Allied Irish bank may be forced to disolve this month

More news that shows the global banking crisis is not yet over. You have to like the bank promoting the idea of splitting the bank into the good part and the bad part. Only the banking industry would have the nerve to even consider such a crazy idea. CNBC:

It is a big week for Ireland following news that the European Commission wants Anglo Irish, the nationalized lender, wound down and with conflicting reports regarding the bank's future emerging.

With the cost of its bailout rising, the bank's CEO was reported as saying that the Commission has a point.

"The European Commission is saying this bank has dropped 25 billion euros ($32.2 billion) and it doesn't deserve to survive," Mike Aynsley, the CEO of Anglo Irish, told the Sunday Business Post in Dublin.

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Tom Emmer's family's family values

Via Phoenix Woman ("I really can't believe this") comes this tale from Minneapolis City Pages about the family values of Tom Emmer's family.

Tom Emmer is the Republican candidate for Minnesota governor. I called him a "troglodyte" for his backward views on, oh, everything. As I wrote here:

Emmer is also anti-tax, anti-union, anti-minimum wage, anti-abortion, anti-contraception, pro-"pharmacy conscience" . . . and pro-"more rights for DUI arrestees" (yep, he's got two convictions for DUI-related offenses).

He's such a Family Guy that he's featured his family in his ads.

Turns out DWI-guy's apple hasn't fallen far from the tree. City Pages obtained Facebook photos (since scrubbed) of underage Tripp Emmer, son of Tom, doing the frat-boy thing.


Stylin'.

While it certainly suggests a family tone, it's probably not the end of the world. It's this, however, that caught Phoenix Woman's eye (and mine):


Those would be body parts, and that would seem to be a passed-out girl, age unknown. Phoenix Woman:

[I]f this had been a Democrat’s son who had done this to an unconscious woman, it would be nationwide by now. Drudge would have picked it up from any one of the local conservative blogs, it would be on Morning Joe, FOX and Friends would be on Red Alert, and Luke Hellier would be flogging it as assiduously as he’s doing this current ginned-up non-scandal involving [Democratic gubernatorial candidate] Mark Dayton.

Indeed. And I'd join them. I'd call that "abuse"; and depending on how those photos were used — for example, if they were widely published on ... well, Facebook ... to embarrass the girl — I'd call it "sexual harassment". But you can call it "Family Guy's family's family values".

But let's give young Tripp the last word. Under Favorite Quotations, this has pride of place:

"Don't blow your wad in the first period!" -- Thomas Emmer Jr

In light of that photo, I'm speechless. Thanks, Tom, for leading the way. Next stop, the governor's mansion.

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Assets frozen at Kabul bank, except for Karzai's brother

Can we not stick a fork in this mess and move on already? Why are we still in Afghanistan? Washington Post:

Struggling to contain an escalating crisis at Kabul Bank, Afghan authorities have barred the sale of Kabul properties held by the bank's principal owners.

But the freeze excludes President Hamid Karzai's brother, Kabul Bank's third largest shareholder, who says he does not own property in the Afghan capital.

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Ezra Klein recants support for raising Social Security retirement age

Thanks to Glenn Greenwald, I'm pointed to this, from Ezra Klein, writing Sunday in the Washington Post (my emphasis):

There are a lot of things Congress doesn't know right now. What to do about jobs, for instance. Who'll be running the House come January. How to balance the budget. But there is one thing that both parties increasingly seem to agree on: You should work longer.

Raising the Social Security retirement age has become as close to a consensus position as exists in American politics. House Minority Leader John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) supports it. House Majority Leader Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) has said that "we could and should consider a higher retirement age." And for a while, I agreed with them, too. It seemed obvious: People live longer today, and so they should work later into life. But as I've looked at the issue, I've decided that I was wrong. So let me be the skunk at the party. We should leave the retirement age alone. In fact, we should leave Social Security alone -- unless we're making it more, rather than less, generous. ...

That doesn't mean that Social Security shouldn't be on the table when we look at how to balance the budget. Everything should be on the table. And Social Security is our single largest program -- though Medicare is projected to overtake it in the next couple of years. But if you really put everything on the table -- the health-care system, the tax code, military spending, farm subsidies, etc. -- then raising the retirement age or otherwise cutting Social Security stops looking so good.

Ezra's turned into one of the good guys on Social Security, and I'm glad to see him on the team. He's a listened-to voice.

If you recall, it was Klein who stood up to Lawrence O'Donnell on that shameful Countdown segment where O'Donnell caught benefit-cutting fire and Klein tried to douse him out. In that segment, by the way, Klein came out for ... (gasp) raising taxes, specifically the FICA income ceiling. (Click through to watch the vid; Klein comes through like a champ.)

Raising the income ceiling is also my preferred solution. It now stands at $106,800. I think people who like that extra $4 million in their pay envelope should be taxed on it, just like the rest of us. But that's me; I'm a bit of an egalitarian.

Thanks, Ezra. We look for more from you.

GP Read the rest of this post...

In Louisiana, GOP Governor Jindal won't endorse GOP Senator Vitter

Governor Bobby Jindal won't endorse David Vitter's reelection:

Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal has finally answered a questioned asked of him for months: Will he endorse embattled Republican Sen. David Vitter's reelection bid?

The answer is no.

"Voters can make up their own minds," the Louisiana governor and fellow Republican told local television station WDSU.

Jindal added he doesn't like to get involved in federal races, though the station reports he has backed federal-office seekers in the past.

Yeah, that line about not getting involved in federal races is basically BS. But, it's rare for a GOPer to decline support for anoother GOPer. Even Jindal doesn't want to get to close too Vitter. He probably knows more about Vitter than the rest of us do. Makes me think there's more to the Vitter story.

And, there's this:
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Obama's Labor Day speech takes aim at the GOP's 'economic philosophy'

Obama delivered his Labor Day speech in Milwaukee. He announced a $50 billion Infrastructure Bank to fund roads, railways and runways. And, he hammered Republicans. Here's the meat of the speech, which sets the stage for the next two months:

But there are some folks in Washington who see things differently. When it comes to just about everything we’ve done to strengthen the middle class and rebuild our economy, almost every Republican in Congress said no. Even where we usually agree, they say no. They think it’s better to score political points before an election than actually solve problems. So they said no to help for small businesses. No to middle-class tax cuts. No to unemployment insurance. No to clean energy jobs. No to making college affordable. No to reforming Wall Street. Even as we speak, these guys are saying no to cutting more taxes for small business owners. I mean, come on! Remember when our campaign slogan was “Yes We Can?” These guys are running on “No, We Can’t,” and proud of it. Really inspiring, huh?

To steal a line from our old friend, Ted Kennedy: what is it about working men and women that they find so offensive?

When we passed a bill earlier this summer to help states save the jobs of hundreds of thousands of teachers, nurses, police officers and firefighters that were about to be laid off, they said “no” to that, too. In fact, the Republican who’s already planning to take over as Speaker of the House dismissed them as “government jobs” that weren’t worth saving. Not worth saving? These are the people who teach our kids. Who keep our streets safe. Who put their lives on the line for our own. I don’t know about you, but I think those jobs are worth saving.

We made sure that bill wouldn’t add to the deficit, either. We paid for it by finally closing a ridiculous tax loophole that actually rewarded corporations for shipping jobs and profits overseas. It let them write off the taxes they pay foreign governments – even when they don’t pay taxes here. How do you like that – middle class families footing tax breaks for corporations that create jobs somewhere else! Even a lot of America’s biggest corporations agreed the loophole should be closed, that it wasn’t fair – but the man with the plan to be Speaker is already aiming to open it up again.

Bottom line is, these guys refuse to give up on the economic philosophy they peddled for most of the last decade. You know that philosophy: you cut taxes for millionaires and billionaires; you cut rules for special interests; you cut working folks like you loose to fend for yourselves. They called it the ownership society. What it really boiled down to was: if you couldn’t find a job, or afford college, or got dropped by your insurance company – you’re on your own.

Well, that philosophy didn’t work out so well for working folks. It didn’t work out so well for our country. All it did was rack up record deficits and result in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.

I’m not bringing this up to re-litigate the past; I’m bringing it up because I don’t want to re-live the past. It would be one thing if Republicans in Washington had new ideas or policies to offer; if they said, you know, we’ve learned from our mistakes. We’ll do things differently this time. But that’s not what they’re doing. When the leader of their campaign committee was asked on national television what Republicans would do if they took over Congress, he actually said they’d follow “the exact same agenda” as they did before I took office. The exact same agenda.

So basically, they’re betting that between now and November, you’ll come down with a case of amnesia. They think you’ll forget what their agenda did to this country. They think you’ll just believe that they’ve changed. These are the folks whose policies helped devastate our middle class and drive our economy into a ditch. And now they’re asking you for the keys back.

Do you want to give them the keys back? Me neither. And do you know why? Because they don’t know how to drive! At a time when we’re just getting out of the ditch, they’d pop it in reverse, let the special interests ride shotgun, and hit the gas, careening right back into that ditch.

Well, I refuse to go backwards, Milwaukee. And that’s the choice America faces this fall. Do we go back to the policies of the past? Or do we move forward? I say we move forward. America always moves forward. And we are going to keep moving forward today.

Let me just close by saying this. I know these are difficult times. I know folks are worried, and there’s still a lot of hurt out here. I hear about it when I spend time in towns like this; I read about it in your letters at night. And when times are tough, it can be easy to give in to cynicism and fear; doubt and division – to set our sights lower and settle for something less.

But that is not who we are. That is not the country I know. We do not give up. We do not quit. We are a people that faced down war and depression; great challenges and great threats; and lit the way for the rest of the world. Whenever times have seemed at their worst, Americans have been at their best. Because it is in those times when we roll up our sleeves and remember that we will rise or fall together – as one nation, and one people. That’s the spirit that started the labor movement. The idea that alone, we are weak. Divided, we fall. But united, we are strong. That’s why we call them unions. That’s why we call this the United States of America.

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GOP uses photo from Senator Byrd's memorial service in attack ad

Surprise, a new low for the GOP.

The family of the late Robert C. Byrd blasted the GOP nominee for his U.S. Senate seat Sunday after he used an image from Byrd's memorial service in a TV ad attacking the Democratic nominee.

The ad by Republican John Raese's campaign seeks to link President Barack Obama to Gov. Joe Manchin by displaying an image of the two Democrats at the state Capitol ceremony marking Byrd's June 28 death.

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US soldiers engage in gun battle in Baghdad

Andrew Bacevich is right:

Back in Iraq, meanwhile, nothing has been resolved and nothing settled. Round one of the Iraq war produced a great upheaval that round two served only to exacerbate. As the convoys of U.S. armored vehicles trundle south toward Kuwait and then home, they leave the stage set for round three.

U.S. soldiers are still involved in round three:

Insurgents mounted a coordinated attack on one of the main military commands in Baghdad on Sunday, briefly drawing fire from American soldiers, an event that underscored the ambiguity of the American military’s role in Iraq.

The attack punctuated a sharp rise in violence as the United States declared an official end to its combat mission here effective last Wednesday.

A group of at least six armed men, some of them rigged with explosives, attacked a rear gate at the base, the headquarters of Iraq’s 11th Army Division, which houses the command responsible for security in the part of the capital east of the Tigris River and a federal police brigade, as well as American advisers and the soldiers who protect them. None of the Americans were reported hurt.

There are still 50,000 U.S. servicemembers in Iraq. It's no longer a combat mission, but it's not over. Read the rest of this post...

Rahm Emanuel: 'F--- the UAW'

The first insider book from an ex–Team Change official is due out shortly, and it's said to contain a bunch of why people buy these books. The name is Overhaul by Steven Rattner, the short-lived car czar. From the press release:

In Overhaul, due out in October, Rattner provides a gripping account about how he led the largest restructuring in American history — working against a ticking clock and vocal opposition to keep General Motors (a nightmare of huge proportions) and Chrysler (a company so close to death it was nearly sacrificed) in operation and to save more than a million jobs. He crafts a tightly plotted narrative of political brinkmanship, corporate mismanagement and personalities under pressure in a high-stakes clash between Washington and Detroit.

The book should be interesting on many fronts, not the least of which is the auto industry itself. Wheels within wheels, as it were — GM had that hated UAW deal (hated by all who hate unions); Obama had the right wing to please; and Chrysler had as owners a hedge fund with big DC friends (John Snow, Dan Quayle and, er, Steven Rattner).

So I'm looking forward to it. We'll see if the Rattner book equals the first Bush book, Ron Suskind's The Price of Loyalty, which featured the stylings of outed insider Paul O'Neill.

In the meantime here's a tidbit from HuffPost writer Marcus Baram, who was granted an exclusive peek under the covers (click through for all the goods):

In "Overhaul", his upcoming chronicle of his reign as "car czar," Steven Rattner offers an insider's account of the Obama administration's rescue of the auto industry. And he pulls no punches when it comes to describing the foibles of such heavyweights as Rahm Emanuel, Tim Geithner, Larry Summers and Sheila Bair. ...

Rattner depicts White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel as a force to be reckoned with who disparaged unions -- once quipping "f--- the UAW" -- and who effectively supervised Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner during his first rocky months on the job by dictating his public appearances and staff picks.

He also depicts infighting between economic advisers Larry Summers and Austan Goolsbee and describes FDIC Chair Sheila Bair as a stubborn obstacle to the work of the auto rescue team.

So while we're waiting for the actual book, I leave you with two questions:

1. Did Rahm Emanuel really say "f--- the UAW"?
   
2. Was Rahm really running Geithner the way a LeCarré control runs a field agent?

If so, that's trouble on two fronts. It means that the Bush–Rove use of the exec branch as an arm of the political branch is no longer a one-off; it's metastasized into "just the way it's done."

And how does Obama not share Rahm's hatred of unions?

GP Read the rest of this post...

Monday Morning Open Thread

Good morning.

Happy Labor Day. But, let's face it: this isn't a happy labor day for many American workers. We've got unemployment, underemployment, foreclosures, bankruptcy, offshoring...the list goes on and on. American workers deserve better than what they've been getting. Eight years of GOP leadership created the economic crisis we're in. And, GOPers on Capitol Hill have done nothing over the past twenty months to help fix the mess they made. What sucks is Republicans could be rewarded for that in the November elections. And, that won't be good for American workers.

The President is celebrating Labor Day in Milwaukee Laborfest. The Vice President is at a Labor Day celebration in Toledo, Ohio.

It is a stunningly beautiful day in the District. Read the rest of this post...

Basque separatist Eta declares ceasfire

Although some remain suspicious - ceasefires have been declared before - others are hopeful that a political settlement is possible. The Basque region of Spain already enjoys some level of political autonomy from the central government. The Independent:

Three hooded figures flanked by flags, filmed for a grainy video released to the BBC, announced yesterday that the Basque separatist group Eta was calling off the armed campaign it has waged for more than half a century.

Their statement defended Eta's actions but suggested that the group might now be ready to turn to the political process to pursue its aim of an independent Basque state. "Eta confirms its commitment to finding a democratic solution to the conflict," one of the hooded figures, a woman, said. "In its commitment to a democratic process to decide freely and democratically our future, through dialogue and negotiations, Eta is prepared today as yesterday to agree to the minimum democratic conditions necessary to put in motion a democratic process, if the Spanish government is willing."

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Scientists develop self-repairing solar cells

What will they think of next at MIT? One of the major problems with solar panels is their limited lifespan. This may help extend that and make it a much more viable solution. BBC:

Researchers have demonstrated tiny solar cells just billionths of a metre across that can repair themselves, extending their useful lifetime.

The cells make use of proteins from the machinery of plants, turning sunlight into electric charges that can do work.

The cells simply assemble themselves from a mixture of the proteins, minute tubes of carbon and other materials.

The self-repairing mechanism, reported in Nature Chemistry, could lead to much longer-lasting solar cells.

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Ronald Reagan on Progressive values

Are you ready? Here's Ronald Reagan campaigning for Harry Truman (via Digby and the Donkey Edge):



Digby's title — "the original Reagan Democrat." Wonder what happened to him. Seriously, the speech is very convincing, and makes a lot of sense. I do wonder what happened to him.

GP Read the rest of this post...