Bank of America may dump 30,000 jobs

Wow. They talked about 10,000 job cuts this morning and by the afternoon, the talk is about 30,000. After the Q4 results start arriving next quarter, it's not going to be much of a surprise if the cuts are even higher.

Bank of America could end up cutting 30,000 jobs as it moves to absorb Merrill Lynch, three times as many as previously estimated, sources told CNBC.

As of yesterday, sources were saying that layoffs could total at least 10,000 and would start before the end of the year.

But Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis wants to wring out $7 billion in savings from the merger over the next few years, so the total number of jobs lost could be closer to 30,000, they said.

Some of these job cuts could be through attrition or the sale of some businesses. But the heaviest cuts will probably come in the investment banking business, which has dried up during the current credit crisis.

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Vatican wants gays to be criminals -- and apparently think it's okay when nations execute gays

There is no level of gay-bashing to which the Catholic Church will not stoop. Via Think Progress, we learn that the Vatican opposes a U.N. resolution that would urge nations to de-criminalize homosexuality:

The Vatican is drawing criticism from gay rights groups and newspapers editorials after Archbishop Celestino Migliore, the Vatican’s permanent observer to the United Nations, told a French Catholic news service that the Vatican opposes “a proposed U.N. resolution calling on governments worldwide to de-criminalise homosexuality.” Migliore claimed that the resolution “would create new and implacable discriminations” against opponents of same-sex marriage.

The resolution has nothing to do with marriage. It's aimed, in part, at nations that kill gays. Killing gays. How Christian. That should make the Prada wearing Pope very proud.

The Catholics are now in some weird competition with their new friends, the Mormons, to see which church can bash gays more. Of course, both churches should spend more time preventing young children from being molested by church leaders, but that's another story.

The Vatican and its U.S. subsidiary couldn't be bigger hypocrites when it comes to the gays. There are plenty of gays in the Catholic Church, including a lot right here in D.C. Some of them aren't too subtle about it, either. That may explain why the Catholic leadership spends so much time thinking about all things gay. It's a very familiar subject. Read More......

Saxby Chambliss won the Georgia Senate runoff

NBC called it.

According to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution's liveblog, AP called it, too:

9 p.m.: The Associated Press has just declared Republican incumbent Saxby Chambliss the victor in the U.S. Senate race in Georgia. The Democrats have fallen short of their 60-seat majority.

Yep, no 60 vote super-majority for now.

And, Minnesota is still being recounted. That one will go on for awhile.

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Today in God

Reader Andrew pointed us to the following from AP:

A man who rammed his truck into a woman's vehicle on a highway early Friday told authorities he crashed into her while going more than 100 mph because God told him "she needed to be taken off the road."

The truck rear-ended the car on U.S. Highway 281, both vehicles spun across a median then came to a stop along a barrier in the opposite lanes. Both drivers suffered only minor injuries.

"He just said God said she wasn't driving right, and she needed to be taken off the road," Bexar County Sheriff's Office spokesman Kyle Coleman said in the online edition of the San Antonio Express-News....

A psychiatric evaluation has been ordered for a man.

It's religious bigotry, I tell you. How dare the police tell this man that he isn't hearing voices from God telling him to hurt other people? The Mormons and their religious right buddies have made an entire industry out of using God to justify their bashing of blacks and Jews and gays. And if you tell them to stop attacking you, they'll call you an intolerant bigot. So how is this any different? Read More......

AIG scraps "bonus" plan and replaces it with "retention" plan

Retain them? Besides the unemployment line, where would these people go? If ever there was a company begging for either Congress or the State of New York to lower the boom, it would be AIG. Looking at how badly they ruined their once proud business and then repeatedly stumbled with their post-bailout boondoggles, I don't see how this one can be overlooked. Even now, the management team remains 100% oblivious to the world around them. (h/t Gregg)

American International Group Inc., the insurer that said yesterday it scrapped bonuses for top executives after a U.S. bailout, will still pay 130 managers “cash awards” to stay with the firm, including $3 million to retirement services chief Jay Wintrob.

Wintrob, 51, will get the “retention” payment in two installments, the first in April 2009 and the rest a year later, New York-based AIG said today in a regulatory filing. The firm previously disclosed the program in a Sept. 26 filing and said today that Wintrob and Chief Financial Officer David Herzog elected to get the payments four months later than planned.

“The expectation from the public and Congress was that they weren’t getting bonuses, not that they’d be pushed off by several months,” said David Schmidt, a consultant at executive pay firm James F. Reda & Associates. “That clearly violates the spirit of AIG saying they’ll forgo their bonuses.

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Bill-O again makes Worst Person in the World

He's number one! He's number one!

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Franken picked up 37 votes from machine with uncounted ballots. This one is far from over.

This is another reason why recounts matter. Ballots were missed in the initial count -- and Al Franken benefited to the tune of a not insignificant total of 37 votes:

The final day of recounting in Ramsey County in the U.S. Senate race kicked up controversy today when 171 uncounted ballots from Maplewood turned up. The ballots apparently had been uncounted because of a ballot-counting-machine malfunction on Election Day.

Democrat Al Franken made a net gain of 37 votes from the ballots, as he got 91 of the total, to 54 for Republican Sen. Norm Coleman and 26 for other candidates, including Dean Barkley of the Independence Party.

At a press conference earlier today, Franken's lawyer said the margin, by their count, was down to 50 votes:

Minnesota Democrat Al Franken’s lead attorney said Tuesday that his count shows the comedian trailing Sen. Norm Coleman by just 50 votes with more than 200,000 left to be counted.

Attorney Marc Elias held his press conference in Washington just hours after elections officials found nearly 200 ballots that had not been counted on election night.

We won't know who won this race for awhile. It will come down to the ballots challenged during the recount process. As of last night, Coleman had challenged 3067 ballots while Franken had challenged 2876. The five-member canvassing board will review those challenges beginning December 16th. Franken's lawyer also said today that most of the challenges wouldn't hold:

“I’m here to tell you that the vast majority of these challenges are going to be thrown out,” Elias said. “We’re confident that we’re going to gain votes when the challenges are resolved.”

We may yet see Senator Franken.

One quick update: The 50-vote lead of which Franken's lawyer spoke did not include the 37 new votes. That would mean the margin is down to 13 votes.

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Bank of America to cut 10,000 jobs before end of year

We really need to seriously move away from "too big to fail" because the BofA purchase of Merrill Lynch expanded an already too big financial organization. The merger-mania that has come as a result of the credit crisis may be saving banks from total failure but the last thing we need are fewer banks with even larger balance sheets to support. Republicans convinced everyone that what was needed was to throw out the New Deal banking laws and look how that's all worked out.

Bank of America can be expected to cut at least 10,000 investment banking jobs as it moves to absorb Merrill Lynch, sources have told CNBC.

The layoffs will start before the end of the year and possibly as soon as this week.

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OPEC, hoping to push the world into a depression, to cut oil production again

Screw OPEC. I seriously hope the Obama people have a stern talk with the Saudis and the Kuwaitis, among others, and let them know that the next time their existence is threatened the American people won't be so disposed towards saving their greedy, ungrateful asses. Read More......

Obama's birth certificate

Yes, I'm still getting emails about Obama's birth certificate.

One of the more interesting conspiracy theories about President-elect Obama is that he was secretly born in Africa, then apparently sneaked into the United States (in a banana crate?), and now is pretending to be a natural born American, born in Hawaii, when he's really a secret Muslim African who can't be president because the Constitution requires the president to have been born in the United States.

Only problem? Obama's American birth certificate was made public long ago. Snopes has it. And Snopes also has the birth announcement from the local Hawaii paper back when Obama was born. Very sneaky of the Obamas to have a child in Africa, yet simultaneously place a birth announcement in the Hawaiian paper on the same day, nearly five decades ago - in the pre-Internet era, no less - on the off chance that their child might grow up to be president and require an American-born citizenship.

What's interesting to me is that this is the kind of crazy stuff people claim the left-wing blogs do. We don't. The top left-wing blogs didn't jump on the story, at all, about whether Palin's baby was really her own. And the one salacious story we did jump on, that Palin's first child was born 8 months after she was married - eh hem - turned out to be true. Read More......

Murkowski to Palin: Meeeow!

Fun fun fun fun fun fun fun:
From Politico:

Alaska Sen. Lisa Murkowski has some Republican-to-Republican advice for Gov. Sarah Palin: If you want to make a run at the White House, keep your hands off my Senate seat.

Murkowski, up for reelection in 2010, is nervously awaiting word on whether John McCain’s former running mate will run against her in the GOP primary. But she says Palin is the one who should be nervous.

“I can guarantee it would be a very tough election,” Murkowski said in an interview.

Palin is also up for reelection in 2010. She could run for a second term as governor, but the Senate holds some obvious attractions: a national platform, and with it the chance to beef up a thin résumé and rebuild damaged credibility on foreign policy and other issues.

But Murkowski says a run against her would be fraught with risk. If Palin lost, her stock would drop just ahead of a potential 2012 presidential run. And if she won, she’d be a backbencher in a chamber that is dominated by seniority — and would have to begin her presidential campaign as soon as she took office.

“If she wants to be president, I don’t think the way to the presidency is a short stop in the United States Senate,” Murkowski said.

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Florida's GOP Senator, Mel Martinez, not running for re-election in 2010, may quit early

Big political news from Florida today. According to Steve Bosquet, one of the most plugged-in political reporters in that state, Mel Martinez is not running for re-election:

U.S. Sen. Mel Martinez plans a major announcement in Orlando shortly and a highly-placed Republican source says Martinez will announce that he's not seeking re-election and that he may leave his seat in advance of the end of his term in 2010. That would open the door for Gov. Charlie Crist to appoint a replacement in advance of a wide-open Senate race in '10.

The quitting early part adds some intrigue. Will Crist appoint Jeb Bush to get him back on the national stage? Republicans tend to plan these moves out. So, maybe this is all just a GOP scheme to get Sarah Palin out of the limelight. But, would putting up a Bush really help the Republicans?

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Canadian left forms alliance that could unseat Bush crony

Change (it's spelled the same way in Quebecois):

With the announcement of a formal alliance among opposition parties, Canada moved closer Monday to removing its Conservative government without holding an election.

If the pact — signed by the Liberal and New Democratic parties and the Bloc Québécois — is successful at dislodging the Conservatives, it will be the first time since 1926 that the federal government has changed hands without a vote.

Coalition governments are rare in Canada, and the opposition plan still faces constitutional and political uncertainties.

Hat tip to Dan "He's not just about sex" Savage.

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Bush: Mistakes, I've made a few, but I feel bad that everyone got so mean

Your president opened up a bit to ABC yesterday -- and kinda, sorta acknowledged mistakes in his administration. Actually, the whole administration was a mistake. But, his regret about "the tone in Washington" getting worse is almost funny. Bush and his political minions, led by Karl Rove, were on a crusade of destruction and divisiveness. They reveled in making the tone worse and a lot uglier:

In the interview with ABC's Charles Gibson, Bush also admitted to errors and regrets in several key areas. He said he wished "the intelligence had been different" on Iraq but declined to speculate on whether he still would have decided to go to war. "That is a do-over that I can't do," he said.

Bush also said he regretted his failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform and "the fact that the tone in Washington got worse, not better" during his time in the White House.

Bush sidestepped a question about whether Obama's resounding election victory amounted to a personal repudiation. "I think it was a repudiation of Republicans," he said. "And I'm sure some people voted for Barack Obama because of me. I think most people voted for Barack Obama because they decided they wanted him to be in their living room for the next four years explaining policy."

It's like he really doesn't understand his role in the failures of the past eight years -- including the ugly tone.

And, Bush is partly right about the election. It was a repudiation of Republicans and Bush.

Barack Obama will actually explain policy and treat us like we're adults. And, we can't wait to get Bush out of our living rooms.

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Tuesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

I know I'm always complaining about the TODAY Show, yet I continue to watch it. But, today, the show hit a new low. The expert guest to analyze the new administration was Karl Rove. Yes, FOX News contributor Karl Rove was on my t.v. this morning talking about Obama. It was surreal hearing Rove, who owns a lot of responsibility for the failed Bush presidency, pontificating about the next administration. That's rich, especially since the new administration has to clean up the enormous foreign and domestic policy disasters left by Rove's boss. And, of course, there was no accountability demanded of Rove by Matt Lauer.

I realize that Karl Rove is only a pundit now. He can't hurt us or the country anymore. He can only further destroy the GOP. In fact, we owe him some gratitude for foisting Sarah Palin on John McCain. We can only hope he continues to advise the Republican Party. He's done so much for them already.

Rove-bashing will never go out of style.

Let's get it started... Read More......

JPMorgan cutting 9,200 WAMU jobs

Recession accomplished.

JPMorgan Chase & Co. said Monday it will cut a total of 9,200 jobs at Washington Mutual, which it acquired Sept. 25 after Washington Mutual became the nation's largest bank to fail amid the ongoing credit crisis.

Of the 9,200 jobs being eliminated as JPMorgan integrates Washington Mutual, 4,000 will be cut by the end of January, a JPMorgan spokesman said. The remaining 5,200 employees will remain with JPMorgan through a transition period, but will lose their positions by the end of 2009.

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Even more trouble in Trump-land?

I don't know what it is about the US media's obsession with self-obsessed flashy business people. Up until the Enron failure (the Republicans previous example of failed business policy) CNN used to broadcast an annoying show that featured big name CEOs and their life story. Somehow that show disappeared when too many of their featured guests started to receive indictments though the problem could have also been related to the sponsor of the show - Anderson Consulting - being connected to some of the troubled businesses such as Enron.

It was an act of mercy when that show was cut but that did not stop the hot run of Donald Trump and The Apprentice. What anyone could ever see in that program was a mystery to me but it was hard to argue against its commercial success. As with the old narcissistic CNN program "leaders", Trump can't live up to his own hype.

From Dubai to Chicago, from Atlantic City to Aberdeen, the host of the US version of The Apprentice is scaling back his ambitions for global domination, trying to fend off furious bankers and facing new questions from political opponents.

These are grim echoes of the past for a man who, during the recession of the early-Nineties, was forced to put large chunks of his business into bankruptcy, and even teetered on the edge of financial ruin. His re-emergence from that disaster is such a source of personal pride that he even sued the author of a book that estimated his wealth in mere millions, rather than billions, of dollars. The official tally – from Forbes magazine, which is the unofficial arbiter of these things – is that Mr Trump was worth $3bn (£2bn) at the last count, but that was before a string of disasters that was still unfolding yesterday.

It emerged that the Trump Organisation and its partners in Dubai were mothballing work on a 62-storey steel and glass skyscraper on one of the palm tree-shaped artificial islands in the Arabian Gulf. The development was meant to be a hotel and residential complex boasting Norman Foster bathtubs and furniture by the Italian designer Poltrona Frau, and Mr Trump had personally earmarked one of the penthouse suites. But demand has collapsed along with the fortunes of the wealthy that had flocked to Dubai in the boom.

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Bush blames crisis on events from ten years ago

In other words, it's all Bill Clinton's fault. Right. The Republicans continue to pin all of this on Clinton and the poor. Clinton most certainly helped promote lending policies that helped poor minorities who were previously blocked out of the system though to lay blame on that is an extreme stretch. Again, it wasn't the poor who decided to repackage those loans and offer high returns, cashing in with bonus money at each step. It wasn't the poor who decided to hand out liar loans, again making a healthy commission for the sale. It wasn't the poor who fed the commercial real estate boom. It wasn't the poor who chose not to provide traditional oversight or ask questions about over-extended banks. The scope of the credit crisis is so much larger than offering fair access to loans.

In the coming months as the losses mount and the crisis deepens - and it will most certainly get worse - the Republican response will be precisely what Bush is promoting as he's ushered out the door. The GOP approach has failed completely but that's not going to stop them from attempting to throw the blame on the Democrats and the poor. To accept their theory is to ignore the trillions sold around the globe and millions paid out to Wall Street along the way. As on other subjects, Bush has nothing so is hoping that "the future" will somehow absolve him of any guilt on this failure.

As he leaves office, Bush said he felt responsible for the economic downturn because it's occurring on his watch, but he added: "I think when the history of this period is written, people will realize a lot of the decisions that were made on Wall Street took place over a decade or so" before he became president.

He said he would like to see "instant liquidity" in the markets given the extent of the financial rescue plan, yet he understands that fear has paralyzed the markets.

"It is hard for the average citizen to understand how frozen the system became and how over-leveraged the system became," Bush said. "And so what we're watching is the de-leveraging of our financial markets, which is obviously affecting the growth of the economy."

Um, no. I'm pretty sure Americans do, in fact, have an understanding. It's Bush that has been oblivious to the problem. They're also pretty clear that the over-leveraging was the way Wall Street wanted it and the way the Republicans wanted it to be. That's what happens when a government fails to provide proper guidance and hands over the job to business. Bush really was the CEO president, but just not the CEO for the US. He has been the CEO for big business lobbyists. Read More......

The age of the members of the US Supreme Court

John Paul Stevens, 88 (Ford)
Ruth Bader Ginsburg, 75 (Clinton)
Antonin Scalia, 72 (Reagan)
Anthony Kennedy, 72 (Reagan)
Stephen Breyer, 70 (Clinton)
David Souter, 69 (GHW Bush)
Clarence Thomas, 60 (GHW Bush)
Samuel Alito, 58 (GW Bush)
John Roberts, 53 (GW Bush)

Only 2 of the 9 were chosen by a Democrat. Read More......