Ben Bernanke should not be nominated for a second term !!!

Embattled Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke won confirmation for a second term

Thursday, but only by the closest vote ever for the crucial post and after withering criticism from

lawmakers for bailing out Wall Street while other Americans suffered in recession.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/forums/thread.jspa?threadID=86069&tstart=0#ixzz0dy8zMGRP

I have to blame the Dems, specially Obama for keeping this bastard (Ben Bernanke) in his post. Obama also has kept some bush crooked federalattorneys. He should fire them. It is normal for a new president to nominate new attorneys. Specially those judges that together with the corrupt karl rove, which sent to jail the democrat governor of Alabama Don Siegelman.

See the following article:

These are nervous days in Montgomery. Federal prosecutors, investigating corruption in Alabama's two-year college system, have subpoenaed legislators by the dozen — in some cases delivering papers just outside the statehouse itself. Sue Schmitz, a state representative, was arrested in the bathroom of her home while she was taking an early morning shower. As prosecutors have fostered a climate of fear, numerous legislators have hired lawyers, and some have swept their offices for listening devices. "It's had an effect on the atmosphere," says Pat Lindsey, a state senator, offering what sounds like an understatement. "There's some bitterness there toward the U.S. attorney's office and the Department of Justice."

The tension is even greater because the recent investigation comes in the aftermath of a separate case involving Don Siegelman, the former Democratic governor sent to federal prison last year on corruption charges. Siegelman was released in March by a federal court, pending his appeal. As with the community-college investigation, Democrats have accused Republicans of prosecuting Siegelman as a partisan vendetta, and the case has drawn attention from the national media and Congress. Lawyers for Alabama's legislators have taken to referring to Siegelman's plight as evidence that their own clients are being railroaded for political reasons. "If I were accused of something right now and I were a Democrat, " says William Stewart, a University of Alabama political scientist, "I would say they're after me, just like they were after Siegelman. It's become very standard."

Alabama is far from the only place where indicted public officials accuse prosecutors of targeting them for political purposes, either to destroy an opponent from the other party or simply to advance their own careers. But such accusations have taken on greater currency following the dismissal of nine U.S. attorneys who were insufficiently loyal to an effort in Washington to politicize public corruption cases. That scandal led last August to the resignation of U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, along with most of the other top officials at the Justice Department. "It gives traction to the claims of partisan political motivation made by indicted officials," says former prosecutor Geoff Moulton, now a law professor at Widener University, "even in cases where there's absolutely no merit to those claims."

There's no disputing that the feds are going after a lot of state and local officeholders these days. Since 2002, both the number of public corruption cases and the number of FBI agents devoted to such cases has increased by more than 50 percent. But is it because there's been a sudden spike of mischief in office? Or is it more an epidemic of prosecutorial zeal and ambition? Those are not easy questions to answer. But they're increasingly important to ask.

What's clear is that we are dealing with a national phenomenon. In the past three years, the FBI's long-running undercover operation in Tennessee (code named "Tennessee Waltz") has led to the conviction of a dozen officials, including several state senators and a state representative, the most recent of them in April. In New Jersey, U.S. Attorney Christopher Christie has prosecuted more than 125 state and local officials, without a single acquittal. In North Carolina, U.S. Attorney George Holding successfully prosecuted House Speaker Jim Black in a corruption scandal, followed this spring by the conviction and expulsion of one of Black's top lieutenants — the first expulsion of a legislator in that state since 1880. And in Alaska, a major bribery scandal involving an oil services company has already led to seven convictions, including that of former state House Speaker Pete Kott.

Corruption cases always have been, and always will be, part of the public-sector landscape. A prosecutor seeking to press such cases can usually find plenty of work — and prosecutors have shown they can obtain an indictment from a grand jury without presenting anything close to an airtight case. Given the vast discretion prosecutors maintain in picking their targets, they are subject to regular complaints that they are interfering with the political process and the normal operations of government. Democrats still single out Ken Starr, the special prosecutor who published an X-rated account of President Clinton's love life, in their pantheon of villains. For their part, many Republicans have excoriated Patrick Fitzgerald, the U.S. attorney in Chicago and special counsel in the Valerie Plame investigation, for his successful prosecution of former vice presidential chief of staff I. Lewis "Scooter" Libby.

Public corruption cases may not be the most certain way for a prosecutor to advance his career — they create plenty of enemies even when, or especially when, they're successful — but they do guarantee bigger headlines than conducting drug seizures or even sending a series of murderers to death row. That sort of motivation was starkly on display in 2004, when e-mails leaked from the office of Thomas DiBiagio, then the U.S. attorney in Maryland. He demanded that his staff bring no fewer than three "front-page" corruption indictments by Election Day. Given the current climate, it's become the first line of a vigorous defense for public officials to suggest they are the latest victims of politically-motivated investigations.

On the other hand, there are safeguards. To carry off a partisan prosecutorial vendetta really does require something of a conspiracy, with a U.S. attorney having to bring on board his or her own career staff, FBI agents and other investigators, the media, a judge and a jury. It's such a tough trick to pull off that even David Iglesias, a U.S. attorney who was told to speed up prosecutions of Democrats and ultimately was fired by Gonzales, is skeptical about the existence of organized partisan scalp-hunting. Iglesias, who just published a book about his experience, concedes there was an "attempt to politicize the Justice Department both in Washington and out in the field," but argues that it failed. In his biggest case, which led to the conviction of two New Mexico state treasurers, Iglesias says that "our referral wasn't from the Republican Party, it was from a state employee caught copying U.S. currency on an office photocopier."

There is always a risk that prosecutors will want to score points by aiming at the ripe target of elected leadership. Yet in the vast majority of cases, government officials who are formally charged with crimes end up either entering into a plea bargain or being convicted. Even critics of the system concede that it remains a necessary corrective to the temptations of exploiting public office. And when politicians do get caught, they normally have themselves, much more than the prosecutors, to blame. "People in public office, particularly legislators, ought to know they are in somebody's gun sights," says Alan Rosenthal, an expert on legislatures at Rutgers University. "If it's not an opponent or a newspaper, it's the prosecuting attorney."

Obama, it's time to close Guantanamo!!!

On Eve of Missed Guantánamo Deadline President Announces He Will Hold 50 Without Trial
CCR Condemns Unconstitutional Indefinite Detention Scheme

NEW YORK - January 22 - In response to the announcement that President Obama has decided he will detain 50 of the approximately 200 remaining men at Guantánamo without trial indefinitely, the Center for Constitutional Rights issued the following statement:

"Today was supposed to be the deadline by which President Obama would close Guantánamo. Now it will be the anniversary of the president's decision to abandon our most fundamental constitutional principles. Our nation was built on the idea that no president or king should have the power to imprison people solely at will, that a system of checks and balances on executive authority is the bedrock of a free democracy, and that it is up to the courts to determine whether individuals have engaged in acts that justify depriving them of their liberty.

"Guantánamo remains open, and remains a symbol of lawlessness and abuse. Now the President has committed to holding approximately 50 men without any trial not as a result of anything the men have done in the past but because of a fear of what the men may due in the future and because they have been deemed too difficult to prosecute but too dangerous to release. This is too much power to put into the hands of one person. It is an assault on the rule of law, our principles and our system of justice.

"The true danger is from the damage this will do to our reputation in the world and the way we are viewed by those who are undecided about our country, those we must most urgently convince that we are not their enemy and that we truly value the ideals we claim to represent."

CCR has led the legal battle over Guantanamo for the last eight years - sending the first ever habeas attorney to the base and sending the first attorney to meet with a former CIA "ghost detainee" there. CCR has been responsible for organizing and coordinating more than 500 pro bono lawyers across the country in order to represent the men at Guantanamo, ensuring that nearly all have the option of legal representation. In addition, CCR has been working to resettle the approximately 50 men who remain at Guantánamo because they cannot return to their country of origin for fear of persecution and torture.
###
The Center for Constitutional Rights is dedicated to advancing and protecting the rights guaranteed by the United States Constitution and the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. Founded in 1966 by attorneys who represented civil rights movements in the South, CCR is a non-profit legal and educational organization committed to the creative use of law as a positive force for social change.

US healthcare sham

US healthcare sham
by Serge Halimi
A Republican Congress and President Bill Clinton abolished a welfare programme in 1996 under the (largely fallacious) pretext that it bred fraud, waste and abuse. Thirteen years on, the reforms that Barack Obama is proposing will not fundamentally change the United States’ abysmal healthcare system because those who profit from it have been able to buy protection from the lawmakers. The welfare programme ditched in 1996 absorbed about 1% of the US budget; today’s well-ensconced private insurance companies swallow most of the 17% of the budget set aside for healthcare.

Paradoxically, the US president is one of the most spirited prosecutors of the system he has chosen to retain. Day after day he recounts how “we are held hostage by health insurance companies that deny coverage, or drop coverage, or charge fees that people can’t afford for care they desperately need… We have a healthcare system that too often works better for the insurance industry than it does for the American people” (1).

Obama’s project initially set out with two important objectives. It proposed compulsory health cover for the 46 million Americans outside the system while funding the poorest amongst them. It also suggested the creation of a public insurance system with less prohibitive tariffs than private companies (2), which commit huge resources to finding legal loopholes (“pre-existing conditions”) allowing them not to pay out when their insured clients fall ill.

What is it that so alarms the right? Bobby Jindal, the Republican governor of Louisiana, claims that “any government plan will benefit from taxpayer subsidies and be able to operate at a financial loss, competing unfairly in the marketplace until private plans are driven out of business” (3). Other more telling tales of distress might have concerned him, particularly in Louisiana, one of the poorest US states.

American politics is so poisoned by money flowing from industrial and financial lobbies that the only proposals ensured a smooth ride through Congress are those that cut taxes. Banks, insurance companies and the pharmaceutical industry have almost nothing to fear. Max Baucus, the Democrat chairman of the Senate finance committee, whose approval is needed for reforms to be adopted, is also the lawmaker who receives the most money from private hospitals, insurance companies and doctors. However, his largest donors are hardly worried about the problems of Montana, the small rural state he represents, since 90% of their contributions come from elsewhere in the country, in a perfectly legal and accountable way. Will anyone be surprised to hear that Baucus opposes a complete overhaul of the current medical system?

A year after the crash of neoliberalism, the (small-scale) panic that gripped the ruling classes has vanished. The political system remains locked in their favour. From time to time, a more corrupt or unlucky operator goes to jail; the mantra – morals, ethics, regulation, G20 – is chanted; then it all starts again. Questioned recently about the huge bonuses awarded to traders at BNP-Paribas, Christine Lagarde, France’s economy minister and a former Chicago business lawyer, had only this to say: “If we say no more bonuses, the best trader teams will simply move elsewhere.”

Cradled in a political system that protects them (and which they in turn protect) and profiting from the public’s widespread cynicism and all-round despair, traders and medical insurance companies can only pursue their parasitic ways. “Abuse” is not some aberration in their practice, it’s their essence. So a “reform” they could agree to will not do: what we need is their disappearance.

Hackable Diebold Machines to Decide US Senate Race in MA !!!

• COAKLEY BREAKS WORLD CONCESSION RECORD!

Democracy bravely averted; Sen. Kerry applauds...

• Rocket Science Rather Than Democracy on Election Day

[UPDATED] Ballots reported as pre-marked in "at least three" jurisdictions for Brown; Election experts file public records requests; Why didn't they just hand count?...

• More on E-Vote Vulnerabilities in MA Senate Race

Election integrity groups issue 'Orange Alert'; Details given on how to'protect election'; Brad's media interviews...

Hackable Diebold Machines to Decide U.S. Senate Race in MA

Brad at rightwing outlet on disturbing e-vote vulnerabilities, dubious company running Special Election for Kennedy's seat...

'Green News Report' 1/19/09
w/ Brad & Desi

TODAY: Climate & energy legislation may also hinge on MA Senate race; James Inhofe is #1! PLUS: The long aftermath as Haiti's 'second wave' of disaster unfolds ...

Previous GNRs: 1/14/09 - 1/12/10 - Archives...

Finally 'Uncensored': Mysterious Death of Bush/Rove IT Guru Connell Hits Mag

An EXCLUSIVE PREVIEW of Maxim's feature hitting stands this week on the still-unexplained circumstances surrounding the plane crash of the man at the center of the 2004 Ohio election fraud scandal...

Ernest Canning: 'Zionism' & the 3rd Rail of U.S. Politics

Frank Schaeffer: Our Very Own Pact With Satan

NEW STUDY: CA Prop 8 'Marriage Equality Ban' Results 'Probably Corrupted'

'Election Verificiation Exit Poll' shows tallies off by 7.5% to 17.7% in L.A. precincts. Report authors call for investigation...

Palin, Fox, 'Jesus on Acid' and the End of the World

Frank Schaeffer on the unconnected dots of Alaska's superstar and rightwing evangelical/fundamentalist victimhood for politics and profit. And he oughta know...

• Brad @ Guardian: 'Rogue Palin at Fox'

Progressive Group to Woolsey:
Pull Support for 'War Hawk' Harman

Previously: Betrayal?: 'Progressive' Dem Backs 'Blue Dog'

Justice Returns to DoJ Civil Rights Unit Following a little help from The BRAD BLOG, voting rights returns...

'Terrorism' in the Eye of the Beholder Ernest Canning on our view from 9/11, their's from Fallujah...

• Bush Attorney Arrested for Attempted Murder
• Yemen: Intervention Strengthens al-Qaeda
• Feds: KY Officials Manipulated Elections for Decades
• Fight Wall Street, Switch Banks
• Another Blow for the Death Penalty
• The Debate NOT Had About Terrorism
• Canning: We Must Be Insane - Escalation Continues

The Case Against Geithner !!!

January 12th, 2010 10:57 AM

The Case Against Geithner
By Dylan Ratigan

As we sit here today, Wall Street continues to exploit a policy of government-sponsored giveaways and secrecy to pay themselves billions.

Record-setting bonuses due to banks like Goldman Sachs as early next week.

Yet instead of acting as our cop, Secretary Tim Geithner has become central to what may be a cover-up of the greatest theft in U.S. history.
Here is the evidence.
COUNT 1: The AIG Emails:
Recently-released emails show Geithner's New York Federal Reserve Bank directing AIG to keep details of the 100-cents-on-the-dollar bailout secret in 2008 -- A reversal of the traditional role of government, which is to force companies to become more transparent, not less.

A Treasury Spokeswoman says: "Secretary Geithner played no role in these decisions and indeed, by November 24, he was recused from working on issues involving specific companies, including AIG."

Friday, the White House also defended the Treasury Secretary:
Gibbs: These decisions did not rise to his level at the fed.
CNN's Ed Henry: How do you know that he wasn't involved? He was the leader of the New York Fed.
Gibbs: Right, but he wasn't on the emails that have been talked about and wasn't party to the decision that was being made.
He wasn't party to a decision to hide $62 billion dollar payouts to firms that became insolvent during his 5-year watch at the New York Fed?
Congressman Darrell Issa speculates that maybe Geithner wasn't on the emails in question because his people felt so strongly they already knew their boss's intentions, they didn't feel the need to bother him with the details.
COUNT 2: He wasn't even a regulator!
In Geithner's own words during confirmation hearings in March:
"First of all, I've never been a regulator...I'm not a regulator."
According to the New York fed bank's website, that was your job!! And I quote from the Fed's website: "As part of our core mission, we supervise and regulate financial institutions in the Second District."
That district of course is the epicenter for bailed out banks and billion dollar bonuses.
Count 3: "The Christmas Eve Taxpayer Massacre."
As you were wrapping those last presents, Geithner's Treasury Department lifted the 400-billion dollar cap on taxpayer responsibility for potential losses for Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

The new cap? Unlimited taxpayer funds! Interesting timing... Christmas eve, Tim?
Still no word on recovering the hundreds of millions paid to the CEOs who created this mess.
COUNT 4: He's too cozy with certain banks.

Remember those call logs when he first started... 80 contacts with Goldman Sachs, JP Morgan, and CitiGroup CEOs in just 7 months!
But Bank of America's CEO only got three calls. Apparently Bank of America is not one of Geithner's favorites, especially when you consider that there are still many unanswered questions about Tim Geithner's role in threatening to fire Bank of America management if they didn't go through with a deal to buy Merrill lynch.
COUNT 5: TARP Special Investigator Neil Barofsky's report says Geithner's New York Fed overpaid the big banks through AIG by billions of dollars.
Geithner says it had to be done. Maybe so, maybe not, but this takes us to our final point.
Since then, the Treasury Secretary has yet to really prove whose side he's on -- the Wall Street big wigs or the American taxpayer? Here's the litmus test: Mr. Geithner, show us the past ten years of AIG emails or step down so that we can get somebody who will. A crime has been committed against the American taxpayer and right now you are standing at the door of the crime scene refusing to let anyone in.
Show us you're not involved Mr. Geithner, prove the White House correct in defending you. All we are asking for is the transparency promised by the President you serve.

Activists Ask for Peace Dividend !!!

WE should do this in every state !!!:


Published on Friday, January 15, 2010 by the Kennebec Journal (Maine)

Activists Ask for Peace Dividend

by Susan M. Cover

AUGUSTA -- A coalition of activists gathered Thursday in the State House Hall of Flags to call for an end to wars in Iraq and Afghanistan as a way to help pay for needed state programs.

In the future, Brennan (seen speaking here) said he'd like Maine to be known less for building warships and more for providing a high-quality education. ( photo Roger Leisner The Maine Paparazzi Radio Free Maine)The groups say Maine taxpayers have already spent $2.5 billion on the wars. Their estimate is that Maine makes an annual contribution of $320 million toward those conflicts.

This week, hundreds of citizens have come to the State House to protest proposed cuts in the state budget to help fill a $438 million gap. Many of the cuts are to human services and education.

"We are calling for cuts in war spending as a way to help Maine state government deal with this crisis," said Lisa Savage, representing a group called Code Pink.

Savage, a teacher in central Maine, said she used a personal day to come to the State House for the rally and to protest proposed cuts to education funding.

She said the Bring Our War Money Home coalition has launched a three-month campaign to spread their message across the state. The coalition includes Maine Veterans for Peace, Pax Christi Maine, Peace Action Maine and Waterville Area Bridges for Peace & Justice.

Former Sen. Michael Brennan of Portland said he and a dozen other legislators called for an end to the wars more than three years ago.

"I'm sorry to say we were right in our prognosis three and a half years ago," he said. "The state of Maine and this country is in a more dire situation than it was."

Brennan said cuts to education funding, both K-12 and higher education, have continued to chip away at the quality of schools.

"In the 1970s, this country led the world in the number of people that graduated from high school," he said. "Now we're not even in the top 10."

In the future, Brennan said he'd like Maine to be known less for building warships and more for providing a high-quality education.

"My dream is that we will soon become the state known for building universities, building schools, and educating our young people," he said. "And we become No. 1 in the world in that, not in building ships and destroyers."

Stop Obama from sending $30Bi more to Afghan/Iraq wars !!!

Watch The Video



Have you heard? On top of a record $708 billion request for Defense Department funds for next year, President Obama wants another $33 billion for the unpopular Iraq and Afghanistan wars. It's outrageous.

Please take a moment to call your Member of Congress and tell them:

"I oppose spending billions more on the Afghanistan War without a clear path to a 2011 drawdown and a 2012 exit. President Obama said we'd begin bringing troops home in July 2011. I want you to demand a concrete plan to make that a reality."

Call (202) 224-3121 to be transferred to your member of Congress.

After you call, tell us about it on our Facebook page.

We are suffering through the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression, and spending those funds on war will further damage our economy. It's outrageous to waste so much of our national wealth on war. Please call today.

Yours,
Robert Greenwald
Derrick Crowe
and the Brave New Foundation team

Why Obama Must Take On Wall Street

Why Obama Must Take On Wall Street

WEDNESDAY, JANUARY 13, 2010

It has been more than a year since all hell broke loose on Wall Street and, remarkably, almost nothing has been done to prevent all hell from breaking loose again.

In fact, close your eyes and you could be back in the wilds of 2007. Bankers are still making wild bets, still devising new derivatives, still piling on debt. The big banks have access to money almost as cheaply as in 2007, courtesy of the Fed, so bank profits are up and bonuses as generous as at the height of the boom.

The only difference is that now the Street’s biggest banks know they are “too big to fail” and will be bailed out by taxpayers if they get into trouble – which means they have every incentive to make even riskier bets. And, of course, American taxpayers are out some $120bn, while millions have lost their homes, jobs and savings.

All could be forgiven if the House and Senate committees with responsibility for coming up with new regulations were about to come down hard on the Street and if the Obama administration were pushing them to. But nothing of the sort is happening. Yes, the White House has indicated interest in charging banks for the cost of the bailout, but this is not real reform; it’s just making up for some of the direct costs of cleaning up the mess.

Last week, Senator Chris Dodd, chairman of the Senate banking committee, announced he would not seek re-election next November, recasting himself as a lame duck who will do whatever the banks want. Mr Dodd’s decision “makes it more likely that regulatory reform will be enacted”, says Edward Yingling, chief executive of the American Bankers Association, because it “frees him from political dynamics that would have made it more difficult for him to compromise”. Translated: Dodd’s committee will report out a bill – Democrats would be embarrassed not to – but it will be weak because voters can no longer penalise Mr Dodd for rolling over for the Street.

The bill that has already emerged from the House is hardly encouraging. Dubbed the “Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act”, it effectively guarantees future Wall Street bail-outs. The bill authorises Fed banks to provide up to $4,000bn in emergency funding the next time the Street crashes. That is more than twice what the Fed pumped into financial markets last year. The bill also enables the government, in a banking crisis, to back financial firms’ debts – a wonderful insurance policy if you are a bondholder. To be sure, the bill authorises the Fed and Treasury to spend these funds only when “there is at least a 99 per cent likelihood that all funds and interest will be paid back,” but predictions about pending economic disasters can be conveniently flexible, especially when it comes to bailing out the Street.

If this were not enough, the House bill creates regulatory loopholes big enough for bankers to drive their Ferraris through. Consider derivatives. Last year, as taxpayers threw money at the Street, congressional leaders promised to put derivative trading on public exchanges. The prices of derivatives could be disclosed and margin requirements imposed, making it more likely that traders would make good on their bets. Yet the House bill exempts nearly half the $600,000bn of outstanding derivatives trades.

The bill also allows – but, notably, does not require – regulators to “prohibit any incentive-based payment arrangement”. This makes fat bonuses the norm unless a regulator has reason to prevent them. And as we witnessed last year, bank regulators tend not to disturb the status quo. The House bill does not even make an attempt to unravel the conflict of interest that led credit ratings agencies to turn a blind eye to the risks the Street was taking on.

To its credit, the House bill does create a Consumer Financial Protection Agency to protect borrowers from predatory lending. Banking regulators have authority to protect consumers but failed to do so, so consolidating these powers in a new agency makes some sense. But Senate Republicans are dead-set against it, and Mr Dodd’s new willingness to compromise may well doom it in that chamber.

What is truly remarkable is what Congress and the administration have shown no interest in doing. Large numbers of Americans have lost their homes to bank foreclosures or are in danger of doing so. Yet American bankruptcy law does not allow homeowners to declare bankruptcy and have their mortgages reorganised. If it did, homeowners would have more bargaining power to renegotiate with banks. But neither Congress nor the administration has pushed to change the bankruptcy laws. Wall Street opposes such change and was instrumental in narrowing the scope of personal bankruptcy in the first place.

Nor have lawmakers shown any enthusiasm for resurrecting the wall that used to exist between commercial and investment banking. The Glass-Steagall Act, passed in the wake of the Great Crash of 1929, separated the two after it became obvious that commercial deposits needed to be insured by government and kept distinct from the betting parlour of investment banking. But Wall Street forced Congress to take down the wall in 1999, enabling financial supermarkets such as Citigroup to use its deposits to make all sorts of bets. Even Obama adviser and former Fed chief Paul Volcker has argued that the two functions should be separated again.

Nor is anyone talking seriously about using antitrust laws to break up the biggest banks – the traditional tonic for any capitalist entity that is “too big to fail”. Five giant Wall Street banks now dominate US finance. If it was in the public’s interest to break up giant oil companies and railroads a century ago, and the mammoth telephone company AT&T, it is not unreasonable to break up the almost infinitely extensive tangles of Citigroup, Bank of America, JPMorgan Chase, Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley. No one has offered a clear reason why giant banks are important to the US economy. Logic and experience suggests the reverse.

What happened to all the tough talk from Congress and the White House early last year? Why is the financial reform agenda so small, and so late?

Part of the answer is that the American public has moved on. A major tenet of US politics is that if politicians wait long enough, public attention wanders. With the financial crisis appearing to be over, the public is more concerned about jobs. Another 85,000 jobs were lost in December, bringing total losses since the recession began in December 2007 to over 7m. One out of six Americans is unemployed or underemployed.

Yet if the president and Congress wanted to, they could help Americans understand the link between widespread job losses and the irresponsibility on Wall Street that plunged America into the Great Recession. They could make tough financial reform part of the answer to sustain-able jobs growth over the long term.

True, financial regulation does not make a powerful bumper sticker. Few Americans know what the denizens of Wall Street do all day. Even fewer know or care about collateralised debt obligations or credit default swaps. To the extent Americans have been paying attention to the details of any public policy, it has been the healthcare reform bill. But that only begs the question of why financial reform has not been higher on the agenda of the president and Democratic leaders.

A larger explanation, I am afraid, is the grip Wall Street has over the American political process. The Street is where the money is and money buys campaign commercials on television. Wall Street firms and executives have been uniquely generous to both parties, emerging as one of the largest benefactors of the Democrats. Between November 2008 and November 2009, Wall Street doled out $42m to lawmakers, mostly to members of the House and Senate banking committees and House and Senate leaders. In the first three quarters of 2009, the industry spent $344m on lobbying – making the Street one of the major powerhouses in the nation’s capital.

Money is powerful. Talk is cheap. Mr Obama recently called the top bankers “fat cats”, and the bankers insisted they were shocked – shocked! – to learn how intransigent their lobbyists had been in opposing financial reform. The bankers even claimed a “disconnect” between their intentions and their lobbyists’ actions. This was all for the cameras, of course.

But the widening gulf between Wall Street and Main Street – a big bail-out for the former, unemployment checks for the latter; high profits and giant bonuses for the former, job and wage losses for the latter; buoyant expectations of the former, deep anxiety and cynicism by the latter; ever fancier estates for denizens of the former, mortgage foreclosures for the rest – is dangerous. Americans went ballistic early last summer when AIG executives got big bonuses after taxpayers had bailed them out. They will not be happy when Wall Street hands out billions in bonuses very soon. Angry populism lurks just beneath the surface of two-party politics in America. Just listen to Sarah Palin or her counterparts on American talk radio and yell television. Over the long term, the political stakes in reforming Wall Street are as high as the economic.

Pat Robertson the billionaire thief, evilman, evangelist, crazy nuts !!!

We should look at Pat Robertson tax free status and ask the IRS to investigate this nuthouse phony evil man and send him to jail and take all his possession and give to the needed.

So I recommend to people to start looking at Pat Robertson tax free status (because of his "christian evangelical" cause).

Pat Robertson, you are the evil in person!!

Look at what the imbecile, ignorant, stupid, evil, thief, millionaire Pat Robertson has said about the earthquake in Haiti:


(CNN) -- Pat Robertson, the evangelical Christian who once suggested God was punishing

Americans with Hurricane Katrina, says a "pact to the devil" brought on the devastating

earthquake in Haiti.


Pat Robertson and the whole Fox News cast, which by the way are all (can only be)

republi-cons.

That explains a lot about the behavior of these bastards that unfortunately populates the main

stream media in our country. No wonder the US is in such a state of failure: big deficit, huge

trade deficit, four wars (Iraq, Afghan, Yemen and Gaza) which are bankrupting the country,

worse healthcare

system of the industrialized world, uncontrolled

bank/investment system, worse economic system (supply-side economics) milton

friedman's/university of Chicago school) and founder of the "reagonomics", and the infamous

trickle down economics that is responsible for the big hole that the US is in, bad free trade

agreements, 18 % unemployment, abuses military power to invade other countries with

oil/mineral resources, etc.

Tom Friedman, the billionaire idiot !!!

Billionaire Scion Tom Friedman


I've documented repeatedly how New York Times columnist Tom Friedman parrots the propaganda of Big Money, using his column to legitimize some of the worst, most working-class-persecuting policies this country has seen in the last century - all while bragging on television that he doesn't even bother read the details of the policies he advocates for. I have always believed Friedman's perspective comes from the bubble he lives in - that is, I have always believed he feels totally at ease shilling for Big Money and attacking workers because from the comfortable confines of the Washington suburbs he lives in and the elite cocktail parties he attends, what Friedman says seems mainstream to him. But I never had any idea how dead on I was about the specific circumstances of Friedman's bubble - and how it potentially explains a lot more than I ever thought.

As the July edition of the Washingtonian Magazine notes, Friedman lives in "a palatial 11,400-square-foot house, now valued at $9.3 million, on a 7½-acre parcel just blocks from I-495 and Bethesda Country Club." He "married into one of the 100 richest families in the country" - the Bucksbaums, whose real-estate Empire is valued at $2.7 billion.

Let's be clear - I'm a capitalist, so I have no problem with people doing well or living well, even Tom Friedman. That said, this does potentially explain an ENORMOUS amount about Friedman's perspective. Far from the objective, regular-guy interpreter of globalization that the D.C. media portrays him to be, Friedman is a member of the elite of the economic elite on the planet Earth. In fact, he's married into such a giant fortune, it's probably more relevant to refer to him as Billionaire Scion Tom Friedman than columnist Tom Friedman, both because that's more descriptive of what he represents, and more important for readers of his work to know so that they know a bit about where he's coming from.

Mind you, I don't think everyone needs to publish their net worth. But Friedman's not everyone. He's not just "doing pretty well" and is not just any old columnist. He's not just a millionaire or a multimillionaire - he's member of one of the wealthiest families in the world, and is one of the most influential media voices on the planet, who writes specifically about economic/class issues. If politicians are forced to disclose every last asset they own, you'd think at the very least, the New York Times - in the interest of basic disclosure - should have a tagline under Friedman's economic columns that says "Tom Friedman is an heir to a multi-billion-dollar business empire."

Again, there's positively nothing wrong with people being rich in general, or Tom Friedman being a billionaire scion in specific. The problem is that so few of his readers know this, even as he aggressively uses his platform to justify policies that almost exclusively benefit his super-wealthy brethren - all under the guise of supposed objectivity.

Then again, the fact that we know so little about who is actually making opinion in this country isn't surprising. Even looking at this kind of information as it relates to the most important opinionmaker in the world is looked down upon by Washington insiders/elites/politicians. To paraphrase Jack Nicholson from "A Few Good Men," deep down in places they don't talk about at parties, they want billionaires like Friedman dictating the debate because they need someone creating public rationales for policies that enrich Big Money interests, sell out America and guarantee the next fat campaign contribution.

Some, of course, might ask: Why should we care about Friedman's billionaire status, but not the status of very rich people like, say, Ted Kennedy? Two points on that: First, most people already know that Kennedy comes from a very wealthy family, so there is no lack of knowledge by the public about potential conflicts of class interest. The same can't be said for Friedman, who is constantly billed as just an average Joe speaking his mind.

But far more important, the superwealth of a political actor (ie. a politician, columnist, etc.) is really only relevant when that actor is using their power to push their own class's economic interests, because then and only then does it really bring up questions of conflicts of interest, bias and corruption. Ted Kennedy is widely known as one of the most outspoken advocates for the poor and for economic progressive causes in general - causes that defy the interests of his personal economic class. Thus, his wealth really isn't important in conflict-of-interest, objectivity or personal corruption terms as it relates to his actions in the political arena. (Same thing goes, I might add, for wealthy folks who donate to liberal causes. In the words of Franklin Delano Roosevelt critics, they are "traitors to their class." They are altruistically/patriotically donating against their own personal economic class interests and for the broader good - and therefore there is no relevant conflict of interest or pay-to-play corruption going on. That stands in sharp contrast to right-wing billionaires who fund conservative institutions that purport to be steered only by principled ideology, but which inevitably spend much of their time trumpeting the very specific policies that personally benefit their big donors.)

Friedman, unlike Kennedy, uses his position to push the very specific economic policies (such as "free" trade) that the superwealthy in this country are pushing and exclusively benefit from. That's why his billionaire scion status is so important for the public to know - because it raises objectivity questions. If, for instance, Richard Mellon Scaife wrote articles in newspapers demanding the repeal of the estate tax - don't you think it would be important for readers to be warned that Scaife was a multimillionaire whose family (and the few families like his) would almost exclusively benefit from the policies he was writing about? Of course. That's called full disclosure and transparency, the very things critical to an objective free press and democracy - the very thing Friedman says is so important for other countries when he writes about foreign policy.

So the next time you read a piece by Tom Friedman telling us how wonderful job outsourcing is or how great it is to pass Big Money's latest trade deal that include no labor, wage, human rights or environmental provisions - just remember: Tom Friedman, scion of a billionaire business empire, is just doing right by his own economic class.

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Rachel Maddow tonight!

January 12th, 2010
Rachel Maddow will be our guest following her program tonight, so be sure to tune in at 10:30 PM ET as Mike and Rachel discuss the ongoing DC madness.

Sarah Palin struts onto the set at Fox “News” and joins their army of overly-botox’d bubble heads who stare blankly at the camera and read whatever Murdoch’s minions scrawl on the telescreen. Tonight it’s Bill O’Reilly’s turn. He won the coin toss and get’s the first shot at Sarah while she “takes on America’s top issues” while simultaneously removing Bill-O’s hand from her thigh. Somebody pass me a loofah.

A prop 8 update, and more on the show tonight!

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Fox and Facts

January 12th, 2010
President Obama doesn’t have enough to worry about with the tumultuous debate on the final version of his health care reform proposal, continuing economic uncertainties, rising unemployment, and bank failures; two wars he’s inherited and the ongoing threat of terror attacks. Now he’s being criticized for not holding enough press conferences.

“Obama Going on Six Months Without a Press Conference” reads the headline on . . . . you guessed it, Fox “News.” The “article” continues to blast the President for being out of touch with the public. This from a “news” organization that just a few weeks ago criticized him for being overexposed. The article states, “Obama has given dozens of one-on-one interviews for television, radio and print, and Towson University political science professor Martha Joynt Kumar said presidents tend to favor media exchanges that best suit their particular goals,” adding that “some in the White House press corps are getting antsy for him to hold a news conference with reporters, something he hasn’t done since July 22, almost six months ago.”

Fox “News” and other, similar, Neocon media outlets continue their selective amnesia about Presidential administrations. First, one of the former Bush spokesmodels - Dana Perino – stated that there was no terrorist attack during the eight years Bush was in office, magically forgetting the tragedy of 9-11-2001. Naturally, that ridiculous statement went unchallenged as she was appearing on Fox “News” with Sean Hannity at the time. As they accuse Obama of avoiding the press (itself a flip-flop from Fox’s previous admonishment that he was always seeking the cameras) they seem to forget that their own Favorite Son, George Dubya, failed to hold a presser for his first nine months in office, and then entered an extended press blackout from July of 2008 to January of 2009, a (gasp!) six month period during which he avoided even a single reporter’s question. Darn those pesky facts that keep interfering with their “news” reporting.

By the numbers, Bush only exposed publicly himself to the press three times in 2004 and four times in 2008 . . . . hmmmmmm, both of those election years. Perhaps he was busy devising amusing new nicknames for the reporters, or trying to remember which ones were vision impaired so he didn’t repeat his 2006 mistake of asking legally blind reporter Peter Wallsten of the Los Angeles Times why he didn’t remove his “shades.”

But, Fox “News” has become infamous for its many double standards, be it politicians and their private parts (Bill Clinton affair = impeachable offense, Henry Hyde affair = youthful indiscretion), criminal activity (witness the innocent victims of circumstance Tom Delay and Irving “Scooter” Libby), response to terror threats (Bush’s delayed response to the shoe bomber vs. Obama’s prompt response to the Detroit incident), or natural disasters like Hurricane Katrina. Don’t even talk about the number of troops that have died under Dubya compared to Clinton. The amnesiacs at Fox never, ever touch that topic. Nor do they discuss how the Bush Crime Family sucked up the Clinton budget surpluses into a massive, personal war chest and spent billions of our taxpayer dollars on fomenting terror, death, and destruction across the oily, Muslim Mideast. That will never be a headline on The O’Reilly Factor.

Sarah Palin, with her murky understanding of the world outside Wasilla, will fit right in with the other factually-challenged misfits at Fox “News.” And they won’t even have to fix her face like they did before dragging Greta over from CNN. How long before Sarah Barracuda and Glen Beck are dueling it out on white-board challenges to see who can wax crazier about death panels, Obama’s terrorist pals, God-inspired crusades in various Muslim majority countries, ACORN, and bogus birth certificates?

They deserve each other.

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Afghan war kills three children a day: report

LATEST NEWS

January 7th, 2010 4:06 PM

Afghan war kills three children a day: report

Looks like there's a fourth one hiding back there who can wait until tomorrow.

1 of 7

By Lynne O'Donnell / AFP

KABUL — Children are the biggest victims of the war in Afghanistan, with more than 1,050 people under 18 years old killed last year alone, according to an Afghan human rights watchdog.
Taliban-linked militants caused around 64 percent of all violent child deaths last year, the Afghanistan Rights Monitor (ARM) said in a report.

Children were also press-ganged, sexually exploited, deprived of health and education, and illegally detained by all sides in a war that is dragging into its ninth year since the US-led invasion toppled the Taliban regime.
"At least three children were killed in war-related incidents every day in 2009 and many others suffered in diverse but mostly unreported ways," ARM director Ajmal Samadi said.

Children died in suicide attacks and roadside bombings -- at the crux of the Taliban's arsenal against US, NATO and Afghan troops fighting the increasingly virulent insurgency as it spreads across the impoverished country.

The Taliban "reportedly caused more harm and intentionally abused more children for illegal purposes than pro-government Afghan and international forces," the report said.
"Through a horrible anti-education policy of heinous attacks, intimidation and terror the insurgents deprived hundreds of thousands of children, boys and girls, from education mostly in the insecure south and east of the country."
On the other hand, the Western-backed government has failed to introduce or implement laws to protect children against the abuses of war or "bring alleged criminals and abusers to justice," Samadi said.
ARM called on the Afghan authorities to set up an official child protection body and liaise with the warring parties on child rights.

The report by ARM, an independent rights monitoring group set up in Kabul in 2008, comes after the United Nations said civilian deaths in Afghanistan rose 10.8 percent in the first 10 months of 2009, most caused by the Taliban.
The United Nations put civilian deaths at 2,038 for that period, up from 1,838 for the same period of 2008, with the vast majority killed by insurgents.
It said 468 deaths were caused by pro-government forces, including NATO and US-led forces, and 166 by "other actors."
ARM released the report as a suspected roadside bomb attack killed four children and wounded more than a dozen in volatile eastern Nangahar province.

Reports that foreign forces killed eight students in Kunar province on December 26 caused widespread outrage, including US flag-burning demonstrations in two cities, though reports of what happened varied widely.
A government investigation found the teenagers were unarmed and killed in cold blood, while Western military sources said the group were armed, opened fire at foreign and Afghan forces, and were killed in self-defence.
Civilian deaths at the hands of foreign forces fuel distrust between the Afghan population, the government and US and NATO troops, even though most are caused by insurgent tactics such as homemade bombs.

The Taliban regularly exploit deaths caused by foreign and Afghan forces, and Western military intelligence officials say the militants have gained the upper hand in a sophisticated propaganda war.
Militant leaders, based largely in Pakistan, rarely claim responsibility for operations that kill large numbers of civilians but routinely exaggerate losses among foreign forces.

The United States and NATO are boosting their troop numbers in Afghanistan to 150,000 over the course of 2010, as part of a new strategy determined to clear and secure insurgent strongholds.
US General Stanley McChrystal, commander of foreign forces in Afghanistan, has ordered civilian casualties be kept to a minimum, yet as more troops pour in, a higher death rate is inevitable, experts say.

The US as a Failed State !!!

The Super Rich are Laughing

The US as Failed State

By PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS

The US has every characteristic of a failed state.

The US government’s current operating budget is dependent on foreign financing and money creation.

Too politically weak to be able to advance its interests through diplomacy, the US relies on terrorism and military aggression.

Costs are out of control, and priorities are skewed in the interest of rich organized interest groups at the expense of the vast majority of citizens. For example, war at all cost, which enriches the armaments industry, the officer corps and the financial firms that handle the war’s financing, takes precedence over the needs of American citizens. There is no money to provide the uninsured with health care, but Pentagon officials have told the Defense Appropriations Subcommittee in the House that every gallon of gasoline delivered to US troops in Afghanistan costs American taxpayers $400.

“It is a number that we were not aware of and it is worrisome,” said Rep. John Murtha, chairman of the subcommittee.

According to reports, the US Marines in Afghanistan use 800,000 gallons of gasoline per day. At $400 per gallon, that comes to a $320,000,000 daily fuel bill for the Marines alone. Only a country totally out of control would squander resources in this way.

While the US government squanders $400 per gallon of gasoline in order to kill women and children in Afghanistan, many millions of Americans have lost their jobs and their homes and are experiencing the kind of misery that is the daily life of poor third world peoples. Americans are living in their cars and in public parks. America’s cities, towns, and states are suffering from the costs of economic dislocations and the reduction in tax revenues from the economy’s decline. Yet, Obama has sent more troops to Afghanistan, a country half way around the world that is not a threat to America.

It costs $750,000 per year for each soldier we have in Afghanistan. The soldiers, who are at risk of life and limb, are paid a pittance, but all of the privatized services to the military are rolling in excess profits. One of the great frauds perpetuated on the American people was the privatization of services that the US military traditionally performed for itself. “Our” elected leaders could not resist any opportunity to create at taxpayers’ expense private wealth that could be recycled to politicians in campaign contributions.

Republicans and Democrats on the take from the private insurance companies maintain that the US cannot afford to provide Americans with health care and that cuts must be made even in Social Security and Medicare. So how can the US afford bankrupting wars, much less totally pointless wars that serve no American interest?

The enormous scale of foreign borrowing and money creation necessary to finance Washington’s wars are sending the dollar to historic lows. The dollar has even experienced large declines relative to currencies of third world countries such as Botswana and Brazil. The decline in the dollar’s value reduces the purchasing power of Americans’ already declining incomes.

Despite the lowest level of housing starts in 64 years, the US housing market is flooded with unsold homes, and financial institutions have a huge and rising inventory of foreclosed homes not yet on the market.

Industrial production has collapsed to the level of 1999, wiping out a decade of growth in industrial output.

The enormous bank reserves created by the Federal Reserve are not finding their way into the economy. Instead, the banks are hoarding the reserves as insurance against the fraudulent derivatives that they purchased from the gangster Wall Street investment banks.

The regulatory agencies have been corrupted by private interests. Frontline reports that Alan Greenspan, Robert Rubin, and Larry Summers blocked Brooksley Born, the head of the Commodity Futures Trading Commission from regulating derivatives. President Obama rewarded Larry Summers for his idiocy by appointing him Director of the National Economic Council. What this means is that profits for Wall Street will continue to be leeched from the diminishing blood supply of the American economy.

An unmistakable sign of third world despotism is a police force that sees the pubic as the enemy. Thanks to the federal government, our local police forces are now militarized and imbued with hostile attitudes toward the public. SWAT teams have proliferated, and even small towns now have police forces with the firepower of US Special Forces. Summons are increasingly delivered by SWAT teams that tyrannize citizens with broken down doors, a $400 or $500 repair born by the tyrannized resident. Recently a mayor and his family were the recipients of incompetence by the town’s local SWAT team, which mistakenly wrecked the mayor’s home, terrorized his family, and killed the family’s two friendly Labrador dogs.

If a town’s mayor can be treated in this way, what do you think is the fate of the poor white or black? Or the idealistic student who protests his government’s inhumanity?

In any failed state, the greatest threat to the population comes from the government and the police. That is certainly the situation today in the USA. Americans have no greater enemy than their own government. Washington is controlled by interest groups that enrich themselves at the expense of the American people.

The one percent that comprise the superrich are laughing as they say, “let them eat cake.”

Giuliani is a fucking idiot!

Giuliani: It's not Terror if it's not Islamic [Updated]
by DanK Is Back


Fri Jan 08, 2010 at 05:00:48 PM PST

In an amazing feat of acrobatics, Rudy Giulani went on CNN today to try to talk his way out of his claim the other day that "no domestic terrorism" had happened under Bush's watch. It was an attempt to backpedal while keeping foot firmly in mouth.

What he meant to say, he said, was that there had been no domestic terrorism under Bush's watch since 9/11.

What about the anthrax letters a month later, Wolf Blitzer asked him?

He ... said the anthrax attacks of 2001 don't count, because they never proven to be done in the name of "Islamic terrorism."

DanK Is Back's diary :: ::
In other words, it only counts as terror if it's "Islamic terror."

Every time I think these Republicans have gone as low as they can get, they find a new level to sink to. If I were Giuliani, I would not go any time soon to the offices of those senators and congressmen who got those letters, or anywhere near the families of those who died from handling them.

Maybe Giuliani was setting up to excuse abortion clinic bombings and doctor shootings; since those are done by "Christian" fundamentalists, they can't be acts of terror by his definition.

Then there's the Beltway Sniper, who "terrorized" the DC area for 23 days in October 2002 - Bush's term - before he was caught? As the Washington Examiner put it in its headline:

Beltway sniper fights execution as region remembers terror

The DC region, it seems, has a different definition of terror, not to mention a better memory, than Giuliani.

Giuliani also said that his reference to "domestic terrorism" on Obama's watch was meant to be the Fort Hood shootings. That was designed a dodge to avoid comparing the shoe bomber (Bush) to the underwear bomber (Obama). But in saying that, he in effect denied that the underwear bomber was a domestic terrorist, since he only gave Obama a score of 1 terrorist.

Giuliani still hasn't learned a lesson from Politics 101: When you're in a hole, stop digging.

I'll leave the last word on the subject to WH Press secretary Gibbs:

"There were a number of things that didn’t quite seem to jive with the better part of reality," White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said at Friday’s briefing. "I think he mentioned there not being any domestic terror attacks in the previous administration... It’s interesting that the mayor of New York had forgotten that." ABC News blogs

Update [2010-1-8 20:17:5 by DanK Is Back]: I rushed this a bit because I wanted to go watch Countdown. Lawrence O'Donnell was on subbing for Keith, and he led with this as the lead story. Since I do not have any bugs planted in MSNBC's office, I can only plead GMTA.

O'Donnell listed a number of other attacks that took place on Bush's watch that can only be called "Islamic terrorism" such as the attack on El Al's Los Angeles airport counter in 2002.

In some ways, I prefer O'Donnell to Olberman because he is calmer, cooler, sounds more rational. This time he was clearly, visibly, angry over Giuliani's lies - and he called them that in so many words. Very effective.

Tags: Rudy Giuliani, Terror, Islamic Terror, 9/11, Fort Hood, Anthrax (all tags) :: Previous Tag Versions

ass-holes Joe Liberman and Ben Nelson

My rant against big media political "blogs" by way of "Black Tuesday" coverage

by: Chris Bowers
Thu Jan 07, 2010 at 14:00

Uh-oh for D.C. political writers: it looks like the Democratic retirements on Tuesday were actually a net positive for the Democratic Party's electoral chances. Colorado, too:
Now that Colorado Governor Bill Ritter has said he will step down rather than run for reelection, Democrats may be more competitive in this year's gubernatorial race. Ritter trailed former GOP Congressman Scott McInnis by eight points a month ago.
New Rasmussen Reports polling of likely Colorado voters shows that two of McInnis' potential Democratic opponents are a bit closer than that.

Three Democrats running for statewide re-election retied on Tuesday (a fourth Democratic retirement came from a Lt. Governor in Michigan seeking a promotion). The retirements in Colorado and Connecticut were helpful to Democratic causes, while the Democratic retirement in North Dakota was not. On balance, that makes so-called "Black Tuesday," almost universally defined as a negative for Democrats among D.C. political writers, a net positive for Democrats.
So much for there being "Black Tuesday" at all. As such, let's revisit some conventional wisdom that appeared on MSNBC's First Read yesterday:

Here is some more genius from MSNBC:
Of course, be wary when the first set of blind quotes you read from party strategists after a retirement is "[Fill in the blank's] decision may turn out to be a blessing." As we wrote above, that's probably true regarding Dodd.
And then, at the end of the same paragraph:

The fact is that retirements, party switches, etc. hurt a party -- period.
Yeah, retirements always hurt a party. PERIOD!!!!! Except that, at the start of this same paragraph, the author wrote that Dodd's retirement helped Dems. Awesome.

To put it in completely ungenerous terms, the claim that retirements are always bad for an incumbent party is just plain stupid. There are lots of cases where an incumbent retiring either is, or would be, good for the incumbent's party. Claiming otherwise is simply to cling to entirely qualitative, entirely fact-less, conventional wisdom rather than looking at the actual numbers.
Corruption cases are one obvious, glaring example that proves retirements can sometimes be good for an incumbent party. Take, for example, the Louisiana 2nd congressional district. There is no possible way Democrats would have lost that campaign in 2008 if the incumbent, William Jefferson, had retired. Further, take the California 50th congressional district as an example. There is no possible way Republicans would have held that seat in 2006 if Duke Cunningham had remained the Republican nominee, even if he had escaped jail time.
If an incumbent is unpopular, and his or her district is leans in favor of his or her party, then his or her retirement absolutely helps that party's electoral chances. PERIOD. This is why, as Kos pointed out yesterday, Democratic chances in Nevada and Arkansas would be improved with Harry Reid and Blanche Lincoln stepped aside, respectively. Reid and Lincoln are personally unpopular in Nevada and Arkansas, and a "generic Democrat" has a relatively better chance of winning either state. As such, their retirements would help Democratic electoral chances.
The same goes for Jim Bunning's retirement in Kentucky, which moved an almost certain Democratic pickup into toss-up / lean Republican territory. There is no hard and fast rule about whether an incumbent retirement, in and of itself, helps or hurts the incumbent's party. The effect of incumbent retirements needs to be examined on a case by case basis, using actual, scientific, empirical evidence (aka, polls).
Using such evidence, and engaging in such detailed examination, is not a strength of political writing from well-financed, established, national news organizations. And I'm not going to hide my agenda here: poor political writing from those organizations is what really angers me in this case. After spending years dismissing us, these well-financed, established, national news organizations are now stealing market share from smaller, independent, political websites by paying people lots of money to write "blogs" of their own. It pisses me off that they are able to do this even though those "blogs" are largely replicating the same, crappy conventional-wisdom and non-fact-based political writing that led to the rise of independent (in the institutional, rather than partisan sense of the word) political websites in the first place. They are beating us because they are able to pay people a lot more money, and because they are attached to well-established brand names, not because they have actually improved their writing all that much. This is exceptionally frustrating.
With the rare exceptions of people like Greg Sargent, Ezra Klein and Matt Yglesias, who established themselves as independent bloggers before they became big media bloggers, most big media "bloggers" couldn't get even one million page views a year if they started independent political websites of their own. They certainly couldn't get the eight million page views of even a mid-range independent political website like Open Left. They would be nobodies without their institutions. Instead, they are well paid "bloggers" who help define the conventional wisdom. And yeah, as someone who has spent the last six years trying to make a living as an independent political writer, that really does piss me off. Effectively, with their move to "blogs," these news organizations are just yet more crappy superstores pushing small businesses to the side, to the benefit of absolutely no one except the superstore investors.

Discuss :: (13 Comments)
People don't like hostage-takers: Ben Nelson, Joe Lieberman now most unpopular Senators of all
by: Chris Bowers
Thu Jan 07, 2010 at 13:00
It is both small comfort, and an important lesson, for public option advocates that Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson have become the most unpopular and electorally imperiled members of the entire Senate. This has happened largely because of their hostage-taking actions on the healthcare bill.
Joe Lieberman:

Joe Lieberman's actions on the health care bill antagonized constituents both for and against it, and in the wake of that he finds his approval rating at just 25% with 67% of voters in the state disapproving of him.(...)
It's clear that his actions on the Senate health care bill have made a large contribution to his falling popularity. 68% of voters say they disagree with how he handled the issue to just 19% giving him support. Among people who support the health care bill 84% say they disapprove of Lieberman's actions but even among those opposed to the initiative 52% say they disagree with how Lieberman handled himself.

This isn't the first poll showing that Lieberman took a big hit over his backstab on the public option. Two weeks ago, CNN polling showed the exact same results, much to the mystification of D.C. political writers.
Lieberman's actions appealed to no one. Now, he is toast, even among Republicans. A warm body will defeat him in 2012.
Ben Nelson:

If Governor Dave Heineman challenges Nelson for the Senate job, a new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey shows the Republican would get 61% of the vote while Nelson would get just 30%. Nelson was reelected to a second Senate term in 2006 with 64% of the vote.
Nelson's health care vote is clearly dragging his numbers down. Just 17% of Nebraska voters approve of the deal their senator made on Medicaid in exchange for his vote in support of the plan.

Nelson, like Lieberman, did not make himself more popular among those who oppose the health care bill, or the public option, with his actions. Both supporters and opponents of both the health care bill and the public option were largely disgusted with what they viewed as personal power aggrandizement.
Their actions earned both Nelson and Lieberman featured appearances on Sunday D.C. talk shows, but it also made voters of all sorts loathe them. It would appear that people don't like members of Congress who take enormous pieces of legislation hostage for personal reasons. Nelson and Lieberman are now the most unpopular Senators in their home states in the entire country, far more unpopular than even Harry Reid, Chris Dodd or Blanche Lincoln.
All of this makes it quite amusing that ongoing hostage-taker, Bart Stupak, is strongly considering a run for Governor of Michigan. What a fool. It seems that he really believes that the only people who hate his hostage-taking actions are from New York City. The Nelson and Lieberman polling quoted above shows that very few people, whether in your home state or nationally, and whether among people who agree with your positions or not, like it when members of Congress take hostages in this manner.
Man, I hope Stupak does run for Governor. It would be an easy way to get him out of elected office altogether. It would also be nice to see another health care hostage-taker go down in flames, mystified about why people don't like him anymore.
Finally, I think this is a lesson for public option advocates, and our high-profile hostage-taking strategy called The Progressive Block. It seems clear to me now that a strategy like that only works if you build up public support for it (which we most definitely did not do among the Democratic primary electorate), or if the fight is far more low-profile (such as IMF funding in the Afghanistan supplemental). High-profile hostage taking just doesn't work from the left (or, as polling shows, from the right or the center, either) Voters of all sorts, including those on the left, just don't like it, and they will punish you given the opportunity. It is indeed small comfort that the mendacious hostage-takers who stopped us are now wildly unpopular both at home and around the country, but it is also a warning that we would have been in the same position if we had become the hostage takers ourselves.