Day: August 20, 2008

2008 Anal-Ocity

These guys just amaze me…No matter how hard I try…I just cannot make this stuff up.

Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-GA) returned to Sen. Barack Obama ’s (D-IL) recent suggestion that Americans inflate their tires properly in order to save energy costs. Seeming to outdo his previous false attacks on this issue, Gingrich claimed that Obama’s idea is actually encouraging Americans to “enrich Big Oil”

So Exxon made billions selling air?  You gotta love the cajones of people like this.

Fannie And Freddie Prepare For A Bailout

As reported in the NY Times:

Financial conditions are continuing to worsen at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, leading some investors to prepare for a government bailout of the housing giants even as the Treasury Department and the companies say such government intervention will not be necessary.

“The markets are acting like a bailout is inevitable,” said Sean Egan, managing director of Egan-Jones Ratings, an independent credit ratings firm. Mr. Egan said he believed the federal government would need to help pump about $20 billion into each company, possibly through a government guarantee rather than through a direct injection of capital.

Treasury officials have repeatedly emphasized that they do not plan to use the authority, recently granted by Congress, to pump billions of dollars into the firms. Company insiders have begun arguing that the recent stock declines are the work of duplicitous critics conspiring to undermine the firms. Executives at both firms say they are confident they can raise additional money from investors and that the companies are adequately capitalized, with capital in excess of what they are required to hold by their regulator. Government officials note that both companies continue to buy mortgages and that they are borrowing at rates far below what other banks and companies pay.

But as the companies’ fortunes decline, their options are narrowing. Fannie and Freddie are a critical part of the nation’s housing finance system, owning or guaranteeing nearly half of all home mortgages. They have lost more than $14 billion in the last year, however, and are expected to announce further losses later this year. Government officials, company insiders and investors all agree the firms will need to raise more money.

Hence, the smell of a government bailout is getting stronger with each market closing.

Court Sides With The Environment

In a blow to oil refiners, chemical makers and other polluting industries, a federal appeals court threw out a rule that prevented states from implementing tougher pollution-monitoring requirements.

The decision by the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit could lead to higher compliance costs and give states, local authorities and environmentalists more data that could be used to prosecute polluters, environmentalists said.

The decision marks the latest instance in which a federal court has rejected the approach to regulating harmful emissions taken by the administration of President George W. Bush. “It is a pretty serious rebuke of the Bush administration’s efforts to tie the hands of states at the behest of industry,” said John Walke, director of the clean-air program at the Natural Resources Defense Council. The court found the Environmental Protection Agency’s rule under the Clean Air Act “is contrary to the statutory directive that each permit must include adequate monitoring requirements.”

The court’s decision was one in a string of rulings scrapping Bush administration air-quality policies. Last month, the same court struck down the administration’s signature air-quality program, the Clean Air Interstate Rule — one of the few Bush administration efforts applauded by the environmental community. The regulation, announced in 2005 and covering more than two dozen states, sought to slash emissions that contribute to respiratory illnesses by instituting a “cap and trade” system in which companies that exceed their emissions caps can buy allowances from companies that do not.

In February, the appeals court rejected the EPA’s decision to remove mercury from a list of pollutants the agency is required to control at each power plant. Last year, a divided Supreme Court ruled that carbon dioxide and other so-called greenhouse gases are air pollutants under the Clean Air Act, and that the Bush administration had wrongly refused to limit emissions of those gases.

At least someone is looking out for the environment, up until recently, NO one in Washington cared.

Saddleback–Revisited

A bitter sweet story of two men coming to terms with their homosexuality……..wait…..that was Broke Back…..crap….never mind.

Saddleback? Oh yeah, that was that snooze-a-thon of Rick Warren which asked social conservative questions of the two presidential candidates, Obama and McCain.

I was not going to comment that much on this waste of time but in the last couple of days I have heard many pundits and the media say that McCain won this match up hands down. Well, duh! McCain gave normally vague Republican answers to complex questions. And who would you think would be considered the winner of a conservative forum? Obama?

McCain gave answers that warrant applause from the mental midgets in the audience. That was his only intention never was he going to offer thoughtful answers; that is just not the Republican way. Obama gave thoughtful, intelligent answers, but that was not what was needed when you are talking to people who have an IQ and shoe size the same.

This also illustrates where the media is in this fight. They are the ones telling everyone of McCain’s win in this lively discussion. The only thing lively in watching this pile of crap was when the viewer switched channels to see how that swimmer guy was doing.

Of course, McCain won this abortion (pun intended) called a forum, was there going to be any doubt? But to turn this thing into some sort of campaign one-upmanship is just stupid, but then we are talking about Republicans, right?

Today In Labor History

20 August
Slave traders land their first cargo in the New World: 20 Africans, at Jamestown, Virginia – 1619

The short-lived National Labor Union is formed, headed by William H. Sylvis. It was the first American union to unite skilled and unskilled workers. One of its first acts: calling for an eight-hour workday – 1866

Colorado gold miners seize town of Cripple Creek and deport officials – 1904

In response to continuing violence by coal operators and their paid goons in the southern coalfields of West Virginia, a three hour gun battle between strikers and guards leaves six dead – 1920

Is The Taliban Winning?

International efforts to contain the Taliban insurgency in Afghanistan are failing and reinforcements are needed, a research group said, after militants killed 10 French soldiers and attacked a U.S. base. The fighting “sends a clear message that current Western strategy in Afghanistan is failing,” the Senlis Council said in a statement today. “Until now, Western leaders have been in denial about the true extent of Taliban presence in Afghanistan, and their ability to move swiftly on the Afghan capital.’

Insurgents are stepping up attacks against NATO’s International Security Assistance Force and U.S. troops seeking to stabilize the country under President Hamid Karzai‘s government. The monthly death toll for international forces in Afghanistan has topped that in Iraq.

As reported in Bloomberg.com.

More troops are needed and both presidential candidates have said that they would find away to increase the troop numbers for Afghanistan.  But think about that also, the USSR had a massive amount of troops and they left with hat in hand.  The possiblity of an extended stay is there and the outcome could be as diasterous as it was for the USSR.

Will There Be A Vote On Drilling?

The energy issue is at or near the top of the agenda in competitive contests across the country. Many Republican candidates have taken to focusing on energy at the expense of nearly every other issue. And polls continue to show solid majorities of the public favoring more offshore drilling.

Moderate and conservative Democratic incumbents have been pushing their leaders for weeks to allow a vote on drilling. Pelosi, who represents one of the most liberal districts in the country, is a strong ally of environmentalists but has felt pressure to help her party’s most vulnerable members.

Democrats will use the comprehensive plan Pelosi discussed Saturday as a defense against charges that they won’t allow a vote on drilling. But the measure may contain enough unpalatable items for the GOP — particularly on taxes — that most members of the minority will vote against it, and Senate Republicans could decide to block it altogether.

So it still appears unlikely that the House and Senate will be able to agree on an energy package that would pass with bipartisan support and be signed by President Bush. Democratic leaders may prefer to wait until next year, when they expect to have bigger majorities on the Hill and, they hope, Obama in the White House.

Will They Honor 9/11?

A group of September 11 victims’ families appealed to White House hopefuls John McCain and Barack Obama on Wednesday to suspend all campaigning on the anniversary of the 2001 attacks as a show of respect.

The group called MyGoodDeed.org, formed in 2003 with the aim of transforming September 11 into a national day of charitable service, sent letters to the two presidential hopefuls urging them to put aside partisanship for the day.

“We ask that you and your staff will dedicate a portion of that sacred day to community service, honoring the spirit of unity that brought our nation together in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks,” the letters said.

The letters to Obama and McCain invited them to participate in a “ServiceNation Summit” in New York this September 11, saying it would “provide a nonpartisan forum for you to address the events of 9/11 and the importance of national service.”

I am looking forward to hearing these guys talk about national service.  I would bet that it will be just amazing (pun intended).