Despite Scandal, Muni-Bonds Perform Well in 09

Considering Obama's payoff to the banks and the general support for muni's in the financial industry, this isn't that big a surprise. Of course further look at how the muni-bond scandal devastated whole swaths of the country as well as the incredible role of AIG and the banks should make one pause to wonder how after doing all this damage, the muni's still came out smelling like roses.

The climate for municipal bonds has been pretty good in 2009 as low interest rates for federal debt drove investors to chase yield-funding civic projects. Some are worried about a reversal, especially if the Federal Reserve starts to raise rates as inflation starts to show up at least on the year-over-year comparisons.

But "just because rates are low now doesn't necessarily mean they'll rise quickly, or soon," says Rob Williams, director of income planning at Charles Schwab ( SCHW - news - people )Whether or not interest rates go up is something we won't know until Ben Bernanke sings. But taxes are going back to pre-Bush levels as the Democratic Congress plans to let the Bush tax cuts expire next year. As municipal bonds are (mostly) tax-free investments, says Bill Walsh, president of the asset management firm Hennion & Walsh, "Rising taxes at either the state or federal level would boost the appeal … as could potentially a repeal of the 15% rate on equity dividends," Williams says.

Of course there is that whole muni-bond scandal thing:

But there could be some credibility issues for municipal bonds, says Bill Singer, shareholder at Stark & Stark law firm. There was a nine-count indictment filed at the end of October against Beverly Hills firm Rubin/Chambers, Dunhill Insurance Services Inc., also known as CDR Financial Products Inc. The indictment is for allegedly participating in "bid-rigging and fraud conspiracies related to contracts for the investment of municipal bond proceeds and other related municipal finance contracts," according to a press release from the Department of Justice.

Because this is a criminal case pursuant to a grand jury indictment, "that tends to raise the stakes and may well prompt as yet un-indicted individuals to come forward with offers or cooperation and further leads," Singer says. He says this has the "potential to further gridlock an already limping industry."

Tip of the iceberg.

Fannie and Freddie Get More "Help"

The government is the gift that gives on giving in regards to Fannie and Fred.

The housing giants stumbled badly in the financial crisis after backing too many troubled loans. Late last year, the government put them into conservatorship, and since then they have provided most of the liquidity in the mortgage market, allowing homeowners to refinance and buy new homes. Now, announcing new long-term support for the companies, the Obama administration has effectively transformed them into arms of the government, using them to help carry out its mortgage modification programs.

The agencies have already used $112 billion of a $400 billion pledge from the Treasury Department to stay afloat, but investors have remained nervous about their future. To quell uncertainty, the government said it would remove the $400 billion financial cap for three years.

The lifeline would keep Fannie and Freddie from tumbling into a downward spiral of debt, but it effectively tethers the companies more tightly to the government, which already owns 79.9 percent of each. The Obama administration has said it will issue a plan on the future role of Fannie and Freddie in February.

The announcement “should leave no uncertainty about the Treasury’s commitment to support these firms as they continue to play a vital role in the housing market during this current crisis,” the Treasury said in a statement.

My hunch, the money is going in one door, and going right out the other. The question is who is lining their pockets with out tax payer dollars?

Clashes in Iran

Well we shall see and I hope the thugs get defeated:

TEHRAN (Reuters) - A reformist website said Iranian riot police armed with batons and tear gas clashed with opposition backers in Tehran who used a religious commemoration on Saturday to try to revive anti-government protests.

The opposition Jaras website said security forces fired warning shots in the air and tear gas to disperse protesters, and also attacked a building housing an Iranian news agency, ISNA, where it said some opposition backers had sought shelter.

If confirmed, the outbreak of clashes during a two-day major Shi'ite Muslim ritual would underline escalating tension in the Islamic Republic, six months after a disputed election plunged the major oil producer into turmoil.

Of course the admin's response is to send......Kerry?

Merry Christmas

Enjoy the day and Merry Christmas to You!

Coburn: The Process was Corruption

And he is right:

This vote is indeed historic. This Congress will be remembered for its arrogance, corruption and stupidity. In the year of 2009, a Congress ignored the coming economic storm and impending bankruptcy of our entitlement programs and embarked on an ideological crusade to bring our nation as close to single-payer, government-run health care as possible. If this bill becomes law, future generations will rue this day and I will do everything in my power to work toward its repeal. This bill will ration care, cut Medicare, increase premiums, fund abortion and bury our children in debt.

This process was not compromise. This process was corruption. This bill passed because votes were bought and sold using the issue of abortion as a bargaining chip. The abortion provision alone makes this bill the most arrogant piece of legislation I have seen in Congress. Only the most condescending politician can believe it is appropriate to force Americans to pay for other people's abortions and to coerce medical professional to take the lives of unborn children.

The president and his allies genuinely believe that expanding government's control over health care is the way to control health care costs, improve lives and extend life spans. I don't question their motives, but I do question their judgment. History has already judged this argument and put it in its ash heap. The experience of government-run health care in the United States and around the world shows that access to a government program is not access to health care. Forty percent of doctors restrict access to Medicaid patients. Medicare already rations care and denies medical claims at twice the rate of private insurers. Nations like the United Kingdom with government run health care routinely ration care based on cost, and Canadians flock to the United States to escape waiting lines. Neither nation, incidentally, has managed to control costs as promised.

Our health care system needs to be reformed not because government's role has been too small but because it has been too big. Since the 1940's, government's role in health care has been expanded to the point that it controls 60 percent of our health care economy, according the non-partisan Congressional Research Service. If more government were the answer, health care would have been reformed long ago.

Iraqis Rule Iraq

A remarkable development, and one the left, the Democrats, "realists" and our current Commander and Chief said couldn't happen:

Nearly seven years after the Americans toppled Saddam Hussein, Iraq is still groping towards normality. If 2009 was its calmest year since the invasion, 2010 may mark the moment when it can claim to have fully recovered its independence.

The first big event of the year will be a general election due by the end of January. The second, if Barack Obama sticks to the timetable he adjusted after winning the presidency, will be the departure of most American troops by the end of August. By the end of 2010 it should become clearer whether Iraq can stand on its own feet both politically and militarily. The odds, just, are that it will do so. But it will be a year of danger and uncertainty as well as hope.

Much will depend on the smooth emergence of a new government and prime minister. Though shenanigans in late 2009 within the dominant Shia establishment cast doubt on the political survivability of Nuri al-Maliki, who became prime minister in 2006, he has a chance of keeping his post for the next few years. But he must decide whether to join an electoral list that embraces most of the main Shia religious parties, which together won the last general election four years ago, or whether he forges alliances with more secular-minded Shias and with Sunni Arabs of various stripes, including former Baathists once loyal to Saddam.

Good work and good luck.

Rebirth of Nuclear Energy?

Considering the butchery occurring in the Senate today, I thought some good news was needed on the Merry Christmas Eve:

WASHINGTON — When experts on power grid reliability asked themselves recently how a cleaner energy future would look, seven of eight regional councils imagined how their systems would work with 10 percent wind power.

Only one, representing the southeastern United States, chose a radically different option: doubling nuclear power capacity.Thirty years after the American nuclear industry abandoned scores of half-built plants because of soaring costs and operating problems like the Three Mile Island accident, skepticism persists over whether the technology is worth investing in.

Yet the pendulum may be swinging back. The 104 plants now running have sharply raised their output, emboldening utilities across the country to make a case for building new ones.

And the industry is about to get a big boost. In the next few days, the Energy Department plans to announce the first of $18.5 billion in loan guarantees for building new reactors.The guarantees were authorized in a bill passed by Congress in 2005.

It has taken four years for the department to set up a system to evaluate applications and determine how much the borrowers will be charged for the guarantees to compensate the government for taking the risk.

Of course, some democrats like Global Warming Apostle Ed Markey have whined about this, and we still don't have a place to store materials after Obama shut down Yucca, but its a start.

Freedom Tower Gets First Restaurant

A good sign, by fits and starts the damage gets repaired:

NEW YORK (AP) -- Fresh bread will soon be baking high above ground zero.The new World Trade Center got its first restaurant Wednesday -- a sandwich shop at the top of the Freedom Tower under construction.

As the sun rose over the site of the Sept. 11 attack, a crane hoisted the Subway restaurant up the signature skyscraper that marks the rebirth of the trade center's 16 acres. The shipping containers-turned-eatery will open in January and keep moving up as the tower is built to 105 floors.

That was about the height of Windows on the World, a dining institution atop one of the original twin towers with a panoramic view of New York and its harbor.

All things pass.

Anwar al Awlaki Kill in Yemen

Oh well:

SANAA (Reuters) - A radical Muslim preacher linked by U.S. intelligence to a gunman who killed 13 people at a U.S. Army base is believed to have died in a Yemen airstrike on al Qaeda militants, a security official said on Thursday.

"Anwar al Awlaki is suspected to be dead (in the air raid)," said the Yemeni official, who asked not to be identified. Yemen said 30 militants were killed in the strike in the eastern province of Shabwa.

By the way this is the place the Obama admin has decided to repatriate several detainees the other day, seems like a strange choice considering they are ina state of near civil war. Anyway it appears the US is stepping up its presence in that beleaguered country:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- The Pentagon has poured nearly $70 million in military aid to Yemen this year, a massive financial infusion aimed at eliminating the expanding al-Qaida safe havens in that country.

Airstrikes Thursday in Yemen's Shabwa province, in which at least 30 suspected militants were said to have been killed, is evidence of Yemen's more aggressive efforts against al-Qaida.

The U.S. spending in the fast-growing campaign to better equip and fund Yemeni forces compares with no spending in 2008.

Gitmo to Close in 2011?

We knew Obama's one year deadline was lie, we also know they are are desperate. But 2011? Will they still be blaming Bush when Obama is on the 2012 campaign trail? (Of course)

As a result, officials now believe that they are unlikely to close the prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and transfer its population of terrorism suspects until 2011 at the earliest — a far slower timeline for achieving one of President Obama’s signature national security policies than they had previously hinted.

While Mr. Obama has acknowledged that he would miss the Jan. 22 deadline for closing the prison that he set shortly after taking office, the administration appeared to take a major step forward last week when he directed subordinates to move “as expeditiously as possible” to acquire the Thomson Correctional Center, a nearly vacant maximum-security Illinois prison, and to retrofit it to receive Guantánamo detainees.

How desperate are they?

Frustrated by the difficulties in obtaining financing from Congress, administration officials had discussed invoking a little-known statute that would allow the president to declare a national emergency and then use military funds allocated for other construction projects to buy and retrofit the Illinois prison.

Of course the system can be made to work in Gitmo and the fact is that Holder and Obama, for all their hyperventilating have decided to allow the use of tribunals. That leaves closing Gitmo as purely for propaganda purposes, a decision that makes no sense when stacked up against the security and financial concerns of transferring terrorists to America.

Cuba Not Feeling the Hope and Change

I do wonder why Cuba has all of a sudden taken such a harsh line of attack against Obama. We had the seizure of the US contractor on trumped up charges, and now this:

HAVANA (Reuters) - Cuba accused U.S. President Barack Obama on Monday of being "imperial, arrogant" and dishonest during last week's global climate conference in the latest sign of deteriorating relations between Havana and Washington.

Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodriguez said in a televised press conference that Obama lied during the United Nations summit in Copenhagen and is making a habit of it after less than a year in office.

"He lies all the time, deceives with demagogic words, with profound cynicism," Rodriguez told reporters.

I guess the Hope and Change thing has finally sputtered out. Anyway there is more to this then meets the eye, add to this Chavez being even crazier then usual and you have the making of dangerous days in the Caribbean.

Larry Langford to be Sentenced Febuary 26th

The man who helped destroy Jefferson county over nice suits will finally get his day of justice.

TUSCALOOSA, AL (WBRC) – Former Birmingham Mayor Larry Langford's sentencing date has been decided.On Thursday, Judge Scott Coogler set the date of the sentencing for February 26^th, 2010 at 9:30 a.m. in the Tuscaloosa Federal Building.

Dems Get 60

This history junk is disgusting.

Dec. 21 (Bloomberg) -- Legislation calling for the most sweeping overhaul of the U.S. health-care system in more than four decades survived a crucial test vote, allowing it to move toward final Senate passage later this week.

All 60 members of the Democratic caucus voted to curtail debate on the $871 billion measure against united opposition from Senate Republicans, who say the bill would raise taxes, hurt insurers and widen the federal deficit. Democrats scheduled the 1 a.m. vote to thwart Republican tactics aimed at preventing final passage before Christmas.

Barring surprise defections, the vote clears the way for passage by Dec. 24. The Senate must then draft a compromise with the House, which approved its own bill on Nov. 7. Both measures are designed to cover tens of millions of uninsured Americans and attempt to curb rising medical expenditures.

“Let’s make history,” Iowa Democrat Tom Harkin, who runs the Senate health committee, said before the vote. “The other side says no. We say yes. We say yes to progress, yes to people, yes to health care as an inalienable right of every American citizen.”

The other day Democrat Sheldon Whitehouse said there was going to be a "reckoning" over this vote, sadly I think he is right, but not in the way he intended. By the way for great analysis if the whole bill, read this from Jay Cost.

Chavez: Aruba to be Used for US Invasion

One Happy Island

Can we officially say Chavez is insane:

It is not uncommon for Chavez to accuse other nations, especially the U.S. and its allies, of conspiring against Venezuela.

Last week, the president accused the Netherlands of letting the U.S. military use Dutch islands off Venezuela's Caribbean coast to prepare for a possible military offensive. The former paratroop commander said the U.S. military has sent intelligence agents, warships and spy planes to Aruba, Curacao and Bonaire, which are self-governing Dutch islands.

The Dutch government rejected the allegations and the country's top diplomat, Foreign Minister Maxime Verhagen, has asked Venezuela's ambassador to clarify the claims, Dutch Foreign Ministry spokesman Bart Rijs said.

Oh and he also accused the US of sending spy planes and ordered them shot down.

UPDATE:

Note the Mobilization of Forces as the US begins to expand its Hegemony.

Obligatory:

Its Almost as If Obama Can't Be Trusted

In honor of the Presidents "Historic" health care I think its important to remember that the heart of the plan, the Mandate and a tax on employee benefits was opposed during the general election and the primaries:

This is a re-post from October:

I know his claims come with a expiration date, but it strikes me that no one in the media or throughout this debate has bothered to call the president out on the subject. The mandate he opposed while running against Clinton, while the the tax on employee benefits was ferociously opposed during the campaign by Obama and the left while the issue was used as a club to beat McCain over the head:

The proposal is politically problematic for President Obama, however, since it is similar to one he denounced in the presidential campaign as “the largest middle-class tax increase in history.” Most Americans with insurance get it from their employers, and taxing workers for the benefit is opposed by union leaders and some businesses.

In television advertisements last fall, Mr. Obama criticized his Republican rival for the presidency, Senator John McCain of Arizona, for proposing to tax all employer-provided health benefits. The benefits have long been tax-free, regardless of how generous they are or how much an employee earns. The advertisements did not point out that Mr. McCain, in exchange, wanted to give all families a tax credit to subsidize the purchase of coverage.

And of course this now infamous ad:





I point this out as the Baucus plan (the president's plan) moves forward today with the mandate and the tax as the centerpiece of accomplishing coverage for Americans. In response the house democrats launched a pre-emptive attack decrying the taxes. As of now the massive contradiction between the House and Senate plans has not been reconciled, as noted by the Times this morning:

WASHINGTON — A proposed tax on high-cost, or “Cadillac,” health insurance plans has touched off a fierce clash between the Senate and the House as they wrestle over how to pay for legislation that would provide health benefits to millions of uninsured Americans.

Supporters, including many senators, say that the tax is essential to tamping down medical spending and that over 10 years it would generate more than $200 billion, nearly a fourth of what is needed to pay for the legislation.

Critics, including House members and labor unions, say the tax would quickly spiral out of control and hit middle-class workers, people more closely associated with minivans than Cadillacs.

The tax, a provision of the bill to be voted on Tuesday by the Senate Finance Committee, is one of the few remaining proposals under consideration by Congress that budget experts say could lead directly to a reduction in health care spending over the long term, by prompting employers and employees to buy cheaper insurance. Whether it remains in the bill is emerging as a test of the commitment by President Obama and his party to slowing the steep rise of medical expenses.It is also a prime example of the major differences still to be bridged by Democrats as health care legislation advances to floor debate in both houses.

By the way this will violate the president's will not increase taxes pledge, as the House Democrats noted, a tax on the front end of the insurance plans will roll right down to the rest of us.

(I guess it really was all Just Words.)

When Warming Strikes Long Island

The Global Warming Prime Directive: Anecdotal Evidence can only be used to prove warming.

Yeah, I know I am breaking the rule, but outside the window it looks like a scene from the Polar Express. Normally the weather guys are filled with nonsense and hysteria about the weather, this time though they nailed it:

An overnight blizzard brought more than 20 inches of snow to some spots on Long Island, accompanied by thunder, 50-mph northeast winds and heavy, shifting drifts of snow, according to the National Weather Service early Sunday.

By the way Winter only starts tomorrow and is this only the beginning?

Iraq Moves Forces to Disputed Oil Well

Good for them:

BAGHDAD (AP) -- Iraq deployed security forces Saturday near a remote oil well seized by Iran, officials said, and its government pressed Tehran to withdraw its forces from the area along their disputed southern border.

U.S. officials applauded Iraq for standing its ground against Iran -- an uneasy ally that analysts said was aiming to remind its neighbor of its economic and political pull in its takeover of the oil well Thursday. The site is located in one of the largest oil fields in Iraq and has about 1.5 billion barrels in reserves.

The standoff was a dramatic display of the occasionally tense relations between the two oil-rich nations that fought an eight-year war in the 1980s but now share common ground in Shiite-led governments.

In other news the country has come around to viewing the Iraq war as a success.(which it was)

From NBC's Mark Murray
Here's a final set of numbers from our new NBC/WSJ poll that we find fascinating: 57% say the Iraq war has been successful, versus 40% who say it has been unsuccessful.

It's a reversal from July 2008, when 43% said Iraq was successful, and 53% said it was unsuccessful.

I blame Bush.

Another Despicable Moment At Copenhagen

After Chavez and Mugabe, is this not just the icing on the cake. Here the delegate is referring to the fake agreement that summed up the Copenhagen summit.

'Despicable'
The document "is a solution based on the same very values, in our opinion, that channeled six million people in Europe into furnaces," said Sudan's Lumumba Stanislaus Di-aping.

Coming from the Sudanese, no less. Home of the genocidal dictator who essentially got away with ethnic cleansing.

Update:

Lumumba Di-Aping, chief negotiator for the G77 group of 130 developing countries, said the deal had "the lowest level of ambition you can imagine. It's nothing short of climate change scepticism in action. It locks countries into a cycle of poverty for ever. Obama has eliminated any difference between him and Bush." (Yeah Right)

John Sauven, executive director of Greenpeace UK, said: "The city of Copenhagen is a crime scene tonight, with the guilty men and women fleeing to the airport. Ed Miliband [UK climate change secretary] is among the very few that come out of this summit with any credit." It is now evident that beating global warming will require a radically different model of politics than the one on display here in Copenhagen."

Lydia Baker of Save the Children said world leaders had "effectively signed a death warrant for many of the world's poorest children. Up to 250,000 children from poor communities could die before the next major meeting in Mexico at the end of next year."

Obama Top Adviser Larry Summers Signed Off on Swap Deals that Cost Harvard 1 Billion

Having detailed the swap and bond scandal ad-nauseum, I understand what they mean by how complicated these deals can appear. But remember they were often designed to be that way as a means to snooker people. One of the common themes of the muni-bond scandal was either the corruption of local politicians, or the exploitation of their ignorance to get them to sign off on convoluted swap deals which no laymen could understand. Perhaps I was being to harsh in that original assessment of ignorance because now it comes out that Larry Summers, top economic adviser for Obama, and former head of Harvard, also signed off on a series of deals that devastated the school:

Dec. 18 (Bloomberg) -- Anne Phillips Ogilby, a bond attorney at one of Boston’s oldest law firms, on Oct. 31 last year relayed an urgent message from Harvard University, her client and alma mater, to the head of a Massachusetts state agency that sells bonds. The oldest and richest academic institution in America needed help getting a loan right away.

As vanishing credit spurred the government-led rescue of dozens of financial institutions, Harvard was so strapped for cash that it asked Massachusetts for fast-track approval to borrow $2.5 billion. Almost $500 million was used within days to exit agreements known as interest-rate swaps that Harvard had entered to finance expansion in Allston, across the Charles River from its main campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

The swaps, which assumed that interest rates would rise, proved so toxic that the 373-year-old institution agreed to pay banks a total of almost $1 billion to terminate them. Most of the wrong-way bets were made in 2004, when Lawrence Summers, now President Barack Obama’s economic adviser, led the university. Cranes were recently removed from the construction site of a $1 billion science center that was to be the expansion’s centerpiece, a reminder of Summers’s ambition. The school suspended work on the building last week.

“For nonprofits, this is going to be written up as a case study of what not to do,” said Mark Williams, a finance professor at Boston University, who specializes in risk management and has studied Harvard’s finances. “Harvard throws itself out as a beacon of what to do in higher learning. Clearly, there have been major missteps.”

Now in fairness to Summers, he wasn't alone in this disaster and many of the ideas were mulled over and approved by the best and the brightest:

The financing plan using the swaps was developed by the university’s financial team and discussed with the Debt Asset Management Committee, an oversight group, according to James Rothenberg, a member of the President and Fellows of Harvard College, or Harvard Corp., and the school’s treasurer, a board position.

The swaps plan was then approved by Harvard Corp. and implemented and monitored by the financial team, Rothenberg said in an e-mail.

Oh by the way, it was our freinds at J.P. Morgan Chase that held over 1.8 billion dollars in the swaps. Yes the same bank that just settled with the SEC and has been connected to various muni-disasters across the country. Oddly enough, the the bulk of the leadership of Harvard Corp declined comment:

Berman’s Role

Ann Berman, Harvard’s chief financial officer at the time, also played a role in developing the plan, Rothenberg said. Berman declined to be interviewed. She stepped down in 2006 when she was named an adviser to the president, according to the school’s Web site. A certified public accountant, Berman got her master’s in business administration at the University of Pennsylvania’s Wharton School of Business in Philadelphia and had earlier served as a financial planner and adviser for Harvard’s dean of the Faculty of Arts & Sciences.

Other members of Harvard Corp. in 2004 and 2005, who served with Summers and Rothenberg, were former U.S. Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin, Summers’s previous boss and predecessor at the U.S. Treasury, who was an instrumental supporter of his bid for the Harvard presidency; Robert D. Reischauer, former director of the Congressional Budget Office, who was a colleague of Summers and Rubin’s in Washington; Conrad K. Harper, a lawyer at Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP in New York; Hanna Gray, former president of the University of Chicago; and James R. Houghton, chairman of Corning Inc., the world’s biggest maker of glass for flat-panel televisions, in Corning, New York. All except Rothenberg declined to comment or didn’t return telephone calls

Its nice to see Robert Rubin involved. Wouldn't want to leave that top Democrat out in the cold. Anyway, to make matters worse Harvard hit the panic button and tried to dump the swaps at the worse possible moment, leading to a greater loss then if they had only held out longer. The best and the brightest my friends, the best and the brightest.

Obama Admin Plans on Repatriating Terrorists to Terrorist Haven

Because Yemen is such a bastion of stability:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The United States plans to transfer six Yemenis held at the Guantanamo Bay prison in Cuba back to their home country in coming days, a move that could lead to repatriating dozens more, The Washington Post reported in its Friday edition.

The newspaper, citing unnamed sources, said the release follows high-level meetings between officials of the two countries, including a visit by CIA Deputy Director Stephen Kappes to Yemen. The CIA declined to comment to the newspaper.

Yemenis are the biggest group held at the controversial prison with 97 of the 210 prisoners from that country.Critics say releasing prisoners to Yemen will pose a security threat to the United States because of doubts the Yemenis will be able to effectively monitor them.

"I believe they will be involved in terrorism that will cost American lives," Republican Congressman Frank Wolf told the newspaper.

Its almost as if this admin has no clue what its doing.

Iran Claims to be Working on Better Centrifuges

No worries right:

TEHRAN, Iran (AP) -- Iran's nuclear chief says the country is making ''new generations of more efficient centrifuges'' that will be in use in its nuclear program by early 2011.

The official, Vice President Ali Akbar Salehi, says Iranian scientists are still testing the more advanced models before putting them to use. Salehi's remarks were carried Friday by the semiofficial Fars news agency.

Centrifuges are machines used to enrich uranium -- a technology that can produce fuel for power plants or materials for a nuclear weapon.

Thankfully the world and our president are off cavorting with Hugo Chavez in their war on warming and capitalism.

Chavez and Mugabe Illustrate What Copenhagen is All About

From Andrew Bolt and the Heraldsun, no explanation is needed as to what we are paying for:

These maniacs in Copenhagen are voting on your future:

President Chavez brought the house down.

When he said the process in Copenhagen was “not democratic, it is not inclusive, but isn’t that the reality of our world, the world is really and imperial dictatorship…down with imperial dictatorships” he got a rousing round of applause.

When he said there was a “silent and terrible ghost in the room” and that ghost was called capitalism, the applause was deafening.

But then he wound up to his grand conclusion – 20 minutes after his 5 minute speaking time was supposed to have ended and after quoting everyone from Karl Marx to Jesus Christ - “our revolution seeks to help all people…socialism, the other ghost that is probably wandering around this room, that’s the way to save the planet, capitalism is the road to hell....let’s fight against capitalism and make it obey us.” He won a standing ovation.

UPDATE

And at the end of this first clip, Chavez rouses the rabble with more anti-Americanism, too:

I don’t think Obama is here yet. He got the Nobel Peace Prize almost the same day as he sent 30,000 soldiers to kill innocent people in Afghanistan.

By the way Mugabe showed up as well:

And a mass-murderer at Copenhagen lectures us about our crimes:

The anti-capitalist theme was picked up on by Mr Mugabe, Zimbabwe’s veteran President, who is the target of Western sanctions over alleged human rights abuses.

“When these capitalist gods of carbon burp and belch their dangerous emissions, it’s we, the lesser mortals of the developing sphere who gasp and sink and eventually die.”

As for Mugabe, well you can check here, here, here, here, here, or here as for the type of monster he is.

Climate Deal Going as Well as Health Care

Lets see. crazy leftists on the outside, and kleptocrats on the inside. Sounds like the leftist utopia has formed on earth! Anyway the big takeaway from "hopenhagan" appears to be paying developing countries money to look after their forests and lakes. Of course this means the money will likely be stolen and many of those forests will be logged and developed anyway, but its the thought that counts.

COPENHAGEN — With just two days remaining in historic and contentious climate talks here, China signaled overnight that it sees virtually no possibility that the nearly 200 nations gathered would find agreement by Friday.

An official in the American delegation said that China would agree only to a brief political declaration that left unresolved virtually all the major issues.The conference has deadlocked over emissions cuts by, and financing for, developing nations, including China, who say they will bear the brunt of a planetary problem they did little to create. Leaders had hoped to conclude an interim agreement on the major issues that would have “immediate operational effect.” The Chinese, it appears, are not willing to go that far at this meeting.

Whether the Chinese position represents political brinkmanship as senior ministers and heads of state begin arriving in Copenhagen for the final 48 hours of negotiations, or a genuine signal that Chinese officials are not inclined to settle the wide differences separating it and developed nations, was unclear on Thursday morning.

Got to it hand it to China, Western Liberals handed them a ready made excuse in warming hysteria and now they are playing it to the hilt. Of course China has spread tyranny and genocide internally and around the globe since the communists took over, but somehow that gets overlooked when questions of Mother Earth arise.

Health Bill before Christmas Unlikely

Not that it would be a surprise if it was pushed into next year. Between the glaring differences of the house bill and the general distaste so many players have, its a wonder they are even talking about passing legislation.
From McClatchy:

WASHINGTON — President Barack Obama tried mightily Tuesday to jolt the Senate's stalled health care overhaul effort, but after an hour-long closed-door meeting with Senate Democrats, the fate of his top 2009 domestic priority remains unclear.Obama afterward said he was "cautiously optimistic" the measure could pass the Senate before Christmas, and Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., said Democrats left the meeting "enthusiastic."

Obama, Baucus said, reminded them "politics catches up with good policy," and that they should remember they may not get all they want in this bill, but they would create a framework for future changes."He reminded, this is why we run for these jobs," said Baucus, reading off notes he made on a cocktail napkin with the White House seal.

Time for pre-Christmas action is running out, however, because Senate rules are likely to require several days of procedural votes that will need 60 members to cut off debate.

Many Democrats remained circumspect about the bill."We're all being urged to vote for something and we don't know the details of what's in it," said Sen. Evan Bayh, D-Ind.

And that is the most absurd part of this whole debacle. We are talking about one of the most significant pieces of legislation facing the country in years, and the haphazard way in which it is being accomplished is an absolute disgrace.

How are Democrats Going to Bridge the Gap Between the House and Senate?

All right, the house passed a totally different bill that has tax increases for the rich, a public option, a health care mandate, and a host of regulations most congressman will not bother to read. The Senate bill (if it passes) contains the tax on employee benefits, a mandate, and also a host of regulations no one will bother to read. These aren't minor details to be worked out over the conference committee. They are fundamental differences and key issues to very powerful constituencies withing the Democratic party. I would not be surprised if Unions begin calling for the defeat of this bill based on the tax alone. As for the left, they are apoplectic that their nemesis Lieberman, the first true scalp they took, has come came back effectively put a stake in their cherished dreams.

Democrats’ Consensus

“The general consensus was that we shouldn’t make the perfect the enemy of the good,” Bayh told reporters after Senate Democrats met yesterday. He said party members agreed the worst outcome would be failing to pass a bill at all.

Democrats need all of the 60 votes controlled by their party in the Senate to pass the legislation if Republicans remain united in opposition to it. By dropping the public option and the proposed Medicare buy-in, Democratic leaders may be able to reel in Connecticut Senator Joe Lieberman, an independent who caucuses with the Democrats and is critical of both ideas.

“Put me down tonight as encouraged at the direction” of negotiations, Lieberman told reporters after the meeting yesterday. “I think we are in reach of a very significant accomplishment” that “will change the lives of millions of people in our country for the better,” he said.

Democrats may also win over Maine Senator Olympia Snowe, the only Republican in the chamber to vote for any health-care plan so far. She is opposed to the public option and supported legislation in the Senate Finance Committee that omitted it.

No Details

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, refused to give any details about what will end up in the final bill when he spoke to reporters after yesterday’s meeting. He and fellow Democratic leaders expressed confidence that they would round up the votes needed to pass legislation soon. It then would have to be reconciled with a version approved by the House last month.

The chances that the progressive caucus might actualy bolt and vote down the bill are slim to say the least. Most of them are smart enough to recognize the longer this debate continues the deeper the hole the dems are digging, but the very fact that we have reached a point that leftists are actually calling for the killing of the bill testifies to how disastrous a year this has been for the Demorats.

P.S.

The abortion land mine hasn't even gone off yet.

China Warns West on Human Rights

Well with the west too busy waging war on warming at Hopenhagan and considering the state of our finances I don't think there should be too much of a problem:

BEIJING (Reuters) - China on Tuesday warned Western countries against taking up the case of a prominent dissident, Liu Xiaobo, who is facing trial for subversion, after the United States and European Union called for his release.

Liu's lawyer said last week that Chinese prosecutors had decided to try him on charges of "inciting subversion of state power" for publishing essays critical of the ruling Communist Party and helping organize a petition demanding democratic transformation.

Liu has been among his country's best known critics of restrictions on citizens' rights, and was detained late last year while helping oversee the launch of the "Charter 08" petition for political change.

The European Union urged China on Monday to release him unconditionally, while the United States pressed Beijing to respect the rights of all Chinese citizens who peacefully express their desire for "internationally recognized freedoms.

As if our President would make human rights important.

Lieberman Opposes Medicare Expansion

Now What?

WASHINGTON — In a surprise setback for Democratic leaders, Senator Joseph I. Lieberman, independent of Connecticut, said on Sunday that he would vote against the health care legislation in its current form. The bill’s supporters had said earlier that they thought they had secured Mr. Lieberman’s agreement to go along with a compromise they worked out to overcome an impasse within the Democratic Party.

But on Sunday, Mr. Lieberman told the Senate majority leader, Harry Reid, to scrap the idea of expanding Medicare and abandon any new government insurance plan or lose his vote.On a separate issue, Mr. Reid tried over the weekend to concoct a compromise on abortion that would induce Senator Ben Nelson, Democrat of Nebraska, to vote for the bill. Mr. Nelson opposes abortion. Any provision that satisfies him risks alienating supporters of abortion rights.

In interviews on the CBS News program “Face the Nation,” Mr. Lieberman and Mr. Nelson said the bill did not have the 60 votes it would need in the Senate.

Reid never had a deal no matter what the article or other Democrats said. he announced he had a deal without actually procuring one in the hope it was force the hand of recalcitrant senators. It was a colossally dumb move when one takes into account the massive polling against the Senate bill.

NY Times Complains About Partisan Tone in WSJ

Really not worthy of a Post, but there is something surreal about the Times pointing out how a distinguished news paper is taking a partisan slant:

The pro-business, antigovernment shift in the news pages has broken into plain view in the last year. On Aug. 12, a fairly straight down the middle front page article on President Obama’s management style ended up with the provocative headline, “A President as Micromanager: How Much Detail Is Enough?” The original article included a contrast between President Jimmy Carter’s tendency to go deep in the weeds of every issue with President George W. Bush’s predilection for minimal involvement, according to someone who saw the draft. By the time the article ran, it included only the swipe at Mr. Carter.

On Aug. 27, a fairly straightforward obituary about Ted Kennedy for the Web site was subjected to a little political re-education on the way to the front page. A new paragraph was added quoting Rush Limbaugh deriding what he called all of the “slobbering media coverage,” and he also accused the recently deceased senator of being the kind of politician who “uses the government to take money from people who work and gives it to people who don’t work.”

On Oct. 31, an article on the front of the B section about estate taxes at the state level used the phrase “death tax” six times, but there were no quotation marks around it. A month later, the newspaper’s Style & Substance blog suggested that the adoption of such a loaded political term was probably not a good idea: “Because opponents of estate taxes have long referred to them as death taxes, the term should be avoided in news stories.”

Gee where does running a story about McCain's make believe affair right AFTER the Times endorsed him fit in. While at it what about the "expose's" of Palin's outfits?

The Hockey Stick Over Time

I saw this first on HA, its pretty good and to the point:

Reid's Medicare Deal Called "Non-Starter" by Key Democrat

We are very close to seeing the health care bill collapse, tomorrow the CBO makes its score, expect slightly under or neutral but its c;ear their is no deal despite the hoopla about Reid,s announcement:

The supposed healthcare deal cut by Harry Reid is a "non-starter," Sen. Bill Nelson (D-Fla.) said today.Reid announced this week that Democrats had reached a "broad agreement" on replacing the public option with a Medicare "buy-in" provision and a series of non-profit insurance plans similar to what federal employees are offered.

But apparently that "broad agreement" didn't include Nelson."I think when we get the score back from CBO that it’s going to be too costly," Nelson told Fox News Live today.

Nelson also said Americans who don't currently have healthcare wouldn't be able to afford their own Medicare policy. (That offer would only apply to those aged 55-64.)"So, at the end of the day, I think it’s going to be a non-starter," he said.

Democrats, of course, need all 60 members of their caucus to vote for cloture on whatever compromise they come up with, unless they pick off a Republican or two.

More to the point reports have indicated the Senate plan would raise costs and overall likely hurt hospitals..

Snowe Tags Democrats on Medicare Plans

The democrats are like kids in a candy store drawing up plans without any understanding of the implications. In that regards Olympia Snow is dead on in her assessment:

Senator Olympia J. Snowe, Republican of Maine, said Democrats were moving to expand Medicare “without really understanding the ramifications.”

Of course Democrats have reached the point where anything has to pass, its our job to stop them. All in all next week will be pivotal, block the Democrats and in all likelihood they will end up addressing the issue next year prior to the mid-terms.

Iraq Looking to Overtake Saudi Arabia in Oil Production

Of course with Al Qaeda out there they must remain vigilant against terror attacks like the massacre that occurred last week. More to the point of they become the Middle East's top oil producer that would mean a functioning Democracy, not the Saudi Monarchy would become the dominat player in the Middle East.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq, emerging from the shadow of war, expects to boost its oil output to rival the level of top producer Saudi Arabia after awarding some of its most attractive oilfields to global oil companies this week.

By the end on Saturday of a two-day bidding round for 10 oil contracts -- the second auction since the 2003 U.S. invasion -- Iraq had received pledges from oil firms to boost its output by 4.765 million barrels per day, almost double its current output.

If all deals from a first auction in June, the second this weekend and others being negotiated are added to national production, Iraq will have a capacity of 12 million barrels per day, overtaking Russia and challenging Saudi Arabia's 12.5 million bpd, Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani said.

Good Luck.

Iran: We Need 15 Nuclear Plants

For what? They have enough natural gas to easily meet their needs.

MANAMA (Reuters) - Iran needs up to 15 nuclear plants to generate electricity, its foreign minister said on Saturday, underlining Tehran's determination to press ahead with a program the West suspects is aimed at making bombs.

Manouchehr Mottaki, addressing a security conference in Bahrain, also cast further doubt on a U.N.-drafted nuclear fuel deal meant to allay international concern about the Islamic Republic's atomic ambitions.

"First I think we could just totally abandon the whole thing or we could propose something more moderate, a kind of middle way ... Iran has done that," he said.

By the way I am glad the unclenched fist of Obama worked out.

Marines Tend Injured Boy

The Best of the Best:

Marines tend to an injured Afghan boy in Helmand province, Afghanistan, Nov. 1. The boy fell from an unknown height and was in critical condition. The Marines are assigned to India Company, 3rd Battalion, 4th Marine Regiment.

President Tassos Papadopoulos of Cyprus Grave Napped

Tassos Papadopoulos

Well someone once tried to steal the Body of Lincoln:

NICOSIA, Cyprus (AP) -- Grave robbers unearthed the remains of former Cyprus President Tassos Papadopoulos and stole his body by night from a suburban graveyard, Cyprus police said Friday, a day before the first anniversary of the statesman's death.

"The grave of the former president has been violated and the body robbed. We are still investigating", said police spokesman Michalis Katsounotos.Investigators believe the body was taken either late Thursday night or early Friday morning. The motive is unclear. Grave-robbing is rare in Cyprus.

Mounds of freshly dug-up earth lay at the site of the robbery in the Deftera village cemetery in a southwestern suburb of the Cypriot capital, Nicosia. Police investigators cordoned off the area and were searching the site.

Cyprus has been bitterly divided between Greeks and Turks especially after a pro-Greek coup led to a Turkish invasion. Whether this is political, a prank, a plain old crime, remains to be seen.

No Drawdown in Afghanistan

So pretty much the 2011 thing was window dressing for the left, at least for the week:

OSLO (Reuters) - There will be no "precipitous drawdown" of U.S. forces in Afghanistan and U.S. troops could still be in the country for years to come, President Barack Obama said on Thursday.Obama told Americans in a televised speech last week U.S. troops would begin withdrawing from Afghanistan on July 2011 as they transferred control to newly trained Afghan security forces.

Obama, in Oslo to receive the Nobel Peace Prize, shied away from repeating the word "withdraw" and said July 2011 would signal a shift in the U.S. mission in Afghanistan, when "we are beginning to transfer responsibility to the Afghan people."

There has been debate in Washington over Obama's commitment to the July 2011 withdrawal date after administration officials testifying before the U.S. Congress suggested it was flexible.

Flexible, that means whatever Obama defines the mission at any given time.

Chooch and the Pension Scandals

Chooch (2003)

The pension scandal that originated in New York but managed to make it all the way to New Mexico and Illinois centers around a movie about a jackass. Oh well between Mayor Langford's cycles of stupidity an now this its nice to see some of the worst abuses in political history orchestrated by a bunch of, well asses:

ALBANY - A $100,000 investment in a bad movie has cost the founder of a financial firm caught up in the pension fund pay-to-play scandal a whopping $20 million.Attorney General Andrew Cuomo Wednesday said David Leuschen, co-founder and senior managing partner of Riverstone Holdings LLC, agreed to pay the restitution to settle his part in the ongoing probe.

After the pension fund committed $150 million to a joint venture between Riverstone and The Carlyle Group, Leuschen is said to have invested $100,000 in the poorly-received film "Chooch."The film was produced by the brother of former Controller Alan Hevesi's chief investment officer.Carlyle, which previously settled for $20 million over other parts of the scandal, was unaware of the Leuschen investment in the film, Cuomo's office said.

Riverstone, which invests in energy and power companies, previously agreed to repay the pension fund $30 million and adhere to a code of conduct pushed by Cuomo to settle the firm's involvement in the scandal.

What will the title of this documentary about this be? By the way this was the same scandal that dogged Obama's first Auto Czar Steve Rattner and most likely led to his leaving that position.

Bloomberg News Looks at Solutions to the Muni-Bond Scandal

An interesting piece out of Bloomberg news written by Joe Mysak that looks back at possible solutions the muni-bond disaster. The piece goes a long way to discussing the national scale of the problems, from the SEC and Chase revolving around Jefferson County disaster, California suing CDR Financial Products, and the various lawsuits that have cropped up in recent years as these deals went sour. One of the ideas floated is to replace the banks with the Treasury department as a way to end some of the more dubious practices that institutions from Chase to UBS, Socgen and others have practiced in around the world:

Suing Everybody

For those keeping score, the Justice Department is prosecuting CDR, while the SEC settled with J.P. Morgan Securities Inc. and is suing its ex-bankers, Charles LeCroy and Douglas MacFaddin, in connection with the business they did in Jefferson County.

A number of California municipalities are suing just about everybody: Bank of America Corp., Merrill Lynch & Co., UBS AG, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Citibank NA, Morgan Stanley, Wachovia Bank, Goldman Sachs Group Inc., CDR, Investment Management Advisory Group Inc. and 37 others who have worked in the reinvestment-of-proceeds business. Most of them have declined to comment. Bank of America pointed out that it was cooperating with the government.

Documentary Evidence

Last year, a number of jurisdictions filed complaints against the dealers who worked on their swaps and derivatives, piggybacking on the news reports of the Justice Department and SEC investigation. These lawsuits were long on quotations from the press and a vague sense of outrage, short on substance.

No more. The California lawsuits -- and here I refer to one filed by the Sacramento Municipal Utility District, although all the complaints are related -- are based on both original research and oral and documentary evidence provided by Bank of America.

In February 2007, the bank said it had entered into an agreement with the Justice Department. In return for leniency, the bank agreed to tell all. According to the lawsuit, the bank had asked for leniency in 2004, and began cooperating with the feds at that time.

‘Conspiratorial Conduct’

The 181-page complaint is stuffed with quotes, examples and anecdotes, and analyses of those auctions that don’t look much like auctions.“So pervasive was the conspiratorial conduct at the dominant providers of municipal derivatives,” the complaint says, “that it became accepted practice for the conduct to occur and industry participants were surprised not when it occurred, but rather when it did not.”

Reading these documents, you have to wonder whether it is even possible to fix the reinvestment-of-proceeds business. I asked ex-MSRB head Taylor, who first floated the idea of requiring issuers to reinvest all their bond proceeds in Treasury securities back in February, whether he had seen the various lawsuits. He had. He expects more. And he still thinks all issuers should be required to reinvest in Treasuries.

Color me skeptical this shift will ever happen. Considering Obama's payoff to the banks in regards to muni-bonds, it appears the administration is less then concerned with an overhaul of this particular market. By the way it was LeCroy who was in Jefferson County Alabama who later went onto Gulf Breeze Florida, scene of some of the more questionable bond deals.

Democrats Discuss Medicare Expansion

Sometimes you can smell the desperation in politicians, as in this harebrained idea by Reid to wave the magic wand and expand Medicare:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Senate Democrats on Monday examined expanding the Medicare health program for the elderly to people as young as 55 as they sought a compromise on a government-run insurance plan in the healthcare reform bill.

With the clock ticking toward a self-imposed year-end deadline for passage, the Senate also debated Democratic Senator Ben Nelson's divisive amendment to tighten the bill's restrictions on the use of federal funds for abortions.

The abortion issue and the government-run insurance plan are the two biggest hurdles remaining for the Senate's version of the healthcare overhaul, President Barack Obama's top domestic priority.

McConnell pretty much nailed it:

"If your goal was to come up with a plan for financial ruin, you couldn't come up with a better idea than cutting a program by $500 billion and simultaneously expanding the number of people it is required to cover," said Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell.

It makes sense in a way, the Democrats best strategy has been to create a program and then incrementally expand it far beyond the original scope as means to accomplish their goals over all the long.
By the way Reid is a Jackass:

Election Deal Reached in Iraq

These political battles have been off and on for some time now. Its nice to see how quickly Iraqis have taken to the frustration and headaches of politics ( including the mind numbing gridlock)so quickly:

BAGHDAD — Lawmakers pulled Iraq back from the brink of a constitutional crisis on Sunday night, brokering a last-minute compromise that will allow for the first national elections since 2005.

A deal on the election law has fallen apart before, underscoring the deep sectarian divide that remains in Iraq, despite a drop in violence. Fighting over the law also threatens to complicate the American withdrawal.

After months of wrangling, the Iraqi Parliament gathered just before midnight to approve a deal that had been secured only hours before in closed-door talks.

“It is a great achievement for Iraq,” said Khalid al-Attiya, a deputy speaker of Parliament, shortly after the vote. The deal had been approved Sunday by Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish leaders, according to government officials, so it was unlikely to collapse again.

I hope the deal holds and may the election be safe.

Clashes in Iran

I wish them luck and may the thugs who run that country one day find themselves on a helicopter running for their lives:

TEHRAN (Reuters) - Iranian police clashed on Monday with opposition supporters in a central Tehran square, a witness said.

(This is a breaking news story, that is why its so short.)

Petraeus: Key Goal of Afghan Surge is to Kill Enemy Leadership

Seems like something we have been doing all along, anyway add this to the expansion of Drone attacks by the CIA and you have a big push to wipe out the leadership of our enemies in that region:

WASHINGTON (Dec. 2, 2009) – Tens of thousands of additional U.S. forces slated for deployment to Afghanistan will be employed to target and eliminate terrorist leaders and assist the Afghan government to better safeguard and provide a brighter future for its people, the commander of U.S. Central Command said.

President Barack Obama Tuesday announced the deployment of 30,000 extra U.S. forces to Afghanistan over the next several months, which would bring the total U.S. troop strength there to about 100,000.


Officials are finalizing plans as to exactly where in Afghanistan the additional troops will be deployed, Army Gen. David H. Petraeus told John D. Roberts today on CNN’s “American Morning” television news program. The Afghanistan-bound troops will be deployed to secure the most important elements of the Afghan population, while also securing lines of communication and enabling the training of additional Afghan military and police so that they can eventually assume the security mission, the general said.


Concurrently, he added, counterterrorist operations against Taliban and al-Qaida operatives will be ramped up. “You have to kill or capture key leaders, the irreconcilables, in such an endeavor,” Petraeus said. Meanwhile, he added, efforts to engage and provide better security and economic opportunity for the Afghan people will be increased “so that local individuals don’t have to choose sides to go with the Taliban because they’re threatened or because it’s the only way they can earn a living for their family.”

Good Luck.

Demonstrators Rally Against 9/11 trial in New York

Good for them, Holder and Obama's choice doesn't make any sense so why not apply pressure to them:

NEW YORK (Reuters) - Demonstrators angered by the Obama administration's move to prosecute the self-professed mastermind of the September 11 attacks in civilian court on U.S. soil called on Saturday for the trial to be moved to a military tribunal.

More than 1,000 people braved cold and rain to rally outside the Manhattan federal courthouse where Khalid Sheikh Mohammed and four others will be tried.

Speakers blasted U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder for his decision to hold the trials in a court just blocks from the World Trade Center site, where thousands of people were killed in the 2001 attacks with hijacked planes.

Demonstrators -- among them family members of victims and rescuers-- held U.S. flags and signs reading "no constitutional rights for enemy combatants," and booed and jeered as speakers invoked Holder's name and that of President Barack Obama.

Its clear, Obama messed up shutting down Gitmo so they made another hasty decision by calling for the trial to be held in NYC, therby compounding their error.