Where's the Outrage?

I wasn’t a fan of Ted Stevens, but I think that he did a great job representing the State of Alaska. He was a huge force in the Senate for several decades. I find the news of his death very sad. My heart goes out to the loved ones of Senator Stevens and family members of the others killed in the plane crash.

From TPM:

Former Sen. Ted Stevens (R-AK) passed away as a result of a plane crash last night outside of Dillingham, Alaska. He was 86 years old. He leaves behind a wife, Catherine; five children from his first marriage to Ann — Ben, a former state Senator, Susan, Beth, Walter, Ted Jr.; and Lily, his daughter with Catherine.

Stevens was the longest-serving Republican member of the United States Senate in its history, having first won election to it in 1968.

[TPM SLIDESHOW: The Senator From Alaska: Ted Stevens' Political Career]

According to a profile in the Anchorage Daily News, Stevens began his political career volunteering for Eisenhower’s Presidential campaign in 1952 while working at a DC-based law firm: he left to take a job he was offered at the Interior Department which then failed to materialize. He accepted a job offer with an Alaskan law firm instead, driving to Fairbanks in February 1953. Stevens got the job offer from Charles Clasby because Stevens was the D.C.-based lawyer of Clasby’s client, coal miner Emil Usibelli.

Stevens spent only 6 months working for Clasby before he was offered the job of U.S. Attorney for the Alaska Territory, and the Senate confirmed him in 1954. Stevens built a reputation as a pugnacious prosecutor, though he denied reports that he regularly accompanied the U.S. Marshalls on raids packing heat, telling the Anchorage Daily News in 1994:

He remembers only one such incident. It was in Big Delta, about 75 miles southwest of Fairbanks. “We decided we’d take a combined force down there because of information we’d received about a lot of different violations of federal and territorial law. There was a prostitution ring, and drugs and violations of liquor laws.”They wanted to make sure everything was done right, that the evidence would be admissible, the arrests would be legal, so they asked me if I wanted to go along. I said, yeah. “So one of them suggested I ought to take a gun,” he said. “So he checked me out a gun. It was a holster with a gun. It wasn’t two guns. I never had two guns. I never walked around town with it. “But someone did see it,” he said. “Someone saw us coming back in or going out of the federal building that day and said, ‘Jesus Christ, there’s the damn district attorney carrying a gun.’ ” The report spread “up and down Fourth Avenue in every bar.” (more…)

Tags: Senate by ecthompson
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I found this on Morningstar.com. I thought that it was worth commenting on.

 

 5 Big Econ - July 2010: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

I’d like to take a few moments and go over these five big statements of the week.

• Let’s start with this report from Moody’s.com. This report attempts to analyze the unprecedented steps that were taken both by the Federal Reserve, Congress and the Bush/Obama administrations in order to stabilize the economy. They use a modeling technique in order to stimulate the economy. They estimate that 8.5 million jobs have been saved. They also estimate that the Gross Domestic Product would be approximately 11.5% lower without the intervention. Wow! Basically, they’re saying that government intervention worked to avoid the Great Depression 2.0. Now, I know that this will not be the last word on this. I find this paper very fascinating. For those who are interested in the economy, please read the whole paper.
• Just as in the United States, Europe has performed their stress tests on their financial institutions and found that the vast majority of their financial institutions are fiscally sound. From a political standpoint, what else could they have found? Just for a moment, imagine that the European Union announced that the majority of their banks were unable to stand a significant stress. The panic that would ensue would cause distress and the banks will collapse. The purpose of the stress test is to calm the fears of investors.
• There should be no surprise to anybody that the housing market remains depressed. In my opinion, the housing market has overbuilt and will take several years to alleviate that oversupply. In the meantime, there will not be much building. As I mentioned earlier, the economy has to find another fuel to drive economic engine. The housing sector just can’t do it anymore. This is why I have been pushing green energy.
• The Democrats are unable to push through comprehensive climate change legislation. There’s almost no Republican support. The conservative Democrats have too much to lose by supporting such legislation. In my opinion, Democrats need to split up this legislation into small pieces. Small portions can pass.
• British Petroleum has put Tony Hayward up on the shelf. They haven’t really fired him. With the amount of money he is getting, it’s hard to say that he’s really been demoted. He has just been removed from public view. To be honest, Tony Hayward is not the problem. The problem is a sense of entitlement that many of these executives have. The chairman of BP had the nerve to say that they look out for the “little people.” Really? Instead of feeling lucky or deep sense of humility for running a multibillion dollar corporation and taking home a multimillion dollar salary, they seem put out and upset that one of their wells has contaminated the Gulf of Mexico. It is not the person, but the culture that is the problem.

Tags: Bush Administration, Economy, Obama administration, Senate by ecthompson
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I never knew that Thurgood Marshall was an activist judge. Foolishly, I thought he was somebody to be admired and even emulated. It is clear that in 1954, when he argued Brown versus the Board of Education he did not share the mainstream view that separate could be equal. It took Senator Jeff Sessions (Republican — Alabama) to point out the craziness that was Thurgood Marshall.

Dana Milbank noted: Sen. Jeff Sessions (Ala.), the ranking Republican on the panel, branded Marshall a “well-known activist.” Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) said Marshall’s legal view “does not comport with the proper role of a judge or judicial method.” Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) pronounced Marshall “a judicial activist” with a “judicial philosophy that concerns me.”

From TPM:

Looks like Senate Judiciary Republicans have at least one unified talking point today: Justice Thurgood Marshall, the first African-American to ever serve on the Supreme Court, was an “activist judge.” As Elena Kagan kept on her listening face, multiple senators slammed both Marshall’s judicial philosophy and her service as his clerk in the late 1980s.

Ranking member Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) criticized Kagan for having “associated herself with well-known activist judges who have used their power to redefine the meaning of our constitution and have the result of advancing that judge’s preferred social policies,” citing Marshall as his son, Thurgood Marshall Jr., sat in the audience of the Judiciary Committee hearings.

In an example of how much the GOP focused on Marshall, his name came up 35 times. President Obama’s name was mentioned just 14 times today.

Thankfully, the Democrats had a thoughtful response. From TP:

These attacks on Justice Marshall sparked what was easily the most eloquent moment of the hearing, Sen. Dick Durbin (D-IL) reminding Senate Republicans exactly who they were going after:

On at least three or four occasions I have been disappointed by my Republican colleagues warning us that you just might follow in the tradition of Justice Thurgood Marshall. . . . Let me say for the record, America is a better nation because of the tenacity, integrity and values of Thurgood Marshall. Some may dismiss Justice Marshall’s pioneering work on civil rights as an example of “empathy”—that somehow as a black man that had been a victim of discrimination, his feelings became part of his passionate life’s work—and I say “thank God.” The results which Justice Marshall dedicated his life to broke down barriers of racial discrimination that had haunted America for generations. . . . And I might also add that his most famous case, Brown v. Board of Education—if that is an activist mind at work, we should be grateful as a nation that he argued before the Supreme Court, based on discrimination in this society and changed America for the better.

Senator Tom Coburn of Oklahoma was happy to let us know that we had more freedom 30 years ago that we have today.

From TP:

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) then responded to Coburn by pointing out that Coburn’s idea of a more “free” society was when women had fewer rights:

KLOBUCHAR: I was really interested and listening to Senator Coburn. … He was actually asking you, just now, back 30 years ago if you thought that we were more free. … But I was thinking back 30 years ago, was 1980. … And then I was thinking, were we really more free, if you were a woman in 1980? Do you know, solicitor general, how many women were on the U.S. Supreme Court in 1980?

KAGAN: I guess zero.

KLOBUCHAR: That would be correct. There were no women on the Supreme Court. Do you know how many women were sitting up here 30 years ago in 1980?

KAGAN: It was very striking when Senator Feinstein said she was one of two women. I thought, how amazing. So, how many?

KLOBUCHAR: There were no women on the Judiciary Committee until after the Anita Hill hearings in 1991. Do you know how many women were in the United States Senate in 1980, 30 years ago?

KAGAN: I’m stumped again.

KLOBUCHAR: No women were in the United States Senate. There had been women in the senate before, and then in 1981, Senator Kassebaum joined the Senate. So, as I think about that question about if people were more free in 1980, I think it’s all in the eyes of the beholder.

(Klobuchar corrected herself later to note that Kassebaum was already serving in the Senate at the time, having been sworn in in 1978.)

Tags: Legal, Senate by ecthompson
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Senator Robert Byrd is dead at age 92.

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From WaPo:

Robert C. Byrd, 92, a conservative West Virginia Democrat who became the longest-serving member of Congress in history and used his masterful knowledge of the institution to shape the federal budget, protect the procedural rules of the Senate and, above all else, tend to the interests of his state, died at 3 a.m. Monday at Inova Fairfax Hospital, his office said.

Mr. Byrd had been hospitalized last week with what was thought to be heat exhaustion, but more serious issues were discovered, aides said Sunday. No formal cause of death was given.

Starting in 1958, Mr. Byrd was elected to the Senate an unprecedented nine times. He wrote a four-volume history of the body, was majority leader twice and chaired the powerful Appropriations Committee, controlling the nation’s purse strings, and yet the positions of influence he held did not convey the astonishing arc of his life.

A child of the West Virginia coal fields, Mr. Byrd rose from the grinding poverty that has plagued his state since before the Great Depression, overcame an early and ugly association with the Ku Klux Klan, worked his way through night school and by force of will, determination and iron discipline made himself a person of authority and influence in Washington. (more…)

Chris Matthews who I think is over-the-top most of the time had an interesting tribute to Senator Robert Byrd. Take a look:

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Tags: Congress, Hardball, Senate by ecthompson
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You remember what happened, don’t you? Everything started to unravel late in 2007. The first one who was found without a chair when the music stopped was Countrywide. Bank of America was able to buy Countrywide for $4 billion (a stock swap) in early 2008. Just a year earlier Countrywide was worth over $50 billion. Countrywide’s founder and CEO Angelo Mozilo (Time wrote that he was one of the top 25 people to blame for the financial crisis) was once the darling of Wall Street. He ended up being charged by the SEC for taking more than $139 million in profits. It was Countrywide who first introduced us, the American people, to credit default swaps and CDOs. In a wonderful bit of irony, IndyMac was founded in 1985 by David Loeb and Angelo Mozilo as a means to collateralize Countrywide Financial loans that were too big to be sold to Freddie Mac or Fannie Mae. In 1997, IndyMac (Independent National Mortgage Corporation) was spun off as a separate company. I mention all this about Countrywide because we’re going to see this exact same cycle again with IndyMac. IndyMac, Washington Mutual and Countrywide were birds of a feather. Each company pushed subprime mortgages. Each company pushed adjustable-rate mortgages. Each company packaged the mortgages into securities which could be sold to Wall Street.

Case: 80-year-old retiree in Savannah, Georgia, loan in 2005 to build a modular house. The mortgage was approved by IndyMac. They approve the application based on the applicant’s Social Security income, which was written down as $3825 per month. The only problem is the maximum social security benefit is less than half this amount.

In late June of 2008, Senator Chuck Schumer released a letter which was volatile to say the least. Unfortunately, I’ve been unable to find the original letter on the Internet. I have been able to find portions of the letter quoted in several articles. (If someone is able to find the letter please send me the link.) In a statement the senator mentioned that he was “concerned that IndyMac’s financial deterioration poses a significant risk to both taxpayers and borrowers.” He went on to say that IndyMac “could face a failure if prescriptive measures are not taken quickly.”

Let’s back up and look at what the Los Angeles Times wrote in January of 2008. (This was six months before Schumer opened his yap.) This particular article looked at adjustable-rate mortgages. The author noted that adjustable-rate mortgages were usually given to small business owners, self-employed professionals and salespeople with consultative finances and fluctuating earnings. The article notes that adjustable-rate mortgages were given out by Countywide and IndyMac to people who previously would not qualify. Adjustable-rate mortgages usually have a “teaser rate” for around two or three years. So loans written in 2005 and 2006 were now resetting at their higher interest rate in 2008. The article noted delinquency rates in some parts of California of 13-15%. (One particularly egregious variation of adjustable-rate mortgages for something called an option adjustable-rate mortgage. This mortgage gave the homeowner three choices at the end of every month — pay principal plus interest, pay interest only or pay less than interest-only and allow the principle to increase.) So, in January, the Los Angeles Times called out Countrywide, which had just been bought by Bank of America, and IndyMac by name.

IndyMac Stock Price

A report that was published by the Department of Treasury after IndyMac’s implosion shows us the magnitude of the problem. According to this report, by May 2005, officials at IndyMac were aware of problems with their adjustable-rate mortgages. This market completely collapsed in 2007. The bank could no longer sell its mortgage securities because there were no buyers. By May 2008, over 12% of these loans were greater than 90 days in delinquency. Another reason for IndyMac’s failure lies in its lack of deposits. The bank did not have many retail branches. Therefore there were many customers opening up savings accounts and checking accounts. IndyMac had to rely on Federal Home Loan Banks and brokered deposits for funds. Basically, as I understand it, this is simply another way to borrow money. At one point in 2006, IndyMac had over $9 billion in these loans. Finally, every bank is supposed to have a certain amount of cash on hand to balance out possible loan losses. In early 2008, IndyMac hired an outside accounting firm and the firm showed that IndyMac did not have enough cash on hand. As if this wasn’t bad enough, Standard & Poor’s and Moody’s decided in April 2008 to re-rate the number of mortgage-backed securities (before this time they simply rubberstamped many of the securities that were brought to them by J.P. Morgan and Goldman Sachs). This included over $160 million in mortgage-backed securities that Indy Mac was holding, thus lowering IndyMac’s capital ratio (when it rains it pours). Around the same time, IndyMac announced its third consecutive quarterly loss (see graph).

I think it’s been pretty much established that the Office of Thrift Supervision ignored warning signs. Had they acted in a timely manner, the implosion could have been prevented. There is one little side note that I thought was interesting. The Office of Thrift Supervision allowed Indy Mac to accept an $18 million deposit from its holding corp. and backdate that deposit in order to help balance its books. This transaction happened on May 9, 2008. On May 6, 2008 the FDIC told the Office of Thrift Supervision that Indy Mac was “close to failing and needed new money quickly.” (Some at OTS were forced to resign because of IndyMac.)

So, I think that after further investigation it is clear that IndyMac was going to fail with or without Chuck Schumer’s help. Did Senator Chuck Schumer drive the final stake through the heart of a dying Rasputin who already been shot, poisoned and burned? Yes, I think that’s a fairly accurate metaphor. On the other hand, I have clearly shown that IndyMac was dying. Federal regulators were going to have to step in soon. In hindsight, they should’ve stepped in sooner. IndyMac was going to die with a without Chuck Schumer’s help. Their business model simply could not stand the catastrophic failure of the subprime mortgage market.

Tags: Business, Economy, Senate by ecthompson
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As a trauma surgeon, I find Monday to be a relief. By Monday afternoon, you have an opportunity to look around and see how bad the weekend truly was. So, unlike most Americans, I like Mondays.

• 15 years ago, I was working at LSU Medical Center in Shreveport. The bombing of the Murrah Federal Building in Oklahoma City, in which 168 people lost their lives, continues to be shocking. I remember wanting to help, but not knowing exactly what to do.

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• I’ve been working on a small research project. One of my readers challenged my assumption that Senator Charles Schumer did not cause the failure of IndyMac. I contend that there was a run on the bank but that the bank was failing long before that run started. I should have a post ready by tomorrow at this time.
• One of the reasons that I did not believe that IndyMac was solvent had to do with the fact that they were handing out these loans like free candy. Something just smelled rotten. And it’s not just with this particular institution. The more you read about the financial industry in the mid-2000s, the more you get this foul stench. Look at Countrywide. Look at AIG. Look at Bear Stearns. Now look at what we’re learning about Goldman Sachs. Several people have pointed out that there was a extremely cozy relationship between the rating agencies (Moody’s and Standard & Poor’s) and some of the big financial institutions like Goldman Sachs. The Senate is investigating. The California Attorney General has been looking into this for a year or so. He held a press conference today announcing that he was going to court to force Moody’s to comply with a subpoena. The SEC, which seems to have been dormant for over a decade, has now been awakened. They charged Goldman with fraud. This is starting to get good.
• BTW, leading economic indicators seem to be heading in the right direction.
• It appears that Europe will be flying again, starting tomorrow.

• Interesting accounting practices seem to be popping up. It appears that in 2008 Lehman Brothers may have been cooking the books.
• I guess Representative Darrell Issa never heard about living in glass houses.
• A top Al Qaeda leader in Iraq has been killed. Yet again, top American official in Iraq stated this could’ve been a potentially “significant blow” to the insurgents. Where we heard that before? Where’s Bin Laden?
• There appears to be a huge scandal brewing in India that involves cricket and politics.

Tags: Al Qaeda, Bin Laden, Economy, Iraq, Rachel Maddow Show, Senate, Sports by ecthompson
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The Senate opens hearings today into the failure of Washington Mutual. Washington Mutual was among a group of banks that jumped into the subprime mortgage sector headfirst. Jumping into anything headfirst is not usually a good idea until you know how deep the pool truly is. It is estimated that over $700 billion of these subprime mortgages were handed out between 2004 and 2007. These were those famous adjustable-rate mortgages. Washington Mutual handed out over $133 billion in these adjustable mortgages. The former CEO Kerry Killinger stated that WaMu wasn’t being treated fairly by the government. He whined that WaMu “should have been given a chance to work its way through the crisis.” What I want to know is whether anyone in that hearing run over to Mr. Killinger and cry tears of sadness for this millionaire.

When people are given the wrong incentives, we shouldn’t be surprised when they do the wrong thing. Specifically, loan originating officers were given incentives to generate loans. It really didn’t matter what kind of loan. It didn’t matter whether the loan was fraudulent or legitimate. During Washington Mutual’s own internal investigation back in 2005, they found the two offices in California where over 50% of their loans were fraudulent. (At one location was over 80%.) Yet, the practice continued. Why? The money was too good. (Oh, I forgot to mention that their own risk officers were excluded from important meetings. This means that either these risk guys are lying to protect their butts or WaMu knew what they were doing was fraudulent and they didn’t want to rish telling them.)

In Michael Lewis’s book, The Big Short, he describes an incident where a immigrant farm worker who made no more than $14,000 a year was given a loan for $750,000.

Lower middle class and upper lower class Americans were hit the hardest by these fraudulent practices. They were specifically sought out by these banks. These are Americans that are holding down one or two jobs. Both parents are working. They’re working extremely hard and they are very close to being able to afford a nice house, in a nice neighborhood with good schools. Something always gets in the way of their dream house. These are everyday expenses that they simply cannot afford — car breaks down, they need a new refrigerator, Johnny was hit in the head with a baseball and needs stitches. So Washington Mutual, IndyMac, Wachovia and others preyed on these Americans.

Here’s my whole problem with these shysters. They made tons of money off of unsuspecting Americans, off of Americans who wanted to believe in the American dream. When the banks collapsed, the Americans were kicked out on the street. Banks who were deemed too big to fail were rewarded for their size and they were allowed to buy the smaller failing banks at fire sale prices. Bankers who lost their jobs were given a little pot of gold on their way out the door. Bankers who kept their jobs were given big fat pay raises for acquiring new assets. Real, honest-to-goodness, hardworking Americans who believed that they would never be given a mortgage they didn’t qualify for were asked to bend over (and kicked in the seat-of-the-pants repeatedly).

So, I hope that something meaningful will come out of these Senate hearings. I hope this is not just a dog and pony show.

Tags: Corporate Wrongs, Economy, Senate by ecthompson
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Personally, I think it has something to do with older politicians. They just don’t recognize that the field has changed. In the late 1980s and early 1990s you could say one thing on Monday and say a completely different thing on Friday and almost nobody would pay attention. For that matter, once Walter Cronkite stepped down, it seemed like America lost its memory. We can’t remember squat. Politicians took advantage of our collective memory deficit disorder. John McCain was one of those politicians. Now, we have the Internet, blogs and the Rachel Maddow Show.

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How can John McCain say he doesn’t consider himself a maverick? That was his campaign slogan. More correctly, that was his campaign image. This is the same image that he crafted for the 2000 campaign. In spite of the fact that we really can’t find much evidence that McCain bucks the party line, he has run multiple campaigns on the idea that he is an independent voice in the Senate; conservative, yet independent. I guess somebody has come up with some polling which has suggested that his “maverickiness” may be holding him back. Wouldn’t this technically be called a flip-flop? I think I have a new campaign slogan for John McCain — the anti-maverick. I like it.

Tags: Elections, Senate by ecthompson
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Over the next several days I’m going to try and talk about what’s next after healthcare reform.

Rachel Maddow had to take out a full page ad in the Boston Globe to combat rumors that she was running for Senate in Massachusetts. It seems that former model and newly minted Senator Scott Brown thought would be a great idea to say that somebody liberal and famous was gunning for his position. I guess he thought would be a great way to rake in campaign funds. Of course, the other thing he could do would be to shout at the president during a joint session of Congress. That seemed to work for Joe Wilson.

Since I didn’t post a music video last night, I thought that I would post one this morning.

Artist: Al Jarreau
Tune: Morrnin’

From PA:

• Election results in Iraq: “The former interim prime minister, Iyad Allawi, a secular Shiite once derided as an American puppet, galvanized the votes of Sunnis who sat out Iraq’s first national elections and clawed his way back from political obscurity. But his wafer-thin edge of 91 to 89 over his nearest rival, the incumbent prime minister, Nuri Kamal al-Maliki, falls far short of the majority of 163 of the 325 seats in parliament that he needs to form a government.” (Ed. I think that it is interesting that Sunnis are coming back to the table.)
• Uh oh: “A South Korean naval ship sank early Saturday after an explosion tore a hole in its bottom near a disputed sea border with North Korea. The cause of the explosion was not clear, and the Seoul government did not blame North Korea for the incident.”
• Campaign-finance ruling: “A federal appeals court on Friday handed another victory to conservative opponents of campaign-finance restrictions, striking down limits on individual contributions to independent groups who want to use the money for or against candidates in federal elections.”
• Welcome changes to the Home Affordable Modification Program and the Federal Housing Administration program: “The Obama administration announced new ways Friday to tackle the foreclosure crisis, in part by requiring lenders to temporarily slash or eliminate monthly mortgage payments for many borrowers who are unemployed.”
• Senate Republicans did what they do best: they blocked an extension of unemployment benefits.
• House Minority Whip Eric Cantor’s (R-Va.) spokesperson tries to explain why the GOP leader got the story of the magic bullet so very, very wrong this week. [Read more →]

Tags: Elections, Iraq, North Korea, Party Politics, Rachel Maddow Show, Senate by ecthompson
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I first read about the blogger Jon Swift dying from the update below.  Jon, which wasn’t his real name, was one of the first major bloggers to answer one of my e-mails. He put my little blog on his blog roll. He engaged me in conversation. After a while, I was able to engage just about all of the major bloggers except for Jane, Huffington and Digby (they have never answered any of my e-mails). Jon was the rarest of conservatives, he was thoughtful, open, humorous and engaging. I know that the world would be a better place if there were more people like him around.

From Political Animal:

• Iraq: “Three powerful suicide bombings killed at least 33 people and wounded more than 50 Wednesday in the restive Diyala province northeast of Baghdad, authorities said. Most of those killed and wounded were Iraqi police officers charged with securing the province’s capital city ahead of elections Sunday. “
• Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-N.Y.) announced a “leave of absence” from his powerful post as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee today. Whether he’ll ever get his gavel back remains unclear.
• Marriage equality reaches the nation’s capital. Western civilization remains unaffected.
• Matters get slightly worse for New York Gov. David Paterson (D).
• Greece tried to alleviate creditors’ fears today with a new $6.5 billion austerity plan.
• Sen. Jim Bunning (R-Ky.) is blaming Harry Reid for Bunning’s five-day hostage standoff over unemployment benefits.
• On a related note, Kevin Drum explains, “Bunning is a moron.”
• Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-Ariz.), the co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, is threatening to vote with far-right Republicans to kill health care reform. This isn’t the first time Grijalva has talked like this.
• I was very sorry to hear that the blogger known as “Jon Swift” has died.
• Rep. Steve King (R-Iowa) is not above trying to connect his hatred for gays to his opposition to federal wage requirements.
• As part of our ongoing coverage of SUNY Binghamton’s troubling transition to Division I athletics, the school announced this week that its basketball team will not be participating in the America East tournament this year.
• Leave Grant’s picture on the $50 alone.
• And finally, Rod Blagojevich was — in all seriousness — the “guest of honor at a Northwestern University panel on ethics in politics last night.” The disgraced former governor reportedly “elicited laughs from the audience — and not necessarily intentionally.”

Tags: Civil Rights, Economy, House of Representatives, Senate by ecthompson
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If you voted against extending unemployment benefits, should you be forced to present to the American people what your alternative is? If you have no alternative, shouldn’t you be fired from the Senate immediately?

From DK:

Lamar Alexander, John Barasso, Bob Bennett, Jim Bunning, Richard Burr, Tom Coburn, Bob Corker, John Cornyn, Mike Crapo, Jim DeMint, John Ensign, Mike Enzi, Judd Gregg, Orrin Hatch, Mike Johanns, Mitch McConnell, James Risch, Jeff Sessions and John Thune. Those are the guys who decided Tuesday night that Americans limping along on meager unemployment benefits apparently are, in the word chosen by Nevada Rep. Dean Heller, “hobos.” They all voted against extending those benefits.

If you’re drawing such benefits in Tennessee, Kentucky, Wyoming, Utah or Idaho, you have both of your Senators to thank for telling you to get off the dole and get a job ya lazy bum. Yep. Who would want to work instead of enjoying all that these magnificent government checks will buy? It’s such a cush life on the $275 weekly maximum you can draw from unemployment coffers if you live in Tennessee, where the jobless rate is 10.9%. If it’s you, your spouse and a couple of kids in the family, those benefits will put you $8,000 below the federal poverty line.

That is, if you were lucky enough before being laid off to work in a job covered by unemployment insurance in the first place. Only 38% of out-of-work Americans have that option. But whether you’re covered by benefits or are one of the less fortunate 62%, the above 19 members of the Party of No Way, No How have a couple of words for you: Tough shit. Like Jim Bunning riding the Senators-only elevator, they all just keep giving out-of-work Americans the finger. Those exact same 19 Senators plus 19 of their Republican colleagues also voted against the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act a year ago. And most of them were on board to oppose the teensy job-creation bill that passed the Senate last month.

Tags: Economy, Senate by ecthompson
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I find the caution on the part of the Democrats to be sad and the hypocrisy on the part of the Republicans par for the course.

From TPM:

Republicans are doing everything they can to convince the media and the public that using the budget reconciliation process to finish health care would be a grave crime against democracy.

But reconciliation is part of the Senate rules. And there’s perhaps no better person to make that point than Sen. Judd Gregg (R-NH)–the Senate Republicans’ top budget guy–who vociferously defended the use of reconciliation when his party tried to use it in 2005 to allow drilling in Alaska.

“The representation by the Senator from Massachusetts that somehow that this is outside the rules–to proceed within the rules–is a very unique view of the rules,” Gregg said on the Senate floor back when he was part of the majority. “We are using the rules of the Senate here, that’s what they are senator. Reconciliation is a rule of the Senate set up under the Budget Act. It has been used before for purposes exactly like this on numerous occasions.”

Gregg went on, “Is there something wrong with majority rules? I don’t think so.”

Unsurprisingly, Gregg feels differently about things these days. Last year he compared the majority-rules vote to “running over the minority, putting them in cement and throwing them in the Chicago River.”

Republicans have also advanced the meme that reconciliation amounts to the “nuclear option”–a term that came to fame when Republicans tried to change the Senate rules regarding the minority’s right to obstruct judicial nominations. But the “nuclear option” was a threat to change the rules. As Gregg pointed out very publicly, reconciliation is already part of the rules.

Tags: Obama administration, Party Politics, Senate by ecthompson
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I guess that there are no “moderate” Republicans left. I guess when you are 100% wrong about something you should just make up more shit stuff.

From Political Animal:

We’re supposed to be able to expect a certain degree of rationality from “moderates” like Sen. Susan Collins (R) of Maine. When truly unhinged senators like DeMint and Inhofe make incoherent, blatantly false remarks, no one bats an eye. When Collins does it, reasonable people start wondering if Republicans will ever be able to recover from their current condition.

On Saturday, Collins delivered the official GOP weekly address, and blasted the Obama administration’s handling of the Abdulmutallab case. She claimed, in prepared text, that officials only questioned the attempted terrorist for 50 minutes before he was read his rights and “he stopped talking.” She proceeded to use some absurd, Giuliani-like rhetoric, as if she were just another Republican hack.

We’ve since learned that Collins was completely, demonstrably, unambiguously wrong. The administration handled the matter exactly as Bush/Cheney did, but unlike Bush/Cheney, Obama’s team actually got results. Thanks to this administration’s strategy, the attempted terrorist didn’t “stop talking,” but rather has been “cooperating for days” with U.S. officials. Abdulmutallab has in fact produced valuable, actionable intelligence.

OK, so Collins was wrong. We all make mistakes. She can show some contrition, express her relief that Obama’s approach is helping improve our national security, and we can all move on. Collins’s reputation would be a little worse for wear, but it can recover.

But, no. Collins refuses to back down — even though we know she was completely wrong — and keeps digging herself deeper. Asked to explain the discrepancy between her claims and reality, Collins issued a statement to MSNBC:

“I remain concerned that there was no consultation with intelligence officials before the Department of Justice unilaterally decided to treat Abdulmutallab as if he were an ordinary criminal. If Abdulmutallab is now talking in the context of plea negotiations, that is, of course, welcome, but it implies that the government is willing to grant him a measure of leniency for the information he is willing to provide. We will never know whether the quality and quantity of information might have been superior had he not been given a lawyer who is now guiding him on what to reveal and what not to disclose. The lack of coordination on the front end and the inexplicable, reflexive choice to use a law enforcement approach were dangerous decisions.”

Sigh.

Is Abdulmutallab “now talking in the context of plea negotiations” as Collins suggests? No, she just made that up, and the Justice Department has offered him nothing in exchange for information.

Did we lose valuable “information” by reading the attempted terrorist his rights? No. The FBI interrogated Abdulmutallab, then read him his rights, and then got lots of additional information.

Collins is now clinging to the notion that there “was no consultation with intelligence officials,” but what she may not realize is that the FBI is actually pretty good at this, and there was no reason for the Justice Department to “consult” with other agencies. [Update: Also note, Collins has her facts wrong on this, too.]

Honestly, Collins is coming across as a rookie, right-wing House member, more interested in getting on Fox News than seeming credible. Josh Marshall concluded today that Collins has ended up looking like “an embarrassment.”

Tags: Party Politics, Senate, Terrorism by ecthompson
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I have problem with these rich people stoking their campaigns with their own money. It makes me sick. It is an unfair advantage over “regular” folk. Bloomberg did it. Hillary did it. Now, Carly is doing it. This isn’t right.

From TPM:

Carly Fiorina’s $2.5 million loan to her U.S. Senate campaign has given the former Hewlett-Packard CEO a considerable financial edge over her Republican rivals.

In all, Fiorina’s campaign had $2.75 million in the bank to begin the year, according to a federal disclosure report delivered Friday. She is one of three Republicans vying for the right to challenge California Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, who is seeking a fourth term. (more…)

Tags: Elections, Senate by ecthompson
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Republicans continue to floor me.

From C&L:

Mitch McConnell is asked why seven of the Republicans who co-sponsored the Conrad-Gregg fiscal commission turned around and voted against it. McConnell says he now wants a spending reduction commission because heaven forbid we can’t have them considering any tax hikes for the rich. Leave it to Republicans to take a bad idea and make it worse.

KING: Well, let’s talk about your side of the equation. Robert Gibbs just complained about it and the president mentioned it in his Saturday radio address. He says there was a proposal. It was sponsored by one Democrat and one Republican. It would create a commission that would spend a few months studying how can we cut federal spending, maybe even propose tax increases; find some way to reduce the federal budget deficit. Now, it then failed last week on a vote in the Senate. And here’s the president’s complaint.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

OBAMA: This past week, 53 Democrats and Republicans voted for this commission in the Senate, but it failed when seven Republicans who had cosponsored this idea in the first place suddenly decided to vote against it.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KING: Now, we want to show on our screen the seven Republicans who were cosponsors but then withdrew their cosponsorship and voted against it: the Republican Sam Brownback of Kansas, Mike Crapo of Idaho, John Ensign of Nevada, Kay Bailey Hutchison of Texas, James Inhofe of Oklahoma, John McCain of Arizona, Robert Bennett of Utah.

If this was such a good idea that they would cosponsor it — this is what comes up, Senator McConnell, in my travels all the time. People say, why do they always just play politics in Washington? Is this just politics, as the president says, or if it was the same proposal six months ago when they cosponsored it, what was wrong with it last week when a Democratic president wanted it?

MCCONNELL: Well, what was wrong with it last year? I mean, I discussed this very issue with the president right after he came to office, and with his chief of staff, never could get a commitment out of him.

In the meantime, we’ve seen a year, now, in which we’ve been on a spending binge. They passed a budget that doubled the national debt in five years and tripled it in 10.

There’s a lot of skepticism now about whether — and the president endorses this commission a couple of days before the vote. Where was he a year ago when we were talking to him about it?

KING: But why should that…

(CROSSTALK)

KING: Why should that matter? Why should that matter?

(CROSSTALK)

KING: Because I want to go back to your point. I’m sorry for interrupting. I want to go back to your point.

Why should that matter? Yes, the president endorsed it because of political pressure, without a doubt. Democratic senators went to the White House and said, we will not vote to increase the debt ceiling unless you help us out here.

But if it was a good idea, why should — let’s say the president’s playing politics. But if it’s a good idea, why not vote for it? Because you were here several months ago and you said it was a great idea. [Read more →]

Tags: Budget, Party Politics, Senate by ecthompson
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From TP:

One question bouncing around news outlets today is what Senate Banking Committee Chairman Chris Dodd’s (D-CT) retirement means for the regulatory reform effort. Does it make him more or less likely to compromise on key parts of the bill, including the Consumer Financial Protection Agency (CFPA)?

It’s hard to discern whether Dodd’s retirement will lead him to give in on a host of issues (as one “gleeful” financial services lobbyist told Politico it would) or compel him to put “it all on the line to get what he wants, bipartisanship be damned.”

But one thing is for certain: Dodd’s retirement means that the regulatory reform effort needs to wrap up this year, as Dodd’s likliest successor as chairman is Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD), a very bank-friendly Democrat who would almost certainly produce a worse product. And this point hasn’t escaped Republicans, as the Wall Street Journal pointed out:

At the same time, [Dodd's] decision gives Republicans the incentive to draw out the process until after next year’s elections when a more business-friendly Democrat could ascend to the banking panel’s chairmanship. Next in line on the committee is Sen. Tim Johnson (D., S.D.), generally seen as more receptive to industry concerns.

According to Roll Call, “Senate Democrats said that no palace intrigue is expected to take place with the Banking panel” and that Johnson will take the gavel. So Republicans and the financial industry have ample motivation to gum up the works until Dodd is all the way out.

This same concern arose when it looked like Dodd might take the helm of the Senate HELP committee following the death of Sen. Ted Kennedy. Back then, Tim Fernholz wrote that “it would be bad news for regulatory reform if Johnson took over the [banking] committee; he’s received nearly a million dollars from the financial industry in the last 20 years.”

Johnson was the only Senate Democrat to vote against a credit card reform bill last year, and the banking industry has focused on him as one of the Democrats most likely to torpedo the CFPA. “No one is pro-industry today but he’s been historically very receptive,” said a top financial services lobbyist of Johnson. “He’s been sensitive to the impact of legislation on the financial service industry given the large number of jobs he represents.”

Even if Dodd gets a regulatory reform bill passed, as the investment research firm Concept Capital pointed out, Johnson’s chairmanship would likely result in other efforts to rein in banks going by the wayside. “His elevation to chairman should put to restworries over interchange and interest rate caps,” the firm wrote.

There is one note of good news amidst all this, however: Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal will be running for Dodd’s seat, and he has been a strong advocate for consumer financial protection.

Tags: Economy, Party Politics, Senate by ecthompson
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I have complained about Harry Reid on a number of occasions. I think that he has been lead-footed on important issues and has been outflanked by the Republicans on a number of occasions. I think he has the forethought and insight of a gnat. Six months ago, everyone knew that the Senate was going to be a problem. What did he do to prevent the problem?

From C&L: Can we please have new Senate leadership now? The White House and Harry Reid have made one bad decision after another. We can’t do anything about Obama, but why do we have to put up with an incompetent Senate Majority Leader?

Four days before the Senate jettisoned the idea of expanding Medicare to younger Americans, a dozen Senate Democrats, including some of the chamber’s most liberal members, dispatched a stern letter warning that the proposal would make it harder for elderly patients in parts of the country to find care.

The letter, sent to Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.), attests to the effectiveness of a ferocious campaign by influential hospital and physician lobbyists to defeat the idea. And it underscores the difficulty of forging policy and political deals in the warp-speed, supercharged environment in which Congress is trying to reshape the nation’s health-care system.

The proposal to allow people ages 55 to 64 to buy insurance through Medicare — one of the most significant ideas to emerge from the Senate’s side of the debate — appeared and vanished in a mere six days.

Sources on and off Capitol Hill say the quick life and death of the Medicare buy-in reflects the complex politics and a brutal reality at this stage of the Senate’s deliberations, in which there is little time to refine proposals that do not immediately attract the 60 votes needed for health-care legislation to pass.

The broad contours of the proposal emerged early last week from 10 liberal and moderate senators whom Reid had assigned to negotiate a bill. The group reached for the Medicare buy-in as a compromise between members who favored a new government-sponsored insurance alternative for Americans of all ages, and those who were wary of more public coverage. The buy-in, they reasoned, would create access to public insurance for people in late middle age — a group for whom medical problems become more common and insurance is particularly expensive.

But in the following days, the proposal met resistance among Senate moderates as well as some liberals. Meanwhile, Reid made a strategic decision, ordering the negotiators to keep the details of their proposal secret until congressional budget analysts examined the impact it might have on consumers and the federal budget. That strategy, however, meant that the proposal did not attract much support from outside constituencies that have, in the past, favored letting younger people buy into Medicare.

“We were immobilized due to lack of information,” said John Rother, executive vice president for policy and strategy at AARP, a lobbying group for people age 50 and older, which has endorsed buy-in proposals in the past. “We couldn’t support something that we didn’t know what it was.”

Tags: Healthcare, Senate by ecthompson
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Many years ago, Markos was a dude like you and me. At parties, once everyone was all liquored up, folks would listen to him. It is the same way with me. Once everyone has a few, they will listen to anyone. That was then. Now, Markos has an audience of hundredss of thousands, if not millions. Markos has grown with his audience. He has tailored his rants. He makes thoughtful arguments that some of the best columnists in the world don’t or can’t make.

Markos makes an excellent case for giving the Senate a big fat raspberry.

(Raspberry at 2:19)

Markos:

Ezra Klein takes me to task for my opposition to the mandate, pointing out that Switzerland, among other systems, have mandates that require citizens to purchase health insurance from private insurers. It’s true. They do. Those countries also have strict regulatory regimes that heavily regulate those insurance companies. In Switzerland, for example, insurance companies cannot profit from the essential benefits plan everyone must purchase. That’s kind of an important detail missing from the Senate’s monstrosity of a bill. In addition, Switzerland also strictly regulates the price of medicines and medical devices — something this Senate has explicitly refused to allow.

Give me those kinds of restrictions to the Senate bill, and I’ll rethink my opposition.

Then there’s Nate Silver and his 20 questions For Bill Killers, which I’ll happily answer:

1. Over the medium term, how many other opportunities will exist to provide in excess of $100 billion per year in public subsidies to poor and sick people?

The assumption here is that this bill is the only option on the table. The House still has a say in the matter. And really, the point of reform isn’t to shovel taxpayer dollars to the insurance companies, it’s to expand care and lower costs. I’m not willing to surrender on costs.

2. Would a bill that contained $50 billion in additional subsidies for people making less than 250% of poverty be acceptable?

This betrays a simplistic view of liberals, as if our answer is to merely shovel money at a problem. What we’re looking for is good policy, which in this case, would also be good politics. So no, throwing money at the insurance companies doesn’t change a thing. The insurance industry would simply absorb the new subsidies just like universities have raised tuition to shovel up any increases in financial aid.

3.  Where is the evidence that the plan, as constructed, would substantially increase insurance industry profit margins, particularly when it is funded in part via a tax on insurers?

Where is the evidence that insurance companies would rig the system to extract record profits? I don’t know. Perhaps the last decade or two might provide the answer.

4. Why are some of the same people who are criticizing the bill’s lack of cost control also criticizing the inclusion of the excise tax, which is one of the few cost control mechanisms to have survived the process?

Because it is a measure that would disproportionately affect blue collar workers in high-risk jobs, or workers that have given concessions on wages to preserve good benefits packages. Limit that provision to people making over X amount (say, $100K/year), and I wouldn’t have a problem with it.

5. Why are some of the same people who are criticizing the bill’s lack of cost control also criticizing the inclusion of the individual mandate, which is key to controlling premiums in the individual market?

Because without premium caps or a public-run competitive option, there is no incentive for them to lower their premiums. They have a monopoly, and monopolies aren’t in the business of unilaterally reducing their prices. There are two ways to force them to do so — government regulation or market competition. The former is out, and the latter is inadequate.

6. Would concerns about the political downside to the individual mandate in fact substantially be altered if a public plan were included among the choices? Might not the Republican talking point become: “forcing you to buy government-run insurance?”

If you start worrying about Republican talking points, you’ve lost the game. They’re accusing Democrats of trying to kill grandma. They’re not going to back off because a talking point isn’t 100 percent accurate. 2010 will be the year of the “commie socialist Democrats”, no matter what health care reform bill is passed.

In any case, Republicans have tried to destroy socialist programs such as Medicare and Social Security for years. If people like a program, there’s nothing the GOP can do about it.

Please read more of his thoughts. I think that Markos has done an excellent job at summarizing the thoughts of those of us who are trying to get behind this bill. There are some good things in this bill. Unfortunately, I feel that supporting this bill is like buying a car without the engine. There simply ain’t much there.

Tags: Healthcare, Senate by ecthompson
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I’m still not sold on this Senate healthcare bill. I think it is a sorry excuse of a bill. Yet there are a few good things still in the bill that I can support. Here’s one point of view.

FromThink Progress:

Since Joe Lieberman demanded stripping the public option and Medicare buy-in provisions from the merged Senate bill, some strong progressives like Howard Dean have argued that without a public option or a Medicare buy-in provision, the bill is a giveaway to private insurers and should be killed. Other progressive leaders like Senators Jay Rockefeller, Tom Harkin and Sherrod Brown believe that the bill represents the best chance for passing health care reform in the foreseeable future. “I’m going to vote for it,” Brown told reporters. “I can’t imagine I wouldn’t. I mean there’s too much at stake.”

Change of the magnitude envisioned by health care reformers does not come easily. There have been many frustrations and there will be more. But, as a senior White House staffer with a ringside seat for the slow death of comprehensive care in 1994, I am keenly aware of the real alternative to the bills now before us: millions more Americans without health care and billions more for health care spending as the same challenges President Clinton tried to resolve continue to metastasize unchecked.

So while I have great respect for Governor Dean, and we have worked together to provide the strongest health care reform bill for the American people, I come down on the side of the Senate passing the bill.

Here’s why:

The Senate health care bill is not without its problems. But if enacted, it would represent the most significant public reform of our health care system that Congress has passed in the 40 plus years I have worked in politics. The bill will give health care coverage to a record 31 million Americans who are currently uninsured, lay a foundation that will begin to lower costs for millions of families, and provide all Americans with the access to adequate and dependable coverage when they need it most.

All of us are anxious to see the final language from the Senate. And a final bill must ensure that the subsidies provided are sufficient to make insurance truly affordable for working families. But based on what we know, here are my top ten reasons for why progressives should support the Senate passing the bill:

1. Largest Expansion Of Coverage Since Medicare’s Creation: Thirty-one million previously uninsured Americans will have insurance.

2. Low/Middle Income Americans Will Not Go Without Coverage: For low-income Americans struggling near the poverty line, the bill represents the largest single expansion of Medicaid since its inception. Combined with subsidies for middle income families, the bill’s provisions will ensure that working class Americans will no longer go without basic health care coverage.

3. Insurance Companies Will Never Be Able to Drop or Deny You Coverage Because You Are Sick: Insurers can no longer deny coverage because of a pre-existing condition. They can’t rescind coverage or impose lifetime or annual limits on care. Significantly, the bill also ends insurer discrimination against women — who currently pay as much as 48% morefor coverage than men — and gives them access preventive services with no cost sharing.

4. Lowers Premiums For Families: The Senate bill could lower premiums for the overall population by 8.4%. For the subsidized population, premiums would decrease even more dramatically. According to the CBO, “the amount that subsidized enrollees would pay for non-group coverage would be roughly 56 percent to 59 percent lower, on average than the nongroup premiums charged under current law.”

5. Invests in Keeping People Healthy: The bill creates a Prevention and Public Health Fund to expand and sustain funding for public prevention programs that prevent disease and promote wellness.

6. Insurers Can’t Offer Subprime Health Care: Insurers operating in the individual and small group markets will no longer sell subprime policies that deny coverage when illness strikes and you need it most. Everyone will be offered an essential benefits package of comprehensive benefits.

7. Helps Businesses Afford Coverage: Small employers can take advantage of large risk pools by purchasing coverage through the bill’s state-based exchanges. Employers with no more than 25 employees would receive a tax credit to help them provide coverage to their employees. The bill also establishes a temporary reinsurance program for employers providing coverage to retirees over the age of 55 who are not eligible for Medicare.

8. Improves Medicare: The bill eliminates the waste and fraud in the Medicare system, gets rid of the special subsidy to private insurers participating in Medicare Advantage and extends the life of the Medicare trust fund by 9 years. It also closes the doughnut hole that affected 3.4 seniors enrolled in Medicare Part D in 2008.

9. Reduces The Deficit: Not only would the bill expand coverage to 30 million Americans without adding to the nation debt, it would also reduce the deficit by up to $409 billion over 10 years.

10. Reduces National Health Spending: A CAP-Commonwealth Fund analysis concludes the bill could reduce overall spending by close to $683 billion over 10 years – with the potential to save families $2,500. Even the most conservative government estimates conclude that the bill would reduce national health care expenditures by at least 0.3% by 2019.

Tags: Healthcare, Senate by ecthompson
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Look, unless we were blind and still living in the ’50s, we knew that the Senate was going to be a problem on healthcare legislation. We knew this back in March. Senator Harry Reid has had approximately nine months to come up with a strategy to pass a healthcare bill through the Senate. In the nine months, he was unable to garner one Republican vote. He’s been unable to garner enough Democratic votes to stave off a filibuster. If, by some chance, he can procedurally outmaneuver Joe Lieberman, Ben Nelson, Mary Landrieu and Blanche Lincoln, he probably has 54 votes to pass an extremely watered-down healthcare bill which will not cover all Americans. (Let’s celebrate.)

Progressives, we only have ourselves to blame. We’ve known since 2002 that we have an uphill battle to fight. We are fighting not only conservative Republicans but also uninformed Americans, the “liberal media” and the corporatists. This last category is a huge problem. It encompasses both Democrats and Republicans.

Senator Ben Nelson has stated that he wants more abortion controls in the healthcare bill. What? This is not an abortion bill. Yet, Ben Nelson would hold up progress so that we can write a special phrase or clause dedicated to abortion. What is wrong with this man? The current laws are clear. Public money cannot fund abortions. There’s no ambiguity. There is no language in this bill that would support abortions. So what is he talking about?

Back to Joe Lieberman. We saw in his reelection campaign who he really was. Joe Lieberman was vindictive, pompous and extremely flexible on the issues depending upon whether it was advantageous for him and his career to go one way or the other (see video above). He supported expansion of Medicare just a few years ago. Now it is the worst thing ever. If anything good has come out of this healthcare debate is that Joe Lieberman has clearly shown the voters of Connecticut that he is not looking out for them. It’s hard for me to imagine either Republicans or Democrats supporting Joe Lieberman anymore. He has no principles. He has proven this over and over and over again.

Back to Harry Reid. What is he doing? He has shown little or no leadership on this issue. He’s shown the willingness to get in front of the cameras, but he never says anything of substance.

Finally, it is time for progressives to realize that we might have bitten off more than we can chew. We’ve worked hard over the last four years to get Democrats elected to national office. For the most part, we’ve had great success. Unfortunately, maybe we did not do the right thing. We tried to elect Democrats. Maybe we should’ve tried to elect progressives. Maybe we should’ve insisted on trying to find candidates who supported healthcare reform, closing Guantánamo Bay, not spying on Americans without warrants and withdrawing troops from Iraq expeditiously. I think these last nine months should not get us dispirited or disheartened; instead, we need to redouble our efforts. Our country depends on it.

Tags: Healthcare, Party Politics, Senate by ecthompson
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