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Tag Archives: This Week

Obama and Axelrod’s Mixed Messages

12 Monday Jul 2010

Posted by Craig in Congress, Democrats, economy, Obama, Obama administration, Politics, Republicans

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Atrios, David Axelrod, DNC, job creation, no desire on Capitol Hill, Paul Krugman, President Obama, speech, This Week, Washington Monthly, White House

To whom it may concern at the White House and the DNC:

If you want to lose the House and possibly the Senate in November, if you want to increase the possibility of the 2 most dreaded words in the English language—President Palin—becoming a reality in 2012, keep the lack of a cohesive message coming. And keep on waiting for the GOP to get on board.

First have President Obama come out on a Thursday with a speech focusing on job creation—saying how we can’t afford to give the keys back to the Republicans because they’re the ones whose policies “gave us the economic crisis” and drove the economy into the ditch. This is called firing up the base for the upcoming mid-term elections. (BTW, mid-term elections are all about turning out the base, and in case you haven’t noticed the Republican base is ready to vote today).

Then have David Axelrod go on This Week on Sunday and say that “there is no great desire on Capitol Hill” for more spending to stimulate the economy and that “we’re hoping we can persuade enough people on the other side of the aisle to put politics aside and join us.”  This makes your base throw up their hands (or just throw up) and say ‘For cryin’ out loud, somebody get a freakin’  clue. The Republicans don’t want anything that resembles economic growth, now or in the next 2 years. When are you guys gonna get it?’

Here are some steps you might want to consider and some advice you might want to listen to. First from Atrios:

“So let’s say Obama’s people have correctly deduced that there’s no chance in hell of getting anything through Congress. They have two basic options. First, they could get on the teevee every day and say, “This is my plan to help. Republicans in Congress won’t pass it.” They could hold rallies in Maine. Allies could run ads. At least people would know who is for and who is against…and just what it was that people are for or against.”

Option two is back off proposals you’ve previously made and have Axelrod get on the teevee and say, “there is some argument for additional spending in the short-run to continue to generate economic activity.”

Paul Krugman adds:

“I have no idea what they’re thinking. It would be one thing if polls suggested a tolerable outcome in November, so that playing it safe could possibly make sense as a political strategy. But that’s not the way it is; and it’s hard to see what possible motivation there is for pulling punches.”

Steve Benen at Washington Monthly:

“My sense is that President Obama really hates — and actively avoids — picking fights he fully expects to lose…The defeat would leave him weaker, exacerbate intra-party tensions, and at the same time signal that the White House lacks confidence in the strength of the economic recovery.

But the current alternative is far worse, especially given the fact that the White House should lack confidence in the strength of the economic recovery. It makes a lot more sense to push an ambitious jobs bill — like, now — invite Republicans to do what they always do, give Democrats something to fight for, and have the debate.

[…]

Yes, Republicans will block any measure intended to improve the economy, and it’s largely too late for a new stimulus effort to boost the economy before November. But it’s still worth having the fight — force the GOP to stand in the way of job creation, and show the public that Democrats are prepared to fight to improve on an unsatisfactory status quo.”

To sum up, you’re quickly approaching (if not already at) ‘nothing to lose’ stage. In sports terminology, this is not the time for basketball’s 4-corner offense or football’s prevent defense. (Long-time Houston fans can tell you how both of those work out, and it ain’t good. See UH–NC State and Oilers vs. Buffalo Bills). For those who don’t follow sports, let’s go with “faint heart never won fair maiden.” And faint heart never kicked the shit out of an obstructionist Republican either. It’s time to go bold and force the other team to re-act to you, not you to them.

Just my $0.02.

Operation Enduring Insanity

28 Monday Jun 2010

Posted by Craig in Afghanistan, Obama administration, Pakistan, Politics, terrorism, war on terror

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ABC, Afghan security forces, Afghanistan, al Qaeda, corruption, election, Karzai government, Leon Panetta, narcotics trafficking, stability, This Week, winning

CIA Director Leon Panetta appeared on ABC’s This Week yesterday, where he laid out some of the “problems” we face in Afghanistan along with our “fundamental purpose” there and what “winning” might look like. From Think Progress:

Too bad most, if not all, of what Panetta describes is not based in reality.

“There are some serious problems here. We’re dealing with a tribal society. We’re dealing with a country that has problems with governance, problems with corruption, problems with narcotics trafficking, problems with a Taliban insurgency.”

We’re dealing with a country that isn’t a country. Afghanistan combat veteran Wes Moore was on Meet the Press yesterday where he gave this account:

“…one of the things we did–I was with a team in Afghanistan, you go out and you give out gifts to people. And one of the things that we would, we would give out to some of the tribal leaders were cutout–were maps, which were cutouts of Afghanistan.  And literally, the most popular question was, “What is this?” And we’d say, “It’s your country.”

Problems with governance, corruption, and narcotics trafficking? The problem is that the Karzai government and his family are at the root of the corruption and narcotics trafficking. From stealing last year’s election, to his brother’s (alleged) involvement in the heroin trade, to the same brother awarding security sub-contracts to a company owned by 2 of Karzai’a cousins, to this:

“In recent months…Afghan prosecutors and investigators have been ordered to cross names off case files, prevent senior officials from being placed under arrest and disregard evidence against executives of a major financial firm suspected of helping the nation’s elite move millions of dollars overseas.

Afghanistan is awash in international aid and regarded as one of the most corrupt countries in the world. Indeed, even as the United States and its allies pour money in, U.S. officials estimate that as much as $1 billion a year is flowing out as part of a massive cash exodus.

The money, as first reported in The Washington Post in February, is often carried out in full view of customs officials at Kabul’s airport, where such transfers are legal as long as they are declared. Officials suspect much of the cash is going to the Persian Gulf emirate of Dubai, where elite Afghans, including Karzai’s older brother, have villas.”

How do we on the one hand acknowledge that government corruption is a major problem while we continue to prop up the government and the president that is hip-deep in corruption?

Back to Panetta: “But I think the fundamental key, the key to success or failure is whether the Afghans accept responsibility, are able to deploy an effective army and police force to maintain stability. If they can do that, then I think we’re going to be able to achieve the kind of progress and the kind of stability that the president is after…it is going to take the Afghan army and police to be able to accept the responsibility that we pass on to them. That’s going to be the key. ”

The size of the Afghan security forces our generals say are needed to provide that stability, about 450.000, would cost about $3 billion a year to maintain. The annual budget of Afghanistan is $600 million. They can’t do it. Care to guess who will be expected to pick up the tab?

Panetta’s definition of “winning”:

“Winning in Afghanistan is having a country that is stable enough to ensure that there is no safe haven for Al Qaida or for a militant Taliban that welcomes Al Qaida…Our purpose, our whole mission there is to make sure that Al Qaida never finds another safe haven from which to attack this country. That’s the fundamental goal of why the United States is there.”

Earlier in the interview Panetta admitted that there are only 50 to 100 members of al Qaeda in Afghanistan, “maybe less.”

Emptywheel has it exactly right:

“So 1,000 US troops per al Qaeda member, at a cost of $1 million each. That’s $1 billion a year we spend for each al Qaeda member to fight our war in Afghanistan.

This sort of adds a new twist to that old Einstein quip about the definition of insanity being doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. Because we’re doing the same thing over and over again–at a cost of $1 billion a year per nominal opponent–and expecting anything other than bankruptcy.”

It all comes down to this, from a McClatchy article about Iraq but it applies to Afghanistan as well:

“…a nearly inviolable rule governs this arena: Democracy cannot be imposed on any nation unless its people and its leaders all are asking for it. Otherwise the nation’s oligarchy will fight to restore the old order of things, to protect their positions and perquisites. It happens every time.”

Self-Contradictory Sarah

25 Friday Jun 2010

Posted by Craig in BP, Gulf Oil Spill, Politics, Republicans, Sarah Palin

≈ 2 Comments

Tags

article, Hitler, Jewish World Review, Joe Barton, lamestream media, Louie Gohmert, Obama, power grab, Rahm Emanuel, Sarah Palin, shallow, This Week, Thomas Sowell, Tweet

Poor Sarah. She wakes up in a new world every day. Following White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel’s remarks on ABC’s This Week on Sunday that the sentiment Joe Barton expressed when he apologized to BP was…

“…not a political gaffe,” but rather a statement based on “prepared remarks.” He linked Barton’s comments to the GOP’s “larger philosophy,” saying it “is an approach to what they see. They see the aggrieved party here is BP, not the fisherman. And remember, this is not just one person.”

Palin almost immediately responded with this Tweet:

 

 (Just as an aside, for this dingbat to call anyone shallow is like Paris Hilton calling Lindsey Lohan skanky. But I digress). That was on Sunday, however, and our girl Sarah has slept since then. She woke up today and tweeted this:

 

 (Another aside if I may. For Palin to assume her followers can read is a bit of a stretch if you ask me). So  to review, she calls Rahm Emanuel a liar for saying that Republicans agree with Joe Barton and then a few days later Mrs. Palin, still a Republican I presume………agrees with Joe Barton. (The Thomas Sowell article The Quitter references is the lunacy Sowell wrote for the Jewish World Review in which he made yet another of the right’s Obama—Hitler comparisons, and which was quoted from on the floor of the House by Screwy Louie Gohmert.)

Don’t worry, Sister Sarah. We’re not laughing near you, we’re laughing at you.

A Crucial Week for Financial Reform

26 Monday Apr 2010

Posted by Craig in bailout, Congress, economy, Financial Crisis, financial reform, financial regulation, Obama, Politics, Republicans, too big to fail, Wall Street

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Blanche Lincoln, Bob Corker, Chris Dodd, claw back, derivative legislation, financial reform, Goldman Sachs, great vampire squid, Harry Reid, letter, Mitch McConnell, Olympia Snowe, President Obama, Richard Shelby, Scott Brown, This Week

In what’s shaping up as a crucial week in the quest for financial reform there are some encouraging signs, some not so encouraging, and a demonstration by the executives at “the great vampire squid” (aka Goldman Sachs) give us an example of why meaningful reform is necessary.

First, the reasons to be hopeful. There appear to be some cracks in the Republican wall of solidarity. Sen. Olympia Snowe endorsed Sen. Blanche Lincoln’s tough stance toward derivative trading passed last week by the Agriculture Committee. (Sen. Grassley, another possible defector, was the lone Republican on the committee who voted for Lincoln’s proposal). In a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid, Snowe wrote:

“I believe that strong derivatives regulation goes to the heart of an effective financial reform bill and that Chairman Lincoln’s legislation is a strong step towards realizing this fundamental component to financial reform……I believe that we should err on the side of caution and finally bring full transparency to these markets once and for all and allow regulators to preemptively identify these damaged firms.

“Accordingly, I believe the Senate should start with a comprehensive, strong derivatives reform proposal and defend attempts to weaken it, not the other way around and the legislation produced by the Senate Agriculture Committee includes the strongest safeguards and most robust transparency provisions on our expansive derivatives market.

I urge the Majority Leader to incorporate these provisions into the regulatory reform bill.”

On Friday, Sen. Chris Dodd, chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, “agreed to replace his proposed restrictions on derivatives with those of the Senate Agriculture Committee, chaired by Arkansas Democrat Blanche Lincoln.”

On This Week yesterday, Sen. Bob Corker said he intended to propose an amendment containing a “claw back” provision to the legislation “which would take away the personal earnings for the past five years of the corporate officers of failed institutions that fall under the government’s resolution authority.”

Another possible Republican defector might be the newly-elected senator from Massachusetts, Scott Brown. Will someone who was elected as a sort of “man of the people” want to be painted as a defender of Wall Street? Especially when he faces re-election in 2 years? Maybe not.

Also on the positive side, “President Obama and House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank have personally urged Dodd not to cut a deal with Republicans…This is a welcome sign that Obama realizes that public opinion is moving in the direction of tougher banking reform, and that he learned from the health debate that bipartisan compromise on key reform issues is a snare and a delusion.”

Sen. Dodd has shown signs of weakening the legislation in order to compromise with Republicans leaders in the Senate, Mitch McConnell and Richard Shelby, who want to use the same tactics Republicans used on health care reform—stall and delay as long as possible. Hopefully, Dodd will be emboldened by support from President Obama and not dilute reform to try and pacify those whose intentions are to maintain the status quo.

Now to the crooks at Goldman. What were they doing as the housing market was collapsing and threatening to take the entire economy with it? Having a party:

“As the U.S. housing market began its epic fall nearly three years ago, top executives at Wall Street powerhouse Goldman Sachs cheered the large financial gains the firm stood to make on certain bets it had placed, according to newly released documents.

The documents show that the firm’s executives were celebrating earlier investments calculated to benefit if housing prices fell, a Senate investigative committee found. In an e-mail sent in the fall of 2007, for example, Goldman executive Donald Mullen predicted a windfall because credit-rating companies had downgraded mortgage-related investments, which caused losses for investors.

“Sounds like we will make some serious money,” Mullen wrote.”

To somewhat defend Goldman, what they were doing, “selling short,” (betting against certain investments) is something that happens on Wall Street every day. But, betting against instruments that they designed to fail, and which were sold to investors as AAA investments allowing Goldman to profit from on both ends, may not be illegal (although it should be) but it certainly shows that the execs at the “great vampire squid” have no interest in what’s best for the country. They have one party’s interests in mind—-their own.

Alan Greenspan and the “Everybody Missed It” Myth

05 Monday Apr 2010

Posted by Craig in bailout, economy, Financial Crisis, financial reform, financial regulation, Politics, too big to fail, Wall Street

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Alan Greenspan, ARM, Bernanke, Bruce Bartlett, Geithner, home prices, housing bubble, Lehman Brothers, Long Term Capital Management, missed it, Paul Krugman, This Week

On ABC’s This Week yesterday former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan once again pulled out the “nobody saw it coming” excuse for missing the conditions which led to the financial meltdown in 2008:

“…the reason it was missed is we have had no experience of the type of risks that arose following the default of Lehman Brothers in September 2008.That’s the critical mistake. And I made it. Everybody that I know who works in this business made it.”

False on many fronts. First, the “no experience” myth. The collapse of Lehman Brothers in 2008 was predictable, or should have been, by the failure of Long Term Capital Management in 1998 because both were brought about by similar business practices. Both had debt that far exceeded their assets and both were major players in the mortgage backed securities “shadow market.”

The other thing that “everyone” missed, according to Greenspan and his fellow revisionists anyway, and what was driving the mortgage backed securities explosion, was the housing bubble. Again false. Economists from Paul Krugman on the left to Reagan administration Treasury Department official Bruce Bartlett on the right were warning of the impending disaster in the housing market.

But putting aside economists for a minute, it shouldn’t have taken a Nobel Prize in economics to see that a 50% increase in home prices from 1995-2005 was unsustainable. Or that giving a $500,000 loan to someone with no documented income was not a good idea. Or that adjustable rate mortgages, 100% financing, interest-only loans, and all the other exotic mortgage variations were an accident looking for a time to happen. What was Greenspan saying at the time?

“Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan said Monday that Americans’ preference for long-term, fixed-rate mortgages means many are paying more than necessary for their homes and suggested consumers would benefit if lenders offered more alternatives…He said a Fed study suggested many homeowners could have saved tens of thousands of dollars in the last decade if they had ARMs.”

No, Mr. Greenspan, not “everybody” missed it. YOU missed it. You and the disciples of the group-think mentality in Washington who were afraid to buck you because of your position as the alleged “Maestro” and “Wizard” who was responsible for the supposedly booming economy which was in reality a house of cards. Unfortunately two of those disciples, Ben Bernanke and Timothy Geithner, are still in decision-making positions.

Just as a side note, there could be some fireworks at the Financial Crisis Commission hearings this week. Greenspan is set to testify on Wednesday and Don Robert Rubin-leone is up on Thursday.

Why Is This Man Not Facing a War Crimes Tribunal?

16 Tuesday Feb 2010

Posted by Craig in Dick Cheney, Justice Department, Obama, Politics, torture, war on terror

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Andrew Sullivan, Convention Against Torture, Dick Cheney, Eric Holder, Geneva Conventions, This Week, torture, war crimes, waterboarding

Every time I see former Vice-President Dick Cheney interviewed on any news program, national or otherwise, I think to myself, ‘Why is this man here and not facing a war crimes tribunal?’ Cheney made a remark during an interview with Jonathan Karl Sunday on ABC’s This Week, a remark made almost in passing, that once again brought that question to mind:

KARL: Did you more often win or lose those battles, especially as you got to the second term?

CHENEY: Well, I suppose it depends on which battle you’re talking about. I won some; I lost some. I can’t…

KARL: … waterboarding, clearly, what was your…

CHENEY: I was a big supporter of waterboarding. I was a big supporter of the enhanced interrogation techniques that…

KARL: And you opposed the administration’s actions of doing away with waterboarding?

CHENEY: Yes.

It never ceases to amaze me, although it’s not the first time it has happened and undoubtedly won’t be the last, that a former vice-president of the United States of America can openly and brazenly confess to something which the Geneva Conventions and the United Nations Convention Against Torture recognize as torture, something for which members of the Japanese military were punished after World War II. Torture, a punishable offense under U.S. Code 2340A by imprisonment or death. And he can do so without any fear of reprisal, thanks to the ‘look forward, not back’ policy of the Obama administration.

Shameful.

Andrew Sullivan at the Daily Dish calls on Attorney General Eric Holder to take action or be considered an accessory, also a punishable offense:

“…the attorney general of the United States is legally obliged to prosecute someone who has openly admitted such a war crime or be in violation of the Geneva Conventions and the UN Convention on Torture. For Eric Holder to ignore this duty subjects him too to prosecution. If the US government fails to enforce the provision against torture, the UN or a foreign court can initiate an investigation and prosecution.

Cheney himself just set in motion a chain of events that the civilized world must see to its conclusion or cease to be the civilized world. For such a high official to escape the clear letter of these treaties and conventions, and to openly brag of it, renders such treaties and conventions meaningless.”

These are not my opinions and they are not hyperbole. They are legal facts. Either this country is governed by the rule of law or it isn’t. Cheney’s clear admission of his central role in authorizing waterboarding and the clear evidence that such waterboarding did indeed take place means that prosecution must proceed.

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