11
Nov
Barack Obama Spotted Palling Around With Real Terrorist In DC
WRITER ALICE WALKER HAS SOME ADVICE FOR BARACK OBAMA
I would advise you to remember that you did not create the disaster that the world is experiencing, and you alone are not responsible for bringing the world back to balance. A primary responsibility that you do have, however, is to cultivate happiness in your own life. To make a schedule that permits sufficient time of rest and play with your gorgeous wife and lovely daughters. And so on. One gathers that your family is large. We are used to seeing men in the White House soon become juiceless and as white-haired as the building; we notice their wives and children looking strained and stressed. They soon have smiles so lacking in joy that they remind us of scissors. This is no way to lead. Nor does your family deserve this fate.
THE BUSHS RECEIVE THE OBAMAS
GOVERNMENT PUMPS MORE MOOLAH INTO AIG
DO WE NEED MORE WAR IN AGHANISTAN?
I wish we had a Sarah Palin (Well we do have Sarah Silverman, see below) because we need someone to say that Barack Obama spent part of his day palling around with a terrorist, a terrorist named George W. Bush when he visited the soon to be not that White a House. American journalism was at its most insipid in covering the love fest. (Yea, I know he had to do it, but still….)
WASHINGTON – President-elect Obama and President Bush met in the Oval Office Monday, a visit that comes during a historic shifting of power to a new administration.
Obama and his wife, Michelle, arrived at the South Portico 11 minutes early with President Bush and first lady Laura Bush waiting for them. Mrs. Bush and Mrs. Obama enjoyed a warm greeting, while the president and his successor exchanged smiles and a handshake.
Taking a bit of prerogative, the president-elect put his left hand on Bush’s back as the two couples entered the Diplomatic Reception Room.
Ian Williams comments:
Barack Obama is a cool guy, so his visit to George Bush’s White House today was likely not as tense as it could have been. After all, given his commitment to talk with his enemies, Obama could have been chatting with Kim Jong Il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, neither of whom has insulted him or ripped up the constitution recently. But Obama is savvy enough to realise that whatever his thoughts on the man, he has to make nice to the office.
By all accounts, Bush is a sociable sort of guy, and as long as the conversation did not stray too into nuance - what type of dog to get was probably safe - it should have been easy. Despite the ugly overtones of the election, the man who appointed Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice is clearly no visceral racist himself, even if his campaigns happily conjured up the ghosts of the Ku Klux Klan.
Indeed, given the bitterness of sectarian Republican politics, which is now as inherently schismatic as the Leninist left, it is quite possible that Bush was actually quite glad to see John McCain get his comeuppance. After all, it does not do much for a guy’s ego when his party’s successor attempts to bury him alive and out of sight for the duration of the election.
Obama pressed Bush for relief for the auto industry. True to form, W said he would consider it IF the dems back his Columbia trade deal. This may be a no-starter
RGE Monitor reports there will be a bailout despite Bush’s horse trading: ” Treasury Bailout On The Way For The Big 3 U.S. Automakers As They Battle Credit Crunch And Plunging Auto Sales.”
BREAKTHROUGH: MORTATORIUMS STARTING ON FORECLOSURES
Even as the Treasury Department does squat for distressed homeowners, CitiGroup is stepping up to the plate:
AP - Citigroup says it is imposing a moratorium on most foreclosures as part of a series of initiatives aimed at helping at-risk borrowers remain in their homes making Citi the latest big bank to announce sweeping efforts to try to curtail losses from souring mortgages.
BACK IN THE REAL WORLD
AP: Wall Street erased an early rally Monday, sinking as enthusiasm fizzled about a $586 billion Chinese stimulus package and gave way to anxiety about how U.S. companies will survive a severe pullback in spending. The Dow Jones industrial average fell about 160 points.
Investors were initially cheered by China’s plans to boost its economy through a mix of spending, subsidies, looser credit policies and tax cuts. The package could benefit multinational companies with business in China such as General Electric Co. and Caterpillar Inc.
Wall Street’s optimism quickly waned, however, as it has tended to do since the mid-September downfall of Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. and government takeover of the troubled insurance giant American International Group. Market participants realized that while China’s stimulus is a positive sign that governments around the world are working to fix the global economy, the stimulus itself will likely have only a limited effect in the United States.
FT: Growing credit crisis claims more US victims
The credit storm swept through Wall Street and Main Street with renewed virulence on Monday as AIG and Fannie Mae FNM reported huge losses,
ZOGBY POLL: New Survey Shows Economic Crisis Forcing Americans to Make Difficult Health Care Choices
Many Consumers Are Considering Drastic Changes in Health Care Behavior to Cut Expenses
DHL cuts 9500 jobs. Circuit City goes Bankrupt.
Government Pumps more money into AIG
The action, announced by the Federal Reserve and the Treasury Department, was taken as it became increasingly clear that an original financial lifeline thrown to AIG in September would be insufficient to stabilize the teetering company. All told, the moves boost aid to the company to more than $150 billion. Fed officials, however, expressed confidence that the money would be repaid to taxpayers.
AIG, NO MORE, SAYS TARP
Investment News: The Department of the Treasury’s decision to increase its bailout package to American International Group Inc., the faltering New York-based insurance giant, doesn’t signal a larger effort to aid companies outside the banking sector, a senior Treasury official said Monday.
BLOOMBERG EXPLAINS:
Nov. 10 (Bloomberg) — The U.S. Treasury will buy $40 billion in American International Group Inc. preferred shares, and the Federal Reserve will open two new emergency loan units to finance the company’s securities, the government said today.
The new terms of the government’s assistance are less costly than the Fed’s first loan to AIG on Sept. 16, a statement released in Washington said. The New York Fed gave the original loan to prevent widespread default against AIG creditors in the same week that Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. collapsed.
“These new measures establish a more durable capital structure and resolve liquidity issues,'’ as well as “protect the interests of the U.S. government and taxpayers,'’ the statement said.
The Fed’s dirty little $2 trillion secret
The Federal Reserve has lent out $2 trillion worth of your money — but it refuses to say who got it or on what terms. We already know that $29 billion worth went to JPMorgan Chase (NYSE: JPM) — to shift the worst junk on Bear Stearns’ balance sheet to the Fed’s back in March. And it’s safe to assume that the $2 trillion the Fed lent out is being exchanged for similarly junky assets.
Why is the Fed keeping this information secret? I can only guess at three reasons. Is such secrecy appropriate for the U.S., which is supposedly a democracy? I don’t think so. My guess is that the Fed is keeping all this secret because it believes that such secrecy will keep the world from losing whatever shred of confidence it still has in the global financial system. That’s because the loan recipients probably include every major financial institution.
FED WATCH: FROM BAD TO WORSE
SEEKING ALPHA: From bad to worse is about the only way to describe the flow of data last week. With each new data point, the case for additional stimulus grows. But does the Fed have much room to maneuver before pursuing a significant shift in policy? And should we listen to those nagging concerns that the limits to US deficit spending are soon approaching?
Why banks are boosting credit card interest rates
USA Today - USA
Selling off credit card debt has given banks a powerful incentive to raise card fees and penalties, according to interviews with dozens of industry analysts .
AND IF THAT’S NOT BAD ENOUGH
U.S. will soon face second “Great Depression”
Renowned economist Khazin predicted U.S. financial crisis in 2000
By Yevgeniy Chernyx
Whatever decision Wall Street takes right now, the demand is going to fall. What will happen to these industries? In 2000, we estimated that 25 percent of the U.S. economy would disappear. Today, we think the number is closest to one-third - if not more.
DEAN BAKER: Bernanke Completely Missed the Housing Bubble and Downplayed Its Consequences Even After it Burst
The Post told readers today that Federal Reserve Board chairman Ben Bernanke “response to the financial crisis has won him plaudits from congressional Democrats who view him as pragmatic and non-ideological.” That may be true, but it might also be worth mentioning that Bernanke completely missed the housing bubble. Furthermore, even after it began to burst he repeatedly downplayed its consequences.
In March of 2007, after the first shock waves from the subprime market were being felt, Bernanke assured Congress that the fallout was likely to be restricted to the subprime market. The following year, after Bear Stearns failed, he told Congress that he didn’t see another Bear Stearns out there. Six months later, Lehman Brothers and AIG failed. If Bernanke had been quicker to recognize the severity of the problems created by the collapse of the housing bubble, he may have been able to prevent much of the current financial chaos.
