The Federal Open Market Committee Released its Statement Today

They kept interest rates at effectively 0%, which is not a surprise.

What was a bit of a surprise, though they did telegraph is were the facts that their statement was significantly more downbeat, and they effectively put a halt to their gradual monetary tightening:

Federal Reserve officials made their first attempt to bolster the economy in more than a year, saying they will maintain their holdings of securities to stop money from draining out of the financial system.

The central bank will reinvest principal payments on mortgage assets it holds into long-term Treasuries after judging that “the pace of economic recovery is likely to be more modest in the near term than had been anticipated,” the Federal Open Market Committee said in a statement after meeting today in Washington.

So, as opposed to simply retiring their securities, they will roll them over, though I would differ with their characterization of 2-year treasuries are "long term".

It's a mild improvement on their earlier position of gradual tightening, but I'm with Paul Krugman:

I know: it’s a heck of a way to make policy. In a better world, the Fed would look at the state of the economy and do what was right, not the minimum necessary. But wishing for that kind of world is like wishing that Ben Bernanke were running the place.

Heh.

Krugman worked with Bernanke at Princeton, and because of this, he has been rather gentle with him, but I think that he is losing patience.

Full statement after break:

Press Release

Release Date: August 10, 2010

For immediate release

Information received since the Federal Open Market Committee met in June indicates that the pace of recovery in output and employment has slowed in recent months. Household spending is increasing gradually, but remains constrained by high unemployment, modest income growth, lower housing wealth, and tight credit. Business spending on equipment and software is rising; however, investment in nonresidential structures continues to be weak and employers remain reluctant to add to payrolls. Housing starts remain at a depressed level. Bank lending has continued to contract. Nonetheless, the Committee anticipates a gradual return to higher levels of resource utilization in a context of price stability, although the pace of economic recovery is likely to be more modest in the near term than had been anticipated.

Measures of underlying inflation have trended lower in recent quarters and, with substantial resource slack continuing to restrain cost pressures and longer-term inflation expectations stable, inflation is likely to be subdued for some time.

The Committee will maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 0 to 1/4 percent and continues to anticipate that economic conditions, including low rates of resource utilization, subdued inflation trends, and stable inflation expectations, are likely to warrant exceptionally low levels of the federal funds rate for an extended period.

To help support the economic recovery in a context of price stability, the Committee will keep constant the Federal Reserve's holdings of securities at their current level by reinvesting principal payments from agency debt and agency mortgage-backed securities in longer-term Treasury securities.¹ The Committee will continue to roll over the Federal Reserve's holdings of Treasury securities as they mature.

The Committee will continue to monitor the economic outlook and financial developments and will employ its policy tools as necessary to promote economic recovery and price stability.

Voting for the FOMC monetary policy action were: Ben S. Bernanke, Chairman; William C. Dudley, Vice Chairman; James Bullard; Elizabeth A. Duke; Donald L. Kohn; Sandra Pianalto; Eric S. Rosengren; Daniel K. Tarullo; and Kevin M. Warsh.

Voting against the policy was Thomas M. Hoenig, who judges that the economy is recovering modestly, as projected. Accordingly, he believed that continuing to express the expectation of exceptionally low levels of the federal funds rate for an extended period was no longer warranted and limits the Committee's ability to adjust policy when needed. In addition, given economic and financial conditions, Mr. Hoenig did not believe that keeping constant the size of the Federal Reserve's holdings of longer-term securities at their current level was required to support a return to the Committee's policy objectives.

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1. The Open Market Desk will issue a technical note shortly after the statement providing operational details on how it will carry out these transactions. Return to text

Ted Stephens is Dead

He died in a small plane crash in Alaska.

He was an SOB, and he reveled in it, though I think that he would argue that he was Alaska's SOB.

My take on his career is that he was not a benefit to the United States, and at best mixed for Alaska, which he was largely responsible for making into a corrupt petro-state.

Additionally, I agree with Zachary Roth, that it is far too likely that we will see a full blown hagiography which ignores the fact that he was actually very corrupt, deriving significant personal benefit from his position, whether or not the government could have successfully retried him after he won a dismissal on prosecutorial misconduct.

Your Moment of Eric Blair*

U.S. forces are staying in Iraq to prevent foreign powers from meddling with the new government Gen. Ray Odierno said Sunday.

Our occupation of Iraq will continue in order to prevent foreign interference in the oil nation.

Irony is dead.

^*George Orwell's real name.

How to Save the US Post Office

It turns out that the USPS makes much of its money from junk mail, and
Zac Bissonnette has a brilliant way to use this to make the big banks bankroll the Post Office, which is a good way to support Saturday service, and its flat rate for anywhere in the country:

Almost daily, I receive at least one pre-approved credit card offer from a big national bank that received bailout money from U.S. taxpayers. I hate big banks, and I hate bailouts, and I really hate it when my bailout money is used to send me junk mail I didn't ask for and don't want.

………

Instead, a grassroots bailout -- this time, of the post office. This time, paid for by the bailed-out banks. We can do it. Here's how: From now on, don't just throw out those credit card offers. Instead, put the paperwork in the "postage will be paid by addressee" envelope (first removing anything with your name on it) and drop it back in the mailbox. You've just transferred the cost of mailing that letter from the not-so-needy Chase/Citi/Bank of America to the oh-so-needy USPS. Who needs Robin Hood when we have postage-paid envelopes?

The U.S. has 307 million people. If each person received an average of just one credit card offer a month (most adults get more than that, while children get none) and mailed it back to the bank without a signed application, at a cost to the bank of 44 cents postage, U.S. consumers could transfer $135 million a month from the banks to the Postal Service.

Truth be told, the net for the USPS is less than that, but it's probably at least a dime, since much of what we pay is for maintaining the the postal infrastructure.

I'm not suggesting that you use it to send a brick, that would be abusive, but it is a good way to generate some additional revenue for your Postal Service.

It also has the advantage of raising the cost to junk mailers to sending you this crap, which might make them send you less crap.

If They Believe It, It's Wrong

Because they are always wrong about everything:

The U.S. economy will improve slowly and another round of fiscal stimulus probably wouldn’t be effective, former Treasury secretaries Paul O’Neill and Robert Rubin said.

Truth be told, I haven't followed Paul O'Neill closely, but Bob Rubin should be on trial for a long history of fraud, and should not be taken seriously since he drove Citi into the ditch.

Mo stimulus, Mo stimulus, Mo stimulus!

Seriously, these guys are the Washington Generals of finance.

Another Place Where Obama is Doubling Down on Bush Policies…

Education, where the Bush era assault on public schools and teachers unions continues apace, so despite the demonstrated fact that charter schools do not produce better results, and despite the fact that the focus on testing has produced widespread fraud, Obama is doubling down with privatizing education in the same way the Dick Cheney privatized core military functions.

What's more, a former George H.W. Bush Assistant Secretary of Education, Diane Ravitch, is now denouncing these policies:

DIANE RAVITCH: Well, I think that what happened in New York City is—shows that the direction he’s taking is wrong, because everything he is proposing in Race to the Top and also in his blueprint will rely on exactly the kinds of methods that led to a massive fraud in New York state—that is, that Race to the Top is requiring states to judge teachers by the student test scores, and we now know, based on this immense fraud in the city and in the state of New York, that the test scores are not reliable. So teachers will be judged by unreliable data, and we’re going to dismantle the teaching profession in pursuit of this mechanical fix that won’t work.

If there is lower class of scum than the war profiteers like Halliburton, who profit off our wars, it's the Education profiteers like the Edison schools, who profit off our children.

There might be an excuse if this crap worked, but it doesn't, and since No Child Left Behind was implemented, the racial and economic gaps between children have widened, because the educational reform establishment believes that the only thing that needs to be done to fix schools is to f%$# teachers.

Our Man in Afghanistan

Afghan President Hamid Karzai is attempting to seize control of the anti-corruption probes in Afghanistan (also here):

Obama administration officials fear that a move by Afghan President Hamid Karzai to assert control over U.S.-backed corruption investigations might provoke the biggest crisis in U.S.-Afghan relations since last year's fraud-riddled election and could further threaten congressional approval of billions of dollars in pending aid.

I wonder why? It couldn't be that anyone that he knows, or is close to him, is corrupt, could it?

For this puke, we lost 3 soldiers today.

I Love General J. C. Christian*

He has come up with Burn the Confederate Flag Day, to be held on September 12:

Burn The Confederate Flag Day

Burn the Confederate Flag Day is a protest against the right's exploitation of racial prejudice for political gain. We urge you to burn the Confederate flag, a long-time symbol of racial hatred, on Sept 12, the date when the racially-divisive Tea Party holds its annual hate fest.

Brilliant.

^*In a 110% purely heterosexual kind of way, of course, as the General would say.

Naomi Campbell Should Go to Jail

I understand that she's a model, and so I really don't care all that much about her flirting with former Liberian dictator, and accused war criminal, Charles Taylor, and getting gifts, in this case blood diamonds, as a result.

That being said, she testified in front of the war crimes trial at the Hague about the diamonds, and what happened, and her former agent and actress Mia Farrow contradicted her on every point. (also here)

I'm sure that Ms. Campbell is embarrasses about (almost literally) playing footsie with a murderous dictator, but it's clear that she is perjuring herself for no good reason.

I Am Not a Finance Guy, But I Have Some Warning Signs………

And they are:

• Opaque markets where ask and bid prices are not known by the participants.
• Opaque financial instruments that seem to generate return and safety at the same time.
• Minimal disclosures.
• Promises from the sellers that they will take care of clients without regulation.

So we see all of this in so-called structured notes:

Wall Street banks are creating the “next investment bubble” by selling opaque and unregulated structured notes to investors hunting for yield, according to Christopher Whalen, managing director of Institutional Risk Analytics.

Using the same “loophole” that allowed over-the-counter sales of collateralized debt obligations and auction-rate securities, firms are pitching illiquid structured notes whose value is partly derived from bets on interest rates, Whalen wrote today in a report.

What's even worse:

Individual investors, who “love the higher yields” on structured notes, will lose money when benchmark interest rates climb, according to Whalen.

“We already know of two hedge funds that are being established specifically to buy this crap from distressed retail investors as and when rates start to rise,” said Whalen, a former Federal Reserve Bank of New York official and co-founder of the Torrance, California-based research firm.

What this means is that when the economy starts to recover, and interest rates rise, we will see another bubble pop and push us down.

Lovely.

Kidnapped, Made to Smoke a Bong, and Worship Aqua Buddha?

We have a report that as a some sort of twisted college prank, while an undergraduate at Baylor, Rand Paul and his friends kidnapped a coed, and then made her take bong hits worship "Aqua Buddha" in a stream.

This is whack, and I hope that Paul doesn't do drugs any more, but it raises a question: If he was into this, why did he go to Baylor, where they ban premarital sex because it might lead to dancing.

This is a weird news day.

Obama Consensus Building: The Incumbent Oligopolies Win, We Lose

Google and Verizon have released the details of their carve up the internet among the big players proposal:

Google Inc. and Verizon Communications Inc. on Monday called for equal treatment of most Internet traffic while at the same time saying fast-growing cellular networks and yet-to-be-developed broadband services should be exempt from such restrictions.

Google and Verizon released a proposal arguing that broadband providers shouldn't be able to discriminate against Internet content providers. Marcelo Prince and Amy Schatz discuss. Also, Dennis Berman discusses why bond investors are giving up on recovery and jobs.

The ideas outlined in the proposal put forth by the Internet search giant and one of the largest broadband providers stand in contrast to the Federal Communications Commission's recent proposals on "net neutrality" rules, which would prevent companies from giving preferential handling to certain types of online traffic.

In Google's case, the proposal's endorsements of two-tier Internet service and a hands-off approach to cellular-based Web services represent a break with many other online companies, which have argued for strict neutrality in how Internet traffic is treated. Google itself previously expressed general support for rules prohibiting discrimination among forms of Web traffic.

This is a direct consequence of the tenor and approach of Barack Obama. It is clear that in internet access, the incumbents have taken billions of government subsidies, and used this money to cement their monopoly positions, rather than improvement access.

It's why US internet performance and penetration^* is the worst in the developed world.

These are not people who you partner with to get the outcome you want, these are people you defeat to get the outcomes you want.

As to the long term consequences, I'll go with what Atrios says:

I'm one who thinks that ultimately the forces of light will prevail and the repeated attempts to carve out internet walled gardens will, over the long run, fail as killing the internet would... kill the internet. But the long run is a long time and companies will likely screw and gouge us over the not very short run unless the FCC acts.

So not hopey changey, and as I have said before, this sort of craven acquiescence to the incumbent players who screwed everything in the first place appears to be a core philosophy of Barack Obama and His Clueless Minions^™, whether it be telecommunications, finance, healthcare, etc.

^*That sounds dirty, doesn't it?

This is Not The Onion

E=mc²: Could it be ………… Satan?

Andy Schlafley, daughter of noted wingnut Phyllis, has declared that Einstein's theory of relativity is a liberal conspiracy:

The theory of relativity is a mathematical system that allows no exceptions. It is heavily promoted by liberals who like its encouragement of relativism and its tendency to mislead people in how they view the world.

……

See, e.g., historian Paul Johnson's book about the 20th century, and the article written by liberal law professor Laurence Tribe as allegedly assisted by Barack Obama. Virtually no one who is taught and believes relativity continues to read the Bible, a book that outsells New York Times bestsellers by a hundred-fold

Seriously, you cannot make this sh$# up.

I Would Never Endorse Computer Hacking…

But this bit of hacking is prize:

Somewhere in the world, someone must have woke up, went to his computer and thought to himself, “I’m going to hack Fox News today.” At least that’s how I imagine things started out today for the currently unnamed hacker who gained access to the Fox News online radio newscast dashboard.

He’s either got a lot of time on his hands, is incredibly skilled or received help from others. If you look at the above photo, you’ll see a screenshot of the Fox News Radio popup that you get when you try to listen live to the online newscast on http://radio.foxnews.com/. It says the title of the next radio program is. “Glenn Beck Raped And Murdered A Girl In 1990.” And there’s more.

The entire list of shows has been tampered with. Right now, the Fox News Radio popup shows that the next newscast is going to be “Naruto.” Everything on the list now is an anime of some sort.

I can't approve the Anime bit, but this is prize.

H/t Vonbecks Temper

Meteor AAM Video Pr0n

It highlights the better endgame kinematics and range available with a ramjet powered missile.

One of the things that surprises me is just how much smoke the initial booster puts out relative to the AMRAAM, which would increase launch platform visibility in visual range.

This implies to me that the European militaries planning to purchase this expect anticipate that its use in relative short range engagements, so I would expect that at least doctrinally, the minimum engagement distance for the missile would be a lot greater than that of the AMRAAM. (Reportedly 2km)

The music is a little bet better than most of these promotional videos:

Another Solution to Limited Look Angles of AESA Radars

One solution, which I have posted about before, is the swash plate radar (also here), and the Russians are looking at mounting an AESA Radar on a conventional (though likely beefed up) radar actuators, and now we have radar mount that uses two oblique rotary bearings, rather like the 3 bearing nozzle on the STOVL version of the F-35 engine exhaust, to get off axis performance approaching that of conventional planar array radars.

One of the advantages appears to be that it avoids antenna polarization issues, and another advantage would be that conventional connectors for power, signal, and cooling could be used.

The original concept would have required slip rings and rotary fittings, which would likely have been maintenance headaches.

I Place This Up There With Soviet Super-Chopper Claims

Skylon is claiming that it will have its liquid air engine ready for test in 3-4 years.

Considering the fact that it's really being run on a shoe string, I simply do not find this a credible timeline.

Additionally (top video) it's reentry profile appears to be problematic to me. The knife edge canard appears to be in a weak shock on reentry, which means that the surface temperature would much higher than in something like a space capsule, or the relatively blunt edged shuttle wing leading edges, where much of the heating occurs in a strong shock that is some distance from in front of any structures, but I am not an aerodynamicist.

If you look at the bottom video, from a couple of years ago, where Richard Varvill, Technical Director of Reaction Engines Limited talks about a 12+ year development cycle with a demonstration of the heat exchangers in 3 years, that sounds rather more realistic.

The bottom vid is also a nice primer on the basic operation of the Sabre engine.

My earlier post on the vehicle and engine.

The Cat Food Commission* is At It Again

Well, we already know that the Republicans on Obama's "Deficit Reduction Commission" are marching lock-step against any meaningful tax increases, and now we know that when push comes to shove, they will cut military pay and benefits over any sort of sanity in weapons systems procurement:

A source familiar with the proceedings of the working group on discretionary spending tells TPM that some commissioners, including one military contractor, would prefer to save money by freezing military pay and scaling back benefits, rather than by eliminating waste in defense contracting.

……

According to the source, [Honeywell CEO David] Cote and other members, including the commission's co-chair Alan Simpson, are focusing instead on "freezing military pay, making military people pay for their health care."

Because that waste is what this "military contractor" calls his "annual bonus."

It's all about someone else taking the hit on this.

On the brighter side, this makes any adoption of any proposals from Cat Food Commission^* that much less likely to be adopted, because this is a completely clueless move.

I would also note that the uniformed military personnel levels are near a post WWII low, so the reason that the budget is exploding is not that we have 8 million active duty servicemen.

One wonders though, who is leaking all of this to Brian Beutler, and why are they doing so?

^*In the interest of health, I would suggest that people eat dog food, and not cat food. Cats because they are one of the few true carnivores, do not need the complex carbohydrates and fats that people, and dogs do. As such, dog food is better for you than cat food because it provides carbs and essential fatty acids. A dog can go blind if it is fed on cat food, but a cat lives just fine on dog food. The phenomenon is known as rabbit starvation.

Dutch Defer JSF Decision Again

It looks like they might buy a 2^nd test aircraft, in order to preserve some workshare for Dutch firms, but that it's unlikely that they will sign a deal for a production run at this time.

Not surprising, they are undergoing austerity cuts to meet Euro zone budget guidelines, cutting, "education, healthcare and social security spending," so why purchase an aircraft that costs (at least) 5 times as much as the F-15, and costs (at least) twice as much to operate?

H/t ELP Defens(c)e Blog:

No, And What Is He Smoking?

James Pethokoukis, whose work I have not followed, but appears to have a fair amount of respect from the blogs that I read, is reporting that a number of sources in the Obama administration saying that the GSEs (Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac), will, at taxpayer expense, engage in a massive program of principal reduction to underwater homeowners:

Main Street may be about to get its own gigantic bailout. Rumors are running wild from Washington to Wall Street that the Obama administration is about to order government-controlled lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to forgive a portion of the mortgage debt of millions of Americans who owe more than what their homes are worth. ……

The motivation, apparently, is electoral politics:

The move, if it happens, would be a stunning political and economic bombshell less than 100 days before a midterm election in which Democrats are currently expected to suffer massive, if not historic losses. The key date to watch is August 17 when the Treasury Department holds a much-hyped meeting on the future of Fannie and Freddie. …

If you go to the article, and I suggest that you do, because I am just relying on my gut, you also see that investment bankers are talking to their clients to insurance themselves against such a possibility.

I take the statements of investment bankers with a grain of salt. Their job is to make people buy and sell securities, since they profit each time.

That being said, here is my take:

• HAMP is an abject failure, because, once again, Barack Obama, as well as Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dumber (Geithner and Summers) decided that banks were their "partners", and they just needed some incentives and no oversight.
• Additionally, the abject failure of HAMP is not beginning to hit the news, which might lead to damage control.
• Obama is concerned about losses in November.
• Notwithstanding what the teabaggers say, Obama is NOT a socialist, he is very much a corporatist, and the idea of this sort of massive government bailout to ordinary people is an anathema to him. He honestly does not want the government to be that activist.
  
• Obama is, and remains, terrified of Republican accusations of socialism.

So, it ain't gonna happen. We may see something to fix HAMP, my suggestion would be bankers arrested and made to do the perp walk, but it will be something relatively minor.

Devaluing the dollar, as Roosevelt did, or massive debt forgiveness is simply not in the cards.

Heck, he can't even bring himself to bring back bankruptcy cramdown for home mortgages.

Times Are Tough for Boeing…

Jon Ostrower finds this gem in America's Finest News Source:

CHICAGO—With the airline industry continuing to suffer under the ongoing recession, the Boeing Company was forced Monday to lay off Al Freedman, the only guy left at the corporation who knows how to keep wings from falling off planes. …………

This is Just Unbelievably Cool

It's called The Ghosts of World War II's Past (20 photos), and all of the photos merge this well:





Wow.

What a Remarkably Unambitious Goal

After much study, the Congressionally mandated to review the Pentagon's Quadrennial Defense Review has determined that it takes too long to develop and deploy new weaopons, and so there should be a 7 year limit to developing weapons systems:

To avoid this problem in the future, Perry and co-chair Steven Hadley want defense contractors to be held to a tight five to seven year development phase. "Past experience indicates that, with proper management authority and accountability, it is possible to deliver relevant military capabilities for current operations in weeks and months, and to deliver longer-term and broader increments of military capability in 5 to 7 years," noted the pair in the report. "The 5- to 7-year time span is consistent with the march of technology, changes in the operational environment, and changes in operational needs to shape and respond to that environment."

Sorry, but that is at least twice as long as it should be.

This is a remarkably timid conclusion, kind of like saying that you should not exceed 70 mph in a school zone.

US Aerospace/Antonov Out of KCX Competition

Rather unsurprisingly, they missed the deadline, which is not surprising, since they seemed not ready for prime time.

Equally unsurprising is the fact that they have filed a protest with the GAO.

The cynic in me wonders if that was not the intention the whole time, to kinda file, and then use a GEO protest as a way to generate some ransom money.

Then again, now that the details have come out, the messenger showed up at the gate at 1:30, was delayed there, and then given bad directions by the gate guards, resulting in a 2:05 stamp, 5 minutes late, perhaps it is incompetence, or maybe the USAF had enough of this crap, and decided to play some hardball as US Aerospace claims.

Pass the popcorn.

You might as well watch. Your tax dollars are paying for this.

The Trippiest Russian Military Demonstrations Ever

Them Russkies Know How to Drive a Tank


Seeing a tank do motocross jumps is almost as weird as the guys with the flaming helmets

Courtesy of Danger Room.

I do have a couple of geek notes about these displays:

First, look at the main gun: They have a larger bore (125 mm vs 120 mm in the west) and a longer length, which implies to me that, probably for metallurgical issues related to wear, they operate at a lower pressure than the western (German) guns, and make up for it with barrel length and bore diameter.

Also, Russian tank suspension ant track designers take a back seat to no one.

I half expected one of the tanks to throw a track.

Finally, is it just me, or did the tanks curtsy at the end of the top video?

Israel's Iron Dome Completes Testing

Click for full size

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Launcher

Israel has completed tests on its Iron Dome defense system, successfully intercepting rockets and mortar targets:

Iron Dome is developed and produced by Rafael Advanced Defense Systems. During the final testS in Southern Israel, Iron Dome successfully engaged salvos of live rockets and mortar shells. With participation of teams from the IAF Iron Dome air defense battalion, the system repeatedly engaged rocket salvos and mortar shells in increasingly complex scenarios.

The system demonstrated effective detection and intercept of targets above and below cloud cover, while maintaining "keep-out zones" for integration with air traffic over the protected area. Iron Dome detected, tracked and selectively engaged only those targets presenting a threat to the area being protected. This feature - unique to the Israeli active defense system - is attributed to the multimode radar (MMR) and battle management and weapon control (BMC) system developed specially for the Iron Dome.

Obviously the first two locations for deployment would be on the Gaza border, near Sderot, and the Lebanese border.

Then again, it may not be deployed, because it is so damn expensive:

Yet, the IDF is reluctant to buy it, grumbling over the cost of each Iron Dome intercept, estimated at nearly $50,000, compared to the estimated $500 cost of a Palestinian rocket. Press reports put Iron Dome development costs at $250 million, with each battery costing about $50 million.

Truth be told, I think that the number for a Katyusha or Kassam is a bit high, and the mortar round is probably under %59.

There are also rumors that the system was actually developed for export to Singapore, with defense to be conducted by installations of land based Phalanx Gatling guns. (See also here for more on export customers, as well as a potential co-installation with Spike-NLOS SSMs, which I assume are for counter-battery fire)

Once again, we have missile defense running into a very simple brick wall: It's something on the order of 100 times more expensive than the threat it is intercepting.

My New Philosophy

No clue as to the source, but it's funny, and NSFW, as hell.

F*ck It - watch more funny videos

(on edit)
It appears to have come from the Dave Chapelle show.

Better Than Pride and Prejudice and Zombies

Jane Austen's Fight Club:


It's not just a send up of Jane Austen, and Fight Club, but also of those damn Merchant-Ivory films.

It's Bank Failure Friday!!!!

And here they are, ordered, and numbered for the year so far.

109. Ravenswood Bank, Chicago, IL

Full FDIC list

So it is a slow Friday for bank closings, but the credit union closings mostly make up for that:

11. Norbel Credit Union, Fort Collins, CO
    
12. Certified Federal Credit Union, Commerce, CA
    
13. Kappa Alpha Psi, Addison, TX

The NCUA has been busy over the past week.

Full NCUA list

So, here is the graph pr0n with trendline (FDIC only):



I would note that are now at the point where the utility of the least squares trendline is diminishing, but I'm keeping it here for historical purposes.

Your Friday of Muppets

Muppet Labs Experiment 5T832: Ghost Hunt

The NFP is Out

And Non-Farm Payroll fell by 131,000 last month, though that is because the US Census cut 143,000 temp jobs.

In the private sector, the seasonally adjusted private payrolls rose 71,000, less than the predicted 90K, and well under the 125-150K necessary to keep up with workforce growth.

Additionally, the May and June numbers were revised down by about 97K.

Why people aren't running around with their hair on fire about this, I simply do not understand.

Funeral for a Friend

Click for full size

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The Truck is Here


It Hooks Up


It's Pulls It Up


Ready to Roll to the Bone Yard

Play It Off, Elton

As I mentioned a month and half ago, my wife's Honda Odyssey died, and we got a new car.

Well, we finally completed arrangements, and donated the car to Kars4Kids, and they picked up the car, a 1994 Honda Odyssey.

If I recall correctly, we picked it up in 1998, used, and when it breathed its last, it had 262,930 miles, so it was not a bad run.

I'm glad that this is finally over and done with, but there is a bit of melencholy associsted with the event.

In any case, scroll down for your dose of Elton John.

Why Yes, The Obama Administration is Paying to Offshore Your Job

It's called the Business Process Outsourcing (BPO),and USAID is spending $30 million dollars to train workers in Sri Lanka in order to outsource IT jobs from the United States:

Under director Rajiv Shah [an Obama political appointee], the United States Agency for International Development will partner with private outsourcers in Sri Lanka to teach workers there advanced IT skills like Enterprise Java (Java EE) programming, as well as skills in business process outsourcing and call center support. USAID will also help the trainees brush up on their English language proficiency.

USAID is contributing about $10 million to the effort, while its private partners are investing roughly $26 million.

"To help fill workforce gaps in BPO and IT, USAID is teaming up with leading BPO and IT/English language training companies to establish professional IT and English skills development training centers," the U.S. Embassy in Colombo, Sri Lanka, said in a statement posted Friday on its Web site.

"Courses in Business Process Outsourcing, Enterprise Java, and English Language Skills will be offered at no charge to over 3,000 under- and unemployed students who will then participate in on-the-job training schemes with private firms," the embassy said.

Oh, I forgot to add, they are also doing this in Armenia.

I don't think that Barack Obama really wants to send your jobs overseas, but I do think that there are people in his administration are "strongly free trade" and they think that being "strongly free trade" means that agencies of the US government have an obligation to move jobs out of the country in this manner, on the theory that one day, eventually, these countries will develop a middle class that will buy the sh%$ that we make.

Still, if this is not on the front page of some right wing blogger in the next 3 days, I would be very surprised.

It betrays a level of political incompetence and arrogance that positively boggles the mind.

I'm going to check and see if it is on Slashdot, and if not, I'll do some blog whoring with the story.

Clovis's Lobotomy Scar! What the F%$#?

Remember when I posted about Barry Ritholtz's masterful take-down of the ongoing scam that is the Glen Beck Goldline scam?

What? You don't?

Look at my last post, including the informative graphic.

That's it, just scroll down a bit……Do you see it not?……Good!

Now, look to your left, where the tall banner ad is.

What do you see? Why it's an ad from the scamming pig-felching rat bastards at Goldline!

If you don't see it, here is the add, with the phone number obscured.

You see, Google™ Adsense™ is at it again.

I'm beginning to think that they don't use computers, but instead they use trained monkeys to determine which ads to serve!

If they aren't serving scammers, or right wingers like Fred Thompson pitching extension of the Bush Tax cuts, then they are pitching spammers like Constant Contact.

Unfortunately, I am way too small a fish to attract anyone else…………I dream of the day when I qualify for Blogads.

<Banghead>………</Banghead>

Again, as always, please note: once again, that I do not vet, nor do I endorse any ad that appears on my site, and I reserve the right to mock both the ads that appear on my site, as well as the advertisers.

Also, please note, this should be in no way construed as an inducement or a request for my reader(s) to click on any ad that they would not otherwise be inclined to investigate further. This would be a violation of the terms of service for Google™ Adsense™.

Beck's Fools Gold

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Anatomy of a scam

Barry Ritholtz has a masterful takedown of how Glenn Beck and Goldline are scamming his audience by selling them grossly overpriced gold coins.

It explains very clearly why Goldline is under criminal investigation in its home state of California.

Go read.

Summers and Geithner Rule the Roost

After being ignored for 18 months in favor of the disastrous policies of the Geithner/Summers tag team, Christina Romer is calling it quits.

The ones who understand what needs to be done leave, the incompetent stay, and the status quo remains.

Feeling mopey changey right now.

No Big Surprise

The Annual Report of the Board Of Trustees of the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance And Federal Disability Insurance Trust Funds is out and Social Security is just fine, and healthcare reform has improved Medicare's financial picture.

This is not a surprise. If you follow this at all, and possess the math skills required to engage in basic counting, and are not demagoguing this for political advantage, then you already know this.

Of course, the conditions that I have stated rule out 95% of the reporters, 99% of the pundits, and 101% of the Republicans out there, (someone must be hitting the button twice) so we still get the "youngsters will never see social security" bullsh%$.

I Give Up!

So says the Stewart.

So say we all:

Cement Successfully Injected into Spewing Hole

Unfortunately, it wasn't Rush Limbaugh.^*

Still, the people of the Gulf coast can expect a few more years of pre-oiled shrimp.

^*I considered another prominent right winger *cough*Sarah Palin*cough*, but decided that the sexist overtones were a bit much.

Economics Update

It's jobless Thursday, and initial jobless claims rose again, by 19,000 to 479,000, with four-week moving average increased by 5,250 to 458,500, and continuing claims fell by 34,000 to 4.54 million, though a lot of this may be people running out their string on normal benefits.

I would note that this number has been bouncing between 450K and 480K for a few months, and that this number is around 100,000 more than is needed for a recovery in employment.

Meanwhile, in central bank land, the Bank of England kept its benchmark rate at ½%, effectively 0%, and it's asset purchase program, aka quantitative easing, aka printing money, remains essentially unchanged.

Finally, the 30-year fixed mortgage rate hit an all time low, 4.49%. (!)

Kagan Approved By Senate

So Barack Obama gets his 2^nd Supreme Court Justice through the Senate.

I think that she'll be depressingly conservative, but I'm a fan of Kagan's old mentor, Thurgood Marshall as a good place to put the ideological center of the court.

I hope that her lack of judicial record will mean that she is a pleasant surprise, but I would take 2:1 odds against it.

Remind Me, Once Again, Don't Piss off Jon Stewart

I think that Colbert might have been a bit harsher, but jeebus, it's like watching baby seals being clubbed, which, interestingly enough is something done by Canadians. (You'll get the reference when you see the vid)

Yep, he goes after all the repeal the 14^th Dredd Scott dead-enders.

OK, This is a Harsh Takedown

Stephen Colbert, playing along with Laura Ingram's literary conceit that her book, The Obama Diaries, is real, absolutely destroyes her and her book.

When he says, "I've read a fair amount of this book, and I know he's not supposed to be a dumb guy, he's a great orator, but this writing is terrible," he's telling Laura that she cannot write for sh%$, for example.

Ouch.

Senate Approves State Aid Bill

They got both Senators from Maine to vote against a filibuster, and so it goes to the House, where Nancy Pelosi has promised to hold a special session to pass the bill.

It's 26.1 billion in aid to the states for education and Medicaid, and it's needed.

Google and Verizon Hammer Nails in Net Neutrality's Coffin

My guess is that Google has given up on the timid Obama administration, and Obama's timid FCC chairman Julius Genachowski, who falls over when the incumbent players say "boo", so Google is throwing in the towel, and is negotiating with Verizon to pay extortion money to insure that it doesn't get shut out of the telcos last mile:

Google and Verizon, two leading players in Internet service and content, are nearing an agreement that could allow Verizon to speed some online content to Internet users more quickly if the content’s creators are willing to pay for the privilege.

The charges could be paid by companies, like YouTube, owned by Google, for example, to Verizon, one of the nation’s leading Internet service providers, to ensure that its content received priority as it made its way to consumers. The agreement could eventually lead to higher charges for Internet users.

Why is Google throwing in the towel?

Well part of it may be because Verizon is a major player in mobile phones, and they don't want to be locked out:

People close to the negotiations who were not authorized to speak publicly about them said an agreement could be reached as soon as next week. If completed, Google, whose Android operating system powers many Verizon wireless phones, would agree not to challenge Verizon’s ability to manage its broadband Internet network as it pleased.

Or maybe it's because all this hopey changey crap is nopey change crap:

Since the court decision, involving Comcast, in April, the F.C.C. has been trying to find a way to regulate broadband delivery, and that effort has been the subject of a series of private meetings at the agency’s headquarters in recent weeks. At the meetings, officials from the nation’s biggest Internet service and content providers, including Google and Verizon, have tried to reach a consensus on how broadband Internet service should be regulated in light of the decision. Those meetings continued this week, apart from the talks between Google and Verizon.

Yes, you have a group of people doing bad things, and destroying a public resource, and even though you have the authority to regulate, all you have to do is redefine broadband, and you are good to go, you are working to, "reach a consensus on how broadband Internet service should be regulated."

That's like banks trying to reach a consensus with bank robbers.

The incumbents are not valued members of the community, they are parasites who use an accident of history to attempt to act as highwaymen.

It's not tough to reregulate this sh%$. You can't now because a few years back, your Bushco predecessor made it so:

The F.C.C., meanwhile, favors a level playing field, but it cannot impose one as long as its authority over broadband is in legal doubt. It has proposed a solution that would reclassify broadband Internet service under the Communications Act from its current designation as an “information service,” a lightly regulated designation, to a “telecommunications service,” a category that, like telephone service, is subject to stricter regulation.

It's very simple. Make a new finding. The old one was a payoff to the telcos for campaign bucks, warrantless wiretapping, and a failed free market ideology.

Make that ruling, and then, when you have a big stick, you can get to the rule making.

First, get a firm grip on their balls, and then negotiate.

Remember, we are dealing with The Phone Company here, and to quote Lily Tomlin, "We don't care, we don't have to…we're the phone company."

They may be essential, but they aren't allies.

Then again, I'm being an optimist. If you look at the Obama administration's actions, whether they be healthcare, financial reform, the Employee Free Choice Act, etc., it's clear that their MO is to talk about reform, and then to give the malefactors what they want, so this could be by design, rather than by incompetence or cowardice.

In either case, treating the Obama Administration, and their FCC Chairman as the enemy and a bad faith player still gives activists the best policy, so I would suggest that this is what net neutrality activists do.

Avoid the veal pen conference calls, and light fires under them.

Economics Update

Well, in the "why do they do this any more" department, we have the ADP private employment survey, which predates the official US DoL figures by all of 2 days, saying that private payrolls will increase by a rather unimpressive 42 thousand.

The total figure will be much worse, of course, since the US Census is still shedding the temporary workers they hired for their 2010 enumeration.

On the GDP front, it appears that the inventory data which contributed to a large portion of recent GDP gains was wildly over optimistic.

On the other hand, the Institute for Supply Management's Non-Manufacturing index rose in July rose to 54.3 from 53.8, beating expectations, in June, and mortgage applications, including purchase applications, rose again.

Michelle Maglalang Malkin, Anchor Baby

Yes, immigration hardliner, and frequent railer against immigrants having "Anchor Babies" to secure residency status, was anchor baby herself.

Go figure

When Alan Keyes Calls You Crazy………

You are completely batsh%$ insane:

"The 14th Amendment is not something one should play with lightly," Keyes said in response to a question from ThinkProgress at the Tea Party Express press event today. "Lindsay Graham used the term -- as people have carelessly done over the years -- referring to the 14th Amendment as something that has to do with 'birthright citizenship' and we ought to get rid of 'birthright citizenship.'"

"Well, let me see," Keyes added sarcastically, "If citizenship is not a birthright then it must be a grant of the government. And if it is a grant of the government, it could curtail that grant in all the ways that fascists and totalitarians always want to."

This is like Keith Richards telling you that you do too much drugs.

H8* Amendment Declared Unconstitutional

Federal District Court Judge Vaughn Walker has ruled that California's anti-gay marriage initiative is unconstitutional:

A federal judge in San Francisco struck down California’s voter-approved ban on same-sex marriage on Wednesday, handing a temporary victory to gay rights advocates in a legal battle that seems all but certain to be settled by the Supreme Court.

Wednesday’s decision is just the latest chapter of what is expected to be a long legal battle over the ban — Proposition 8, which was passed in 2008 with 52 percent of the vote -- and proponents were already promising to appeal, confidently predicting that higher courts would be less accommodating to the other side than Vaughn R. Walker, the judge who issued the ruling.

You can be sure of that last bit.

While I cannot speak to the proclivities of the 9^th Circuit Court of Appeals, I know that they are a rather liberal circuit, but that is it, but I am aware of the proclivities of the Supreme Court, and I cannot see this ruling surviving there.

My assesment of the court:

• Scalia has publicly stated his position, even before hearing a case in numerous public speeches.
• Alito and Roberts chomping at the bit to throw red meat to the "cultural conservatives."
• Thomas wants to find an ethnic group to crap on.
• Kennedy being of an age where gay marriage squicks him out, notwithstanding his opinion striking down the criminalization of gay sex in Lawrence v. Texas.
• Between Sotamayor and (almost certainly on the court by the time that this is heard) Kagan, there is at least one vote, and probably 2 votes there for "Civil unions is good enough," which is, after all, Barack Obama's official position.

What worries me is that if Roberts has the votes, he will cast the broadest net possible, as he did in the Citizens United and Heller, and so do his level best reinstitute the criminalization of homosexuality, and probably take a big hack at Roe v. Wade.

It's a good decision, and I support it, but I think that the ratf%$#ers on the Supreme Court will do whatever they can to turn this to evil.

What needs to be done now is to put Scalia on his back heel. He has prejudged the case, and has admitted it in public, so he must recuse himself.

Of course, he won't, not unless the pressure placed on him forces him to.

We need to go after him the way Scientology went after judges they targeted, though obviously no one should drown his pet dog.

I am saying that it is clear that on numerous occasions, in numerous public events, Antonin Scalia has stated that his mind is made up on gay marriage.

As such any rudimentary understanding of legal ethics mandates that he recuse himself, and that Antonin Scalia does not posses even a rudimentary level of legal ethics, so unless there is a constant drum beat pointing out this fact, he will sit on the case with no intention of reviewing either the facts of the law fairly.

^*Proposition 8=H8=Hate, OK?

Why the Chinese Will Continue to Eat Our Lunch

Because they understand what is going on, and they are willing to do tough things to make sure that things don't blow up in their faces:

China’s banking regulator told lenders last month to conduct a new round of stress tests to gauge the impact of residential property prices falling as much as 60 percent in the hardest-hit markets, a person with knowledge of the matter said.

Banks were instructed to include worst-case scenarios of prices dropping 50 percent to 60 percent in cities where they have risen excessively, the person said, declining to be identified because the regulator’s requirement hasn’t been publicly announced. Previous stress tests carried out in the past year assumed home-price declines of as much as 30 percent.

(emphasis mine)

The Chinese understand that the purpose of stress tests is to identify problem institutions, not to reassure markets, so they will thoroughly investigate their banks, and then probably jail senior management at some of the worst run institutions.

It might be painful, but it gets ahead of the events, as opposed to our method, extend and pretend, which means that when future problems occur, the Chinese have better options available to them.

I guess that the leadership of the PRC aren't worried about being called "Socialists," because they call themselves socialists.

How Not to Make Friends With Your Friends at the Department of Homeland Security

Put these handy dandy stickers on your suitcase, which are sure to get you a body cavity search:







OK, maybe this one will get you a date:



And only $15 such a steal.

Economics Update

We have a fair amount of news, most of it bad, with consumer spending and personal income flat, pending home sales falling sharply in June, and the Institute for Supply Management’s manufacturing survey falling more than expected, though the latter still indicates (rather anemic) growth.

Additionally, we have the Wells Fargo/Gallup survey of small business sentiment hitting a new low, while personal bankruptcy filings rose 9% in July.

As to the good news, we have…


We have…

We have…

We have…

Ummmm…A survey of economic mood in Europe hitting two-year high?

Primaries Tonite

Michigan, Missouri, and Kansas, with the updated results here.

The only remotely close race was the MI governor's race. The rest of the races, congressional and gubernatorial, were not even remotely close on the Dem side.

As to the 'Phants, I really don't care, but you can click on their tool too.

Obama Administration Goes Full Eric Blair*

Or maybe Franz Kafka.

You see, last month, the ACLU and the Center for Constitutional Rights were retained by Nasser al-Awlaki, "the father of Obama assassination target (and U.S. citizen) Anwar al-Awlaki," to get a court injunction to keep him from being killed by the U.S. government..

The government's response was declare Anwar al-Awlaki a "Specially Designated Global Terrorist," which meant that lawyers could not represent him without a special license from the government.

George W. Bush never asserted a right to assassinate American citizens, and they never used Treasury Department anti money laundering legislation to prevent lawyers from representing someone pro bono in a case to prevent their assassination:

Left with no choice, the ACLU and CCR this morning filed a lawsuit on their own behalf against Timothy Geithner and the Treasury Department. The suit argues that Treasury has no statutory authority under the law it invokes -- The International Emergency Economic Powers Act -- to bar American lawyers from representing American citizens on an uncompensated basis. It further argues what ought to be a completely uncontroversial point: that even if Congress had vested Treasury with this authority, it is blatantly unconstitutional to deny American citizens the right to have a lawyer, and to deny American lawyers the right to represent clients, without first obtaining a permission slip from Executive Branch officials (the Complaint is here). As the ACLU/CCR Brief puts it: "The notion that the government can compel a citizen to seek its permission before challenging the constitutionality of its actions in court is wholly foreign to our constitutional system" and "[a]s non-profit organizations dedicated to protecting civil liberties and human rights, Plaintiffs have a First Amendment right to represent clients in litigation consistent with their organizational missions." The Brief also argues that it is a violation of Separation of Powers to allow the Executive Branch to determine in its sole discretion who can and cannot appear in and have access to a federal court.

Obama's positions on national defense and surveillance indisputably worse than those of George W. Bush's.

Bootnote:
After stonewalling for weeks, the Treasury Department granted a license once the ACLU and CCR filed a separate lawsuit against the denial of such a license, probably because they want to assert the right again, even if it is just for a few weeks to f%$# with the ability of some guy to get proper legal counsel.

I am so writing in "Howard Dean," in the 2012 general.

^*George Orwell's real name.

Normally I Don't Comment on Local Rulings of Local Landmarks Preservation Commission

Only this time, it was the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission ruling that the location for the Islamic center and mosque in lower Manhattan is not historically significant, allowing for construction to proceed.

This puts them on a higher moral plane than Abraham Foxman's ADL, but considering his recent history, the geriatric leader of the ADL does not set a particularly high bar.

The FBI Gets Stupid

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J. Edgar Hoover can bite my shiny metal ass!

This bit of FBI stupidity is a pretty good indication of how the current IP regime, and what people think the current IP regime is is a clusterf%$#:

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has taken on everyone from Al Capone to John Dillinger to the Unabomber. Its latest adversary: Wikipedia.

The bureau wrote a letter in July to the Wikimedia Foundation, the parent organization of Wikipedia, demanding that it take down an image of the F.B.I. seal accompanying an article on the bureau, and threatened litigation: “Failure to comply may result in further legal action. We appreciate your timely attention to this matter.”

The problem, those at Wikipedia say, is that the law cited in the F.B.I.’s letter is largely about keeping people from flashing fake badges or profiting from the use of the seal, and not about posting images on noncommercial Web sites. Many sites, including the online version of the Encyclopedia Britannica, display the seal.

Other organizations might simply back down. But Wikipedia sent back a politely feisty response, stating that the bureau’s lawyers had misquoted the law. “While we appreciate your desire to revise the statute to reflect your expansive vision of it, the fact is that we must work with the actual language of the statute, not the aspirational version” that the F.B.I. had provided.

I can understand if it's some smart ass blogger telling J. Edgar Hoover, "Bite their shiny metal ass,"^* but this is a post of the seal on a damn encyclopedia.

Morons.

^{*Somehow, I don't think that the G-men are coming after me, and neither does the New York Times, who also reproduced the seal.}

Wanker of the Day

Paul Krugman actually linked the Monty Python sketch and Timothy "Eddie Haskell" Geithner OP/ED first.

Little Timmy Geithner just penned an OP/Ed today, "Welcome to the Recovery," which is remarkably clueless.

While he admits that there is still a tough row to how, his he characterization of the recovery is positively Hooveresque.

I am surprised that he did not announce that "Prosperity is just around the corner."

He declares, "We are on a path back to growth," and that "The economy on the road to recovery".

I understand the desire to paint this rosily, but it is a political loser: Americans do not respond well to claims of a robust recovery when ⅙ of the workforce (U6) is unemployed.

I think that the problem here is that Geithner does not see this unemployment level as a problem.

Why else would he suggest that at a time when there are 5 job applicants for every job opening, a record, that the problem is just that American workers need training:

The share of workers who have been unemployed for six months or more is at its highest level since 1948, when the data was first recorded, and we must do more to ensure that they have the skills they need to re-enter the 21st-century economy.

This is offensive and wrong on so many levels.

As Atrios notes:

The sentence that should have been written is:

The share of workers who have been unemployed for six months or more is at its highest level since 1948, when the data was first recorded, and we must do more to ensure that they have jobs.

But obviously that's not what they're thinking. Unemployment is a skills mismatch problem, unemployed losers don't "have the skills they need to re-enter the 21st-century economy."

We're screwed.

Anyone who thinks that the problem is a temporary dislocation of workers, as opposed to a period of catastrophic job loss should be considered to lack the skills necessary to be employed in the 21^st century economy.

Fire Tim Geithner now.

Porter Goss???

As a part of Congressional ethics reform, the Office of Congressional Ethics was established in 2008.

It's co-chair is Porter Goss, whose aides both in Congress and while he was at the CIA, were convicted of corruption, which (unsurprisingly, it involved Republicans) and whose number 2 at the CIA was sleeping with a woman who was sleeping with a Russian spy at the time of he hired him. (My archive of my posts on him are here)

He was also the guy when asked about an investigation of the invasion or Iraq, he quipped that he would wait for a blue dress.

This is like putting Keith Richards in charge of the Office of National Drug Control Policy.

This may explain why the only two Congressmen brought up on charges so far are Black Democrats, and, just heard on Olbermann, that there have been 8 investigations, and all 8 of them were of Black Democrats.

Jeebus! I understand that this needs to be a bipartisan commission, but you should not be putting rat f%$#ers on the commission so that they can attempt to gain partisan advantage.

God Bless The Onion

Normally, I don't think that making fun of a divorce is in good taste, but the folks at The Onion have created a gem with, "Recently Single Al Gore Finally Able To Listen To W.A.S.P. Albums."

But This Isn't The Onion

The Republicans are now looking at repealing the 14^th amendment, in effect repealing the Dredd Scott decision, which in addition to making slavery eternal, also declared that freed slaves were not US citizens.

<Facepalm>

Worst Website Ever…

Yvette's Wedding Dresses , in Panama City, Fl.

May cause your eyes to bleed, and turn down the volume, the accompanying music sucks too.

They Should Save Their Energies for the Pedophile Priests

The Chilean President has denied a request by the Catholic Church to pardon members of the Pinochet junta currently jailed for murder, rape, kidnapping, etc.:

Chilean President Sebastian Pinera on Sunday denied a pardon to people jailed for dictatorship-era crimes, a move likely to ease tensions with the opposition and rights groups over a controversial call for clemency.

Chile's Catholic Church had asked Pinera to free or lower jail sentences of military officers convicted for human rights violations as well as other criminals in a call for clemency to mark the country's upcoming bicentennial celebrations.

The pardon request infuriated human right groups and the center-left opposition, rekindling memories of General Augusto Pinochet's 1973-1990 rule that still divides many Chileans.

I'm thinking that the Church of Rome issues of forgiveness that are a bit "closer to home".

Perhaps they should address these matters before engaging in a full throated defense of the perpetrators of horrors of the Chilean dictatorship.

It's Not, "Not So Bad," It Sucks

It appears that lawmakers on both the state and federal level are starting to look at the salaries of senior executives for tax-exempt organizations.

What I love is the quote from M. Cass Wheeler departing CEO of the American Heart Association:

“If you peeled all that [outrageous supplemental pension and other provisions] back, you’d get to a base salary less than $600,000,” he said.

OK, so your base is almost 1½ times that of the President of the United States of America, and you are doing charity work, and we are supposed to be OK with that.

No, we aren't.

Neither should we be OK with hedge fund managers making over a billion dollars a year, but for non-profits, we are subsidizing the donations that pay their salary.

Enough.

I would note that the most egregious examples are in "not for profit" hospitals, which would imply to me that these institutions are "not for profit" as a fig leaf.

You Win a Brand New Car! Or a Spiff Horse Drawn Carriage!

They are having a blood drive in Ohio, where donating blood enters you into a competition for a brand new car, or, if you so choose, you can win a brand new custom made horse-drawn buggy:

During the traditionally slow summer months for blood donation, the Northern Ohio Blood Services Region of the American Red Cross offers an incentive: Donate a pint, get a chance to win a car.

It's a tried and true promotion. From charity golfers to high school boosters to game show contestants, who wouldn't want to drive home in a brand … new … car!

How about a culture that shuns such modern contrivances. Say, the Amish.

Turns out Amish people are faithful blood donors in this district, which encompasses Geauga, Holmes and Tuscarawas counties – all centers of Amish population.

The Red Cross doesn't want to forget them, said spokeswoman Christy Chapman. So in addition to the car, donors can win a brand...new...buggy!

Seriously.

Obviously, this is a sensible and humane way to encourage blood donations by accommodating the needs of a supportive community, but I also find it a hoot.

What can I say, I'm not a good person.

A Bit of Meta

I'll be trimming my blogroll over the next week or so.

All of the entries, but there is the time to read them, so I need to do a bit of a cost/benefit analysis.

Additionally, for a number of the more heavily trafficked blogs, I tend to find stuff that most interests me through links from other sites.

Another Ethics Investigation

This time, it's Maxine Waters, who is alleged to have intervened on behalf of a bank that her husband had a significant interest in.

So, in the past 4 weeks, the Ethics Committee has made a substantive move against 2 Dems, though Rengel's ethics problems have been ongoing for months.

I'm curious as to why this is all cropping up now, and I expect a 3^rd shoe to drop.

I would note that in comparison to what the Republicans did, Rengel is alleged to have done favors to people who contributed to a building named after him, evaded taxes, and misused rent controlled apartments, while Waters is alleged to have intervened on behalf of a bank where her husband served as a board member (though it was also the only minority owned bank in Massachusetts) is pretty mild.

By comparison, with the Republicans, (rolling the Abramoff^* Wiki) you had people paid to lobby for slave labor in the Marianas, cheating Indian tribes, taking money from the gambling business while also taking money from anti-gambling activists, and lobbying for the genocidal monsters in Sudan.

Come to think of it, Democratic corruption appears to be rather quite lame in comparison.

It is still reprehensible, but rather a lot like comparing a small snatch and grab with the Great Train Robbery.

Both crooks, but one of them has a bit of audacity.

^*Full disclosure: I went to school with, and served in the student senate with, one of his associates who has faced legal repercussions, and my babysitter went to school with his daughter.

Stephen Colbert Does the Impossible

He finds a use for Bud Lite^® Lime: as an instructional tool:^*



Brilliant!

^*Because drinking that sh%$ is not a good idea.

Call Me a Cynic………

So Barack Obama has repeated his promise to be out of Iraq by August 31.

Note that this involves a lot of weasel words, the core phrase being, "America’s combat mission in Iraq would end."

That doesn't mean that there won't be soldiers there, and that they won't be shot at, but rather that they are providing "Training and Logistical Support."

Shades of American advisers in Vietnam.

I don't think that Obama wants to stay, but he does not have the strength to tell the Pentagon to get the F%$# out and shut the F%$# up, and because the generals still want a little war, because it's good for careers, and because a real peace dividend would interfere with their consulting gigs in retirement.

I am not suggesting that the Pentagon is unpatriotic, any more than I would suggest that the telemarketing industry is, but they view their benefit to be an independent good for the nation, which does not serve the nation.

This is why robust civilian control of the military is essential for a civil society.

I may be wrong in my prediction, I am wrong more often than not, but I fear that I am right.

Colorado Senate Race-Primary Update

It looks like Andrew Romanoff, who recently sold his house to lend money to his campaign, appears to have moving ahead of incumbent appointee corporate raider/DINO Michael Bennet in the polls, with the most recent poll showing a lead of 48%-45%, though the Bennet campaign is claiming that they still hold a 4 point lead in internal polls, 41%-37%.

Note that the rule of thumb is that undecideds break at least 2:1 for the challenger, so either number looks like a very likely loss for Bennet, which to my mind would be a good thing.

Real Democrats win, and then they push good policies in office.

Rather unsurprisingly, the Obama administration come out rather strongly in favor of Bennet, as it has routinely in the case of Corporatocrats this cycle.

The primary is next Tuesday, and here's hoping that Romanoff wins, particularly since the Republicans seem to be busy self-destructing in their primary.

Damn, Another Store to Boycott

Target is making donations to a PAC supporting notorious homophobe Tom Emmer's campaign for Governor of Minnesota.

They claim that they made the donations because that Emmer is "Business Friendly."

It ain't friendly to my business, which I will take elsewhere until they make an abject groveling apology.

Signs of the Apocalypse, Republican Tax Cuts Edition

Who is the latest economics notable criticizing the Republican desire for never ending tax cuts?

Why it's 1980s wunderkind David Stockman, who was Ronald Reagan's director of the Office of Management and Budget.

Not only does he excoriate supply side, "Tax Cuts Pay for Themselves," mentality, he lays the financial crisis at the feet of these policies.

We are living in Bizarro world when David Stockman is the voice of reason.

Economics Data Points for Last Week

So, GDP growth has fallen sharply, down to a 2.4% annual rate in the 2^nd quarter, as compared to the anemic-for-a-meaningful-recovery 3.7% in the 1^st quarter, which appears to indicate that the recovery is running out of steam.

What's more, the base number is overly rosy to begin with, since it is driven by inventory restocking from industries that had drawn down to the bone, home builders rushing to beat the tax credit deadline, and a significant increase in government spending.

Consumer spending rose by only a 1.6% annual rate.

What's more, initial unemployment claims remained above 450,000, at least 50K above a tepid recovery in employment.


I'm beginning to agree with Mohamed El-Erian of PIMCO, who says that employment has become a leading indicator, since it drives consumer spending.

Fun at Garage Sales

Charlie already has a snare drum and a glockenspiel, and today, when we were driving home, we passed a garage sale that had a nearly complete drum set, a bass drum, and 3 different sized tom-toms, and associated mounting hardware, at about 1/3 of their normal price.

We need to get a bass drum pedal, and a high hats, and some cymbals (crash, ride, and splash).

He's already demonstrated the ability to use the drums in a Rock & Roll setting, he and his sister Natalie spent the past three weeks at Day Jams, a Rock and Roll day camp, so he'll be able to practice his skills.^*

He's well on his way to be a heavy metal hebe.

We have videos from the concerts, and I will be posting them shortly.

Both of the kids were both very good.

^*Yes, the idea of a child practicing drums does fill me with a bit of trepidation.