the old regulatory regime. Nobel laureate economist Joseph Stiglitz has argued that the repeal of Glass-Steagall had an “especial role” in making the financial calamity of 2008 possible. Former Fed Chairman Paul Volcker, currently the head of the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, has called for a new separation between commercial banking and riskier financial activities.
Any discussion about breaking up the financial industry, however, runs into a powerful stereotype: the overwhelming consensus belief in the risible backwardness of Glass-Steagall.
Full Story Thomas Frank: Bring Back Glass-Steagall – WSJ.com.
Scoop: 2010: Global Erosion Of Freedom
Global Declines In Freedom Outweighed Gains In 2009, Says Freedom House Annual Survey
SOURCE: Freedom House
Freedom In The World 2010: Global Erosion Of Freedom
(Freedom House/IFEX) – Washington, January 12, 2010 – For the fourth consecutive year, global declines in freedom outweighed gains in 2009, as measured by Freedom House’s annual survey of political rights and civil liberties, Freedom in the World 2010. This represents the longest continuous period of decline for global freedom in the nearly 40-year history of the report.
In a year marked by intensified repression against human rights defenders and civic activists, declines for freedom were registered in 40 countries in Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, and the former Soviet Union, representing 20 percent of the world’s total polities. Authoritarian states including Iran, Russia, Venezuela, and Vietnam became more repressive. Declines in freedom also occurred in countries that had registered positive trends in previous years, including Bahrain, Jordan, Kenya, and Kyrgyzstan.
“The news for 2009 is cause for real concern,” said Arch Puddington, Freedom House Director of Research. “The decline is global, affects countries with military and economic power, affects countries that had previously shown signs of reform potential, and is accompanied by enhanced persecution of political dissidents and independent journalists. To make matters worse, the most powerful authoritarian regimes have become more repressive, more influential in the international arena, and more uncompromising.”
Full Story Scoop: 2010: Global Erosion Of Freedom.
Behind the Veils of Power: Hope for Progressives
by Bernard Weiner, The Crisis Papers
Pundits of all stripes are calling this past decade a thoroughgoing disaster, one of the worst in our nation’s history. True, but there’s another way of evaluating the CheneyBush era.
Sure, lots of horrific things happened in the years between 2000 and 2010: a massive terrorist attack, our country lied into a disastrous war in Iraq, the Administration colluding with corporations in looting the treasury and polluting the air and water, a great recession brought into being at least partially by refusing to enforce oversight regulations on financial institutions, eight years lost in the fight against global warming. Yes, all those things, and many more dark episodes, including the strengthening of a kind of native fascism, happened during the CheneyBush era.
But those shameful ashes of the past eight years can, Phoenix-like, also yield a momentous rebirth of American democracy, a more rational foreign policy, and economic justice. What leads me to this contrarian conclusion?
The essence of my guarded optimism rests on the Removal of the Veils.
Full Story Scoop: Behind the Veils of Power: Hope for Progressives.
Tax Them Both – Banks and Banksters
Editorial -NYTimes -
The White House is talking about levying a tax or fee on large banks to recover the $120 billion it spent to bail out the financial system. That is a good place to start, but it shouldn’t stop there. President Obama and Congress should also impose a windfall tax on the huge bonuses that bailed-out bankers plan to pay themselves over the next few weeks.
This is an issue of fairness and sound public policy. The Treasury needs the money. A fee may also get banks and bankers to rethink the way they do business — something the much-promised, far-too-delayed and increasingly watered-down financial regulatory reform effort is unlikely to do. A permanent tax or fee imposed on the nation’s largest banks could reduce future risks by discouraging big banks from getting even bigger.
Let’s be clear, the crisis spawned by banks’ recklessness has cost the country a lot more than $120 billion. Any calculation must also include the deepest recession since the 1930s and the loss of more than seven million jobs. What profits banks have made since then have not come from lending to credit-strapped businesses. They are trading profits made possible by trillions of dollars in cheap financing from the Federal Reserve.
Full Story Editorial – Tax Them Both – NYTimes.com.
Moral Bankruptcy : Why are we letting Wall Street off so easy?
By Joseph E. Stiglitz -
One of the lessons of this crisis is that there is a need for collective action, that there is a role for government.
Joseph Stiglitz’ new book, Freefall: America, Free Markets, and the Sinking of the World Economy, is in stores as of Monday.
IT IS SAID THAT A NEAR-DEATH experience forces one to reevaluate priorities and values. The global economy has just escaped a near-death experience. The crisis exposed the flaws in the prevailing economic model, but it also exposed flaws in our society. Much has been written about the foolishness of the risks that the financial sector undertook, the devastation that its institutions have brought to the economy, and the fiscal deficits that have resulted. Too little has been written about the underlying moral deficit that has been exposed—a deficit that is larger, and harder to correct.
One of the lessons of this crisis is that there is a need for collective action, that there is a role for government. But there are others. We allowed markets to blindly shape our economy, but in doing so, they also shaped our society. We should take this opportunity to ask: Are we sure that the way that they have been molding us is what we want?
Full Story Moral Bankruptcy | Mother Jones.
click the image to buy it now
Health Insurers Funded Chamber Attack Ads
AHIP President Karen Ignagni. Despite promises to the White House that the major health insurance companies would play nice on healthcare, they quietly pushed funds to third-parties for ads attacking reform. "There's no question that AHIP has quietly solicited monies from their members which were funneled over to the chamber for their ads," said a source. The total donated by the health insurers, according to one estimate, was as much as one-quarter of the chamber's total health care advertising budget.
Just as dealings with the Obama administration and congressional Democrats soured last summer, six of the nation's biggest health insurers began quietly pumping big money into third-party television ads aimed at killing or significantly modifying the major health reform bills moving through Congress.
That money, between $10 million and $20 million, came from Aetna, Cigna, Humana, Kaiser Foundation Health Plans, UnitedHealth Group and Wellpoint, according to two health care lobbyists familiar with the transactions. The companies are all members of the powerful trade group America's Health Insurance Plans.
The funds were solicited by AHIP and funneled to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to help underwrite tens of millions of dollars of television ads by two business coalitions set up and subsidized by the chamber. Each insurer kicked in at least $1 million and some gave multimillion-dollar donations.
Full Story Health Insurers Funded Chamber Attack Ads – Under The Influence – Under the Influence.
The ‘Real Unemployment’ Needs Real Solutions
But in fact real unemployment in the United States is stuck at a dismal 19%, a figure nearly twice the so-called official number.
“Everyone agrees that the recession is over,” said Larry Summers, President Obama’s top economic advisor, on December 13.
Yet December’s unemployment numbers announced last Friday suggest otherwise — especially the ‘real unemployment’ figure.
According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics the official unemployment rate is 10%, a figure which itself caused a major headline to blare, “U.S. Job Losses Dim Hopes for Quick Upswing.”
Full Story Leo Hindery, Jr.: The ‘Real Unemployment’ Needs Real Solutions.
HARDBALL Chris Matthews Interviews ‘Game Change’ Authors Heilemann & Halperin
Hardball Chris Matthews interviews the authors of a controversial new book on the 2008 presidential campaign.
Senior House Democrat: ‘The Senate is just a pain in the ass to everybody in the world as far as I can tell.’
With President Obama indicating “that he intends to use the Senate bill as the framework” for the final health care reform legislation, House Democrats are venting “their frustration with the direction of the debate.” House Ways and Means Chairman Charlie Rangel (D-NY) told reporters yesterday that there is “a problem on both sides of the Capitol. A serious problem.” An anonymous senior House Democrat, however, placed particular blame on the Senate:
With all of these issues at a standstill, tensions are growing between the two chambers. Several House lawmakers have voiced frustration with Sens. Joe Lieberman (ID-Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) over concessions and special deals they cut in the Senate version.
“The Senate is just a pain in the ass to everybody in the world as far as I can tell. I’m so angry that I just wish from now on that we’d just find out what it is that Lieberman and Nelson will let us have,” the senior lawmaker said. “But we’re not giving up on anything in the House.”
Sleep Rituals: Training The Body And The Mind
Does this sound familiar:
The kids are finally down, and you look at the clock. Hmmm… just about 2 hours before I am supposed to get in bed. What can I get done before total exhaustion hits?
Sleep is a very strange behavior. Many people think of it as a battery re-charge, some as a vacation, and still others as a waste of time. Which one are you? How do you value your sleep? When it is not on your list of priorities that can increase your health, energy, and well being, why would you bother with it? Many people value sleep, but they have such a hard time getting it, they just give up and accept that they will be sleep deprived forever.
I would argue that great sleep starts with a reasonable attitude toward sleep. How much do you think you need, and how do you think you may be able to get it? Some nights you will get more, and some less. There are many mysteries to sleep but here are a few things that are known that we can all use to our advantage to get better rest:
Full Story Dr. Michael J. Breus: Sleep Rituals: Training The Body And The Mind.
Mars ‘Tree’ PHOTO: NASA HiRISE Camera Shoots Picture Of Sand Dunes
This week, NASA released a photograph of sand dunes on Mars taken by HiRISE, the most powerful camera ever sent into space. On first glance, the picture appears to show dark trees growing out of reddish sand dunes on the planet’s surface– in fact, it’s showing a landslide of debris as ice melts in Mars’s spring.
NASA’s HiRISE blog describes the process like so:
Full Story Mars ‘Tree’ PHOTO: NASA HiRISE Camera Shoots Picture Of Sand Dunes.
The Shadow Elite Are Killing Democracy
‘Shadow Elite’: Outsourcing Government, Losing Democracy
James Madison famously wrote in the Federalist Papers (#51), “If men were angels, no government would be necessary.”
We’ve learned the hard way, most starkly in the Great Depression and now in the Great Recession, that men and women are anything but angels, and that government first and foremost must protect the American people from the unmitigated avarice of the private sector.
The problem is, what has happened to that lofty, Founding Fathers notion of government as our protector? To me, the most important contribution, and the most disturbing part of Janine Wedel’s brilliant new book, “Shadow Elite: How the World’s New Power Brokers Undermine Democracy, Government and the Free Market”, is that she has laid bare the lie that we have functional separation today between the public and private sector. Over time, capitalism and democracy have become gradually melded into corporatism in the corridors of power in Washington (and in many other national capitals around the world). Public and private are now substantially blurred, as the “transnational” political elites and the financial elites have become literally the same people. It is a condition which leaves the people feeling unrepresented, unprotected and utterly disregarded, a prop in their own play, a hollow feeling the great Peruvian journalist Gustavo Gorriti once eloquently described as “cosmetic democracy.”
Full Story Charles Lewis: ‘Shadow Elite’: Outsourcing Government, Losing Democracy.
Obama To Push Tax On Being ‘Too Big To Fail’
President Obama will unveil on Thursday a proposed levy on the nation's biggest financial firms structured not just to repay taxpayers for the bank bailout, but to recoup some of the public subsidy that “too big to fail” banks have enjoyed on account of their implicit government backstop, a senior administration official tells the Huffington Post.
This would be by far the government's most assertive step in starting to claw back some of the enormous profits the TBTF banks have reaped, first as a result of the bailout and then from the implicit guarantee that the government would back up their debt of major banks if they ever faced bankruptcy.
Because these banks effectively have the full backing of the American government, they are able to borrow at much lower rates than banks that have to borrow based on their own credit-worthiness.
Full Story Obama To Push Tax On Being ‘Too Big To Fail’.
OPS: Don’t hold your breath
Bill Maher On Ending Abusive Relationships – With Your Bank
Author Bill Maher describes a new project developed by Arianna Huffington to end the abuse we’ve received from the big 6 banks.
White House, Dems, Planning Massive Re-Sell Of Health Care After It Passes
Despite being weeks away from signing health care reform into law — and with major impasses remaining between negotiators — Democratic officials are gearing up for a massive re-selling of the legislation once it is passed.
The White House, together with Democratic leadership in both houses of Congress, insists it has learned the lessons of the August recess and won't allow conservative critics who malign the bill to go unopposed.
“The White House has no intention of relaxing and will undertake an aggressive effort to explain to the American people how reform provides stability and security for people with insurance, affordable options to those without and cuts costs for families and small businesses,” Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer told the Huffington Post. “We welcome a debate with the opposition that wants to repeal the entire bill including the insurance reforms. There are only two entities in the country that want to continue to deny coverage to people with preexisting conditions: The insurance industry and the Republican Party.”
Full Story White House, Dems, Planning Massive Re-Sell Of Health Care After It Passes.
Japan Airlines shares dive 81% on bankruptcy fears
Japan Airlines shares dived 81 percent Wednesday to just eight US cents as investors rushed for the exit ahead of an expected bankruptcy filing by the once-mighty carrier, crippled by huge debts.
JAL, Asia’s biggest airline, is believed to be on the verge of seeking court protection from creditors and delisting its shares from the Tokyo Stock Exchange to make it easier to restructure its debt and slash costs.
The airline’s market value now stands at just 210 million dollars, having plummeted by about 1.8 billion dollars in just two days.
Full Story Japan Airlines shares dive 81% on bankruptcy fears – Yahoo! News.
Committee advances bill to legalize, tax pot
California lawmakers on Tuesday endorsed an overhaul of the state's marijuana laws by pushing forward a bill to legalize adult recreational use and taxation of the drug.
The 4-3 vote by the Assembly Public Safety Committee was the first in the nation by a legislative body supporting recreational use of the drug. But several of the lawmakers who voted for the plan said they did so only to extend debate.
“I do not support marijuana. I don’t use it, I don’t want my kids to use it, I don’t want anyone’s kids to use it,” said Assemblyman Jared Huffman, D-San Rafael, who voted in favor. But he said he supported the plan because he wants “a more rational approach to … a failed criminalization policy.”
Full Story Committee advances bill to legalize, tax pot.
Rep. Rangel: Dems facing ‘serious problems’ on healthcare reform bill
Congressional Democrats face “serious problems” in getting a healthcare reform bill to the president’s desk, according to a House panel chairman.
“We’ve got to get a bill that’s more compatible to the House,” Ways and Means Committee Chairman Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) said Tuesday. “Forget all the other questions. Two-hundred-eighteen [votes] is the most important issue we are dealing with… We have serious problems on both sides of the Capitol. Serious problems.”
Rangel’s comments come a day after Sen. Chris Dodd (D-Conn.) said health reform is “hanging by a thread.”
Full Story Rep. Rangel: Dems facing ‘serious problems’ on healthcare reform bill – TheHill.com.
Earth to Get Close Shave Wednesday From Newly Discovered Asteroid
An asteroid 30 to 50 feet across will pass by the Earth at just more than one-third the distance between the Earth and the moon on Wednesday. That’s the closest near-Earth object approach currently known between now and the flyby in 2024 of a similar-size object known as 2007 XB23.
The new asteroid, called 2010 AL30, was discovered by the NASA-funded Lincoln Near-Earth Asteroid Research program, and announced Monday by the Minor Planet Center at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory.
The short amount of time between the spotting of the object and its near intersection with Earth is a good reminder that humans don’t know every object that could come hurtling out of space and collide with our planet.
Full Story Earth to Get Close Shave Wednesday From Newly Discovered Asteroid | Wired Science | Wired.com.
Obama will seek additional $33 billion for wars
The Obama administration plans to ask Congress for an additional $33 billion to fight unpopular wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, on top of a record request for $708 billion for the Defense Department next year, The Associated Press has learned.
The administration also plans to tell Congress next month that its central military objectives for the next four years will include winning the current wars while preventing new ones and that its core missions will include both counterinsurgency and counterterrorism operations.
The administration’s Quadrennial Defense Review, the main articulation of U.S. military doctrine, is due to Congress on Feb. 1. Top military commanders were briefed on the document at the Pentagon on Monday and Tuesday. They also received a preview of the administration’s budget plans through 2015.
Full Story Obama will seek additional $33 billion for wars | Raw Story.
Google ‘no longer willing’ to censor Chinese searches
Google appears to have already turned off Chinese filters
Internet search giant Google dropped a bombshell on Chinese authorities Tuesday with the announcement that the firm is “no longer willing to continue censoring our results on Google.cn,” the company’s portal in China.
In a lengthy explanation posted to the official Google blog, Google’s Senior Vice President David Drummond explained that the decision came after Chinese hackers used phishing scams and malware to access the Gmail accounts of Chinese human rights activists around the world.
While the post does not explain precisely who was behind the attacks, it describes a “highly sophisticated and and targeted attack on our corporate infrastructure originating from China.”
Full Story Google ‘no longer willing’ to censor Chinese searches | Raw Story.
Nine Vermont state office candidates favor secession
Peter Garritano thinks it’s time for Vermont to call it quits with America.
The way the 54-year-old automobile salesman sees it, the “empire” is about to implode and tiny Vermont can lead the way by becoming its own independent republic. So he’s running for lieutenant governor, topping a slate of secession-minded candidates seeking statewide offices this year.
Their name: Vermont Independence Day.
“The only hope is to just say, ‘Look, this isn’t working for us. We want to start fresh again, with a real democracy,’” Garritano said. “I think that’s the answer. Hopefully, it won’t take another horrible economic breakdown to realize that the people running things don’t look out for the little guy, or us, or the soldiers. It’s all about profit and getting the last drops of oil on Earth and trampling people’s rights.”
Full Story Nine Vermont state office candidates favor secession | Raw Story.
OPS: can’t wait to hear what Bernie Sanders has to say about this on Thom Hartmann’s show – Friday
SEC suit: Bank of America failed to disclose ’staggering financial losses’ to shareholders
Federal regulators sued Bank of America Corp. on Tuesday, accusing the company of failing to disclose “staggering financial losses” at Merrill Lynch before shareholders approved a combination of the companies.
The lawsuit filed by the Securities and Exchange Commission in U.S. District Court in Manhattan sought an order requiring Bank of America to pay a civil penalty for not telling shareholders it was losing $15.3 billion in the fourth quarter of 2008.
Bank of America spokesman Robert Stickler called the charges “totally without merit.”
He said the company believes it provided sufficient and appropriate disclosure to shareholders prior to their vote approving the combination.
Full Story SEC suit: Bank of America failed to disclose ’staggering financial losses’ to shareholders | Raw Story.
Mutiny: RNC members to demand Steele end book tour
Just a week after top Republican aides told RNC Chairman Michael Steele’s staff “you really have to get him to stop” making gaffes on national television, some Republican Party members have drafted a resolution to demand the party leader cancel his promotional book tour.
The proposal will be presented to RNC members at their conference at the end of this month. Former RNC General Counsel David Norcross, who held the party’s top legal post under President George H. W. Bush, told The Washington Times, “I think the motion may be the way out of this mess, a step ahead.”
Norcross was also chairman of Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign for New Jersey.
Full Story Mutiny: RNC members to demand Steele end book tour | Raw Story.
Giuliani: My ‘Warped View’ Is That Huge Wall Street Bonuses Are ‘Wonderful’
On Saturday, the New York Times reported that the “bank bonus season” that begins this week “will be one of the largest and most controversial blowouts the industry has ever seen.” “Despite calls for restraint from Washington and a chafed public, resurgent banks are preparing to pay out bonuses that rival those of the boom years. The haul, in cash and stock, will run into many billions of dollars,” reported the Times.
The reality that banks aren’t “taking immediate steps to reduce bonuses substantially” led former Citigroup CEO John Reed to slam the banks for learning nothing from the financial crisis:
Even some industry veterans warn that such paydays could further tarnish the financial industry’s sullied reputation. John S. Reed, a founder of Citigroup, said Wall Street would not fully regain the public’s trust until banks scaled back bonuses for good — something that, to many, seems a distant prospect.
“There is nothing I’ve seen that gives me the slightest feeling that these people have learned anything from the crisis,” Mr. Reed said. “They just don’t get it. They are off in a different world.”
Full Story Think Progress » Giuliani: My ‘Warped View’ Is That Huge Wall Street Bonuses Are ‘Wonderful’.
Fox Thinks Winter Chill Disproves Global Warming; Experts Disagree
Video – In recent days, conservatives have seized on the cold snap gripping the southeast region of the country to cast doubt on global warming. “Hey Al Gore: we want our global warming, and we want it now,” said Newsbusters’ Mark Finkelstein. In his newsletter today, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich wondered about “Al Gore’s explanation for this miserable, persistent chill,” and the National Review’s Mona Charen claimed that the “cold snap has spurred the ‘warmists’ to spin control.”
For the past week, Fox News host Neil Cavuto has been giving a daily “Fox News global warming alert,” which consists of him telling viewers how cold it is. “It is still cold,” Cavuto said yesterday, adding that it’s “not your recent garden variety global warming.” “It’s freezing across the entire globe,” Cavuto shouted on Saturday. Former Nixon speechwriter and actor Ben Stein responded, “Maybe somebody in the government will wake up and say, ‘Hey, it’s colder. It’s not hotter.’ Maybe all this talk about global warming needs to be rethought.” Watch a compilation:
Full Story Think Progress » Fox Thinks Winter Chill Disproves Global Warming; Experts Disagree.
Health Insurers’ Duplicitous Campaign Confirmed: Industry Covertly Gave Millions To Fund Anti-Reform Ads
Last September, ThinkProgress reported that, despite its public support for health care reform, the insurance industry was engaged in a “duplicitous” campaign to undermine the effort. Now the National Journal has confirmed that from September to December 2009, “six of the nation’s biggest health insurers began quietly pumping big money into third-party television ads aimed at killing or significantly modifying the major health reform bills moving through Congress.” The companies used America’s Health Insurance Plans — the lobbying arm of the insurance industry — “as a conduit to avoid a repeat of the political flack that hit the insurance industry after it famously ran its multi-million dollar ‘Harry and Louise’ ads to help kill health care reforms during the Clinton administration”:
That money, between $10 million and $20 million, came from Aetna, Cigna, Humana, Kaiser Foundation Health Plans, UnitedHealth Group and Wellpoint, according to two health care lobbyists familiar with the transactions. The companies are all members of the powerful trade group America’s Health Insurance Plans. The funds were solicited by AHIP and funneled to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to help underwrite tens of millions of dollars of television ads by two business coalitions set up and subsidized by the chamber. Each insurer kicked in at least $1 million and some gave multi-million dollar donations.
Watch a compilation of some of these ads:
Controlling Yemen Is Just Part of Obama’s Power Game with China
The stepped-up presence in Yemen is the latest move in an increasingly cozy three-way US-Israel-India alliance that is the emphatic counter to China’s surge.
A year ago, Yemeni President Ali Abdallah Saleh made the startling revelation that his country’s security forces apprehended a group of Islamists linked to the Israeli intelligence forces. “A terrorist cell was apprehended and will be referred to the courts for its links with the Israeli intelligence services,” he promised.
Saleh added, “You will hear about the trial proceedings.” Nothing was ever heard and the trail went cold. Welcome to the magical land of Yemen, where in the womb of time the Arabian Nights were played out.
Combine Yemen with the mystique of Islam, Osama bin Laden, al-Qaeda and the Israeli intelligence and you get a heady mix. The head of the US Central Command, General David Petraeus, dropped in at the capital, Sana’a, on Saturday and vowed to Saleh increased American aid to fight al-Qaeda. United States President Barack Obama promptly echoed Petraeus’ promise, assuring that the US would step up intelligence-sharing and training of Yemeni forces and perhaps carry out joint attacks against militants in the region.
Full Story Controlling Yemen Is Just Part of Obama’s Power Game with China | World | AlterNet.
4-Year-Old Boy Suspended From School for Months Because His Hair Is ‘Too Long’
So what’s this really about? Messed up cultural norms.
First the facts. This kid is 4-years old. Four! He’s in pre-kindergarten. His name is Taylor Pugh but he prefers the nickname Tater Tot. Do you not love him already?! All he wants to do is go back to the classroom and be with his friends. But he has been suspended since November because his hair is considered too long by his public school (which is Floyd Elementary School in suburban Dallas). His hair, by the way, barely touches his shoulders. From what I can tell, it’s also clean and brushed.
So what’s the problem? Apparently his hair violates school district dress code. Why on earth a 4-year-old has a dress code, I don’t know. I would think if you’re dealing with a bunch of kids that young, you’d pretty much just hope they show up with their shoes still on. But on further review, the school district seems to have lots of ridiculous dress restrictions. And there are some that just drive me nuts. For instance, girls can have piercings, boys cannot. Girls can have long hair, boys cannot.
So what’s this really about? Messed up cultural norms that put boys in one box and girls in the other and don’t allow any kind of freedom of expression. What do the people of Texas think will go wrong if a boy has long hair? Does it have anything to do with *gasp* gender identity? Will it get in the way of that algebra they’re surely teaching 4-year-olds? I’m guessing the only thing that really interferes with education is not letting a kid go to class.
GeithnerGate: Obama’s Treasury Sec. Should Get the Boot and Let’s Take Our Money Back Too | Corporate Accountability and WorkPlace | AlterNet
By all means, let’s fire Geithner — and let’s also target Wall Street as a whole. Also: MSNBC Host Dylan Ratigan’s case against Geithner.
Cover-up revelations keep coming about Timothy Geithner’s secret assistance to AIG. The latest show that he urged AIG not to disclose how it would be shoveling money to Goldman Sachs and other large financial institutions by paying off its credit default swaps at par value instead of much less.
More than $60 billion changed hands that shouldn’t have if Geithner had played hard ball. Therefore, the charge is that Geithner should be bounced because he was protecting the banks’ interests ahead of the public interest. He may also have protecting himself during his confirmation hearings.
Ok, string him up. But what about recapturing the loot?
Is the Fermented Tea Kombucha Really the Healing Wonder Drink It’s Cracked Up to Be?
They say it cures cancer. They—and by “they” I mean the nameless, faceless but seemingly unlimited horde of strangers on the Internet—also say it cures diabetes, migraines, asthma, acne, AIDS, hangovers, psoriasis, insomnia, fatigue, bronchitis, arteriosclerosis, bad eyesight, cold sores and erectile dysfunction. They say it reverses the aging process, smoothing out wrinkles, growing hair on formerly bald scalps and transforming gray heads back into brown, black, red and blonde. They say it soothes menstrual cramps, smoothes cellulite and cures cancer. They’re talking about kombucha, a fermented tea drink containing probiotics, polyphenols, amino acids, enzymes, minerals and more. It tastes pickled, sparkly and faintly alive. Sometimes it contains small, slimy lumps that slither down your throat. But, hey.
I’m a hypochondriac. Not the cartoon kind who haunts doctors offices demanding daily MRIs and colonoscopies for nonexistent heart murmurs and rare tropical parasites. My hypochondria is more selective, more refined. I fear only one ailment: cancer. The moment I detect the slightest spot or twitch, I am convinced it can mean only one thing, and that it’s terminal. My mind arrives at this conclusion automatically and instantly. I’ve never had cancer, nor have any known relatives. I’m physically fit, a vegetarian for 20 years, and have never smoked or worked in hazardous industries. Yet by the time I even start to marshal a rational thought, it’s too late and I’m having a panic attack. I’m working on this issue now, addressing fear as an addiction, but all my life I have been its slave, quivering on its spike.
Full Story Is the Fermented Tea Kombucha Really the Healing Wonder Drink It’s Cracked Up to Be? | Food | AlterNet.
The New Recession Generation
As America slowly emerges from the edge of an economic catastrophe, the psychological effects of the downturn are only now coming to light. In past recessions many predicted that the downturn would have the effect of reining in American consumerism. In each case, material accumulation came back with a vengeance.
This time however, many economists, scholars, and academics see things differently. Since World War II the United States has always chased its downturns with a time of lavish.
Americans witnessed this phenomenon just a few years ago, after the Internet boom went bust the economy sputtered before returning to its old ways. In a sense, the persistence of our spending mentality is both an economic engine and a built-in ticking time bomb. Our spending gets us into trouble, and our spending traditionally helps get us out of it.
Full Story The New Recession Generation | Economy In Crisis.
White House Alters How Stimulus Jobs are Counted
Now, businesses will be required to report all jobs on projects funded by the stimulus, regardless of whether it was an existing job or not.
Amid a barrage of criticisms over how the administration tracked jobs created by the $787 billion stimulus package, the White House last month quietly issued a directive changing the way those numbers are reported to the government, according to CNNMoney.com.
Previously, the Obama administration had attempted to calculate the number of “jobs created or saved” through the stimulus package. The jobs saved numbers were widely criticized as being highly subjective and impossible to judge.
Instead, businesses will begin to change the way they report their numbers to the government. Now, businesses will be required to report all jobs on projects funded by the stimulus, regardless of whether it was an existing job or not.
Full Story White House Alters How Stimulus Jobs are Counted | Economy In Crisis.
Firefighters Rip Obama For Breaking Campaign Promise Over Cadillac Tax | TPMDC
The International Association of Fire Fighters–an influential union that belongs to the AFL-CIO–has released the strongest condemnation yet of President Obama’s support for taxing high-end health insurance plans as a means of financing a major health care overhaul–accusing him of breaking a campaign promise, and threatening to hold him accountable.
“If candidates make a promise to us, we hold them accountable. We held President Bush accountable when he made decisions that had a negative impact on our members’ jobs and lives. We will do the same with President Obama,” reads a statement from IAFF President Harold Schaitberger. “In 2008, then-candidate Obama promised three things: he said he would not raise taxes on folks making less than $250,000 a year; he vowed not to tax health insurance benefits; and he promised that under his health reform plan, people would be able to keep their existing coverage.”
Full Story Firefighters Rip Obama For Breaking Campaign Promise Over Cadillac Tax | TPMDC.
AFL-CIO Chief: In Rebuilding The U.S. Economy, ‘There Is No Middle Ground’
The leader of the nation’s largest organized labor association exhorted U.S. policymakers to continue taking bold action, and resist the urge to “go slow–take half steps,” in order to not only create new American jobs in the face of crushing unemployment, but to create “an entirely different kind of economy.”
Richard Trumka, president of the 11-million-member AFL-CIO, also proposes adoption of a new tax financial speculation to fund his ambitious vision.
“Working people want an American economy that works for them—-that creates good jobs, where wealth is fairly shared, and where the economic life of our nation is about solving problems like the threat of climate change rather than creating problems like the foreclosure crisis,” says Trumka, in remarks delivered Monday in Washington. “We know that growing inequality undermines our ability to grow as a nation –- by squandering the talents and the contributions of our people and consigning entire communities to stagnation and failure.
Full Story On The Hill: AFL-CIO Chief: In Rebuilding The U.S. Economy, ‘There Is No Middle Ground’.
Quake-stunned Haitians pile bodies by fallen homes
Haitians piled bodies along the devastated streets of their capital Wednesday after the strongest earthquake hit the poor Caribbean nation in more than 200 years crushed thousands of structures, from schools and shacks to the National Palace and the U.N. peacekeeping headquarters. Untold numbers were still trapped.
The devastation was so complete that it seemed likely the death toll from Tuesday afternoon’s magnitude-7.0 quake would run into the thousands. France’s foreign minister said the head of the U.N. peacekeeping mission was apparently among the dead.
International Red Cross spokesman Paul Conneally said an estimated 3 million people may have been affected by the quake and that it would take a day or two for a clear picture of the damage to emerge.
Full Story Quake-stunned Haitians pile bodies by fallen homes – Yahoo! News.
Blackwater/Xe mercs arrive in Somalia, Al-Shabab says
At least 18 people have been killed in clashes between rival factions in southern and central Somalia, and there are reports that Blackwater/Xe mercenaries have entered the country.
A battle broke out between the pro-government Ahlu Sunnah militia and Hizbul Islam fighters in the town of Baladwayne on Sunday and went well into Monday, during which at least 13 people lost their lives, witnesses said.
In addition, five people were killed when Hizbul Islam fighters engaged Al-Shabab fighters in the town of Dhobley near the Kenyan border, Reuters reported.
There are also allegations of US-sponsored bomb plots in the capital.
Full Story Blackwater/Xe mercs arrive in Somalia, Al-Shabab says.
Venezuela starts nationwide energy rationing
Rolling four-hour outages every other day; drought cuts dam’s output
Venezuela’s government imposed rolling blackouts of four hours every other day throughout the country on Tuesday to combat an energy crisis.
President Hugo Chavez
has said rationing is necessary to prevent water levels in Guri Dam — the cornerstone of Venezuela’s energy system — from falling to critical lows and causing a widespread power collapse. Drought has cut the flow of water into the dam, which feeds three hydroelectric plants that supply 73 percent of Venezuela’s electricity.
Rolling blackouts will begin in the capital of Caracas on Wednesday, said Javier Alvarado, president of the city’s state electric utility.
Full Story Venezuela starts nationwide energy rationing – Venezuela- msnbc.com.
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Republicans Don't Care about Voter Fraud....owa Republicans are trying to dismiss claims that the vote count in Tuesday's Iowa Caucus was wrong. An Iowa voter told a local TV station yesterday that he noticed a 20-vote discrepancy in the count - and that Rick Santorum was the real winner of the Caucuses. Republican Party officials, though, are sticking to their first count - showing Mitt Romney as the winner by 8-votes - and there will be no recount.The Republican Party has launched a war on voters around the nation this year with strict new laws that will disenfranchise over 5 million Americans. They claim these laws are necessary to combat so-called voter fraud. Yet in Iowa - where there are no such laws - and where a very, very close and questionable election was just held - Republicans don't seem to care at all about getting it right.Clearly - the war on voters isn't about making sure the people's voices are represented accurately - it's about making sure poor people, young people, and minorities who tend to vote for Democrats - can't vote at all.-Thom(Who do you think won? Tell us here.) -
LEGALIZE Democracy
" We the corporations" On January 21, 2010, with its ruling in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Supreme Court ruled that corporations are persons, entitled by the U.S. Constitution to buy elections and run our government. __________
MOVE to AMEND
a project of the CAMPAIGN TO LEGALIZE Democracy
Help end Corporate personhood
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The modern conservative is engaged in one of man's oldest exercises in moral philosophy; that is, the search for a superior moral justification for selfishness. 
