Only in America

Bank of America and Citi manage to go from the outhouse to the penthouse, turning in multi-billion dollar profits. And here I thought they were the worst of the worst, hanging on by a thread a few months ago. Oh that's right, they were. Go figure. As much as these institutions needed to be propped up to prevent an even worse recession there is something very annoying and suspicious about these profits on Wall Street. Maybe it's time every American gets their own fat bonus and rescue plan so we can all experience such a miraculous climb out of ruin. Looks like others are scratching their heads and wondering what this is all about as well. Strange times. Read the rest of this post...

Amazon kindle takes back 1984 (irony alert)

From Boing Boing:

People who bought Orwell's 1984 and Animal Farm for their Kindle were surprised to discover that it had disappeared from their devices overnight. It turns out the publisher changed its mind about offering an electronic version, and Amazon caved into their demand to sneak into people's electronic libraries and take back the book at the publisher's request.

And from the NYT's David Pogue:

This is ugly for all kinds of reasons. Amazon says that this sort of thing is “rare,” but that it can happen at all is unsettling; we’ve been taught to believe that e-books are, you know, just like books, only better. Already, we’ve learned that they’re not really like books, in that once we’re finished reading them, we can’t resell or even donate them. But now we learn that all sales may not even be final.

As one of my readers noted, it’s like Barnes & Noble sneaking into our homes in the middle of the night, taking some books that we’ve been reading off our nightstands, and leaving us a check on the coffee table.

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Walter Cronkite is dead

Walter Cronkite died today. He was 92. The NY Times called him the "iconic Anchorman." He was.

I am old enough to remember watching Cronkite every night at 6:30 PM. And, he was the guy to watch during all the Apollo missions. Read the rest of this post...

Jumbo flying squid attack San Diego

I told you what would happen if Iowa let the gays marry.

Jumbo flying squid have invaded the shallow waters off San Diego, California, spooking scuba divers and beachgoers after washing up dead on the beaches.

The carnivorous cephalopods, which weigh up to 45kg (100lb), came up from the depths last week, with swarms of them roughing up unsuspecting divers. Some reported tentacles enveloping their masks and yanking at their cameras and gear.

Stories of close encounters with the squid have chased many divers out of the water and created a whirlwind of excitement among those torn between their personal safety and the once-in-a-lifetime chance to swim with the deep-sea giants....

Roger Uzun, a veteran scuba diver and amateur underwater videographer, swam with a swarm of the creatures for about 20 minutes and said they appeared more curious than aggressive. The animals taste with their tentacles, he said, and seemed to be touching him and his wet suit to determine if he was edible.

Thought I'd add, this isn't a joke. It's from the Guardian. Read the rest of this post...

CNBC: Healthcare reform equals communism

Nobody enjoys the communist pitch more than I do so let's have a big round of applause for CNBC who went there again. My favorite Wall Street boot-licking network has gone back to ol' faithful, smearing the Democrats as pinko-commies while ignoring the massive redistribution of wealth in recent years. For CNBC types, it only is a scare if it goes in favor of their friends and sponsors. When it's the middle class or YIKES! the poor who are asking for anything, there's reason to sound the alarms. The pillaging of the middle class was but a speed bump for that network. It was all in the name of profiteering by a handful. By the way, what the hell happened to everyone's 401K and their jobs? Just because CNBC's friends all walked away with handfuls of cash doesn't mean it was so easy for everyone else. Scary stuff below so be careful about nightmares tonight! Look under your bed and check for hiding commies.

Democrats in the House have rolled out an ambitious $1 trillion plan to fund healthcare reform that forces businesses and wealthier Americans to pick up the costs with higher taxes.

But while the House bill proposes revenues for healthcare, some analysts say the real goal could be to re-distribute income for an ailing economy.

"The tax increase will put the tax code to pre-Reagan days," says Chris Dolan, a professor of political science at Lebanon Valley College in Pennsylvania.

"On the whole, what the bill is trying to do is move the tax code back some 33 years when it was higher," says Dolan. "It's tax increases under the guise of healthcare reform to help the economy."

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FOX guest cites Bruno as reason health care reform is bad

More evidence that the GOP is out of ideas. Read the rest of this post...

Two of the three House Committees have passed health care reform

More progress on health care reform today. Not one GOP member in two of the three House committees voted for reform. They've opted for the insurance industry over doctors and patients. Several Democrats joined the GOPers by also voting no:

Republican united in opposition to the measure and were joined by some centrist Democrats.

The Ways and Means Committee voted to send the Democrat-crafted healthcare reform bill to the full House after a 23-18 vote, with three Democrats voting against it: Reps. Ron Kind (Wis.), Earl Pomeroy (N.D.) and John Tanner (Tenn.).

The Education and Labor Committee approved their portion of the bill by a 26-22 vote. Democratic Reps. Jared Polis (Colo.), Dina Titus (Nev.) and Jason Altimire (Pa.) voted against the bill.

The bills will be merged with another version being considered by the House Energy and Commerce Committee.

Couple things to keep in mind. First, Energy and Commerce is going to be the toughest commmittee in the House. As we've been reporting, Rep. Mike Ross (D-AR) is threatening to defeat the bill on behalf of the Blue Dogs, but that really means he'd kill it for the insurance industry and the GOP. Second, we're now keeping a close eye on Reps. Kind (WI), Pomeroy (ND), Tanner (TN), Polis (CO), Titus (NV) and Altmire (PA). They've all had their chance to cast a protest vote in their respective committees. But, when the bill gets to the floor, they can redeem themselves. They better. Read the rest of this post...

Why does NBC pay Pat Buchanan to be its on-air racist?

The nomination of Sonia Sotomayor has shown, for any who doubted, that racism is alive and well in America. Pat Buchanan has been at the forefront of the hatemongering. What's shocking is how the media, particularly, NBC, coddles the racist Buchanan.

Watch this and ask yourself why NBC pays Pat Buchanan to appear on its networks? It's jaw-dropping, but pretty standard rhetoric from Buchanan:
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Texas Gov. Who Refused Stimulus Funds Asks for Loan

Politico:

Earlier this year, Texas Governor Rick Perry was one of a handful of Republican governors who refused some federal stimulus funds from President Obama's economic recovery package on the grounds that there were too many strings attached to the money.

Now that the state is dire straits, however, Perry is asking the federal government for a loan to cover the very expenses the rejected stimulus money would have paid for.

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How often has voluntary oversight worked with Wall Street?

The basic idea of reporting salaries and bonuses for the Wall Street/City crowd is great. Really. It would be enlightening to see the actual numbers instead of the ridiculous (fill in the blank Wall Street company) makes an average of $X. (In fact, it's usually $XXX,XXX if not more.) I still don't think that most people fully appreciate how overpaid this industry was and still is today. The finance industry makes working in pharmaceuticals look like sweat shop pay the total compensation is so high. Providing lists of actual annual compensation should absolutely be done even if it's only for the top few hundred, for now.

The problem with this great idea in the UK is that it's voluntary and we all know how voluntary works for the spongers in Big Finance. If this sector wasn't so deeply responsible for creating the credit crisis and then global recession it would be overreach but the fact remains, they are responsible. Let the industry defend its compensation policies to those who rescued them from failure. They could stand to have much more scrutiny than they are currently receiving by the government because everyone should be very alarmed and concerned with the recent profits by Goldman Sachs and JPMorgan. It's a bit too much, too quickly. The results suggest something greater than the "blocking and tackling." If they can withstand the scrutiny and prove their recent run has been sound, then fine, but there are too many questions that can be easily brushed off without real oversight. Read the rest of this post...

White House pressuring Dem Senators to support climate change bill

That's good. It's also what we've been talking about in the context of DOMA and DADT. The White House may not initiate legislation, but it can seriously influence the legislative process if it so chooses. So arguments about how the president is powerless to lift a finger until Congress votes are false. As proven in this article. Read the rest of this post...

Obama admin already on top of cost control for health care bill

Orszag is on it.

Despite a vow not to draw lines in the sand about reform legislation, President Obama has been adamant that any bill make substantial progress on cost reduction--a pledge his Budget Director, Peter Orszag, reiterated in the course of a brief (and previously scheduled) interview he gave TNR Thursday afternoon. "The legislation that emerges from this process has to contain key provisions that will bend the curve over the long term," Orszag said. "The president has said that and we're in the middle of a legislative process, so it's not surprising that, as you go through that process, there are modifications that are necessary."

It may sound a bit bland. But, as proof of the admnistration's determination to press this issue, Orszag cited a proposal that the administration circulated on Capitol Hill this week.

As first reported by David Rogers in Politico, the administration is effectively calling to reconstitute, and strengthen, MedPAC--a commission that now advises Medicare on how it pays for medical services and wares. The recommendations of this new commission, which the administration would call IMAC (the Independent Medicare Advisory Commission), would go into effect automatically, unless either the President or Congress decided to block them. It's similar to an idea that Senator Jay Rockefeller and Representative Jim Cooper have been promoting in their respective chambers. Orszag called it "the most important game-changer" now on the table.

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After raging against "excess" government spending, Gov. Sanford traveled in style to see his mistress

AP:

South Carolina Gov. Mark Sanford shed his fiscal conservatism on several taxpayer-funded international trips, including a South American jaunt that included time with his mistress, choosing expensive first-class or business-class seats while his aides sat in coach.

Sanford, who once criticized other state officials for costly travel, charged the state more than $37,600 for one first-class and four business-class flights overseas since November 2005, expense records show. Other state employees flew in the back of the plane at a fraction of the price, according to the documents.

The Republican governor, who balked at taking federal stimulus money after arguing it was an unwise use of taxpayer funds, charged the state $8,687 for a Delta Airlines trip to Brazil last year that included a leg in business class, state expense records show.

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RNC took down website offering "sexually explicit, anti-Semitic and anti-Latino items."

Last night, John introduced us to the RNC's Obama Card, "a website promoting anti-Semitic, anti-Latino, and pornographic literature."

Today, Politico picked it up:

A Republican National Committee online game that challenges players to spend trillions of dollars was taken down today after reports that it offered some objectionable items for sale – including sexually explicit, anti-Semitic and anti-Latino items.

Love this quote from the RNC:

“It’s unfortunate that someone would spend the time, and go to great lengths, to abuse and exploit this website feature that was designed to give taxpayers the opportunity to see if they could spend $3.4 trillion – like President Obama did with his budget,” [RNC spokeswoman Gail] Gitcho said.

Actually, Gail, we didn't spend that much time and it wasn't that hard. The RNC made it very, very easy. Also, Gail, we're still looking for that 1.8 trillion dollars Bush wasted in his tax cuts and the trillion he spent on Iraq. Maybe, the RNC could find that. In the meantime, the RNC sure made it easy to amuse ourselves with its website:

The liberal website Americablog was one of the first to report on the GOP website and searched all kinds of naughty words, including bondage and escorts, which yielded suggested purchases including handcuffs, how-to-books and Astroglide.

Thanks, RNC. Read the rest of this post...

Friday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

This seemed like a really long week. A lot happened.

Looks like Sotomayor is well on her way to becoming a Supreme Court Justice. She did an admirable job during her testimony. And, Jeff Sessions showed the world what a hateful buffoon he is. The GOP has done us a huge favor my raising the profile of Sessions.

Health care reform made some important progress this week. Keep an eye on the House Energy and Commerce Committee. That's where the Blue Dog Democrats, led by Rep. Mike Ross (AR), have vowed to derail progress. That cannot happen. This is now a battle between doctors/patients and the insurance industry/GOP. Whose side are the Blue Dogs on?

Let's get started... Read the rest of this post...

Bombings strike Jakarta

It's still early so details remain light, though the bombs have claimed nine lives so far.

The Marriott, which was attacked in 2003 in a bombing blamed on Southeast Asian terror network Jemaah Islamiyah, was hit first, followed by the blast at the Ritz two minutes later. The attacks came just two weeks after presidential vote expected to re-elect incumbent Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono who has been credited with stabilizing a nation previously wracked by militancy.

Local media reported that two people were killed in another explosion in a car north Jakarta later Friday. Officials confirmed a blast but said it did not appear to be related.

Security Minister Widodo Adi Sucipto told reporters at the scene the hotel blasts happened at 7:45 a.m. and 7:47 a.m. (0045 GMT, 8:45 p.m. EDT) and that "high explosives were used." He said at least nine people were killed and 50 wounded.

Anti-terror forces were rushed to the scene, and authorities blocked access to the hotels in a district also home to foreign embassies.

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UK halves number of plastic shopping bags

Impressive. Now they can take on the rest of the plastic used in stores and thin out that junk.

It began in 2007 with a few traders in the small town of Modbury in Devon refusing to give out plastic bags. But yesterday their small green revolution reached a national milestone: British shoppers have nearly halved the number of single-use bags they get through.

Figures from Wrap, the government's waste and resources programme, show that whereas 870m single-use plastic bags were handed out in the UK in May 2006, the figure for May 2009 was down to 450m – a 48% reduction, and 4,740 tonnes to send to landfill against 8,890 tonnes in May 2006.

Nationwide rejection of the bags, which take up to 1,000 years to decompose and clog drains and pollute oceans, followed a government challenge to retailers to voluntarily halve bag use by June 2009.

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Cherie Blair suspected of having swine flu

The sharp rise in the UK is seriously impacting the NHS which is now setting up special hotlines to support the rapidly growing numbers. Doctors and hospitals in parts of the UK are being overwhelmed by the flood of new cases. The UK is now preparing for a worst case scenario of 65,000 deaths. Sounds extreme but the rapid increase has alarmed the country.

The swine flu pandemic is growing exponentially with 55,000 new cases in the past week, twice the number in the previous week. There have been 29 deaths across the UK, up from 16 the previous week, and the number of people admitted to hospital because of the virus has doubled to 652. There was a "massive surge" in consultations with GPs last Monday and pressure on the NHS has become intense, Sir Liam said. In response, he announced the launch of the National Pandemic Flu Service, a dedicated internet and telephone helpline with 2,000 operators, to take the pressure off frontline medical staff.

Planning assumptions for the NHS, published yesterday, show that up to half of all children may eventually fall ill with swine flu. Although the virus is still mild in most people – and there is no sign yet that it is mutating – it is targeting younger people. The hospitalisation rate for the under-fives is four times that for other age groups.

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