Bush: Afghanistan war not going so well

Ya don't say. Imagine that.

U.S.-led operations are having more success in Iraq than in Afghanistan, where a porous border with Pakistan has allowed Islamist extremists to cross into the war zone, President George W. Bush said on Tuesday.

Bush also pledged U.S. assistance to investigate Afghan President Hamid Karzai's accusation that Pakistani agents were involved in attacks in his country, including a suicide car bomb at the Indian Embassy in Kabul that killed 58 people. Pakistan says the accusations are baseless.

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Bernanke tells Congress: economy in trouble for a while

What a whiner. At least he's coming around to what many said months ago that inflation needs to be tamed. Earlier in this cycle many said that the Fed was too focused on Wall Street at the expense of everyone else. Bailing out Wall Street and throwing wads of cash at them was only delaying the inevitable and probably feeding inflation. It's clear now that he ignored inflation and it's coming back in a big way. It certainly didn't help us avoid a meltdown, which looks like our future in the near term.

The problem for many of us is that his policies reflected the same old coddling of Wall Street - who benefited tremendously from the subprime policies - and left the problem for everyone else. For once it would be nice if the Fed stopped being an arm of Wall Street and looked out for everyone else. Even now Bernanke is propping up the banks - which of course he needs to do - but the high rollers still are getting a much easier ride compared to the middle class. I don't care what his term is, he needs to go very early on after the election. We need a break from the old ways that have ceased working for the country as a whole.

In long-awaited testimony at the Senate Banking Committee, Mr. Bernanke avoided the word “recession” in characterizing the current economy, noting instead that consumer spending and exports were keeping growth “at a sluggish pace” while the housing sector “continues to weaken.”

“The economy has continued to expand, but at a subdued pace,” Mr. Bernanke said. But he added that spending for personal goods had “advanced at a modest pace so far this year, generally holding up somewhat better than might have been expected given the array of forces weighing on household finances and attitudes.”

He said that while the risks to the overall economy were still “skewed to the downside,” inflation “seems likely to move temporarily higher in the near term.” The Fed, Mr. Bernanke said, needed to guard against higher prices spreading throughout the economy.

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Salmonella outbreak grows, FDA still has no clue

As this video link mentions at the end, the growers who are talking about incalculable financial losses due to this outbreak are the same group who have fought any changes in regulation. They have lobbied the Bush administration and Republicans to let self-regulation control this process despite repeated failures. Now they're losing millions and thousands of people across 42 states, DC and Canada are getting sick and consumers are afraid to buy tomatoes, cilantro, peppers and who knows what else.

It's hard to believe that the US still doesn't have traceability for food so instead of limiting the problem, the large food producers are dragging down everyone, making the financial losses much more than they have to be. How's that self regulation thing working out? Read the rest of this post...

The husband of the beer heiress, John McCain, is in St. Louis "to rub salt in the wounds of Missourians"

All politics is local. And, John McCain just did some bad some local politics in Missouri. Remember how Cindy McCain got all those millions and millions because of her Anheuser-Busch distributorship? Yeah, and she's making a lot more from the sale of the company to a Belgian firm.

From Fired Up Missouri:

John McCain certainly knows how to rub salt in the wounds of Missourians suffering the slings and arrows of a GOP-ruined economy.

Just a day after Missourians learned that Anheuser-Busch would be sold to Belgian firm InBev, McCain promptly comes to St. Louis --the home of Anheuser-Busch-- for a mega-dollar reception at the vast estate of the former United States ambassador to, of all countries, Belgium.

Missouri is a true toss up. The latest poll in Missouri shows Obama with a slight lead. Read the rest of this post...

McCain opposes gay adoption, kind of, sometimes

The New York Times quoted John McCain as saying he opposes gay adoption. His campaign then issued a statement saying he only opposes gays adopting when straight couples are available to take the kids. So basically, rather than put the kids to sleep, McCain wolud let them be adopted. I'm sorry, but the year is 2008. I'm not going to accept John McCain saying that gays are less fit to be parents, or that gay parents don't have as much to offer as straight parents, and then have him say in the same breath that as a last resort gays are fit as parents. Either we are or we're not, you can't have it both ways. Not to mention, McCain's argument that he's for letting states decide is bull. In California, he's supporting the initiative to repeal the right to marry for gay couples, so McCain is only for states deciding what's best until the religious right pulls him by the short hairs.

Here's what happened today:

"I think that we've proven that both parents are important in the success of a family so, no, I don't believe in gay adoption," McCain replied.

McCain then remarked that he and his wife, Cindy, were proud to be adoptive parents of a daughter born in Bangladesh, and he encouraged others to adopt. Asked if those adopting should be a "traditional couple," McCain answered, "Yes."
...

On Tuesday, as criticism of McCain's comments spread, his campaign elaborated on the candidate's views.

"John McCain could have been clearer in the interview in stating that his position on gay adoption is that it is a state issue. ... He was not endorsing any federal legislation," a campaign statement said.

"Sen. McCain's expressed his personal preference for children to be raised by a mother and a father wherever possible," the statement added. "However, as an adoptive father himself, McCain believes children deserve loving and caring home environments, and he recognizes that there are many abandoned children who have yet to find homes. John McCain believes that in those situations that caring parental figures are better for the child than the alternative."

Well, my first choice wouldn't be to put a child with a drug addict either. Read the rest of this post...

McCain's rape joke

Yes he did. McCain circa 1986:

Did you hear the one about the woman who is attacked on the street by a gorilla, beaten senseless, raped repeatedly and left to die? When she finally regains consciousness and tries to speak, her doctor leans over to hear her sigh contently and to feebly ask, ‘Where is that marvelous ape?’

But hey, it was a youthful indiscretion. I mean, McCain was only 49 years old at the time. Read the rest of this post...

Big Oil stands by Bush plan for drilling

Can someone tell this guy to go Cheney himself? Of course, Big Oil is hardly more popular than Bush and we already know that nothing will get in the way of their drilling projects whether its war or the environment. If only they would stop drilling a hole in the pockets of consumers.

“It’s an American problem,” said John Hoffmeister, president of Shell Oil, “adding that the powers that be in Washington need to “quit the rhetoric and get on to solutions.”

Right, and Shell is not an American company. Shell is a European oil company who has a very different agenda from the citizens of the US. I'm sick and tired of Big Oil deciding what is in the best interest of the US or Europe or any other country. Remember how GM used to play that game? How'd that all work out? Instead of throwing more money at oil we ought to be investing in alternative energies. Promoting more oil based solutions is great business for Big Oil but at this time it's quite clear what's good for Big Oil is not good for America. Read the rest of this post...

Bush - no idea on price of gas, clueless on oil impact

This is really something to observe because besides not having any clue about the price of gas for Americans - which is important enough for a President to know these days - he is laughing about it. What a joker Dear Leader can be. He starts off by pitching our Phil Gramm-John McCain favorite - psychology - as the lead reason for our problems today. Right. As if years of thumbing his nose at conservation and suggesting that anyone who bothered was not quite macho enough. Bush speaks as though he has been the governor of Texas, with no control over the national energy plan. Can he ever accept responsibility for anything? Ever? He is talking as though he is just another casual observer and not the President.

The Big Oil lapdogs talk about changing the psychology by drilling, so why the constant hesitation to promote real conservation and real investment in alternative energies. I don't disagree with him that whatever we do will take years so who wants to be ten years down the road, still tied to unstable countries who pump oil when we could bring new technologies onshore? This is jobs, this is investment money this is tax dollars and it's the future. More oil pumping is throwing money at the past. What kind of economic sense does it make to throw more money at old technology? How short sited is that? Why be an also-ran when we can become the leader for the future? Just because the GOP is shaking in their boots about our ability to lead doesn't mean everyone should go along with such cowardice. Read the rest of this post...

Your questions for Joseph Stiglitz and George Papandreou?

I've got two interviews scheduled for tomorrow, and I'd like your suggestions for questions.

The first interview is with Nobel prize in economics winner Joseph Stiglitz of Columbia University. As I wrote yesterday, Stiglitz is the man who recently came up with the $3 trillion price tag for Iraq, as described in his new book, The Three Trillion Dollar War. I'm thinking of asking him about Iraq, of course, and the mortgage crisis. But open to other suggestions.

The second interview is with George Papandreou, the leader of the largest opposition party in Greece, PASOK (and the son of former Greek Premier Andreas Papandreou. I plan to ask Papandreou to tell us, as Americans, what it means to be a socialist. Papandreou not only runs a socialist party, he's the newly re-elected president of the Socialist International. Americans of my generation and older, at least many of us, associated the Socialist International with the Soviet Union specifically, and anti-Americanism generally. It's now been some 17 years since the Soviet Union joined the dust bin of history, so perhaps it's time we revisited our knee-jerk distaste for anything termed "socialism." In any case, I plan to ask Papandreou about this, but again am open to whatever questions you may have. Read the rest of this post...

Wholesale inflation jumps, surge hits 27 year high

What a nation of whiners. Can we get another inspirational pep talk from Phil Gramm? Tell us how you made millions from subprime loans again, Phil. Tell us that story one more time so we can sleep soundly tonight and turn that frown upside down.

Soaring costs for gasoline and food pushed inflation at the wholesale level up by a larger-than-expected amount in June, leaving inflation rising over the past year at the fastest pace in more than a quarter-century.

The Labor Department reported that wholesale prices jumped by 1.8 percent last month, the biggest one-month rise since last November. Over the past 12 months, wholesale prices are up 9.2 percent, the largest year-over-year surge since June 1981, another period when soaring energy costs were giving the country inflation pains.

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Is the GOP now gay-baiting Obama?

Uh yeah. You tell me what kind of man is called "a fancy lad," especially when the attack comes from a Republican. She means he acts gay. Which is ironic, considering how gay John McCain's campaign, the Bush White House, and the GOP at large is. I mean, if we're going to get into a contest of which party has the fanciest lads, the GOP wins hands down. Putting that aside, where is Mrs. Greenspan's outrage now that the GOP is gay-baiting Obama? She was plenty upset when anyone dared impugn the honor of Saint McCain. But now that the GOP is gay-baiting Obama, in addition to yesterday's moment in courage when the McCain campaign basically called Obama un-American (for the second time), when are we going to hear from Andrea Mitchell, Bob Schieffer, Leonard Pitts, the Washington Independent, and the rest of the corporate media that ran running to the defense of John McCain when anyone dared question his experience as commander in chief? We're waiting. Read the rest of this post...

GM chops and chops and chops and chops

Lots of news headlines related to GM and none of is good. Their stock price is less than a quarter of its 52 week high. Besides job cuts and salary cuts they are also looking at eliminating health coverage for US salaried retirees. What a slap in the face to those people who worked there. My father worked for an old rust belt industrial company who also did this. He retired with health insurance and not long after, the company started to ask him to contribute. Then it was more and then it was all of it and of course we know how much those costs have increased. Retirees have a fixed income and insurance can easily be $5000 or more and that's for a high deductible. How in the world do retirees whip up a spare chunk of change like that?

This market is about to hit another rough patch that will make us forget about the initial hiccup. The only positive spin on this is that it's happening today and ought to force political leaders to speak about critical issues such as health care, unemployment and whether we need more risk in our society. We also need to step back and look at how well a select few have done in recent years compared to the bulk of the population. People like McCain and Gramm are hardly able to understand if they can't even see how poorly their economic model is working. Forget about McCain's dismissal of the "whining" remark and listen to the rest of the story. These people are 10000% in favor of more of the same. More of the same that brought us to GM chopping and banks on the edge of bankruptcy. We've seen enough, haven't we? Read the rest of this post...

It's satire, get it?

From the Seattle Post-Intelligencer:

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Bush presser at 10:20 a.m.

Interesting timing. Obama is scheduled to deliver his "major foreign policy address" at 10:45 a.m. But, today, for the first time since April, Bush is going to do a press conference -- at 10:20 a.m.:

President Bush is preparing to hold a news conference, his first full-blown meeting with reporters at the White House since April 29.

White House press secretary Dana Perino said Bush would open with a statement about steps to help stabilize the housing and financial markets and his lifting of the executive ban on offshore oil drilling. He'll also call on lawmakers to pass long-stalled spending bills.

That should instill confidence, huh?

The economic news today is especially abysmal. Bush's economy and his war have drained the nation. But, Bush will always put partisan politics first. They're probably high-fiving each other at the White House for stepping on Obama's speech -- not realizing that the more the American people see George Bush, the less likely they are to vote for Bush's heir apparent, John McCain. Read the rest of this post...

Obama: "our single-minded and open-ended focus on Iraq is not a sound strategy for keeping America safe"

Obama delivers a "major foreign policy address" later today. Unlike Bush and McCain, Obama is actually aware of the toll the Iraq war is taking on the United States, our position in the world and the safety of the country -- oh, also our tanking economy. Of course, being honest about our situation doesn't please the pundits:

Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama said on Tuesday a "single-minded" focus on Iraq was distracting the United States from other threats and he renewed his vow to end the war.

"This war diminishes our security, our standing in the world, our military, our economy, and the resources that we need to confront the challenges of the 21st century," Obama said in excerpts of a speech to be delivered later on Tuesday.

"By any measure, our single-minded and open-ended focus on Iraq is not a sound strategy for keeping America safe," he said.

Obama, who has been accused by his Republican rival John McCain of shifting positions on Iraq, is seeking to lay out his views on the war ahead of a planned trip to Afghanistan and Iraq soon.

Does John McCain even know we're in a war in Afghanistan? Read the rest of this post...

McCain lies to a kid about immigration

It's good to be John McCain. Not only is he one of the very rich and famous with nine homes and counting, but McCain can say anything he wants with impunity. McCain knows the media will give him a free ride. So, he makes things up, changes position and sometimes just outright lies. But, it's okay. He's John McCain.

But, lying/flip-flopping/obfuscating about the DREAM Act to a kid is still pretty low -- even for John McCain:



And, if he didn't lie to the kid, he lied to the conservative bloggers. Read the rest of this post...

Tuesday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

I realized late in the day yesterday that I missed yesterday's open thread. Sorry about that.

There are 16 weeks -- 112 days -- til November 4, 2008. That's not a lot of time. And, I'll keep repeating what I've been saying. McCain's campaign is a disaster. He's got nothing to offer the American people. But, McCain and the GOP have $400 million which will be used to destroy Obama's reputation. It's going to get ugly. When the GOP fears losing, they go nuclear. Seriously, I expect this campaign to make 1988's Willie Horton and 2004's Swift Boats look like child's play. What else can McCain do? And, given the crimes committed over the past eight years by Bush and Cheney, the Republicans really want to keep the power.

Seriously, everyone who wants a Democratic President better be ready. The time for fun and games is over.

Now, start threading the news....

Read the rest of this post...

Dollar hits new low against Euro, oil over $146

Not exactly what anyone wants to see before Wall Street opens. Read the rest of this post...

Is it the 1970s all over again?

Similarities are there such as the belief that this could end up being a long, drawn out period instead of the usual 10 month recession. In the 1970s the Dow trudged along with peaks and valleys (thanks to the energy crisis) but it took ten years for the Dow to bounce above its 1972 peak of 1,000. Last July the Dow hit 14,000 and everyone celebrated the new era and wondered how soon before 15,000 and 20,000. At the moment we are sitting just above 11,000 and in all likelihood we're about to drop again thanks to weak banks and years of pathetic regulation. For the sake of everyone's retirement I hope the Dow doesn't wait until 2017 to hit 14,000 again but we're certainly not going to be there by 2010.

It's obvious to anyone who wants to live in the real world that the economy is bad. Very bad. To think that more of the same Republican economics that brought us here will somehow miraculously trigger a u-turn is at best wishful thinking. Their friends (and themselves) have all profited from this model yet for the bulk of Americans, job security is less, pay is stagnant, costs for everything are going up and now everyone has to worry about whether their bank can stay afloat. Notice the silence from those who thought it was a great idea in the past? And then, of course, we have the Phil Gramm/John McCain model where we're kicked and then insulted because have the nerve to complain about this half-baked theory. Glad to see they get it. Read the rest of this post...

Cindy McCain to profit from InBev-Anheuser-Busch deal

Should be enough to buy yet another mansion for the McCain family. Read the rest of this post...