Obama campaign kills Colbert Presidential run

Petty or practical? From CNN Political Ticker:

Two prominent supporters of Sen. Barack Obama's presidential campaign in South Carolina called state Democratic Party officials urging them to oppose putting comedian Stephen Colbert's name on the primary ballot, according to party officials and Obama supporters with knowledge of the calls.

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Bush appointee awards "most original Halloween costume" to non-black employee dressed up as escaped black prisoner

Seems the appointee is now facing Senate confirmation and allegations of being a Bush nepotism appointee well. Heckuva job. Five bucks the Dems confirm her anyway. Read the rest of this post...

Subprime fiasco: "We've only begun to see the pain"

Let's all thank the GOP for their bang up job with allowing Wall Street to self regulate. How did anyone think this would not become an ugly problem?

"We've only begun to see the pain from the standpoint of the homeowner in terms of those monthly payments," said Bill Gross, chief investment officer of Pacific Investment Management or Pimco. "Defaults and delinquencies will increase as we extend throughout 2007 and into 2008."

Gross blamed "garbage loans" issued by large banks who couldn't guarantee them and consumers who couldn't afford them. Large lenders like Citigroup
Citigroup Inc, Merrill Lynch & Co Inc and Bear Stearns will be paying the price, he said.

At least voters will have an opportunity to have this fresh in the minds during the campaign season next year and can decide just how much they enjoy self-regulation and all of its benefits. Read the rest of this post...

My first podcast is up

Okay, I took the plunge. I've signed up with a podcast host service, Liberal Syndication, and produced my first podcast yesterday (my account got a bit goofed up, so I'm posting it today). You can find episode one here. I'm still trying to figure out how this service works, whether I can post something more than just a link here (can I embed the content in the post?), etc., but for now, you can go over, listen to the show (it's about 20 minutes), grab the RSS, etc. Also, I'm open to advice as to what to do next - do I need to register with podcast promo services, etc.? All pretty new to me, but was pretty fun, and not too hard to produce (and forgive the high pitched sound in the background, I think I was too close to my computer). Read the rest of this post...

NYT: White House now unsure it will veto ENDA

I suspect the religious right Frankenstein will scare the bejeesus out of the White House soon enough, but it's still quite telling that for the second time the White House is sending mixed signals on whether it truly opposes ENDA. From the NYT:

President Bush threatened to veto an earlier version of the bill, but a White House spokesman, Tony Fratto, said the administration would need to review recent changes before making a final decision.

As for the bill's chances in the Senate, check this out:

Senator Edward M. Kennedy, a Massachusetts Democrat and a longtime supporter of gay rights legislation, said he would move swiftly to introduce a similar measure in the Senate. Some Senate Republicans said that, if worded carefully, it would have a good chance of passing, perhaps early next year.

That's a far cry from dead until 2009. Read the rest of this post...

1 in 4 US homeless are veterans

And what exactly is George Bush doing about this? Nothing. Bush and the Republicans only "support" the troops when it means sending them to die in a poorly-planned and poorly-equipped mission. If they survive, not so much. Read the rest of this post...

"Investors agree: Anything but the dollar"

Our country is in serious trouble. Under George Bush and the Republicans we not only lost our leadership as the moral standard-bearer of the world, we now risk losing our leadership as the financial bedrock of the world. People no longer have confidence in America. And all of the republicans' flag-waving and "we're number one!" slogans have done nothing to fix some very serious problems that they've caused and ignored. We can't go on like this. Pretending that we're winning in Iraq, pretending that we don't have a health care crisis, pretending that global warming doesn't exist, pretending that massive federal budget deficits don't matter because lowering taxes supposedly makes money (even though Reagan and Bush have now both broken the budget by lowering taxes). We can't keep pretending that everything is okay when it's not, simply because the Republicans are afraid to admit that they've royally screwed up our country.

From the International Herald Tribune:

In short, markets appeared firmly in the grip of a mood that seemed to scream for any investment other than the dollar, a reflection of a broad lack of confidence in a U.S. economy that could not seem to put the subprime mortgage crisis behind it. Unusually, powerful new Chinese investors appeared to endorse the idea that the U.S. currency was bound to fade as a result.

The European Central Bank seems set to stand by the strong euro when it meets Thursday to set interest rates - offering a credible alternative to a U.S. currency that now seems less indispensable than it has in some time.....

"We are experiencing among our clients an awakening that the United States is in big trouble," said Erik Nielsen, chief Europe economist at Goldman Sachs. "It is not just the mortgage market."

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Washington Post refuses to write even one word about House ENDA victory yesterday

(Correction: The Post DID write about ENDA today in its print edition, on page 7 in one of those throwaway small blurbs it does for the unimportant stories. Yes, that's better than I thought they did - which was nothing - but the fact that I missed it is kind of my point, they treated it like some insignificant blurb. So I stand corrected, but only kind of.)

Front page story in the NYT print edition. No coverage at all in the Washington Post print edition. And spare us the "the bill's passage came too late in the day" garbage - the NYT covered it just fine. (Then again, the Times decided to go back in time to an age when it was okay for newspapers to refer to being gay as an "alternative lifestyle" - where the hell did that blast from the past come from?)

The Washington Post, it's the new Washington Times. Read the rest of this post...

NH independents leaning Democratic, big time

From AP:

"Undeclareds," as independents are called in New Hampshire, are congregating around the Democratic race.

Four out of 10 say they plan to vote in the Democratic primary, and about the same number say they aren't sure which ballot they will pick up on primary day. Only 19 percent are planning to vote in the Republican primary, according to a recent poll by Saint Anselm College's Institute of Politics.

In contrast, undeclareds in 2000 broke heavily for Republicans — 62 percent to 38 percent — thanks to keen interest in the Bush-McCain race and the lackluster campaigns of Al Gore and Bill Bradley.

The 43 percent of voters who register as "undeclared" in New Hampshire outnumber both Republicans, 31 percent, and Democrats, 26 percent. They helped produce McCain's 2000 upset, though the Arizona senator also won among Republicans.

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Um, you do realize that ENDA could still become law in the next year, right?

I just got done reading an email from the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force about yesterday's passage in the US House of a bill outlawing job discrimination against gays. The email is odd in that it's factually wrong about how a bill becomes a law. The email suggests that the battle over ENDA is now over until the next Congress, in 2009. That's simply untrue. Yesterday's passage of the bill in the House is the first step - we could get this passed in the next year.

First, NGLTF's line:

"We are relieved this episode is behind us, and starting right now we are going to pick up where we were six weeks ago -- namely, working to pass into law in 2009 the ENDA our entire community wants and deserves."

Let's put aside for a moment the fact that what "our entire community wants," to the tune of 70% of us in a recent poll, is to pass ENDA even if it doesn't include gender identity. This episode isn't behind us. Where did they get the idea that nothing can be done until 2009? The way the legislative process works in Washington, DC is that once a bill passes one body of Congress, it stays alive until the end of that Congress - i.e., until the end of the two-year period leading to the next congressional election (November 2008). We have one year to get ENDA passed in the Senate and signed into law.

Now, the other odd thing that the folks trying to kill ENDA keep arguing (I'm sorry, I don't mean Pat Robertson, I mean NGLTF and their allies), is that since Bush said he'll veto ENDA there is no chance it will become law. Again, that kind of argument shows a serious lack of understanding of DC politics and legislative process. I've written this before, but I'm going to write it again since too many of the "kill ENDA" crowd quite literally don't seem to understand how a bill becomes a law, yet they're demanding that they be allowed to take the lead in making ENDA become the law of the land. That prospect is a bit frightening. After all, we saw how well they did trying to get the votes to pass Tammy Baldwin's transgender amendment. All the queen's horses and all the queen's men failed, even though they claimed to have the entire gay community behind them and claimed that Congress and America are generally supportive of transgender rights. Apparently, not so much.

Let's recap the way the legislative process actually works in DC:

1. As already stated, we have until November 2008 to get the bill passed in the Senate. This "wait until 2009" stuff is nonsense.

2. The scuttlebutt in town is that Senators Kennedy and Collins are still planning on introducing their version of ENDA in the Senate this Congress.

3. Whether or not we have the votes to get it passed in the Senate, ENDA can be added on to other must-pass legislation, such as funding bills, that Republicans would be loathe to filibuster. This isn't a rare procedural trick. It's standard procedure in DC. You just need to convince the Democratic leadership to do it. And that takes some major lobbying.

4. The same tactic, adding ENDA on to a must-pass bill, is also a way of getting it around a threatened presidential veto. If ENDA is tacked on to a bill that Bush desperately wants or needs, he then has to choose between signing the bill, and making ENDA law, or vetoing his desperately wanted/needed legislation that ENDA has been attached to.

None of this means for certain that we will get ENDA passed this Congress (meaning, before Nov. 2008). But to suggest that ENDA is dead until 2009 shows a lack of understanding about the legislative process and how things work in this town. We are dealing with the civil rights of 30 million gay Americans. We can't afford to have a coalition of political neophytes take the lead when they don't even understand how a bill becomes a law. (Or, maybe they do know that we can still make ENDA the law of the land this Congress, but they're still simply trying to kill ENDA because it doesn't include transgender people - if they can convince you that all is lost, then it really is.)

ENDA can become law in the next year. But it's not going to be easy. It will take some major chutzpah and some major lobbying and pressure to make it so (to pressure the Dems not to let ENDA slide until after the election). The only thing that's certain is that we will lose ENDA, we will fail to pass it this Congress, if we believe those who incorrectly tell us that we've already lost. They may have lost - we have not. Read the rest of this post...

Thursday Morning Open Thread

From the the never-ending war in Iraq to the growing toy recall scandal to the housing market disaster to the crisis in Pakistan to whatever is happening with Iran, the crises just keep coming. And, does anyone -- anyone -- have any confidence that George Bush could deal with any of these issues individually -- let alone all of them. We're so screwed.

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

Chinese toys found to contain date-rape drug

Uh, I think the problem is well beyond ridiculous. This is nuts.

U.S. safety officials have voluntarily recalled about 4.2 million Chinese-made Aqua Dots toys contaminated with a powerful "date rape" drug that has caused some children to vomit and lose consciousness upon ingesting the contents.

Scientists have found the highly popular holiday toy contains a chemical that, once metabolized, converts into the toxic "date rape" drug GHB (gamma-hydroxy butyrate), U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) spokesman Scott Wolfson told CNN.

"Children who swallow the beads can become comatose, develop respiratory depression or have seizures," a CPSC statement warned.

"Anyone with Aqua Dots at home should throw them out," CPSC spokeswoman Julie Vallese said. The toy was named toy of the year in Australia and recently made Wal-Mart Store Inc's list of top 12 Christmas toys.

All we need now to make this even crazier is to listen to Republicans pontificate once again about letting industry self-regulate. Then they can tell us how "the market" will work out the problems. Just ignore those kids who are being rushed to the hospital and think of them as martyrs for industry and cheap toys from China. The worst of this is that the Democrats will probably just sit back and take punches like this, afraid to call out the GOP on their terribly failed policies. Read the rest of this post...

Morgan Stanley joins the multi-billion dollar loss party

Keeping up with the Joneses.

Morgan Stanley on Wednesday said it has suffered a $3.7 billion loss stemming from its U.S. subprime mortgage exposure, which it expects will reduce fourth-quarter earnings by about $2.5 billion.

The Wall Street investment bank said the loss occurred in September and October, and might change before its fiscal quarter ends this month.

It attributed the loss to deterioration in capital markets, which was triggered in large part by the struggles of thousands of homeowners to keep up with mortgage payments. Morgan Stanley said markets may remain unsettled for several quarters.

Meanwhile, $33 billion (yes, billion) of the now infamous "SIV" securities (the slices of debt based on the questionable subprime loans) has been downgraded by Moody's. The once high-flying SIV market has dried up practically overnight. Read the rest of this post...