March, 2009 archive
The End of Being . . . Awaits . . . 0
In . . . a . . . world . . . where working persons get fair treatment, all . . . bets . . . are . . . off.
Coming soon to a letter to your Congress persons.
Profiting on Misery 0
Bloomberg explains how certain Wall Street practices encourage the destruction of companies.
When you cut through the gibberish, it means, “The hell with stockholders, employees, customers, and the economic health of the country. I got mine.”
Following a meltdown last year in the relationship between prices on bonds and credit swaps after the Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. bankruptcy, basis traders often stand to make the most money if companies default. They can also profit by holding the trade until the debt matures or unwinding the position after the market value gap between the bonds and derivatives closes.
This, my friends, is fiduciary responsibility and good financial citizenship at its best.
And pigs fly.
Speakers Corncob 0
I spend my junior college year abroad in England.
One of the places I made sure to see was the Speakers Corner in Hyde Park, London, where tradition held that anyone could rant about almost anything without interference.
When I visited Hyde Park, shortly after arriving in London and before catching the train to Exeter, an older gentleman was holding up an empty toilet paper roll and ranting about toilet paper’s being the fundament of all evil.
He was most passionate.
Apparently, the speaker’s message lives on.
Nowhere To Go, Nothing To Do 0
The Promised Land of Republican Economic Theory. Bloomberg:
First-time unemployment applications decreased by 31,000 to 639,000 in the week that ended Feb. 28, less than anticipated, from a 26-year high of 670,000 the prior week, the Labor Department said today in Washington. The number of people staying on benefit rolls eased from a record.
Drags on the System 0
It’s not thousands of banks. It’s JPMorgan Chase, Citigroup, Bank of America and Wells Fargo who possess 64% of the nation’s banking assets. Paul Krugman:
(snip)
So as far as this discussion is concerned, we’ve got, like, four banks. The “thousands of banks” line is just a diversion.
Via Susie.
Those Unlimited Minutes Must Have Come Through 2
Maureen Dowd has long demonstrated that, in a conflict between snark and fact in her world, snark wins every time.
I think I’ve managed to finish one of her columns.
Now comes the dissection of today’s column: Brendan makes a lot of phone calls in researching various claims in Maureen Dowd’s lame column today. (There’s a call for every linked word.)
Brendan summarizes.
Duncan has the tag line.
Coda: Brendan gets an email. And answers it.
(I am really glad I queued this post for later tonight, so I could keep updating it so as to tell The Rest Of The Story.)
Aside: I’ve heard David Denby, the author of the book linked in the first line, interviewed several times. He gives a good interview and seems a most charming man. I think I get what he’s trying to say, but, when he tries to draw a line between sarcasm and snark, it’s like he’s trying to swim in melted peanut butter.
As near as I can figure, he differentiates between snark and sarcasm by defining snark as nastiness for nastiness’s sake–getting laughs by inflicting hurt–and sarcasm as nastiness to make a legitimate point–getting laughs by inflicting pain while adding a new point to the argument. But it’s awfully muddled.
The Big Republican (Updated) 0
Mudflats has details:
John Cole has commentary:
Addendum:
Margaret Carlson at Bloomberg.
Addendum-Dee-Dum-Dum:
The Booman explains the rise of Rush. A nugget:
No, no one has done more to deserve his present position of prominence within the Republican party. But as we all know (because Clint Eastwood told us so) “Deserve’s got nothing to do with it.” No Rush is The Man for one reason and one reason only: he’s the last [anatomical reference] standing.
Growth Industry 0
Writing resumes for a fee.
All the News that Flits 0
Fox News, upholding its usual standards. Colbert comments (warning: double-entendre galore):
Steve Disects the Spin 0
I’m not going to try to improve on this on how the same story gets spun in opposite ways.
Words matter. Words can hide or conceal reveal the truth.
At the Trough 1
Farmers used to mark their livestock by cutting nicking distinctive marks into their ears. Hence the term earmark: something to make sure the right pig ended up slurping at the right trough.
Kos lists who was first in line at the trough amongst our elected representatives incongruously assembled:
Earmarks $ in millions
- Cochran (R-MS): 204 471
- Wicker (R-MS): 143 390
- Landrieu (D-LA): 177 332
- Harkin (D-IA): 177 292
- Vitter (R-LA): 142 249
- Bond (R-MO): 86 248
- Feinstein (D-CA): 153 235
- Inouye (D-HI): 106 225
- Shelby (R-AL): 125 219
- Grassley (R-IA): 125 219
- Murkowski (R-AK): 93 181
- Murray (D-WA): 155 171
- Lincoln (D-AK): 93 181
- Pryor (D-AK): 92 167
- Menendez (D-NJ): 171 160
- Lautenberg (D-NJ): 173 159
- Hutchinson (R-TX): 106 106
- Levin (D-MI): 178 152
- Stabenow (D-MI): 178 152
- Byrd (D-WV): 76 152
Off the bat, we see that six of the top 10 earmarkers (by dollar amount) are Republicans, including the top two being our good wingnutty friends in Mississippi. We also see that six of the top 10, and 11 of the top 20, come from red states. (And remember, there are far fewer Republicans in the Senate this year.)
’nuff said.
Housekeeping 0
I took down the “Torture Awareness” bit on my sidebar.
Torquemada is no longer in the government.
I replaced it with a link to Geekazine, where Jeffrey has been letting me fly my geek flag.
Why Am I Not Surprised? 3
Movies that aren’t worth watching aren’t worth renting.
“The Biggest Investment Most Persons Ever Make” 0
So has sung the real estate industry for decades.
The flaw in that statement is that someone’s primary dwelling–house, condo, coop, whatever–is first a place to live. Any “investment potential” is a nice side-effect. Persons who allow themselves to be deluded into thinking of their houses as “investments” to be day-traded err grievously.
The brokers who sold the houses, with no or minimal down payments and funky time-bomb mortgages, promising “investment returns,” knew this. But left it out of the sales pitch.
An additional 2.2 million borrowers will be underwater if home prices decline another 5 percent, First American, a Santa Ana, California-based seller of mortgage and economic data, said in a report today. Households with negative equity or near it account for a quarter of all mortgage holders.
Metamorphosis 1
A carrion eater is a creature, such as a hyena, that comes along and eats the remains after a predator, such as a lion, had finished with it. Lions seldom morph into hyenas in the wild.
In nature, defrocked lions seldom re-invent themselves as hyenas. Not the case in what passes for busine–oh, I give up. If I write any more, I shall break my own ban on raving profanity.
So it may come as a surprise that a dozen former top Countrywide executives now stand to make millions from the home mortgage mess.
Stanford L. Kurland, Countrywide’s former president, and his team have been buying up delinquent home mortgages that the government took over from other failed banks, sometimes for pennies on the dollar. They get a piece of what they can collect.
Via Balloon Juice.
Pay for Performance (Updated) 1
Look!
Over at Google.
Some executives got bonuses and
they. did. not. even. destroy. the. company. and . demand. a. bailout!
Who woulda thunk!
State Pens 1
Up the road a piece–no, not that road, the other road–in Harrisburg, Pa., freebies for the newbies. And for the oldies.
Now comes word that members of the state House got something else that day as well – a desktop pen set.
It was a gift presented by new House Speaker Keith R. McCall (D., Carbon). But he didn’t pay for it. The public did – nearly $4,000.
In all, 210 of the trinkets were ordered at a cost of $18.95 each. That’s one for each of the 203 representatives with a few to spare.
The bases of the pen sets are crafted from a three-inch chunk of coal and feature a small plaque with McCall’s name and new title.
This is in a state that, like most other states, is having trouble paying its bills.
I think Chris has a marketing opportunity here.
Oh, about those Bibles and Torahs. They get a new one every session, even if they’ve gotten one before. Some of the long-serving ones must have whole libraries.