Car dealer in Colorado posts billboard linking Obama to Ft Hood, and pushing birther nonsense

The sad, and scary part, is that these people actually believe this stuff. Read the rest of this post...

Blackwater allegedly running covert ops in Pakistan, posing as USAID employees

Yes, the Blackwater that Bush's DOJ was considering indicting last December. The same Blackwater that was accused of shooting at innocent Iraqi civilians. The same Blackwater that was accused, just a few weeks ago, of bribing Iraqi officials to quell criticism of the civilian shooting incident. Yes, that's the Blackwater that the Obama administration is reportedly employing to help plan assassinations in Pakistan.

Oh, and posing as USAID workers is a good way to make actual US development workers targets. From the Nation:

At a covert forward operating base run by the US Joint Special Operations Command (JSOC) in the Pakistani port city of Karachi, members of an elite division of Blackwater are at the center of a secret program in which they plan targeted assassinations of suspected Taliban and Al Qaeda operatives, "snatch and grabs" of high-value targets and other sensitive action inside and outside Pakistan, an investigation by The Nation has found. The Blackwater operatives also assist in gathering intelligence and help run a secret US military drone bombing campaign that runs parallel to the well-documented CIA predator strikes, according to a well-placed source within the US military intelligence apparatus.

The source, who has worked on covert US military programs for years, including in Afghanistan and Pakistan, has direct knowledge of Blackwater's involvement. He spoke to The Nation on condition of anonymity because the program is classified. The source said that the program is so "compartmentalized" that senior figures within the Obama administration and the US military chain of command may not be aware of its existence.

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Provincetown clarifies Pilgrim history

Rock? Who needs a rock when you have the real history? Just kidding, of course, but why not check out both fantastic places and their history? I admit to having a bit of bias though because I love P-town. Follow the link and check out the video with a bit more of the Pilgrim history.

And now, the good people of Provincetown want you to know the rest of the story: The Pilgrims made landfall here first, 389 years ago yesterday, five weeks before they moved to Plymouth, and about a year before they sat down to the harvest feast that spawned an American tradition. And if the Cape Codders have to steal a little Thanksgiving thunder to get their message across, well, so be it.

“Important things happened here, and we should remember that,’’ said Laurel Guadazno, education and program manager at the Pilgrim Monument and Provincetown Museum. “Provincetown has always gotten short shrift. It still does.’’

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RNC loses communications director

As Cillizza notes, mid-cycle, that tends to mean turmoil in GOP land.

Trevor Francis, the communications director at the Republican National Committee, is leaving his post, an odd mid-cycle departure that suggests some level of turmoil within the GOP's chief campaign committee.

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Which airlines have wi-fi where

Other than the incredibly obnoxious automatic loading ad on ABC's page, this is a quite useful article for those seeking wi-fi on their flights. I've yet to find a flight that actually has wi-fi. Have any of you? Did it work well? Read the rest of this post...

Obama's approval slips below 50%, but...

A good point from Adam Nagourney at the NYT:

Ronald Reagan’s average job approval rating in the months before his first mid-term Congressional election, in 1982, was 42 percent — and Republicans that November lost 26 seats. And who remembers that? Two years later, Reagan carried 49 states as he galloped to a second term over Walter F. Mondale.

Though, this does not mean that Obama will turn things around. It means it's not written in stone that he can't. On the present course, I remain skeptical that things will get better for the White House. I don't see them trying to mend relations with the Democratic base, and I don't see the president showing a lot of decisiveness on health care reform or Aghanistan, among other issues. The anger, disappointment and disillusionment that a growing number of Democrats have with the President, the Congress and the party will continue to make things worse for Democrats over time, I fear. Read the rest of this post...

Howard Dean sounding awfully pessimistic on health care reform

Former DNC chair Howard Dean to Huffington Post:

"[I]if they drop the public option [to placate moderate members], I think they lose seats."

"So this is really tough. I didn't anticipate being in this position. I thought it would pass. Maybe Harry has some magic up his sleeve. But I don't see how he gets those four votes [Sens. Joseph Lieberman (Conn.), Mary Landrieu (La.), Blanche Lincoln (Ark.) and Ben Nelson (Neb.)] without compromising the bill," Dean concluded.

The former Vermont governor warned that if the party allowed the four moderates to further water down the bill (or defeat it altogether) it could lead to primary challenges or a drop in fundraising from the party's base.

"If you have members refusing to vote for Reid on procedural issues you will have a revolt in the party," Dean said. "What is the point of having a 60-vote margin? This is going to be death for the [Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee] and the [Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee]. Why would anyone donate to them if they're supporting candidates who defeat the Democratic agenda?"

There was, he insisted, an out clause. Reconciliation -- the budgetary maneuver that would allow portions of reform to be considered by an up or down vote -- "looks better every time," Dean said. "Someone has to say, at some point, we need to pass a bill." Reid has hinted that reconciliation is an increasingly unlikely proposition.

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How and Why to Make Goldman Pay

By now everyone, even the NY Times front page, has noticed the huge multi-billion dollar profits posted by Goldman Sachs and others in the financial sector. Naturally, at a time when everyone else is hurting, the instinct is to stop them or make them pay the money back to the government. The first question is "Why should they?" The usual answer is because we bailed out the finance industry, and they shouldnt make such huge profits on the backs of the taxpayers. I am sympathetic to this argument on simple fairness grounds, but it is important to answer a second question: "If we hit them with a huge payment, are we cutting off our nose to spite our face?"

My answer to the first question is that there is plenty of reason to think that it is entirely wrong that the financial sector runs off with such huge piles of money. And my answer to the second is that even if the financial sector were to quit doing what they are doing because of new taxes, there is good reason to believe we might be better off rather than worse.

First, to the extent that they are relying on taxpayer money, there is a prima facie case for taking the money back. We didn't bail them out so they could make profits - though I doubt that a smaller level of profits would have provoked such negative reaction - and so long as their profits are less than the amount the taxpayers pumped into them either directly or indirectly (and so far they are) then I feel on perfectly good moral ground taking the money back.

But there is a bigger case than that to be made - the truly obscene levels of profits in the investment banking industry have ballooned since the financial deregulation that happened at the end of the Clinton Administration (Gramm-Leach-Bliley). There is no question that the deregulation allowed huge gains and improvements in efficiency that could never have been gained before. For the investment bankers and their clients it was clearly a great thing. But here is the rub: that group - investment bankers and their clients - are all of them in the upper 5% of the income distribution. And this 5% is the only group in the whole economy that saw sustained income gains over the past decade.

So, what we had is a reform that increased income markedly but most of us didn't get any of the increase. What we DID get was much higher risk and volatility, which is a polite way of saying we are taking the hit for the economic crash of 2008-09. Most of us could only gain from the financial boon by having a stock portfolio, but those arent looking to great right now. Even with the recent increases, we have only recouped 50% of the losses since the crash began. I, for one, would be very happy with less efficiency but more stability. Unlike investment bankers, I don't make money on a down market just as easily as an up market. (In the interest of honesty, I used to be one of them - In a previous incarnation I was a bond trader - I was in charge of one of the largest traded portfolios in the UK gilt market back in the mid-1980's) It is not at all obvious to me that the bottom 90% of the income distribution would be worse off today if we had never done the reforms of 1999, had forgone the GDP increases that resulted, and had a somewhat less efficient financial sector.

So, how to get the money back? I think it would be a great thing to have another income tax bracket in the USA. Why not just tax those guys at 50% on income over $5 or 10 million? Sure, they would try to evade the tax by moving income offshore but we have an IRS - we could pay to chase them down if they try anything fishy. OH NO, they will say. We cant possibly work as hard if you take half our money over $5 million! Fine. Don't. But I will bet that the Goldmanites will scramble just as hard for $8 billion as they did for $16 billion.

But lets face it, that isn't going to happen with our current crop of politicians. (Its socialism!!) So how about a windfall profits tax? Or even a permanent tax on federally backed too-big-to-fail financial institutions? After all, there is clearly a well defined logic to this last idea: If we are all on the hook if they mess up, then they should contribute to the Treasury in return. We economists call that "internalizing the externality." That is, if their activities have a costly undesirable side effect that doesn't show up on their books - and this would seem to be the case here - then the cure is to find a way to make those costs come back to them, so they act according to society's cost/benefit calculation rather than their own private one.

And finally, some advice for those of them who don't like it and throw the inevitable hissy fit: Dont let the door hit you on the way out. We have plenty of people lined up who would love to have your job. Read the rest of this post...

Martha Stewart: Palin is "dangerous" and "confused"

God bless Martha.

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Man in vegetative state for 23 years was actually fully alert

From AP:

For 23 torturous years, Rom Houben says he lay trapped in his paralyzed body, aware of what was going on around him but unable to tell anyone or even cry out....

The 46-year-old Houben is now communicating with one finger and a special touchscreen on his wheelchair.

"Powerlessness. Utter powerlessness. At first I was angry, then I learned to live with it," he said, punching the message into the screen during an interview with the Belgian RTBF network, aired Monday. He has called his rescue his "renaissance."

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Glenn Beck mocks name of Jewish Media Matters employee

Funny. Mocking Jewish names. Perhaps Glenn Beck thinks that people with "funny" names are all immigrants and thus not "real" Americans. I remember making fun of people's names. When I was 8.

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Credit card delinquencies improve

This may not signal great times are here but it's definitely a positive sign that Americans are not falling behind on credit card debt.

For the first time in a decade, more people paid their credit card bills on time in the third quarter this year than in the second quarter.

The delinquency rate on bank-issued cards like those bearing MasterCard and Visa logos fell to 1.1 percent for the June-to-September period, from a rate of 1.17 percent in the prior three months, according to credit reporting agency TransUnion.

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Kerry and Hatch want health care reform to pay people to pray for you

I can't even get my insurance company to cover my allergy pills, or a year's supply of my asthma drugs, and these guys are worried about whether health care reform covers prayer? Are they kidding? Why not have it cover sex as a treatment for migraines? (It actually works.) Hell, why not have it cover my own prayer - there are, what, 6 billion people in the world? Hang on.... There, I just prayed for their well-being. That's $6 billion multiplied by $20 or $40 bucks according to John Kerry and Orrin Hatch. Where's my check?

From the Washington Post:

Each prayer is a cerebral search for resolution to the patient's problem. And the answer often comes in the form of an idea or feeling: "God is here," "God is life," "We are created in God's perfect image."

Such thoughts, she said, drive out the fear causing the sickness: fear of pain, death, hopelessness. And as she and her patients reconnect with God, healing comes naturally.

Practically speaking, they want us to cover this unproven remedy but not other unproven remedies. Solely because this unproven remedy is practiced by a religion. That's not equal treatment of religion, it's special rights for religion. It's the state subsidizing a religious practice at a time in which our country is already in serious fiscal peril. (Why not just pay people to pray for deficit reduction, for Afghanistan, for DOMA repeal, and so on?)

This is one of the reasons it's good to travel abroad. You get to see how ridiculous your own country looks, at times, when seen from a distance. An Australian reader of ours recently remarked that "Australia got the convicts, but you got the Puritans." Want to trade?

Kerry and Hatch will please their own constituents by putting this Christo-pork in the health care bill, but it's the kind of thing that only reinforces for the rest of Americans how out of touch Washington really is. The health care reform bill isn't about paying people to pray. Unless of course we're praying that the final legislation actually does anything at all to change our corrupt and inefficient health care system.

PS Would Kerry and Hatch's language also require insurance companies to pay religious right hucksters who claim to "cure" gays or their sexual orientation "illness" through prayer? Sure sounds like it would be covered. It's prayer by religious people who claim to be curing someone of a physical ailment. To deny it, while covering Christian Scientists, could be unconstitutional. So your tax money may soon be paying bigots to cure gays. Heck of a health care bill, Brownie. Read the rest of this post...

Report: Jamie Dimon could replace Geithner

If nothing else, it's interesting to see someone testing the waters. Geithner remains highly unpopular in Congress, the public and even with Obama supporters. NYPost:

Dimon, meanwhile, has achieved rock star status during the financial crisis, having navigated JPMorgan through the recession and being a go-to guy when Uncle Sam last year needed Wall Street's help during the collapses of Bear Stearns and Washington Mutual.

Furthermore, while many bank chiefs are facing heat over outsize bonuses, Dimon has repeatedly made clear he won't write fat checks to attract or keep talent.

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Dem Senators Lieberman and Nelson again threaten to scuttle health care reform

Here's a simple question. What are President Obama and Senator Reid doing to tell Leiberman and Nelson to shape up or ship out? Combined, Reid and Obama have immense power. Are they using it?

Moderate Senate Democrats threatened Sunday to scuttle health-care legislation if their demands aren't met, while more liberal members warned their party leaders not to bend....

Final passage is in jeopardy, even after the chamber's historic 60-39 vote Saturday night to begin debate.

"I don't want a big-government, Washington-run operation that would undermine the ... private insurance that 200 million Americans now have," said Sen. Ben Nelson, a conservative Nebraska Democrat....

"I don't want to fix the problems in our health care system in a way that creates more of an economic crisis," said Lieberman.

They only have power when you give them power. And you give them power when you're afraid to crack heads. Read the rest of this post...

Monday morning open thread

I'm back from Barcelona. Got in last night. It was a quick trip, unfortunately - my God what a gorgeous city - but it was an incredibly worthwhile experience. I got to meet so many interesting political Internet activists and consultants and just overall experts from around the EU, and even a few from the states. I'm jet lagging massively as I write this, but will write more about who I met and things I learned, and just the overall experience, over the day. And share a few more photos (though I didn't get that many - most of the trip was spent at the conference site). The photo above is of the Sagrada Familia church, and the surrounding grounds. A truly spectacular building. It's been under construction since 1883. Seriously. 1883. It's scheduled to be completed in 2026. Talk about taking a long view of history. Read the rest of this post...

Job losses to hit bottom in first quarter 2010

If indeed true, this would be good news. On the ground, I certainly see some of the best movement in a long time in terms of spending, though that's in Europe. Another blow to the economy could drastically change all of this but as it stands today, next year could look a little bit better.

While signs have pointed to the end of the recession, joblessness remains rampant. The national unemployment rate jumped to 10.2 percent in October, the highest in 26 years. About 9 million people currently receive unemployment benefits.

The November outlook by the National Association for Business Economics, which is set to be released Monday, shows economists expect net employment losses to bottom out in the first quarter of next year. Employers are seen starting to add to their payrolls after that.

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British Iraq War inquiry: Blair misled the public

Wait one minute. I think I need to hold on to my seat with this surprise. Next thing you know, we're going to find out that the WMD story was false. Days like this shock me to my core. The Guardian:

They were so shocked by the lack of preparation for the aftermath of the invasion that they believe members of the British and US governments at the time could be prosecuted for war crimes by breaching the duty outlined in the Geneva convention to safeguard civilians in a conflict, the Guardian has been told.

The lengths the Blair government took to conceal the invasion plan and the extent of military commanders' anger at what they call the government's "appalling" failures emerged as Sir John Chilcot, the inquiry's chairman, promised to produce a "full and insightful" account of how Britain was drawn into the conflict.

Fresh evidence has emerged about how Blair misled MPs by claiming in 2002 that the goal was "disarmament, not regime change". Documents show the government wanted to hide its true intentions by informing only "very small numbers" of officials.

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