Joie de vivre...

Joie de vivre… 22 March 2009

Posted by marisacat in Divertissements.
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crocus

Visitors stroll through a sea of crocuses in the park of the castle in Husum, northern Germany. According to local legend, monks in the 15th century planted the first crocuses here – today some 4.5m blossom in the spring Photograph: Heribert Proepper/AP

I think the mouse (accessory) might die tonight, rebooting gooses it.. it’s pulse is weaker, LOL… but the new mouse should come tomorrow.. I missed the delivery Friday afternoon, or so a UPS tracking notice tells me. I thought it was coming 3 day ground and Amazon sent it 2 day UPS air.

Oh well.

Invader mice on the ground and dying mouse in the hand.

Anyway a new thread, should anyone want one…

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1. Madman in the Marketplace - 22 March 2009: that is a beautiful photo.

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marisacat - 22 March 2009: oh I thought so too… very mysterious….

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2. BooHooHooMan - 22 March 2009: LOL. The Mob almost whacked Charlie Rose by mistake.

Whatever would we have done?

CR: “”Tonight, I am tied to a chair here as you can see. Rocco the Hitter they brought in from Staten Island is the gentleman on my right with the pliers. { cut to Rocco who nods}. .{back to Charlie.}

On my left, the Award winning author being accosted by… woaps ! – they’re loading him into a trunk….”"

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marisacat - 22 March 2009: Jesus.. bumblers. Whether cops or crooks… or both.

The 1992 incident wasn’t the first goof by the corrupt former detectives, whom Casso paid $4,000 a month to help kill rival hoods and supply tips on turncoats and probes.

Caracappa and Eppolito, who were sentenced to life on March 6, were asked to find the address of Nicholas Guido, a conspirator who tried to knock off Casso in a botched hit.

The cops got the wrong information; this time, Casso’s henchmen killed an innocent Brooklyn man also named Nicholas Guido.

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3. marisacat - 22 March 2009: HA!… a few days ago Ob said the difference between the US and others who sought to subjugate Afghanistan is that we do not seek to occupy nor to run the government.

The US and its European allies are preparing to plant a high-profile figure in the heart of the Kabul government in a direct challenge to the Afghan president, Hamid Karzai, the Guardian has learned.

The creation of a new chief executive or prime ministerial role is aimed at bypassing Karzai. In a further dilution of his power, it is proposed that money be diverted from the Kabul government to the provinces. Many US and European officials have become disillusioned with the extent of the corruption and incompetence in the Karzai government, but most now believe there are no credible alternatives, and predict the Afghan president will win re-election in August. …

Richard Holbrooke, the US envoy for Afghanistan and Pakistan, who will implement the new policy, said it would represent a “vastly restructured effort”. At the weekend in Brussels, he was scathing about the Bush administration’s conduct of the counter-insurgency. “The failures in the civilian side … are so enormous we can at least hope that if we get our act together … we can do a lot better,” he said.

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4. marisacat - 22 March 2009: hmm hard to know what is coming…

[T]he recent Gaza donor conference at Sharm el Sheikh was a familiar exercise of nations pledging large amounts of money while respecting taboos imposed by Israel that effectively block reconstruction. That was in marked contrast to the aid convoy led by the maverick British MP George Galloway that arrived in Gaza two weeks ago, comprising some 100 trucks and ambulances loaded with medical and humanitarian supplies funded and collected at grassroots level in churches, mosques, trade union branches and community groups all over Britain.

Sure, the amount of aid delivered was small potatoes relative to the need, but the gesture showed that hundreds of thousands of ordinary Britons no longer accept their government’s equivocation on the fate of the Palestinians. That is exactly how the international anti-apartheid movement was born, back when the governments of the US and Britain were happy to concur with Pretoria that Nelson Mandela was a terrorist.

In a remarkable interview last November, the Israeli prime minister Ehud Olmert cautioned that unless it could achieve a two-state solution quickly, Israel would “face a South African-style struggle for equal voting rights, and as soon as that happens, the state of Israel is finished”. The reason, he said, was that Israel would be internationally isolated. “The Jewish organisations, which are our power base in America, will be the first to come out against us because they will say they cannot support a state that does not support democracy and equal voting rights for all its residents.”

Jewish communities in western countries have long been Israel’s trump card against international pressure, because they mobilise support for Israel and restrain critics by painting opposition to Israel’s policies as motivated by hostility to Jews – a toxic accusation in a world still sensitive to the horrors of the Holocaust. But what was palpable during the Gaza conflict was the diminished enthusiasm of young Jewish people abroad for Israeli militarism, and the increasing willingness of many to openly challenge Israel. …

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BooHooHooMan - 22 March 2009: Ehud Olmert on Winged Monkee exiting my ass…“The Jewish organisations, which are our power base in America, will be the first to come out against us because they will say they cannot support a state that does not support democracy and equal voting rights for all its residents.”

also in the graf:

But what was palpable during the Gaza conflict was the diminished enthusiasm of young Jewish people abroad for Israeli militarism, and the increasing willingness of many to openly challenge Israel. …

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5. BooHooHooMan - 22 March 2009: They have ten , fifteen years at best, they know it… in a world still sensitive to the horrors of the Holocaust. Israel and her patrons will grab everything they can in the meantime and frankly the only thing that could plausibly justify her continued indulgence , if bought, is a false flag attack on the U.S. pinned on the Palestinians/ the Arabs/ the Persians / the Muslim World in general…

I fear we will see it , too.

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6. marisacat - 22 March 2009: Obit: Sylvia Plath’s son:

[H]is sister Frieda is travelling to Alaska. She released this statement: “It is with profound sorrow that I must announce the death of my brother, Nicholas Hughes, who died by his own hand on Monday 16th March 2009 at his home in Alaska. He had been battling depression for some time.”

News of his death comes 46 years after Plath gassed herself in the kitchen of the family home while her children slept in a nearby room. Her suicide prompted intense public interest in the family, with some feminist groups laying the blame for her death at the feet of Ted Hughes, who had left Plath for Assia Wevill, the wife of another poet. Tragically, Wevill later killed herself, and their daughter Shura, in what was believed to be a “copycat suicide”. …

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7. marisacat - 23 March 2009: fwiw… Geithner has some sort of preamble blither up in the WSJ….

Seems sold on invoking Alexander Hamilton…

[T]he rule of law gives responsible entrepreneurs and investors the confidence to invest and create jobs in our nation. Our nation’s commitment to pursue economic policies that promote confidence and stability dates back to the very first secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, who first made it clear that when our government gives its word we mean it. …

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Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: Wall Street sure loves the buckets of cash this morning. Up over 300 points on the Dow. Shouldn’t be much longer before they back down on higher taxes on large bonuses, then I expect a new short-lived bubble to grow.

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marisacat - 23 March 2009: bubble bubble toil and trouble…

by the end of this week, people will start to believe in it… some anyway…

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Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: plenty of eager suckers out there.

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8. BooHooHooMan - 23 March 2009: Paterson mulls changing NY pension oversight

Governor says charges leveled against two former aides of ex-Comptroller Alan Hevesi has made him consider changes to how the public employee retirement fund is managed.

Ooo. –> mulling.

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9. Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: Capitol Hill: Parties All the Time

When I showed up unannounced–and with a video crew in tow–at a couple dozen Congressional fundraisers on Capitol Hill, I felt as if I were channeling two paragons of contrarian virtue: first, Diogenes the Cynic, the ancient Greek sage who carried a lantern around Athens during the daytime, looking for an honest man; second, the great sociologist Harold Garfinkel, who in the 1960s pioneered the use of what he called “breaching experiments,” interactions in which researchers intentionally breach unspoken rules of conduct to reveal hidden features of our social order.

In my breaching experiment, the unspoken rule was that you do not show up to a Congressional fundraiser with a video crew and ask to speak to a member of Congress or their staff. Even just for two minutes. Even if you are very polite. Even though all of the money raised is going to be reported to the Federal Elections Commission and posted on their website. You do not ask how much the member of Congress or candidate expects to raise. You do not even inquire about the suggested contribution levels–even though those numbers are also available online, thanks to the hundreds of fundraiser invitations that lobbyists have leaked to the Sunlight Foundation’s website Political Partytime.

Fundraising parties seem to be proliferating–possibly as an unintended consequence of the otherwise laudable post-Abramoff reforms of 2007, which banned gifts from lobbyists to members of Congress, restricted the use of corporate jets by members, and curbed junkets like Abramoff’s notorious Scottish golfing trip. In his new book, So Damn Much Money, Robert Kaiser quotes the prominent lobbyist Lawrence O’Brien III, who says the latest reforms “have shifted the emphasis over to political fundraising. Now writing checks and raising money is the simplest pathway to completely legal personal face time with members and their senior staff.”

It all may be “completely legal,” but campaign finance advocates wonder what deals get cut along with all the big checks. After all, just before his sentencing no less an authority than Jack Abramoff reportedly said, “I was participating in a system of legalized bribery. All of it is bribery, every bit of it.”

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10. marisacat - 23 March 2009: Have a laugh…

I’m unsure why a “better society” means social, tax-payer-funded welfare and healthcare for the wealthy till the end of their days; or why large agricultural subsidies help us at all; or why the countless corporate tax shelters add anything but distortion to the economy; or why an open-ended commitment to turning Afghanistan – yes, Afghanistan – into a stable democracy is worth more billions; etc. [well ya shoulda listened to the candidate on the stump! --Mcat] I’m happy with short-term costly fixes to emergent problems – especially if they help restrain long-term healthcare costs or stall climate change.

But only if we balance them with long term cuts in the entitlements state and defense retrenchment. Obama said he’d do that. He hasn’t. It’s a major break with those of us in the center who supported him.

From Sully. 60 days is not too soon [for him] to bitch and moan and declare a major break with the beloved. when ti is Sully’s mean little demands. I am aware that Sully is a legal resident of the US under a special waiver for the arts that overrides the ban against HIV + coming into the US. Which is greatly aided by his on going position of a useful voice, gay, conservative and Brit. Whoohoo. So great.

Obama NEVER said he’d cut back on the mil nor cut back on Afghanistan. NEVER. He said the war on terror should be in Afhgnaitan and Pakistan and he promised to GROW the mil. Nor that he would cut back on masses of special interest welfare for the wealthy and the corps. NEVER.

But ya know, Sully is NOT a citizen. End of story.

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11. marisacat - 23 March 2009: trolling around I think the word for the day is

UPBEAT…

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12. marisacat - 23 March 2009: LOL Baby fall down go boom. So perfect:

The Levee

Liberals appear to be concerned that the Geithner plan will result in the people who wrecked finance finding themselves rewarded for the wrecking. This, I’ll suggest, is the plan’s principal aim. The euphemism of “risk” is indicative of the accuracy of my reading. Baby fall down, go boom. Mommy lift baby back up. …

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13. CSTAR - 23 March 2009: Gaza.

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14. marisacat - 23 March 2009: Don’t worry! Stress is over! Everybody loves Geithner. Gregg Judd too! (loves Geithner)…. Summers tours the chat shows and slams Krugman!

Except for those not happy, everybody is happy!

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15. marisacat - 23 March 2009: Stock market UP UP UP… and AIG big wigs returning THIRTY MILLION.

We are saved!

Obviously Mrs Madoff is soon to move back from FL! Donate 62 million to the impoverished investors! Any minute! Any minute Mr Madoff will convert to being a Xtian!

Saved!

I figure this gets Ob thru the G20 meetings.

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16. Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: Senator Sanders Blocking Key Obama Nomination

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marisacat - 23 March 2009: oh FFS.. can’t Ob and Oblings find someone better?

While Mr. Gensler is clearly an intelligent and knowledgeable person, I cannot support his nomination. Mr. Gensler worked with Sen. Phil Gramm and Alan Greenspan to exempt credit default swaps from regulation, which led to the collapse of A.I.G. and has resulted in the largest taxpayer bailout in U.S. history. He supported Gramm-Leach-Bliley [the final kill shot at Glass -Steagall - Mcat], which allowed banks like Citigroup to become “too big to fail.” He worked to deregulate electronic energy trading, which led to the downfall of Enron and the spike in energy prices. At this moment in our history, we need an independent leader who will help create a new culture in the financial marketplace and move us away from the greed, recklessness and illegal behavior which has caused so much harm to our economy.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: that’s when happens when you keep looking under the same rocks … more slugs.

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17. Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: IDF Soldiers Ordered to Shoot at Gaza Rescuers, Note Says

“Rules of Engagement: Open fire also upon rescue,” was handwritten in Hebrew on a sheet of paper found in one of the Palestinian homes the Israel Defense Forces took over during Operation Cast Lead. A reservist officer who did not take part in the Gaza offensive believes that the note is part of orders a low-level commander wrote before giving his soldiers their daily briefing.

One of the main themes in news reports during the Gaza operation, and which appears in many testimonies, is that IDF soldiers shot at Palestinian and Red Cross rescuers, making it impossible to evacuate the wounded and dead. As a result, an unknown number of Palestinians bled to death as others cowered in their homes for days without medical treatment, waiting to be rescued.

The bodies of the dead lay outside the homes or on roadsides for days, sometimes as long as two weeks. Haaretz has reported a number of such cases, some of them as they happened. The document found in the house provides written proof that IDF commanders ordered their troops to shoot at rescuers.

The sheet of paper entitled “Situational Assessment” was found by a field researcher of The Palestinian Center for Human Rights in the home of Sami Dardone’s family in Jabal al-Rayes, east of Jabalya. The extended Dardone family lives in about 40 homes in this neighborhood, built on a hilltop. Some of the homes were taken over by the army to house troops during the offensive and to serve as sniping positions, or for shooting in general.

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18. BooHooHooMan - 23 March 2009: Arianna Huffington
Take the Steering Wheel out of Geithner’s Hands
{True that, but Arianna confuses the doorman with the chauffeur. }

On February 10th, the New York Times reported that there had been a “spirited” battle within the Obama administration over restrictions on executive pay and bonuses, and over attaching stringent conditions to any bailout money given to banks.

The clash pitted Tim Geithner, who opposed the restrictions and conditions, against David Axelrod, who favored them. According to the Times, Geithner had “largely prevailed.”…..

Which means what? Geithner? Steering Wheel? “largely prevailed”???
Sorry to be Carvillesque: It’s the Limos , Ariana.

It’s Obama’s car that needs the all points bulletin in these robberies. Make, model, who’s in it when pulled over, silly girl..
WHO’s DRIVING FFS?

They’re ALL down with this, though Axelrod , if anything, is smart enough to try and preserve the image:: his own, personally, and the one crafted for Obama’s jalopy:: the mechanically sound lemon that need revisit for mere tune-ups later.
Keep comin, Back now, ya hear?!?

Sorry, don’t lose me now. Oh go ahead, laugh your ass off.
The mofo’s are soaking us.

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19. Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: Gay rights battle puts strain on parties

The women come to celebrate without having to worry about straight men pawing them. The gay men are there because, well, they don’t want to be around a lot of women.

For years, some bar owners have tried to accommodate both groups, but that’s becoming increasingly difficult. With California’s vote last November in favor of the gay-marriage ban known as Proposition 8, some gays are saying that bachelorette parties at their bars are becoming more than a minor nuisance. They’re a constant reminder that gays don’t have equal marriage rights.

“The women are a hoot, and some can be just delightful,” said Geno Zaharakis, the owner of Cocktail, a gay bar on North Halsted Street. “But because not everybody can get married, watching them celebrate, it’s such a slap in the face. Prop 8 just reopened the wound.”

Zaharakis told me that Cocktail stopped hosting bachelorette parties a couple of years ago when he noticed his gay patrons weren’t just complaining about the women being minor irritants but about them “flaunting” their right to marry. So Zaharakis hung a sign on the front door of his establishment that says, “Bachelorette Parties Are Not Allowed.”

If that message isn’t resonant enough, he offers a written statement: “Until same-sex marriage is legal everywhere and same-sex couples are allowed the rights as every heterosexual couple worldwide, we simply do not think it’s fair or just for a female bride-to-be to celebrate her upcoming nuptials here at Cocktail. We are entitled to an opinion, this is ours.”

Indeed some gay men and straight women have a friendship that’s reminiscent of the old television show “Will & Grace.” And many men make the distinction between their “girlfriends” who frequent gay bars and are sensitive to the marriage issue and other women who are merely seeking good music and “go-go boys” (translation: nearly naked male dancers) for a bachelorette party.

“We appreciate that these women are not homophobic and … want to party with us,” said Jens Hussey, a gay man who’s in a four-year relationship and worries about being able to make medical and other decisions regarding his partner. “But with all that’s going on [in] the media about us not being able to marry, are [these women] willing to march with us or raise money with us or work to change somebody’s attitude to help us get equal rights?”

Hussey recently was on hand at Circuit Night Club, a gay bar about three blocks north of Cocktail that caters to bachelorette parties. But he said he’d rather see women take such parties elsewhere until everybody legally can wed.

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20. Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: Bright Shining Lies: American Death Squads and ‘Dissident’ Self-Delusion

Following up from yesterday’s post, we now turn to Winter Patriot for a deeper look into how the world really works — or rather, how the American power structure really works. In this powerful and detailed piece, WP takes “dissident” icon Seymour Hersh to task for his very typical schizophrenic reaction to the literally atrocious crimes that he uncovers in the American system. Hersh condemns the crimes while absolving the criminals — in this case, the American death squads in Afghanistan — because, in the end, their hearts are in the right place.

Hersh is rightly lauded for working his inside sources in the security apparat to reveal high crimes and corruption committed by other insiders in the security apparat. But his relevations usually come larded with heaping helpings of unwitting obfuscation: he will root out a rotten tree here and there, even while admiring the beauty of the whole poisonous forest as it keeps spreading.

This was never more true than in Hersh’s latest bombshell: his public assertion that there is a covert American death squad operating outside all ordinary chains of command, and reporting solely to the White House. This is the Joint Special Operations Command, which is now breaking into houses in Afghanistan and murdering people, including women and children — foul crimes which even the Pentagon was forced to admit, when it announced that it had halted certain Special Forces operations for two whole weeks because of the surfeit of civilian deaths. (Or rather, as WP points out, because of bad publicity about civilian deaths.)

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21. liberalcatnip - 23 March 2009: From the Big Orange reaction to Rich’s NYT Katrina moment column. At least someone gets it:

What a bunch of bullshit (45+ / 0-)

And I hate to disagree with my good friend Inky99, but Katrina is a perfect comparison to this crisis.

What the fuck do you think is happening here? People are losing their livelihoods, their homes, even their lives.

Coincidentally, USA Today published a story just days ago that cited Harvey Brenner:

Harvey Brenner, professor emeritus at Johns Hopkins’ Bloomberg School of Public Health, projects that an increase of 1 percentage point in the nation’s unemployment rate could cause as many as 47,000 more deaths —including 1,200 more suicides and 26,000 additional heart attacks —over the ensuing two years.

It was, in fact, the Katrina tragedy that made me have an epiphany: the only difference between a disaster like Katrina and the ongoing disaster of our barbaric economy, including our immoral health care system, is time.

A hurricane happens suddenly. The ongoing disaster of poverty and negligence of our fellow human beings plays out in relative slow motion. But it is no less disastrous. Just as deadly. There’s just no one around taking photos of all the bodies of people who died of lack of health care, or homelessness.

The conservative, darwinistic, barbaric economic policies of this right wing, piece of shit country, have killed far more people than all the natural disasters combined.

by TocqueDeville on Sun Mar 22, 2009 at 09:01:06 AM MDT

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22. Madman in the Marketplace - 23 March 2009: Don’t Feed The Local Citylife: Man Arrested for Feeding Homeless in Orlando

Eric Montanez faces a curious criminal charge in Orlando, Florida: feeding hungry people. The good people of Orlando, Florida have decided to join other cities in making it a crime to feed poor and hungry people caught up in this recession. Even at Yellowstone you are simply asked not to feed the bears, but in Orlando feeding the hungry will get you arrested. There was a guy in the New Testament that did such things and look where that got us.

Orlando’s ordinance makes it a crime to feed groups of 25 or more people in parks and other public property within two miles of City Hall without a special permit. While most of the witnesses at the hearing testified against the ordinance, it was supported by a small group of businesses objecting to the gathering of poor people and the trash that they left. (Of course, one could easily see an ordinance that ticketed groups that do not clean up after such distributions of food).

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liberalcatnip - 23 March 2009: That reminded me of the clip I saw on CNN yesterday of Jorge Muñoz who feeds the homeless in Queens. Truly selfless and an inspiration.

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23. marisacat - 23 March 2009: 3 of madman’s out of Moderation… sorry for the delay…

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24. marisacat - 23 March 2009: NYT:

Plan B Must Be Made Available to 17-Year-Olds

By NATASHA SINGER

Published: March 23, 2009

A federal judge on Monday ordered the Food and Drug Administration to make the Plan B morning-after birth control pill available without prescription to women as young as 17. The judge ruled the agency had improperly bowed to political pressure from the Bush Administration when it set 18 as the age limit in 2006.

The F.D.A. has 30 days to comply with the order, in which the judge also urged the agency to consider removing all restrictions on over-the-counter sales of Plan B. The drug consists of two pills that prevent conception if taken within 72 hours of sexual intercourse.

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25. marisacat - 23 March 2009: Tapper:

AIG Changes Its Name

March 23, 2009 5:27 PM

Valujet became ATA.

Blackwater morphed into Xe.

And New Kids on the Block changed to NKOTB.

Plus, as we noted earlier, “toxic assets” today became “legacy loans.”

Amidst all this re-branding, AIG has emerged as AIU Holdings.

Enjoy!

- jpt

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26. liberalcatnip - 23 March 2009: moiv

A fiction recommendation for you (or anyone else, for that matter): The Birth House by Ami McKay

It was interesting, political (the age-old battle between midwifery and modern medicine set during the first world war), and entertaining. I thought the historical aspect might be of interest to you, moiv, and it’s an easy read.

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27. liberalcatnip - 23 March 2009: The author, Ami McKay, also has a hysteria quiz on the book’s site to find out how many “treatments” a woman might need. lol

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28. BooHooHooMan - 23 March 2009: Wall Street Journal-

BEIJING — China called for the creation of a new currency to eventually replace the dollar as the world’s standard, proposing a sweeping overhaul of global finance that reflects developing nations’ growing unhappiness with the U.S. role in the world economy.

The unusual proposal,
{“Unusual”??? Try INEVITABLE… and SANE. -BHHM }
made by central bank governor Zhou Xiaochuan in an essay released Monday in Beijing, is part of China’s increasingly assertive approach to shaping the global response to the financial crisis.

Mr. Zhou’s proposal comes amid preparations for a summit of the world’s industrial and developing nations, the Group of 20, in London next week. At past such meetings, developed nations have criticized China’s economic and currency policies.

This time, China is on the offensive, backed by other emerging economies such as Russia in making clear they want a global economic order less dominated by the U.S. and other wealthy nations….

We just FUCKED them last week with the Fed move to run off 1.2 Trillion . People in the U.S. by and large have NO IDEA their money itself was devalued last week. People grok having few bucks while they are being crushed with debt for the rich, but they don’t yet realize the new “quantitative easing” – bullshit for running off more paper – they don’t yet realize how it has screwed the power of very few dollars they hold.

China and Russia do. They were just fucked out of a good chunk of the value of their dollars held and receivables in which they were expecting payment in dollars.
The G20 is going to be a fucking disaster.

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BooHooHooMan - 23 March 2009: We looted the world to prop up the collapsing core of our Empire:
Our MIC, our monied, and Israel.

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marisacat - 23 March 2009: … out of mod pod… as IB calls it…

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marisacat - 23 March 2009: think th UN said something similar about the dollar the other day….

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29. BooHooHooMan - 24 March 2009: Read this WaPo. Then Blow Your Brains Out.

U.S. Seeks Expanded Power to Seize Firms

White House considers asking Congress for ability to seize troubled non-bank financial companies whose collapse would threaten the economy. -Binyamin Appelbaum and David Cho

The Obama administration is considering asking Congress to give the Treasury secretary unprecedented powers to initiate the seizure of non-bank financial companies, such as large insurers, investment firms and hedge funds, whose collapse would damage the broader economy, according to an administration document.

Not bad eh? But look who’s running the show, and look who has the final say underneath. The Bankers!

Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner is set to argue for the new powers at a hearing today on Capitol Hill about the furor over bonuses paid to executives at American International Group, which the government has propped up with about $180 billion in federal aid. Administration officials have said that the proposed authority would have allowed them to seize AIG last fall and wind down its operations at less cost to taxpayers.

The administration’s proposal contains two pieces. First, it would empower a government agency to take on the new role of systemic risk regulator with broad oversight of any and all financial firms whose failure could disrupt the broader economy. The Federal Reserve is widely considered to be the leading candidate for this assignment. But some critics warn that this could conflict with the Fed’s other responsibilities, particularly its control over monetary policy.

The government also would assume the authority to seize such firms if they totter toward failure.

Besides seizing a company outright, the document states, the Treasury Secretary could use a range of tools to prevent its collapse, such as guaranteeing losses, buying assets or taking a partial ownership stake. Such authority also would allow the government to break contracts, such as the agreements to pay $165 million in bonuses to employees of AIG’s most troubled unit.

The Treasury secretary could act only after consulting with the president and getting a recommendation from two-thirds of the Federal Reserve Board, according to the plan.

I’m Kidding about the Head shot.
Save the Bullets.

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30. NYCO - 24 March 2009: 41. For all the talk about government seizure of “too big to fail” companies being tantamount to socialism, I guess people have forgotten how India became a British possession – the Crown nationalized the East India Company after they cocked up the Sepoy Mutiny. Not that it resulted in much change for the Indian people, but it wasn’t exactly socialism.

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wu ming - 24 March 2009: excellent point, NYCO. also a nice reminder of just how old the pattern of “globalization” is.

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31. wu ming - 24 March 2009: oops. damn autofill.

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marisacat - 24 March 2009: I fixed it wu ming…

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wu ming - 24 March 2009: danke. all these auto-everything for convenience, most of them just make twice the work correcting them.

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32. NYCO - 24 March 2009: Omerta isn’t what it used to be…

Goldman’s sudden urgency to return the money stems, in part, from the uproar over A.I.G.’s bonuses last week, and the criticism of Goldman over revelations that the firm had been the largest recipient of government money as a counterparty of bets placed with A.I.G. It’s also paying a hefty 5 percent interest payment to taxpayers for that money.

“It’s just impossible to run our business in this environment,” said one senior Goldman executive who insisted on not being quoted by name for fear of crossing the Treasury Department.

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BooHooHooMan - 24 March 2009: Hey NYCO, if you care to and get a chance, I’d like to hear the down low from NY re Cuomo poking into the NY Pensions., the Hank Morris indictment, (Schumers campaign dir) / Hevesi’s boy, / Shelley Silver /Schumer etc…..Any traction?

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NYCO - 24 March 2009: I’m not hearing anything about the pensions stuff. I think everyone is too busy kicking Paterson around. And the news about the nearly 9,000 state job cuts today will help diffuse any energy.

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BooHooHooMan - 24 March 2009: Thanks. Just checkin.
Like I said, we here in Jersey wouldn’t want corruption filtering in to our unspoiled State from New York. LOL.

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liberalcatnip - 24 March 2009: “It’s just impossible to run our business in this environment,”

My heart bleeds for them.

Maybe they should take some of the bazillions they have and send the guy to the Himalayas – permanently – to get his work done.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: assholes … my heart breaks for the difficulty they have now that the shadows hiding their machinations are occasionally being pierced. Fuckers.

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33. liberalcatnip - 24 March 2009: The case for banning the Israel/Palestine topic from Daily Kos
by dufffbeer
Tue Mar 24, 2009 at 04:59:38 PM MDT

How many places are there on the internet where a Congressman we helped get elected will write a diary and answer questions from regular citizens? Just Daily Kos!
How many places are there on the internet can you get liberal activists across the country excited about a mayoral candidate in a small city somewhere? Only a few. Daily Kos is by far the largest.
How many places are there on the internet where users can argue over the Israel/Palestine conflict? Thousands!
Unfortunately it is becoming more and more apparent that Daily Kos cannot be all of these things. We need to choose.

The Israel/Palestine conflict has generated far too many diaries and comments that offend decent people and embarrass this site and all the good people who have put so much work into it. If the system worked then these comments would get hidden, but too often they are uprated by likeminded users.

How many places are there on the internet where simple-minded kossacks can’t chew gum and walk at the same time? Just Daily Kos!

How many places are there on the internet where AIPAC puppets spout pro-Israel talking points any time the topic comes up? Thousands! Daily Kos is by far the largest!

***

This is too easy…

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BooHooHooMan - 24 March 2009: What is this? The fuckin Catskills? LOL.

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34. Intermittent Bystander - 24 March 2009: So the ExecuPretzel is nabbing the airwaves tonight, eh?

Not sure I have the fortitude to watch national government talking macroeconomics right now . . . Hard enough to refrain from ill-advised eyewitness reporting on the microclimates abounding . . . but I’ll look forward to reading all about it, just the same.

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35. marisacat - 24 March 2009: Not to be too rude but they are handling the teleprompter(s) differently… not flanked by a pair. Staring out, at the little people … out there in the dark.

Go for it!

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BooHooHooMan - 24 March 2009: Word is – they have him in a humane Plexiglass Box.

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marisacat - 24 March 2009: Reply
36. marisacat - 24 March 2009: whoops! Tapper… Middle class tax cut? Hide and seek…

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37. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: “Gail, Please! Stick your hand in it!”

The petite Eskimo-Chugach woman gave me that you-dumb-ass-white-boy look.

“Gail, Gail. STICK YOUR DAMN HAND IN IT!”

She stuck it in, under the gravel of the beach at Sleepy Bay, her village’s fishing ground. Gail’s hand came up dripping with black, sickening goo. It could make you vomit. Oil from the Exxon Valdez.

It was already two years after the spill and Exxon had crowed that Mother Nature had happily cleaned up their stinking oil mess for them. It was a lie. But the media wouldn’t question the bald-faced bullshit. And who the hell was going to investigate Exxon’s claim way out in some godforsaken Native village in the Prince William Sound?

So I convinced the Natives to fly the lazy-ass reporters out to Sleepy Bay on rented float planes to see the oil that Exxon said wasn’t there.

The reporters looked, but didn’t see it, because it was three inches under their feet, under the shingle rock of the icy beach. Gail pulled out her hand and now the whole place smelled like a gas station. The network crews wanted to puke.

And now, with their eyes open, they saw the oil, the vile feces- colored smear across the glaciated ridge faces, the poisonous “bathtub ring” that ran for miles and miles at the high tide level. And it’s still there. Less for sure. But twenty years later, IT’S STILL THERE, GODDAMNIT. And I want YOU, dear reader, to stick your hand in it. I want YOU, President Obama, to stick your hand in it before you blithely fulfill your Palin-esque campaign promise for a little more offshore drilling.

Tuesday marks the 20th Anniversary of the Exxon Valdez grounding and the smearing of 1,200 miles of Alaska’s coastline with its oil.

It also marks the 20th Anniversary of a lie. Lots of lies: catalogued in a four-volume investigation of the disaster; four volumes you’ll never see. I wrote that report, with my team of investigators working with the Natives preparing fraud and racketeering charges against Exxon. You’ll never see the report because Exxon lawyers threatened the Natives, “Mention the f-word [fraud] and you’ll never get a dime” of compensation to clean up the villages. The Natives agreed to drop the fraud charge – and Exxon stiffed them on the money. You’re surprised, right?

Doubtless, for the 20th Anniversary of the Great Spill, the media will schlep out that old story that the tanker ran aground because its captain was drunk at the wheel. Bullshit. Yes, the captain was “three sheets to the wind” – but sleeping it off below-decks. The ship was in the hands of the third mate who was driving blind. That is, the Exxon Valdez’ Raycas radar system was turned off; turned off because it was busted and had been busted since its maiden voyage. Exxon didn’t want to spend the cash to fix it. So the man at the helm, electronically blindfolded, drove it up onto the reef.

So why the story of the drunken skipper? Because it lets Exxon off the hook: Calling it a case of “drunk driving” turns the disaster into a case of human error, not corporate penny-pinching.

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liberalcatnip - 24 March 2009: That was enlightening.

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38. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: If you want to be dazzled by the beauty and power of this planet, check out tonight’s NOVA.

Remarkable time-lapse footage by one of the world’s foremost nature photographers reveals massive glaciers and ice sheets splitting apart, collapsing, and disappearing at a rate that has more and more scientists alarmed. This NOVA-National Geographic Television special investigates the latest evidence of a radically warming planet.

“Extreme Ice” follows National Geographic-funded photojournalist James Balog to some of the most dangerous places on Earth as he documents the disappearance of an icy landscape that took thousands of years to form. An artist, scientist, explorer, and former mountain guide, Balog braved treacherous terrain to site his cameras in ideal locations to record the unfolding frozen drama. (Watch an audio slide show with Balog’s narration and striking images.)

The program charts the progress of Balog’s Extreme Ice Survey (EIS), the largest photographic study ever attempted of the cryosphere, the mantle of ice that covers large portions of the Earth and that plays a critical role in weather. The effort involves deploying 26 time-lapse cameras in alpine and arctic locations across the Northern Hemisphere and programming them to shoot a frame every daylight hour for three years.

As the program shows, the resulting time-lapse movies give breathtaking evidence of geology in action. Ominously, the proverbial glacial pace of large masses of ice is no longer as slow as it once was, due to the warming of the planet that is accelerating the break-up of these titanic structures, including the separation of a Rhode Island-sized piece of the Antarctic ice sheet in 2002. Scientists are overwhelmingly convinced that the temperature increase is tied to the rise in greenhouse-gas emissions caused by burning fossil fuels.

A NOVA-Nat Geo film crew accompanies Balog to EIS locations around the world. In Alaska, Balog records the rapid retreat of the Columbia Glacier, one of the largest ocean-feeding glaciers in North America (see photo at right). Amazingly, the calving of such glaciers is so frequent that wetsuit-clad surfers sometimes paddle nearby, waiting for an avalanche of ice to generate massive waves for a wild ride. Later, in Iceland, Balog photographs exquisitely sculpted icebergs on the beach, the last stop in their natural journey from the interior out to sea.

Most dramatically of all, in Greenland the award-winning photographer explores a landscape as magnificent as the canyon country of Utah—except carved in solid ice. Lowering himself by rope into a giant hole in the ice sheet bored out by a torrent of meltwater, Balog finds himself in a world of surpassing beauty, scientific mystery, and maximum peril.

Awesome, beautiful and very, very scary. Forget the dithering and machinations of the pathetic munchkins in DC …

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39. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: Democratic North Dakota Senator Byron Dorgan Saw Into The Future, It Was Dark, We Didn’t Listen

“‘I think we will look back in 10 years’ time and say we should not have done this but we did because we forgot the lessons of the past, and that that which is true in the 1930′s is true in 2010,” said Senator Byron L. Dorgan, Democrat of North Dakota. “‘I wasn’t around during the 1930′s or the debate over Glass-Steagall. But I was here in the early 1980′s when it was decided to allow the expansion of savings and loans. We have now decided in the name of modernization to forget the lessons of the past, of safety and of soundness.’”

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marisacat - 24 March 2009: He was also around for the NAFTA sell…. and the Dems managed to just about fully censor coverage of his book on trade. He finally got a book interview on Cspan and a half hour on Charlie Rose. But it took over a year, Reid practically soldered steel wire around the book. Or a steel straight jacket. It was almost completely not reviewed, across the whole of the country.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: I’m kinda amazed he keeps trying. How do you sit in a room with that fucking hack Reid and not punch him?

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marisacat - 24 March 2009: I saw a clip of Reid today, on the floor of the senate at the litte Dem party lectern. He’s been bad, done bad, is bad…

…this was worse.

He was reading some lame lines, haltingly, in almost a whisper and not looking up. Childlike frail hands, sunken pit cheeks.

I say call the undertaker. Call it over.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: there ARE plenty of stairs in that building …

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40. marisacat - 24 March 2009: Obama will save the children.

geesh.

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Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: gotta keep them in shape until you can strap them to a machine, rifle or cubicle. They is our future etc.

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41. BooHooHooMan - 24 March 2009: LOL. Markos Moulitsas is really such the little cocktail weenie:
Remember What?? — Two Weeks Ago??
Him gerbling himself silly????

PA-Sen: It’s just about time for Arlen to switch
by kos
Tue Mar 10, 2009 at 10:10:04 AM PDT.

I’ve now heard from multiple sources that the AFL-CIO and other labor unions have promised to stand firmly with Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter if he becomes a rare crossover Republican vote on EFCA….
::
Rather than criticize a marker which seems short-sighted to me, I’ll accept it as a political reality……
::
The pieces are really falling in place for Specter to make the leap and switch parties.

.
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Spector Will Vote No on the Employee Free Choice Act.

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42. marisacat - 24 March 2009: Ob almost put me to sleep.

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liberalcatnip - 24 March 2009: Most.boring.press.conference.evah.

He now has more exposure than Janet Jackson’s nipple.

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43. liberalcatnip - 24 March 2009: The WH is hosting an online town hall. You can submit questions about the economy that’ll supposedly be answered on Thursday. WH link.

Have at it guys. *mischievous look*

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44. liberalcatnip - 24 March 2009: Non-profit status for newspapers? How bizarre.

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45. liberalcatnip - 24 March 2009: Here’s my headline for tonite:

What if your military was engaged in 2 wars and not one reporter asked you a question about it?

There still is a very odd disconnect between “the economy” and MIC spending – so much so that it isn’t even in the mix as an issue.

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marisacat - 24 March 2009: yeah just finishing up a post on The Wars….

so forgotten. Don’t bleed over here, basically… keep it over there.. over there…

… and so on

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46. Madman in the Marketplace - 24 March 2009: True to form

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47. BooHooHooMan - 24 March 2009: The biggest problem we have long term are Medicare and Medicaid. – President Barack Obama – March 24, 2009

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48. marisacat - 24 March 2009: gnu post

LINK

…………. ……………

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