FDIC: Number of banks at risk rose sharply in Q3

Yeah, hands off is really the future. We need less regulation and for gosh sakes, just leave business alone and let them do their thing. They're professionals, you know.

The number of problem U.S. banks and thrifts jumped in the third quarter to 171, from 117 at the end of the prior quarter, marking the highest level since the end of 1995 and adding to expectations that more banks will fail, regulators said on Tuesday.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp said the industry-funded reserve to back deposits was $34.6 bln as of September 30, a 23.5 percent decrease from the previous quarter.

The FDIC also reported that bank industry income fell 94 percent from the previous year to $1.7 billion in the third quarter.

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"No on 8" reportedly thought the black vote would be "insignificant"

Uh, oops. In fact, according to exit polls, 70% of blacks voted for Prop 8, 51% of whites voted against, 53% of Latinos voted for, and 51% of Asians voted against. 10% of voters were black. Had the black pro-Prop-8 vote been closer to 50% - or 20% less than it was - that would have meant a 2% overall change in the vote (20% of 10% is 2%). How much did we lose by? A little over 2% (there was a 4 point spread, so that means if we gain 2%, the bad guys lose 2%).

A lesbian black leader in California says she wasn't impressed with No on 8's strategy for reaching out to the black vote.

How did the No on 8 bring your organization into the larger campaign? Were you approached?

We weren’t approached, however I did make attempts, as did many of our staff and volunteers made attempts to reach out and let them know we were certainly willing to come to the table and help out. Unfortunately we were not approached. It was almost a dismissive response.

Did you go to the Gay and Lesbian Center, did you go to California Equality…

All of the above. And Let Freedom Ring. We were approached basically to kind of showcase some of the couples especially when the courts permitted same-sex marriage. We were immediately approached, “do you have any couples who are going to get married?” However, they were looking for mixed couples, they weren’t looking for African-American couples, from the message that was provided to me. So it wasn’t a real attempt to get us involved in the marketing process, or also kind of going into our communities and canvassing and trying to educate our community on the issues of Prop 8.

Did anyone come and say, “Hey, we need to do outreach in the African-American community together?”

Absolutely not, in fact the message I got from a key person in the No on 8 campaign was that the black vote was really going to be insignificant. It’s not enough, that it wasn’t going to be an issue because we are not a majority of the vote, even though they knew that a large number was going to come out to vote for Obama. It wasn’t a fear because they didn’t feel like the numbers were going to affect (Prop 8 ) either way.

When did you have that conversation?

It was a month prior to the elections. It was a concern after, I believe, the L.A. Times or the New York Times came out implying that black people will be coming out in grater numbers and it was going to affect Prop 8 because of the black vote and the fear of that. From there, I was like, “Okay, how can I get involved?” It was dismissive. It was kind of like it didn’t matter.

PS I know our "leaders" in California are claiming that we'd have lost anyway, even had African-Americans voted with us in the same proportion as other ethnics groups, but that claim is simply not supported by the math (assuming you believe the exit poll data to be correct). Read the rest of this post...

"The current crisis is, indeed, like the Great Depression in important ways"

Krugman is just freaking me out now.

The reason we’re making analogies with the Great Depression — and the reason I’ve come out with a new edition of The Return of Depression Economics — is the collapse of policy certainties. In particular, the Fed’s sudden impotence — its inability to cut rates any more, because they’re essentially zero — is a very real parallel with the Depression, and necessitates drastic responses.

Now, if all goes well the Obama stimulus plan will head off the worst. But that will be precisely because we understood that the current crisis is, indeed, like the Great Depression in important ways. Only those who learn from history can hope to avoid repeating it.

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L.A. Film Festival director Richard Raddon resigns after donating $1500 to Prop 8

Buh bye.

Richard Raddon, the director of the Los Angeles Film Festival who has been at the center of controversy ever since it was revealed almost two weeks ago that he had contributed $1,500 to the campaign to ban gay marriage in California, resigned from his post over the weekend.

And our favorite appeaser, Bill Condon, again explains why evil is good and good is evil.

"I'm personally saddened by the outcome," said Film Independent board member Bill Condon, the writer-director of "Dreamgirls." "Someone has lost his job and possibly his livelihood because of privately held religious beliefs. I think the organization was ready to tough this out, but Rich ultimately decided it wasn't worth the cost. I'm not sure he was right."

Not very private when he publicly donated $1,500 in an effort to revoke the marriages of 20,000 gay couples. And yes, one guy lost his job. 40,000 people may have lost their marriages. Millions of Californians definitely lost their civil rights. But I'm not hearing a lot of concern about any of those victims, only sympathy for their attacker.

When you use the power of the state to rip away my civil rights, and force me to live by your "values," you are no longer practicing your religion. You're practicing politics. And in politics, we have the right - nay, the duty - to fight back. Read the rest of this post...

Brennan loses CIA job after ties to torture

Good. People complained, and the guy didn't get the job. This is change we can believe in. And someone (well, someone else) is finally paying a price for the sins of the past eight years. Read the rest of this post...

Is Hillary constitutionally barred from State Department job?

Interesting, and odd, turn of events. From Ambinder at TIME - well, Pete Williams apparently first reported this:

Article One, Section Six of the U.S. Constitution says:

No Senator or Representative shall, during the Time for which he was elected, be appointed to any civil Office under the Authority of the United States which shall have been created, or the Emoluments whereof shall have been increased during such time; and no Person holding any Office under the United States, shall be a Member of either House during his Continuance in Office.

Essentially, you cannot take a job if the salary was increased during your current congressional term. And the salary for cabinet officials has gone up in the past year. Even if it is lowered back down, constitutional scholars say that may not be enough to fix the problem.

Let the Republicans bring this up at Hillary's confirmation hearings. After they object to Hillary being Secretary of State, let's have a full and public congressional investigation of torture, the entire war on terror, Iraq, and 9/11... for starters. Read the rest of this post...

Gates accepts position as Obama's defense secretary

From Politico

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates has agreed to stay on under President-elect Obama, according to officials in both parties. Obama plans to announce a national-security team early next week that includes Gates at the Pentagon and Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) as secretary of State, officials said.

Retired Marine Gen. James L. Jones, former Marine commandant and commander of U.S. and NATO forces in Europe, will be named national security adviser, the officials said.

The national security adviser heads the National Security Council, which is the part of the White House structure that deals with foreign policy, and varies in influence from presidency to presidency. Jones insisted on – and got – a commanding role, the sources said.

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Salt Lake Tribune: Prop 8 has become a PR "fiasco" for Mormons

When your biggest negatives are that people think you're pushy, rich, secretive, weird, and hell-bent on imposing your seemingly-cultish way of life on them, the last thing you should do is use gobs of money to force your views on millions of others. It's not clear what the Mormons were thinking, but in the process, they may have made a few friends on the religious right - friends who still think the Mormons are a cult, mind you (even the Mormon's evangelical "allies" have this to say about them, "Our theological differences with Mormonism are, frankly, unbridgeable") - but they've just convinced millions of other Americans that they're hateful heavy-handed bigots.

In one fell swoop, the Mormons just convinced somewhere between 10 million and 30 million gay Americans, and their 40 to 120 million friends and families, that the Mormons are filthy rich bigots who want to come into your town, take over, and force you to live under their rules (rules which include accepting Jesus as a polygamist who married his mother and was the brother of Satan, rules which include being forced to convert to Mormonism against your will), or else they'll destroy your families and ruin your lives.

Hell of a way to stop people from hating you. Read the rest of this post...

Even Google is trimming staff

In this phase, it's always the contractors who get cut first, even at Google.

Internet search giant Google said it is "significantly" reducing the number of contract workers it uses, but has no plans at this time to lay off employees, the Wall Street Journal said.

"We have been thinking for some time, before the acute phase of the economic crisis, about significantly reducing the number of contract workers," spokeswoman Jane Penner told the paper.

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Ann Coulter's jaw wired shut

From Page Six:

We hear... THAT although we didn't think it would be possible to silence Ann Coulter, the leggy reaction- ary broke her jaw and the mouth that roared has been wired shut.

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Q3 GDP even worse than initially reported

Not that it's surprising, but it's not very welcome news right now. AP:

The government says the economy took a tumble in the summer that was worse than first thought as American consumers throttled back their spending by the most in 28 years.

It was further proof the country is almost certainly in the throes of a painful recession.

The Commerce Department’s updated reading on the economy’s performance showed gross domestic product shrank at a 0.5 percent annual rate in the July-September quarter. That was deeper than the 0.3 percent rate of decline first reported.

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Krugman: Citi bailout is an outrage

From Nobel laureate economist Paul Krugman:

Mark Thoma has the rundown of informed reactions. A bailout was necessary — but this bailout is an outrage: a lousy deal for the taxpayers, no accountability for management, and just to make things perfect, quite possibly inadequate, so that Citi will be back for more.

Amazing how much damage the lame ducks can do in the time remaining.

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Joe Lieberman, worst person in the world

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Mormon church under investigation for possible election fraud

Gosh, breaking the law isn't very Christian.

California's Fair Political Practices Commission (FPPC) confirmed Monday that it will investigate allegations that the LDS Church failed to report nonmonetary contributions to the Yes on Proposition 8 campaign.

An independent nonprofit organization, Californians Against Hate, called for the investigation after the measure passed earlier this month, effectively ending same-sex marriages in that state.

"They read my letter and I guess came to the conclusion that there's something worth looking into," said Fred Karger, who heads Californians Against Hate, which was formed to track donations in support of the ballot initiative. "I'm hopeful that the LDS Church will cooperate and share all the records and all the information they have about their activities in the Proposition 8 campaign."

Karger, a retired political consultant, alleged in his complaint that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints failed to report money invested to organize phone banks, send out direct mailers, provide transportation to California, mobilize a speakers bureau, send out satellite simulcasts and develop Web sites as well as numerous commercials and video broadcasts....

Karger, however, sees the fact that FPPC is moving forward as a good sign. He said his political attorney told him the commission looks into fewer than 5 percent of complaints, an indication in his mind that "when they do it, it's pretty serious."

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Tuesday Morning Open Thread

Well it's official. I talked to Joe yesterday and I have full permission to do the morning open thread for at least a few days this week while Joe slowly makes his way up to Maine for Thanksgiving. As for me, I'm in Chicago, and spent last night visiting Carmela the wonder dog. (No new pics yet, sorry). In political news, in Georgia, Joe's most hated candidate, Republican Saxby Chambliss, is ahead in the polls by only 3 points for his upcoming Senate runoff with Democrat Jim Martin. And can I just add, what kind of a name is Saxby? Then again, what kind of a name is Lindsey? Read the rest of this post...

Report: US spied on Tony Blair

For starters, this times ten. Did Blair really think that Bush - the man who wanted to spy on everyone including his own citizens - would really abide by an agreement with the UK and not spy on Blair himself? That said, Blair's own policies of spying on everyone would make Bush blush so it was a real match made in heaven with those two.

US intelligence officials kept a file on former prime minister Tony Blair's "private life", a former US navy communications operator claimed today.

David Murfee Faulk, who worked at a listening post in Fort Gordon, Georgia, told ABCNews.com he saw the file on Blair in 2006.

But he refused to provide details of what the file, held in an intelligence database called Anchory, contained, other than to say it was a file on his "private life" and included information of a personal nature.

Faulk also said he heard "pillow talk" phone calls of Iraq's first interim president, Ghazi al-Yawer, another key US ally, when he worked as a US Army Arab linguist assigned to a US National Security Agency (NSA) facility at Fort Gordon, Georgia, between 2003 and 2007.

While not illegal to collect information on foreign leaders, the US and the UK have pledged "not to collect on each other", several former US intelligence officials told ABC.

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Wachovia execs to receive over $98 million?

Is it really asking too much for Congress to lower the boom here? Andrew Cuomo is great but surely he's not the only person who knows how to go after such excesses. Again, let's look at who lost billions and who was rewarded (and continue to be rewarded) very handsomely. The GOP needs to quit blaming the poor for this historic failure because it's Wall Street who is killing capitalism through their greed. Of course, if they're never held accountable, why would they not behave this way? Even now, it's not as though Congress or Paulson are aggressively overseeing this process.

Wachovia Corp (NYSE:WB - News), which lost $33 billion in the last two quarters, said 10 top executives may be entitled to $98.1 million in severance pay after the bank is acquired by Wells Fargo & Co (NYSE:WFC - News).

In a U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission filing, Wachovia said the executives would receive severance under their employment agreements if the merger closes by December 31, as expected. Wachovia said shareholders will vote on the merger on Dec 23.

The 10 executives do not include Robert Steel, who in July replaced the ousted Ken Thompson as Wachovia's chief executive, and does not have an employment agreement.

Wachovia also said a closing would entitle its 11 executive officers, who include Steel, as well as Chairman Lanty Smith to $2.5 million in equity-based awards under existing stock incentive plans. But the executives' stock options are worthless, the bank said.

U.S. regulators pushed Wachovia to find a merger partner after losses soared on a $118.7 billion portfolio of option adjustable-rate mortgages. The bank largely took these on when it bought California's Golden West Financial Corp in 2006.

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Zimbabwe declining rapidly, cholera outbreak grows

It's hard to imagine the situation getting worse in Zimbabwe, but that's what they are saying down there. Thabo Mbeki can thank himself for years of ignoring the problem and securing his friendship with Robert Mugabe as opposed to doing what's right for the people of Zimbabwe.

The situation in Zimbabwe may soon "implode" as a cholera outbreak spreads and basic services collapse, South African leaders and a group of international statesmen warned yesterday.

On the eve of talks in South Africa between Robert Mugabe's Zanu-PF party and opposition rivals, South African leaders sharply upgraded their crisis assessment and warned of Zimbabwe's imminent collapse if urgent action was not taken.

About 6,000 people have contracted cholera in recent weeks, according to the UN, and almost 300 have died. A chronic shortage of medicine has sent hundreds of people south to seek treatment in South Africa.

"Unless this root cause of the political absence of a legitimate government is solved, the situation will get worse and may implode and collapse ... It is now an urgent matter, because people are dying," said South Africa's caretaker president, Kgalema Motlanthe.

Three eminent statesmen representing a group called the Elders, which was established last year to tackle international issues, said Zimbabwe was in a far worse position than previously thought.

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No more Mr. Nice Gay

Nice op ed piece in today's Washington Post about the fallout from Prop 8. The writer talks about hearing a local bus driver in Santa Monica refer to gay demonstrators as "sodomites.'

I realized that in a post-Proposition 8 world, it is not okay for me to enable anyone's bigotry with my silence. If he had said the "n" word or the "k" word or something else offensive regarding someone's race, gender or religion, there would have been no question about whether to report him. But gay men and lesbians are no longer willing to be doormats. It is no longer acceptable for people to say bigoted and hateful things about gays or anyone else in front of me. This behavior has to stop now.

If the bigots thought they would slap down gay men and lesbians by passing Proposition 8, or if they thought it would end the gay civil rights movement, they were mistaken. I haven't seen the gay community this galvanized in a long time. The passage of Proposition 8 might be this generation's "Stonewall," the 1969 riot that began after an unprovoked police raid on a gay bar in Greenwich Village and that marked the start of the gay rights movement. If we can somehow harness the energy unleashed by California's Proposition 8 vote, we can achieve tremendous gains for us and for future generations of gay men and lesbians.

One of the most gratifying aspects of attending "No on 8" rallies was the number of straight demonstrators who showed up -- people who see this not just as an issue for gay men and lesbians but as a matter of everyone's civil rights.

He's right, we need to somehow harness the energy unleashed by Prop 8, but it's not happening, or at least isn't happening well. The protests around the country are great, tremendous, brilliant even, and amazing in their number.

But.

What comes after the protests? Postcard campaigns won't cut it. Nor will having a day without gays. We need a real campaign, a real war, real strategies - mean, nasty, vicious and, above all else, effective strategies targeted at achieving a concrete goal that moves our movement, moves our rights, forward. This is why I've talked endlessly about the role the Mormons had in making Prop 8 a reality. They are willing to be hate's banker, and we need to make sure that their moral bankruptcy becomes a fiscal one as well. Whether that means targeting key Mormon donors, targeting the entire state of Utah, or finding another means to make the price far too high for anyone willing to finance hate.

I'm not sure what the answer is. But we need one. We are a people without leadership at the moment. The California groups who got us into this mess seem downright terrified that gay people are finally rising up and demanding their rights, and the national groups, rightfully, to a degree, are butting out of what is California's own business (for all the criticism of HRC, are they really supposed to parachute into the middle of California and, Al Haig style, declare "we're in charge"?)

Gay people want change. But politics, like war, best achieves its goals when someone with experience and vision is at the helm. And for whatever reason, no one is stepping up. Read the rest of this post...