Its official. Lieberman will filibuster health care bill if it includes Medicare buy-in, after Lieberman told Reid he liked the idea.

Now he's simply being a dick. The question is what Senator Reid and President Obama plan on doing about it. Or is it now open season on the majority leader and the president? Read the rest of this post...

Did Obama miss his opportunity to bully the bankers?

Of course he did. That ship sailed long ago when he handed over the economy to Wall Street boot-lickers like Geithner and Summers. It remains possible to influence them via the tax code - the tool that helped them enjoy massive profits - but does anyone really believe Obama or Congress has the willpower to do that? It's possible but only barely. If Wall Street could call the shots through the worst economic period in decades, there's little to suggest it's going to change during this period. It may be lackluster and few jobs are emerging but it's still calm. This is not a team that likes to rock the boat under any circumstances. CNNMoney:

The president is expected to say he wants to see more loans for the sake of economic recovery. He'll also urge execs to curb compensation, to stop gouging customers with high credit card rates and hidden overdraft fees, and to support financial reform efforts.

But some observers question that the administration can make its message stick. The reason: It no longer has much leverage over the banks because it so readily accepted repayment of bailout money -- $116 billion in all.

That sounds great on a budget report, but now policymakers have little power over bankers who have their own priorities, namely, making money.

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Why and how is Sarah Palin hawking her book at a US military base?

Do we all get to hawk our books at US military bases in events that are closed to the public? Read the rest of this post...

Federal court rules in favor of ACORN, accuses House of passing bill of attainder

This story is from two days ago, but important I think:

The federal government must continue to provide grant money to the national community organizing group Acorn, a federal court ruled Friday, saying that the House violated the Constitution when it passed a resolution barring the group from receiving federal dollars.

A judge at the United States District Court in Brooklyn issued a preliminary injunction that nullifies the resolution and requires the government to honor existing contracts with the group and review its applications for new grants unless the Obama administration appeals the decision.

The court ruled that the resolution amounted to a “bill of attainder,” a legislative determination of guilt without trial, because it specifically punishes one group.

Mind you, it's a Democratic-run House. Read the rest of this post...

Go ahead, it's good for you

There could be worse news over the holidays. Now if only they could do something about the high prices, though there's always a cost for good health.

"We have found that a couple of glasses a day has a beneficial effect on the walls of blood vessels – which suggests champagne has the potential to reduce strokes and heart disease," Dr Spencer told the Observer. "It is very exciting news."

Two glasses a day of red wine, previous research has found, helps ward off heart and circulation problems. Most of that effect comes from chemicals called polyphenols, which affect circulation by slowing down the removal of nitric oxide from the blood. In turn, elevated levels of nitric oxide cause blood vessels to dilate, which lowers blood pressure and reduces risks of heart problems and strokes.

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Lieberman and Nelson now threaten to filibuster their own health care compromise

Appeasement doesn't work. They always come back for more. The Hill, via John Cole at Balloon Juice:

Two key senators criticized the most recent healthcare compromise Sunday, saying the policies replacing the public option are still unacceptable.

Sens. Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) and Ben Nelson (D-Neb.) both said a Medicare “buy-in” option for those aged 55-64 was a deal breaker.

“I’m concerned that it’s the forerunner of single payer, the ultimate single-payer plan, maybe even more directly than the public option,” Nelson said on CBS’s “Face the Nation.”

Lieberman said Democrats should stop looking for a public option “compromise” and simply scrap the idea altogether.

John adds:

Lieberman and Nelson were two of the ten Senators who crafted the god damned compromise. They are now shitting all over the compromise THEY crafted and saying it is a non-starter.

And if you ditch the compromise and the public option, they will find something else to grandstand about. For Nelson, he’ll be back to abortion. Who knows what Lieberman will start whining about, but I am sure Marshall Wittman is, as we speak, cooking up some fatuous bullshit.

They are both in the pockets of insurance and other industries who do not want this bill passed in any shape or form, so they will keep making excuses. They are not going to vote for any health care bill. Period. You might as well be taking input and courting votes from Jim DeMint and Tom Coburn.

And the fact that no one in the Democratic party has the balls to call Nelson on his bullshit is just disgusting.

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Bankers get everything, poor women ignored for cancer screening

Change we can believe in. We're well beyond the phase of big talk about nasty bankers. Maybe the White House and Democrats in general could show a bit more backbone and do something about it.

As the economy falters and more people go without health insurance, low-income women in at least 20 states are being turned away or put on long waiting lists for free cancer screenings, according to the American Cancer Society's Cancer Action Network.

In the unofficial survey of programs for July 2008 through April 2009, the organization found that state budget strains are forcing some programs to reject people who would otherwise qualify for free mammograms and Pap smears. Just how many are turned away isn't known; in some cases, the women are screened through other programs or referred to different providers.

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UN study: drug money saved the banks during crisis

But remember, they're the privileged class and the only group worth saving. Poor and hungry children? Go to the back of the line and take what you get. Middle class unemployment? Bah! Let's all worship at the alter of the global banking system. Send everything you have and let them maintain their exclusive lifestyle because dammit, they deserve it. Respectable folks, you know.

This will raise questions about crime's influence on the economic system at times of crisis. It will also prompt further examination of the banking sector as world leaders, including Barack Obama and Gordon Brown, call for new International Monetary Fund regulations. Speaking from his office in Vienna, Costa said evidence that illegal money was being absorbed into the financial system was first drawn to his attention by intelligence agencies and prosecutors around 18 months ago. "In many instances, the money from drugs was the only liquid investment capital. In the second half of 2008, liquidity was the banking system's main problem and hence liquid capital became an important factor," he said.

Some of the evidence put before his office indicated that gang money was used to save some banks from collapse when lending seized up, he said.

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Sunday Talk Shows Open Thread

John is on CNN's Reliable Sources this morning. His segment should air around 10:40 a.m. Eastern. He'll be talking about a range of topics including the media coverage of the climate change debate and Obama's Nobel.

The Obama administration's focus on economy and jobs is on display on the shows today. The White House is sending out two of its top economic advisers, Larry Summers and Christine Romer, to spread its message. For some reason, NBC is including Alan Greenspan in its discussion of the economy. The husband of NBC's Andrea Mitchell played a significant role in the destruction of the economy during his tenure as Chair of the Fed.

There are also a slew of Senators on the shows. (The Senate is in session again today, but doesn't convene til 1:30 PM.) The most important (and egomaniacal) Senator of all, Joe Lieberman, is on CBS. That should be some fun viewing, huh? We can expect some chatter about the Senate health care bill, but it's doubtful that we'll learn anything new.

The full lineup is after the break.

Here's the full listing:

ABC's "This Week" — Lawrence Summers, director of the White House National Economic Council; Rep. Eric Cantor, R-Va.

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CBS' "Face the Nation" — Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Jay Rockefeller, D-W.Va., Ben Nelson, D-Neb., and Joe Lieberman, Connecticut independent.

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NBC's "Meet the Press" — Christina Romer, chairwoman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers; former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan; Gov. Jennifer Granholm, D-Mich.; former Gov. Mitt Romney, R-Mass.

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CNN's "State of the Union" — Summers; Sens. Mark Warner, D-Va., and John Thune, R-S.D.

"Fox News Sunday" _ Sens. Judd Gregg, R-N.H., Claire McCaskill, D-Mo., and James Inhofe, R-Okla.; Rep. Ed Markey, D-Mass.; Inez Tenenbaum, chairwoman of the Consumer Product Safety Commission.

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The Clash - Rudie Can't Fail

Another sunny weekend day. How did that happen? Oh right...it's cold. My chilly ride yesterday was not too bad besides a bit of drizzle and then a tire blowout along a windy stretch of the Seine. This morning it's 36F but with the wind chill it's 25F. I desperately need another coffee and something lively to head out into this. Read the rest of this post...

Leading Chinese pro-democracy activist going to trial for subversion

Naturally it would be asking too much for any political leader in the west to speak out against this joke of a trial. No, we need China too much to build cheap stuff or to fund our debt. What a tangled web we wove. Proof again that the Olympics failed to change anything.

Liu Xiaobo was one of 300 democratic activists in China to author a bold call for constitutional reform last December. The manifesto was published under the name Charter 08, and called for greater freedom of expression, multi-party elections and independent courts. Seen as a figurehead for the movement, Liu was taken into detention shortly before the document was published online. Then, in June, he was formally arrested on suspicion of incitement to subvert state power.

In the latest development – which came on International Human Rights Day, a year and a day after the charter's publication – officials told Liu's lawyer they would charge him. He will almost certainly be convicted and sentenced to jail, say experts, probably within weeks.

"The timing is not coincidental," said Joshua Rosenzweig of the Dui Hua Foundation, which supports political prisoners. "It draws attention away from commemorating the document and says: 'Look, you want to talk about Charter 08? This is what it gets you.' "

Professor Perry Link, of Princeton University, New Jersey, who translated Charter 08 into English, said: "He must have known that he was running a risk of becoming the regime's target."

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