Pelosi: BushCo Barred Officials From Briefing Congress Pre-'08 Financial Crisis

By GottaLaff

So far, when it comes to legal repercussions for their thuggery, BushCo has skated. Worms like John Yoo, Dick Cheney, Donald Rumsfeld, and Bush himself are free to write books and spew their toxic venom all over the Tee Vee Machine while America (and what's left of its Constitution) has suffered immensely.

There have been no consequences for holding and torturing hostages at Gitmo and elsewhere, for spying on Americans, for outing a CIA agent, etc., ad nauseam.

Will there be any for this?

Nearly two years after the Wall Street meltdown drove the U.S. economy to the brink of collapse, and forced the U.S. government to prop up major financial institutions with hundreds of billions of dollars, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi now claims that the Bush Administration prohibited its own top officials who were handling the emerging crisis from briefing Congress until a complete financial collapse was only hours away.

In little-noticed statements to reporters over the last few weeks, Pelosi has alleged that the Bush administration knew well in advance of its intervention that the financial crisis would hit, and that Congress would need to authorize a historic and unpopular bailout - but that top officials, including then-Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, told her that they had been barred from briefing Congress about true extent of the crisis.

If accurate, the allegation could constitute a major indictment of the Bush administration, which may have worsened the crisis and resulting economic fallout by delaying the call for congressional action.

IMHO, with the economy still slogging through a sluggish recovery, the national state of mind could very well default to blame mode and demand a full investigation. One can only hope. And of course, that's only if this story gets media attention.

Will BushCo be excused because it's difficult to prove intent, or because there is no appetite to go after them?

Nor is it clear if the Administration's alleged decision not to brief Congress earlier was a calculated strategy to avoid spooking the already shaky financial markets thus hastening the crisis or, as Pelosi suggests, a political calculation in advance of the 2008 presidential elections, or a combination of the two.

There's much more here. TPM did a great job reporting this.

UPDATE: Bush and Paulson spokesperson fire back.

H/t: hapkidogal

The inexperienced socialist Marxist president who could

By GottaLaff

Go ahead, Rushpublics, call him a radical Marxist commie socialist. But while you're zinging him with labels, you might want to add "successful":

By the end of this year, Obama "will have soundly achieved many of his chief campaign promises while running a highly competent, scandal-free government. Not bad for a guy whose opponents (in both parties) for the White House suggested he was too green in national life to know how to do the job -- and whose presidency began in the midst of a worldwide economic crisis that demanded urgent attention and commanded much of his focus."

Wait, what? "Scandal free"? A far cry from these pages and pages of Bush crime family escapades.

Gallup- Bush Still Gets More Blame for Economy Than Obama

I'm happy with these numbers, no gripes.

PRINCETON, NJ -- More than a year into Barack Obama's presidency, Americans are more likely to say George W. Bush is responsible for today's economic problems than they are to say Obama is responsible. Gallup shows a significant uptick since last July in the percentage of Americans blaming Obama at least a moderate amount (from 32% to 50%), but little decrease (from 80% to 75%) in the percentage blaming Bush.

Proportionally, the gap in perceived culpability for current economic problems is even wider when one looks at the percentage blaming each president "a great deal" -- 26% for Obama and 42% for Bush.

(snip)

Obama's current job approval rating -- recently bobbing just below 50%, and low by historical standards -- may partly reflect Americans' general economic discontent. Indeed, against the backdrop of broadly low economic confidence, Obama's approval rating on the economy is now 37%, with 61% disapproving. The "blame" data suggest that these job ratings could be even lower were Obama more widely perceived as directly responsible for the economy's problems.

Gallup's Presidential Job Approval Center shows that, of the presidents in office during economic recessions, Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, and Ronald Reagan all received lower overall job approval ratings at the official "troughs" of their recessions than Obama has yet received as president. Ford's approval rating was 37% in March 1975; Carter's was 33% in July 1980; and Reagan's was 43% in November 1992.

Deficit THIS

By GottaLaff

See how liberally biased Reuters is? At least that's what we should soon be hearing from those pesky Rushpublics once they get an eyeful of this:


No matter how they try to deny it, this is what the Obama administration got stuck with. And digging ourselves out of this won't happen overnight.

Clear? Clear.

H/t: Memaloose

VIDEO- Pelosi: "The Democrats will retain the majority in the House of Representatives"

By GottaLaff

Via CNN:



"I'm not yielding one grain of sand. We're fighting for every seat. [...] We inherited this terrible mess."

Damn right we did. And now, most likely as BushCo planned and hoped, we're paying the consequences for their government malpractice.

Axelrod blasts Rove

By GottaLaff

David Axelrod blasted Karl Rove, who bellowed that Democrats in Congress "will run up more debt by October than Bush did in eight years."

Them's fightin' words:

"During eight years in office, the Bush administration passed two major tax cuts skewed to the wealthiest Americans, enacted a costly Medicare prescription-drug benefit and waged two wars, without paying for any of it.... To put the breathtaking scope of this irresponsibility in perspective, the Bush administration's swing from surpluses to deficits added more debt in its eight years than all the previous administrations in the history of our republic combined. And its spending spree is the unwelcome gift that keeps on giving: Going forward, these unpaid-for policies will continue to add trillions to our deficit."

"There's an old saying that everyone is entitled to his own opinions, but not his own facts. The next time Karl Rove would like to offer us some advice, I'd urge him to take that to heart."

Short version: Hey KKKarl, you guys f'ed up in an unprecedented way, you're a colossal liar, so shut your pig snouty pie hole.

Video- Homeless Camps In Tennesee

Oy.

New jobless claims drop unexpectedly to 545K

Slow but still going down.

WASHINGTON – The number of newly laid-off workers seeking unemployment benefits fell last week to the lowest level since early July, evidence that job cuts are slowing.

The Labor Department said Thursday that initial claims for unemployment insurance dropped to a seasonally adjusted 545,000 from an upwardly revised 557,000 the previous week. Wall Street economists expected claims to rise by 5,000, according to Thomson Reuters.

The decline was the third in the past four weeks. The four-week average, which smooths out fluctuations, dropped 8,750 to 563,000. Despite the improvement, that's far above the 325,000 per week that is typical in a healthy economy.

"The message here is that the labor market's healing process is agonizingly slow," Joshua Shapiro, chief economist at MFR Inc., wrote in a note to clients.

Look who's behind ad blaming Obama/Dems for economy

By GottaLaff

Check out the group (at the end of this post) that is behind the ad that's getting complaints from readers:

A newspaper advertisement blaming President Barack Obama and Democrats for wrecking the economy is receiving complaints from some area readers and raising questions about the organization behind it.

"Barack Obama and the Democrats did not inherit the bad economy; they caused it and made it worse," read the full-page ad, which ran Monday in The Gainesville Sun and last week in the Ocala Star-Banner. The ad also has run in other newspapers nationwide, including the Fort Worth Star-Telegram and Salt Lake Tribune.

The ad, a membership plea from the U.S. Citizens Association, alleges that high-profile Democrats caused the subprime mortgage crisis and consequently the recession. It also makes a variety of claims about health care reform, global warming legislation and other liberal policies.

Steven Thames, 31, of Gainesville, said he and three of his family members are canceling their Sun subscriptions as a result of the ad. He questioned both the ad's similar appearance to a news story and the claims it made.

"It's just filled with blatant lies," he said. [...]

The Akron, Ohio-based group behind the ad formed earlier this year under the name the Better Government Association. It changed its name when an 86-year-old Chicago organization with the same name sued.

Calls to the 800 number listed on the ad were received at a call center of InfoCision, an Akron-based telemarketing company. Employees of the center said they did not have a phone number for the U.S. Citizens Association but provided a list of company officials and board members.

The list included Executive Director Lance Davis, a former InfoCision marketing director; Benjamin Suarez, founder of a direct marketing company; and Herschel Gammill and Wayne Maddy, pastors of Ohio churches. A story on the Huffington Post Web site said Ed Rollins, a longtime Republican political consultant who chaired Mike Huckabee's 2008 presidential campaign, also was affiliated with the group.

Some information you might think is worth a look-see:

Benjamin D. Suarez

• Self-made multimillionaire direct mail king (Suarez Corporation Industries (SCI) with a reputation for scorched earth tactics against those who cross him. Extremely litigious. Pursued a case to US Supreme Court and lost. See Newsweek piece.
• Author of 700 page "7 Steps to Financial Freedom: How to Escape the American Rat Race," among others
• This appears on AOL message board on a Suarez memo to employees on Obama, health care reform...

Lance Davis, InfoCision

• Political Division of InfoCision (as of 2007 was Director of Marketing, Political Division) - Telemarketing, fundraising, get out the vote, etc., for conservative groups, causes, candidates and churches

  The Political Division is driven by the current issues and events that shape America’s ideological landscape. The division serves as a full-service political marketing firm for the nation’s most influential political figures and interest groups. We have worked with many of the beltway’s leading conservative organizations, providing the highest quality teleservices for fundraising and grassroots efforts....

• They also have a "Christian Division" "...– experience that includes managing prayer requests and even praying with callers."
• In this 2/15/2007 article in the Non-Profit Times, Davis describes his aggressive scripting tactics
• Lance Davis and InfoCision are credited in the 'Special Thanks' section for several films made by Citizens United with publicity byShirley & Banister Public Affairs - for example the Gingrich film pushing 'Drill Here, Drill Now'
  
• Note the raw credits include Shirley & Banister
  

Who is Shirely & Banister?

• Shirley & Banister - Public Affairs Among others, did PR for John Kerry Swift Boat film and Willie Horton Ad
• As per Rachel Madow, represented Grassfire.org
• Sourcewatch
  

Big h/t: Rachelle Renfrew for her wonderful research

U.S. July existing home sale pace fastest in 2 years

Man, a little more good news would sorely be appreciated today.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Sales of previously owned U.S. homes in July notched their fastest pace in nearly two years, an industry survey showed on Friday, the strongest sign yet that housing was pulling out of a three-year slump.

The National Association of Realtors said that sales jumped 7.2 percent to an annual rate of 5.24 million units, the highest since August 2007, beating market expectations for a 5 million unit pace. Sales were at a 4.89 million pace in June.

July's percentage increase was the largest monthly gain since the series started in 1999 and marked the fourth straight monthly advance. The last time sales rose for four consecutive months was in June 2004, the NAR said.

Video- Senator DeMint: Even If Cash For Clunkers Helps The Economy, 'It's Still A Horrible Policy'

It's pretty obvious that they don't listen to what they say. Vid via Think Progress.

Spike in Suicide Calls Related to Economy

Amazing how insidious the crisis is.

(AP) Economic woes are weighing heavily on some Americans - so much so that the federal government is boosting financial support for suicide prevention centers around the nation.

Richard McKeon, the lead health adviser for suicide prevention at the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, says calls to suicide crisis centers have increased sharply in the past year - with more than 57,000 calls in July alone. He said about a quarter of the calls were linked to economic distress.

(snip)

"We know that every single day, there are people calling who are in the midst of a suicide attempt," McKeon said in an interview late Tuesday. "Any delay in getting that call answered could be tragic."

VIDEO-- DNC ad: "They Broke It" targets GOP leadership

By GottaLaff



How about first they even admit that they broke it?

"Pushing back against Republican charges that President Obama's stimulus package has been ineffective, the DNC is launching a three-pronged attack this week focused on projects being funded in the states and districts of the GOP's congressional leadership," Politico reports.

Of particular interest is a hard-hitting new TV ad aimed at three GOP House leaders and two Senate Republican leaders.

Key line: "They broke it, now they refuse to fix it."

1.5 million homes in foreclosure in '09

Very scary numbers.

NEW YORK -- The foreclosure plague is not going away -- it's only getting worse.

A record 1.53 million properties were in the foreclosure process -- default notices, auction sale notices and bank repossessions -- during the first six months of 2009. That was 9% more than the previous six months and 15% more than the same period of 2008, according to a report released Thursday by RealtyTrac.

There were a total of 1.91 million filings resulting in 1 out of every 84 U.S. properties receiving at least filing in the first half of the year. Banks repossessed 386,800 properties.

(snip)

And, in a bad sign for a housing recovery, there was no recorded improvement in June, the last month of the cycle. More than 336,000 homes reported foreclosure filings, the fourth straight 300,000-plus month. Filings were up 33% over last June and nearly 5% compared with May.

Bonus Quote-O'-The Day: Obama Smacks 'Em Down edition

By GottaLaff

A Bonus Quote-O'-The-Day!

I love those folks who helped get us in this mess, and suddenly they say, "This is Obama's economy." That's fine. Give it to me.

GObama!

Washington, D.C. Thrives During Recession

At least someone/somewhere is doing well.

New Geography: "No matter how far the economy falters, there is always a winner. And no city does better when the nation is at the brink of disaster than Washington, DC. Since December 2007, when the current recession formally began, the nation has lost approximately 6 million jobs. Only two states, Alaska and North Dakota, have lost a smaller percentage of jobs than Washington, DC, which has seen a job loss of 0.6%, or 4,400. Simply put, Washington has done better in this recession than 48 of the fifty states when it comes to job performance."

Cartoon of the Day

Click to enlarge, via.

Video- Elkhart, Indiana: From battlefield to unemployment line

Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy

Pretty freaking rough when your only choice just might be going back to war to make money. I know one of those guys, and my heart just breaks. MSNBC has done a whole series of stories about Elkhart and how hard the shitty economy has hit them. Well worth a read when you have a minute.

U.S. unemployment hits 9.5 percent

With the people who've given up, it's what? 13-14%? Added- Nope, 16.5 in June.

WASHINGTON, July 2 (UPI) -- The U.S. Labor Department said unemployment climbed to 9.5 percent in June, an increase that was not as severe as economists predicted.

The country lost 467,000 non-farm jobs in the month, the department said Thursday. Economists had predicted joblessness would edge higher to 9.6 percent from its previous mark of 9.4 percent.

The healthcare sector provided the only positive news with 21,000 jobs added in the month, in line with its average monthly gain for 2009. Last year, healthcare averaged 30,000 additional jobs a month.

Video- Karl Rove says Bush admin had "no" responsibility for the deficit

Via Think Progess.