GOP Ohio Gov. Kasich turns down $176m in unemployment funds from stimulus bill

Several things are going on here.

1. Kasich, like the rest of the GOP, is doing all he can to hurt the economy before the 2012 elections. These are stimulus funds he's turning down - there is a direct correlation between this money and increased growth. And it's not just hurting the unemployed, it's hurting all of us, as this money would have rippled through the economy (people receiving benefits then spend those benefits at local businesses, etc).

2. This is part of the larger GOP war on the stimulus and everything else the Democrats propose. Kasich is far more interested in toeing the far-right GOP line than in actually helping the unemployed in his state. Today's breed of Republican leaders, the ones running the party, think our ongoing economic crisis is just one big game. Read the rest of this post...

Yves Smith: "It is high time to describe the Obama Administration by its proper name: corrupt"

John introduced initial initial story here, of revelations in the New York Times that the Obama administration is pressuring New York AG Eric Schneiderman to get on board with the corrupt (in my opinion) deal to give mortgage-fraud-immunity to Bank of America in exchange for pocket money (or lint).

Well, the reactions are starting. Here's the estimable Yves Smith, at Naked Capitalism (my emphasis):

Corrupt Obama Administration Pressuring New York Attorney General to Support Mortgage Whitewash

It is high time to describe the Obama Administration by its proper name: corrupt.

Admittedly, corruption among our elites generally and in Washington in particular has become so widespread and blatant as to fall into the “dog bites man” category. But the nauseating gap between the Administration’s propaganda and the many and varied ways it sells out average Americans on behalf of its favored backers, in this case the too big to fail banks, has become so noisome that it has become impossible to ignore the fetid smell.

The Administration has now taken to pressuring parties that are not part of the machinery reporting to the President to fall in and do his bidding. We’ve gotten so used to the US attorney general being conveniently missing in action that we have forgotten that regulators and the AG are supposed to be independent. As one correspondent noted by e-mail, “When officials allegiances are to El Supremo rather than the Constitution, you walk the path to fascism.”

Revealingly, one of the Administration’s allies said: “Wall Street is our Main Street.” ... The latest example is its heavy-handed campaign to convert New York state attorney general Eric Schneiderman to a card carrying member of the “be nice to our lords and masters the banksters” club.

Note this: "[R]egulators and the AG are supposed to be independent." This is yet another gift from Bush II — the corrupted Attorney General's office, in which the "independent" judicial arm of the executive branch has been irretrievably packed with hacks who think they swore an oath to the administration, not the (ahem) Constitution.

Obama has failed to clean house and is clearly continuing yet another toxic Bush II practice. "Bygones" is my enduring painful reminder of the Ally McBeal program, painful thanks to Team Can't You Just Let It Go?

Smith spells out exactly why "corruption" is the correct word, and why so many state AGs, even the ones most on board with the proposed "sellout" are having more-than-second thoughts. Please read through.

I expect other responses to be as striking. This is August, and many are on vacation. Paul Krugman, for example, is hauling a yardarm or something. But wait till he gets back.

My own comment is this, something I've said for a while — Their hubris is our friend; it will sink them. Now "they" is starting to include the Dems, NeoLiberal coalition. And Obama is starting to act like he's bulletproof, against all evidence.

More as it develops. Be assured, there will be more.

GP Read the rest of this post...

Gallup: Obama in close 2012 race with Romney, Perry, Paul and Bachmann

Gallup.

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Protests against tar sands pipeline continue at White House

It's Day 3 of the protests in front of the White House against the tar sands pipeline. There was another round of arrests, 52, according to Think Progress.

The NY Times editorialized against the pipeline:

This page opposes the building of a 1,700-mile pipeline called the Keystone XL, which would carry diluted bitumen — an acidic crude oil — from Canada’s Alberta tar sands to the Texas Gulf Coast. We have two main concerns: the risk of oil spills along the pipeline, which would traverse highly sensitive terrain, and the fact that the extraction of petroleum from the tar sands creates far more greenhouse emissions than conventional production does.

This pipeline, which the Canadians are trying to force on us, has the makings of an environmental disaster on several levels.

One of the first arrestees, Mike Tidwell from the Chesapeake Climate Action Network, explained why the President is on the receiving end of the protests:

And, he also provided some insight into the thinking of the Park Police. They're trying to intimidate the protesters. That's a bad idea:
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Description of the Gaddafi bunker

UPDATE from Joe @ 8:18 PM: Matthew Chance, CNN's reporter in Tripoli, just reported that Saif al-Islam Gaddafi was not captured after all. He showed up at the Rixos hotel a short time ago. Chance talked to him.
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Wikipedia has a pretty good map of the situation in Tripoli. At this point Gaddafi controls only a few square miles of territory.

Click image to see larger version

But that may not be the whole story. According to the London Telegraph Gaddafi has a network of tunnels under Tripoli.

One of the reasons we know about the tunnels is that Gaddafi managed to appear for a press conference at the Rixos hotel without any motorcade or surface transit. The Rixos hotel is where 40 international journalists are being held by Gaddafi troops. Read the rest of this post...

Now the GOP is suddenly in favoring of a tax increase

That's because it benefits workers, and if it expires the economy will take a big hit, and that's music to the GOP's 2012-focused ears. More from AP:

News flash: Congressional Republicans want to raise your taxes. Impossible, right? GOP lawmakers are so virulently anti-tax, surely they will fight to prevent a payroll tax increase on virtually every wage-earner starting Jan. 1, right?

Apparently not.

Many of the same Republicans who fought hammer-and-tong to keep the George W. Bush-era income tax cuts from expiring on schedule are now saying a different "temporary" tax cut should end as planned. By their own definition, that amounts to a tax increase.

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Libyan embassy in Brasilia throws out Gaddafi posters

Times are a-changing. Via Al Jazeera:

The Guardian has a nice summary of today's events in Libya.
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Professor says Boehner’s DOMA lawyer "completely misrepresented" her research

John Boehner is defending DOMA in federal court. His legal team for the Bipartisan Legal Advisory Group (BLAG) is led by former Solicitor General Paul Clement.

Today, Boehner's lawyers got slammed in the case against DOMA brought by 81-year old Edie Windsor.

Clement cited the research of Professor Lisa Diamond in one of his motions to end the case. He's been trying to sneak in testimony without going through the usual process. But, today, Diamond responded that Boehner's legal team has misconstrued and distorted her work. She stated, "They have completely misrepresented my research."

More, including Diamond's affadavit, at AMERICAblog Gay.

Clement is being paid with our tax dollars. But, I've been watching this case pretty closely and I think Edie's lawyers are running circles around him. Read the rest of this post...

Fed gave $1.2 trillion to aristocracy of American finance

Bloomberg:

Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke’s unprecedented effort to keep the economy from plunging into depression included lending banks and other companies as much as $1.2 trillion of public money, about the same amount U.S. homeowners currently owe on 6.5 million delinquent and foreclosed mortgages. The largest borrower, Morgan Stanley (MS), got as much as $107.3 billion, while Citigroup took $99.5 billion and Bank of America $91.4 billion, according to a Bloomberg News compilation of data obtained through Freedom of Information Act requests, months of litigation and an act of Congress.
“These are all whopping numbers,” said Robert Litan, a former Justice Department official who in the 1990s served on a commission probing the causes of the savings and loan crisis. “You’re talking about the aristocracy of American finance going down the tubes without the federal money.”

Bloomberg also has a dramatic chart which documents these findings. Keep in mind that this lending started in 2008 and continued into 2009.

Equally stunning to the extent to which "the aristocracy of American finance" got bailed out was the extent to which the aristocracies of non-American finance also got bailed out:

It wasn’t just American finance. Almost half of the Fed’s top 30 borrowers, measured by peak balances, were European firms. They included Edinburgh-based Royal Bank of Scotland Plc, which took $84.5 billion, the most of any non-U.S. lender, and Zurich-based UBS AG (UBSN), which got $77.2 billion. Germany’s Hypo Real Estate Holding AG borrowed $28.7 billion, an average of $21 million for each of its 1,366 employees.

Keep in mind while this money was shooting out of a fire hose from the Fed to giant international banks, nothing has been done on a remotely similar scale to help out working Americans. Marcy Wheeler has a good take away from this:

the money the Fed lent out to these highly leveraged risk takers could have paid off (much less merely guaranteed) the 6.5 million delinquent and foreclosed mortgages that are currently dragging down the American economy.

But instead of offering money to homeowners who would have used it to stay in their homes and sustain their neighborhoods, the Fed instead loaned it to the banks that were leveraged to the hilt.

Additionally, the free money the Fed gave to big banks could have come with a strict requirement that they lend it right back out to Main Street. But it didn't and the economy is still in the crapper three years later.
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Is Obama "strong" or "weak"?

It's regularly said, in the mainstream and on the left, that Obama is "weak," or a "poor negotiator," or too eager to "surrender" to Republicans, or simply a captive of the "bipartisan brand" that he danced with in the first place.

This is the constant explanation for Obama's behavior; in Drew Westen's terms, it's the framing for any attempt to explain him. Dr. Westen himself, in fact, framed Obama this way in a Netroots Nation session on ... controlling the framing. (I found it ironic — stunning, in fact — that a session on being aware of framing contained an unacknowledged frame buried in the example.)

Framing issues aside (that is, ad-agency manipulation aside), is this the reality of what Obama is doing? Is he the well-meaning but ineffective "friend of the Left," tragically hobbled by personal flaws or Tea Party circumstances?

In this explanation, Obama is playing poker with Republicans, and either can't hear or can't understand our clever advisory whispers into his shell-like ear.

There's another explanation, of course — that Obama is one of our strongest presidents, though widely misunderstood. In this explanation, Obama is playing poker across the table from ... us, the Left. And the whispers into his shell-like come from Republicans and Clintonistas, i.e., Movement Conservatives and NeoLiberals. He wants what they all want; he just wants his own machine to be in charge of the profits and benefits.

The trick? Keep the Left from knowing they're being played. The goal? Keep the game alive until 2013, when Obama is home free (at which point, Mr & Ms Left better seriously watch out).

So which is it? Here's Matt Stoller on the subject (my emphasis):

Since the 1970s, Democratic elites have focused on breaking public sector unions and financializing the economy. Carter, not Reagan, started the defense build-up. Carter, not Reagan, lifted usury caps. Carter, not Reagan, first cut capital gains taxes. Clinton, not Bush, passed NAFTA. It isn’t the base of the Democratic party that did this, but then, voters in America have never had a lot of power because they are too disorganized. And there wasn’t a substantial grassroots movement to challenge this, either.

Obama continues this trend. It isn’t that he’s not fighting, he fights like hell for what he wants. He whipped incredibly aggressively for TARP, he has passed emergency war funding (breaking a campaign promise) several times, and nearly broke the arms of feckless liberals in the process. I mean, when Bernie Sanders did the filiBernie, Obama flirted with Bernie’s potential 2012 GOP challenger. Obama just wants policies that cement the status of a aristocratic class, with crumbs for everyone else (Republican elites disagree in that they hate anyone but elites getting crumbs). And he will fight for them.

There is simply no basis for arguing that Democratic elites are pursuing poor strategy anymore. They are achieving an enormous amount of leverage within the party. Consider the following. Despite Obama violating every core tenet of what might have been considered the Democratic Party platform, from supporting foreclosures to destroying civil liberties to torturing political dissidents to wrecking unions, Obama has no viable primary challenger.

Stoller concludes with our familiar poker metaphor:

A lot of people think that Obama is a bad poker player, but they miss the point. He’s not playing with his money, he’s playing with YOUR money. You are the weak hand at the table, he’s colluding with the other players.

Or as they say: Look around the table. If you don't see the mark, it's you. (Want proof? Whose stack of chips is going down?)

So three questions and/or observations from this:

(1) What do you think? Is Obama strong or weak? Feel free to weigh in with your comments if you wish.

Note: Your answer will determine how to deal with him in 2012. How should the Left treat the Dem candidate as you envision him?

(2) Back to framing. Even if you think he's strong, consider whether it might be more effective to say he's weak anyway, and say it loudly.

I don't mean say it to the Left; say it to Obama. It's upsetting to be called weak to your face. Maybe that attack will throw him off his game — make him miss that next easy lay up, or "get his goat" as John would say. Your thoughts?

And (3) A clarification on primary challengers (see the bottom of this post), as opposed to third-party candidates.

If you primary a candidate, you work within the party to take it over and unseat its ruling faction. If you lose, you get to play the next time.

If you third-party a candidate, you're bidding to destroy the party. If you lose, you never get to play the inside game again. So if you go the third party route, you'd better win; it's pretty much all or nothing on one throw. And I agree with Stirling Newberry — the only third-party group that could unseat the Dems as a party is Big Labor, by abandoning them.

Oh, and just to be clear, that primary challenge should come from the Left — the actual Left, not from a left-of-Obama right-wing hack like Evan Bayh.

Your thoughts? I'd be glad to see them.

GP Read the rest of this post...

Obama administration siding with banks in mortgage fraud settlement dispute

NYT:

Eric T. Schneiderman, the attorney general of New York, has come under increasing pressure from the Obama administration to drop his opposition to a wide-ranging state settlement with banks over dubious foreclosure practices, according to people briefed on discussions about the deal.

In recent weeks, Shaun Donovan, the secretary of Housing and Urban Development, and high-level Justice Department officials have been waging an intensifying campaign to try to persuade the attorney general to support the settlement, said the people briefed on the talks.

Mr. Schneiderman and top prosecutors in some other states have objected to the proposed settlement with major banks, saying it would restrict their ability to investigate and prosecute wrongdoing in a variety of areas, including the bundling of loans in mortgage securities.

But Mr. Donovan and others in the administration have been contacting not only Mr. Schneiderman but his allies, including consumer groups and advocates for borrowers, seeking help to secure the attorney general’s participation in the deal, these people said. One recipient described the calls from Mr. Donovan, but asked not to be identified for fear of retaliation.

The administration will of course say that they're not siding with the banks, but rather, they're simply calling on all sides to reach a settlement agreement. This is a classic Obama flinch. In other words, 'please settle for less than what you could get, because all this fighting makes me sad.'

It also doesn't hurt that the administrating is siding with the banks (who, coincidentally have a lot of money) a good year or so before the next presidential election.

Plus ça CHANGE... Read the rest of this post...

Should the government put people to work?

A very interesting idea:

One way to get the long-term unemployment back on the payroll is to have the government cover their paycheck for a period of time, according to experts. This gives companies a risk-free way to see what the employee can contribute, while giving workers a possible foot in the door.

"It can show employers how good somebody is, how valuable they are to the company and then there is the incentive to bring them on after," said Judy Conti, federal advocacy coordinator, National Employment Law Project.

The idea has merits. It puts people back to work, at least for a while, which helps their self-esteem, their resume, and may even help them stay at the place they're "interning" at. It's not a guarantee, and while working at the temp job they won't be able to spend much time looking for a "real" job. Still, it's an interesting idea. Read the rest of this post...

Oil prices expected to drop once Libya conflict is over

AP:

Independent analyst Andrew Lipow said oil markets will likely respond Monday by sending prices lower in "a sign of relief that conflict has come to the end."

When fighting broke out, oil was trading at around $84 a barrel. It quickly spiked above $93 and kept rising to a high above $110 at the end of April.

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Libya update: Tripoli still up for grabs, fighting throughout the city

The Guardian has a nice live blog of events in Libya.  As does Al Jazeera.

Highlights:

Italian foreign minister says Gaddafi only controls 10% to 15% of Tripoli.

Foreign media trapped in their hotel by heavy fighting in nearby streets.

Gaddafi's imminent demise is nothing but bad news for Assad, the boy dictator, in Syria.  A recent UN trip to Syria was a PR disaster for the Assad regime, as people kept coming up to the UN observers and showing them evidence of torture.

The Libyans are thankful for NATO.

And the big question remains: Where is Gaddafi?  AFP quotes a diplomatic source saying Gaddaffi is still in his Tripoli residence.  (And, how do you really spell his name?)

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