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THE HOT-MONEY COWBOYS OF BAGHDAD
My friend, Iraq is a rich, virgin country! one of its richest men, Namir al-Akabi, told me with a startling enthusiasm when I met him earlier this year at his office in Baghdad. Akabi is the chairman of the Almco Group of Companies, a conglomerate he built from nothing in the wake of the American invasion in 2003. What makes Iraqs economic - By STEVEN LEE MYERS
Lawmakers Temporary Deal Averts Government Shutdown
WASHINGTON -- Retreating from their harsh partisan sniping, and perhaps fearing public rebuke, Congressional leaders said Thursday that they had agreed on a large-scale spending measure to keep the government running for the next nine months. But an accord on extending a payroll tax holiday set to expire at the end of the month remained elusive, - Congressional leaders announce that they have agreed on a large-scale spending measure to keep the government running for the next nine months; an accord on extending the payroll tax holiday remains elusive, with Democrats weighing a possible short-term extension, setting the stage for another fight with Republicans over how to pay for it. Photos (M) - By JENNIFER STEINHAUER and ROBERT PEAR; Lizette Alvarez contributed reporting from Miami.
After meeting with Obama, congressional leaders voice confidence ...
14 hours ago ... WASHINGTON — Congressional leaders from both parties voiced fresh optimism Friday after meeting with newly re-elected President Barack Obama ... For all the expressions of optimism, it was unclear whether the Nov.
Congressional Leaders Optimistic, Say Revenue, Spending On The ...
6 hours ago ... WASHINGTON, DC — Congressional leaders expressed optimism after their first meeting with President Barack Obama on averting the fiscal ...
How will this 700 Billion dollar bailout help and how does it work?
Answer: The plan (700 Billion dollar bailout), sent to Congress by the Bush administration late Friday, calls for the federal government to buy as much as $700 billion worth of mortgage assets held by banks, Wall Street firms and other financial institutions.
Those securities were backed by home loans, many made to buyers with bad credit or without proof of income. As housing values fell and foreclosures shot to record levels in the past two years, the value of those securities plunged. That in turn caused massive losses in the financial sector.
Comment on the bailout plan
This past week it reached a crisis situation. Banks and investment firms stopped making the loans to each other as they hoarded cash to protect against any sudden liquidity crunch as well from unknown problems on their partners' balance sheets.
Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke won support for the bailout plan from Congressional leaders in a meeting Thursday night.
Congress began working on the legislation Saturday, and there could be a vote as soon as the coming week.
"I am convinced that this bold approach will cost American families far less than the alternative -- a continuing series of financial institution failures and frozen credit markets unable to fund economic expansion," Paulson said Friday. "I believe many members of Congress share my conviction."
Word of the plan first leaked Thursday afternoon, causing a massive rally in stocks at the end of the day that carried over into Friday. Several economists also praised the move.
"I'm confident this will work," said Mark Zandi, chief economist with Moody's Economy.com. "The federal government is committed to backstopping the nation's financial system and will do whatever is necessary to make sure the system does not unravel. The details are important but secondary."
The plan also won support from presidential candidates John McCain and Barack Obama. Zandi is an informal economic advisor to the McCain campaign.
Other experts said that while there are obviously big risks to taxpayers, the federal government has little choice but to provide the assurance to financial markets.
"If this doesn't work, we're in trouble, because there's not much more the government can do," said Jaret Seiberg, a financial services analyst at the Stanford Group. "They've left very few arrows in the quiver."
More losses, failures expected
But Seiberg added that the bailout won't completely end the recent turmoil on Wall Street, a crisis that began with the Treasury's seizure of mortgage finance giants Fannie Mae (FNM, Fortune 500) and Freddie Mac (FRE, Fortune 500) earlier this month and escalated this week with the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers (LEH, Fortune 500) and the $85 billion loan to American International Group (AIG, Fortune 500), the world's largest insurer, by the Federal Reserve.
"What the government is doing now is not suddenly going to make institutions profitable," he said. "What we're talking about is trying to make them stable. That means removing the risk from their balance sheet and putting it on the taxpayer. The government has a much better ability to hold onto that risk for an extended period of time."
Still, Seiberg is optimistic that the bailout will help home prices finally start to recover since it should lead to lower mortgage rates and improve consumer confidence.
But others say that there are still enough fundamental problems in housing, including a huge glut of homes for sale and the likelihood of more foreclosures in the pipeline.
"It should help housing prices find a bottom but I still think it will be about a year from now -- and after prices decline another 10%," said Stuart Hoffman, chief economist for PNC Financial Services Group.
Nonetheless, even if home prices don't stabilize soon, one expert said the bailout could be a success if it allows bank to stop hoarding cash and once again begin lending to each other, consumers and businesses.
"The one thing you don't want is to have the economy grind to a halt because people can't get credit," said Dean Baker, co-director of the Center for Economic and Policy Research.
Baker predicts home prices will fall another 20% even with the bailout but said the decline could become even more severe without passage of the rescue plan.
"Housing prices were a bubble and you can't stop them from deflating," Baker said. "But [the bailout] might stop an uncontrolled plunge."
Will Congress pass the bailout?
Despite the support being voiced by Democrats and Republicans for the plan on Friday, Seiberg said its chance of passage is by no means certain.
"The odds of this passing are probably around 80% - and those are pretty good odds for Washington," he said. "But it's not a slam dunk."
Sen. Richard Shelby, the ranking Republican on the Senate Banking Committee, questioned the plan Friday morning, telling CNNMoney.com that he doubts it will be the
Category: Economics
After meeting with Obama, congressional leaders voice confidence ...
WASHINGTON - Congressional leaders from both parties voiced fresh optimism Friday after meeting with newly re-elected President Barack Obama about avoiding year-end "fiscal cliff" tax increases and spending cuts that ...
Why do Democrats think that voting for a RULE is constitutional & the same thing as voting for a BILL?
http://www.nationalcenter.org/2010/03/slaughter-solution-would-not-pass.html
The Supreme Court has decided that its unconstitutional to do so:
A dozen years ago, in a 6-3 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled the line item veto unconstitutional in Clinton v. City of New York, 524 U.S. 417 (1998).
Writing for the majority, Justice John Paul Stevens laid a likely roadmap for how the Court might rule on a challenge to the constitutionality of the Slaughter Solution:
...our decision rests on the narrow ground that the procedures authorized by the Line Item Veto Act are not authorized by the Constitution.
The Balanced Budget Act of 1997 is a 500-page document that became Public Law 105--33 after three procedural steps were taken: (1) a bill containing its exact text was approved by a majority of the Members of the House of Representatives; (2) the Senate approved precisely the same text; and (3) that text was signed into law by the President. The Constitution explicitly requires that each of those three steps be taken before a bill may become a law. Art. I, ��7.
If one paragraph of that text had been omitted at any one of those three stages, Public Law 105--33 would not have been validly enacted. [Emphasis added] If the Line Item Veto Act were valid, it would authorize the President to create a different law - one whose text was not voted on by either House of Congress or presented to the President for signature. Something that might be known as Public Law 105--33 as modified by the President may or may not be desirable, but it is surely not a document that may become a law pursuant to the procedures designed by the Framers of Article I, ��7, of the Constitution.
Whether one agrees or disagrees with the Court in the line item veto case, one cannot deny that the majority decision here is a powerful sign that the Slaughter Solution would not be ruled constitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court.
Answer: But as CNSNews.com reported, the Congressional Budget Office’s analysis of the final Senate health care bill indicates that it would impose a mandatory $15,000 annual fee on middle-class families that earn greater than 400 percent annually of the federal poverty level. That means $88,200 for a family of four.
Among the five basic facts that the CBO analysis cites about the bill is that “Your family insurance plan – if your employer drops your coverage and you are forced to buy it on your own – will cost about $15,000 per year when the legislation is in full force in 2016.”
ObamaCare Nuclear Option Deal Close
Behind closed doors, the Obama Administration, House and Senate Democrat leaders are cutting a secret deal on ObamaCare. They have come up with a way to pass the Senate version of ObamaCare in the House without any House members having to vote directly on the bill. Now The Hill is reporting that the House and Senate Parliamentarians are helping to advise Democrats on how to pass ObamaCare. When will the self proclaimed most ethical Congress in history start acting ethical and honest? This 111th Congress has proven, to date, to be the most secretive, non-transparent and devious Congress in recent history.
I explained in a blog on The Foundry yesterday the unethical procedure being used to pass ObamaCare:
House members have come up with a unique way to structure a vote that attempts to avoid the House voting on legislation before it goes to the President. First, the House Budget Committee will report out a reconciliation bill. It is unclear as to whether the Stupak Amendment will be added. This reconciliation measure would be reported for consideration by the House of Representatives as a whole. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) would then package the Senate passed Obamacare bill and the House reconciliation measure into one measure. The House rules committee will report out a rule that will allow the Senate passed Obamacare bill to pass the House without a vote.
This seems to be a violation of the constitutional requirement of Article 1, Section 7. The Constitution states in part “Every Bill which shall have passed the House of Representatives and the Senate, shall, before it becomes a law, be presented to the President of the United States.” The House will avoid a direct vote on the Senate passed ObamaCare by passing a self-executing rule that deems ObamaCare to be passed, if the House approves the rule setting up debate on ObamaCare. Under the rule if the reconciliation measure passes, then the Senate passed ObamaCare bill will be deemed to have passed the House without a vote.
There is precedent in the House for self-executing rules. In 2007, the House to pass a self-executing rule during the debate on a War Supplemental. Also, during the budget process over the past few years, the House has inserted language into the annual budget resolutions that ”deems” as passed a debt limit increase. This type of rule allows the debt limit to pass the House without a vote and as similar rule would allow teh Senate version of ObamaCare to pass without a vote.
Late last night, The Hill reported that “Democrats Nearing Deal on Reconciliation”:
House and Senate Democratic leaders and White House officials were optimistic Wednesday evening that they were nearing a deal on a reconciliation package that would smooth the way for them to finally complete health care reform. Congressional leaders and senior administration officials met in Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) office late in the day to hammer out a deal on reconciliation, meant to act as a sidecar of adjustments to the original $871 billion Senate-passed health care reform bill.
This meeting was not transparent and not open to the public. Pelosi was behind closed doors in order to cut a deal on a reconciliation measure that the House may consider in the next week or two. Yet again, Democrat leaders have used a closed door secret procedure to craft legislation to impose on Americans.
House Democratic leaders will walk their rank and file through portions of the package in a Thursday morning meeting, a leadership aide said.
This means that only Democrat elites have been part of this negotiation. Not until later today will the House Democrat caucus be allowed to see the reconciliation measure. Republicans need not apply, because they will not be allowed to see the reconciliation measure, until Democrats say so. And for your average American who will have to live under this new health care government run regime, you are not allowed to participate in the legislative process at all.
http://socglory.blogspot.com/
Category: Politics
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WASHINGTON -- President Obama on Tuesday flatly dismissed a short-term Republican plan to keep the federal government operating past Friday as Speaker John A. Boehner sought deeper spending cuts, putting Congress and the White House on a course toward a government shutdown. Showing some exasperation at the impasse over this years budget, Mr. Obama - Pres Obama dismisses a short-term Republican plan to keep the federal government operating because of deeper spending cuts sought by Speaker John Boehner, putting Congress and the Obama administration on a course toward a government shutdown; tense bargaining underlines how important both parties view this budget fight in shaping the debate to come on other fiscal issues; photos (M) - By CARL HULSE and JENNIFER STEINHAUER; Jackie Calmes contributed reporting.
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New York Democrats Skipping Convention for, Well, You Name It
ALBANY -- Representative Timothy H. Bishop of Long Island is visiting the Rocky Point Civic Association. Representative Kathy Hochul of Erie County is meeting with small business owners. And Representative Bill Owens of the North Country is discussing agriculture policy with the New York Farm Bureau.With President Obama set to accept his partys - Democratic New York State Reps Timothy H Bishop, Kathy Hochul, Bill Owens and Louise M Slaughter, who face tough re-election races, are skipping the Democratic National Convention in Charlotte, NC, in September, citing the need to campaign; court-ordered redistricting has forced many incumbents in New York to sway voters they have not previously represented, making any loss of campaign time that much more critical. Photo (M) - By THOMAS KAPLAN
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THE LONG RUN; Conservative Stars Small-Town Roots
JANESVILLE, Wis. -- Representative Paul D. Ryan s childhood home here was not overtly partisan. His parents were enthusiastic supporters of Representative Les Aspin, a Democrat, yet adored President Ronald Reagan from their glimpses of him on the evening news. But the death of his father when Mr. Ryan was only 16 punctured his life of math tests - Representative Paul D Ryan began developing self-reliance and a political philosophy as a teen after his father died that has culminated into a defining role as a vice-presidential candidate; in Ryan, Mitt Romney has found not only a sympathetic life story to animate his campaign but also a politician who fills in what many see as the gaps in Romneys conservative bona fides (Series: The Long Run). Photos (L) - By JENNIFER STEINHAUER, JIM RUTENBERG, MIKE McINTIRE and SHERYL GAY STOLBERG; Jennifer Steinhauer reported from Janesville, Sheryl Gay Stolberg from Washington, and Jim Rutenberg and Mike McIntire from New York. Nicholas Confessore contributed reporting from New York, and Serge Kovaleski from Denver. Kitty Bennett contributed research from Seattle, and Sheelagh McNeill from New York.
Warning: Theres Not Nearly Enough Of This Vaccine To Go Around
A few days after 9/11, a retired Air Force colonel named Randall Larsen entered the northwest gate of the White House, crossed a courtyard to the Eisenhower Executive Office Building, stepped through the front door and stopped dead in his tracks. In place of the usual security checkpoint, there was an elaborate upgrade that included not only metal - By WIL S. HYLTON
Organized Labor Hopes Attacks by Some States Help Nurture Comeback
WASHINGTON -- When Wisconsins governor, Scott Walker, began his crusade against collective bargaining by public employees, his states unions seemed woefully outmatched. But Wisconsins beleaguered labor movement woke up and mobilized, through e-mail blasts, phone trees and Facebook, getting tens of thousands of supporters to rally in Madison - By STEVEN GREENHOUSE
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Daily Kos: President Obama meets with congressional leaders to ...
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Congressional Leaders Remain Optimistic After Election Day Losses
WASHINGTON -- House and Senate minority leaders Nancy Pelosi and Mitch McConnell surrounded themselves with the triumphant faces of newly elected lawmakers Tuesday. But the glow of ... WASHINGTON - U.S. President Barack Obama made his first public comments on Friday since his re-election victory, calling on congressional Republicans to immediately freeze tax. ... jbendery RT @jacksonjk: Bono on the Hill today for meetings with congressional leaders.
Optimism expresed by Obama, congressional leaders on resolving ...
President Barack Obama (R) shakes hands with Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-OH) during a meeting with bipartisan group of congressional leaders in the Roosevelt Room of the White House on November 16, 2012 in Washington, DC. ... Obama, arguing he now has a mandate from voters after winning reelection during a campaign in which he pledged to raise taxes on the wealthy, has said he will allow taxes to go up for all Americans unless Republicans ...
Debt Divide Remains As President Steps In
WASHINGTON -- The White House and Congressional Republicans remained deeply divided on Monday over whether a budget-cutting deal tied to a debt limit increase should contain new federal revenues. As President Obama welcomed Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, and Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, the Republican leader, to the - By CARL HULSE
Fed Chief Says Politics Hurt Markets and Nation
JACKSON HOLE, Wyo. -- The Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, said Friday that the political battle this summer over the federal governments borrowing and spending had disrupted financial markets and probably the economy as well. In remarks that went well beyond his previous calls for Congress and the White House to address the nations - By BINYAMIN APPELBAUM; Jackie Calmes contributed reporting from Vineyard Haven, Mass., and Carl Hulse from Washington.
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Both Sides Are Braced For Debt-Limit Debate
WASHINGTON -- With a showdown approaching over the need to raise the federal debt limit, White House officials feel they have the upper hand over Congressional Republicans who want to use the debate on the measure to force deep spending cuts, people familiar with the administrations thinking say. While Republican leaders say they hope to avoid a - By JACKIE CALMES
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