From Paul Krugman, NY Times economic columnists, MIT economist
Calculated Risk, in a discussion of home price declines, links to my three-year-old analysis, That Hissing Sound, which I think was one of the best pure-economic pieces I’ve done in my tenure at the Times. [in which Krugman accurately predicts the Mortgage bubble and crash]
Of course, everything is political — so if you google the article, high on the list you find this delightful screed from [conservative 'think tank' qua blog] Powerline, which says that I was just looking for something to complain about amidst the Bush Boom, and concludes:
[T]here is little reason to fear a catastrophic collapse in home prices. Krugman will have to come up with something much better, I think, to cause many others to share his pessimism.
Why would retiring Congressmen who do not have to face the voters but might have to face Wall Street recruiters be neutral arbiters of the public good? Why is it bad that candidates in tight elections voted against this bill for political reasons? Isn't that how we decide stuff? I've had the TV on all day and it is a pervasive message that partisanship sunk this and is therefore the root of all evil. I just don't get this attitude. This bill was unpopular and hated because the people proposing it do not have the faith of the public to write honest laws or carry them out. That is the problem, not partisanship or an excess of democracy. ...
This is a political crisis, which is why the public is angrily rejecting laws based on Republican demands for a bailout and Democratic concessions which everyone involved at the time knew were a total farce.
Boehner's got his undies in a wedgie wanting to blame Pelosi's articulate and accurate comments for the bailout's failure:
In her speech, Pelosi had assailed Bush and his administration for reckless economic policies.
"They claim to be free market advocates when it's really an anything-goes mentality: No regulation, no supervision, no discipline. And if you fail, you will have a golden parachute and the taxpayer will bail you out. Those days are over. The party is over," Pelosi said.
"Democrats believe in a free market," she said. "But in this case, in its unbridled form, as encouraged, supported, by the Republicans — some in the Republican Party, not all — it has created not jobs, not capital. It has created chaos."
If what he says is true...and I doubt it..than I've only got two words for Republicans who voted against this pile of manure: thank you.
Thank you for repudiating your crony capitalist boss (Bush) and his crony capitalist allies (McCain). Thank you for denouncing, once and for, all the impotent economics of trickle down and the Republican welfare for the rich state which has provided a statist safety net for any corporation deemed 'too big to fail' but has helped to financially eviscerate nearly everyone else in this country. Thank you for putting the people in your district over the lobbyist and bullies in DC. Thank you for allowing yourself to be hung on the petard of your own ideological inanity.
Right in line with my observation below that the rightwing tends toward the operatic substance free spectacle in terms of politics, SNL has a devastating send up of the Palin/Couric interviews from last week. The devastating part isn't due to the writers at SNL only, however. Palin gets to take a lot of credit as many of the lines used are her own.
When a comedy show can make you look ridiculous by actually quoting you, verbatim, that's a problem.
Roland Barthes wrote a remarkable essay sometime way back in the 70s before wrestling was even remotely fashionable in which he argued that wrestling was not about who wins, in terms of consequences, nor about whether it is 'rigged' or not,. He said something along the lines of 'what matters is not what one thinks about the matter at all, but what one sees'. The audience attended wrestling matches like they attended opera to experience the event as pure spectacle, an aesthetic pleasure devoid of practical implications and moral valuations--precisely because the 'morality' of the event: Bart Bad against Dudley DoRight (or whatever) was so obviously foisted up AS rigged.
I think what happened in last night's debate was John McCain playing spectacle to his right wing base, going on about sacrifice and 'dying in vain', etc... these are all sound bites that are so abused by the Republicans they've lost for many of us any moral compulsion--they have become theater. (Even Chris Matthews went off on McCain for pulling that one out again)
Obama rightly called him on it. But it was a quick counter stroke (I have a bracelet too), not so much raised as theater to make the audience 'feel' but to do the reverse, ground the audience into the actuality of what war so blithely entered into actually means.
In fact, maybe what we were seeing was the difference between a classic Jansenist sport like boxing, a demonstration of excellence, getting in exquisitely executed jabs and then, backing off because the point isn't to destroy your opponent but appeal to the judges (the audience) regarding the execution of the matter and a prima donna of the wrestling arena who understands that his appeal lies largely in making a larger than life spectacle of the event, by, for example, appealing maudily to the audience without taking much note of his opponent at all--unless it's to quite dramatically try to trash him. Objective reality never enters into it from the wrestler's perspective--it's always rigged. Conversely, the boxer is made accutely aware of reality and knows that where he stands and what he's about must be accurately carried out or someone could --and probably will-- get badly hurt.
Interesting tidbit from the debate. Many commentators have noted that throughout the debate, McCain refused to acknowledge Obama, in fact, refused to even look over at Obama. Some wrote this off as contempt and maybe some low level effort at basic anger management. But a commentator over at TalkingPoints memo who studies monkies in an academic environment, makes this observation:
I think people really are missing the point about McCain's failure to look at Obama. McCain was afraid of Obama. It was really clear--look at how much McCain blinked in the first half hour. I study monkey behavior--low ranking monkeys don't look at high ranking monkeys. In a physical, instinctive sense, Obama owned McCain tonight and I think the instant polling reflects that.
In the context of McCain's heirarchical world view, this seems almost right. Certainly, I bet the eye contact thing has also got something to do with being dressed down by superiors as he wound his way through the Naval Academy (at the bottom of the class). In the USMC, when you are being bitched at--at least during boot camp--one of key and first directives to the trainee--is never ever ever look at the drill instructor. As a mere trainee, you're not 'good enough' to look the DI in the eye. So, subliminally, at least, Obama is schooling McCain, and McCain knows it.
In Trading Places, as I recall, the two old guys explain to Eddie Murphy what it is they do and he responds perfectly "Oh I get it! You is bookies!"
Welcome to Henry Paulson's world. As explained brilliantly by rdf over at Eurotrib
Analogies are never perfect, but here's one using horse racing. Don't expect a perfect correspondence to the banking situation, but I think it is close enough for government work. Joe goes to the track and bets $2 on a horse.
Two guys standing nearby get into a discussion and Fred says to Sam, "I'll bet you $5that Joe wins his bet."
Next to them are Bill and Bob. Bill says: "I'll bet you $10 that Fred welshes on his bet if he loses."
Next to them is Sally. Sally says: "For $3 I'll guarantee to Bill that if Bob fails to pay off, I'll make good on the bet."
Sally then goes to Mary and borrows the $7 needed in case she has to ever pay off and promises to pay back $8. She doesn't expect to every have to pay since she believes Bob will always make good. So she expects to net $2 no matter what happens to Joe.
A quick calculation indicates that there is now 2+5+10+3+7 = $27 riding on the outcome of the horse race.
Question how much has been "invested" in the horse race?
Answer:
$50,000 by the owner of the horse who is expecting to recoup his investment from the winnings of the horse and other future deals. Everyone else is gambling, not investing.
The issue with the home market is that the only "investor" was the person who bought the home. All those engaged in the meaningless derivatives spun off from this are gambling. You can see how quickly the face value of all these side bets can exceed the underlying investment. Who is holding these side bets - not the homeowner? It is the people at the failing investment banks, hedge funds and similar enterprises. Notice that the bailout is being directed at them not the homeowners.
The real world is, of course, even more complicated. Over the last 30 years people have been allowed to place bets on everything starting with the value of stock averages. They might as well bet on the temperature in Newark at 8:00 AM.
So when you hear everybody saying this is a crisis caused by the housing collapse, be skeptical. We are in the midst of a classic pyramid or Ponzi scheme and there is no way out except for people to lose a lot of money. All that is different this time is that it is the taxpayers who are being asked for the cash.
Hilzoy over at the Washington Note does a nice deconstruction of Palin's utter vapidity:
CNN:
"McCain supporter Sen. Lindsey Graham tells CNN the McCain campaign is proposing to the Presidential Debate Commission and the Obama camp that if there's no bailout deal by Friday, the first presidential debate should take the place of the VP debate, currently scheduled for next Thursday, October 2 in St. Louis.
In this scenario, the vice presidential debate between Joe Biden and Sarah Palin would be rescheduled for a date yet to be determined, and take place in Oxford, Mississippi, currently slated to be the site of the first presidential faceoff this Friday."
Like Kevin Drum, I had been saying "ha ha, I suppose they'll try to reschedule the first Presidential debate for October 2nd", as a joke. Silly me, and silly Kevin, to think that the McCain campaign would manage not to make that ludicrous unforced error. I think I know why, though: after her interview with Katie Couric, they surely cannot want Sarah Palin to have one more moment of unscripted TV time than is absolutely necessary.
For the most part, people have focussed on the part where Sarah Palin cannot come up with specific examples of McCain favoring regulation. (Note to Sarah Palin: boxing. I'd mention McCain's attempt to regulate tobacco, but since he's flip-flopped on that one, best not to bring it up.) But I was also struck by this bit from the interview:
"COURIC: Would you support a moratorium on foreclosures to help average Americans keep their homes?
PALIN: That's something that John McCain and I have both been discussing whether that is part of the solution or not ... you know, it's going to be a multifaceted solution that has to be found here.
COURIC: So you haven't decided whether you'll support it or not?
PALIN: I have not.
COURIC: What are the pros and cons of it, do you think?
[Translation: OK, you don't want to commit. But do you have the slightest idea what the salient considerations are?]
"PALIN: Well, some decisions that have been made poorly should not be rewarded, of course. COURIC: By consumers, you're saying?
PALIN: Consumers and those who were predator lenders also. That's, you know, that has to be considered also. But again, it's got to be a comprehensive long-term solution found for this problem that America is facing today. As I say, we are getting into crisis mode here."
[Translation: Not a clue. But whatever the solution is, it ought to be comprehensive and long-term. Such a relief to know she doesn't actually favor temporary solutions that do not address the entire problem. Had she had more time, no doubt she would have come out for solutions that are judicious, well-designed, effective and (of course) bipartisan. And I'll bet she doesn't think people should play politics with this issue either. Call me psychic.]
Sarah Palin has been described as a quick study. But she has been surrounded by briefers for nearly three weeks, and she's still completely unable to string together an intelligent thought on the mortgage crisis. Would a moratorium on foreclosures keep people in their homes, or would it make banks even less likely to make mortgage loans, while driving them closer to insolvency? Is this sort of heavy-handed government interference in the market a desperate measure called for by desperate times, or is it more like Robert Mugabe's efforts to stop inflation by banning price increases? (I probably shouldn't wonder whether Sarah Palin knows who Mugabe is...) It would be nice if the running mate of one of the oldest candidates for President ever had some ideas about these issues. Since she's been prepping constantly, it's pretty alarming that she doesn't.
I served with quick studies. I knew quick studies. Quick studies were a friend of mine. Sarah Palin: you're no quick study.
Tuesday, Gingrich called the Paulson plan “stupid,” “a really bad idea” and “the kind of corrupt scheme that could have been designed by [Russian Prime Minister] Vladimir Putin.”
When you think about it, Hank Paulson is about the last person in America who should be entrusted with this emergency infusion of public capital -- because his perspective is entirely that of the bankers who created the mess in the first place. Paulson is treating the U.S. Treasury as a branch office of Wall Street. When I was a proudly liberal graduate student, I used to snicker at my radical classmates who described the government, in Marxian cant, as the "executive committee of the ruling class." Well, there is no better description of the Treasury as operated by Hank Paulson.
Riffing on my earlier observation that this hysterical bailout walked and talked a lot like a 'Shock Doctrine' duck, Chris Bowers raises a few significant question over at Open Left.
These are questions that are well worth pondering for at least the next 42 days. Certainly before we offer one red cent under the literarily extortionist terms that Bush and Paulson demand.
Things are getting a little suspicious about this "crisis."
Why did the Bush administration suddenly declare a "crisis" during the final two weeks when Congress would be in session during his presidency? Is it maybe because, after the election, Congress would know it wasn't dealing with Bush anymore?
If this is such a sudden crisis, why is it that the Bush administration was drawing up the plan for this bill for months beforehand?
Why is it that Congress is supposed to bail out many banks and firms that are actually quite successful and profitable right now, and not just those that are failing?
Why is Paulson blatantly lying to Congress about oversight?
Where did the $700 billion figure come from?
Why is Paulson urging that debate on the matter be held after the legislation is passed?
The burden of proof should always be placed on those who are demanding a huge government bailout, not upon those who are skeptical that one is needed. And yet the questions keep mounting, with no answers in sight.
I am not saying that there is no need for government intervention. I am saying that the case for a $700 billion bailout is far from having been made. Until the case is made, there is no need to go forward. We will elect a new President in 42 days. We swear in a new Congress in 103 days. What is the rush? Why does this all of a sudden need to be done while the Bush administration is still in charge? The case hasn't been made, and answers are slow in coming, if they come at all.
I NEED TO ASK YOU TO SUPPORT AN URGENT SECRET BUSINESS RELATIONSHIP WITH A TRANSFER OF FUNDS OF GREAT MAGNITUDE.
I AM MINISTRY OF THE TREASURY OF THE REPUBLIC OF AMERICA. MY COUNTRY HAS HAD CRISIS THAT HAS CAUSED THE NEED FOR LARGE TRANSFER OF FUNDS OF 800 BILLION DOLLARS US. IF YOU WOULD ASSIST ME IN THIS TRANSFER, IT WOULD BE MOST PROFITABLE TO YOU.
I AM WORKING WITH MR. PHIL GRAM, LOBBYIST FOR UBS, WHO WILL BE MY REPLACEMENT AS MINISTRY OF THE TREASURY IN JANUARY. AS A SENATOR, YOU MAY KNOW HIM AS THE LEADER OF THE AMERICAN BANKING DEREGULATION MOVEMENT IN THE 1990S. THIS TRANSACTIN IS 100% SAFE.
THIS IS A MATTER OF GREAT URGENCY. WE NEED A BLANK CHECK. WE NEED THE FUNDS AS QUICKLY AS POSSIBLE. WE CANNOT DIRECTLY TRANSFER THESE FUNDS IN THE NAMES OF OUR CLOSE FRIENDS BECAUSE WE ARE CONSTANTLY UNDER SURVEILLANCE. MY FAMILY LAWYER ADVISED ME THAT I SHOULD LOOK FOR A RELIABLE AND TRUSTWORTHY PERSON WHO WILL ACT AS A NEXT OF KIN SO THE FUNDS CAN BE TRANSFERRED.
PLEASE REPLY WITH ALL OF YOUR BANK ACCOUNT, IRA AND COLLEGE FUND ACCOUNT NUMBERS AND THOSE OF YOUR CHILDREN AND GRANDCHILDREN TO WALLSTREETBAILOUT@TREASURY.GOV SO THAT WE MAY TRANSFER YOUR COMMISSION FOR THIS TRANSACTION. AFTER I RECEIVE THAT INFORMATION, I WILL RESPOND WITH DETAILED INFORMATION ABOUT SAFEGUARDS THAT WILL BE USED TO PROTECT THE FUNDS.
Here’s an interesting poll of American Economic Association economists and their view of the McCain-Obama matchup:
It’s no surprise to see general pro-Obama sentiment here, since people with advanced degrees are, on the whole, very solidly behind Obama. But still the variances from issue to issue are interesting. Most notable, to me, is that the economists rate “wars and homeland security” as one of Obama’s strongest issues, whereas the conventional wisdom and the bulk of the public sees this as McCain’s strong suit. It’s part of a larger trend I’ve noticed of economists, who appreciate the positive-sum nature of international relations, having generally sounder views on foreign policy than do “foreign policy experts,” who seem to me to tend in the direction of being captured by the military-industrial complex over time. Or, to put this less euphemistically, they suffer from Thomas Friedman's 'suck on this' get your war on complex.
Generalizing an entire population of brown people as effectively disposable for the sake of the psychological health of some super wealthy rich white assholes, in other words.
When you think about our deep South history, and some of the illustrious malcontents who managed to make themselves known either through or because of the blood shed; hell, it's just like old times.
Quick Vote Should Congress limit pay for executives of businesses bailed out by the government?
From a CNN internet poll
vote perc. #
Yes 93% 2194 No 7% 166
Now obviously, we know and you know internet polls are not valid. But what I actually want to know is.... who are the 166 morons who think there should be no limit on executive pay?
Remember when the Bush administration warns there’s a dire crisis that requires immediate action, all decent people put partisanship aside and do what’s right for the country go back to sleep.
Bernie Sanders, one of the few actually 'left' wing Senators in the US Senate has offered a dramatic alternative to the horseshit 'hands off' bail out proposed by George W. Bush and his crony capitalist buds (read McCain).
Excerpt is as follows:
In my view, we need to go forward in addressing this financial crisis by insisting on four basic principles:
(1) The people who can best afford to pay and the people who have benefited most from Bush’s economic policies are the people who should provide the funds for the bailout. It would be immoral to ask the middle class, the people whose standard of living has declined under Bush, to pay for this bailout while the rich, once again, avoid their responsibilities. Further, if the government is going to save companies from bankruptcy, the taxpayers of this country should be rewarded for assuming the risk by sharing in the gains that result from this government bailout.
Specifically, to pay for the bailout, which is estimated to cost up to $1 trillion, the government should:
a) Impose a five-year, 10 percent surtax on income over $1 million a year for couples and over $500,000 for single taxpayers. That would raise more than $300 billion in revenue;
b) Ensure that assets purchased from banks are realistically discounted so companies are not rewarded for their risky behavior and taxpayers can recover the amount they paid for them; and
c) Require that taxpayers receive equity stakes in the bailed-out companies so that the assumption of risk is rewarded when companies’ stock goes up.
(2) There must be a major economic recovery package which puts Americans to work at decent wages. Among many other areas, we can create millions of jobs rebuilding our crumbling infrastructure and moving our country from fossil fuels to energy efficiency and sustainable energy. Further, we must protect working families from the difficult times they are experiencing. We must ensure that every child has health insurance and that every American has access to quality health and dental care, that families can send their children to college, that seniors are not allowed to go without heat in the winter, and that no American goes to bed hungry.
(3) Legislation must be passed which undoes the damage caused by excessive de-regulation. That means reinstalling the regulatory firewalls that were ripped down in 1999. That means re-regulating the energy markets so that we never again see the rampant speculation in oil that helped drive up prices. That means regulating or abolishing various financial instruments that have created the enormous shadow banking system that is at the heart of the collapse of AIG and the financial services meltdown.
(4) We must end the danger posed by companies that are "too big too fail," that is, companies whose failure would cause systemic harm to the U.S. economy. If a company is too big to fail, it is too big to exist. We need to determine which companies fall in this category and then break them up. Right now, for example, the Bank of America, the nation’s largest depository institution, has absorbed Countrywide, the nation’s largest mortgage lender, and Merrill Lynch, the nation’s largest brokerage house. We should not be trying to solve the current financial crisis by creating even larger, more powerful institutions. Their failure could cause even more harm to the entire economy.
JUST TO ADD: Bernie has kept this simple, direct and tangible. What is coming is a storm of lies and obfuscation. Spread this word.
Josh Marshall chimes in...a one word synopsis: NO.
Put on the Brakes As noted in the previous post, I'm quite convinced that some drastic action needs to be taken to avoid a cascading and debilitating series of crises. But the more I look at this plan, the more wrongheaded it seems. But if I'm understanding this deal, the taxpayers are going to pony up close to a trillion dollars to take bad debts off the hands of financial institutions who were foolish enough to make the deals in the first place. And in exchange, I think the tax payers get nothing? Sebastian Mallaby makes the good point that this is radically different than the S&L Crisis RTC which was liquidating the assets of thrifts that had already gone belly up -- paid the ultimate price, as it were. And as the insurer on the accounts, the government inherited the assets anyway. It was just a matter of selling them off. But here the point is to take these bad debts off these companies' hands so they can go back to being profitable businesses. This is moral hazard on steroids if I'm understanding this right.
Also, according to the Journal, finance industry lobbyists are already giving orders to Republican hill staffers not to allow any meaningful reforms or protections for taxpayers. So, just the money. No strings attached.
House Republican staffers met with roughly 15 lobbyists Friday afternoon, whose message to lawmakers was clear: Don't load the legislation up with provisions not directly related to the crisis, or regulatory measures the industry has long opposed.
"We're opposed to adding provisions that will affect [or] undermine the deal substantively," said Scott Talbott, senior vice president of government affairs at the Financial Services Roundtable, whose members include the nation's largest banks, securities firms and insurers.
A deal killer for the group: a proposal that would grant bankruptcy judges new powers to lower the principal, interest rate or both on a mortgage as part of a bankruptcy proceeding.
Let me repeat what I said below. NO. Not this bill, not this way. If that's all they can come up with, fine. Let them eat their worthless mortgages. let them eat dollars. If they want a bail out, do it on terms that make sense. Like helping the middle class, stiff financial regulations--ripped apart thanks to such whiz kids as Phil Gramm (the Deregulator in the night), and the million dollar CEOs can start by having their salaries sliced and their golden parachutes turned to lead.
This bailout bill is a joke, an extreme grab that enables the Treasury secretary to basically take any deal he wants, pay for it, without oversight or review. A blatant and ruthless power grab, or, if you prefer, Naomi Klein's Shock Doctrine in action.
To which a rational response is simple: "NO. NO. NO."
From the bill itself:
(a) Authority to Purchase.--The Secretary is authorized to purchase, and to make and fund commitments to purchase, on such terms and conditions as determined by the Secretary, mortgage-related assets from any financial institution having its headquarters in the United States.
(b) Necessary Actions.--The Secretary is authorized to take such actions as the Secretary deems necessary to carry out the authorities in this Act, including, without limitation:
(1) appointing such employees as may be required to carry out the authorities in this Act and defining their duties;
(2) entering into contracts, including contracts for services authorized by section 3109 of title 5, United States Code, without regard to any other provision of law regarding public contracts;
(3) designating financial institutions as financial agents of the Government, and they shall perform all such reasonable duties related to this Act as financial agents of the Government as may be required of them;
(4) establishing vehicles that are authorized, subject to supervision by the Secretary, to purchase mortgage-related assets and issue obligations; and
(5) issuing such regulations and other guidance as may be necessary or appropriate to define terms or carry out the authorities of this Act.
So essentially the Treasury Secretary can buy any assets he wants on any terms he likes, he can hire anyone he wants to do it, and he can write any kind of regulation he wants. The Treasury Secretary is now essentially in charge of oversight of the Treasury Secretary, and Congress is abdicating once again its own oversight powers, only getting a report from the Treasury Secretary twice a year.
Again, from the language of the Bill:
Within three months of the first exercise of the authority granted in section 2(a), and semiannually thereafter, the Secretary shall report to the Committees on the Budget, Financial Services, and Ways and Means of the House of Representatives and the Committees on the Budget, Finance, and Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs of the Senate with respect to the authorities exercised under this Act and the considerations required by section 3.
Then comes the excessively scary paragraph:
Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.
Full stop folks. This is nuts.
The Treasury Secretary can do anything he deems appropriate without anybody anywhere looking it over--not even a court of law, nor congress or any administrative agency?
While a bailout of the financial sector is debatable on its own merits (I'd prefer not, just to watch the lions of Wall Street boil in their own fetid fat) this bill also constitutes a massive and dangerous power grab by the Executive Branch of this country. Particularly since the Congress seems to be abdicating its own oversight duties and precluding the Court System from being able to intervene as well.
Far better 'bail outs' can be written. Hopefully they will be.
Regarding even the necessity of the bailout:
From Democracy Now:
First some straight talk about the bailout from Michael Hudson, this isn't a bailout for the meltdown of folks who have fallen behind on mortgages--they've been 'melting down' for nearly two years now and no one has lifted a finger--this is a bailout of their creditors. It's a bailout of the gamblers, as Naomi Klein has said. These are people who've gambled. ... we're talking about derivative trades, billions of dollars of bets on which way interest rates will go, billions of dollars of bad loans beyond the ability of debtors to pay.
And Michael Hudson asks the one relevant question: Why on earth would you want to bail out these creditors?
Let them crash and burn.
AMY GOODMAN: Michael Hudson, we're talking government bailout, which means taxpayers stuck with the bill. Do you think this is the right move? MICHAEL HUDSON: No, it's the worst possible move, and it puts the class war back in business with a vengeance. Wall Street has been preparing for this for years, because every financial analyst knows that the debts can't be paid. And the question that Wall Street has, if you're going to take a gamble on bad debts that can't be paid, how are you going to come out a winner? And there's only one way of coming out a winner, and that's to make the government bail you out. This has been known for years, because it's inherent almost in the mathematics of compound interest. Every banker I know knew that the loans they were making were going to go bad. They were trying to sell them to somebody else, ultimately expecting them to end up with some sovereign wealth fund.
And now, you had at the beginning of the show, McCain saying that this is the result of fraud and incompetence. The government has now bailed them out. But by bailing them out--Wall Street was coming to terms with the bad debts. When Bear Stearns went under and when Lehman Brothers went under, this began to wipe away the bad debts. And when the debts exceed the ability to pay, there's only one thing any economy can do, and that's wipe them out. Instead, the government is trying to keep the fiction alive. And what Paulson did yesterday, in bailing out AIG, was to try to lock in whoever is the next president not only to further bailouts of Wall Street, ostensibly to protect the public money, but to make it impossible to write down the debts of the four million homeowners that are expected to default this year, impossible to write down the debts of companies that have issued junk bonds, impossible for the country to get rid of this excess of debts that can't be repaid. And you're having really a war now of creditors against debtors. And this is what Wall Street has been preparing for. It needed an emergency to do it. It's really not an emergency at all. This has been building up for many years. Everybody expected it. And breathlessly now, the Secretary of Treasury has done it.
AMY GOODMAN: But, of course, the argument was, if you don't bail out AIG, it could lead to a global financial meltdown.
MICHAEL HUDSON: What you--it's a meltdown of the gamblers, as Nomi said. These are people who've gambled. You had McCain saying they're gamblers. If these people have gambled, we're talking about derivative trades, billions of dollars of bets on which way interest rates will go, billions of dollars of bad loans beyond the ability of debtors to pay. Why on earth would you want to bail out these creditors?
Regarding the financial debacle Bush and his cohorts have allowed to happen on their watch through 25+ years of fervent and cynical deregulation, Bush said "Now is not the time to play the blame game."
To which I respond as any rational human would, well, what IS now the time for then, George?
Wasn't it you and your Republican cohorts like Phil Gramm and John McCain, who slapped a big smiley face on deregulation, got rich while wiping out the poor and middle class of this country so that now the poor have next to nothing and can barely survive and the middle class are the queuing up daily to take the poor's place? You guys did that, right?
So who would you suggest I blame, instead, George? Fate? The Market? Or maybe you think I ought to blame your God, George? That far rightwing fuckup in the sky you and your fundie troglodytes imagine whole clothe; the big GOP God who thinks gays are evil, brown people should just die unless they give up their oil, and white Republicans can do whatever they want to whomever they want with impunity forever.
Hey George, I don't think so. I think if I ever met your silly ass God, I'd spit in his face. But he's not what caused this--and he's not who I'm going to blame.
I'm going to blame the party whose fingerprints are all over this mess--and that party's name is Republican. And its leader is you.
Opening up the health insurance market to more vigorous nationwide competition, as we have done over the last decade in banking, would provide more choices of innovative products less burdened by the worst excesses of state-based regulation.
As Josh Marshall notes, the only thing surprising about the statement is the degree to which it has been overtaken by events as McCain now tries -- a la Palin the Earmark-Killer -- to rebrand himself as a Mr. Wall Street oversight and transparency when he's been pushing deregulation for 25 years. And of course, he has Mr. Deregulator of the Night, ex-Texas Sen. Phil Gramm onboard as one of his major economic advisors. What did Gramm do?
On Dec. 15, 2000, hours before Congress was to leave for Christmas recess, Gramm had a 262-page amendment slipped into the appropriations bill. It forbade federal agencies to regulate the financial derivatives that greased the skids for passing along risky mortgage-backed securities to investors.
As I noted here, that's why everything's falling apart. That is why the taxpayers are now on the hook for the follies of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bear Stearns and now the insurance giant AIG to the tune of $85 billion. And we have Bush touting a toxic mortgage bailout that sticks it to the American public for nearly $700 billion dollars.
With excellent advisors like Gramm, is it any wonder McCain jokes the way he does? I think he might just win an Emmy for his slapstick performance. Stop, John, stop. You're killing me.
McCain's former economic adviser is ex-Texas Sen. Phil Gramm. On Dec. 15, 2000, hours before Congress was to leave for Christmas recess, Gramm had a 262-page amendment slipped into the appropriations bill. It forbade federal agencies to regulate the financial derivatives that greased the skids for passing along risky mortgage-backed securities to investors.
And that, my friends, is why everything's falling apart. That is why the taxpayers are now on the hook for the follies of Fannie Mae, Freddie Mac, Bear Stearns and now the insurance giant AIG to the tune of $85 billion.
Long story short, if, as McCain and Bush wanted, you had privatized your Social Security insurance as of 2000 you'd be down about eight percent in nominal terms, that is in the hole --that is MINUS whatever you had invested. Not a great scheme for securing your future. And, of course, things could get worse. They probably won't get much better for a while.
That's one reason Republicans who think of the stock market as 'sound investment' rather than, um, gambling--which it is--are, to put it generously--mistaken.
Among the many startling accusations against Sarah Palin in the new profile of her in The New York Times, this one truly stands out: Not only did Palin want the Wasilla librarian to ban books, but she is alleged to have personally pushed for a particular book to be removed before she became mayor:
Witnesses and contemporary news accounts say Ms. Palin asked the librarian about removing books from the shelves. The McCain-Palin presidential campaign says Ms. Palin never advocated censorship. But in 1995, Ms. Palin, then a city councilwoman, told colleagues that she had noticed the book "Daddy's Roommate" on the shelves and that it did not belong there, according to Ms. Chase and Mr. Stein. Ms. Chase read the book, which helps children understand homosexuality, and said it was inoffensive; she suggested that Ms. Palin read it.
"Sarah said she didn't need to read that stuff," Ms. Chase said. "It was disturbing that someone would be willing to remove a book from the library and she didn't even read it."
“I’m still proud of Sarah,” she added, “but she scares the bejeebers out of me.”
This is not the only accusation that Palin personally targeted a particular book for removal from the library on ideological grounds. For years, social conservatives had pressed the library director to remove books they considered immoral.“People would bring books back censored,” recalled former Mayor John Stein, Ms. Palin’s predecessor. “Pages would get marked up or torn out.” Witnesses and contemporary news accounts say Ms. Palin asked the librarian about removing books. It's also worth noting that Rev. Howard Bess, a liberal minister from the nearby town of Palmer, has accused Palin of successfully getting his own book, Pastor I Am Gay, banned from the library while she was mayor.
Poor Sarah Palin got all tongue tied when it came to defining the Bush Doctrine. Lots of horrible liberals are blaming her for not knowing what it is, but in deference, I will say it's not really that easy to define. Here's my shot at how it actually works in practice (via Atrios):
1) Blow a bunch of shit up
2) ??
3) Peeance and Freeance!
Now, come on liberals, admit it, she really can't say that on national television, can she?
The Surreal World At the gym, I watched a Hardball segment in which Reps. Peter King and Debbie Wasserman Schultz were debating whether it’s true, as Rep. Schultz was claiming, that Barack Obama’s proposals would cut taxes for 95 percent of Americans or whether it’s true, as Rep. King was claiming, that Obama would raise taxes on 100 million Americans. The host, Chris Matthews, just kind of sat there as the two congressmen yelled at each other. Then he brought the segment to the end, remarked on how heated it was, and how both members of congress talk really quickly. Did he sum up by noting that independent analysis from the Tax Policy Center and even the conservative ideologues at National Review have concluded that Schultz is right and King is wrong? Of course he didn’t. And Matthews is a better-than-average TV host.
I think people in the news business ought to ask themselves some questions. If a campaign sends a surrogate to appear on my program and lie to my audience, is that more helpful to the campaign than it would have been to send nobody? If it’s more helpful to send someone, then aren’t I structuring my program in such a way as to encourage campaigns to send people to the studio and lie to my audience? Did I get into this business in order to be complicit in campaigns’ efforts to lie to the American public? Meanwhile, viewers need to take some responsibility of their own. Anyone who has a Nielsen box and watches these kind of shows on cable is doing serious harm to the United States of America and if you can count any Nielsen families among your circle of friends you have a duty to try to make them see the light.
In short, don't watch the program. Turn off the television and start doing some reading on your own. That's what Democracy is all about.
From Juan Cole's column appearing in Salon.com, What's the difference between Palin and Muslim fundamentalists? Lipstick!
Excerpt:
John McCain announced that he was running for president to confront the "transcendent challenge" of the 21st century, "radical Islamic extremism," contrasting it with "stability, tolerance and democracy." But the values of his handpicked running mate, Sarah Palin, more resemble those of Muslim fundamentalists than they do those of the Founding Fathers. On censorship, the teaching of creationism in schools, reproductive rights, attributing government policy to God's will and climate change, Palin agrees with Hamas and Saudi Arabia rather than supporting tolerance and democratic precepts. What is the difference between Palin and a Muslim fundamentalist? Lipstick.
' The GOP vice-presidential pick holds that abortion should be illegal, even in cases of rape, incest or severe birth defects, making an exception only if the life of the mother is in danger. She calls abortion an "atrocity" and pledges to reshape the judiciary to fight it. Ironically, Palin's views on the matter are to the right of those in the Muslim country of Tunisia, which allows abortion in the first trimester for a wide range of reasons. Classical Muslim jurisprudents differed among one another on the issue of abortion, but many permitted it before the "quickening" of the fetus, i.e. until the end of the fourth month. Contemporary Muslim fundamentalists, however, generally oppose abortion.
Palin's stance is even stricter than that of the Parliament of the Islamic Republic of Iran. In 2005, the legislature in Tehran attempted to amend the country's antiabortion statute to permit an abortion up to four months in case of a birth defect. The conservative clerical Guardianship Council, which functions as a sort of theocratic senate, however, rejected the change. Iran's law on abortion is therefore virtually identical to the one that Palin would like to see imposed on American women, and the rationale in both cases is the same, a literalist religious impulse that resists any compromise with the realities of biology and of women's lives. Saudi Arabia's restrictive law on abortion likewise disallows it in the case or rape or incest, or of fetal impairment, which is also Gov. Palin's position. '
McCain pledged to work for peace based on "the transformative ideals on which we were founded." Tolerance and democracy require freedom of speech and the press, but while mayor of Wasilla, Alaska, Palin inquired of the local librarian how to go about banning books that some of her constituents thought contained inappropriate language. She tried to fire the librarian for defying her. Book banning is common to fundamentalisms around the world, and the mind-set Palin displayed did not differ from that of the Hamas minister of education in the Palestinian government who banned a book of Palestinian folk tales for its sexually explicit language. In contrast, Thomas Jefferson wrote, "Our liberty cannot be guarded but by the freedom of the press, nor that be limited without danger of losing it."
Palin argued when running for governor that creationism should be taught in public schools, at taxpayers' expense, alongside real science. Antipathy to Darwin for providing an alternative to the creation stories of the Bible and the Quran has also become a feature of Muslim fundamentalism. Saudi Arabia prohibits the study, even in universities, of evolution, Freud and Marx. Malaysia has banned a translation of "The Origin of the Species." Likewise, fundamentalists in Turkey have pressured the government to teach creationism in the public schools. McCain has praised Turkey as an anchor of democracy in the region, but Turkey's secular traditions are under severe pressure from fundamentalists in that country. McCain does them no favors by choosing a running mate who wishes to destroy the First Amendment's establishment clause, which forbids the state to give official support to any particular theology. Turkish religious activists would thereby be enabled to cite an American precedent for their own quest to put religion back at the center of Ankara's public and foreign policies.
Theocrats confuse God's will with their own mortal policies. Just as Muslim fundamentalists believe that God has given them the vast oil and gas resources in their regions, so Palin asks church workers in Alaska to pray for a $30 billion pipeline in the state because "God's will has to get done." Likewise, Palin maintained that her task as governor would be impeded "if the people of Alaska's heart isn't right with God." Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei of Iran expresses much the same sentiment when he says "the only way to attain prosperity and progress is to rely on Islam."
Not only does Palin not believe global warming is "man-made," she favors massive new drilling to spew more carbon into the atmosphere. Both as a fatalist who has surrendered to God's inscrutable will and as a politician from an oil-rich region, she thereby echoes Saudi Arabia. Riyadh has been found to have exercised inappropriate influence in watering down a report in 2007 of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
By the way, some apologists in the letters column at Salon.com are arguing that Palin allowed state benefits to same-sex couples, showing that she does not in fact seek to impose her theological ideas on the public.
Wrong.
The wire services report:
' . . . early in her administration she supported a bill to overrule a court decision to block state benefits for gay partners of public employees. At the time, less than one-half of 1 percent of state employees had applied for the benefits. Palin reversed her position and vetoed the bill after the state attorney general said it was unconstitutional. '
In other words, she actually did try to impose her theological beliefs by supporting a bill that was punitive toward gay partners. She only backed off the effort when the lawyers warned her it was unconstitutional.
ABC's Political Punch reports on Sarah Palin's speech today:
"She said she "championed reform of earmark spending by Congress, and I told the Congress thanks but no thanks on that 'Bridge to Nowhere'", she said, ommiting (sic) mention that she'd campaigned for governor supporting the bridge."
I take it most readers of this blog will know that this is a flat-out lie. From Hilzoy at Washington Monthly
When politicians lie -- and here I mean not just putting the best spin on things, but out and out lying -- they might as well walk up to each and every one of us and say: Hello! I have no respect for the value of your time! You might have other things to do -- work, playing with your kids, taking a long hike in the mountains, whatever -- but I don't care. I'm going to put you in a position where you're going to have to research everything I say, or else just give up on your civic duty. You don't get to assume that my words are, if not exactly true, at least somewhere in the general vicinity of the truth, and decide whether or not to vote for me. If you want to be an informed citizen, you'll have to become obsessive, like hilzoy.
They might as well add: I have no respect for democracy. In a democracy, citizens listen to what each side has to say and decide who to vote for. To work, it requires that what each side says bears some resemblance to the truth. If I cared about democracy, I'd respect those limits -- maybe stretching the truth every now and then, but generally maintaining some sort of relationship between what I say and reality. But guess what? I don't care about democracy! If winning requires that I make things up out of whole cloth and hope that I'm successful enough to frustrate the popular will, then that's what I'll do. Don't like it? Think democracy is a good system, one that we should cherish? That's just too bad.
But Palin has gone beyond this. She is not just telling lies; she's telling lies that have been exposed as lies, and that have gotten a lot of attention. Assuming she does not actually want to lose, she must assume that her audience either doesn't know that she's lying, or doesn't care. In either case, it's deeply cynical, and deeply insulting.
Have you heard much chatter about that $300,000 outfit that Cindy McCain wore to the RNC? Me neither. If a Democratic candidate gets a $400 haircut, the saturation coverage practically kills his candidacy, but a multi-millionaire dollar heiress, wife to the Republican candidate for president, wears a outfit whose value cost more than your average American House and there's hardly a whisper of coverage, much less outrage.
Have you heard about the area around Wassila, Alaska being the Meth Capital of the world? Have you heard of Palin's attempt to fire a sheriff for suggesting that the bars close at 2 am rather than 4 am--the later hour no doubt helping to attract all those meth heads unable to sleep?
Did you know that Sarah Palin is in favor of teaching 'creationism' and that she doesn't believe--counter massive scientific evidence--that global warming is caused by human activity? Have you heard this wonderful quote yet:
Environmentalists have nicknamed Palin the "killa from Wasilla," a reference to the small town where she formerly was mayor.
"Her philosophy from our perspective is cut, kill, dig and drill," said John Toppenberg, director of the Alaska Wildlife Alliance, maintaining she is "in the Stone Age of wildlife management and is very opposed to utilizing accepted science."
Did you know that Cindy McCain was business partners with Keating around the time John McCain was meeting with regulators on Keating's behalf? Probably not: The Washington Post hasn't told readers that fact during this campaign; The New York Times has made only brief mention of it. ABC, CBS, NBC -- nothing.
Or how about the fact that John and Cindy McCain would save nearly $400,000 a year under John McCain's tax plan -- a tax plan that includes the extension of Bush tax cuts McCain once bashed as unfairly skewed towards the wealthy? Have you seen any media mention to that lately? It wasn't long ago that news organizations thought John Edwards' wealth was important to keep in mind in assessing his policy proposals -- but that apparently doesn't apply to John McCain.
But you probably did know that Sarah Palin has been unjustly bashed by the press for having a daughter with a child out of wedlock. Did you know that the only media outlet even bothering with that story was the infamous National Enquirer. Did you know that it wasn't even a national news story until the McCain campaign decided to make it so, by announcing it; and then in the same day resentfully accusing the press of using the story to bash their candidate.
Did you know that Sarah Palin was lying when she claimed she had told Congress she did not want funding for the "bridge to nowhere"? Or that Congress had said a year before Palin became governor that Alaska need not spend the federal funds on the bridge? And Palin had initially supported the bridge, not opposed it. And once she became governor, Palin kept the money. Did you know that Palin's false claims Wednesday night were not new? She had actually said the same thing in previous campaign appearances since McCain picked her -- and several media outlets, including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and the Los Angeles Times had debunked the boast. But when Palin told the lie during her convention speech -- after days of McCain complaints that the media had been too hard on Palin -- those newspapers ignored the lie.
Did you know that conservatives have been using that same nonsense about biased press coverage since Richard Nixon and that it's a concerted effort to 'work the refs' (the press) and that it does, in fact, work?
Even simple balance issues like the amount of time devoted to either convention tell the tale. The media has actualy devoted more air time to the Republican National Convention than the Democratic National Convention.
She [Sarah Palin] falsely attacked Barack Obama's legislative record -- and media uncritically quoted the false claims. She lied about Obama's tax plans -- she said he "wants to raise" them, even though John McCain's own economic adviser has admitted that is false -- and, again, the media repeated her claim without debunking it.
Instead, much of the media gushed over her speech. If you watched MSNBC yesterday, you would have seen reporter after reporter talk about the McCain complaints that the media were too hard on Palin. And you would have seen reporter after reporter lavish praise on Palin's speech. But you wouldn't have seen them say much about the actual content of Palin's speech -- certainly not about whether she told the truth in it. At one point, Andrea Mitchell declared that "what came through" in Palin's address was "the authenticity."
Yes, she's an authentic liar, gold plated, I'd say, as is most of what makes up the McCain campaign.
Here's Foser again:
The next two months will constitute a test for reporters: If they fall for the idea that they're treating unfairly a candidate who has long referred to them as his "base," what won't they fall for? If they won't stand up to these attacks, what will they stand up to?
Now, to leave on a more positive note, here's Rachel Maddow laying into the lies of the RNC:
Time has pretty decent (and even handed) analysis of the Palin pick, its upside and, notably, its downside. Money quote:
Palin's red-meat conservatism and Evangelicalism will almost certainly play well with those party faithful who attended the Republican National Convention this week. But with fewer than 60 days until Election Day (and a month before the start of early voting in many states), the McCain campaign's continued courting of the more traditional base spells trouble for any efforts to expand his appeal to independent voters and less conservative Evangelicals. If so, McCain may find himself quoting a bowdlerized verse of Scripture in November: What does it profit a man to gain the Christian right and lose the White House?
The hits just keep on coming. Wasilla and the surronding Matanuska-Susitna area of Alaska is informally duped the "meth capital of Alaska".
In 2003, authorities uncovered nine meth labs in the area. Last year, the number increased to 42, said Kyle Young, an investigator with the troopers who works with the Mat-Su narcotics team.
Note too that apparently Sarah Palin tried to fire the chief of police because he wanted to close the bars at 2 am instead of 4 am. Wonder why everyone wanted to stay up so late and party?
It's okay, though I've been told that Republicans are the party of family values.
Among other things that Sarah Palin does, when she's not off scoring Federal funds for bridges to nowhere before denouncing the bridge and keeping the dough, is banning books in libraries. Now that might not be so bad to a 14 year old, generically, but when you look at the types of book Sarah Palin is likely to ban, things get dicey. What would really get my daughter ticked off is trying to ban the ever popular Harry Potter series. Apparently, Sarah is one of those piously self-righteous Evangelicals who, when they are not busy raiding the federal coffers for funds to build hockey rinks, are deeply concerned with the 'morals' of others and what they deem are irredeemably anti-Christian messages, you know, like good triumphing over evil, helping your friends and sticking up for the weak. Harry Potter is just loaded with such evil pagan nonsense. Oh, it's magic! Boo!
So, if you're a Republican seriously contemplating voting for a book censoring, Evangelical hack from one of the smallest cities in this nation, maybe this might give you pause. I promise you are sure to lose my daughter's generation. Or not? Republicans don't have a very good record of thinking realistically or long term, or governing realistically or long term, do they? But maybe you'll just roll the dice and consider how lucky it is that McCain is only 72 and hasn't had that many problems with cancer yet.
The question is, will the rest of the electorate want to be governed by a religious zealot and her geriatric captive?
Editor's Note: For the doubting Thomas's among you, the first Harry Potter book in the series was indeed published in the US in 1998. Sarah Palin served as mayor from 1996 until 2002.
So, yes, the books were indeed in print while she was mayor and seeking to ban books hated by Evangelicals.
A few of the lesser intellectual stars of the conservative circuit running for high office have decided that community organizers are beneath contempt.
To which a wit on one of those mean ol' liberal blogs responded, pithily: "Jesus was a community organizer; Pontius Pilate was a Governor."
Finally tuned into tonight to the RNC. Man, what a diabolical waste of brain cells. Rudy was turned onto his hate minute thing, followed by Ann Coulter...er Sarah Paulin imitating a Vice Presidential candidate.
I'm glad Rudy didn't make the Primary nod and it's obvious now why he didn't. He speaks only to the 30% of Americans still embracing Bush's vision. Same goes for Palin. But wait. She actually is on the ticket, isn't she?
Well, to quote the more diplomatic Joe Klein:
... it is important for the public to know that Palin raised taxes as governor, supported the Bridge to Nowhere before she opposed it, pursued pork-barrel projects as mayor, tried to ban books at the local library and thinks the war in Iraq is "a task from God." The attempts by the McCain campaign to bully us into not reporting such things are not only stupidly aggressive, but unprofessional in the extreme.
Read the list: pork barrel, lying, banning books, suppressing the press, and starting and continuing wars as a "task from God"... These people don't need to rule a country, they need a padded cell.
One other thing, regarding the dog whistle nonsense Rudy and Sarah were tag teaming with that mocking of Obama's stint as a 'community organizer'-- was there a single person in that entire center who had any inkling what a community organizer actually does?
According to the New York Post, this is Sarah Palin's daughter's love interest, some fellow named Johnston:
On his MySpace page, Johnston boasts, "I'm a f - - -in' redneck" who likes to snowboard and ride dirt bikes.
"But I live to play hockey. I like to go camping and hang out with the boys, do some fishing, shoot some s- - - and just f - - -in' chillin' I guess."
"Ya f - - - with me I'll kick [your] ass," he added.
He also claims to be "in a relationship," but states, "I don't want kids."
Aside from that last blow to the Pro-Life and Evangelical for whom reproduction appears less a biological function than a moral mandate, this boy is almost perfect Republican material.
I guess the future of the GOP is in the great white North. Or maybe just its wilderness.
Amy Goodman, well known commentator and radio host for Democracy Now! with a listenership in the millions, was arrested by Saint Paul police for a vaguely worded charge regarding rioting. Below is an article from Pacifica Radio's website:
Goodman was arrested while attempting to free two Democracy Now! producers who were being unlawfuly detained. They are Sharif Abdel Kouddous and Nicole Salazar. Kouddous and Salazar were arrested while they carried out their journalistic duties in covering street demonstrations at the Republican National Convention. Goodman’s crime appears to have been defending her colleagues and the freedom of the press.
Ramsey County Sherrif Bob Fletcher told Democracy Now! that Kouddous and Salazar were being arrested on suspicion of rioting. They are currently being held at the Ramsey County jail in St. Paul.
Democracy Now! is calling on all journalists and concerned citizens to call the office of Mayor Chris Coleman and the Ramsey County Jail and demand the immediate release of Goodman, Kouddous and Salazar. These calls can be directed to: Chris Rider from Mayor Coleman’s office at 651-266-8535 and the Ramsey County Jail at 651-266-9350 (press extension 0).
Democracy Now! stands by Goodman, Kouddous and Salazar and condemns this action by Twin Cities law enforcement as a clear violation of the freedom of the press and the First Amenmdent rights of these journalists.
During the demonstration in which they were arrested law enforcement officers used pepper spray, rubber bullets, concussion grenades and excessive force. Several dozen others were also arrested during this action.
Amy Goodman is one of the most well-known and well-respected journalists in the United States. She has received journalism’s top honors for her reporting and has a distinguished reputation of bravery and courage. The arrest of Goodman, Kouddous and Salazar is a transparent attempt to intimidate journalists from the nation’s leading independent news outlet.
Democracy Now! is a nationally-syndicated public TV and radio program that airs on over 700 radio and TV stations across the US and the globe.
Video of Amy Goodman’s Arrest: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oYjyvkR0bGQ
Just a brief note. Freedom of the press has always been a strained affair in this country, swerving from the Pravda of FOX to the penny ante chatter that passes itself for analysis on any other broadcast and cable channel, but Democracy Now! has always been an outstanding exception, willing to go where few so called main stream journalists venture. The news black out on a national media figure being arrested at the RNC today is simply astounding. Please send this information to anyone you think might be interested.
Sorry for the potty langauge, but the phrase 'healthy sense of schaudenfraude' really doesn't capture it.
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