News That Matters*

Bill Black on Lehman Failure

2010-04-21T21:53:00.001-05:00

April 20, 2010 — Bill Black's eye-popping opening statement at House Financial Services hearing on Lehman Bros. failure.

For more see his written statement to the Committee [pdf].

Also some explanation about Liar’s Loan and Aurora Loan Services.

Deconstructing Goldman Sachs

2010-04-16T23:04:00.001-05:00

It is also worth noting that Gretchen Morgenson and Louise Story broke the entire story 4 months ago, and the SEC complaint reads verbatim from the authors' December 24 article.

Lehman Brothers, the cover up

2010-03-15T18:34:00.001-05:00

This is pretty bad but serves as a reminder why Geithner and Bernanke should go:

Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Now, how about the crime bosses from Goldman-Sachs?

Update: More sources on the matter

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Japan acknowledges secret account with the Fed

2010-03-13T21:33:00.001-06:00

TOKYO -(Dow Jones)- The Japanese government's probe into a confidential post- war agreements with the U.S. not only confirmed the existence of a secret deposit that Japan kept with the Federal Reserve for nearly three decades, but also uncovered Tokyo's lax management of information related to its foreign reserves.

Japanese Finance Minister Naoto Kan said Friday the ministry's recent investigation into a 1969 bilateral accord confirmed that the financial settlement Japan made with the U.S. to end its occupation of Okinawa was larger and more complex than previously acknowledged and included a secret non-interest deposit the government and the Bank of Japan kept at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.

The deposit totaled $103 million during much of its life before the two nations agreed to lower it to an unsubstantial sum of $3 million in 1999. The deposit was counted as part of Japan's official foreign reserves and consisted of dollars the Japanese government received from the Okinawans in exchange for yen in 1972 when the U.S. ended its post-war occupation of the southern Japanese island. The non-interest deposit amounted to a de-facto financial payment, as the U.S. was free to manage the money to generate returns. U.S. embassy press officers couldn't be reached for comment.

Read the rest of the article By Yuka Hayashi here.

UK: Spy chips hidden in 2.5 MILLION dustbins

2010-03-05T09:20:00.001-06:00

More than 2.5million homes now have wheelie bins fitted with microchips to weigh their contents.
This is an increase of nearly two-thirds in just a year. The bins, which can be electronically identified and weighed, are designed for 'pay-as-you-throw' rubbish tax schemes.
Under such schemes - which are likely to be hugely unpopular - families who put out more waste will pay higher taxes to their local council.
Disclosure of the rapid spread of chipped bins followed the announcement this week of the first council to bring in a bin tax. Bristol City is presenting its scheme as a reward for recyclers, with cash payments to homes that leave out less rubbish.
The spread of chipped bins marks the revival of a tax idea that the Government appeared to have abandoned last year.
Gordon Brown promised to ditch bin taxes in the spring of 2008, at a point when the unpopularity among voters of fortnightly collections, strict bin rules, and the threat of pay-as-you-throw was at its height.
In January last year, ministers acknowledged that not one council had applied to test pay-as-you-throw schemes.
But yesterday, research by the Big Brother Watch campaign group showed that the use of chipped bins has quietly spread over the past year.

Read more: Daily Mail UK
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Greece could sell islands to cut debt - German MPs

2010-03-04T17:28:00.001-06:00

Josef Schlarmann, a senior member of Merkel's Christian Democrats, and Frank Schaeffler, a finance policy expert in the Free Democrats, were quoted on Thursday as saying that selling islands and other assets could help Greece out of its crisis.

"Those in insolvency have to sell everything they have to pay their creditors," Schlarmann told Bild newspaper. "Greece owns buildings, companies and uninhabited islands, which could all be used for debt redemption."

Greece has launched an austerity programme designed to secure European help to tackle its crippling debt burden. Opinion polls show Germans are overwhelmingly against taxpayers bailing out Greece.

Greece's deficit was 12.7 percent of GDP in 2009, well ahead of the EU's 3 percent of GDP limit.

Merkel will meet Greek Prime Minister George Papandreou in Berlin on Friday.

Read the rest of the article at Reuters.
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Nigel Farage Calling Out Herman van Rompuy

2010-02-25T22:27:00.001-06:00

The head of the European parliament has summoned British Eurosceptic MEP Nigel Farage over his tirade against European Council President Herman van Rompuy.

Parliament President Jerzy Buzek is expected to reprimand Mr Farage at the meeting on Tuesday.

Mr Farage, the leader of the UK Independence Party (UKIP) group in the parliament, could face a suspension.

Mr Farage drew jeers on Wednesday when he told the chamber Mr Van Rompuy had "the charisma of a damp rag".

He also said Mr Van Rompuy had the appearance of a "low-grade bank clerk".

The attack came as Mr Van Rompuy, a former Belgian prime minister, made his maiden appearance in parliament in Brussels.

Read the rest of the article.

$1 Billion Embassy

2010-02-25T22:17:00.001-06:00

Unbelievable! Spend, spend, spend!

U.S. officials announced Tuesday that a light-filled cube by Philadelphia-based architecture firm Kieran Timberlake has won the competition to design the United States' high-security new embassy in London – billed as the greenest and one of the most expensive U.S. diplomatic buildings in the world.

And then this question:

Morning Matters

2010-02-25T08:06:00.001-06:00

New York City public school system has 55,000 teachers. They’ve managed to fire just three in two years for incompetence.
More Blackwater shenanigans.
Obama exercises his SOTU-promised “belt-tightening” with plans for a new, $1 billion U.S. embassy in London.
Toll collectors gone wild!
ABC News reports on the case of Koua Fong Lee, a Laotian immigrant serving eight years in a Minnesota prison for vehicular manslaughter. Lee was driving a 1996 Toyota Camry with acceleration problems.
New Yorkers embrace Bloomberg’s Nanny State. Bill of Rights probably wouldn’t win a popular vote there, either.

Debt Commission

2010-02-19T16:59:00.001-06:00

On Thursday, President Obama signed an executive order creating the "National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform" -- what most people in D.C. are calling the debt commission. Advocates of the commission hope that it will help create a bipartisan solution to a politically charged and difficult issue--much like the Base Closure and Realignment Commission helped the government close military bases following the end of the Cold War.

The commission will have 18 members, and will be charged with creating recommendations for Congress to balance the budget, excluding interest on the debt, by 2015. Any recommendations must be approved by at least 14 of the 18 members. Six members, including at least two non-Democrats, will be appointed by the president, and the rest will be appointed by Congress, with an even split between appointments by the majority and the minority. In theory, Congress will take up the recommendations at the end of the year -- although it's not clear whether or not all of Congress will play along.

Obama has already named the co-chairs of the commission, former Wyoming Republican Senator Alan Simpson, and Erskine Bowles, Bill Clinton's former chief of staff.

At this point, there's no indication that the commission will recommend anything that would affect federal employees. But some federal workforce advocates, wary of past debt-cutting initiatives, said they will keep a watchful eye.

Source.

Great, now the decision is getting pushed into a commission with the purpose of creating recommendations… nicely dodged. Responsibility and Reform will take a break in the mean time.

Audit finds US census wasted millions

2010-02-16T10:17:00.001-06:00

Census preparations wasted millions as temps collected checks for excessive travel, training

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Census Bureau wasted millions of dollars in preparation for its 2010 population count, including thousands of temporary employees who picked up $300 checks without performing work and others who overbilled for travel costs.

Federal investigators caution the excessive charges could multiply once the $15 billion headcount begins in earnest next month unless the agency imposes tighter spending controls, according to excerpts of a forthcoming audit obtained by The Associated Press.

On a positive note, investigators backed the Census Bureau's decision to spend $133 million on its advertising campaign, saying it was appropriate to boost public awareness. The spending included a $2.5 million Super Bowl spot that some Republicans had criticized as wasteful.

The findings by Todd Zinser, the Commerce Department's inspector general, highlight the difficult balancing act for the Census Bureau as it takes on the Herculean task of manually counting the nation's 300 million residents amid a backdrop of record levels of government debt.[…]

Among the waste found by investigators:

--More than 10,000 census employees were paid over $300 apiece to attend training for the massive address-canvassing effort, but they quit or were otherwise let go before they could perform any work. Cost: $3 million.

--Another 5,000 employees collected $300 for the same training, and then worked a single day or less. Cost $1.5 million.

--Twenty-three temporary census employees were paid for car mileage costs at 55 cents a mile, even though the number of miles they reported driving per hour exceeded the total number of hours they actually worked.

--Another 581 employees who spent the majority of their time driving instead of conducting field work also received full mileage reimbursements, which investigators called questionable.

Census regional offices that had mileage costs exceeding their planned budgets included Atlanta; Charlotte, N.C.; Chicago; Dallas; Denver; Detroit; Kansas City and Seattle.

Most of the nation will receive census forms in mid-March, and the Census Bureau is asking residents to return them by April. For those who fail to respond, the government will dispatch some 700,000 temporary workers to visit homes in May.

Obama Making Plans to Use Executive Power

2010-02-15T11:20:00.001-06:00

WASHINGTON — With much of his legislative agenda stalled in Congress, President Obama and his team are preparing an array of actions using his executive power to advance energy, environmental, fiscal and other domestic policy priorities…

Mr. Obama has already decided to create a bipartisan budget commission under his own authority after Congress refused to do so. His administration has signaled that it plans to use its discretion to soften enforcement of the ban on openly gay men and lesbians serving in the military, even as Congress considers repealing the law. And the Environmental Protection Agency is moving forward with possible regulations on heat-trapping gases blamed for climate change, while a bill to cap such emissions languishes in the Senate.

In an effort to demonstrate forward momentum, the White House is also drawing more attention to the sorts of actions taken regularly by cabinet departments without much fanfare. The White House heavily promoted an export initiative announced by Commerce Secretary Gary Locke last week and nearly $1 billion in health care technology grants announced on Friday by Kathleen Sebelius, the health and human services secretary, and Hilda L. Solis, the labor secretary.

White House officials said the increased focus on executive authority reflected a natural evolution from the first year to the second year of any presidency.

[…]

But Mr. Obama has to be careful how he proceeds because he has been critical of both Mr. Clinton’s penchant for expending presidential capital on small-bore initiatives, like school uniforms, and Mr. Bush’s expansive assertions of executive authority, like the secret program of wiretapping without warrants.

Already, Mr. Obama has had to reconcile his campaign-trail criticism of Mr. Bush for excessive use of so-called signing statements to bypass parts of legislation with his own use of such tactics. After a bipartisan furor in Congress last year, Mr. Obama stopped issuing such signing statements, but aides said last month that he still reserves the right to ignore sections of bills he considers unconstitutional if objections have been lodged previously by the executive branch.

NY Times article.

Update1: Obama back in May 2008

Update2: Perhaps Obama’s most notorious Executive Order is the Establishment of the Council of Governors, which creates a body of ten state governors directly appointed by Obama who will work with the federal government to help advance the “synchronization and integration of State and Federal military activities in the United States”.

The subject came up in 2009 when the American Bar Association, has called the practice unconstitutional.

Greece turns on EU critics

2010-02-15T11:12:00.001-06:00

Greece on Friday unleashed a fierce attack on its European Union partners, accusing them of creating a “psychology of looming collapse” a day after they pledged support for the country’s crisis-hit government.

George Papandreou, Greek prime minister, said that, in the eurozone’s first big test, Greece had become “a laboratory animal in the battle between Europe and the markets”.

In a televised address to his cabinet, he criticised EU members for sending “mixed messages about our country . . . that have created a psychology of looming collapse which could be self-fulfilling”.

Mr Papandreou blamed the European Commission for failing to crack down on the previous conservative government’s “criminal record” in falsifying statistics. “This has undermined the responsibility of the European institutions with international markets,” he said.

The professor’s amazing climate change retreat

2010-02-15T11:09:00.001-06:00

Untold billions of pounds have been spent on turning the world green and also on financing the dubious trade in carbon credits.

Countless gallons of aviation fuel have been consumed carrying experts, lobbyists and politicians to apocalyptic conferences on global warming.

Every government on Earth has changed its policy, hundreds of academic institutions, entire school curricula and the priorities of broadcasters and newspapers all over the world have been altered – all to serve the new doctrine that man is overheating the planet and must undertake heroic and costly changes to save the world from drowning as the icecaps melt.

You might have thought that all this was based upon well-founded, highly competent research and that those involved had good reason for their blazing, hot-eyed certainty and their fierce intolerance of dissent.

But, thanks to the row over leaked emails from the Climatic Research Unit, we now learn that this body’s director, Phil Jones, works in a disorganised fashion amid chaos and mess.

World may not be warming, say scientists

2010-02-15T11:07:00.001-06:00

The United Nations climate panel faces a new challenge with scientists casting doubt on its claim that global temperatures are rising inexorably because of human pollution.

In its last assessment the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) said the evidence that the world was warming was “unequivocal”.

It warned that greenhouse gases had already heated the world by 0.7C and that there could be 5C-6C more warming by 2100, with devastating impacts on humanity and wildlife. However, new research, including work by British scientists, is casting doubt on such claims. Some even suggest the world may not be warming much at all.

“The temperature records cannot be relied on as indicators of global change,” said John Christy, professor of atmospheric science at the University of Alabama in Huntsville, a former lead author on the IPCC.

The doubts of Christy and a number of other researchers focus on the thousands of weather stations around the world, which have been used to collect temperature data over the past 150 years.

These stations, they believe, have been seriously compromised by factors such as urbanization, changes in land use and, in many cases, being moved from site to site.

Christy has published research papers looking at these effects in three different regions: east Africa, and the American states of California and Alabama.

“The story is the same for each one,” he said. “The popular data sets show a lot of warming but the apparent temperature rise was actually caused by local factors affecting the weather stations, such as land development.”

[…]

“We concluded, with overwhelming statistical significance, that the IPCC’s climate data are contaminated with surface effects from industrialisation and data quality problems. These add up to a large warming bias,” he said.

Such warnings are supported by a study of US weather stations co-written by Anthony Watts, an American meteorologist and climate change sceptic.

His study, which has not been peer reviewed, is illustrated with photographs of weather stations in locations where their readings are distorted by heat-generating equipment.

Some are next to air- conditioning units or are on waste treatment plants. One of the most infamous shows a weather station next to a waste incinerator.

Watts has also found examples overseas, such as the weather station at Rome airport, which catches the hot exhaust fumes emitted by taxiing jets.

In Britain, a weather station at Manchester airport was built when the surrounding land was mainly fields but is now surrounded by heat-generating buildings.

Terry Mills, professor of applied statistics and econometrics at Loughborough University, looked at the same data as the IPCC. He found that the warming trend it reported over the past 30 years or so was just as likely to be due to random fluctuations as to the impacts of greenhouse gases. Mills’s findings are to be published in Climatic Change, an environmental journal.

“The earth has gone through warming spells like these at least twice before in the last 1,000 years,” he said.

A Times On Line article.

Obama. Taxes. Lies.

2010-02-13T23:58:00.001-06:00

The Agitator has it right on:

Obama, during the 2008 campaign:

“If you are a family making less than $ 250,000 a year……you will not see your taxes go up. Not your capital gains tax, not your payroll tax, not your income Tax, no taxes. Your taxes will not go up.”

Obama in an interview with Bloomberg this week:

President Barack Obama said he is “agnostic” about raising taxes on households making less than $250,000 as part of a broad effort to rein in the budget deficit.

Obama, in a Feb. 9 Oval Office interview, said that a presidential commission on the budget needs to consider all options for reducing the deficit, including tax increases and cuts in spending on entitlement programs such as Social Security and Medicare.

“The whole point of it is to make sure that all ideas are on the table,” the president said in the interview with Bloomberg BusinessWeek, which will appear on newsstands Friday. “So what I want to do is to be completely agnostic, in terms of solutions.”

He makes lying sound so reasonable, doesn’t he?

Morning Matters

2010-02-04T00:44:00.001-06:00

Finally, Pentagon brass support ending ban on gays in the military.
Federal payroll to hit record 2.15 million.
UN climate change panel based claims about disappearing ice on a student dissertation and an article in a mountaineering magazine.
AIG pays out another $100 million in bonuses.
A list of the former lobbyists Obama promised would never work for his administration who are now working for his administration.

U.S. May Lose 824,000 Jobs

2010-02-03T20:22:00.001-06:00

(Bloomberg Multimedia) -- The U.S. may lose 824,000 jobs when the government releases its annual revision to employment data on Feb. 5, showing the labor market was in worse shape during the recession than known at the time.

Click here for a Bloomberg Multimedia interactive visual analysis of the economy’s job losses.

Mind-reading systems could change air security

2010-01-08T11:36:00.001-06:00

From May Way News:

CHICAGO (AP) ... On Thursday, in the wake of the Christmas Day bombing attempt over Detroit, President Barack Obama called on Homeland Security and the Energy Department to develop better screening technology, warning: "In the never-ending race to protect our country, we have to stay one step ahead of a nimble adversary."

The ideas that have been offered by security experts for staying one step ahead include highly sophisticated sensors, more intensive interrogations of travelers by screeners trained in human behavior, and a lifting of the U.S. prohibitions against profiling.

Some of the more unusual ideas are already being tested. Some aren't being given any serious consideration. Many raise troubling questions about civil liberties. All are costly.

"Regulators need to accept that the current approach is outdated," said Philip Baum, editor of the London-based magazine Aviation Security International. "It may have responded to the threats of the 1960s, but it doesn't respond to the threats of the 21st century."

Here's a look at some of the ideas that could shape the future of airline security:

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MIND READERS

The aim of one company that blends high technology and behavioral psychology is hinted at in its name, WeCU - as in "We See You."

The system that Israeli-based WeCU Technologies has devised and is testing in Israel projects images onto airport screens, such as symbols associated with a certain terrorist group or some other image only a would-be terrorist would recognize, said company CEO Ehud Givon.

The logic is that people can't help reacting, even if only subtly, to familiar images that suddenly appear in unfamiliar places. If you strolled through an airport and saw a picture of your mother, Givon explained, you couldn't help but respond.

The reaction could be a darting of the eyes, an increased heartbeat, a nervous twitch or faster breathing, he said.

The WeCU system would use humans to do some of the observing but would rely mostly on hidden cameras or sensors that can detect a slight rise in body temperature and heart rate. Far more sensitive devices under development that can take such measurements from a distance would be incorporated later.

If the sensors picked up a suspicious reaction, the traveler could be pulled out of line for further screening.

"One by one, you can screen out from the flow of people those with specific malicious intent," Givon said.

Some critics have expressed horror at the approach, calling it Orwellian and akin to "brain fingerprinting."

For civil libertarians, attempting to read a person's thoughts comes uncomfortably close to the future world depicted in the movie "Minority Report," where a policeman played by Tom Cruise targets people for "pre-crimes," or merely thinking about breaking the law.

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LIE DETECTORS

One system being studied by Homeland Security is called the Future Attribute Screening Technology, or FAST, and works like a souped-up polygraph.

It would subject people pulled aside for additional screening to a battery of tests, including scans of facial movements and pupil dilation, for signs of deception. Small platforms similar to the balancing boards used in the Nintendo Wii would help detect fidgeting.

At a public demonstration of the system in Boston last year, project manager Robert Burns explained that people who harbor ill will display involuntary physiological reactions that others - such as those who are stressed out for ordinary reasons, such as being late for a plane - don't.

The system could be made to work passively, scanning people as they walk through a security line, according to Burns.

Field testing of the system, which will cost around $20 million to develop, could begin in 2011, The Boston Globe said in a story about the demonstration. Addressing one concern of civil libertarians, Burns said the technology would delete data after each screening.

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THE ISRAELI MODEL

Some say the U.S. should take a page from Israel's book on security.

At Israeli airports, widely considered the most secure in the world, travelers are subjected to probing personal questions as screeners look them straight in the eye for signs of deception. Searches are meticulous, with screeners often scrutinizing every item in a bag, unfolding socks, squeezing toothpaste and flipping through books.

"All must look to Israel and learn from them. This is not a post-911 thing for them. They've been doing this since 1956," said Michael Goldberg, president of New York-based IDO Security Inc., which developed a device that can scan shoes while they are still on people's feet.

Israel also employs profiling: At Ben-Gurion Airport, Jewish Israelis typically pass through smoothly, while others may be taken aside for closer interrogation or even strip searches. Another distinquishing feature of Israeli airports is that they rely on concentric security rings that start miles from terminal buildings.

Rafi Ron, the former security director at Israel's famously tight Ben Gurion International Airport who now is a consultant for Boston's Logan International Airport, says U.S. airports also need to be careful not to overcommit to securing passenger entry points at airports, forgetting about the rest of the field.

"Don't invest all your efforts on the front door and leave the back door open," said Ron.

While many experts agree the United States could adopt some Israeli methods, few believe the overall model would work here, in part because of the sheer number of U.S. airports - more than 400, versus half a dozen in Israel.

Also, the painstaking searches and interrogations would create delays that could bring U.S. air traffic to a standstill. And many Americans would find the often intrusive and intimidating Israeli approach repugnant.

---

PROFILING

Some argue that policies against profiling undermine security.

Baum, who is also managing director of Green Light Limited, a London-based aviation security company, agrees profiling based on race and religion is counterproductive and should be avoided. But he argues that a reluctance to distinguish travelers on other grounds - such as their general appearance or their mannerisms - is not only foolhardy but dangerous.

"When you see a typical family - dressed like a family, acts like a family, interacts with each other like a family ... when their passport details match - then let's get them through," he said. "Stop wasting time that would be much better spent screening the people that we've get more concerns about."

U.S. authorities prohibit profiling of passengers based on ethnicity, religion or national origin. Current procedures call for travelers to be randomly pulled out of line for further screening.

Scrutinizing 80-year-old grandmothers or students because they might be carrying school scissors can defy common sense, Baum said.

"We need to use the human brain - which is the best technology of them all," he said.

But any move to relax prohibitions against profiling in the U.S. would surely trigger fierce resistance, including legal challenges by privacy advocates.

---

PRIVATIZATION

What if security were left to somebody other than the federal government?

Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the Washington-based Cato Institute, a free-market-oriented think tank, says airlines should be allowed take charge of security at airports.

Especially since 9/11, the trend has been toward standardizing security procedures to ensure all airports follow the best practices. But Harper argues that decentralizing the responsibility would result in a mix of approaches - thereby making it harder for terrorists to use a single template in planning attacks.

"Passengers, too, prefer a uniform experience," he said. "But that's not necessarily the best security. It's better if sometimes we take your laptop out, sometimes we'll pat you down. Those are things that will really drive a terrorist batty - as if they're not batty already."

Harper concedes that privatizing airport security is probably wishful thinking, and the idea has not gotten any traction. He acknowledges it would be difficult to allay fears of gaping security holes if it were left to each airline or airport owner to decide its own approach.

Morning Matters

2010-01-07T11:41:00.002-06:00

D.C. Metro train nearly takes out a group of safety inspectors.
Good Dahlia Lithwick piece showing the absurdity of Obama’s decision not to release innocent Gitmo detainees because . . . they’re from Yemen.
Minnesota to begin database tracking patient use of “often abused prescription drugs.” Translation: If you’re a chronic pain patient in Minnesota, your life is about to get more hellish.
Trials of “vaccine” to prevent cocaine high didn’t turn out so well.
http://runningfromcamera.blogspot.com/
Damon Root on incorporating the Second Amendment.
Airport body scanners may violate U.K. child porn laws.
Stephen Hawking on the new human evolution.
Freelance journalist Michael Yon says he was arrested by TSA at a Seattle airport for failing to disclose his income.

With Reason, Hit and Run.
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TSA agent: 'I am God, I'm in charge'

2010-01-07T11:37:00.001-06:00

They are the first line of defense in airport security but two troubling incidents involving TSA agents at LAX are raising concerns.

A TSA agent was arrested on January 3rd in Terminal One at LAX, a source told NBCLA. He had just gotten off duty and was behaving erratically, saying, "I am god, I’m in charge." The agent was arrested.

Meanwhile, a TSA Internal Affairs investigation turned up evidence of LAX TSA agents using drugs at an after-hours party.

TSA officials say a videotape of the party was of poor quality and the employees were not in uniform, but 4 employees were tentatively identified.

All 4 were tested for drugs. One came back positive and that employee was fired.

Source.
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Morning Matters

2009-12-10T10:08:00.000-06:00

Shortly after escalating war in Afghanistan, Obama accepts Nobel Peace Prize, then angers the Norwegians.
Population control and deals at Copenhagen.
A fun rundown of the creeping (and creepy!) U.K. surveillance/nanny state.
Report says gossipy Iraqi tax driver was key source for pre-war intelligence about WMDs.
Obama administration argues that lawsuit against John “Testicle Crusher” Yoo should be dismissed.
Fishing show bloopers. Funnier than you might think.

With Reason, Hit and Run.

Mystery as spiral blue light display hovers above Norway

2009-12-10T09:20:00.001-06:00

From Mail Online

A mysterious light display appearing over Norway last night has left thousands of residents in the north of the country baffled.

Within seconds a giant spiral had covered the entire sky. Then a green-blue beam of light shot out from its centre - lasting for ten to twelve minutes before disappearing completely.

The Norwegian Meteorological Institute was flooded with telephone calls after the light storm - which astronomers have said did not appear to have been connected to the aurora, or Northern Lights, so common in that area of the world.
The mystery deepened tonight as Russia denied it had been conducting missile tests in the area.

Maybe the culprit for this phenomena is the ESCAT. The EISCAT Scientific Association is an international research organisation operating three incoherent scatter radar systems, at 931 MHz, 224 MHz and 500 MHz, in Northern Scandinavia. It is funded and operated by the research councils of Norway, Sweden, Finland, Japan, China, the United Kingdom and Germany (collectively, the EISCAT Associates.)

EISCAT (European Incoherent Scattter) studies the interaction between the Sun and the Earth as revealed by disturbances in the magnetosphere and the ionised parts of the atmosphere (these interactions also give rise to the spectacular aurora, or Northern Lights). The radars are operated in both Common and Special Programme modes, depending on the particular research objective, and Special Programme time is accounted and distributed between the Associates according to rules which are published from time to time.

One EISCAT transmitter site consisting of a UHF system and a VHF system is located close to the city of Tromsø, in Norway, and additional receiver stations are located in Sodankylä, Finland, and Kiruna, Sweden. The EISCAT Headquarters are also located in Kiruna. In 1996 the EISCAT Scientific Association constructed a second incoherent scatter radar facility, the EISCAT Svalbard Radar (ESR), near Longyearbyen on the island of Spitsbergen, far to the North of the Norwegian mainland.

Helpful links:

About EISCAT http://e7.eiscat.se/about...
EISCAT Tromso Norway http://www.eiscat.se:8080...
EISCAT 3D http://www.eiscat3d.se/dr...

Copenhagen climate summit in disarray after 'Danish text' leak

2009-12-08T16:36:00.001-06:00

The so-called Danish text, a secret draft agreement worked on by a group of individuals known as "the circle of commitment" – but understood to include the UK, US and Denmark – has only been shown to a handful of countries since it was finalised this week.
The agreement, leaked to the Guardian, is a departure from the Kyoto protocol's principle that rich nations, which have emitted the bulk of the CO2, should take on firm and binding commitments to reduce greenhouse gases, while poorer nations were not compelled to act. The draft hands effective control of climate change finance to the World Bank; would abandon the Kyoto protocol – the only legally binding treaty that the world has on emissions reductions; and would make any money to help poor countries adapt to climate change dependent on them taking a range of actions.
The document was described last night by one senior diplomat as "a very dangerous document for developing countries. It is a fundamental reworking of the UN balance of obligations. It is to be superimposed without discussion on the talks".

Read the rest of the article.

Morning Matters

2009-12-07T10:24:00.001-06:00

Copenhagen climate summit: 1,200 LIMOS, 140 PRIVATE PLANES...
All about Argentina’s piqueteros, essentially professional, federally-subsidized protesters who shut down the country’s highways. I saw some of this when I spent a month down there a couple years ago. It’s really odd.
Photos of people drinking. (Happy belated Repeal Day!)
His plate might as well say, “Go ahead and rear end me.”
“So I got arrested by the SWAT team last night….” Over a Lego gun.
Clever, but I can’t think it’s all that good for business.
Seattle, Washington State team up to shut down, arrest, prosecute man who started booze home delivery service.
Woman arrested, jailed, charged with felony for recording 4-minute clips of her sister’s birthday party because a copyrighted movie was playing in the background.
Amanda Knox convicted of murder in Italian court despite the absence of any, well . . . evidence.
The man who is apparently going to save health care for all of America nominated his girlfriend to be a U.S. Attorney. So yeah. I can’t see any problem with having our health care system dictated by politicians. No problem at all. I’m sure all decisions will be made based on what’s best for America and stuff. Never on what’s best for the politicians themselves.
FDA mistakes an Apple for an apple.
Scientists wanted to do a study involving men who have never looked at porn–but couldn’t find any.
Will Wilkinson on nationalism, patriotism, and war.
Pot smoker shares in the holiday spirit.

New Jersey Losing $22,000-a-Day With Swap for Bonds Never Sold

2009-12-04T14:12:00.001-06:00

New Jersey taxpayers are being saddled with a bill of about $657,000 a month from Bank of Montreal for an interest-rate swap approved by state officials and linked to bonds that were never sold.
The 11th-largest U.S. state by population, which is cutting expenses to close a $1 billion budget deficit, will pay Canada’s oldest lender $23.5 million. The sum, about the same as the salaries for 113 teachers over three years, will allow it to avoid a $50 million penalty for canceling the contract, which was tied to planned sales of school-construction bonds.
The interest rate swap, an agreement between borrowers to exchange fixed and variable-rate payments on a set amount of debt, was arranged in 2004 to protect taxpayers against rising borrowing costs. The strategy backfired after officials decided against issuing the securities.
“This is a classic case of a strategic error,” said Robert Brooks, a finance professor at the University of Alabama- Tuscaloosa and author of a book on derivatives. “It’s arrogant to believe that you have such a command of the future that you know with certainty what is going to happen.”
The payments, which work out to $21,892 a day for three years,

More at Bloomberg.com

Climategate: it's all unravelling now

2009-12-02T09:24:00.001-06:00

Climategate links from James Delingpole's article in Telegraph UK:

1. Australia’s Senate rejects Emissions Trading Scheme for a second time. Or: so turkeys don’t vote Christmas. Expect to see a lot more of this: politicians starting to become aware their party’s position on AGW is completely out of kilter with the public mood and economic reality. Kevin Rudd’s Emissions Trading Scheme – what Andrew Bolt calls “a $114 billion green tax on everything” – would have wreaked havoc on the coal-dependent Australian economy. That’s why several opposition Liberal frontbenchers resigned rather than vote with the Government on ETS; why Liberal leader Malcolm Turnbull lost his job; and why the Senate voted down the ETS.

2. Danes caught fiddling their carbon credits. (Hat tip: Philip Stott) Carbon trading is the Emperor’s New Clothes of international finance. It was invented by none other than Ken Lay, whose Enron would currently be one of the prime beneficiaries in the global alternative energy market, if it hadn’t been shown to be (nearly) as fraudulent as the current AGW scam. It is a licence to fleece, cheat and rob. Still, jolly embarrassing for the Danes to get caught red handed, what with their hosting a conference shortly in which the world’s leaders will try, straight-faced, to persuade us that carbon emissions trading is the only viable way of defeating ManBearPig.

3. Hats off to The Daily Express – the first British newspaper to make the AGW scam its front page story.

The piece was inspired by another bravura performance by Professor Ian Plimer, the Aussie geologist who argues that climate change has been going on quite naturally, oblivious of human activity, for the last 4,567 million years.

4. BBC finally gets round to reporting – sort of – that Climatic Research Unit at University of East Anglia may have been up to no good. It’s true that this report on their website is so hedged with special pleading for the temporarily suspended director Phil Jones the man might have written it himself. But on the BBC Radio 4 Today programme this morning, I did hear the newsreader reporting it as more than just a routine theft story. Which is a start.

5. Legal actions ahoy! Over the next few weeks, one thing we can be absolutely certain of is concerted efforts by the rich, powerful and influential AGW lobby to squash the Climategate story. We’ve seen this already in the “nothing to see here” response of Dr Rajendra Pachauri, the jet-setting, troll-impersonating railway engineer who runs the IPCC and wants to stop ice being served with water in restaurants. This is why those of us who oppose his scheme to carbon-tax the global economy back to the dark ages must do everything in our power to bring the scandal to a wider audience. One way to do this is law suits.

At Ian Plimer’s lunch talk yesterday, Viscount Monckton talked of at least two in the offing – both by scientists, one British, one Canadian, who intend to pursue the CRU for criminal fraud. Their case, quite simply, is that the scientists implicated in Climategate have gained funding and career advancement by twisting data, hiding evidence, and shutting out dissenters by corrupting the peer-review process. More news on this, as I hear it.

Lord Monckton has written an indispensible summary of the Climategate revelations so far.

6. Watch out Green Dave! The Independent reports on the growing backlash within the party to Cameron’s libtard-wooing greenery. Turning to the Independent for a balanced report on environmental matters is a bit like consulting Der Sturmer for a sensible, insightful view on the Jewish question. Still, for once, the house journal of eco-loonery seems to have got it right and the point made by Tory backbencher David Davis is well made:

“The ferocious determination to impose hair-shirt policies on the public – taxes on holiday flights, or covering our beautiful countryside with wind turbines that look like props from War of the Worlds – is bound to cause a reaction in any democratic country.”

WAR PRESIDENT

2009-12-02T08:36:00.001-06:00

Obama: 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan

Obama: "We Did Not Ask for This Fight"
Bush: "We Did Not Seek This Conflict"

Obama: "New Attacks are Being Plotted as I Speak"
Bush: "At This Moment ... Terrorists are Planning New Attacks"

Obama: "Our Cause is Just, Our Resolve Unwavering"
Bush: "Our Cause is Just, Our Coalition [is] Determined"

Obama: "This Is No Idle Danger, No Hypothetical Threat"
Bush: "The Enemies of Freedom Are Not Idle"

Obama: "We Have No Interest in Occupying Your Country"
Bush: "I Wouldn't Be Happy if I Were Occupied Either"

Ambush:
U.S. troop killed in Afghanistan brings
death toll to 300 so far this year

www.michaelmoore.com

Russian Federal Reserve Chief Killed in Train Attack

2009-12-01T08:32:00.001-06:00

The guardian reports:

Russia was tonight coming to terms with its most deadly terrorist attack in years after investigators confirmed that a powerful improvised bomb caused Friday's devastating train crash in which at least 26 people, including several top government officials, were killed.
The head of Russia's FSB counter-terrorism agency, Alexander Bortnikov, said the bomb, hidden on the railway line between Moscow and St Petersburg, contained the equivalent of 7kg (15.4lb) of TNT. Officers had found "elements of an explosive device", he said.[...]
Among the named dead so far were several senior Kremlin bureaucrats, including Boris Yevstratikov, the head of Russia's Federal Reserve Agency, and Lyudmila Mukhina, a deputy head in the Federal Fishing Agency. A former St Petersburg senator, Sergei Tarasov, also died.

Climategate: Michael Coren with Lord Christopher Monckton

2009-11-28T19:58:00.001-06:00

Bloomberg reporter who sued the Fed, dead

2009-11-28T19:52:00.001-06:00

Nov. 28 (Bloomberg) -- Mark Pittman, the award-winning investigative reporter whose fight to open the Federal Reserve to more scrutiny led Bloomberg News to sue the central bank and win, died Nov. 25 in Yonkers, New York. He was 52.

Pittman suffered from heart-related illnesses. The precise cause of his death wasn’t known, said his friend William Karesh, vice president of the Global Health Program at the Bronx, New York-based Wildlife Conservation Society.

A former police-beat reporter who joined Bloomberg News in 1997, Pittman wrote stories in 2007 predicting the collapse of the banking system. That year, he won the Gerald Loeb Award from the UCLA Anderson School of Management, the highest accolade in financial journalism, for “Wall Street’s Faustian Bargain,” a series of articles on the breakdown of the U.S. mortgage industry.

“He was one of the great financial journalists of our time,” said Joseph Stiglitz, a professor at Columbia University in New York and the winner of the 2001 Nobel Prize for economics. “His death is shocking.”

Continue at: Bloomberg

FDIC Fund Slides into the Red

2009-11-27T14:28:00.001-06:00

Flashback: On January 15, 2009, the head of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Sheila Bair, insisted that deposits in American banks were secure:

“The FDIC will never go broke. We are still running at a surplus, our reserves seem to be quite fit for the projected closure activity that we have,” Bair said.

Bair said the FDIC won’t rule out that in the future they may need to borrow from the Treasury, but added: “At this time it doesn’t look like we will have to do that.”

Flash-forward: As of today, November 27, 2009, the FDIC is not only broke, but $8.2 Billion dollars in the red:

The agency said Tuesday that its reserve used to protect consumers’ deposits when a financial institution goes under is $8.2 billion in the hole.
end of the third quarter, up from the second quarter’s tally of 416. The new figure represents about 7 percent of all U.S. banks.
In the Tuesday release of the FDIC’s quarterly assessment of the nation’s banking landscape, the agency also reported that banks’ cut lending in Q3 by the largest amount since the government began tracking loan activity in 1984, with declines recorded in every loan category, from commercial and real estate mortgages to small business and corporate funding.
Total loan balances of FDIC-insured institutions fell by $210.4 billion, or 2.8 percent, compared to the second quarter of this year, indicating that banks are still reluctant to extend credit which analysts agree is an essential element of an economic recovery. According to the report, large banks were responsible for 75 percent of the decline. It’s these institutions that hold more than half of the industry’s assets and were the primary recipients of the government’s bailout program – funding intended to jumpstart lending.

Why does this whole “we predict everything is going to be ok” situation seem so oddly familiar?

Ron Paul's Fed Audit Bill Passes House Financial Services Committee

2009-11-20T07:46:00.001-06:00

From MarketWatch:

The measure was approved by the House Financial Services Committee as it considered broad bank regulatory reform legislation, and included a package of other measures weakening the Fed's power and capping how much it can lend or guarantee.

The committee is now poised to pass the entire bill and has scheduled its final vote on the legislation for December 1.

Lawmakers also agreed to provisions that would require the Fed to work with other regulators before acting as a lender-of-last-resort.

"If you care about transparency of the Fed, you would allow a look at monetary policy," Paul said. "We're dealing with trillions of dollars that doesn't get audited. There is no reason why the world can't know, eventually, what the Fed is doing."

Paul's measure, which was approved by a vote of 43 to 26, would require the Government Accountability Office to audit the central bank's interest rate policy, agreements with foreign governments, foreign central banks and the International Monetary Fund. It also would permit audits of a roughly $800 billion Fed mortgage-backed securities purchase program, which could grow to $1.25 trillion, Paul said.

The GAO would be instructed to complete a Fed audit within 12 months of passage of the bill.

Morning Matters

2009-11-20T07:40:00.001-06:00

"The deal went through swiftly at a dinner of EU heads..." and now EU has it's first president in Herman Van Rompuy
Geithner Under Fire on Economy
Obama rewards big donors with plum jobs overseas
For the Church of Oprah, the apocalypse is coming in 2011, not 2012.

Morning Links

2009-11-17T10:41:00.001-06:00

White House now claiming stimulus is creating jobs in Congressional districts that don’t exist.
Chinese officials detain U.S. journalist for t-shirt Chinese feared could be offensive to U.S. president. Of course, before we get too hard on the Chinese, we should remember that we do that here, too.
This is one brave Russian cop.
Just under a million dollars in stimulus money headed to two drug task forces in Alabama. Because more jailed drug offenders is just what Alabama’s economy needs.
The only thing surprising about this is how many people seem to be surprised by it.
Million hit by "plague worse than swine flu"

Airport rules changed

2009-11-11T09:32:00.001-06:00

An angry aide to Rep. Ron Paul, an iPhone and $4,700 in cash have forced the Transportation Security Administration to quietly issue two new rules telling its airport screeners they can only conduct searches related to airplane safety.

In response, the American Civil Liberties Union is dropping its lawsuit on behalf of Steve Bierfeldt, the man who was detained in March and who recorded the confrontation on his iPhone as TSA and local police officers spent half an hour demanding answers as to why he was carrying the money through Lambert-St. Louis International Airport.

The new rules, issuedin September and October, tell officers "screening may not be conducted to detect evidence of crimes unrelated to transportation security" and that large amounts of cash don't qualify as suspicious for purposes of safety.

"We had been hearing of so many reports of TSA screeners engaging in wide-ranging fishing expeditions for illegal activities," said Ben Wizner, a staff lawyer for the ACLU, pointing to reports of officers scanning pill-bottle labels to see whether the passenger was the person who obtained the prescription as one example.

He said screeners get a narrow exception to the Fourth Amendment, which prohibits unreasonable searches, strictly to keep weapons and explosives off planes, not to help police enforce other laws.

Article from Washington Times

Morning Matters

2009-11-11T09:29:00.001-06:00

NY Times reports that Blackwater executives approved $1 million in bribes to buy support from Iraqi officials after the firm's employees killed 17 Iraqi civilians.
American Medical Association urges the federal government to reclassify marijuana, allowing clinical trials on medical cannabis.
In addition to bringing coerced new business to the health insurance companies, Obamacare also likely to net billions for the pharmaceutical industry. Thank god we’re ridding the health care industry of evil corporate profit mongering! Instead, the government is just going to give private corporations taxpayer money directly. Much better.
Congress may tell ISPs to block access to illegal websites.

Careful about criticizing N.J. school board officials

2009-11-09T19:11:00.001-06:00

New Jersey newspapers report high school administrators hired despite having fake online degrees.The School Board's respond:

The Freehold School Board has subpoenaed New Jersey Online to identify several citizens who chimed in to discuss stories published in the Newark Star Ledger and New Jersey Online about several high administrators who got fake degrees from an online diploma mill, and hence received higher pay. After New Jersey Online notified its subscribers of the subpoena, the ACLU of New Jersey and Freehold attorney Stuart J. Moskovitz stepped in to represent various anonymous posters, and NJ.com has refused to furnish identifying information about the posters.

Asbury Park Press:

Howell representative William Bruno on the school board said he was in favor of the Aug. 31 subpoena.

“If they have nothing to hide, what’s the problem?” Bruno said.

Story from Overlawyered.

Corruption, Graft, Conspiracy and Fraud

2009-10-30T10:13:00.001-05:00

A leaked document shows that House ethics investigators are probing the activities of nearly three dozen lawmakers — an ethical dust storm that will empower the Republicans and could imperil efforts to get health care reform through the House next week.

The House Ethics Committee said Thursday that it was opening two new investigations — one into the foreclosure scandal of Rep. Laura Richardson (D-Calif.) and one involving financial questions about Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) and her husband.

But shortly after the committee met, chairs Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) and Jo Bonner (R-Ala.) interrupted proceedings on the House floor to say that an internal document on secret committee proceedings had been leaked to the Washington Post — and that it would name the names of many other members who had drawn the attention of either the committee or the Office of Congressional Ethics.
According to the Post, the document identifies more than 30 House members.
Much of the investigative interest swirls around lawmakers' relationship with the PMA Group, a now-defunct lobbying firm that pumped campaign contributions to members and obtained earmarks for its defense clients.

Democratic Reps. Jack Murtha (D-Pa.) and Peter Visclosky (Ind.) had been implicated in the PMA case previously, but the leaked document showed that investigators are also interested in Reps. James Moran Jr. (D-Va.), Norm Dicks (D-Wash.), Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), Bill Young (R-Fla.) and Todd Tiahrt (R-Kan.), according to the Post.

The Department of Justice is also looking into allegations that Paul Magliocchetti, a former Appropriations Committee staffer and founder of PMA, used “straw men” donors to improperly funnel campaign to Murtha and the other Appropriations Committee members.

Visclosky and his former chief of staff, Charles Brimmer, have been served with subpoenas in the FBI's criminal probe into PMA’s activities, and FBI agents raided a Pennsylvania defense contractor with close ties to Murtha earlier this year.
In addition, the ethics committee document said the panel had attempted to look into the case of Rep. Alan Mollohan (D-W.Va.) but had been asked to back off by the Justice Department, the Post reported. Mollohan attracted DOJ attention in 2006 for steering tens of millions of dollars in earmarks to political allies and campaign contributors, including a former aide involved in the lawmaker’s lucrative real-estate investments. While Mollohan has never been charged with any wrongdoing, he stepped down from his post as ranking member of the ethics committee.

In a statement, Lofgren and Bonner said the document given to the Post was on the personal computer of a former panel aide, who placed it on a file-sharing system, when it was “exposed to unauthorized and inappropriate access by persons outside the Committee.”

The chairs also said that "no inference" should be made about the guilt of any of the lawmakers identified in the document, saying that the committee has "dozens" of matters before it any given time, and that some are simply requests for information rather than actual investigations.

Still, Republicans — who have pummeled Pelosi for not doing more to "drain the swamp," as she promised in 2006 — pounced on the suggestion that the Democrats' ethics problems may be much wider than previously reported.

"Clearly the Democrats were not serious when they said they would clean up the House of Representatives,” said Rep. Scott Garrett (R-N.J.). “They promised the American people honesty, transparency, and accountability, and yet they have failed to deliver by adequately addressing [ethics] issues.”

Read the rest of the article.

Update: The List, so far of the USUAL SUSPECTS under Investigation:

Charlie Rangel D-NY
Maxine Waters D-CA
Laura Richardson D-CA
Jack Murtha D-PA
Peter Visclosky D-IN
James Moran Jr. D-VA
Norm Dicks D-WA
Marcy Kaptur D-OH
Bill Young R-FL
Todd Tiahrt R-KS

US Quietly Slips Funds Into Military Bill to Pay Off Taliban $1.3 billion

2009-10-29T09:19:00.001-05:00

$1.3 Billion Authorized for "Re-Integration" Program

The $680 billion US military funding bill that passed late last week saw its share of controversy over pet projects, attempts to block the Guantanamo Bay closure, and new curbs on aid to Pakistan.

Less talked about however was the $1.3 billion clause quietly slipped into the bill to support the “re-integration into Afghan society” of those Taliban which renounce violence.

Source.

Morning Matters

2009-10-27T22:32:00.001-05:00

A black hole in every household.
Nothing is funny anymore. And you should apologize for laughing.
George Will almost comes out for legalization of marijuana.
It’s in the way that you Us it.
Good debunking of the latest British moral panic over sex trafficking.
Canadian police accused of posing as protesters, encouraging riots during 2007 North American Leaders Summit in Quebec.

Carnivores rule.

Note to plaintiff’s attorneys: Killing baseball probably isn’t going to help your public image problem.

XKCD commemorates the demise of GeoCities.

Stimulus money has been going to companies already under investigation for defrauding the federal government.

U.N. investigating whether NYC’s high rents are a human rights violation. Seriously.

Man mistakenly ends up on state sex offender list.

With Reason, Hit and Run.

Treasuries Fall as U.S. Begins Record $123 Billion Note Sales

2009-10-26T15:07:00.001-05:00

Oct. 26 (Bloomberg) -- Treasuries fell, with 10-year note yields touching their highest level in two months, as the U.S. began to sell a record $123 billion of notes to fund its stimulus program and record deficits.
Government securities declined for a fourth day as the Treasury sold of $7 billion of five-year Treasury Inflation Protected Securities at a yield of 0.769 percent. The offering, which drew higher-than-average demand, will be followed by three auctions of fixed-rate notes this week.
“We are still at relatively low yield levels, which in front of so much supply and an economy that seems to be starting to turn the corner, don’t seem justified,” said Ajay Rajadhyaksha, head of U.S. fixed-income strategy in New York at Barclays Plc, one of the 18 primary dealers required to bid at Treasury auctions.
The yield on the 10-year note increased seven basis points, or 0.07 percentage point, to 3.55 percent at 2:48 p.m. in New York, according to BGCantor Market Data. The yield touched 3.58 percent, the highest level since Aug. 24. The 3.625 percent security maturing in August 2019 fell 18/32, or $5.63 per $1,000 face amount, to 100 19/32.
“The momentum suggests we could move higher in yields,” said David Ader, head of U.S. government bond strategy in Stamford, Connecticut, at CRT Capital Group LLC. “If we break 3.52 percent, then the next projection is 3.76 percent. Resistance is at 3.28 percent.”
The 10-year yield will increase to 3.56 percent by year- end, according to the average forecast of analysts in a Bloomberg survey, with the most recent estimates given the heaviest weightings.

http://www.bloomberg.com/...

Morning Matters

2009-10-26T12:01:00.001-05:00

The president declares swine flu a national emergency as Americans line up for scarce vaccines.
Two bombs in Baghdad kill at least 160 people.
Stimulus money just might be going to corrupt companies.
Dallas cops ticket drivers for not speaking English.

Pelosi: 'Are You Serious?'

2009-10-25T08:38:00.001-05:00

When CNSNews.com asked House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) on Thursday where the Constitution authorized Congress to order Americans to buy health insurance--a mandate included in both the House and Senate versions of the health care bill--Pelosi dismissed the question by saying: “Are you serious? Are you serious?”

Pelosi's press secretary later responded to written follow-up questions from CNSNews.com by emailing CNSNews.com a press release on the “Constitutionality of Health Insurance Reform,” that argues that Congress derives the authority to mandate that people purchase health insurance from its constitutional power to regulate interstate commerce.
[...]
Currently, each of the five health care overhaul proposals being considered in Congress would command every American adult to buy health insurance. Any person defying this mandate would be required to pay a penalty to the Internal Revenue Service.

In 1994, when the health care reform plan then being advanced by President Clinton called for mandating that all Americans buy health insurance, the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office studed the issue and concluded:

“The government has never required people to buy any good or service as a condition of lawful residence in the United States. An individual mandate would have two features that, in combination, would make it unique. First, it would impose a duty on individuals as members of society. Second, it would require people to purchase a specific service that would be heavily regulated by the federal government.”

Read the article here.

EU Prepares to Reject a Blair Presidency

2009-10-22T18:55:00.001-05:00

BRUSSELS -- The odds against former British Prime Minister Tony Blair becoming the first president of the European Union appear to have lengthened over the past month with a series of blows to his candidacy at home and abroad.
Mr. Blair remains the most prominent figure linked by diplomats to the leadership post which, together with the post of a new EU foreign policy chief, will be created by the Lisbon Treaty. The treaty is designed to speed up decision making in the 27-nation grouping and increase its influence in world affairs.
But the winds have been blowing against Mr. Blair in recent weeks, with EU governments coming out in increasing numbers -- though sometimes in code -- suggesting they oppose Mr. Blair for the job.
Formal negotiations on who should fill the top job are unlikely to begin until at least next month, European officials say, because the treaty has been held up awaiting ratification by the Czech Republic.

Read the article here

Morning Matters

2009-10-19T11:05:00.001-05:00

Obama formalizes policy calling the feds off of medical marijuana dispensaries. We’ll see how the policy works in practice, but Obama deserves some credit, here.
Health care negotiations: No one knows what goes on behind closed doors.
A suicide bombing in Iran kills dozens; the Iranian authorities blame the U.S., the U.K., and Pakistan.
The coming crackdown on insider trading.
Now available: the golf cart tax credit.
Connecticut Democrats warn: Our opponent favors simulated necrophilia.
Ayn Rand inspires . . . the fashion world?

Senate Democrats Promise to Keep Health-Care Costs Down, Except When They Won't

2009-10-16T11:46:00.001-05:00

Slate's John Dickerson links to this story in The Hill with the tweet: "At the same time Congress is promising to keep health care costs down, they're undoing past promises to keep costs down." It's true! From The Hill:

The Senate is looking to quickly move legislation costing more than $200 billion over 10 years that would adjust Medicare reimbursement rates for doctors, but it does not plan to pay for the bill with offsetting spending cuts or tax increases.

The AP explains the strategy behind this move:

By creating a two-bill approach, Democrats intend to claim the more comprehensive health care measure meets President Barack Obama's conditions — that it will neither add to deficits nor exceed $900 billion in costs over 10 years.

Source Reason, Hit and Run.

Ron Paul vs. Lindsey Graham

2009-10-16T10:16:00.001-05:00

Texas Republican Rep. Ron Paul took to the cable networks today to jab back at South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham, who over the weekend said he would not sit back and watch the Texan “hijack” the GOP with his brand of Republicanism.
“My first reaction would be, ‘What does he have against the Constitution?’ And the supporters I have support me because I’m a traditional conservative and I support the Constitution,” Paul told CNN in an interview tonight.
He cited Graham’s support of TARP funds and the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and “all the big government things” as examples of why his supporters feel lukewarm about the GOP. “These are the things that constitutional conservatives don’t support,” he said.
The spat was sparked during a contentious Oct. 12 town hall meeting in Greenville, S.C., when Graham engaged in verbal combat with constituents who questioned his GOP credentials and urged him to be a little more like Paul. (Click here to watch the video.)
“I’m going to grow this party. I’m not going to let it be hijacked by Ron Paul,” Graham said to jeers. One heckler called out: “You’re the one that hijacked it!”
Another constituent questioned the senator’s adherence to constitutional principles, and aligned herself with the Constitution Party “because I’m a constitutionalist, senator, and you are not.” In his reply, Graham said that “Ron Paul’s run for president like 39 times. He keeps losing.”
Graham argued that if the GOP only caters to one wing of the party they will become a permanent minority. “If you want 30 pure Republicans who think exactly like you, [Senate Majority Leader] Harry Reid would say ‘Send them on’… he’ll run right over us. And this country that we know, you’re going to turn over to the most liberal people in the world because you can’t believe someone disagrees with you.”
Their war of words is emblematic of larger battles brewing within the Republican Party over how best to heal the electoral wounds suffered in 2006 and 2008, rebrand itself, and build a new generation of party leaders.
Paul adheres to a strict political philosophy on economic and foreign policy that’s helped him carve out a role as party outsider. It also allowed him to build a small but fierce political following during the presidential campaign that tapped in to voter anger on issues ranging from the war in Iraq to the Wall Street meltdown.

Read the rest at Wall Street Journal blog.

Reason.tv on the Whole Foods Health Plan

2009-10-16T10:12:00.001-05:00

Don't you just love peace!

2009-10-13T13:58:00.001-05:00

WASHINGTON - The Pentagon is speeding up delivery of a colossal bomb designed to destroy hidden weapons bunkers buried underground and shielded by 10,000 pounds of reinforced concrete.

Call it Plan B for dealing with Iran, which recently revealed a long-suspected nuclear site deep inside a mountain near the holy city of Qom.

The 15-ton behemoth — called the "massive ordnance penetrator," or MOP — will be the largest non-nuclear bomb in the U.S. arsenal and will carry 5,300 pounds of explosives. The bomb is about 10 times more powerful than the weapon it is designed to replace.

Source.

_______________________________________________________________

Morning Matters

2009-10-12T08:19:00.001-05:00

Obama’s DOJ to review policy requiring defendants who plead guilty to waive any right to later request DNA testing. Like Johnathan Adler (see link), I didn’t know the Bush administration had this policy, either. Seems like a pretty bad idea.
The Nobel prize in economics goes to Ben Bernanke Elinor Ostrom and Oliver Williamson.
Sheriff Joe Arpaio loses some of his immigration enforcement powers.
Local governments rescind or postpone smoking bans.
Police chief ordered to turn over gun after shooting a family’s dog last month.
USDA uses federal regs aimed at preventing animal exploitation to harass Colorado rescue operation because their dog sleeps in the organization’s display window. Looks like it’s only a matter of a $40 fee and license, but it seems pretty petty.
Iran hands down death sentences to three of last summer’s protesters.
Julian Sanchez video-fisks Fox News coverage of the PATRIOT Act renewal. Also, “fisking video” sounds like something dirty.
Steve Moore profiles Whole Foods CEO John Mackey.
This is pretty cool: An iPhone at that plots and profiles traffic fatalities in your area.

With Reason, Hit and Run
_______________________________________________________________

Gold prices surge

2009-10-08T00:04:00.001-05:00

Gold prices continued to surge on Wednesday, hitting a fresh record close to $1,050 a troy ounce as investors bet that trading momentum would push the precious metal still higher.
Barclays Capital said gold prices, which have risen 10.3 per cent since the end of August, could run to as high as $1,500 an ounce if previous technical trading patterns were extrapolated.
“We believe gold has a significant upside potential into 2010,” the bank said, adding current prices “were off the charts”. In spite of a 40 per cent rally in gold prices since Lehman Brothers collapsed a year ago, few traders appeared to be taking profits or betting on a price fall.
“The selling is not materialising,” said James Steel, a precious metal analyst at HSBC in New York, echoing a view held by other analysts and traders.
Jon Spall, gold specialist at Barclays Capital in London, added: “No one is saying ‘this is enough, let’s sell’.”
The reluctance to sell is in spite of mounting worries about a sharp drop in jewellery demand in India – the world’s largest buyer of gold – Turkey, United Arab Emirates and Italy.
Jim Rogers, the Singapore-based investor who has been one of the biggest bulls during this decade’s commodities rally, said that he would refrain from buying gold at a record high, but added that he was not betting against a drop in prices.
He told Reuters: “I cannot say what will happen to gold tomorrow. But if you ask me whether gold will go up in the long term... would say yes.”

Read the rest of the article.

Dylan Ratigan: Corporate Communism - Video

2009-10-07T23:59:00.001-05:00

http://www.youtube.com/wa...

WSJ: Ron Paul Calls for Delay in Bernanke Confirmation

2009-10-07T23:57:00.001-05:00

In a letter they will send to Senate Banking Committee Chairman Christopher Dodd this afternoon, Reps. Ron Paul (R., Tex.) and Alan Grayson (D., Fla.) will ask that the Senate hold off on Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke’s confirmation hearing until the central bank releases more information about its rescues. ( Read the full letter.)
It is up to the Senate and not the House to confirm the Fed chairman, and the congressmen’s letter might not carry much weight in the neighboring chamber. Still, it is a sign of the potentially hostile environment Mr. Bernanke could face when he returns to Congress in the weeks ahead to defend his policies in confirmation hearings. Mr. Paul has won broad support in the House for a bill that would subject the Fed to audits by Congress’s Government Accountability Office.
The lawmakers offer a long list of disclosure demands, including a call for more information on which financial firms have received emergency Fed loans in the past year and transcripts of Federal Open Market Committee meetings up to June 2009. Transcripts are released with a five year league. The Fed has resisted calls for information about firms receiving its loans for fear it will stigmatize them in markets and make them and others reluctant to turn to the central bank in a time of crisis.
Both congressmen have been sharp critics of the Fed.

Read the rest of the article

What you don't know can hurt you

2009-10-06T15:54:00.001-05:00

» House energy and global warming bill, passed June 26, 2009. 1,200 pages. Available online 15 hours before vote.

» $789 billion stimulus bill, passed Feb. 14, 2009. 1,100 pages. Available online 13 hours before debate.

» $700 billion financial sector rescue package, passed Oct. 3, 2008. 169 pages. Available online 29 hours before vote.

» USA Patriot domestic surveillance bill, passed Oct. 23, 2001. Unavailable to the public before debate.

The fight against posting bills online

2009-10-06T15:52:00.001-05:00

As Congress lurches closer to a decision on an enormous overhaul of the American health care system, pressure is mounting on legislative leaders to make the final bill available online for citizens to read before a vote.
Lawmakers were given just hours to examine the $789 billion stimulus plan, sweeping climate-change legislation and a $700 billion bailout package before final votes.
While most Americans normally ignore parliamentary detail, with health care looming, voters are suddenly paying attention. The Senate is expected to vote on a health bill in the weeks to come, representing months of work and stretching to hundreds of pages. And as of now, there is no assurance that members of the public, or even the senators themselves, will be given the chance to read the legislation before a vote.
"The American people are now suspicious of not only the lawmakers, but the process they hide behind to do their work," said Michael Franc, president of government relations for the Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank.
At town hall meetings across the country this past summer, the main topic was health care, but there was a strong undercurrent of anger over the way Congress rushed through passage of the stimulus, global warming and bank bailout bills without seeming to understand the consequences. The stimulus bill, for example, was 1,100 pages long and made available to Congress and the public just 13 hours before lawmakers voted on it. The bill has failed to provide the promised help to the job market, and there was outrage when it was discovered that the legislation included an amendment allowing American International Group, a bailout recipient, to give out millions in employee bonuses.
"If someone had a chance to look at the bill, they would have found that out," said Lisa Rosenberg, who lobbies Congress on behalf of the Sunlight Foundation to bring more transparency to government.
The foundation has begun an effort to get Congress to post bills online, for all to see, 72 hours before lawmakers vote on them.
"It would give the public a chance to really digest and understand what is in the bill," Rosenberg said, "and communicate whether that is a good or a bad thing while there is still time to fix it."
Congress. Reps. Brian Baird, D-Wash., and Greg Walden, R-Ore., are circulating a petition among House lawmakers that would force a vote on the 72-hour rule.
Nearly every Republican has signed on, but the Democratic leadership is unwilling to cede control over when bills are brought to the floor for votes and are discouraging their rank and file from signing the petition. Senate Democrats voted down a similar measure last week for the health care bill.

Read the rest of the article.

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Gold hits record high on 'plan' to ditch dollar

2009-10-06T13:27:00.001-05:00

LONDON (AFP) – The price of gold struck an all-time high at 1,038.65 dollars an ounce here on Tuesday as the dollar fell on a reported plan by Gulf states to stop using the greenback for oil trading.

Gold reached the level in late afternoon trade on the London Bullion Market, beating the previous record high of 1,032.70 dollars an ounce struck in March, 2008.

"Gold prices hit an all-time high as the dollar weakens," said Barclays Capital precious metals analyst Suki Cooper.

"The dollar weakness appears to be related to ... (reported) secret talks about oil being priced in a basket of currencies including gold rather than the dollar, which has added to concerns about the future role of the dollar in international financial markets."

The dollar's future as the world's top currency was thrown into doubt on Tuesday as a report said Arab states had launched secret moves with China and Russia to stop using the greenback for oil trading...

Article from yahoo news.
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Morning Matters

2009-10-05T11:53:00.001-05:00

Democrats ponder a second stimulus.
So if you’re a big government-loving, what do you do when the regulators come for the farmers’ markets?
The Supreme Court's new session starts today.
Iran agrees to a nuclear inspection.
A surprise attack in Afghanistan kills 10.
Concessions in hand, Irish voters embrace the European Union's Lisbon Treaty.
Police arrest anarchists for unlawful tweeting.
Schools in New York City crack down on bake sales.
And about halfway through, Roman Polanski offers you a glass of wine.

With Reason, Hit and Run
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Defense Pork

2009-10-05T11:30:00.001-05:00

From a USA Today editorial:

"Absolutely, we need earmark reform. And when I'm president, I will go line by line to make sure that we are not spending money unwisely."
Thus spoke candidate Barack Obama in last fall's first presidential debate [...]
Since reaching the White House, however, Obama's zeal for tackling congressional add-ons has been lukewarm, at best. Early in his presidency, he signed a pork-laden spending bill left over from the previous year but vowed to be more vigilant going forward. Now, his administration is lauding a $636 billion defense spending bill, for the fiscal year that began Thursday, that includes $2.7 billion in earmarks.

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Bernanke, Paulson misled public on bailouts

2009-10-05T11:26:00.001-05:00

Federal Reserve Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and former Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson Jr. misled the public about the financial weakness of Bank of America and other early recipients of the government's $700 billion Wall Street bailout, creating "unrealistic expectations" about the companies and damaging the program's credibility, according to a report by the program's independent watchdog.
The federal government last October loaned Bank of America and eight other "healthy" financial institutions a total of $125 billion - the initial payout from the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP - in an attempt to avoid a series of major bank collapses that would push the sputtering economy into a free fall or depression.
The rationale for giving money to stable banks and not failing ones, regulators said, was that such institutions would be better able to lend money and thus unfreeze tight credit markets - a major factor in last year's Wall Street losses.
But an audit released Monday by TARP Special Inspector General Neil Barofsky says senior government officials and Wall Street regulators, including Mr. Bernanke and Mr. Paulson, had "affirmative concerns" that several of the nine institutions were financially shaky. [...]

From Washington Times.

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Government report questions rescue claims

2009-10-05T11:24:00.001-05:00

WASHINGTON (AP) - The credibility of the government's $700 billion financial rescue program was damaged by claims a year ago that all of the initial banks receiving support were healthy, a new report contends.

Special Inspector General Neil Barofsky generally found that the government had acted properly in October 2008 as it scrambled to implement the Troubled Asset Relief Program to avert the collapse of the U.S. financial system.

But the report said that then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and other officials were wrong to contend at an Oct. 14 press conference that all nine institutions receiving the first round of support - $125 billion - were sound.

"These are healthy institutions, and they have taken this step for the good of the economy," Paulson had declared at the time.

Barofsky said that the fact that Citigroup Inc. and Bank of America Corp. soon required billions in additional assistance highlighted the inaccuracy of that claim and raised questions about the whole effort. In addition, Merrill Lynch, which was also in the original nine, was in the process of being acquired by Bank of America because of its weakening financial position.

"Statements that are less than careful or forthright - like those made in this case - may ultimately undermine the public's understanding and support," the report said. "This loss of public support could damage the government's credibility and have long-term unintended consequences that actually hamper the government's ability to respond to crises."

In announcing the $125 billion in support to the nine institutions, Paulson had said that by building up the capital reserves of these healthy institutions, it would allow them to resume normal lending to businesses and consumers and help stabilize the financial system.

Read the article here.

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Matters

2009-09-13T12:38:00.002-05:00

Checking Obama’s math on the number of people without health insurance.

Wonderful photo collection from Afghanistan and Nepal.

We don’t even have a health care plan yet and the anti-fact advocates are already figuring out how to use it to police what you eat.

9/11 didn’t change everything. And that’s a good thing.

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Tea Party March on DC Draws Somewhere between 2 million and 60,000 People

2009-09-13T12:34:00.001-05:00

...

Press accounts are pegging the crowd at somewhere between (get this) 60,000 (ABC News) and and "in excess of 75,000" (local officials) 1.2 million (local police agency estimates) and 2 million people (ABC News again, Fox News, The Daily Mail, and various other outlets).

I confess to having no way of checking or even evaluating these stats, but from my view of the proceedings (and having attended various events over the years), my sense is that 60,000 is way low and 2 million a stretch by a huge factor. Crowd counts are notoriously difficult and always pumped up or down for various reasons.

That said, the three takeaways I had from the event comport with Welch's from yesterday's post: First, the crowd was truly huge. Second, the crowd was from all over the place (both geographically and ideologically). And third, the crowd, well-behaved and stunningly normal in the main, was genuinely pissed off at out of control spending and government policies. "Stop spending," was the basic answer to any questions about what Congress and the president should do come tomorrow. Throw the bums of either party out come next fall was the second most-common answer.

From Reason, Hit and Run.
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The Man Who Saved a Billion Lives

2009-09-13T12:16:00.001-05:00

Norman Borlaug has died.

He justly lived a long life. But his death won’t get a thousandth of the coverage, say, Michael Jackson’s did. And it won’t get a tenth of the coverage someone like Paul Ehrlich’s will.

All Borlaug did was invent modern high-yield agriculture, then teach it to the world. He likely saved a billion people from starving to death in India and Pakistan alone.

He was a great man. If one way of measuring a life is by the number of other lives a man saved or bettered, Borlaug was certainly one of the greatest human beings who ever lived.

Rest in peace.

From Radley Balko's blog.

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A Good First Step on Cuba

2009-09-08T07:33:00.001-05:00

The Washington Post reports :

The Treasury Department formally lifted nearly all U.S. restrictions on family travel to Cuba on Thursday, along with limits on how much money families can send to relatives on the island.

The department also eased regulations prohibiting U.S. telecommunications and satellite linkages between the United States and Cuba and licensing requirements for visitors engaged in agricultural and medical sales.

President Obama first announced most of the changes in April as part of a general opening that he said would allow Americans to reach out to the Cuban people, and he ordered Cabinet departments to take steps to implement the changes. Since then, the administration has also resumed a regular dialogue with the Cuban government on immigration issues and said it would move toward a resumption of direct mail service between the two countries.

What's the Matter?

2009-09-07T14:36:00.002-05:00

Obama issues 10 more waivers on his lobbying ban. So what was the point of the ban in the first place?
Some well-earned shame for Conde Nast.
Al Franken has an odd, but strangely impressive, skill.
From The Agitator: So for consistency’s sake, Michael Moore’s new film won’t be advertised, marketed, or otherwise promoted by crass capitalist machinations, right? And I assume we’ll all be able to see it for free?
The White House green jobs adviser Van Jones stepped down.

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What Fed-Audit Legislation Would Mean

2009-09-01T20:50:00.003-05:00

Hoping for a successful vote on HR 1207, a good article at Wall Street Journal on what the legislation could mean:

Overturning current limits on government audits of the Federal Reserve has become a key goal of the central bank's critics inside and outside Congress.

House lawmakers are expected to seek a comprehensive audit of the Federal Reserve system by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of Congress, as part of a broader overhaul of financial regulation this fall. But the precise scope of such an audit remains undetermined.

The move follows a proposal by Rep. Ron Paul (R., Texas), endorsed by two-thirds of the House, that would require the GAO to conduct an audit by the end of 2010. It would override—for at least that period—a law that shields the Fed's monetary-policy decisions from GAO inquiries.

Rep. Barney Frank, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, is in talks with Mr. Paul on the details of the bill, and has said he expects some version to pass the House this fall. But Mr. Frank said he would ensure the Fed's independence in setting interest rates and other aspects of monetary policy...
What would Ron Paul's bill do?
The Federal Reserve Transparency Act of 2009, H.R. 1207, simply directs the comptroller general (who heads the GAO) to complete an audit of the Fed system—the Board and regional banks—before the end of 2010 and report his findings to Congress.

Mr. Paul, in an interview, said he expects the audit to detail who the Fed lends to, how much it lends and what agreements it has with foreign central banks and financing organizations. Mr. Paul said he wants the Fed to be audited at least annually.

Read the entire article at WSJ.

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Morning Matters

2009-09-01T07:41:00.002-05:00

Here’s a good piece the valuable work the ACLU has done it is campaign against government abuse in the war on terror.
Consumer Reports turns snitch. Also, according to the CEI press release, the EPA is going to make shower heads even more low-flo?
Dealers still waiting for "clunker" cash.
Wrongly convicted man speaks from the grave.
So near as I can tell, this Alternet piece doesn’t really have any specific criticisms of Whole Foods other than that it’s “too big,” which the author states without any supporting evidence is “unsustainable.” Yeah. I’m not convinced.
Montana Supreme Court could make assisted suicide a right protected by the state's constitution.
Mark Cuban asks court to fine SEC for bringing unwarranted insider trading charges against him.
Federal regulators take aim at garage sales, Goodwill, Salvation Army reselling recalled items.
Paris cracks down on public urination.

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Morning Matters

2009-08-31T10:06:00.002-05:00

Dick Cheney says he might not cooperate with the Justice Department's torture investigation.
More reports of vote fraud emerge in Afghanistan.
Jay Rockefeller's staff is quietly preparing a bill that "appears to permit the president to seize temporary control of private-sector networks during a so-called cybersecurity emergency."
Argentina decriminalizes marijuana.
City of Memphis to cops: no tasers.
Remember the sloppily written "for the children" toy testing law that went into effect last year? After $1 million lobbying third-party safety tests are not required for Mattel

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Fed makes $14bn profit on crisis loans

2009-08-31T09:59:00.001-05:00

The Federal Reserve has made a $14bn profit on loan programmes that have provided hundreds of billions of dollars in liquidity to the financial system since the start of the crisis two years ago, according to Fed officials.
The internal estimate is based on the difference between the fees and interest on the lending facilities and the interest the Fed would have earned had it invested the funds in three-month Treasury bills.
The central bank earned about $19bn in income from charging interest and fees to financial institutions and investors that tapped the new facilities to obtain much-needed funds during the turmoil. The interest the Fed would have earned by investing the same amount in T-bills was an estimated $5bn, leaving a $14bn gain since August 2007.
The Fed assessment underlines the possibility that other central banks could make a profit on their crisis-fighting measures – at least before adjusting for the risk they assumed.
The calculation by Fed staff, which has neither been audited, published or risk-adjusted, only deals with its liquidity facilities.
Those include discount window and Term Auction Facility loans to banks, currency swaps with other central banks, purchases of commercial paper and financing for investors in asset-backed securities.
The most profitable liquidity programmes were the commercial paper one, which is one of the riskier facilities for the Fed because participants do not post collateral, and the foreign exchange swap agreements, followed by the TAF, according to the New York Fed staff.

Read the entire article at Financial Times
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Morning Matters

2009-08-28T10:34:00.002-05:00

The Obama administration will essentially keep an intrusive Bush-era search policy.
The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation runs low on funds.
"Banks 'Too Big to Fail' Have Grown Even Bigger"
The chairman of the Federal Reserve was the victim of identity theft last year. But yes, that was the real Ben Bernanke who helped ram through TARP.
Fine for marijuana possession in Denver could drop to $1.

With Reason, Hith and Run.
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Cash for Clunkers Postmortem

2009-08-28T10:31:00.000-05:00

Irwin Stelzer at the Washington Examiner with a calm and measured explanation of why cash for clunkers wasn't a good idea no matter how much money it gave away and funnelled to the new, All-American auto industry.

Government forecasters are really bad at their job. The program was originally funded with $1 billion of taxpayer money to cover rebates of $3,500-$4,500 on cars traded in for more fuel-efficient models, and the money was expected to last for about six months. It lasted for one week.....No surprise, then, that the government just discovered that its forecast of the deficit in the coming decade is light by a mere $2 trillion, or almost 30%.
...the government's talents, whatever they might be, do not include efficient administration of its programs......The Department of Transportation assigned 2,000 workers to process dealer paperwork, but they seemed unable to get the money to dealers who, having laid it out in response to promises of prompt repayment, desperately needed the cash. So if you think the President's plan to "reform" health care will make it easier to cope with the paperwork surrounding hospital and doctor's bills, think again.
....programs such as Cash-for-Clunkers have no regard for lower-income consumers. By mandating the destruction of trade-ins, Congress removed 700,000 cars from the used-car market, inevitably driving up prices of the cars that lower-income consumers tend to buy.
And by ordering that a trade-in's engine be destroyed by replacing its engine oil with a sodium silicate solution (which turns out to be in short supply!), Congress sharply reduced the salvageable used parts that are bought mostly by poorer consumers to keep their cars running.

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Bill Divulges IRS Tax Data

2009-08-28T10:28:00.001-05:00

From a CBS News article:

Section 431(a) of the bill says that the IRS must divulge taxpayer identity information, including the filing status, the modified adjusted gross income, the number of dependents, and "other information as is prescribed by" regulation. That information will be provided to the new Health Choices Commissioner and state health programs and used to determine who qualifies for "affordability credits."

Section 245(b)(2)(A) says the IRS must divulge tax return details -- there's no specified limit on what's available or unavailable -- to the Health Choices Commissioner. The purpose, again, is to verify "affordability credits."

Section 1801(a) says that the Social Security Administration can obtain tax return data on anyone who may be eligible for a "low-income prescription drug subsidy" but has not applied for it.

Over at the Institute for Policy Innovation (a free-market think tank and presumably no fan of Obamacare), Tom Giovanetti argues that: "How many thousands of federal employees will have access to your records? The privacy of your health records will be only as good as the most nosy, most dishonest and most malcontented federal employee.... So say good-bye to privacy from the federal government. It was fun while it lasted for 233 years."

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Morning Matters

2009-08-25T10:26:00.002-05:00

The budget deficit projections set to be roughly $2 trillion higher than previously estimated
Karzai claims large victory in Afghanistan; opponents cry foul.
Obama administration has filled just 43 percent of political appointee positions.
Fewer people catching up on lapsed mortgages.
Obama administration will continue overseas rendition for interrogation. They just promise to be more careful this time.
Missouri legislature accidentally bans Tupperware.

Drudge, Hit and Run
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Federal Reserve Loses Lawsuit; Will Have to Divulge Loan Recipients

2009-08-25T10:24:00.000-05:00

The "audit the Fed" bill hasn't passed yet, but the courts are already striking blows for Federal Reserve transparency, as reported by Bloomberg, about a lawsuit filed by Bloomberg:

The Federal Reserve must for the first time identify the companies in its emergency lending programs after losing a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
Manhattan Chief U.S. District Judge Loretta Preska ruled against the central bank yesterday, rejecting the argument that loan records aren’t covered by the law because their disclosure would harm borrowers’ competitive positions.
The Fed has refused to name the financial firms it lent to or disclose the amounts or the assets put up as collateral under 11 programs, most put in place during the deepest financial crisis since the Great Depression, saying that doing so might set off a run by depositors and unsettle shareholders. Bloomberg LP, the New York-based company majority-owned by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, sued on Nov. 7 on behalf of its Bloomberg News unit.....
The judge said the central bank “improperly withheld agency records” by “conducting an inadequate search” after Bloomberg News reporters filed a request under the information act. She gave the Fed five days to turn over documents it told the reporters it located, including 231 pages of reports, and said it must look for more at the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, which runs most of the loan programs....
Bloomberg said in the suit that U.S. taxpayers need to know the terms of Fed lending because the public became an “involuntary investor” in the nation’s banks as the financial crisis deepened and the government began shoring up companies with capital injections and loans.....“When an unprecedented amount of taxpayer dollars were lent to financial institutions in unprecedented ways and the Federal Reserve refused to make public any of the details of its extraordinary lending, Bloomberg News asked the court why U.S. citizens don’t have the right to know,” said Matthew Winkler, the editor-in-chief of Bloomberg News. “We’re gratified the court is defending the public’s right to know what is being done in the public interest.”

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Despite the Polls

2009-08-24T09:19:00.003-05:00

The Washington Times:

America must keep up the fight in Afghanistan despite the polls. Fifty-one percent of Americans now think the war in Afghanistan is not worth fighting, according to an ABC News/Washington Post poll released last week. That is a dramatic 10-point move since March, when the number of war skeptics was at 41 percent. It's the first time since the question was asked in 2007 that the "not worth it" number was higher than 50 percent. Among Democrats, the antiwar number is 70 percent.
The Afghan war is following a pattern established more than 50 years ago. Since the end of World War II, every long-duration limited conflict has witnessed a slow erosion of public support on the question of whether the war was worth fighting. This makes sense intuitively; the longer a war continues, the more it costs and the less the original reasons for fighting it seem to matter. Gen. Maxwell D. Taylor said the Korean War "illustrated the difficulty of convincing the American people and keeping them convinced for the long pull of the necessity and justification of exposing the lives of a small segment of our manhood for a stake far from home with little visible relation to the national security." The same could be said of the wars in Vietnam, Iraq and Afghanistan.

Whole thing here.

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Morning Matters

2009-08-24T09:09:00.003-05:00

The Department of Veterans Affairs hands out bonuses.
The government prepares an enormous vaccination campaign for swine flu.
The Abramoff scandal isn't over yet. Neither is the torture scandal.
Lt. William Calley apologizes for the My Lai massacre.
Paul Krugman: Washington Is "Ruled by Reaganism"
Physicist claims to have discovered why time only moves in one direction.
Obama DOJ advises reopening, possibly prosecuting CIA interrogation abuse cases.
Some New York lawmakers collecting both pension pay and regular pay.
All Obama’s czars.

With Reason, Hit and Run
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NY dealers pull out of clunkers program

2009-08-19T17:11:00.001-05:00

NEW YORK (AP) - Hundreds of auto dealers in the New York area have withdrawn from the government's Cash for Clunkers program, citing delays in getting reimbursed by the government, a dealership group said Wednesday.
The Greater New York Automobile Dealers Association, which represents dealerships in the New York metro area, said about half its 425 members have left the program because they cannot afford to offer more rebates. They're also worried about getting repaid.
"(The government) needs to move the system forward and they need to start paying these dealers," said Mark Schienberg, the group's president. "This is a cash-dependent business."
The program offers up to $4,500 to shoppers who trade in vehicles getting 18 mpg or less for a more fuel-efficient car or truck. Dealers pay the rebates out of pocket, then must wait to be reimbursed by the government. But administrative snags and heavy paperwork have created a backlog of unpaid claims.
Schienberg said the group's dealers have been repaid for only about 2 percent of the clunkers deals they've made so far.

Read the rest of the article.
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WIRE: "Impromptu Obamanomics is getting scarier by the day"

2009-08-19T10:34:00.002-05:00

“UPS and FedEx are doing just fine. It’s the Post Office that’s always having problems.” -- Barack Obama, Aug. 11, 2009
No institution has been the butt of more government- inefficiency jokes than the U.S. Postal Service. Maybe the Department of Motor Vehicles.

The only way the post office can stay in business is its government subsidy. The USPS lost $2.4 billion in the quarter ended in June and projects a net loss of $7 billion in fiscal 2009, outstanding debt of more than $10 billion and a cash shortfall of $1 billion. It was moved to intensive care -- the Government Accountability Office’s list of “high risk” cases - - last month and told to shape up. (It must be the only entity that hasn’t cashed in on TARP!)

That didn’t stop President Barack Obama from holding up the post office as an example at a town hall meeting in Portsmouth, New Hampshire, last week.

When Obama compared the post office to UPS and FedEx, he was clearly hoping to assuage voter concerns about a public health-care option undercutting and eliminating private insurance.

What he did instead was conjure up visions of long lines and interminable waits. Why do we need or want a health-care system that works like the post office?
[...]
Impromptu Obamanomics is getting scarier by the day. For all the president’s touted intelligence, his un-teleprompted comments reveal a basic misunderstanding of capitalist principles.

For example, asked at the Portsmouth town hall how private insurance companies can compete with the government, the president said the following:

“If the private insurance companies are providing a good bargain, and if the public option has to be self-sustaining -- meaning taxpayers aren’t subsidizing it, but it has to run on charging premiums and providing good services and a good network of doctors, just like any other private insurer would do -- then I think private insurers should be able to compete.”

Self-sustaining? The public option? What has Obama been doing during those daily 40-minute economic briefings coordinated by uber-economic-adviser, Larry Summers?

Capitalism Explained

Government programs aren’t self-sustaining by definition. They’re subsidized by the taxpayer. If they were self-financed, we’d be off the hook.

Llewellyn Rockwell Jr., chairman of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, and editor of LewRockwell.com, put it this way in an Aug. 13 commentary on Mises.org:

“The only reason for a government service is precisely to provide financial support for an operation that is otherwise unsustainable, or else there would be no point in the government’s involvement at all.”
[...]
The public is left with one of two unsettling conclusions: Either the president doesn’t understand the health-insurance reform plans working their way through Congress, or he understands both the plans and the implications and is being untruthful about the impact.

Neither option is good; ignorance is clearly preferable to the alternative.

Read the article at Bloomberg
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White House disables e-tip box

2009-08-17T12:33:00.000-05:00

Following a furor over how the data would be used, the White House has shut down an electronic tip box — flag@whitehouse.gov — that was set up to receive information on “fishy” claims about President Barack Obama’s health plan.

E-mails to that address now bounce back with the message: “The email address you just sent a message to is no longer in service. We are now accepting your feedback about health insurance reform via: http://www.whitehouse.gov/realitycheck.”

The “flag” service was introduced Aug. 4, with a White House blog post saying: “There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.”

Federal Government Wants to Offer the People Tasty Cookies

2009-08-14T10:20:00.002-05:00

The American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) warns:

The American Civil Liberties Union submitted comments today [Aug. 10] to the Office of Management and Budget (OMB) opposing its recent proposal to reverse current federal policy and allow the use of web tracking technologies, like cookies, on federal government websites. Cookies can be used to track an Internet user’s every click and are often linked across multiple websites; they frequently identify particular people.
Since 2000, it has been the policy of the federal government not to use such technology. But the OMB is now seeking to change that policy and is considering the use of cookies for tracking web visitors across multiple sessions and storing their unique preferences and surfing habits. Though this is a major shift in policy, the announcement of this program consists of only a single page from the federal register that contains almost no detail.
“This is a sea change in government privacy policy,” said Michael Macleod-Ball, Acting Director of the ACLU Washington Legislative Office. “Without explaining this reversal of policy, the OMB is seeking to allow the mass collection of personal information of every user of a federal government website. Until the OMB answers the multitude of questions surrounding this policy shift, we will continue to raise our strenuous objections.”...
“Americans rely on the information from the federal government to research politics, medical issues and legal requirements. The OMB is now asking to retain the personal and identifiable information we leave behind,” said Christopher Calabrese, Counsel for the ACLU Technology and Liberty Project. “No American should have to sacrifice privacy or risk surveillance in order to access free government information....”

Morning Matters

2009-08-14T10:18:00.001-05:00

Weekly initial unemployment claims are ascending again, up 4,000 from previous week, to 558,000. Details
July retail sales declined 0.1 percent, short of "consensus estimates" prophesying a 0.6 percent gain. Details
Foreclosures are up, Way up
Germany and France officially pull out of the global recession.
Michael Vick signs with the Philadelphia Eagles. (Animal activists boo.)
U.S. Chamber of Commerce and AARP launch tv ad blitzes on health care.
A market solution for insuring people with pre-existing conditions.
Cash for Clunkers subsidizes gas guzzlers!
Bill Clinton tells bloggers: "We have entered a new era of progressive politics which, if we do it right, can last 30 or 40 years."
The Justice Department investigates allegations of excessive force by deputies in Orange County's troubled jail system.

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The Whole Foods Alternative to ObamaCare

2009-08-13T10:19:00.001-05:00

With a projected $1.8 trillion deficit for 2009, several trillions more in deficits projected over the next decade, and with both Medicare and Social Security entitlement spending about to ratchet up several notches over the next 15 years as Baby Boomers become eligible for both, we are rapidly running out of other people’s money. These deficits are simply not sustainable. They are either going to result in unprecedented new taxes and inflation, or they will bankrupt us.
While we clearly need health-care reform, the last thing our country needs is a massive new health-care entitlement that will create hundreds of billions of dollars of new unfunded deficits and move us much closer to a government takeover of our health-care system. Instead, we should be trying to achieve reforms by moving in the opposite direction—toward less government control and more individual empowerment. Here are eight reforms that would greatly lower the cost of health care for everyone:

• Remove the legal obstacles that slow the creation of high-deductible health insurance plans and health savings accounts (HSAs)
• Equalize the tax laws so that that employer-provided health insurance and individually owned health insurance have the same tax benefits
• Repeal all state laws which prevent insurance companies from competing across state lines
• Repeal government mandates regarding what insurance companies must cover
• Enact tort reform to end the ruinous lawsuits that force doctors to pay insurance costs of hundreds of thousands of dollars per year
• Make costs transparent so that consumers understand what health-care treatments cost
• Enact Medicare reform
• Finally, revise tax forms to make it easier for individuals to make a voluntary, tax-deductible donation to help the millions of people who have no insurance and aren’t covered by Medicare, Medicaid or the State Children’s Health Insurance Program

Read the rest of this spot on article at WSJ
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Morning Matters

2009-08-13T09:36:00.001-05:00

Cheney hints that upcoming memoir will be less than flattering toward former President Bush.
Record number of foreclosures in July.
DEA participates in two medical marijuana raids in California.
The Washington Post looks at the origin of the CIA's secret prisons program.
Classic car lobby won provision exempting cars made before 1984 from Clunkers program.
Kenosha, WI alderman wants to fine people for swearing at police officers.
This will blow your mind.
Indiana congressman says town hall protests are “political terrorism.” Maybe I should start pitching my “Support Dissent” gear to the right, and it’s lefties who will give me dirty looks when I wear my own shirt in public.
The lawn chair wars continue!

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Fed Thinks It Has Conjured Inflation

2009-08-13T09:33:00.000-05:00

With economic activity "leveling out," "signs of stabilizing" in household spending, "tight credit," continued business cutbacks and a "gradual resumption of sustainable economic growth in a context of price stability," the Fed expects inflation to "remain subdued for some time." But the Fed is also standing by its plan to discontinue purchases of Treasury debt this fall:

The Committee will maintain the target range for the federal funds rate at 0 to 1/4 percent and continues to anticipate that economic conditions are likely to warrant exceptionally low levels of the federal funds rate for an extended period. As previously announced, to provide support to mortgage lending and housing markets and to improve overall conditions in private credit markets, the Federal Reserve will purchase a total of up to $1.25 trillion of agency mortgage-backed securities and up to $200 billion of agency debt by the end of the year. In addition, the Federal Reserve is in the process of buying $300 billion of Treasury securities. To promote a smooth transition in markets as these purchases of Treasury securities are completed, the Committee has decided to gradually slow the pace of these transactions and anticipates that the full amount will be purchased by the end of October.

The plan to phase out Treasury purchases is a bet that inflation will be kicking in by the fall, as Americans gear up for the harvest festival that marks their winter solstice. Will Santa be bringing you a wallet full of degenerated dollars?

Read the article at Hit and Run.
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Morning Matters

2009-08-12T01:25:00.001-05:00

Feds choose interesting way of tabulating the “Cash for Clunkers” program that conveniently allows them to omit the fact that the top vehicle bought through the program thus far has been . . . an SUV.
Because that’s what Iraq needs right now–a smoking ban.
Obama’s top anti-trust appointee wants to turn Google execs into libertarians.
Another round of thick-headed local authorities shutting down a kid’s lemonade stand.
Obama faces grim choices in Afghanistan.
GM to start selling new cars on eBay.
Last year's record federal deficit may quadruple this year.
New White House policy for federal websites stirs privacy concerns.

With Reason, Hit and Run

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AMERICAN ANGER

2009-08-12T01:02:00.000-05:00

LEBANON, Pa. – Jeers and taunts drowned out Democrats calling for a health care overhaul at town halls Tuesday, and one lawmaker said a swastika was spray-painted at his office as debate turned to noisy confrontation over President Barack Obama's plan. The president himself was treated more respectfully.

"You'll be gone, by God the bureaucrats will still be here," one man told Sen. Arlen Specter, D-Pa., at a town hall in Lebanon, Pa.

"If they don't let us vent our frustrations out, they will have a revolution," Mary Ann Fieser of Hillsboro, Mo., told Sen. Claire McCaskill at her Missouri health care forum.

An AP article

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Army Tests Drones and Robots for Soldiers

2009-08-12T00:58:00.002-05:00

As the mock attack began on the sprawling military base here, tiny drones hovered overhead, peering through the windows to see insurgents gathered inside the houses. Small robots — like R2-D2 in “Star Wars” — crawled through some of the doors, flashing back live video of the startled enemy’s positions. Electronic sensors placed nearby watched escape routes. And a battery of six-foot-high missiles stood at the ready farther out in the desert to destroy vehicles that tried to rush in to help the insurgents.

“When I was in Iraq, we couldn’t see what we were busting into,” said Specialist Randall Thompson, who operates the robots. “But with this equipment, we can at least get a peek.”

Read the article at The New York Time

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In peril in Pyongyang? How jailed female journalists were in greater danger sharing a plane with Bill Clinton

2009-08-09T10:23:00.003-05:00

A Mail on Sunday investigation has unearthed some rather surprising facts about the pair – facts that show they were hopelessly ill-prepared for their ‘mission’ to the Chinese-Korean border, that they were working for a minor television organisation run by a former ambulance-chasing lawyer and, while they no doubt did not intend to be captured, the hapless twosome ended up as valuable pawns in an international game of bluff and double bluff.

Indeed, from the whole tawdry affair only one clear winner has emerged – an exuberant Bill Clinton – even if, according to an insider, ‘the joke in the White House was that the girls were safer in North Korea than on the plane going home with Bill’...
For Bill Clinton, it was an easy mission. In a phone call to her husband a month ago, Laura said that if Clinton turned up, she and Euna would be granted amnesty.
The Clinton insider said: ‘Obama’s people suggested sending Al Gore, but Kim Jong Il only wanted Bill.
He idolises the former President because he thinks he is a virile stud with influence in Hollywood.’
Just as Laura fretted she was being overshadowed by her sister Lisa, Bill Clinton has found it increasingly hard to reconcile himself to life on the sidelines. When asked to undertake a ‘sensitive’ mission to ‘rescue’ the pair, he jumped at the chance...
The Clinton confidant said: ‘This wasn’t about the women – this was about a PR coup.
Barack Obama may have defeated Bill’s wife but this is the Clintons’ revenge. The North Koreans are talking about nuclear disarmament but they say they will talk only to Bill. It’s a win-win situation for everyone except Obama.
‘Two greenhorn journalists stand to make a financial killing. And Bill is on a roll now that everybody has bought into the official story.’

Read more at Mail On Sunday UK

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Friday Cartoons

2009-07-31T19:55:00.002-05:00

..

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'Cash for Clunkers' Goes Broke

2009-07-31T08:50:00.005-05:00

Obama's much-heralded "Cash for Clunkers" program was supposed to last until the end of October—but on Thursday, less than one week after its launch, the White House announced the program would be suspended. Apparently it burned through the $1 billion allocated for it in six short days. The program began last Friday, with car dealerships registering to sell new, more fuel-efficient vehicles to consumers who traded in older ones. Consumers were to receive a discount on their new vehicles. The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which is responsible for the program, has yet to comment on Clunkers' demise.

Read it at Politico

UPDATE: but then Cash for Clunkers Is Back, Baby!

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Morning Matters

2009-07-31T08:50:00.004-05:00

Tax-fed firms keep paying big bonuses.
Another wave of protests breaks out in Iran.
Signs of a Republican recovery?
Rhode Island threatens to close more than 1,200 businesses for failing to pay sales taxes.
Army medical centers score poorly on timely access to routine treatments.
According to a new CDC report, 11 percent of out-of-pocket medical spending in America goes to alternative remedies.
Some towns have unique reasons for installing surveillance cameras.
D.C. man arrested for disorderly conduct for singing “I hate the police” as a (admittedly odd and juvenile) form of protesting the disorderly conduct arrest of Henry Louis Gates.
Philly residents caught having fun. So city bans it.
New jobless claims up, but still below last month's peak.
U.S. moves toward federal mandate of ignition interlock systems for first-time DWI offenders.
Cigar companies taking hit from smoking bans, large tax increases.
House refuses to remove pork from new defense bill, leaving in "dozens of new ships, planes, helicopters and armored vehicles that Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates says the military does not need to fund next year."

With Reason, Hit and Run
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China Warns USA on Soaring Deficits

2009-07-28T13:50:00.002-05:00

WASHINGTON (AP) - The United States and China are striking a conciliatory tone in their public comments during economic talks, although that hasn't stopped China from posing some pointed questions behind closed doors about such issues as America's soaring budget deficit.
The Obama administration has questions it wants answered as well in such areas as China's long reliance on massive trade surpluses with the United States to bolster its domestic economy.
Both sides are expected to wrap up two days of high-level talks Tuesday with a joint communique that will lay out a work plan that both sides will tackle in upcoming meetings.
Officials from both nations played down the prospects for any breakthroughs this week on the major issues that separate the two nations, including America's massive trade deficit with China. Critics have blamed the trade deficit over the years for the loss of millions of U.S. manufacturing jobs.
President Barack Obama opened Monday's discussions by declaring that the United States sought a new era of "cooperation, not confrontation" with China and that management of the U.S.-China relationship would be a major factor in defining the history of the 21st century.
Obama dispatched his top economic officials - Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, National Economic Council Director Lawrence Summers, White House budget director Peter Orszag and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke - to try to reassure China that the U.S. will not let deficits or inflation jeopardize the value of Chinese investments...
The Chinese, who have the largest foreign holdings of U.S. Treasury debt at $801.5 billion, have been expressing worries that soaring deficits could spark inflation or a sudden drop in the value of the dollar, thus jeopardizing their investments. Chinese officials said those concerns were raised during Monday's talks.

Read it at AP
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The First Amendment and Insulting Cops

2009-07-28T13:40:00.000-05:00

Andrew Sullivan finds an eloquent opinion from federal appeals court judge Alex Kozinski. The plaintiff was suing under federal civil rights statutes after a police officer stopped and arrested him, apparently in retaliation for a series of obscenities the plaintiff had earlier directed at the cop. Kozinski writes:

Defendant relies heavily on the fact that Duran was making obscene gestures toward him and yelling profanities in Spanish while traveling along a rural Arizona highway. We cannot, of course, condone Duran’s conduct; it was boorish, crass and, initially at least, unjustified. Our hard-working law enforcement officers surely deserve better treatment from members of the public. But disgraceful as Duran’s behavior may have been, it was not illegal; criticism of the police is not a crime.

[T]he First Amendment protects a significant amount of verbal criticism and challenge directed at police officers…

The freedom of individuals to oppose or challenge police action verbally without thereby risking arrest is one important characteristic by which we distinguish ourselves from a police state…

Thus, while police, no less than anyone else, may resent having obscene words and gestures directed at them, they may not exercise the awesome power at their disposal to punish individuals for conduct that is not merely lawful, but protected by the First Amendment.

Inarticulate and crude as Duran’s conduct may have been, it represented an expression of disapproval toward a police officer with whom he had just had a run-in. As such, it fell squarely within the protective umbrella of the First Amendment and any action to punish or deter such speech–such as stopping or hassling the speaker–is categorically prohibited by the Constitution…

No matter how peculiar, abrasive, unruly or distasteful a person’s conduct may be, it cannot justify a police stop unless it suggests that some specific crime has been, or is about to be, committed, or that there is an imminent danger to persons or property.

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Obama Birthers

2009-07-28T13:39:00.001-05:00

Alex Knapp makes a very convincing argument.
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Broken Fiscal Promises

2009-07-28T13:33:00.000-05:00

Remember Barack Obama’s New Era of Responsibility? It got off to an inauspicious start, with a $787 billion economic stimulus package, a $410 billion appropriations bill, and a record $1.8 trillion budget deficit. But now the president wants to signal that he’s serious about cutting the federal budget. Unfortunately, writes Senior Editor Jacob Sullum, Obama's plan hinges on the assumption that Americans do not know how to calculate percentages.

Read all about it here.

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"Legal Age 21 has not worked." Yes, we know.

2009-07-28T13:30:00.000-05:00

Amanda Carey at Reason writes:

"Legal Age 21 has not worked." Of course, any 20-year-old could, and probably would, tell you that. But the quote in question was written by Dr. Morris Chafet, a psychiatrist who served on the presidential committee that pushed to have the legal drinking age raised to 21. That push paid off on July 17, 1984, when President Ronald Reagan signed the new drinking age into law.

Since that time, however, Chafet has apparently had a change of heart. The Los Angeles Times reports that in an editorial that has yet to be published, Chafet describes his effort to raise the drinking age as the "single most regrettable decision" of his career. "To be sure, drunk driving fatalities are lower now than they were in 1982," Chafet notes. "But they are lower in all age groups. And they have declined just as much in Canada, where the age is 18 or 19, as they have in the United States."

Read it at Reason.com
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Sotomayor Clears Judiciary Committee

2009-07-28T13:29:00.000-05:00

So much for a bipartisan nomination. Sonia Sotomayor cleared the Senate Judiciary Committee Tuesday, though only one Republican, Lindsay Graham, joined the Democrats who approved of her. The 13-6 vote paves the way for a full vote in the Senate next week. Jeff Sessions, the top Republican on the committee, reiterated his discomfort with some of Sotomayor's comments and court rulings. The Associated Press reports that the GOP is struggling with the "politically perplexing issue" of how to handle the Sotomayor nomination, as they must avoid alienating both Hispanic voters and the conservative base.

Read it at Associated Press

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Morning Matters

2009-07-28T13:11:00.002-05:00

Ilya Somin has more on the expanding reach of federal law, including a pretty scary essay by Judge Alex Kozinski and Misha Tseytlin. The fear here isn’t that we’re all going to be prosecuted, it’s that if a U.S. attorney decided he doesn’t like you, he can pretty easily find a way to ruin your life.
This seems pretty creepy, although the story is so poorly written it’s hard to say exactly what’s going on.
Five freedoms you’ll lose under the Dems’ health care plan.
Six key senators are moving health care reform to the center.
Some states considering legalizing sports betting to boost revenue.
Cambridge police release partial audio of Henry Louis Gates arrest.
Mexico facing increasing political pressure to change its drug war strategy.
Cheney, Yoo, Addington wanted to do away with Posse Comitatus, send federal troops into Buffalo back in 2002.
Jack Dunphy, NRO’s pseudonymous cop in residence, says the lesson from the Gates/Crowley incident is that if a cop confronts you, don’t even think about exercising your constitutional rights, or he just might shoot you.
The world’s saddest zoos.

With Reason, Hit and Run
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Obama to Keep Indefinite Detentions

2009-07-21T13:01:00.001-05:00

The Obama administration’s long-term plan to close Guantánamo Bay and deal with war-on-terror detainees will miss its deadline this week, but has Newsweek learned what the report—which a source says will take a “few months”—will say anyway? “Three administration officials familiar with the process said the detention task force, which is jointly run by aides to Attorney General Eric Holder and Defense Secretary Robert Gates, did agree that the Obama administration should continue to claim the right to hold some Guantánamo inmates indefinitely as ‘combatants’ under the ‘laws of war,’ without charging them either in criminal courts or in military commissions. Three administration officials familiar with the process said the detention task force, which is jointly run by aides to Attorney General Eric Holder and Defense Secretary Robert Gates, did agree that the Obama administration should continue to claim the right to hold some Guantánamo inmates indefinitely as ‘combatants’ under the ‘laws of war,’ without charging them either in criminal courts or in military commissions.”

Read it at Newsweek

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