How We Became the United States of France
By Bill Saporito
This is the state of our great republic: We've nationalized the financial system, taking control from Wall Street bankers we no longer trust. We're about to quasi-nationalize the Detroit auto companies via massive loans because they're a source of American pride, and too many jobs — and votes — are at stake. Our Social Security system is going broke as we head for a future where too many retirees will be supported by too few workers. How long before we have national healthcare? Put it all together, and the America that emerges is a cartoonish version of the country most despised by red-meat red-state patriots: France. Only with worse food.
Admit it, mes amis, the rugged individualism and cutthroat capitalism that made America the land of unlimited opportunity has been shrink-wrapped by a half dozen short sellers in Greenwich, Conn. and FedExed to Washington D.C. to be spoon-fed back to life by Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke and Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson. We're now no different from any of those Western European semi-socialist welfare states that we love to deride. Italy? Sure, it's had four governments since last Thursday, but none of them would have allowed this to go on; the Italians know how to rig an economy.
You just know the Frogs have only increased their disdain for us, if that is indeed possible. And why shouldn't they? The average American is working two and half jobs, gets two weeks off, and has all the employment security of a one-armed trapeze artist. The Bush Administration has preached the "ownership society" to America: own your house, own your retirement account; you don't need the government in your way. So Americans mortgaged themselves to the hilt to buy overpriced houses they can no longer afford and signed up for 401k programs that put money where, exactly? In the stock market! Where rich Republicans fleeced them.
Now our laissez-faire (hey, a French word) regulation-averse Administration has made France's only Socialist president, Francois Mitterand, look like Adam Smith by comparison. All Mitterand did was nationalize France's big banks and insurance companies in 1982; he didn't have to deal with bankers who didn't want to lend money, as Paulson does. When the state runs the banks, they are merely cows to be milked in the service of la patrie. France doesn't have the mortgage crisis that we do, either. In bailing out mortgage lenders Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, our government has basically turned America into the largest subsidized housing project in the world. Sure, France has its banlieus, where it likes to warehouse people who aren't French enough (meaning, immigrants orAlgerians) in huge apartment blocks. But the bulk of French homeowners are curiously free of subprime mortgages foisted on them by fellow citizens, and they aren't over their heads in personal debt.
We've always dismissed the French as exquisitely fed wards of their welfare state. They work, what, 27 hours in a good week, have 19 holidays a month, go on strike for two days and enjoy a glass of wine every day with lunch — except for the 25% of the population that works for the government, who have an even sweeter deal. They retire before their kids finish high school, and they don't have to save for a $45,000-a-year college tuition because college is free. For this, they pay a tax rate of about 103%, and their labor laws are so restrictive that they haven't had a net gain in jobs since Napoleon. There is no way that the French government can pay for this lifestyle forever, except that it somehow does.
Mitterand tried to create both job-growth and wage-growth by nationalizing huge swaths of the economy, including some big industries, including automaker Renault, for instance. You haven't driven a Renault lately because Renault couldn't sell them here. Imagine that. An auto company that couldn't compete with a Dodge Colt. But the Renault takeover ultimately proved successful and Renault became a private company again in 1996, although the government retains about 15% of the shares.
Now the U.S. is faced with the same prospect in the auto industry. GM and Ford need money to develop greener cars that can compete with Toyota and Honda. And they're looking to Uncle Sam for investment — an investment that could have been avoided had Washington imposed more stringent mileage standards years earlier. But we don't want to interfere with market forces like the French do — until we do.
Mitterand's nationalization program and other economic reforms failed, as the development of the European Market made a centrally planned economy obsolete. The Rothschilds got their bank back, a little worse for wear. These days, France sashays around the issue of protectionism in a supposedly unfettered EU by proclaiming some industries to be national champions worthy of extra consideration — you know, special needs kids. And we're not talking about pastry chefs, but the likes of GDF Suez, a major utility. I never thought of the stocks and junk securities sold by Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley as unique, but clearly Washington does. Morgan's John Mack calls SEC boss Chris Cox to whine about short sellers and bingo, the government obliges. The elite serve the elite. How French is that?
Even in the strongest sectors in the U.S., there's no getting away from the French influence. Nothing is more sacred to France than its farmers. They get whatever they demand, and they demand a lot. And if there are any issues about price supports, or feed costs being too high, or actual competition from other countries, French farmers simply shut down the country by marching their livestock up the Champs Elysee and piling up wheat on the highways. U.S. farmers would never resort to such behavior. They don't have to: they're the most coddled special interest group in U.S. history, lavished with $180 billion in subsidies by both parties, even when their products are fetching record prices. One consequence: U.S. consumers pay twice what the French pay for sugar, because of price guarantees. We're more French than France.
So yes, while we're still willing to work ourselves to death for the privilege of paying off our usurious credit cards, we can no longer look contemptuously at the land of 246 cheeses. Kraft Foods has replaced American International Group in the Dow Jones Industrial Average, the insurance company having been added to Paulson's nationalized portfolio. Macaroni and cheese has supplanted credit default swaps at the fulcrum of capitalism. And one more thing: the food snob French love McDonalds, which does a fantastic business there. They know a good freedom fry when they taste one.
http://www.time.com/time/nation/article/0,8599,1843168,00.html
Monday, September 22, 2008
Best Dress Website Ever...
I have loved their dresses (and own quite a few) for YEARS now...an old friend turned me onto it. We're not friends anymore...at least she was good for something...
http://www.daddyos.com/
http://www.daddyos.com/
Thursday, September 18, 2008
Now I will never be able to open my paycheck without crying.
Commentary: Blame boards of directors for financial mess
Nell Minow: Wall Street directors ultimately to blame for financial crisis
As big Wall Street firms topple like dominoes, there is plenty of blame to go around.
Failure this broad and deep takes a village, and regulators, lawyers, compensation consultants, auditors, executives, shareholders, and the press all played a part. But the people who are most responsible for the massive meltdowns of these institutions are the boards of directors.
Their sole responsibility is to act as fiduciaries for the shareholders in managing risk. They not only failed to perform this task but indeed, in their approval of outrageous pay plans with perverse incentives, they all but guaranteed the current disaster.
I am a capitalist. I love it when executives earn boatloads of money. But it infuriates me when they get it without earning it.
If the executives' compensation is tied to the volume of business rather than the quality of business, we should expect dealmakers to be more attentive to the number of transactions than the value they create. This is the basis for much of the sub-prime mess, whose collateral damage is taking down the biggest firms on Wall Street.
At Merrill Lynch, former CEO Stanley O'Neal received total compensation of more than $91 million for 2006, according to The Corporate Library's calculations. He was given that package based on performance numbers that came out before nearly $23 billion in write-downs by the company.
O'Neal received more than $160 million in stock and retirement benefits while shareholders lost more than 41 percent of their investment value over the year. Three executives brought in to Merrill less than a year ago will share a $200 million payment as they turn over the company to Bank of America in a last-minute deal to help it survive.
American International Group (AIG) replaced CEO Martin Sullivan after the company posted losses for two consecutive quarters totaling $13 billion. Sullivan's contract entitled him to about $68 million. His replacement, a board member who served as CEO for three months before the company was taken over by the government, will get as much as $7 million.
The boards of directors approved pay that was completely disconnected to performance. This, after all, is the world of the ultimate oxymoron: the "guaranteed bonus." So we should not be surprised that executives took the money and ran.
Fewer than 13 percent of public companies have claw-back policies requiring executives to return bonuses based on inflated numbers. All of the incentives are for them to inflate the numbers, take the money, and run.
And that is why companies whose names used to be synonymous with stability and trustworthiness will live on through history and business school case studies as discredited, greedy and corrupt.
The people who insisted that government regulation interfered with the perfect efficiency of the markets are now getting bailed out by taxpayers with some walloping welfare checks.
I just hope that this time the government does a better job of protecting itself than it did with its bail-out of Chrysler almost 30 years ago and this time insists on a piece of the upside rather than a fixed repayment. If the government is going to run a business, it has to act like a business and make sure its interests are aligned with the executives.
Despite the post-Enron adoption of the most extensive protections since the New Deal, a survey released this week by Kroll and the Economist Intelligence Unit found that corporate fraud rose 22 percent since last year.
The option back-dating and sub-prime messes show that even the post-Enron Sarbanes-Oxley reform law and expanded enforcement and oversight cannot eliminate the severest threats to our markets and our economy.
This proves that there are limits to structural solutions. Ultimately, markets are smarter and more efficient than regulation. What the government needs to do now is insist on removing obstacles to the efficient operation of market oversight.
Shareholders must be able to replace directors who make bad decisions and they should have a non-binding "say on pay" vote on executive compensation as they do in the UK and several other countries.
Our current system of executive compensation does not tie pay to performance, it does not provide an effective incentive to create long-term shareholder value, and it does not meet any possible market test.
Executive compensation must be looked at as any other asset allocation. The return on investment for the expenditures on CEO pay is by any measure inadequate.
Some have argued that the amounts at issue are so small in proportion to the assets being managed that they do not have any material impact. On the contrary, the CEO compensation in America's public companies is a leading indicator of serious problems -- and one reason my firm has consistently given most financial services companies "high-risk" ratings.
And it is more than a symptom of the pervasive problem that is toppling our most respected financial services companies. It is a perversion of the market that imposes enormous and growing costs on America's working families -- as shareholders, customers, employees, and members of the community.
These outrageous pay packages juxtaposed with losses in share value and jobs diminishes our credibility and increases our cost of capital. In today's global economy this is an expense we clearly can no longer afford.
Nell Minow: Wall Street directors ultimately to blame for financial crisis
As big Wall Street firms topple like dominoes, there is plenty of blame to go around.
Failure this broad and deep takes a village, and regulators, lawyers, compensation consultants, auditors, executives, shareholders, and the press all played a part. But the people who are most responsible for the massive meltdowns of these institutions are the boards of directors.
Their sole responsibility is to act as fiduciaries for the shareholders in managing risk. They not only failed to perform this task but indeed, in their approval of outrageous pay plans with perverse incentives, they all but guaranteed the current disaster.
I am a capitalist. I love it when executives earn boatloads of money. But it infuriates me when they get it without earning it.
If the executives' compensation is tied to the volume of business rather than the quality of business, we should expect dealmakers to be more attentive to the number of transactions than the value they create. This is the basis for much of the sub-prime mess, whose collateral damage is taking down the biggest firms on Wall Street.
At Merrill Lynch, former CEO Stanley O'Neal received total compensation of more than $91 million for 2006, according to The Corporate Library's calculations. He was given that package based on performance numbers that came out before nearly $23 billion in write-downs by the company.
O'Neal received more than $160 million in stock and retirement benefits while shareholders lost more than 41 percent of their investment value over the year. Three executives brought in to Merrill less than a year ago will share a $200 million payment as they turn over the company to Bank of America in a last-minute deal to help it survive.
American International Group (AIG) replaced CEO Martin Sullivan after the company posted losses for two consecutive quarters totaling $13 billion. Sullivan's contract entitled him to about $68 million. His replacement, a board member who served as CEO for three months before the company was taken over by the government, will get as much as $7 million.
The boards of directors approved pay that was completely disconnected to performance. This, after all, is the world of the ultimate oxymoron: the "guaranteed bonus." So we should not be surprised that executives took the money and ran.
Fewer than 13 percent of public companies have claw-back policies requiring executives to return bonuses based on inflated numbers. All of the incentives are for them to inflate the numbers, take the money, and run.
And that is why companies whose names used to be synonymous with stability and trustworthiness will live on through history and business school case studies as discredited, greedy and corrupt.
The people who insisted that government regulation interfered with the perfect efficiency of the markets are now getting bailed out by taxpayers with some walloping welfare checks.
I just hope that this time the government does a better job of protecting itself than it did with its bail-out of Chrysler almost 30 years ago and this time insists on a piece of the upside rather than a fixed repayment. If the government is going to run a business, it has to act like a business and make sure its interests are aligned with the executives.
Despite the post-Enron adoption of the most extensive protections since the New Deal, a survey released this week by Kroll and the Economist Intelligence Unit found that corporate fraud rose 22 percent since last year.
The option back-dating and sub-prime messes show that even the post-Enron Sarbanes-Oxley reform law and expanded enforcement and oversight cannot eliminate the severest threats to our markets and our economy.
This proves that there are limits to structural solutions. Ultimately, markets are smarter and more efficient than regulation. What the government needs to do now is insist on removing obstacles to the efficient operation of market oversight.
Shareholders must be able to replace directors who make bad decisions and they should have a non-binding "say on pay" vote on executive compensation as they do in the UK and several other countries.
Our current system of executive compensation does not tie pay to performance, it does not provide an effective incentive to create long-term shareholder value, and it does not meet any possible market test.
Executive compensation must be looked at as any other asset allocation. The return on investment for the expenditures on CEO pay is by any measure inadequate.
Some have argued that the amounts at issue are so small in proportion to the assets being managed that they do not have any material impact. On the contrary, the CEO compensation in America's public companies is a leading indicator of serious problems -- and one reason my firm has consistently given most financial services companies "high-risk" ratings.
And it is more than a symptom of the pervasive problem that is toppling our most respected financial services companies. It is a perversion of the market that imposes enormous and growing costs on America's working families -- as shareholders, customers, employees, and members of the community.
These outrageous pay packages juxtaposed with losses in share value and jobs diminishes our credibility and increases our cost of capital. In today's global economy this is an expense we clearly can no longer afford.
Can you imagine the nagging x's 86?
Man arrested for having 86 wives
Muslim preacher allegedly breaks Islamic law — four wives is the limit
ABUJA, Nigeria - Police in northern Nigeria have arrested a Muslim preacher who has 86 wives and 107 children for breaking Islamic marriage laws.
Niger state police spokesman Richard Oguche says Mohammed Bello Masaba, 84, was detained Monday.
It was unclear when he would appear in court, or what the potential punishment could be. Muslim principles forbid men from taking more than four wives.
Almost half of Nigeria's 140 million people are Muslim and Niger is one of twelve states in the country where Islamic Sharia law holds sway.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26735448/
Muslim preacher allegedly breaks Islamic law — four wives is the limit
ABUJA, Nigeria - Police in northern Nigeria have arrested a Muslim preacher who has 86 wives and 107 children for breaking Islamic marriage laws.
Niger state police spokesman Richard Oguche says Mohammed Bello Masaba, 84, was detained Monday.
It was unclear when he would appear in court, or what the potential punishment could be. Muslim principles forbid men from taking more than four wives.
Almost half of Nigeria's 140 million people are Muslim and Niger is one of twelve states in the country where Islamic Sharia law holds sway.
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26735448/
PSoftheD
LOS ANGELES — Lindsay Lohan's efforts to stump for Barack Obama were reportedly thrown back in her face by the Democratic candidate's campaign ... and her father is none too happy about it.
According to the Chicago Sun-Times, LiLo wanted to promote Obama but was turned away by his camp due to her wild ways. Now daddy Michael Lohan is biting back.
"For Barack Obama to condemn my daughter for past indiscretions when he admitted to the exact same himself is indicative of what kind of president he would be," Michael Lohan told Pop Tarts via e-mail on Wednesday night.
"His visions of a positive future for this country should be representative of a positive future for people as well. It is looking beyond the difficult times and letting go of the past," Michael said. "Obviously, Obama can do this for himself and not others, when in fact a good president should have hope for all."
Michael and his famous daughter have had a rocky relationship in recent weeks, but he had nothing but nice words for his little one in his e-mail.
"Lindsay is gifted — she has a wonderful heart and she can and will affect millions of people in a very positive way. She is here to stay," he said. "Obama might have eight years, and then he will be giving lectures. Who knows, maybe Lindsay will give him a part in one of her movies."
hahahahah...like anyone gives a shit who lindsay lohan and her dad support. I actually like Obama MORE for telling her to f off.
According to the Chicago Sun-Times, LiLo wanted to promote Obama but was turned away by his camp due to her wild ways. Now daddy Michael Lohan is biting back.
"For Barack Obama to condemn my daughter for past indiscretions when he admitted to the exact same himself is indicative of what kind of president he would be," Michael Lohan told Pop Tarts via e-mail on Wednesday night.
"His visions of a positive future for this country should be representative of a positive future for people as well. It is looking beyond the difficult times and letting go of the past," Michael said. "Obviously, Obama can do this for himself and not others, when in fact a good president should have hope for all."
Michael and his famous daughter have had a rocky relationship in recent weeks, but he had nothing but nice words for his little one in his e-mail.
"Lindsay is gifted — she has a wonderful heart and she can and will affect millions of people in a very positive way. She is here to stay," he said. "Obama might have eight years, and then he will be giving lectures. Who knows, maybe Lindsay will give him a part in one of her movies."
hahahahah...like anyone gives a shit who lindsay lohan and her dad support. I actually like Obama MORE for telling her to f off.
Palin Drops Trow
In the three days after Palin joined Team McCain--Aug. 29-31--32 percent of voters told the pollsters at Diageo/Hotline that they had a favorable opinion of her; most (48 percent) didn't know enough to say.
By Sept. 4, however, 43 percent of Diageo/Hotline respondents approved of Palin with only 25 percent disapproving--an 18-point split. Apparently, voters were liking what they were hearing.
Four days later, Palin's approval rating had climbed to 47 percent (+17), and by Sept. 13 it had hit 52 percent. The gap at that point between her favorable and unfavorable numbers--22 percent--was larger than either McCain's (+20) or Obama's (+13).
But then a funny thing happened: Palin seems to have lost some of her luster. Since Sept. 13, Palin's unfavorables have climbed from 30 percent to 36 percent. Meanwhile, her favorables have slipped from 52 percent to 48 percent. That's a three-day net swing of -10 points, and it leaves her in the Sept. 15 Diageo/Hotline tracking poll tied for the smallest favorability split (+12)** of any of the Final Four.
The Sept. 17 Diageo/Hotline tracking poll shows Palin at 47 percent favorable and 37 percent unfavorable--an even narrower +10 split.
Over the course of a single weekend, in other words, Palin went from being the most popular White House hopeful to the least.
By Sept. 4, however, 43 percent of Diageo/Hotline respondents approved of Palin with only 25 percent disapproving--an 18-point split. Apparently, voters were liking what they were hearing.
Four days later, Palin's approval rating had climbed to 47 percent (+17), and by Sept. 13 it had hit 52 percent. The gap at that point between her favorable and unfavorable numbers--22 percent--was larger than either McCain's (+20) or Obama's (+13).
But then a funny thing happened: Palin seems to have lost some of her luster. Since Sept. 13, Palin's unfavorables have climbed from 30 percent to 36 percent. Meanwhile, her favorables have slipped from 52 percent to 48 percent. That's a three-day net swing of -10 points, and it leaves her in the Sept. 15 Diageo/Hotline tracking poll tied for the smallest favorability split (+12)** of any of the Final Four.
The Sept. 17 Diageo/Hotline tracking poll shows Palin at 47 percent favorable and 37 percent unfavorable--an even narrower +10 split.
Over the course of a single weekend, in other words, Palin went from being the most popular White House hopeful to the least.
So, um...just repeat everything you've ever said before. helpful...
Bush: Markets adjusting to economic action
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush on Thursday said he shared Americans' concerns about the economy and his administration is ready to act to prevent severe market disruptions.
The U.S. economy still faces "serious challenges," Bush said. "My administration is focused on meeting these challenges."
The president said the government had taken "extraordinary measures" to help stabilize the markets, including the takeover of insurance giant American International Group Inc. on Tuesday.
Bush said the AIG takeover was necessary to prevent "a severe disruption in our financial markets and threatened other sectors of the economy."
He also said the federal takeover of two mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were necessary to "help promote market stability and to ensure they can continue to play a role in helping our housing market recover."
The Federal Reserve on Wednesday night also took steps, in coordination with central banks around the world, to provide additional liquidity to U.S. markets, Bush said.
"These actions are necessary and important, and the markets are adjusting to them," Bush said.
Despite the government's takeover of AIG, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 449 points Wednesday in its second worst session of the year. The market has bounced back somewhat Thursday morning, with the Dow up more than 100 points.
Bush made his comments after meeting with economic advisers, including Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. Bush said he would confer again with Paulson later Thursday.
The president canceled a fundraising trip to Alabama and Florida to meet with his advisers, the White House said.
The White House has defended the Federal Reserve's decision to bail out AIG. The Fed announced Tuesday it would provide an $85 billion emergency loan in exchange for a nearly 80 percent stake in the company, the most far-reaching intervention into the private sector ever for the Federal Reserve.
"While no one would have liked to have ended up in this situation, you have a government that is willing to lead," White House press secretary Dana Perino said.
Bush has not fielded questions about the economic upheaval this week and even canceled a statement Tuesday. Reporters have tried each day. When one tried to press Bush in the Oval Office on Wednesday, he said he could not hear the question, then made light of the moment by saying, "I'm old."
Congressional Democrats, along with key Republicans, voiced their displeasure with the recent bailout. Some Republicans said they were not aware of the White House's plans to rescue AIG.
"Once again the Fed has put the taxpayers on the hook for billions of dollars to bail out an institution that put greed ahead of responsibility and used their good name to take risky bets that did not pay off," said Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Kentucky, a member of the Senate Banking Committee.
Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Missouri, said House Republicans are struggling to "understand a coherent strategy" about which firms get rescued and which ones don't.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, placed the blame for the nation's economic woes squarely on the Bush administration, arguing it failed to regulate the financial industry aggressively.
"The most recent bailout initiated by the Bush administration -- that of AIG -- is just another example that George Bush is a failed manager," she said Wednesday. "Because of the inattention, or a decision on their part to have crony capitalism in our country, Americans across the country are feeling the pain of this."
Perino countered, saying lawmakers could have done more to head off the crisis.
"I think that Congress needs to take -- before they start throwing arrows -- take a little bit of time for some self-reflection," she said. "But also, why don't we just set that aside for a minute and focus on the fact that we have a crisis that we're trying to manage."
Vice President Dick Cheney will fill in for Bush at Thursday's fundraiser scheduled in Huntsville, Alabama. Another Alabama event, a tour of the Huntsville Waste-to-Energy Facility, has been canceled.
Find this article at: http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/09/18/bush.economy/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- President Bush on Thursday said he shared Americans' concerns about the economy and his administration is ready to act to prevent severe market disruptions.
The U.S. economy still faces "serious challenges," Bush said. "My administration is focused on meeting these challenges."
The president said the government had taken "extraordinary measures" to help stabilize the markets, including the takeover of insurance giant American International Group Inc. on Tuesday.
Bush said the AIG takeover was necessary to prevent "a severe disruption in our financial markets and threatened other sectors of the economy."
He also said the federal takeover of two mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were necessary to "help promote market stability and to ensure they can continue to play a role in helping our housing market recover."
The Federal Reserve on Wednesday night also took steps, in coordination with central banks around the world, to provide additional liquidity to U.S. markets, Bush said.
"These actions are necessary and important, and the markets are adjusting to them," Bush said.
Despite the government's takeover of AIG, the Dow Jones industrial average fell 449 points Wednesday in its second worst session of the year. The market has bounced back somewhat Thursday morning, with the Dow up more than 100 points.
Bush made his comments after meeting with economic advisers, including Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson. Bush said he would confer again with Paulson later Thursday.
The president canceled a fundraising trip to Alabama and Florida to meet with his advisers, the White House said.
The White House has defended the Federal Reserve's decision to bail out AIG. The Fed announced Tuesday it would provide an $85 billion emergency loan in exchange for a nearly 80 percent stake in the company, the most far-reaching intervention into the private sector ever for the Federal Reserve.
"While no one would have liked to have ended up in this situation, you have a government that is willing to lead," White House press secretary Dana Perino said.
Bush has not fielded questions about the economic upheaval this week and even canceled a statement Tuesday. Reporters have tried each day. When one tried to press Bush in the Oval Office on Wednesday, he said he could not hear the question, then made light of the moment by saying, "I'm old."
Congressional Democrats, along with key Republicans, voiced their displeasure with the recent bailout. Some Republicans said they were not aware of the White House's plans to rescue AIG.
"Once again the Fed has put the taxpayers on the hook for billions of dollars to bail out an institution that put greed ahead of responsibility and used their good name to take risky bets that did not pay off," said Sen. Jim Bunning, R-Kentucky, a member of the Senate Banking Committee.
Rep. Roy Blunt, R-Missouri, said House Republicans are struggling to "understand a coherent strategy" about which firms get rescued and which ones don't.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-California, placed the blame for the nation's economic woes squarely on the Bush administration, arguing it failed to regulate the financial industry aggressively.
"The most recent bailout initiated by the Bush administration -- that of AIG -- is just another example that George Bush is a failed manager," she said Wednesday. "Because of the inattention, or a decision on their part to have crony capitalism in our country, Americans across the country are feeling the pain of this."
Perino countered, saying lawmakers could have done more to head off the crisis.
"I think that Congress needs to take -- before they start throwing arrows -- take a little bit of time for some self-reflection," she said. "But also, why don't we just set that aside for a minute and focus on the fact that we have a crisis that we're trying to manage."
Vice President Dick Cheney will fill in for Bush at Thursday's fundraiser scheduled in Huntsville, Alabama. Another Alabama event, a tour of the Huntsville Waste-to-Energy Facility, has been canceled.
Find this article at: http://www.cnn.com/2008/US/09/18/bush.economy/index.html?iref=mpstoryview
He Can Drive?!?!
Gary Coleman Formally Charged With Reckless Driving, Disorderly Conduct
By Ken Lee
Gary Coleman was formally charged Wednesday with reckless driving and disorderly conduct following an altercation at a bowling alley in Utah. "Mr. Coleman was notified today of the charges through his attorney," said Lt. Bill Wright of the Payson, Utah, Police Department.
"(Coleman) never spoke to us about what happened, but we gathered evidence after speaking to witnesses and the other party involved." Both charges are misdemeanors. Coleman, 40, was backing out of a bowling alley around midnight on Sept. 6 when his truck hit Colt Rushton, 24, as well as another car. Rushton was taken to a local hospital and treated for minor injuries.Witnesses said Coleman became irritated after Rushton photographed him.
The two argued in the bowling alley and then moved outside, Lt. Wright said. Rushton's attorney, Dustin Lance, said in a statement: "This wasn't a situation of paparazzi or stalker-razzi, this was a fan snapping two photographs with a cell phone." Rushton has since filed a lawsuit against Coleman, seeking damages for medical bills, pain and suffering, and punitive damages. A rep for Coleman wasn't immediately available for comment.
By Ken Lee
Gary Coleman was formally charged Wednesday with reckless driving and disorderly conduct following an altercation at a bowling alley in Utah. "Mr. Coleman was notified today of the charges through his attorney," said Lt. Bill Wright of the Payson, Utah, Police Department.
"(Coleman) never spoke to us about what happened, but we gathered evidence after speaking to witnesses and the other party involved." Both charges are misdemeanors. Coleman, 40, was backing out of a bowling alley around midnight on Sept. 6 when his truck hit Colt Rushton, 24, as well as another car. Rushton was taken to a local hospital and treated for minor injuries.Witnesses said Coleman became irritated after Rushton photographed him.
The two argued in the bowling alley and then moved outside, Lt. Wright said. Rushton's attorney, Dustin Lance, said in a statement: "This wasn't a situation of paparazzi or stalker-razzi, this was a fan snapping two photographs with a cell phone." Rushton has since filed a lawsuit against Coleman, seeking damages for medical bills, pain and suffering, and punitive damages. A rep for Coleman wasn't immediately available for comment.
Be Very Afraid...
Election day could be a mess
Worries over registration surge, failure-prone equipment, new procedures
By Mary Pat Flaherty, The Washington Post
Faced with a surge in voter registrations leading up to Nov. 4, election officials across the country are bracing for long lines, equipment failures and confusion over polling procedures that could cost thousands the chance to cast a ballot.
The crush of voters will strain a system already in the midst of transformation, with jurisdictions introducing new machines and rules to avoid the catastrophe of the deadlocked 2000 election and the lingering controversy over the 2004 outcome. Even within the past few months, cities and counties have revamped their processes: Nine million voters, including many in the battleground states of Ohio, Florida and Colorado, will use equipment that has changed since March.
But the widespread changes meant to reassure the public have also increased the potential for trouble.
"You change systems and throw in lots of new voters, and you can plan to be up the proverbial creek," said Kimball Brace, president of Election Data Services, a consulting firm that has tracked the voting changes.
$3 billion overhaul
Since Congress passed the Help America Vote Act six years ago, $3 billion in federal funds has been spent to overhaul voting operations, much of it for new equipment. With touchscreen machines falling out of favor, an increasing number of the nation's voters -- just over half -- will use paper ballots, which will be read by optical scanners. That will produce a paper trail that can serve as a backup if questions arise over tallies.
For more than half of the states, this will be the first presidential election using statewide databases required by the 2002 law to improve the accuracy of voter rolls. When voters arrive at the polls, their information must match the list in order for them to receive a regular ballot. That could trigger contentious questions in places with particularly rigid rules on what constitutes a match.
Both campaigns have lined up teams of lawyers to challenge any irregularities, from registrations to polling place problems to vote counts.
And experts say the problems ahead will be formidable, even if they don't rise to the level of the Supreme Court challenge over the 2000 results.
"The voting process is going to be tested in a way it has not been in recent history," said Tova Wang, vice president for research at Common Cause, a government watchdog group.
Warning signsRecent local primaries have offered warning signs.
In the District last week, initial tallies were inflated by thousands of votes, causing chaos that night, and officials have yet to explain the problem.
In Palm Beach County, Fla., more than 3,500 ballots went missing in an August primary, forcing workers to hunt through bins and leaving a judicial election still undecided.
That same day, equipment problems in two other Florida jurisdictions delayed results for hours.
Premier Election Solutions, the company that makes many of the nation's voting machines, last month acknowledged that software used in 34 states, including Virginia and Maryland, could cause votes to be dropped. The company, formerly called Diebold, said it has no fix for the problem now, but election officials can catch the errors and recover the votes through a routine process of double-checking electronic memory cards.
Any weak spots in the process in November, whether poorly trained poll workers, a confusing ballot design or faulty equipment, will be further stressed by turnout, including many first-time voters.
During this year's presidential primaries, the number of voters hit an eight-year high in 36 states, according to Electionline.org, which monitors electoral reforms as part of the Pew Center on the States.
Maryland election officials said Tuesday that they expect 250,000 new voters to register by next month's deadline. More than 280,000 Virginians have registered to vote since the beginning of the year.
In the battleground state of Nevada, there are 400,000 more voters registered than four years ago. More than 500,000 have registered in Indiana since the beginning of the year, prompting Secretary of State Todd Rokita to say this could be "the biggest Election Day in our nation's history in terms of turnout."
2 million poll workers needed
Federal officials estimate that 2 million poll workers will be needed to handle the turnout, twice 2004's number and a goal states are scrambling to meet.
New York City had hoped to muster more than its usual 30,000 poll workers, particularly to help voters with disabilities, but extra funds were not available, said Marcus Cederqvist, executive director of the city's Board of Elections. "We will have waits -- I'd guess an hour or maybe two -- but we like to see high turnouts," he said. "It's what we are here for, and let's hope voters keep it in perspective. It won't be like waiting for an iPhone overnight."
Because elections are managed at the local level -- more than 10,000 jurisdictions run voting operations -- there is plenty of opportunity for foul-ups, which can resound nationally.
"Nobody wants to be that county," said Rosemary Rodriguez, chairwoman of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, created in 2002 to oversee and enforce nationwide election reform. But, she added, "the biggest fear I have is that elections officials don't heed what they saw in the primary and plan."
Long lines
After a spate of Election Day problems in Ohio in 2004, when some voters waited in line more than five hours, Franklin County, which includes Columbus, has added poll workers, increased the number of voting machines by 50 percent and commissioned a study on where the machines should go.
Other jurisdictions, including elsewhere in Ohio and several counties in Virginia, are requiring more training of poll workers, from greeters who will walk lines to make sure voters are at the right site to supervisors who must be able to set up and test voting machines.
In Worcester, Mass., local election officials are trying to prepare for the bigger turnout by locating some polling places in four supermarkets, which have plenty of parking and are accessible to disabled voters.
But David Moon, program director for FairVote, a voting advocacy group that is surveying local operations, said that "very few county officials" in swing states "are creating rational plans" to put machines where they are most needed. As a result, he said, frustrated voters stuck in long lines could give up and go home without casting ballots -- the same thing that happened four years ago in many states.
The process could be complicated by the statewide registration databases, which have been coming online one by one since 2004. For 31 states, Nov. 4 will be the first test of the systems with the bigger turnout of a presidential election.
States have taken a variety of positions on what should be considered a match when it comes to nicknames, hyphenated names and married names. If the information doesn't match, voters can cast provisional ballots, but whether those will count in final tallies depends on local rules, which vary widely.
"If you have small glitches multiplied by thousands of voters, that means big problems that cost eligible voters their voice," said Daniel P. Tokaji, an election law specialist at Ohio State University's Moritz College of Law. The problems could be more acute with hyphenated Hispanic names or transposed Asian surnames, he said, "leaving certain groups disproportionately affected."
Registration rules have prompted bitter complaints and lawsuits in Missouri, New Mexico and other states, and could lead to challenges after the votes are counted. Voting rights advocates have protested an Arizona requirement that residents show proof of citizenship to register, which has been upheld by a federal judge.
Advocates also worry that the back-and-forth of legislative debates and court rulings on voter identification in numerous states could further confound poll workers, disenfranchising some voters.
'Two lessons learned'As they approach November, some local officials say they have addressed problems that surfaced in this year's presidential primaries.
Touchscreen machines still will be in place in Horry County, S.C., which includes Myrtle Beach, but elections director Sandy Martin said she will avoid the programming error that forced the county to use backup paper ballots -- some votes were cast on yellow legal pads -- and delayed results for a day.
"Oh, my gosh, it was awful," Martin said.
In Contra Costa County, east of San Francisco, registrar Stephen Weir said he too learned from the primary. A fold in the absentee ballots forced him to spend nearly two weeks ironing, by hand, about 16,000 ballots to make them flat enough to feed into vote-counting machines.
"There were two lessons learned," he said. "Dump the fold. And the silk setting worked great."
© 2008 The Washington Post Company
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26767481/
Worries over registration surge, failure-prone equipment, new procedures
By Mary Pat Flaherty, The Washington Post
Faced with a surge in voter registrations leading up to Nov. 4, election officials across the country are bracing for long lines, equipment failures and confusion over polling procedures that could cost thousands the chance to cast a ballot.
The crush of voters will strain a system already in the midst of transformation, with jurisdictions introducing new machines and rules to avoid the catastrophe of the deadlocked 2000 election and the lingering controversy over the 2004 outcome. Even within the past few months, cities and counties have revamped their processes: Nine million voters, including many in the battleground states of Ohio, Florida and Colorado, will use equipment that has changed since March.
But the widespread changes meant to reassure the public have also increased the potential for trouble.
"You change systems and throw in lots of new voters, and you can plan to be up the proverbial creek," said Kimball Brace, president of Election Data Services, a consulting firm that has tracked the voting changes.
$3 billion overhaul
Since Congress passed the Help America Vote Act six years ago, $3 billion in federal funds has been spent to overhaul voting operations, much of it for new equipment. With touchscreen machines falling out of favor, an increasing number of the nation's voters -- just over half -- will use paper ballots, which will be read by optical scanners. That will produce a paper trail that can serve as a backup if questions arise over tallies.
For more than half of the states, this will be the first presidential election using statewide databases required by the 2002 law to improve the accuracy of voter rolls. When voters arrive at the polls, their information must match the list in order for them to receive a regular ballot. That could trigger contentious questions in places with particularly rigid rules on what constitutes a match.
Both campaigns have lined up teams of lawyers to challenge any irregularities, from registrations to polling place problems to vote counts.
And experts say the problems ahead will be formidable, even if they don't rise to the level of the Supreme Court challenge over the 2000 results.
"The voting process is going to be tested in a way it has not been in recent history," said Tova Wang, vice president for research at Common Cause, a government watchdog group.
Warning signsRecent local primaries have offered warning signs.
In the District last week, initial tallies were inflated by thousands of votes, causing chaos that night, and officials have yet to explain the problem.
In Palm Beach County, Fla., more than 3,500 ballots went missing in an August primary, forcing workers to hunt through bins and leaving a judicial election still undecided.
That same day, equipment problems in two other Florida jurisdictions delayed results for hours.
Premier Election Solutions, the company that makes many of the nation's voting machines, last month acknowledged that software used in 34 states, including Virginia and Maryland, could cause votes to be dropped. The company, formerly called Diebold, said it has no fix for the problem now, but election officials can catch the errors and recover the votes through a routine process of double-checking electronic memory cards.
Any weak spots in the process in November, whether poorly trained poll workers, a confusing ballot design or faulty equipment, will be further stressed by turnout, including many first-time voters.
During this year's presidential primaries, the number of voters hit an eight-year high in 36 states, according to Electionline.org, which monitors electoral reforms as part of the Pew Center on the States.
Maryland election officials said Tuesday that they expect 250,000 new voters to register by next month's deadline. More than 280,000 Virginians have registered to vote since the beginning of the year.
In the battleground state of Nevada, there are 400,000 more voters registered than four years ago. More than 500,000 have registered in Indiana since the beginning of the year, prompting Secretary of State Todd Rokita to say this could be "the biggest Election Day in our nation's history in terms of turnout."
2 million poll workers needed
Federal officials estimate that 2 million poll workers will be needed to handle the turnout, twice 2004's number and a goal states are scrambling to meet.
New York City had hoped to muster more than its usual 30,000 poll workers, particularly to help voters with disabilities, but extra funds were not available, said Marcus Cederqvist, executive director of the city's Board of Elections. "We will have waits -- I'd guess an hour or maybe two -- but we like to see high turnouts," he said. "It's what we are here for, and let's hope voters keep it in perspective. It won't be like waiting for an iPhone overnight."
Because elections are managed at the local level -- more than 10,000 jurisdictions run voting operations -- there is plenty of opportunity for foul-ups, which can resound nationally.
"Nobody wants to be that county," said Rosemary Rodriguez, chairwoman of the U.S. Election Assistance Commission, created in 2002 to oversee and enforce nationwide election reform. But, she added, "the biggest fear I have is that elections officials don't heed what they saw in the primary and plan."
Long lines
After a spate of Election Day problems in Ohio in 2004, when some voters waited in line more than five hours, Franklin County, which includes Columbus, has added poll workers, increased the number of voting machines by 50 percent and commissioned a study on where the machines should go.
Other jurisdictions, including elsewhere in Ohio and several counties in Virginia, are requiring more training of poll workers, from greeters who will walk lines to make sure voters are at the right site to supervisors who must be able to set up and test voting machines.
In Worcester, Mass., local election officials are trying to prepare for the bigger turnout by locating some polling places in four supermarkets, which have plenty of parking and are accessible to disabled voters.
But David Moon, program director for FairVote, a voting advocacy group that is surveying local operations, said that "very few county officials" in swing states "are creating rational plans" to put machines where they are most needed. As a result, he said, frustrated voters stuck in long lines could give up and go home without casting ballots -- the same thing that happened four years ago in many states.
The process could be complicated by the statewide registration databases, which have been coming online one by one since 2004. For 31 states, Nov. 4 will be the first test of the systems with the bigger turnout of a presidential election.
States have taken a variety of positions on what should be considered a match when it comes to nicknames, hyphenated names and married names. If the information doesn't match, voters can cast provisional ballots, but whether those will count in final tallies depends on local rules, which vary widely.
"If you have small glitches multiplied by thousands of voters, that means big problems that cost eligible voters their voice," said Daniel P. Tokaji, an election law specialist at Ohio State University's Moritz College of Law. The problems could be more acute with hyphenated Hispanic names or transposed Asian surnames, he said, "leaving certain groups disproportionately affected."
Registration rules have prompted bitter complaints and lawsuits in Missouri, New Mexico and other states, and could lead to challenges after the votes are counted. Voting rights advocates have protested an Arizona requirement that residents show proof of citizenship to register, which has been upheld by a federal judge.
Advocates also worry that the back-and-forth of legislative debates and court rulings on voter identification in numerous states could further confound poll workers, disenfranchising some voters.
'Two lessons learned'As they approach November, some local officials say they have addressed problems that surfaced in this year's presidential primaries.
Touchscreen machines still will be in place in Horry County, S.C., which includes Myrtle Beach, but elections director Sandy Martin said she will avoid the programming error that forced the county to use backup paper ballots -- some votes were cast on yellow legal pads -- and delayed results for a day.
"Oh, my gosh, it was awful," Martin said.
In Contra Costa County, east of San Francisco, registrar Stephen Weir said he too learned from the primary. A fold in the absentee ballots forced him to spend nearly two weeks ironing, by hand, about 16,000 ballots to make them flat enough to feed into vote-counting machines.
"There were two lessons learned," he said. "Dump the fold. And the silk setting worked great."
© 2008 The Washington Post Company
URL: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26767481/
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