DEZINFORMATSIA

Slamming Palin:

“Palin, who was thrust on to the national stage as John McCain’s running mate against President Obama, defended her decision [to resign] as a move to avoid becoming a lame duck. Love her or hate her, Sarah Palin’s able to — she was already lame — Sarah Palin’s able to electrify the conservative base of the party like no other Republican in the country.” –CNN’s Jack Cafferty

Feminists hate her:

“Caribou Barbie is one nutty puppy.” –New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd on Sarah Palin

What about Hillary?

“If Sarah Palin thinks that she’s had it tougher than anybody else, she’s been more harshly criticized, I have for two words for her: Hillary Clinton. Hillary Clinton was savaged for eight years.” –Atlanta Journal-Constitution political columnist Cynthia Tucker

From the sycophants:

“Henry Waxman is to Congress what Ted Williams was to baseball — a natural. … This is the voice of David, whose career has featured the slaying of one Goliath after another. … Waxman’s personal accomplishments are impressive.” –Washington Post associate editor Robert Kaiser

Just keep spending:

“Well, I think they’re hoping that this summer period is when they can in fact ramp up the [stimulus] spending. It’s not easy to spend the amount of money that they appropriated, $800 billion, that quickly.” –CNBC Chief Washington correspondent John Harwood

Speaking of out-of-control spending:

“[The July 4th tea party protesters are] exercising that First Amendment right to protest, but hopefully, they’ll clear out of the way for the fireworks tonight.” –CNN’s Brooke Baldwin on DC protesters on Independence Day

Three-ring circus:

“Michael Jackson is an accidental civil rights leader, an accidental pioneer. He broke ground and barriers in so many different realms in artistry, in pictures, in movies, in music, you name it. So, no, I don’t think it’s overkill.” –CNN’s Don Lemon on the non-stop Jackson media circus

GOP Bludgeons Dems With AIG Hypocrisy

It’s on.

From Jake Tapper, first we have the two sticks with which the beating will be administered.

White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel was recently quoted in the New York Times saying that as angry President Obama is about AIG, “his main priority is getting the financial system stabilized, and he believes this is a big distraction in that effort.”In today’s Washington Post, senior adviser David Axelrod is quoted saying, “People are not sitting around their kitchen tables thinking about AIG. They are thinking about their own jobs.” The Post described “the bonuses were a distraction from what senior aides called the main focus: getting the economy working and people back to work.”

The Republicans then strolled over to Louisiana Democrat Sen. Blanche Lincoln’s office, kicked in the door, and let her have it.

In an email, the National Republican Senatorial Committee tries to tie Sen. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., up for reelection in 2010, to Axelrod’s and Emanuel’s comments and claims that by supporting the stimulus bill Lincoln was voting to allow “AIG to distribute huge bonuses with taxpayer dollars.”“Does Senator Lincoln – who has railed against AIG’s handing out taxpayer-funded bonuses as ‘outrageous’ – agree with the Obama White House that the voters in Arkansas who have lost their jobs and their homes ‘are not sitting around their kitchen tables thinking about AIG?’” asked NRSC spokeswoman Amber Wilkerson. “After her constituents’ hard-earned dollars were used to pay for these lavish executive bonuses, how can Blanche Lincoln agree with the White House’s assessment that people do not care?”

And when you have all the Democrats voting for this particular crap sandwich, there is no escape. It is not partisan spin to say the stimulus explicitly allowed the AIG bonuses to be paid. It is not partisan spin to say the Democrats rammed the bill through. And it is not partisan spin to say Lincoln and her cohorts are directly responsible for this debacle.

This is a well-earned beating.

VA Senator Mark Warner Received $5,000 from AIG

According to Open Secrets, Virginia Democratic Senator Mark Warner received $5,000.00 in campaign contributions from AIG in the last election cycle, and is the only sitting member of Congress from Virginia to do so.

We contacted Senator Warner’s office yesterday to confirm whether the contribution had been received, and if so, whether he intends to return the money. Warner’s Communications Director, Kevin Hall, could not confirm or deny the contribution, but said he would look into the matter. Despite another message left for Mr. Hall today, the Senator’s office has not responded.

Senator Warner issued a press release and letter on Tuesday blasting AIG CEO Edward Liddy for having the temerity to pay $165 million in bonuses out of taxpayer bailout money.

SENATOR WARNER JOINS COLLEAGUES IN DEMANDING REPAYMENT OF AIG BONUSES~ Criticizes bonuses as “unconscionable” and “morally unacceptable” ~

Senator Mark R. Warner today joined his colleagues in demanding that AIG Chairman and CEO Edward Liddy renegotiate contracts that include $165 million in taxpayer-financed bonuses to employees who were in part responsible for the insurance giant’s near collapse.

The letter pledges additional action if AIG fails to act, including legislation that could impose severe tax penalties in order to recover the bonus money.

“It is simply unacceptable that these executives would expect American taxpayers to finance these retention bonuses after AIG accepted more than $170 billion in US government funding,” Senator Warner said.

“If AIG officials do not step up and do the right thing by finding a way to cancel these contracts, Congress will take swift action to make sure the taxpayers are not subsidizing these extravagant and unacceptable bonuses.”

As a member of the Senate Banking Committee, Senator Warner is continuing to work with his colleagues on legislation that will impose rational regulations and restore accountability to Wall Street practices.

In light of the fact that the stimulus bill, which Senator Warner voted for, explicitly permitted the bonuses, it seems that Liddy was simply following the law. The outrage expressed by those on Capitol Hill is starting to look an awful lot like a deflection from their own misguided vote on a bill the Democrats unanimously supported.

If, as Senator Warner says, “the very employees responsible for running the company into the ground,” are the same employees who gave him $5,000.00 in campaign donations, wouldn’t the right thing to do be to return the money to the taxpayers? If not, it sure makes his criticism of AIG ring a little hollow, when their donations helped get him elected to the office he now holds.

via: Patriotroom

Hmmm, Roland Burris may have not have been exactly forthcoming regarding his contact w/former Governor, Rod Blagojevich

“In more good news for the Democratic Party, it turns out that Sen. Roland Burris (D-Il) may have not been exactly forthcoming in answering questions about his dealings with former Illinois Governor (but still a Democrat) Rod Blagojevich before he was appointed to fill the vacancy created by the election of Barack Obama. According to Politico.com,

‘In an affidavit made public on Saturday, [that would be this past Saturday, about a month after he was sworn in as a U.S. Senator] Burris for the first time said that he had been solicited for campaign contributions by the brother of Gov. Rod Blagojevich, who named him to the seat.’ So, now, Burris is ‘facing a possible perjury investigation in his home state; and his [U.S.] Senate colleagues may face new pressure to launch an Ethics Committee probe to determine whether he should be expelled from the body.’ Perhaps a reporter following the President on his Obama Stimulatic Victory Tour will ask him about Sen. Burris, a fellow Democrat, from Illinois, who is now sitting in his Senate seat, neglecting to tell the whole truth and nothing but…” –political analyst Rich Galen

The Dems heavy load . . .

Demos’ money cart is heavy

 

“If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one….” –James Madison

U.S. Taxpayers Risk $9.7 Trillion on Bailouts as Senate Votes.

Feb. 9 (Bloomberg) — The stimulus package the U.S. Congress is completing would raise the government’s commitment to solving the financial crisis to $9.7 trillion, enough to pay off more than 90 percent of the nation’s home mortgages.

The Federal Reserve, Treasury Department and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation have lent or spent almost $3 trillion over the past two years and pledged to provide up to $5.7 trillion more if needed. The total already tapped has decreased about 1 percent since November, mostly because foreign central banks are using fewer dollars in currency-exchange agreements called swaps. The Senate is to vote early this week on a stimulus package totaling at least $780 billion that President Barack Obama says is needed to avert a deeper recession. That measure would need to be reconciled with an $819 billion plan the House approved last month.

Only the stimulus package to be approved this week, the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program passed four months ago and $168 billion in tax cuts and rebates approved in 2008 have been voted on by lawmakers. The remaining $8 trillion in commitments are lending programs and guarantees, almost all under the authority of the Fed and the FDIC. The recipients’ names have not been disclosed.

“We’ve seen money go out the back door of this government unlike any time in the history of our country,” Senator Byron Dorgan, a North Dakota Democrat, said on the Senate floor Feb. 3. “Nobody knows what went out of the Federal Reserve Board, to whom and for what purpose. How much from the FDIC? How much from TARP? When? Why?”

Financial Rescue

The pledges, amounting to almost two-thirds of the value of everything produced in the U.S. last year, are intended to rescue the financial system after the credit markets seized up about 18 months ago. The promises are composed of about $1 trillion in stimulus packages, around $3 trillion in lending and spending and $5.7 trillion in agreements to provide aid.

Federal Reserve lending to banks peaked at a record $2.3 trillion in December, dropping to $1.83 trillion by last week. The Fed balance sheet is still more than double the $880 billion it was in the week before Sept. 17 when it agreed to accept lower-quality collateral.

The worst financial crisis in two generations has erased $14.5 trillion, or 33 percent, of the value of the world’s companies since Sept. 15; brought down Bear Stearns Cos. and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc.; and led to the takeover of Merrill Lynch & Co. by Bank of America Corp.

The $9.7 trillion in pledges would be enough to send a $1,430 check to every man, woman and child alive in the world. It’s 13 times what the U.S. has spent so far on wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, according to Congressional Budget Office data, and is almost enough to pay off every home mortgage loan in the U.S., calculated at $10.5 trillion by the Federal Reserve.

‘All the Stops’

“The Fed, Treasury and FDIC are pulling out all the stops to stop any widespread systemic damage to the economy,” said Dana Johnson, chief economist for Comerica Inc. in Dallas and a former senior economist at the central bank. “The federal government is on the hook for an awful lot of money but I think it’s needed to help the financial system recover.”

Bloomberg News tabulated data from the Fed, Treasury and FDIC and interviewed regulators, economists and academic researchers to gauge the full extent of the government’s rescue effort.

Commitments may expand again soon. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner postponed an announcement scheduled for today that was to focus on new guarantees for illiquid assets to insure against losses without taking them off banks’ balance sheets. The Treasury said it would delay the announcement until after the Senate votes on the stimulus package.

Program Delay

The government is already backing $301 billion of Citigroup Inc. securities and another $118 billion from Bank of America. The government hasn’t yet paid out on any of the guarantees.

The Fed said Friday that it is delaying the start a $200 billion program called the Term Asset-Backed Securities Loan Facility, or TALF, to revive the market for securities based on consumer loans such as credit-card, auto and student borrowings.

Most of the spending programs are run out of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York, where Geithner served as president. He was sworn in as Treasury secretary on Jan. 26.

When Congress approved the TARP on Oct. 3, Fed Chairman Ben S. Bernanke and then Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson acknowledged the need for transparency and oversight. The Federal Reserve so far is refusing to disclose loan recipients or reveal the collateral they are taking in return. Collateral is an asset pledged by a borrower in the event a loan payment isn’t made.

Fed Sued

Bloomberg requested details of Fed lending under the Freedom of Information Act and filed a federal lawsuit against the central bank Nov. 7 seeking to force disclosure of borrower banks and their collateral. Arguments in the suit may be heard as soon as this month, according to the court docket. Bloomberg asked the Treasury in an FOIA request Jan. 28 for a detailed list of the securities it planned to guarantee for Citigroup and Bank of America. Bloomberg hasn’t received a response to the request.

The Bloomberg lawsuit is Bloomberg LP v. Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System, 08-CV-9595, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

Found on The Patriot Resistance