A website dedicated to the man so uniquely unqualified to be President. This blog by by radio talk host Todd Feinburg has been replaced by RealClearThinker.com.
Why the fear of General Motors going under? The demand for cars would remain the same, so the lost manufacturing would have to be replaced, wouldn't it?
...while the cries of certain Armageddon would be ear splitting in the event of a GM failure, the U.S. auto sector would actually emerge much healthier thanks to a change in ownership that would be the certain result of GM going under.
How would auto manufacturing, and Detroit, possibly do well if GM, and others, were allowed to fold?
Far from vanishing, many of GM's assets would be quickly purchased by competent foreign automakers eager to expand their capacity in what is the world's largest auto market. Happily, the list of well-run car companies, from Toyota to Nissan to Porsche, is long.
So GM would fold, others would buy the factories, new managers with new employment contracts (and hopefully no unions) would be in charge, with state of the art cars rolling off the production lines in a sustainable business model.
With capable auto executives finally overseeing GM's poorly deployed assets, the value and utility of each would rise, thus perpetuating the existence of jobs in the sector, all the while ensuring that other businesses that exist due to GM will enjoy more stable commercial relationships with competent management.
Would Democrats ever do such a thing? Of course not. Barack has already signaled clearly he has every desire to offer the capital the broken companies need to keep overpaying their help. The bailout of the auto manufacturers is a bailout of unions, which means it will kick the can down the road, but not fix the underlying problem.
President-elect Barack Obama would like the government to find additional authority to deal with the liquidity crisis in the American automobile industry, Obama's transition co-chairman said on Tuesday.
The Obama team earlier leaked details of the disagreement over an auto bailout that arose between President Bush and Barack in their private meeting yesterday.
John Podesta said Obama stressed the need to help the ailing U.S. auto industry during talks with President George W. Bush at the White House on Monday.
"He's hopeful the government will look for additional authority to deal with the short-term liquidity crisis ... and get onto a program and a plan that would ensure that the auto industry can ... continue as ... independent companies ...," Podesta said in a briefing.
There are two primary ways President Bush could provide aid, either through the recently passed $25 billion in federal loans to help automakers retool (though automakers might needs those funds simply to make payroll) OR through the $700 billion in TARP (Troubled Assets Relief Program) funds, less than $500 billion of which has been allocated.
The Big Three automakers have asked for an additional $25 billion to help prevent their going into bankruptcy. On Saturday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid asked Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson to consider using the TARP funds to help the automakers, though the White House seemed to reject that idea on Monday;
As tight a ship as the Obama campaign was, we have to assume that any aides to Obama who were briefed on his meeting with the President are leaking details with campaign consent and knowledge.
Just hours after President Bush and President-elect Obama met in the Oval Office of the White House, details of their confidential conversation began leaking out to the press, igniting anger from the president, sources claim.
"Senator Obama would be wise to keep close counsel," a top Bush source warned.
"Senator Obama may not be familiar with a long-standing tradition of presidents holding their private conversations, private," a senior adviser explained to the DRUDGE REPORT.
If not, we should expect him to be firing the leakers any minute. After all, how many people would know?
"BUSH AND OBAMA AT ODDS OVER AID FOR AUTO INDUSTRY," splashed the NEW YORK TIMES in an exclusive Monday evening, quoting "people familiar with the discussion."
The two met at the White House in private, without staff.
"Bush indicated at the meeting that he might support some aid and a broader economic stimulus package if Obama and congressional Democrats dropped their opposition to a free-trade agreement with Colombia," claimed the TIMES.
Is this Barack's idea for how to reward President Bush for the gracious transition he's running?
The ASSOCIATED PRESS quickly followed with details of the conversation, citing "aides who described the discussion on grounds of anonymity, citing the private nature of the meeting."
Bush advisers view the leaks as an effort to undermine the president's remaining days in office.
You'll recall that I was suggesting a few days ago that McCain could reclaim control of the campaign narrative by offering confused voters 1) an explanation of why the financial meltdown is happening, and 2) pinning it on Barack.
Yesterday, Frank Luntz revealed the most successful negative ad according to his focus groups - it's one that makes Barack responsible for the Debacle on Wall Street, and links Barack to other liberal Senators.
Harry Reid joined Nancy Pelosi today in being a Democrat with bad judgment in a crisis.
Several big life insurance stocks fell sharply Thursday, dragged down by jitters about their role in the credit crisis and fears sparked by a comment from Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., Wednesday about a potential bankruptcy in the industry.
These people are so dumb.
"We don't have a lot of leeway on time. One of the individuals in the caucus today talked about a major insurance company. A major insurance company -- one with a name that everyone knows that's on the verge of going bankrupt. That's what this is all about," Reid said prior to the Senate's approval of the $700 billion bailout bill.
Too much time in Washington, perhaps?
Steven Schwartz, an analyst who covers insurance companies for Raymond James & Associates, said that even before Reid made his bankruptcy comment, investors were growing worried about life insurers' exposure to real estate as well as "secondary exposure" via investments in troubled finance firms like Lehman Bros, Wachovia and Washington Mutual.
But the comment from Reid clearly caused even more fear.
Yesterday's Gallup poll showed McCain picking up some ground, cutting Barack's lead from 8% to 4%. But today's Rasmussen ticks up a point for Barack.
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Thursday shows Barack Obama attracting 51% of the vote while John McCain earns 44%. This seven-point advantage is the largest yet enjoyed by Obama during Election 2008 and is consistent with the stable lead he has enjoyed over the past week. For each of the past seven days, Obama has been at 50% or 51% and McCain has been at 44% or 45%.
The challenge for McCain remains the strong focus on the bad economy. Will the conversation shift, or can McCain figure out how to get some traction on the Wall Street fiasco? He missed an opportunity to reinforce his brand when he voted for the bailout last night without demanding that the pork be removed. But I suspect the campaign is gunshy after last week's campaign suspension failed to impress.
Obama leads 63% to 32% among voters who name the economy as the top voting issue. McCain lead 74% to 24% among those who say that national security is the highest priority. Fifty percent (50%) of voters say the economy is most important while just 19% see national security that way.
These people are sick. Wall Street needs a bailout, and anyone in congress who isn't brain dead is appalled at the $700B request. So how do Democrats respond to the horror of socializing the financial sector in the new version of the bill?
The Senate substitute now runs over 450 pages. And tucked away in the tax provisions is a landmark health care provision demanding that insurance companies provide coverage for mental health treatment—such as hospitalization—on parity with physical illnesses.
Brilliant. That should certainly lower the cost of health insurance. And it should help the proposal sail through the house.
Really a bill onto itself, the mental health parity measure has been a bipartisan priority for top lawmakers in both chambers but has stalled because of disagreements again over how to pay for its estimated $3.8 billion five-year cost. In the current climate, that seems to be no longer a stumbling block, and if the Treasury plan becomes law, it will also.
What's another $4B to these morons when they're adding $100B to the $700B package? It's lunch money.
Senate leaders are confident that they can prevail, but the strategy is not without risks in the House given the added costs of the tax package. Congressional Budget Office estimates indicate that the net impact will be to add almost $105 billion to an already large deficit next year, and fiscal conservatives will feel they are being straight-armed by the Senate which has refused to do more to offset the costs.
Why should the care when they're also padding the bill with an expensive fix to the Alternative Minimum Tax without worrying about where the money will come from.
The biggest single piece in the package is an extension of protections for millions of middle class families who would otherwise find themselves exposed to the higher levy under the alternative minimum tax. This alone accounts for about three quarters of the cost or $78.8 billion in 2009. Almost $14 billion more can be attributed to a variety of tax break extensions important to business, including the R&E credit worth about $8.4 billion in 2009.
These people are sick on two levels. First, the way they try to force us into socialized medicine by piling on costs when they should be looking for ways to make it cheaper. And second, for using the crisis on Wall Street to expand their crisis in health insurance.
Has McCain's corporate tax break been added to the revised bailout bill that the senate will vote on tonight?
In a surprise move to resurrect President Bush's $700 billion Wall Street rescue plan, Senate leaders slated a vote on the measure for Wednesday - but added a tax cut plan already rejected by the House. Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., and GOP Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky unveiled the plan Tuesday.
The move to add a tax legislation - including a set of popular business tax breaks - risked a backlash from House Democrats insisting they be paid for with tax increases elsewhere.
Barack has attacked McCain for favoring tax breaks for business.
The Senate plan would also raise federal deposit insurance limits to $250,000 from $100,000, as called for by the two presidential nominees only hours earlier.
Both candidates support the insurance hike.
But by also adding legislation to prevent more than 20 million middle-class taxpayers from feeling the bite of the alternative minimum tax, the step could build momentum for the Wall Street bailout from House Republicans. The presidential candidates Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Barack Obama, D-Ill., intend to fly to Washington for the votes, as does Sen. Joe Biden of Delaware, the Democratic vice presidential candidate.
Aren't they afraid of messing things up if they return to Washington? Shouldn't they be out on the campaign trail where they belong?
The surprise move capped a day in which supporters of the imperiled multibillion-dollar economic rescue fought to bring it back to life, courting reluctant lawmakers with a variety of other sweeteners including the plan to reassure Americans their bank deposits are safe.
What faith Americans have in our country. A deep trust that no matter what happens, our nation will always prosper. We are utterly confident in the future - or, at least, in our own ability to manage it. Consider the rejection yesterday of the bailout.
...a majority of those politicians anointed by the U.S. Constitution to reflect the will of the people voted no. This is a remarkable event, the culmination of an historic sense of betrayal that Americans have long felt for their representatives in Washington D.C. The nation's credit crisis exposed Monday a much deeper and more fundamental problem — a political credibility crisis that now threatens to harm our nation further, should the markets freeze up and more companies begin to fail, as many experts predict.
We were promised by the most powerful people in the country that the solution offered may have been ugly, but it was entirely necessary. We didn't believe them.
Asked to take a leap of faith regarding a dizzyingly complex problem, a critical mass of voters refused to trust their leaders, turning down the medicine that was offered. And so the politicians who are most exposed to popular whims have run for cover.
The deal was too cozy - the players too interconnected, the problem too abstract - for us to buy in. We've always heard that our trust in politicians was just a notch below car salesmen, and yesterday we confirmed it.
Years ago, the trust between the people and their politicians was broken. The credibility was lost. The reserve of goodwill went bankrupt. And when they needed it most, our nation's leaders found they had squandered their ability to exert influence over the people who chose them to lead.
Our elections reflect this disdain. We're willing to throw anyone into office, figuring it can't make things any worse. A governor from Arkansas who chases women uncontrollably? Sure. An inexperienced Texas governor whose main claim to fame is that his father was president? Ok, we'll try that.
We're passive aggressive. We don't feel any control over what our government does or what our society is becoming. Like teenagers bending rules to escape their feelings of powerlessness, we express our resentment with an "I don't care," shrug of the shoulders.
Nearly every major political leader in America supported the $700 billion financial bailout bill. The President of the United States. The Vice President. The Treasury Secretary. The Chairman of the Federal Reserve. The Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission. The Democratic and Republican nominees for president. The Democratic and Republican leadership of the House and the Senate. All of them said the same thing. Vote "yes."
We wanted a "no," so that's what they gave us.
I don't know if it's unique to our country, or unique to our time. Perhaps it's just human nature. Sometimes being impetuous feels good... very good. Even when the stakes are incredibly high.
Which is why the worsening economic situation bodes well for Barack. If anyone can be made the American Idol, then why can't anyone be made president? The more we need someone with proven abilities, the less faith we have in experience. The more we need someone we can trust, the more intrigued we are by someone who hasn't earned it.
Because we don't really think that it's all about the government. We figure, in the end, it's about us. And we trust in our own ability to pull through. So we'll take it our way rather than theirs. And we'll live with the outcome. No matter how painful.
The irony is that the desire to act out cuts across party lines. The same instinct that makes Republicans want to lash out at the corruption in Washington by refusing their imperfect bailout makes Democrats want to elect the man so uniquely unqualified to be president.
Wondering who is to blame for the failure of the bailout bill to pass? Must be Michael Moore, who campaigned against it on his website.
This bailout's mission is to protect the obscene amount of wealth that has been accumulated in the last eight years. It's to protect the top shareholders who own and control corporate America. It's to make sure their yachts and mansions and "way of life" go uninterrupted while the rest of America suffers and struggles to pay the bills. Let the rich suffer for once. Let them pay for the bailout. We are spending 400 million dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Let them end the war immediately and save us all another half-trillion dollars!
He seems to have convinced the American people, who opposed the bailout 3 to 1.
I have to stop writing this and you have to stop reading it. They are staging a financial coup this morning in our country. They are hoping Congress will act fast before they stop to think, before we have a chance to stop them ourselves. So stop reading this and do something -- NOW! Here's what you can do immediately:
Obama, like McCain, offered only lukewarm support for the measure - trying to avoid being connected to it through his support, or opposition.
1. Call or e-mail Senator Obama. Tell him he does not need to be sitting there trying to help prop up Bush and Cheney and the mess they've made. Tell him we know he has the smarts to slow this thing down and figure out what's the best route to take. Tell him the rich have to pay for whatever help is offered. Use the leverage we have now to insist on a moratorium on home foreclosures, to insist on a move to universal health coverage, and tell him that we the people need to be in charge of the economic decisions that affect our lives, not the barons of Wall Street.
The House on Monday defeated a $700 billion emergency rescue for the nation's financial system, ignoring urgent warnings from President Bush and congressional leaders of both parties that the economy could nosedive into recession without it.
Stocks plummeted on Wall Street even before the 228-205 vote to reject the bill was announced on the House floor.
If it's really about pandering for McCain, this would have been a beautiful opportunity to separate himself once and for all from the President. Instead, Nancy Pelosi is taking the heat for the defeat of the bailout, as a result of a nasty, partisan speech she gave in advance of the vote.
Several Republican aides said House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., had torpedoed any spirit of bipartisanship that surrounded the bill with her scathing speech near the close of the debate that blamed Bush's policies for the economic turmoil.
Without mentioning her by name, Rep. Adam Putnam, R-Fla., No. 3 Republican, said: "The partisan tone at the end of the debate today I think did impact the votes on our side."
Putnam said lawmakers were working "to garner the necessary votes to avoid a financial collapse."
But the defeat was already causing a brutal round of finger-pointing.
"We could have gotten there today had it not been for the partisan speech that the speaker gave on the floor of the House," House Minority Leader John Boehner said. Pelosi's words, the Ohio Republican said, "poisoned our conference, caused a number of members that we thought we could get, to go south."
Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Mo., the whip, estimated that Pelosi's speech changed the minds of a dozen Republicans who might otherwise have supported the plan.
Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass., scoffed at the explanation.
"Well if that stopped people from voting, then shame on them," he said. "If people's feelings were hurt because of a speech and that led them to vote differently than what they thought the national interest (requires), then they really don't belong here. They're not tough enough."
More than a repudiation of Democrats, Frank said, Republicans' refusal to vote for the bailout was a rejection of their own president.
A deal was announced early this morning that may save Wall Street, for now - but it is moving ahead without regard for what will be destroyed in the process.
The bill includes pay limits for some executives whose firms seek help, aides said. And it requires the government to use its new role as owner of distressed mortgage-backed securities to make more aggressive efforts to prevent home foreclosures.
This video explains how Democrats got us to this point.
Too much meddling by Washington in how loans were given out led to this crisis. The solution? Step up the meddling exponentially.
In some cases, the government would receive an equity stake in companies that seek aid, allowing taxpayers to profit should the rescue plan work and the private firms flourish in the months and years ahead.
We'll own a piece of Wall Street, and Wall Street, more than ever, will own us. Democrat's criticism of President Bush's social security privatization plan seem humorous in retrospect.
The White House also agreed to strict oversight of the program by a Congressional panel and conflict-of-interest rules for firms hired by the Treasury to help run the program.
The administration had initially requested virtually unfettered authority to operate the bailout program. But as they moved toward clinching a deal, both sides appeared to have given up a number of contentious proposals, including a change in the bankruptcy laws sought by some Democrats to give judges the authority to modify the terms of first mortgages.
Occasionally, the fact that our government is controlled by lawyers has a positive side effect. Even Democrats were scared of the idea of letting judges take away the ability of the mortgage system to function on a retail level.
What happened to the alternative plan favored by some congressional Republicans? They gave up on it.
Officials said they had also agreed to include a proposal by House Republicans that gives the Treasury secretary an additional option of issuing government insurance for troubled financial instruments as a way of reducing the amount of taxpayer money spent up front on the rescue effort.
The Treasury would be required to create the insurance program, officials said, but not necessarily to use it. Mr. Paulson had expressed little interest in that plan, and initial cost projections suggested it would be enormously expensive. But final details were not immediately available.
Where are Barack and McCain on this? They've been briefed, but are apparently too focused on winning the White House to worry about how it is financed.
Yesterday the presidential race was a tie according to Gallup. Today, Barack's pulled back into a 3 point lead. Rasmussen, which had Barack up 3% yesterday, now has him up 5%.
It’s stunning to note how rapidly the dynamics of the campaign have changed. Two weeks ago, just before the Wall Street financial crunch became visible, McCain was up by three points in the aftermath of his convention. One week ago today, the candidates were even. Now, Obama’s lead is approaching new highs entering the final few weeks of the campaign.
Obama now leads by five among unaffiliated voters. Last week, the unaffiliated voters were leaning in McCain’s direction.
In a new Battleground poll, Democrats have a 5% advantage over the GOP in generic party preference, but McCain leads the presidential race by 2%.
All this poll watching is largely recreation today, as the bailout bill combined with tonight's debate provide such large potential to redefine the race.
While Democrats are trying to make it look like John McCain somehow killed the administration's Wall Street bailout proposal, it is House Republicans who are unhappy with the proposal.
A group of conservative Republicans in the U.S. House of Representatives offered a mortgage insurance plan on Thursday as an alternative to the Bush administration Wall Street bailout.
As Congress struggled to find agreement on modifying the massive Bush proposal to attack the housing market crisis, three members of the Republican Study Committee criticized the administration's proposal and presented their own ideas.
"We think this insurance model works... This is an alternative," Wisconsin Republican Rep. Paul Ryan said at a press briefing where he distributed a one-page proposal.
He said dozens of House Republicans are involved in the group developing the alternative insurance approach.
Texas Republican Rep. Jeb Hensarling, chairman of the study committee, said its more than 100 members "remain skeptical, fearful and unconvinced" about the administration's plan.
"The insurance model is one that appeals to us," he said.
The status of a rescue plan for the nation’s financial system was in doubt, at least for the moment, on Thursday as lawmakers emerged from a White House meeting with President Bush to say that negotiations have a ways to go.
Looking tired and annoyed, Mr. Dodd complained that late complications were making the episode sound more like “a rescue plan for the Republican presidential candidate, than one for the country’s financial system.
It does no good, Mr. Dodd said, “to be distracted for two or three hours by political theater.”
It seems that Democrats are so depressed over the reality, setting in over recent weeks, that Barack is going to lose this election, that they can't buckle down and focus in on solving the crisis. They feel compelled to claw at the GOP.
The leading Democratic negotiator on the Bush administration's $700 bailout plan accused John McCain of undermining the proposal and prodding House Republicans to lay out a wholly different approach that is opposed by the White House.
"This is the presidential campaign of John McCain undermining what Hank Paulson tells us is essential for the country," said Democratic Rep. Barney Frank, (D-Mass.), chairman of the House Financial Services Committee. "This is McCain at the last minute getting House Republicans to undermine the Paulson approach."
Republican leadership aides reacted incredulously to Frank's broadside, saying there was no way McCain's chief economic adviser, Douglas Holtz-Eakin, could undermine a deal with House Republicans that has never had rank-and-file support.
Republicans expressed their concerns this morning, they said, well before McCain's arrival, and before Democrats started telling the media that a deal was close. Were Democrats trying to sandbag McCain - saying a deal was done when it wasn't so they could blame him for breaking it up?
(McCain's chief economic adviser, Douglas) Holtz-Eakin met this morning with Boehner, House Minority Whip Roy Blunt (R-Mo.) and House Republican Conference Chairman Adam Putnam (R-Fla.), but the GOP leaders did virtually all of the talking, and what they told him was how little support the $700 billion package had with their rank-and-file.
The senator was apparently alluding to a growing revolt by conservative House Republicans against the proposed $700 billion rescue, and the fact that Senator McCain has not yet endorsed the plan, whose concept runs contrary to the policy positions he has taken for years.
The more time that goes by, the more unhappiness with the plan can fester.
Conservative Republicans, in particular, have said that such a huge government intervention violated their free market principles.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi of California has made clear that she does not want to approve the bailout plan without rank-and-file Republican support.
A group of Republicans, led by Representative Eric Cantor, a House leader, were circulating an alternative plan that would rely on mortgage insurance, provided by the government, rather than taxpayer purchase of frozen mortgage assets.
A senior Republican lawmaker, speaking on condition of anonymity so as not to undermine the party leadership, said there is a ‘’violent reaction” among House Republicans to the Paulson plan. He said backers of the alternative, one of several that have been proposed in the House, are calculating that they can force the negotiators to accept it as part of a larger deal.
Word is, things got ugly at the White House meeting when Senate Democrats realized that House Republicans, unhappy with the notion of the huge bailout, were pushing an alternative approach.
Confident but not yet celebrating, congressional leaders agreed Thursday on a multibillion-dollar bailout plan for Wall Street aimed at staving off a national economic catastrophe. President Bush brought the two men fighting to succeed him to a historic White House huddle on how to sell a deal to lawmakers who were still resisting.
Welcoming Republican John McCain and Democrat Barack Obama, Bush said, "My hope is that we can reach an agreement very shortly."
It's hard to know how legitimate opposition is at this point. Those who express displeasure might just be grandstanding.
The tentative accord would give the Bush administration just a fraction of the $700 billion it had requested up front, with half the money subject to a congressional veto, congressional aides said. Under the plan, the Treasury secretary would get $250 billion immediately and could have an additional $100 billion if he certified it was needed. The last $350 billion could be blocked by a vote of Congress under the arrangement, designed to give lawmakers a stronger hand in controlling the unprecedented rescue.
It's good of Bill to choose now to be above the fray.
Appearing on Good Morning America Thursday, Clinton told ABC News' Chris Cuomo that McCain's push to postpone the debate would only be a good political move if both candidates agreed. McCain announced on Wednesday that he would "suspend" his presidential campaign to come to Washington to help negotiate a financial bailout bill
"We know he didn't do it because he's afraid because Sen. McCain wanted more debates," Clinton said, adding that he was "encouraged" by the joint statement from McCain and Sen. Barack Obama.
"You can put it off a few days the problem is it's hard to reschedule those things," Clinton said, "I presume he did that in good faith since I know he wanted -- I remember he asked for more debates to go all around the country and so I don't think we ought to overly parse that."
If the debate moves forward as planned for Friday night, Clinton says "they should be able to talk about this some of the debate because it is a security issue."
And, by the way, you don't have to tell Bill why voters have gone crazy for Palin!
Bill Clinton praised Sarah Palin Wednesday, saying he found the Alaska governor an “appealing person” and her and her family “gutsy, spirited and real.”
“I think that she and her husband and their kids come across gutsy, spirited and real,” he said in an interview to be broadcast Wednesday night. “I have significant disagreements with her about any number of social and economic issues but I find her an appealing person and I think that it’s best to say that Senator McCain looks like he knew what he was doing. He picked somebody who gave him a lot of energy, a lot of support.”
The economy is clearly working in Barack's factor, with McCain's challenge now being to attempt to shift the economic conversation back in his favor. Perhaps the pressure of the vote on a Wall Street bailout gives him the opportunity. This afternoon, in an effort to seize control, McCain has called for a postponement of the first debate scheduled for this Friday night in order to focus on the bailout, which is not likely to be completed for a few days.
McCain, speaking to reporters in New York, said he will return to Washington tomorrow and won't travel to Mississippi, where the debate was scheduled to take place on Sept. 26.
The Republican presidential candidate called on President George W. Bush to convene a meeting of congressional leaders to negotiate a remedy to the financial crisis.
Democratic candidate Barack Obama didn't immediately respond to McCain's comments.
Yesterday, the two candidates were sounding like partners rather than opponents.
In the meantime, the polls have shifted, almost unanimously, in Barack's direction.
