How politics works: Senator Christopher Dodd and his cosy Irish cottage
An intriguing item here from the dogged Kevin Rennie of the Hartford Courant that highlights a classic example of why ordinary citizens become cynical about politicians and the way business in Washington is conducted.
Silver-haired Senator Christopher Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, has already been getting a lot of heat for his two 2003 VIP mortgage loans from Countrywide, one of the major actors in triggering the current financial crisis.
Seeking Senate re-election in 2010, the 2008 presidential candidate (he dropped out on the first day of voting after finishing seventh in Iowa, where he had moved with his family as a way of courting voters) is now in a bit of a sticky spot with another accommodation- his “cottage” on the lovely Irish island of Inishnee.
Mark-to-Market Lobby Buoys Bank Profits 20% as FASB May Say Yes
By Ian Katz and Jesse Westbrook
March 30 (Bloomberg) — Four days after U.S. lawmakers berated Financial Accounting Standards Board Chairman Robert Herz and threatened to take rulemaking out of his hands, FASB proposed an overhaul of fair-value accounting that may improve profits at banks such as Citigroup Inc. by more than 20 percent.
Posted on 2009 03, 31 by duo
S.277 started out titled as “A bill to amend the National and Community Service Act of 1990 to expand and improve opportunities for service, and for other purposes.”
It’s been shortened to “Serve America Act”
How freakin’ appropriate. Bet they don’t see the irony in this.
http://www.opencongress.org/bill/111-s277/show
Fed alchemy can’t turn paper into gold Fleck
No one should think that money printing will solve our No. 1 problem: job creation. It won’t, and it will make the business of running businesses that much harder. That, of course, is going to be even more complicated by other business-unfriendly moves of the Obama administration and Congress, not least of which is the trampling of legal contracts — mortgage “cram-downs,” American International Group (AIG, news, msgs), etc.
The disintegration of the dollar may be somewhat alleviated against other pieces of paper, as the central banks of other countries potentially join the Bank of Japan, the Swiss central bank and the U.S. in quantitative easing. So, the dollar may not go down as hard as it ought to against other pieces of colored paper. But certainly it will against various other assets like precious metals (as well as assets that we can’t yet know but which will become clear over time).
Gold is looking better than ever for the long term. The devaluation of the Swiss franc means the world has one less haven in an inflationary crisis, MSN Money’s Jim Jubak says. (March 19)
As a side note, the Fed has also, given the size of its bid (which will likely be increased), enabled the Chinese to sell their Treasury holdings if they want. Then the question is, what will the Chinese buy with those “liberated” dollars? My guess: the hard assets that China needs.
To sum up: Quantitative easing, unfortunately, is an outcome that I always knew would occur, though it still shocked me when Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke finally pulled the trigger. The masthead of my Web site reads, “In a social democracy with a fiat currency, all roads lead to inflation.” Many people have been confused because they thought that it meant every negative outcome would lead to inflation directly, but that isn’t the case. It’s the response to the problems that leads to the inflation (and currency debasement).
We are attempting to print our way to prosperity (see “The Fed embraces inflation,” my June 2, 2008, column). That can’t be done, any more than we could speculate our way to prosperity during the stock bubble or borrow our way to prosperity in the real-estate/credit bubble. Got gold?
Breaking News Alert
The New York Times
Monday, March 30, 2009 — 12:00 AM ET
The White House on Sunday pushed out the chairman of General
Motors and instructed Chrysler to form a partnership with the
Italian automaker Fiat within 30 days as conditions for
receiving another much-needed round of government aid.
The decision to ask G.M.’s chairman and chief executive, Rick
Wagoner, to resign caught Detroit and Washington by surprise,
and it underscored the Obama administration’s determination
to take a hands-on role in the companies it is bailing out –
a level of government involvement in business not seen since
the Great Depression.
President Obama is scheduled to announce details of the auto
package at the White House on Monday, but two senior
officials, offering a preview on condition of anonymity, made
clear that some form of bankruptcy – a quick,
court-supervised restructuring, as they described it – could
still be an option for one or both companies.
Read More:
http://www.nytimes.com/?emc=na
Legislation passes to create multi-million civilian “army” in line with Obama’s compulsory national service agenda.
Paul Joseph Watson
Prison Planet.com
Tuesday, March 24, 2009
The Senate last night rubber stamped a nightmare domestic draft bill that legislates mandatory national service and creates an “army” of at least 7 million civilian enforcers working at the the behest of the government, while also containing language that threatens to ban free speech and the right to protest.
The Tax Poem
At first I thought this was funny…then I realized the awful truth of it.
Be sure to read all the way to the end!
