Global Articles on what is going on...posted daily

[sandi66]

Efforts to Extend Bush-Era Tax Cuts Falter as Talks Are Delayed

By Ryan J. Donmoyer and Richard Rubin


Nov. 17 (Bloomberg) -- A deal to extend soon-to-expire Bush-era tax cuts won’t be completed until December, and some Democrats in Congress said an accord may not be reached this year.

President Barack Obama and congressional leaders postponed until Nov. 30 a White House meeting, previously scheduled for tomorrow, to negotiate whether to extend lower tax rates for all taxpayers or just those with incomes of $250,000 or less. Separately, Democrats, who control the Senate, said they haven’t agreed on a plan.

“I don’t even know what the options are at this moment,” Senator Maria Cantwell, a Democrat from Washington state who serves on the tax-writing Finance Committee, said yesterday.

The delay sets the stage for year-end brinksmanship that would result in higher taxes for all Americans next year if Congress fails to pass legislation that Obama agrees to sign. The tax cuts enacted in 2001 and 2003 are scheduled to expire Dec. 31.

Unless Congress acts, marginal income tax rates will rise across the board, tax credits that benefit families will be slashed, and rates on capital gains and dividends will increase. In addition, a federal tax on estates worth more than $1 million will be resurrected after expiring for 2010.

Clint Stretch, managing principal at the consulting firm Deloitte Tax LLP in Washington, said expiration of all of the Bush tax cuts would add $2,600 annually to the tax burden of a median-income family earning about $70,000 a year.

Extending the tax cuts permanently would cost the government $5 trillion in foregone revenues and interest on the debt over the next decade, the Congressional Research Service reported last month.

Tax Cut Caps
Obama is at loggerheads with congressional Republicans over whether to cap the tax cuts for individuals with annual incomes of more than $200,000 and couples who make more than $250,000 a year. He has said he’s willing to negotiate on his position; Republicans say they won’t budge on theirs.

The White House yesterday rescheduled until Nov. 30 a meeting with Democratic and Republican congressional leaders, press secretary Robert Gibbs said in a statement.

Obama had invited the leaders to meet Nov. 18 and had said he expected to focus on the economic matters being considered in the lame-duck session, particularly the tax cuts. The Republican leaders in the House and the Senate, John Boehner of Ohio and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, requested the change in date because of scheduling conflicts while they organize for the congressional session that starts in January, the White House statement said.

The delay gives both parties an opportunity to come up with alternative approaches.

‘A Kajillion Ideas’
“There are a kajillion ideas floating around,” said Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, a Montana Democrat.

One, by Senator Mark Warner, a Virginia Democrat, would steer tax cuts that would have flowed to high-income individuals to businesses in the hopes of stimulating investment and hiring.

Another, by Senator Charles Schumer, a New York Democrat, would sustain the Bush tax cuts for all households earning less than $1 million, rather than $250,000.

Representative Dave Camp, a Michigan Republican, told a meeting of business tax lobbyists that members of his party would oppose a third alternative that would extend tax breaks for middle-income households for a longer period than for richer Americans.

‘A Terrible Idea’
Such a proposal, advanced by some Democrats, “is a terrible idea and a total non-starter,” Camp told the Tax Council. If it happens, “I think this issue will end up getting kicked into next year” when Republicans would seek to renew the tax cuts retroactively, said Camp, who is in line to become chairman of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee in the next Congress.

Michigan Democrat Sander Levin, the current Ways and Means chairman, said initial discussions center on Senate action to pass a tax bill before the House acts. Because of the potential for a Republican filibuster, the vote-counting path to Senate passage is more difficult for Democrats in that chamber than in the House.

Overcoming a filibuster requires 60 votes; Democrats currently control 59 seats, and at least four Democrats support some version of the Republican position. After Thanksgiving, Republicans will gain one seat when Senator-elect Mark Kirk of Illinois is sworn in to replace appointed Democratic Senator Roland Burris.

Democrats’ Support
Conversely, the 41 Senate Republicans would need 19 Democrats to vote with them to win the 60 votes necessary to waive budget rules and extend Bush-era policies that benefit only high-income taxpayers. These include retention of reduced top marginal rates and a 15 percent rate on capital gains and dividends for upper-income taxpayers.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a Nevada Democrat, told reporters yesterday that he is willing to “take a look at” a temporary extension of all the Bush-era tax cuts, even though he opposes extending tax policies targeted to benefit high-income taxpayers.

Whether he can go along with it depends on the rest of the Senate Democrats. “I’m waiting to see how my caucus comes down on this, but it’s clear that the vast majority of my caucus believes that we should protect the middle class,” he said.

Democratic senators including Mary Landrieu of Louisiana and Debbie Stabenow of Michigan yesterday said they oppose financing tax cuts for high-income taxpayers with deficits. Vermont Senator Bernard Sanders, an independent who votes with Democrats, also criticized the idea.

“The people of America want us to get our financial house in order and it starts by stop borrowing money,” Landrieu said. She said people shouldn’t “clamor for borrowing money that we don’t have to give out tax cuts.”


To contact the reporters on this story: Ryan J. Donmoyer in Washington at [e-mail]; Richard Rubin in Washington at [e-mail]
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Mark Silva in Washington at [e-mail]

Last Updated: November 17, 2010 00:00 EST

noir.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=newsarchive&sid=ahYC72JxLoKY

[sandi66]

CORRECTED - BofA's seizure of $500 mln Lehman deposits unauthorized
Wed Nov 17, 2010 11:06am EST

(Corrects first paragraph to show that deposits were seized after, rather than before, Lehman bankruptcy filing)

Nov 17 (Reuters) - Bank of America Corp (BAC.N) was ordered by a U.S. judge to return $500 million of deposits it seized from Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc (LEHMQ.PK) shortly after Lehman's record bankruptcy in September 2008.

According to court papers, Lehman had deposited the money in August 2008 as collateral so Bank of America could continue to honour Lehman's checks at times when no funds were on deposit, effectively extending an unsecured line of credit to Lehman pending the clearance of deposits.

In November 2008, after Lehman went bankrupt, Bank of America seized the money as a set-off against claims it held against Lehman on an unrelated derivative transaction, and then sued to validate the seizure.

"It is difficult to understand how BofA could have thought that taking the money was the right thing to do without first seeking permission from the court," Judge James Peck said.

"The court believes that the actions taken were surprising and, quite frankly, disappointing for a leading financial institution that should care a great deal about its reputation," he said.

A Bank of America spokesman did not immediately return a call seeking comment.

Lehman filed for Chapter 11 two years ago, in the largest-ever U.S. bankruptcy.

British bank Barclays Plc (BARC.L) bought Lehman's main U.S. brokerage business after the bankruptcy filing, and Lehman's other assets are being managed and unwound while operating under bankruptcy protection.

The case is Bank of America NA v. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc et al, U.S. Bankruptcy Court, Southern District of New York, No. 08-01753. The main bankruptcy case is In re: Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc in the same court, 08-13555. (Reporting by Santosh Nadgir in Bangalore; Editing by Don Sebastian, Dave Zimmerman)



ty nalmann

[sandi66]

Remarks by FDIC Chairman Bair: The Financial Crisis and Regulatory Reform to the AICPA – SIFMA National Conference

by Moe Bedard on

November 17, 2010

On the Securities Industry; New York, NY

NEW YORK (LoanSafe.org) – I am pleased to join you at the outset of this conference. I have served as FDIC Chair for almost four and a half years now. The financial crisis and regulatory reforms that followed have really come to define my term in office.

When I joined the FDIC in the summer of 2006, U.S. housing markets were just beginning to weaken, and the problems in subprime and nontraditional mortgage lending were only just starting to come into focus. The FDIC was early in sounding the alarm. But not even we foresaw the huge disruptions that were to take place in securities markets and overnight money markets, as well as the impact the resulting crisis would have on financial institutions.
As the crisis accelerated in late 2007 and peaked in the fall of 2008, the FDIC and other regulators focused first and foremost on taking measures that would restore stability to our financial system. We knew in the fall of 2008 that the crisis on Wall Street would take a terrible toll on the U.S. economy. In the six months following the bankruptcy of Lehman Brothers, the U.S. economy shed more than 4.2 million jobs, while domestic steel production fell by half. As we meet today, nearly 15 million Americans remain officially out of work, while discouraged workers and the under-employed number millions more.

Financial instability has imposed an unacceptable cost on the U.S. economy that will be felt for years to come. Now, as a tentative economic recovery continues to build, and as the earnings of banks and other financial companies begin to recover, we must resist the natural impulse to return to business as usual.

Instead, now is the time to carry through with our work to strengthen financial market practices and products and sharpen our approach to financial regulation.

Dodd-Frank Implementation

The financial crisis has exposed critical flaws in how our financial system operated and was regulated. Fortunately, the reforms authorized under the Dodd-Frank Act include far-reaching changes to restore market discipline, internalize the costs of risk-taking, protect consumers, and make our regulatory process more attuned to systemic risks.

The most fundamental reform is the new resolution authority for large bank holding companies and systemically important non-bank financial companies. This new authority directly addresses the dilemma we faced in the fall of 2008, when a number of these companies ran into serious trouble. We all saw the result of the Lehman bankruptcy, which threw global financial markets into chaos.

In contrast, the FDIC regularly carries out a prompt and orderly resolution process using its receivership authority for insured banks and thrifts. The Dodd-Frank Act for the first time gives the FDIC a similar set of receivership powers to close and liquidate systemically-important financial firms that are failing.

The FDIC recently issued a proposed rule clarifying how we would handle the claims process under this new authority. The law gives us discretion to pay certain creditors more than others when necessary to maintain essential operations or to maximize recoveries. But our proposed rule makes clear that shareholders and holders of subordinated and senior unsecured debt will never qualify to receive additional payments above the liquidation value of assets under the statutory priority of claims.

It also affirms that secured creditors will only be protected to the extent of the fair value of their collateral, with any unsecured portion remaining subject to loss. By ensuring that all creditors know they are at risk of loss in a failure, this proposed rule is a solid first step in implementing the resolution authority under Dodd-Frank and ending Too Big To Fail.

Another key step is to develop requirements for the resolution plans that all systemically-important financial companies now have to establish. These resolution plans are essentially blueprints for the orderly unwinding of these companies if they should run into serious problems.

Under Dodd-Frank, the FDIC and the Federal Reserve wield considerable authority to shape the content of these plans. If the plans are not found to be credible, the FDIC and the Fed can even compel the divestiture of activities that would unduly interfere with the orderly liquidation of these companies. The success or failure of the new regulatory regime will hinge in large part on how credible these resolution plans are as guides to resolving these companies.

And let us be clear: we will require these institutions to make substantial changes to their structure and activities if necessary to ensure orderly resolution. If we fail to follow through, and don’t ensure that these institutions can be unwound in an orderly fashion during a crisis, we will have fallen short of our goal of ending Too Big To Fail.

A Top Priority: Resolution Authority

I cannot overstate the significance of making sure this resolution authority is properly implemented.

In a world of Too Big To Fail, risk taking is subsidized by the taxpayer. Systemically-important companies take on too much risk because the gains are private while the losses are socialized. Market discipline fails to rein in the excesses at these institutions because equity and debt holders – who should be at risk if things go wrong – enjoy an implicit government backstop. This skewing of financial incentives inevitably leads to a misallocation of capital and credit flows that keeps our economy from performing up to its potential.

And proscriptive regulation will only take you so far in fixing the problem. After all, banking was already among the most heavily regulated of all economic sectors before the crisis. It was the incentives in place under Too Big To Fail that helped push risk out into the so-called shadow banking system, where regulation was the lightest. That’s where you saw most of the subprime and nontraditional mortgage lending, as well as holdings of mortgage-related derivative instruments.

So implementing the new resolution authority and ending Too Big To Fail is a game changer. Market discipline will be restored. Financial incentives will be better aligned. Capital and credit will be allocated more efficiently. And taxpayers will no longer be on the hook when financial companies get it wrong.

Basel Capital Requirements

We also need to strengthen bank capital requirements. As many of you know, the G-20 earlier this month endorsed a Basel Committee compromise on stronger standards for the quality and quantity of bank capital around the world. The standards are not as high as many of us would have liked. But there should be no doubt that they are a major improvement over current requirements. I also know that there are concerns that higher capital requirements will reduce the balance-sheet capacity of the banking industry, and choke off the availability of credit.

While it will not be cost-free to move to a stronger capital regime, I do not agree that the new requirements will reduce the availability of credit or significantly raise borrowing costs. Studies by economists at Harvard, the University of Chicago, and the Bank for International Settlements argue persuasively that the impact on the cost of credit will be modest, and that these costs will be far outweighed by the benefits of a more stable financial system.

Fair Value Accounting

Another ongoing regulatory process is FASB’s proposal to substantially revise the accounting standards for financial instruments. Under the proposed rule, banks would be required to measure substantially all of their financial instruments at fair value on the balance sheet.

While we understand that the objective of the rule is to make financial statements more transparent, we believe that its effect could be to undermine financial stability by making bank performance more procyclical. In short, we do not believe that a bank – whose business strategy is to hold loans and deposit liabilities for the long term – should be required to measure them at fair value on the balance sheet. Why? Because fair value does not necessarily reflect the manner in which the cash flows associated with these instruments will be realized or expended.

In September, the five federal bank regulatory agencies submitted a joint comment letter to FASB outlining our opposition to fair-value measurement. Instead, we support the continued use of amortized cost – subject to a robust asset impairment model – for financial instruments when the bank’s business strategy is to hold them for the collection or payment of regular cash flows. We do agree that some instruments with highly variable cash flows, such as derivatives and marketable equity investments, should be subject to fair value accounting.

We also support enhanced supplemental disclosure of fair-value information that will give investors and others a more informed view of the institution. But, as outlined in our joint comment letter, we believe that there are a number of other approaches that could enhance the reporting of forward-looking information by banks without imposing an accounting model on them that is inappropriate for their business.

Loan-Loss Reserves

Another area of accounting policy where we need to achieve a healthy balance is in standards for setting aside loan-loss reserves.

One of the fundamental tasks of bank regulation is to ensure that financial institutions maintain appropriate resources on hand to absorb losses. Conceptually, loan-loss reserves should represent the credit losses inherent in an institution’s loan portfolio at any given time, while protection against unanticipated credit losses should be provided through the institution’s equity capital. In that regard, we support moving from a probable-loss measurement of impairment to an expected-loss threshold.

At the same time, we do not support simply projecting a continuation of existing economic conditions when measuring expected future loss. Instead, we believe that the allowance should reflect forecast changes in economic conditions that will influence the size of those losses.

There is no question that FDIC-insured institutions carried inadequate levels of loan-loss reserves coming into the crisis. Provisions for loan losses have totaled more than $550 billion since the end of 2007. Yet as of mid-year, the industry’s “coverage ratio” of loan-loss reserves to noncurrent loans was just over 65 percent, compared with levels of more than 100 percent before the crisis. Now, we are seeing some of the largest institutions reduce their loan-loss reserves as their levels of problem loans diminish.

We wholeheartedly agree with the premise that loan-loss reserves should not be used to manipulate earnings or mislead users of financial statements. But depository institutions play a critical role in our economy, and loan-loss reserves play an equally important role in ensuring the viability of these institutions. That’s why we believe banks should err on the side of caution by maintaining adequate levels of loan-loss reserves, and not rushing to draw them down while their volumes of problem loans are still at elevated levels.

Reforming Securitization

Finally, I would like to address a topic that I know will be an overriding theme of this conference – and that is the reform and the revitalization of asset-backed securitization. The private issuance of asset-backed securities is an essential capital market activity that must be restarted in order to efficiently channel savings to meet the credit needs of U.S. households and businesses.

It is true that misaligned incentives in private securitization in the middle of the last decade led to the risky mortgages that fed the housing bubble and caused the financial crisis. But the answer to this problem is certainly not to turn away from securitization, but to reform it by establishing greater transparency and common-sense rules that will restore market discipline to the process. These reforms should empower investors to perform their own due-diligence on the assets they are buying, and should ensure that the economic interests of issuers are aligned with the long-term performance of those assets.

We fully supported FASB’s 2009 guidance on securitization accounting that made significant changes regarding transfers of financial assets and the consolidation of special purpose entities. Prior to those changes, companies were in some cases able to conduct significant banking activities off their balance sheets and off their financial statements. While these transactions were compliant with GAAP, we now know that the accounting practices in place at that time understated the resulting risk and use of leverage.

In this regard, the FASB’s new guidance makes accounting practices more consistent with recent changes to the legal environment surrounding securitization activities.

Safe Harbor Protection

At the FDIC, we have also set standards for risk retention and other securitization practices by updating our rules for safe harbor protection for securitized assets in failed bank receiverships. This new rule simply confirms that securitized assets will receive sale treatment in receivership when the transaction complies with conditions for the safe harbor. But it has also been designed to address the weaknesses in securitization that contributed to the financial crisis.

Our safe harbor helps ensure greater transparency, better documentation, and risk retention that creates better incentives for sound lending and better long-term performance. Knowing that the issuer is on the hook, and that servicer incentives are aligned with investors, provides assurance that the deal will likely perform over the long term.

Dodd-Frank and Risk Retention

The Dodd-Frank reform law mandates that regulators develop rules requiring any securitizer to retain at least 5 percent of the credit risk for any asset that is securitized and sold, transferred, or conveyed to a third party. We are currently working on an interagency basis to develop standards for risk retention across several asset classes – including requirements for low-risk “Qualifying Residential Mortgages,” or QRMs, that can be exempt from risk retention.

These rules give us a chance to set a “gold standard” for underwriting criteria so that securitization will encourage high-quality mortgages that are sustainable for the long term.

The recent controversy over “robo-signing” by mortgage servicers highlights the unfortunate fact that servicers do not always have the proper economic incentives to make their process as robust and efficient as it needs to be.

Throughout this crisis, servicers have been too reluctant to modify mortgages, opting instead in too many cases to go through a costly foreclosure process. Meaningful reform of securitization is needed to ensure that servicers have: the authority to act to mitigate losses; the responsibility and the incentives to act for the benefit of all investors; and the oversight to make sure they do the job right.

The new rules under Dodd-Frank for risk retention and QRMs give us a unique opportunity to better align the incentives of servicers with those of mortgage pool investors. We believe that risk retention should require issuers – particularly those who also are servicers – to retain a “vertical slice” interest in the mortgage pool that is directly proportional to the value of the pool as a whole.

We also believe that the QRM rules should require servicers to disclose any ownership interest in other whole loans secured by the same real property, and to have in place processes to deal with any potential conflicts.

What I’m referring to is when a single company services a first mortgage for an investor pool and the second mortgage for a different party, or for itself. The many serious conflicts that have arisen in mortgage servicing during this crisis must be addressed if we are to achieve meaningful reform of the securitization process.

Conclusion

I know these are issues that will be discussed and debated during this conference. We all know there are no easy shortcuts to rebuilding our financial infrastructure. And it is always appealing to try to go back to old and familiar ways.

But in American finance, those are the practices that led our economy to the brink of ruin. Instead, we must move forward, make the tough choices, and accept that preserving stability is a prerequisite to making the financial system more efficient and more profitable.

Washington, too, must mend its ways if we are to preserve financial stability in the years ahead. Total U.S. public debt has doubled in just the past seven years to almost $14 trillion, or more than $100,000 for every U.S. household. This explosive growth in federal borrowing is not only the result of the financial crisis, but also the unwillingness of our government over many years to make the hard choices necessary to rein in our long-term structural deficit.

The preliminary report of the National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, released earlier this month, is a credible first step toward recognizing and addressing the problem. But actually fixing the problem will require a national commitment to a comprehensive package of spending cuts and tax increases over many years. It is critical for the new Congress to act. While I do not see short term risk, I do believe that there is a systemic risk to the financial system if structural deficits are not credibly addressed over the next few years.

Financial stability and public confidence are the ultimate public goods and the foundation of our prosperity. Let us work together as Americans to rebuild that foundation and secure our economic future. Thank you.

www.loansafe.org/remarks-by-fdic-chairman-bair-the-financial-crisis-and-regulatory-reform-to-the-aicpa-sifma-national-conference

[sandi66]

Thursday, November 18, 2010

UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES, TREASON, SEDITION, AND SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES

Submitted by VKD
The Rumor Mill News Reading Room
www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=187805


LETS EXPLORE: UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES, TREASON, SEDITION, AND SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES

Posted By: watcher51445 <Send E-Mail>
Date: Thursday, 18-Nov-2010 08:01:14

LETS EXPLORE: UN-AMERICAN ACTIVITIES, TREASON, SEDITION, AND SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES

If these united States had judges on the Bench in the Courts of the People who were/are not appointed by the President and Special Interest Groups who protect those who PURCHASED OR LEASED AMERICA'S INFRA-STRUCTURE which includes former Duly Constituted Federal Agencies such as Department of Health and Human Services aka Social Security, the U.S. Military [Pentagon], etc defined, to wit:

Executive Order 12803 - Infrastructure Privatization

April 30, 1992

By the authority vested in me as President by the Constitution and the laws of the United States of America, and in order to ensure that the United States achieves the most beneficial economic use of its resources, it is hereby ordered as follows:

Section 1. Definitions. For purposes of this order:

(a) "Privatization" means the disposition or transfer of an infrastructure asset, such as by sale or by long-term lease, from a State or local government to a private party.

(b) "Infrastructure asset" means any asset financed in whole or in part by the Federal Government and needed for the functioning of the economy. Examples of such assets include, but are not limited to: roads, tunnels, bridges, electricity supply facilities, mass transit, rail transportation, airports, ports. waterways, water supply facilities, recycling and wastewater treatment facilities, solid waste disposal facilities, housing, schools, prisons, and hospitals. [ www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=175646 ]

There appears to be a direct connection between HAWKES CAFE article and Mr. Obama's latest Executive Order: Executive Order, June 2010: Behavior Modification Council Sunday, 13-Jun-2010 20:45:10 www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=175644

which connects to:

NEW: Executive Order 12803 - Infrastructure Privatization

www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=175646

Appearing to further connect to: Statutory Instrument 1997 No. 1778. The Social Security (United States of America) Order 1997 . see: STATUTORY INSTRUMENT 1997 No. 1778. The Social Security (United States of America) Order 1997

© Crown Copyright 1997(MIRROR)

www.theantechamber.net/Mirror/StatutoryInstrument1997.html

It appears BIG TIME VIOLATIONS of LAW OF THE LAND i.e. TITLE 18 - CRIMES AND CRIMINAL PROCEDURE

PART I - CRIMES CHAPTER 11 - BRIBERY, GRAFT, AND CONFLICTS OF INTEREST [ see for yourself at trac.syr.edu/laws/18/18USC00201.html ] is and has been going on as the following VIDEO explses an important detail being left out of mainstream media reports about the new airport body scanning devices is that former Department of Homeland Security Chief, Michael Chertoff is personally profiting from them.
Last year, his former office, the Department of Homeland Security awarded a US$160 million contract to Rapiscan, a manufacturer of these new devices and one of his main clients at The Chertoff Group, the security consultancy firm of which he is Chairman. Chertoff has been stumping for these devices on any news program that will have him.

Besides the fact that Chertoff is illegally advertising his product during news programs while pretending to be a public servant, there is a legitimate debate about the medical safety of these new body scanning devices:

[looks like big time conflict of interest]

VIDEO-Department of Homeland awarded a US$160 million to Rapiscan-his main clients The Chertoff Group

www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=187802

Another: George Soros also profitting off controversial new TSA scanners www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=187572

Anyone remember WHO bankrupted the Bank of England? George Soros, financier and philanthropist as well as an archetype of the "post-capitalist" speculator and prophet, is flattered and feared at the same time. He is responsible for the "Stock Market crash" and Maecenas in some fifty countries.

read more www.voltairenet.org/article30024.html

Recently this expose came in and I posted it.. White Hat Report from -- A Source www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=187490 and a follow up report "CGI's Pax: The Ulsterman Report: Banking Scandal Lurking for Obama in 2011?" www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=187561

and let us not forget "Deafening silence: MSM fails to report explosive Obama scandal" www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=187704 .

Let us take into consideration.. CHICAGO'S "PARTY" MACHINE activity and Rham Emanuel: Emanuel was purged twice from voter rolls - chicagotribune.com

www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=187760

Now.. I'm goint to make a prediction.. INTERPOL'S wide net will haul in: The La Salle Banking Group, Mr. Jamie Dimon, JP Morgan, Bank One, Comex, Mr. Obama, Benjamin Netanyahu, the Clintons and the Bush Groups along with Rubin, Summers, Greenspan, Rham Emanuel [currently under investigation] will probably be tried for HUMAN RIGHTS VIOLATIONS and VIOLATIONS OF THE PATRIOT ACT AS INVOLVED IN FINANCIAL ESPIONAGE, FINANCIAL TERRORISM AND MONEY LAUNDERING CHARGES..
This does not end here.. There is a matter of another CRIMINAL CODE Violation of a long standing Law.. R.I.C.0.

TITLE 18 > PART I > CHAPTER 96 > § 1961. § 1961. Definitions.
(1) “racketeering activity” means (A) any act or threat involving murder, kidnapping, gambling, arson, robbery, bribery, extortion, dealing in obscene matter, or dealing in a controlled substance or listed chemical (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act), which is chargeable under State law and punishable by imprisonment for more than one year; (B) any act which is indictable under any of the following provisions of title 18, United States Code: Section 201 (relating to bribery), section 224 (relating to sports bribery), sections 471, 472, and 473 (relating to counterfeiting), section 659 (relating to theft from interstate shipment) if the act indictable under section 659 is felonious, section 664 (relating to embezzlement from pension and welfare funds), sections 891–894 (relating to extortionate credit transactions), section 1028 (relating to fraud and related activity in connection with identification documents), section 1029 (relating to fraud and related activity in connection with access devices), section 1084 (relating to the transmission of gambling information), section 1341 (relating to mail fraud), section 1343 (relating to wire fraud), section 1344 (relating to financial institution fraud), section 1425 (relating to the procurement of citizenship or nationalization unlawfully), section 1426 (relating to the reproduction of naturalization or citizenship papers), section 1427 (relating to the sale of naturalization or citizenship papers), sections 1461–1465 (relating to obscene matter), section 1503 (relating to obstruction of justice), section 1510 (relating to obstruction of criminal investigations), section 1511 (relating to the obstruction of State or local law enforcement), section 1512 (relating to tampering with a witness, victim, or an informant), section 1513 (relating to retaliating against a witness, victim, or an informant), section 1542 (relating to false statement in application and use of passport), section 1543 (relating to forgery or false use of passport), section 1544 (relating to misuse of passport), section 1546 (relating to fraud and misuse of visas, permits, and other documents), sections 1581–1592 (relating to peonage, slavery, and trafficking in persons).,[1] section 1951 (relating to interference with commerce, robbery, or extortion), section 1952 (relating to racketeering), section 1953 (relating to interstate transportation of wagering paraphernalia), section 1954 (relating to unlawful welfare fund payments), section 1955 (relating to the prohibition of illegal gambling businesses), section 1956 (relating to the laundering of monetary instruments), section 1957 (relating to engaging in monetary transactions in property derived from specified unlawful activity), section 1958 (relating to use of interstate commerce facilities in the commission of murder-for-hire), section 1960 (relating to illegal money transmitters), sections 2251, 2251A, 2252, and 2260 (relating to sexual exploitation of children), sections 2312 and 2313 (relating to interstate transportation of stolen motor vehicles), sections 2314 and 2315 (relating to interstate transportation of stolen property), section 2318 (relating to trafficking in counterfeit labels for phonorecords, computer programs or computer program documentation or packaging and copies of motion pictures or other audiovisual works), section 2319 (relating to criminal infringement of a copyright), section 2319A (relating to unauthorized fixation of and trafficking in sound recordings and music videos of live musical performances), section 2320 (relating to trafficking in goods or services bearing counterfeit marks), section 2321 (relating to trafficking in certain motor vehicles or motor vehicle parts), sections 2341–2346 (relating to trafficking in contraband cigarettes), sections 2421–24 (relating to white slave traffic), sections 175–178 (relating to biological weapons), sections 229–229F (relating to chemical weapons), section 831 (relating to nuclear materials), (C) any act which is indictable under title 29, United States Code, section 186 (dealing with restrictions on payments and loans to labor organizations) or section 501 (c) (relating to embezzlement from union funds), (D) any offense involving fraud connected with a case under title 11 (except a case under section 157 of this title), fraud in the sale of securities, or the felonious manufacture, importation, receiving, concealment, buying, selling, or otherwise dealing in a controlled substance or listed chemical (as defined in section 102 of the Controlled Substances Act), punishable under any law of the United States, (E) any act which is indictable under the Currency and Foreign Transactions Reporting Act, (F) any act which is indictable under the Immigration and Nationality Act, section 274 (relating to bringing in and harboring certain aliens), section 277 (relating to aiding or assisting certain aliens to enter the United States), or section 278 (relating to importation of alien for immoral purpose) if the act indictable under such section of such Act was committed for the purpose of financial gain, or (G) any act that is indictable under any provision listed in section 2332b (g)(5)(B);

(2) “State” means any State of the United States, the District of Columbia, the Commonwealth of Puerto Rico, any territory or possession of the United States, any political subdivision, or any department, agency, or instrumentality thereof;

(3) “person” includes any individual or entity capable of holding a legal or beneficial interest in property;

(4) “enterprise” includes any individual, partnership, corporation, association, or other legal entity, and any union or group of individuals associated in fact although not a legal entity;

(5) “pattern of racketeering activity” requires at least two acts of racketeering activity, one of which occurred after the effective date of this chapter and the last of which occurred within ten years (excluding any period of imprisonment) after the commission of a prior act of racketeering activity;

(6) “unlawful debt” means a debt

(A) incurred or contracted in gambling activity which was in violation of the law of the United States, a State or political subdivision thereof, or which is unenforceable under State or Federal law in whole or in part as to principal or interest because of the laws relating to usury, and

(B) which was incurred in connection with the business of gambling in violation of the law of the United States, a State or political subdivision thereof, or the business of lending money or a thing of value at a rate usurious under State or Federal law, where the usurious rate is at least twice the enforceable rate;

(7) “racketeering investigator” means any attorney or
investigator so designated by the Attorney General and charged with the duty of enforcing or carrying into effect this chapter;

(8) “racketeering investigation” means any inquiry conducted by any racketeering investigator for the purpose of ascertaining whether any person has been involved in any violation of this chapter or of any final order, judgment, or decree of any court of the United States, duly entered in any case or proceeding arising under this chapter;

(9) “documentary material” includes any book, paper, document, record, recording, or other material; and

(10) “Attorney General” includes the Attorney General of the United States, the Deputy Attorney General of the United States, the Associate Attorney General of the United States, any Assistant Attorney General of the United States, or any employee of the Department of Justice or any employee of any department or agency of the United States so designated by the Attorney General to carry out the powers conferred on the Attorney General by this chapter. Any department or agency so designated may use in investigations authorized by this chapter either the investigative provisions of this chapter or the investigative power of such department or agency otherwise conferred by law. READ MORE

www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/search/display.html?terms=RACKETEERING&url=/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sec_18_00001961----000-.html AND YET MORE

www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/search/index.html

What has happened? SEE: UNITED STATES CODE: TITLE 18,CHAPTER 115TREASON, SEDITION, AND SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES | LII / LEGAL INFORMATION INSTITUTE see: www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/search/display.html?terms=SEDITION&url=/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sup_01_18_10_I_20_115.html

It is thought the very same despicable items the Judiciary cited back when Franklin D. Roosevelt tried to sneak through in 1937 have been employed by later presidents of the US CORPORATE Body which allows CONFLICT OF INTEREST activities to hold the citizenry "hostage" under illegal Executive Orders which exceed the boundries of the Law of the Land i.e., the Constitution of/for the united States of America. See: 515. REFORM OF THE FEDERAL JUDICIARY 1937 (U. S. 75Th. Cong. 1St. Sess. Sen. Report 711) [read the full report]

www.theantechamber.net/UsHistDoc/AmeriHist/AmeriHist.htm

When president G.H.W. Bush sold off "tax payers infra-structure".. he as the president did commit the following as defined:

CHAPTER 115—TREASON, SEDITION, AND SUBVERSIVE ACTIVITIES

§ 2381. Treason
§ 2382. Misprision of treason
§ 2383. Rebellion or insurrection
§ 2384. Seditious conspiracy
§ 2385. Advocating overthrow of Government
§ 2386. Registration of certain organizations
§ 2387. Activities affecting armed forces generally
§ 2388. Activities affecting armed forces during war
§ 2389. Recruiting for service against United States
§ 2390. Enlistment to serve against United States
[§ 2391. Repealed.]

source: www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/search/display.html?terms=SEDITION&url=/uscode/html/uscode18/usc_sup_01_18_10_I_20_115.html

nesaranews.blogspot.com/2010/11/un-american-activities-treason-sedition.html

[sandi66]

Investigate Michael Chertoff for fraud and corruption


Selected few;


This is what the naked body scanners are all about!


Investigate Michael Chertoff
for fraud and corruption
Chertoff ordered the full-body scanners
when he was Homeland Security head
Now he profits from them
www.brasschecktv.com/page/982.html


Just yesterday, George Soros sold 100% of his holdings in this bogus security system!
Visit www.infowars.com for more details.

nesaranews.blogspot.com/

[sandi66]

U.S. Headlines
“Food Safety” Bill to Empower FDA Wins Senate Cloture Written

Thursday, 18 November 2010 08:48

Senator Richard Durbin's “FDA Food Safety Modernization Act” (S. 510) passed a cloture vote hurdle Nov. 17 by a 75-25 margin, and appears headed for final Senate passage in the next few days. The bill would increase funding to the Food and Drug Administration and give it greater regulatory power over foods and medicines. It would require all food producers to register with the FDA and pay new taxes (which the bill calls “fees”) that recoup all the inspection costs for the new army of regulators the bill would create. The impact of S. 510 upon small producers and farms is unclear at best. Though at present it nominally exempts farms and restaurants from the bureaucratic registration and record-keeping requirements of the FDA for all food producers, at the same time it calls for the FDA to draw up new regulations within two years on “raw agricultural commodities for which the Secretary has determined that such standards minimize the risk of serious adverse health consequences or death.” Section 204 of the bill requires FDA regulators to analyze those new rules and detail “the impact of such regulations on farms and small businesses.”
If FDA regulators determine a “reasonable probability” exists that the food “will cause serious adverse health consequences or death to humans or animals,” then S. 510 also gives the FDA authority to shut down the business or farm.

Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.) has offered an amendment to clarify that the bill would not allow the FDA to regulate family farms or small restaurants, and a vote on the Tester amendment may yet take place before the likely passage of the bill in the Senate. Sen. Tom Harkin (D- Iowa) has told the press he has the votes to pass the bill without adding the Tester amendment.

The bill does explicitly ban FDA regulation of dairy farms, however, the FDA already has vigorously pursued dairy farmers who do not conform to FDA rules. Regulation of dairy farms is a direct reaction to the “raw milk” movement, a group of milk consumers who insist upon being able to drink unpasteurized milk based on the belief that it is better tasting and/or a healthier alternative to pasteurized milk. Government regulators counter that unpasteurized milk may contain salmonella and other bacteria that could cause sickness. The FDA has already militantly cracked down on “raw milk” producers across the country, and such crackdowns would only increase with the passage of the Food Safety bill.

Despite the overwhelming vote in the Senate, a number of libertarian and constitutionalist organizations have rallied to stop passage of S. 510. The John Birch Society issued the following alert on November 17:

Senate Bill 510 has already passed committee and is on the Senate calendar. It calls for enhanced expansion of FDA authority over small farms, ranches, and other food producers, establishes burdensome administrative requirements for large and small operations, and arbitrary legal authority to recall “unsafe medications,” the definition of which is not clearly established; if in line with the global standard set by Codex Alimentarius, “unsafe medications” could extend to dietary supplements and herbal products. There is language that currently exempts from heavy regulation dietary supplement manufacturers and packagers. However, the FDA and its agents are notorious for interpreting regulations their own way.

The JBS concluded with a request that members and friends write to their Congressman and Senators arguing: “My right to produce, distribute, and consume the foods of my choice is part of my right to life and liberty under the Constitution.”

Debate over the bill may also include a vote on an amendment by Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) that would impose a partial ban on bisphenol-A. The Los Angeles Times reported November 17 that “BPA is a plastic hardener and an ingredient in epoxy resin, which is used in can linings. In the human body, it mimics estrogen. Some studies have linked the chemical to reproductive abnormalities and higher risks of cancer and diabetes.” Government scientists at the FDA and the World Health Organization have stated that science has yet to demonstrate any health risks posed by bisphenol-A, though they have called for more study of the issue. The FDA has concluded that "the present consensus among regulatory agencies in the United States, Canada, Europe, and Japan is that current levels of exposure to BPA through food packaging do not pose an immediate health risk to the general population, including infants and babies."

The Food Safety bill also includes a new foreign aid program to help foreign food importers competing with U.S. farmers. According to the Congressional Research Service, S. 510 “Directs the Secretary to develop a comprehensive plan to expand the technical, scientific, and regulatory capacity of foreign governments and food industries from which foods are exported to the United States.”

www.thenewamerican.com/index.php/usnews/politics/5236-food-safety-bill-to-empower-fda-wins-senate-cloture

[sandi66]

* Dinar Daddy: Dinars… Gotta Love em!

November 18th, 2010 01:06 pm

theiraqidinar.com/2010/11/18/dinar-daddy-dinars-gotta-love-em/

[sandi66]

* Goldline: Gold Rebounds on Possibility of Ireland Bailout
November 18th, 2010 02:51 pm · Posted in NEWS
Gold rose a staggering $21 on the New York Spot Market as of 8:45 a.m. PST, buoyed by a combination of factors including a weaker dollar index, investors seeking to “buy the dip” and a general move away from the dollar in anticipation of a bailout for Ireland.1

“Precious metals are rebounding today along with other commodities, mainly as the dollar weakens relative to a number of currencies,” said Anne-Laure Tremblay, BNP Paribas precious metals strategist. “It’s not just a currency thing. It’s got to do with the belief that governments aren’t in control of the economic and financial situation. That’s been supportive for gold investment,” said Matthew Turner, an analyst with Mitsubishi.2

Economist Dennis Gartman expressed his belief that any gold correction is over. “About the only thing we are comfortable stating is that we remain long of gold in non-U.S. dollar terms, and we believe strongly that gold’s correction has run its course,” he said.3

theiraqidinar.com/2010/11/18/goldline-gold-rebounds-on-possibility-of-ireland-bailout/

[sandi66]

* Iraqi Finance: Delete the zeros from the currency will strengthen the position of Iraq to the International Monetary

November 18th, 2010 01:09 pm · Posted in NEWS
18/11/2010 16:37 18/11/2010 16:37

ÛÏÇÏ/18 ÊÔÑíä ÇáËÇäí/äæÝãÈÑ(ÂßÇäíæÒ)- ÃÚáäÊ æÒÇÑÉ ÇáãÇáíÉ ÇáÚÑÇÞíÉ¡ ÇáÎãíÓ¡ Ãä ÍÐÝ ÇáÃÕÝÇÑ ãä ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáãÍáíÉ ÓíÍÑÑ ÇáÇÞÊÕÇÏ ÇáÚÑÇÞí ãä ÇáÞíæÏ æíÚÒÒ ÞíãÉ ÇáÏíäÇÑ ÇáÚÑÇÞí Ýí ÕäÏæÞ ÇáäÞÏ ÇáÏæáí. Baghdad / November 18 (Rn) – The Iraqi Ministry of Finance, Thursday, that the deletion of zeros from the local currency will liberate the Iraqi economy from the constraints and enhance the value of the Iraqi dinar in the International Monetary Fund.

æÞÇá ÇáãÓÊÔÇÑ Ýí æÒÇÑÉ ÇáãÇáíÉ ÇáÚÑÇÞíÉ ÖíÇÁ ÇáÎíæä áæßÇáÉ ßÑÏÓÊÇä ááÃäÈÇÁ (ÂßÇäíæÒ) Åä “ÚãáíÉ ÑÝÚ ÇáÇÕÝÇÑ ÇáËáÇËÉ ãä ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáãÍáíÉ ÓíÚÒÒ ãæÞÝ ÇáÚÑÇÞ ÇáÇÞÊÕÇÏí áÏì ÇáãÌÊãÚ ÇáÏæáí æÈÇáÊÍÏíÏ áÏì ÕäÏæÞ ÇáäÞÏ ÇáÏæáí”. The chancellor said the Iraqi Ministry of Finance Zia Alckheon Kurdistan News Agency (Rn) that “the process of removing three zeroes from the local currency will strengthen Iraq’s economic position in the international community and specifically the International Monetary Fund.”

æÃÖÇÝ Ãä “ÈÞÇÁ ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáÍÇáíÉ Úáì æÖÚåÇ ÇáÍÇáí áä íÚÇáÌ ãÓÃáÉ ÇáÝÌæÉ ÇáÇÞÊÕÇÏíÉ ÇáÊí íÔåÏåÇ ÇáÏíäÇÑ ÇáÚÑÇÞí ßãÇ Çäå ÓíÒíÏ ãä ÇáËÞá Úáì ßÇåá ÇáÇÞÊÕÇÏ ÇáÚÑÇÞí”. He added that the “survival of the current currency and the current status would not address the question of the economic gap taking place in the Iraqi dinar as it will increase the burden on the Iraqi economy.”

æÈíä Ãä “ÚãáíÉ ÊÛííÑ ÇáÚãáÉ ÈÇáÊÃßíÏ ÓÊÃÎÐ æÞÊÇð æÃãæÇáÇ¡ áßäåÇ ÃãÑ ãØáæÈ áÅÒÇáÉ ÇáÍÇÌÒ Èíä ÇáÇÞÊÕÇÏ ÇáÚÑÇÞí æÇáÇÞÊÕÇÏ ÇáÚÇáãí æÅÚØÇÁ ÇáãÒíÏ ãä ÇáÞíãÉ ááÏíäÇÑ ÇáÚÑÇÞí”. And that “the process of changing the currency certainly will take time and money, but is required to remove the barrier between the Iraqi economy and the global economy and to give more than the value of the Iraqi dinar.”

æíÑì ÇáÈäß ÇáãÑßÒí Ãä ÚãáíÉ ÑÝÚ ÇáÇÕÝÇÑ ÇáËáÇËÉ ãä ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáãÍáíÉ ÚãáíÉ ãÚÞÏÉ æÈÍÇÌÉ Åáì ÏÑÇÓÉ ÇÞÊÕÇÏíÉ ãÓÊÝíÖÉ . In the view of the central bank to raise the three zeroes from the local currency is a complex process and need to be thorough economic study.

æÇÈÏì ÕäÏæÞ ÇáäÞÏ ÇáÏæáí Ýí ÇÈ/ ÃÛÓØÓ ÇáãÇÖí ÏÚãå ááÇÞÊÕÇÏ ÇáÚÑÇÞí Ýí ÍÇá ÞíÇãå ÈÚÏÏ ãä ÇáÅÌÑÇÁÇÊ ÇáÇÞÊÕÇÏíÉ ãä ÖãäåÇ ÎÕÎÕÉ ÇáãÕÇÑÝ æÑÝÚ ÇáÇÕÝÇÑ ÇáËáÇËÉ ãä ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáãÍáíÉ æÇíÝÇÁ ÇáÏíæä æÇáÊÚæíÖÇÊ ÇáÊí ÊÞÚ Úáì ÚÇÊÞ ÇáÚÑÇÞ . He expressed the International Monetary Fund in August last support of the Iraqi economy in the event of having a number of economic measures, including privatization of banks and raise three zeroes from the local currency and to meet debt and compensation is the responsibility of Iraq.

æßÇäÊ ÇáÍßæãÉ ÇáÚÑÇÞíÉ äÝÊ ÃÌÑÇÁ Çí ÊÛííÑ Úáì ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáãÍáíÉ Ýí åÐÇ ÇáÚÇã ÈåÏÝ ÊÞáíá ÇáÊÖÎã ÇáãÇáí . The Iraqi government denied conducting any change in the local currency this year in order to reduce inflation.

æßÇäÊ ÃäÈÇÁ ÃÔÇÑÊ ãÄÎÑÇð Åáì Ãä ÇáÍßæãÉ ÇáÚÑÇÞíÉ ÊÚÊÒã ÅÌÑÇÁ ÊÛííÑÇÊ Úáì ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáãÍáíÉ¡ ãäåÇ ÑÝÚ ËáÇËÉ ÇÕÝÇÑ ÈåÏÝ ÊÞáíá ÇáÊÖÎã ÇáãÇáí ÇáÐí ÊÚÇäí ãäå ÇáÓæÞ ÇáÚÑÇÞíÉ¡ Çáì ÌÇäÈ ÅÖÇÝÉ ÇááÛÉ ÇáßÑÏíÉ Úáì æÑÞÉ ÇáÚãáÉ. The news has recently indicated that the Iraqi government plans to make changes to the local currency, including raising three zeros in order to reduce inflation suffered by the Iraqi market, as well as add the language Kurdish paper currency.

íÐßÑ Çä ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáãÍáíÉ ÇáÚÑÇÞíÉ ÞÏ ãÑÊ Ýí ÊÇÑíÎåÇ ÈÊÛííÑÇÊ ÚÏÉ ßÇä ÇÎÑåÇ Ýí ÚÇã 2004 ÚäÏãÇ ÞÇã ãÌáÓ ÇáÍßã ÇáÓÇÈÞ ÈÇÓÊÈÏÇá ÇáÚãáÉ ÇáÓÇÈÞÉ ÇáÊí ßÇäÊ ÊÑãÒ ááäÙÇã ÇáÓÇÈÞ . The local Iraqi currency has gone through several changes in its history, most recently in 2004 when the former Governing Council replaced the previous currency, which was a symbol of the former regime.

ãä ÌÚÝÑ ÇáæäÇä¡ ÊÍ: ãÍãÏ ÇáÝíáí Allonan of Jafar, the Open: Mohammad Faili

theiraqidinar.com/2010/11/18/iraqi-finance-delete-the-zeros-from-the-currency-will-strengthen-the-position-of-iraq-to-the-international-monetary/

[sandi66]

... this was emailed to me ... I think Glenn Beck mentioned it on his today's program



(Sen Rockefeller November 17, 2010) Sen. Rockefeller's FCC Fantasy

www.youtube.com/watch?v=wz-i7qIYGCQ



Sen Rockefeller : "There’s a little bug inside of me which wants to get the F.C.C. to say to Fox and to MSNBC, ‘Out. Off. End. Goodbye.’ It would be a big favor to political discourse; to our ability to do our work here in Congress; and to the American people, to be able to talk with each other and have some faith in their government and, more importantly, in their future."




ty joye

[sandi66]

Exposed: Michael Chertoff's junkþ
www.brasschecktv.com/page/983.html

oh my



ty joye

[sandi66]

After loss, Lincoln unsure White House will keep $1.5B promise

By Alexander Bolton - 11/19/10 10:08 AM ET

Sen. Blanche Lincoln (D-Ark.) does not expect the White House to fulfill its promise to farmers in her home state in the wake of her failed bid for a third term.

Former White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel pledged in July that the administration would find $1.5 billion within its budget to help farmers in Arkansas and elsewhere in the country affected by natural disasters.

Emanuel made the promise to get Lincoln to accept the deletion of $1.5 billion in disaster relief for farmers from pending small-business legislation. The small business bill subsequently passed in mid-September.

Lincoln said the White House has already doled out more than $600 million in assistance to farmers in her state and others hit hard by weather events.

“We got almost half of that disaster assistance,” she said, adding that farmers started signing up for it “weeks ago.”

But Lincoln, who serves as chairman of the Senate Agriculture Committee, does not think the White House will come through with the rest.

“I don’t think that’s going to happen,” she said.

She lost her bid for a third term to Rep. John Boozman (R-Ark.) and Emanuel has left the White House to run for mayor of Chicago.

Other interest groups are clamoring for money from President Obama’s administrative fund, especially now that Republicans — who vowed to crack down on government spending — will take control of the House next year.

Members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) strongly objected earlier this year after Emanuel’s promise became public.

Six CBC lawmakers, including Reps. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) and Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), wrote a stern letter to Obama, urging him not to let natural-disaster claims take precedence over African-American farmers.

“The current hardships experienced by other farmers should not trump hardships placed on African Americans and Native Americans by the U.S. Department of Agriculture in the past,” they wrote.

John W. Boyd, president and founder of the National Black Farmers Association, has approached the Obama administration for help in case funding for a settlement between the Department of Agriculture and black farmers fails to pass during the lame-duck session.

“That’s something I shared with the White House during the recess,” Boyd said during a conference call with reporters Thursday. “[If] we were unable to get a successful deal during the lame-duck, I hope the administration will reevaluate this thing and look what can be done administratively.”

Boyd’s group has asked for $1.2 billion to settle the discrimination claims of black farmers against the Department of Agriculture.

Boyd told reporters on Thursday that the Senate was close to reaching a unanimous consent agreement to pass legislation that would fund the black farmer’s settlement. He said the cost of the bill would be offset.

“From all indications I have, this is a pretty solid deal on the table,” he said, but cautioned that one senator could derail the deal by objecting.

A Senate Republican leadership aide, however, declined to confirm the existence of an agreement.

“There’s no agreement until an agreement has been announced,” the staffer said.

The White House did not comment for this article.

thehill.com/homenews/senate/130067-after-loss-lincoln-not-confident-white-house-will-keep-its-15b-promise

[sandi66]

Senate expected to pass black farmers

November 19, 2010 1:10 p.m. EST

STORY HIGHLIGHTS
NEW: The Senate is set to approve a roughly $1.15 billion settlement for minority farmers, sources say
NEW: $3.4 billion is expected to be approved for mishandling a Native American trust fund
The House has approved money for the settlement before; the Senate has not
Black Farmers Association president calls the Senate action "long overdue justice"
Washington (CNN) -- The U.S. Senate is expected to approve $1.15 billion Friday to fund a settlement initally reached between the Agriculture Department and minority farmers more than a decade ago, according to Senate sources.

The 1997 Pigford v. Glickman case against the U.S. Agriculture Department was settled out of court 11 years ago. Under a federal judge's terms dating to 1999, qualified farmers could receive $50,000 each to settle claims of racial bias.

"This is much long overdue justice for black farmers," said John Boyd, founder and president of the National Black Farmers Association.

The Senate is also expected to clear -- in the same piece of legislation -- $3.4 billion to fund a separate settlement reached with the Department of Interior for mishandling of a trust fund managed for Native Americans.

In July, the House approved a war supplemental bill that included money to pay for the settlements. At the time, however, the Senate failed to approve the measure.

Sen. Tom Coburn, R-Oklahoma, dropped an objection to the package this week after Senate leaders agreed not to finance it through additional deficit spending.

Prominent members of both parties have voiced support for paying out the settlements.

If the Senate measure passes, it will have to be approved by the lame duck House before moving to President Obama's desk to be signed into law.

www.cnn.com/2010/POLITICS/11/19/black.farmers/

[sandi66]

NATO agrees on missile defense system for most of Europe, the U.S.

Lisbon, Portugal (CNN) -- Calling it a significant step forward for the alliance and European security, President Obama announced Friday that NATO will develop a missile defense system to safeguard most of Europe and the United States.

The agreement, according to the president, followed a year of talks to determine the best ways to coordinate efforts to protect members of the 61-year-old alliance.

The system would be "strong enough to cover all NATO European territory and populations, as well as the United States," Obama told reporters in Lisbon, Portugal.

The missile defense plan "offers a role for all of our allies in response to the threats of our times," the president said. "It shows our determination to protect our citizens from the threat of ballistic missiles."

Obama addressed reporters during the first day of what he promised would be a "landmark summit" featuring leaders of NATO's 28 member countries, as well as Russia. By the time it wraps Saturday, the alliance aimed to produce a set of new initiatives intending to reinvigorate and redirect NATO 20 years after the end of the Cold War.

NATO Secretary-General Anders Fogh Rasmussen announced Friday that heads of state had agreed to a new mission statement, calling it the alliance's "road map for the next 10 years." Crafting this so-called strategic concept had been a top priority of the meeting, which Rasmussen last month deemed "one of the most important summits in the history of our alliance."

"This strategic concept reconfirms the commitment by NATO members to defend one another against attack, and that will never change," Rasmussen said in Lisbon. "But it also modernizes the way NATO does defense in the 21st century."

The document, prepared from recommendations made by a panel led by former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, sought to build upon NATO's work in Afghanistan to redefine the alliance as a "global" actor that would work with regional partners to combat threats outside Europe.

Under the new plan, NATO will bolster its role in counterinsurgency efforts, as well as the stabilization and reconstruction of key countries, according to Rasmussen. The defense alliance will also develop "a standing capability to train local security forces" and create a civilian arm to deal with other nations and groups.

Obama added Friday that NATO, under Rasmussen, was also looking at how to deal with threats like improvised explosives and cyber defenses, all serving a commitment that "an attack on one NATO member is an attack on all."

Afghanistan will be front and center on Saturday's agenda, with NATO members working with others who have committed resources to the nation and its government to "align our approach," according to Obama. He said that includes having Afghan forces transition, between 2011 and 2014, taking over the security and governance mission in the country and forging a "long-term partnership" beyond that.

Russia's relationship with NATO and the United States is also a chief focus Saturday.

Obama said that starting then, NATO will work with Russia "to build our cooperation with them in this area ... recognizing that we share many of the same threats."

In an exclusive interview with CNN's Chris Lawrence, Georgian President Mikhail Saakashvili said he hoped that Russia's deepening partnership with NATO would cause Moscow to take a "more civilized approach" in dealing with its neighbors.

Russian troops have occupied Georgian territory since its invasion in 2008. Saakashvili, whose country's bid to join NATO has been stalled for several years, said that he hoped the alliance's involvement would prompt Russia to withdraw its troops from Georgia.

"Once Russia becomes less paranoid, more cooperative, more self-confident in a nicer way -- because I think lots of things have emerged from their almost paranoid sense of insecurity -- hopefully, the small neighbors of Russia hopefully will feel themselves more safe," said Saakashvili, who met with Obama on Friday.

Obama reiterated his belief that the U.S. Congress should pass the New START nuclear control treaty, which the U.S. and Russia agreed on last spring but has not been ratified by either nation's legislatures. U.S. Senate Republicans have held up a vote on START, citing a heavy workload, in the lame duck session before a new Congress comes in next year, and concerns about the strength of the U.S. nuclear arsenal.

Obama said Friday that NATO leaders had called passage of the treaty -- which, among other things, would restart mutual nuclear inspections and limit the arsenal in the two countries -- critical to European and global security.

"A failure to ratify [this treaty] ... will put at risk the substantial progress that has been made in advancing our nuclear security and our partnership with Russia," Obama said.

The search for a new mandate for the entire alliance comes at a time that 16 of the 28 NATO members have announced cuts in defense spending. NATO officials said leaders are expected to agree at the summit on a list of the top 10 spending priorities, including helicopters, transfer aircraft, technology to combat improvised explosive devices and increased medical capabilities.

The outcome of the war in Afghanistan is intrinsically tied to the future of the NATO alliance, a new analysis from the RAND Corporation suggested. The report, published Friday, warns that the U.S. lead in the war could undermine any future willingness to fight together if needed.

"In an alliance that finds achieving consensus is central, having one partner clearly overshadow all others highlights the real limits of the transatlantic alliance," the report said.

The difficulty and length of engagement will weigh on decisions by alliance members to intervene or aid in the future.

"The scope of NATO's future roles abroad may be more limited, such as focusing on humanitarian assistance or training, advising, and assisting nations that seek support. While these efforts may entail long-term commitments, they would fall well short of committing combat forces," wrote the RAND authors, Andrew Hoehn and Sarah Harting.

The new strategic concept will cite current security challenges facing NATO members in the 21st century, such as terrorism, cyber warfare and piracy.

Rasmussen has encouraged NATO members to be more agile in order to respond to 21st century threats and to continue to invest in military technology despite the global economic downturn. He urged allies to "cut fat, not muscle" and pool military spending.

The United States is pushing for a realignment of military spending priorities.

"We have proposed and hope to have accepted a set of capabilities that the alliance, in a time of dwindling resources, will decide it must fund," U.S. Ambassador to NATO Ivo Daalder told reporters earlier this week. "Those are capabilities that deal with ongoing operations in Afghanistan, but also capabilities to deal with 21st century threats, including beefing up our cyberdefenses and embracing the deployment of missile defenses to protect European territory and populations against the growing threat of ballistic missiles."

Obama also will hold a summit with European Union leaders, seeking to reaffirm a partnership with Europe that many feel has gone adrift as the United States expands its partnerships in Asia. Jobs and economic growth are expected to top the agenda at a time of growing tension between U.S. and European countries over the way to fix the global economy.

While the United States has pushed for stimulating economic expansion with more government spending, many European allies are tightening their belts.

The future of some 80,000 U.S. military forces in Europe will also be discussed. European leaders are looking for Obama to keep U.S. troops at their current levels, although the Obama administration has urged Europe to share more of the burden of its own defense.

three video clips on the link below...

edition.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/europe/11/19/us.nato.summit/?hpt=T1

[sandi66]

House ethics committee postpones Waters trial

Friday, November 19, 2010; 9:04 PM

Newly discovered evidence led the House ethics committee Friday to postpone this month's planned trial of Rep. Maxine Waters, the California Democrat accused of inappropriately helping a financially troubled bank in which her husband was a large shareholder.

The panel's leaders did not characterize the evidence except to say in a statement that it "may have had an effect" on the charges filed against Waters. The lawmaker, however, said the evidence is an e-mail from her chief of staff about the 2008 bank bailout legislation.

The committee effectively returned the case to an investigative subcommittee to consider the new evidence rather than proceed with a trial that had been slated to begin Nov. 29.

"The Committee's decision to cancel the hearing and put it off indefinitely demonstrates that the Committee does not have a strong case and would not be able to prove any violation has occurred," Waters said in a statement, adding later, "I am puzzled at the committee's insistence on moving backwards instead of forwards."

Waters has said she did nothing wrong in helping the nation's largest minority-owned bank get a meeting with Treasury officials in September 2008, where the bank requested tens of millions of dollars in assistance. Separately, the bank eventually received a $12 million grant from the Troubled Assets Relief Program.

In the statement, Waters suggested that the e-mail supports her contention that she was interested in helping a broad group of minority-owned banks, not just the one her husband invested in.

Unlike Rep. Charles B. Rangel (D-N.Y.), who fought with multiple legal teams and ultimately had no counsel when the committee found him guilty this week of 11 ethics charges , Waters has consistently been represented by veteran ethics lawyer Stanley Brand. Waters is expected to mount a vigorous defense.

The e-mail was sent by Mikael Moore, the lawmaker's top aide who is also Waters' grandson, on Sept. 28, 2008, just two hours before House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) unveiled TARP. Moore complained to staff on the House Financial Services Committee that he wanted to know "the status of the provisions that we have been working on" related to minority-owned banks.

"It would not be acceptable to receive a copy [of the legislation] after it is final," Moore wrote, making a couple of suggestions in changing a few words from an earlier bill.

The investigative subcommittee alleged in August that Waters's office improperly worked in September 2008 to press for aid to prevent the failure of Boston-based OneUnited Bank, which eventually stayed afloat with the help of TARP money.

Waters's husband, Sidney Williams, had served on the bank's board. He owned stock in OneUnited that had declined in value from $350,000 in June 2008 to $175,000 two months later.

In early September 2008, Waters arranged a meeting between the bank's officers and Treasury officials. At the meeting, the bank's officers requested $50 million in federal money. Treasury balked, saying it had no legal authority to give the bank the money.

The Treasury Department has said that the TARP grant it later gave OneUnited was based on sound, normal criteria.

Throughout the investigation Waters - the most senior black lawmaker on the Financial Services Committee - has maintained that she arranged the meeting as part of an effort to help minority-owned banks in general, and not OneUnited specifically. She told the ethics investigators that after the meeting, she removed herself from the effort to help the bank, citing the conflict.

But the four-member investigative subcommittee found that Moore remained "actively involved in assisting OneUnited representatives with their request for capital from Treasury."

www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/19/AR2010111906498.html?hpid=topnews

[sandi66]

U.S. in Vast Insider Trading Probe


NOVEMBER 20, 2010


By SUSAN PULLIAM, MICHAEL ROTHFELD,JENNY STRASBURG and GREGORY ZUCKERMAN


Federal authorities, capping a three-year investigation, are preparing insider-trading charges that could ensnare consultants, investment bankers, hedge-fund and mutual-fund traders and analysts across the nation, according to people familiar with the matter.

The criminal and civil probes, which authorities say could eclipse the impact on the financial industry of any previous such investigation, are examining whether multiple insider-trading rings reaped illegal profits totaling tens of millions of dollars, the people say. Some charges could be brought before year-end, they say.

The investigations, if they bear fruit, have the potential to expose a culture of pervasive insider trading in U.S. financial markets, including new ways non-public information is passed to traders through experts tied to specific industries or companies, federal authorities say.

One focus of the criminal investigation is examining whether nonpublic information was passed along by independent analysts and consultants who work for companies that provide "expert network" services to hedge funds and mutual funds. These companies set up meetings and calls with current and former managers from hundreds of companies for traders seeking an investing edge.



Among the expert networks whose consultants are being examined, the people say, is Primary Global Research LLC, a Mountain View, Calif., firm that connects experts with investors seeking information in the technology, health-care and other industries. "I have no comment on that," said Phani Kumar Saripella, Primary Global's chief operating officer. Primary's chief executive and chief operating officers previously worked at Intel Corp., according to its website.



In another aspect of the probes, prosecutors and regulators are examining whether Goldman Sachs Group Inc. bankers leaked information about transactions, including health-care mergers, in ways that benefited certain investors, the people say. Goldman declined to comment.



On the Inside
The New Age of Insider Information on Wall Street.
More from the series:

•THE MOLE: Wired on Wall Street: Trader Betrays a Friend
Jan. 16, 2010
•SWAP TALK: Trader's 'Nice Little Kiss' Tests Reach of Regulators
Mar. 31, 2010
•THE PITS: Wild Trading in Metals Puts Fund Manager in Cross Hairs
Aug. 20, 2010
•DEBT CLASH: Bankruptcy Court Is Latest Battleground for Traders
Sept. 7, 2010
•CAPITOL GAINS: Congress Staffers Gain From Trading in Stocks
Oct. 11, 2010


Independent analysts and research boutiques also are being examined. John Kinnucan, a principal at Broadband Research LLC in Portland, Ore., sent an email on Oct. 26 to roughly 20 hedge-fund and mutual-fund clients telling of a visit by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

"Today two fresh faced eager beavers from the FBI showed up unannounced (obviously) on my doorstep thoroughly convinced that my clients have been trading on copious inside information," the email said. "(They obviously have been recording my cell phone conversations for quite some time, with what motivation I have no idea.) We obviously beg to differ, so have therefore declined the young gentleman's gracious offer to wear a wire and therefore ensnare you in their devious web."


The email, which Mr. Kinnucan confirms writing, was addressed to traders at, among others: hedge-fund firms SAC Capital Advisors LP and Citadel Asset Management, and mutual-fund firms Janus Capital Group, Wellington Management Co. and MFS Investment Management. SAC, Wellington and MFS declined to comment; Janus and Citadel didn't immediately comment. It isn't known whether clients are under investigation for their business with Mr. Kinnucan.


The investigations have been conducted by federal prosecutors in New York, the FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Representatives of the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's office, the FBI and the SEC declined to comment.

Another aspect of the probe is an examination of whether traders at a number of hedge funds and trading firms, including First New York Securities LLC, improperly gained nonpublic information about pending health-care, technology and other merger deals, according to the people familiar with the matter.

Some traders at First New York, a 250-person trading firm, profited by anticipating health-care and other mergers unveiled in 2009, people familiar with the firm say.

A First New York spokesman said: "We are one of more than three dozen firms that have been asked by regulators to provide general information in a widespread inquiry; we have cooperated fully." He added: "We stand behind our traders and our systems and policies in place that ensure full regulatory compliance."

Key parts of the probes are at a late stage. A federal grand jury in New York has heard evidence, say people familiar with the matter. But as with all investigations that aren't completed, it's unclear what specific charges, if any, might be brought.




The action is an outgrowth of a focus on insider trading by Preet Bharara, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney. In an October speech, Mr. Bharara said the area is a "top criminal priority" for his office, adding: "Illegal insider trading is rampant and may even be on the rise." Mr. Bharara declined to comment.

Expert-network firms hire current or former company employees, as well as doctors and other specialists, to be consultants to funds making investment decisions. More than a third of institutional investment-management firms use expert networks, according to a late-2009 survey by Integrity Research Associates LLC in New York.

The consultants typically earn several hundred dollars an hour for their services, which can include meetings or phone calls with traders to discuss developments in their company or industry. The expert-network companies say internal policies bar their consultants from disclosing confidential information.

Generally, inside traders profit by buying stocks of acquisition targets before deals are announced and selling after the targets' shares rise in value.

The SEC has been investigating potential leaks on takeover deals going back to at least 2007 amid an explosion of deals leading up to the financial crisis. The SEC sent subpoenas last fall to more than 30 hedge funds and other investors.



“Today two fresh faced eager beavers from the FBI showed up unannounced (obviously) on my doorstep thoroughly convinced that my clients have been trading on copious inside information.... We obviously beg to differ, so have therefore declined the young gentleman's gracious offer to wear a wire and therefore ensnare you in their devious web.” John Kinnucan, of Broadband Research, in an Oct. 26 email to clients



Some subpoenas were related to trading in Schering-Plough Corp. stock before its takeover by Merck & Co. in 2009, say people familiar with the matter. Schering-Plough stock rose 8% the trading day before the deal plan was announced and 14% the day of the announcement. Merck said it "has a long-standing practice of fully cooperating with any regulatory inquiries and has explicit policies prohibiting the sharing of confidential information about the company and its potential partners."

Transactions being focused on include MedImmune Inc.'s takeover by AstraZeneca Plc in 2007, the people say. MedImmune shares jumped 18% on Apr. 23, 2007, the day the deal was announced. A spokesman for AstraZeneca and its MedImmune unit declined to comment.

Investigators are also examining the role of Goldman bankers in trading in shares of Advanced Medical Optics Inc., which was taken over by Abbott Laboratories in 2009, according to the people familiar with the matter. Advanced Medical Optics's shares jumped 143% on Jan. 12, 2009, the day the deal was announced. Goldman advised MedImmune and Advanced Medical Optics on the deals.

A spokesman for AstraZeneca and its MedImmune unit declined to comment.


In subpoenas, the SEC has sought information about communications—related to Schering-Plough and other deals—with Ziff Brothers, Jana Partners LLC, TPG-Axon Capital Management, Prudential Financial Inc.'s Jennison Associates asset-management unit, UBS AG's UBS Financial Services Inc. unit, and Deutsche Bank AG, according to subpoenas and the people familiar with the matter.


Representatives of Ziff Brothers, Jana, TPG-Axon, Jennison, UBS and Deutsche Bank declined to comment.

Among hedge-fund managers whose trading in takeovers is a focus of the criminal probe is Todd Deutsch, a top Wall Street trader who left Galleon Group in 2008 to go out on his own, the people close to the situation say. A spokesman for Mr. Deutsch, who has specialized in health-care and technology stocks, declined to comment.


Prosecutors also are investigating whether some hedge-fund traders received inside information about Advanced Micro Devices Inc., which figured prominently in the government's insider-trading case last year against Galleon Group hedge fund founder Raj Rajaratnam and 22 other defendants.



Fourteen defendants have pleaded guilty in the Galleon case; Mr. Rajaratnam has pleaded not guilty and is expected to go to trial in early 2011.

Among those whose AMD transactions have been scrutinized is hedge-fund manager Richard Grodin. Mr. Grodin, who received a subpoena last fall, didn't return calls. An AMD spokesman declined to comment.

online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704170404575624831742191288.html?mod=WSJ_hp_LEFTTopStories#articleTabs%3Darticle

[sandi66]

Banks Exit From Embassy Business
Moves By Largest Lenders Could Strain Relations Between U.S. Government and Other Countries

NOVEMBER 20, 2010

By MATTHIAS RIEKER, JOSEPH PALAZZOLO and VICTORIA MCGRANE
Some of the nation's largest banks are exiting or scaling back their dealings with foreign embassies and missions in the U.S. because of the burden of complying with money-laundering regulations.

The moves could strain U.S. foreign relations. The State Department said that about 40 countries have been affected, 16 of which are African nations. The department next week will host a briefing by banking regulators for the heads of embassies and missions affected.
A spokesman said the department is fully engaged in the issue, seeking a solution to what it sees as a problem that could have implications for U.S. diplomacy and security.


View Full Image


none
FOREIGN AFFAIR: J.P. Morgan Chase's letters to ambassadors, sent Sept. 30, said accounts would be closed on March 31, 2011.

online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748703531504575625060985983720.html?mod=WSJ_newsreel_business


ty joy

[sandi66]

Money Talks: The $15-trillion Investors Taking on Climate Change COP16 Climate Change Policy Demanded by Investor Group Worth $15 Trillion


Alex Goldmark
Public Radio Producer :: Reporter

November 17, 2010 • 9:30 am PST


A group of investors—collectively worth as much as the GDP of the United States—have signed a United Nations statement calling for a coordinated international policy on climate change. Their message, as you'd expect from the stewards of $15 trillion, isn't moral so much as it is economic. Specifically, the investors argue that a damaged planet will hurt business, and they estimate as much as a 20 percent drop in GDP by 2050 if action isn't taken to shift investments to low-carbon technologies.

Signatories of the statement come from 259 organizations on every continent except Antarctica. Major international banks, like HSBC and Alianz, joined with the U.N. Environment Program, a dozen U.S. pension funds, and developing world investment firms and banks.

U.S. investors also added in some domestic demands. Citing that the U.S. lags behind Europe and Asia both in clean energy investing, at less than half what those continents spend. "Climate change may be out of vogue in Washington today, but it poses serious financial risks that are not going away and will only increase the longer we delay enacting sensible policies to transition to a low-carbon economy," said Jack Ehnes, chief executive officer of the California State Teachers' Retirement System, the nation's second largest public pension fund with $141 billion in assets and one of the signatories.

Globally, low-carbon global investment is increasing, especially in Asia. Still, substantially more money would flow to clean-tech if better government policies were in place, according to a statement from Calvert Investments. They say global clean energy investment will top $200 billion in 2010, up a tad from 2009, but substantially less than the $500 billion that Bloomberg New Energy Finance and the World Economic Forum say is needed, per year, by 2020 to restrict global warming to below 2 degrees. Complicated and clunky on the numbers there, but the point is, not nearly enough money is going to renewable energy, and these investors feel that they can't do it alone; the governments of the world need to help.

This is what they call for:


Prudent investors around the world have therefore joined to endorse this statement. We welcome a dialogue with governments and international institutions on the policies and finance tools needed to catalyze private investment in the low-carbon economy. In particular, investors are calling for:

• Domestic policy frameworks to catalyze renewable energy, energy efficiency, and other low-carbon infrastructure, so as to provide investors with the certainty needed to invest with confidence in receiving long-term risk-adjusted returns.

• International agreement on climate financial architecture, delivery of climate funding, reducing deforestation, robust measurement, reporting, and verification, and other areas necessary to set the global rules of the road, bolster investor confidence, and allow financing to flow.

• International finance tools that help mitigate the high levels of risk private investors face in making climate-related investments in developing countries, enabling dramatic increases in private investment.


Today's statement comes in advance of the next round of climate negotiations known as COP16 in Cancún, beginning November 29.
Global governments will try to negotiate a new international climate policy to substitute the Kyoto Protocol. No agreement or consensus is expected out of that summit, so the more pressure, from the more corners, the better.

This statement, after all, is just a words on paper directed at the leaders meeting in Cancún. Action is what is needed. There's plenty each of these money managers can do without a climate policy in place, and as GOOD pointed out in March, the business community needs to take some responsibility for the climate talks as well. Do you think this statement does it? What else should this investor group do, with one quarter of the world's assets in their charge?

Read the full statement in PDF and the press release from UNEP.

Image: (CC) by Flickr user Señor Codo.




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Everyone Agreed About Climate Change This Week (UPDATED)
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LION: A Model for Local Investing in Washington?
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www.good.is/post/cop16-climate-change-policy-demanded-by-investor-group-worth-15-trillion/?utm_source=outbrain&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=outbrain



ty joye

[sandi66]

Senate approves payment of black farmers' claims
Sunday, November 21, 2010
The New York Times
The Senate has approved $4.55 billion to settle longstanding charges that the federal government had denied or underpaid aid to black farmers and mismanaged trust funds for American Indians.

The bill sets aside $1.15 billion to resolve racial bias claims brought by black farmers against the Agriculture Department and $3.4 billion to pay claims stemming from the Department of the Interior's handling of American Indian trust funds.

The Senate approved the measure by a voice vote on Friday evening and sent it to the House. Similar measures have passed the House twice, and President Barack Obama has said he would sign the bill into law.

The black farmers' case is an outgrowth of Pigford v. Glickman, a federal class-action lawsuit originally settled in 1999. The Obama administration agreed in February to provide a second round of damages to people who were denied earlier payment because they had missed the deadlines for filing.

The American Indian case, Cobell v. Salazar, was settled in December after more than 13 years of litigation. The settlement creates a $1.4 billion trust fund and a $60 million scholarship fund. It also provides $2 billion for the federal government to repurchase tribal lands sold to individuals in the late 19th and early 20th centuries.

The House has approved money for both settlements twice this year -- first in a war supplemental bill, then in a tax extenders bill.



First published on November 21, 2010 at 12:00 am


Read more: www.post-gazette.com/pg/10325/1104988-84.stm#ixzz15vXK0cNh

www.post-gazette.com/pg/10325/1104988-84.stm

[sandi66]

US Senate Pays USD 4.6 M to Black, Indian Farmers over Racism
November 20th, 2010
The US Senate set out to correct past mistakes by approving almost USD 4.6 billion to settle long standing claims brought by American Indians and black farmers against the government.

Photo: thirdcoastdigest.com

The Senate approved the spending for civil settlements with black farmers and American Indians with the former alleging racial discrimination by government lenders and the latter saying that they had been cheated out of land royalties dating back to 1887.

The farmers sued after decades of discrimination by the agriculture department in providing loans and other support, reports CBS News, while the Native Americans had been cheated by the Interior Department over royalties from income from tribal lands.

The money has been held up for months in the Senate as Democrats and Republicans squabbled over how to pay for it. The two class action lawsuits were filed over a decade ago.

“Black farmers and Native American trust account holders have had to wait a long time for justice, but now it will finally be served,” Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said in a statement, obtained by the Reuters. “I am heartened that Democrats and Republicans were able to come together to deliver the settlement that these men and women deserve.”

Elouise Cobell, a member of the Blackfeet Tribe from Browning, Mont. and the lead plaintiff in the Indian case, said Friday that it took her breath away when she found out the Senate had passed the bill. She was feeling despondent after the chamber had tried and failed to pass the legislation many times and two people who would have been beneficiaries had died on her reservation this week, reported the Associated Press.

John Boyd, head of the National Black Farmers Association, said the passage of the black farmers’ money is also long overdue. “Twenty-six years justice is in sight for our nation’s black farmers,” he said.

Though lawmakers from both parties said they supported resolving the long-standing claims of discrimination and mistreatment by federal agencies. But the funding has been caught up in a fight over spending and deficits.

Republicans repeatedly objected to the settlements when they were added on to larger pieces of legislation. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (Democrat – Nevada) satisfied conservative complaints by finding spending offsets to cover the cost.
The legislation also includes a one-year extension of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families program, which gives grants to states to provide cash assistance and other services to the poor, and several American Indian water rights settlements.

The settlements include almost $1.2 billion for black farmers and $3.4 billion would go to Indian landowners.

The amount of money each would get depends on how many claims are successfully filed.
The bill would be partially paid for by diverting dollars from a surplus in nutrition programs for women and children and by extending customs user fees.



news.maars.net/blog/2010/11/20/u-s-senate-to-pay-usd-4-6-million-to-black-farmers-and-indians-to-settle-lawsuits/

[sandi66]

www.tradewithdave.com


maxkeiser.com/

November 21st, 2010 by maxkeiser
Respond
Greetings:

In researching yesterday’s story in the Wall Street Journal about the FBI crackdown on insider trading, I uncovered a strange nine year old connection to 9-11. The same guy highlighted in the Wall Street Journal, John Kinnucan, was the whistleblower on the suspicious options trading of airline stocks just prior to the terror attacks. You can read about it at my blog. Please give me some attribution if you publish this story.

By the way, I get a large number of the readers of our blog that come from viewers of MaxKeiser.com.

Here’s a link to the specific story:

Kind Regards
Dave Harrison

www.tradewithdave.com

maxkeiser.com/




ty joy

[sandi66]

www.dailyreckoning.com




Joel's Note: Barry Ritholtz is the author of Bailout Nation: How Greed and Easy Money Corrupted Wall Street and Shook the World Economy. He blogs at The Big Picture. Contact him at [e-mail]


The Daily Reckoning Presents
Dear Uncle Sucker...


Barry Ritholtz
[Ed. Note: This article originally appeared at "The Big Picture"]

For many years, I've been a fan of Warren Buffett's long term approach to value investing. Understanding the value of a company, regardless of its momentary stock price, is a great long term investing strategy.

But it pains me whenever I read commentary from Buffett that glosses over reality or is somehow self-serving. His OpEd in the NYT - Pretty Good for Government Work - paints an artificially rosy picture of the Bailout, ignores the negatives, and omits his own financial interest in government actions.

What might he have written if Sir Warren was dosed with some sodium pentothal before he sat down to pen that "Thank you" letter? It might have gone something like this:

DEAR Uncle Sam Sucker,

I was about to send you a thank you note for bailing out the economy...but then some nice men dressed in Ninja outfits came in and shot me full of truth serum. That led me to make one more set of edits to my letter thanking you for saving the economy.

It also helped me recall some things I seemed to have forgotten in my other public pronunciations about the bailouts.

I suddenly recalled who it was who allowed the banks to run wild in the first place: You. Your behavior before, during and after the crisis was the epitome of a corrupt and irresponsible government. You rewarded incompetency, created moral hazard, punished the prudent, and engaged in the single biggest transfer of wealth from the citizenry of the United States to the Wall Street insiders who created the mess in the first place.

Kudos.

Before I get to the bailouts, I have to remind you that in:


•1999, you passed the Financial Services Modernization Act. This repealed Glass-Steagall, the law that had successfully kept main street banking safely separated from Wall Street for seven decades. Even the 1987 market crash had no impact on Main Street credit availability, thanks to Glass-Steagall.


•1997-2010, you allowed the Credit Rating Agencies to change their business model, from Investor pays to Underwriter pays - a business structure known as Payola. This change effectively allowed banks to purchase their AAA ratings, and was ignored by the SEC and other regulators.


•2000, you passed the Commodities Futures Modernization Act. It allowed the shadow banking industry to develop without any oversight by the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the SEC, or the state insurance regulators. This led to rampant creation of credit-default swaps, CDOs, and other financial weapons of mass destruction - and the demise of AIG.


•2001-04, the Fed, under Alan Greenspan, irresponsibly dropped fund rates to 1%. This set off an inflationary spiral in housing, commodities, and in most assets priced in dollars or credit.


•1999-07, the Federal Reserve failed to use its supervisory and regulatory authority over banks, mortgage underwriters and other lenders, who abandoned such standards as employment history, income, down payments, credit rating, assets, property loan-to-value ratio and debt-servicing ability.


•2004, the SEC waived its leverage rules, allowing the 5 biggest Wall Street firms to go from 12 to 1 to 20, 30 and even 40 to 1. Ironically, this rule was called the "Bear Stearns Exemption."
These actions and rule changes were requested by the banking industry. Rather than behave as adult supervision, you indulged the reckless kiddies, looking the other way as they acted out. You were the grand enabler of the finance sector's misbehavior. Hence, you helped create the mess by allowing the banking sector to run roughshod over decades of successful constraints. (Kudos again on that).

There were voices warning about the upcoming crisis, but you managed to turn a deaf ear to them: Warnings about subprime lending, problems with securitization, against the false claim that residential real estate never went down in value, or that the models forecasting VAR were wildly understating risk. An economy driven by growth dependent upon credit-fueled consumption was unsustainable, and yet you encouraged that reckless credit consumption. The compensation schemes for Wall Street were hilariously short term (ignored by you); the crony capitalism of Boards of Directors that undercut market discipline was similarly ignored. You encouraged the hollowing out of the US economy, allowing it to become increasingly "Financialized" at the expense of industry and manufacturing. What was once a small but important part of the economy became dominant, yet unproductive, with your blessing.

Bottom line: You were at a loss for understanding the many factors that led to the crisis in the first place.

When the crisis struck, you did not seem to understand the role you should play. Instead of stepping up to halt the financialization, to unwind it, you gave away the shop. You failed to extract concessions from firms on the verge of bankruptcy. Your negotiating skills were embarrassing. In the face of meltdown, you panicked.

You could have undone the decades of radical deregulation at that moment. You could have fired the incompetent management, wiped out the shareholders who invested in insolvent companies, given the creditors and bond holders a major haircut for their foolish lending. Instead, you rewarded them for their gross incompetence.

The solutions you ran with were ad hoc, poorly thought out, improvised. You crossed legal boundaries, putting the Fed in the position of violating its charter and exceeding its mandates. You created a Moral Hazard, the impact of which may not be felt until decades in the future.

Very few of your senior elected and appointed officials understood what was going on.

Rather than offer an intelligent response to the crisis, you delivered brute force: Trillions of dollars were thrown at the problem, papering over its symptoms but not its underlying causes.

Well, Uncle Sam, you delivered a motherload of cash. Considering the dollar sums involved, your actions were remarkably ineffective. What was left over afterwards was a wildly over-leveraged consumer whose credit limits had been reached; State and municipal budgets were heavily dependent upon that excess consumer spending, creating huge budget holes because of it. Net net: The resultant economy was in the worst recession since the Great Depression.

As a student of the Great Depression, Ben Bernanke should have had the best grasp - but his bailout of Bear Stearns revealed him to be just another banker, intent on saving the banks - banking system be d**ned. To give you a clue of exactly how lost Hank Paulson was, he spent his time praying, and creating documents that exempted himself personally for liability. He's from Goldman, so we know that "team first" ain't exactly his style. Tim Geithner, who did such a stupendous job overseeing the banks in the first place, was in way over his head. And while I never voted for George W. Bush, I give him great credit for hiding under the bed and pretty much staying out of everyone else's way. I would call him clueless, but that wouldn't be fair to the legions of clueless around the world.

Sheila Bair grasped the gravity of the situation earliest, and put numerous failed banks through the insolvency process. If we were smart, we would have allowed her to work her way through the entire finance sector, effecting a GM-like prepackaged bankruptcy for Citigroup, Bank of America, Merrill Lynch, Morgan Stanley, AIG, etc. It would have been painful as hell, but we would be much better off had we allowed her to tear the Band-Aid off quickly. Instead, we are suffering through a death of a 1000 cuts, Japanese style.

I would be remiss if I failed to mention my personal positions in this: I made a killing in Goldman Sachs and GE. My investments in Wells Fargo would have been a disaster if not for you. Don't even get me started with me being the largest shareholder in Moody's - that was some joyride. And considering all of the counter-parties that Berkshire Hathaway has, we risked being just another insolvent investment firm along with everyone else had nothing been done.

So I must say thanks to you, Uncle Sam, and your aides. In this extraordinary emergency, you came through for me - and my world looks far different than if you had not.

Your grateful but wide-eyed nephew,

Warren

Regards,

Barry Ritholtz,
for The Daily Reckoning

Joel's Note: Barry Ritholtz is the author of Bailout Nation: How Greed and Easy Money Corrupted Wall Street and Shook the World Economy. He blogs at The Big Picture. Contact him at [e-mail]

This article is reproduced with permission of author. Copyright Ginormous Content Limited. All rights reserved.



ty joy

[sandi66]

U.S. in Vast Insider Trading Probe

November 20, 2010

Federal authorities, capping a three-year investigation, are preparing insider-trading charges that could ensnare consultants, investment bankers, hedge-fund and mutual-fund traders, and analysts across the nation, according to people familiar with the matter.

The criminal and civil probes, which authorities say could eclipse the impact on the financial industry of any previous such investigation, are examining whether multiple insider-trading rings reaped illegal profits totaling tens of millions of dollars, the people say. Some charges could be brought before year-end, they say.

The investigations, if they bear fruit, have the potential to expose a culture of pervasive insider trading in U.S. financial markets, including new ways non-public information is passed to traders through experts tied to specific industries or companies, federal authorities say.

One focus of the criminal investigation is examining whether nonpublic information was passed along by independent analysts and consultants who work for companies that provide "expert network" services to hedge funds and mutual funds. These companies set up meetings and calls with current and former managers from hundreds of companies for traders seeking an investing edge.

Among the expert networks whose consultants are being examined, the people say, is Primary Global Research LLC, a Mountain View, Calif., firm that connects experts with investors seeking information in the technology, health-care and other industries.

"I have no comment on that," said Phani Kumar Saripella, Primary Global's chief operating officer.

Primary's chief executive and chief operating officers previously worked at Intel Corp., according to its website.

In another aspect of the probes, prosecutors and regulators are examining whether Goldman Sachs Group Inc. bankers leaked information about transactions, including health-care mergers, in ways that benefited certain investors, the people say. Goldman declined to comment.

Independent analysts and research boutiques also are being examined. John Kinnucan, a principal at Broadband Research LLC in Portland, Ore., sent an email on Oct. 26 to roughly 20 hedge-fund and mutual-fund clients telling of a visit by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

"Today two fresh faced eager beavers from the FBI showed up unannounced (obviously) on my doorstep thoroughly convinced that my clients have been trading on copious inside information," the email said. "(They obviously have been recording my cell phone conversations for quite some time, with what motivation I have no idea.) We obviously beg to differ, so have therefore declined the young gentleman's gracious offer to wear a wire and therefore ensnare you in their devious web."

The email, which Mr. Kinnucan confirms writing, was addressed to traders at, among others: hedge-fund firms SAC Capital Advisors LP and Citadel Asset Management, and mutual-fund firms Janus Capital Group, Wellington Management Co. and MFS Investment Management.

SAC, Wellington and MFS declined to comment; Janus and Citadel didn't immediately comment. It isn't known whether clients are under investigation for their business with Mr. Kinnucan.

The investigations have been conducted by federal prosecutors in New York, the FBI and the Securities and Exchange Commission. Representatives of the Manhattan U.S. Attorney's office, the FBI and the SEC declined to comment.

Another aspect of the probe is an examination of whether traders at a number of hedge funds and trading firms, including First New York Securities LLC, improperly gained nonpublic information about pending health-care, technology and other merger deals, according to the people familiar with the matter.

Some traders at First New York, a 250-person trading firm, profited by anticipating health-care and other mergers unveiled in 2009, people familiar with the firm say.

A First New York spokesman said: "We are one of more than three dozen firms that have been asked by regulators to provide general information in a widespread inquiry; we have cooperated fully." He added: "We stand behind our traders and our systems and policies in place that ensure full regulatory compliance."

Key parts of the probes are at a late stage. A federal grand jury in New York has heard evidence, say people familiar with the matter. But as with all investigations that aren't completed, it is unclear what specific charges, if any, might be brought.

The action is an outgrowth of a focus on insider trading by Preet Bharara, the Manhattan U.S. Attorney. In an October speech, Mr. Bharara said the area is a "top criminal priority" for his office, adding: "Illegal insider trading is rampant and may even be on the rise." Mr. Bharara declined to comment.

Expert-network firms hire current or former company employees, as well as doctors and other specialists, to be consultants to funds making investment decisions. More than a third of institutional investment-management firms use expert networks, according to a late 2009 survey by Integrity Research Associates in New York.

The consultants typically earn several hundred dollars an hour for their services, which can include meetings or phone calls with traders to discuss developments in their company or industry. The expert-network companies say internal policies bar their consultants from disclosing confidential information.

Generally, inside traders profit by buying stocks of acquisition targets before deals are announced and selling after the targets' shares rise in value.

The SEC has been investigating potential leaks on takeover deals going back to at least 2007 amid an explosion of deals leading up to the financial crisis. The SEC sent subpoenas last autumn to more than 30 hedge funds and other investors.

“Today two fresh faced eager beavers from the FBI showed up unannounced (obviously) on my doorstep thoroughly convinced that my clients have been trading on copious inside information.... We obviously beg to differ, so have therefore declined the young gentleman's gracious offer to wear a wire and therefore ensnare you in their devious web.”
John Kinnucan, of Broadband Research, in an Oct. 26 email to clients


Some subpoenas were related to trading in Schering-Plough Corp. stock before its takeover by Merck & Co. in 2009, say people familiar with the matter. Schering-Plough stock rose 8% the trading day before the deal plan was announced and 14% the day of the announcement.

Merck said it "has a long-standing practice of fully cooperating with any regulatory inquiries and has explicit policies prohibiting the sharing of confidential information about the company and its potential partners."

Transactions being focused on include MedImmune Inc.'s takeover by AstraZeneca PLC in 2007, the people say. MedImmune shares jumped 18% on April 23, 2007, the day the deal was announced. A spokesman for AstraZeneca and its MedImmune unit declined to comment.

Investigators are also examining the role of Goldman bankers in trading in shares of Advanced Medical Optics Inc., which was taken over by Abbott Laboratories in 2009, according to the people familiar with the matter. Advanced Medical Optics's shares jumped 143% on Jan. 12, 2009, the day the deal was announced. Goldman advised MedImmune and Advanced Medical Optics on the deals.

A spokesman for AstraZeneca and its MedImmune unit declined to comment.

In subpoenas, the SEC has sought information about communications—related to Schering-Plough and other deals—with Ziff Brothers, Jana Partners LLC, TPG-Axon Capital Management, Prudential Financial Inc.'s Jennison Associates asset-management unit, UBS AG's UBS Financial Services Inc. unit, and Deutsche Bank AG, according to subpoenas and the people familiar with the matter.

Representatives of Ziff Brothers, Jana, TPG-Axon, Jennison, UBS and Deutsche Bank declined to comment.

Among hedge-fund managers whose trading in takeovers is a focus of the criminal probe is Todd Deutsch, a top Wall Street trader who left Galleon Group in 2008 to go out on his own, the people close to the situation say. A spokesman for Mr. Deutsch, who has specialized in health-care and technology stocks, declined to comment.

Prosecutors also are investigating whether some hedge-fund traders received inside information about Advanced Micro Devices Inc., which figured prominently in the government's insider-trading case last year against Galleon Group hedge fund founder Raj Rajaratnam and 22 other defendants.

Fourteen defendants have pleaded guilty in the Galleon case; Mr. Rajaratnam has pleaded not guilty and is expected to go to trial in early 2011.

online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704170404575624831742191288.html

[sandi66]

Arrests Looming in Huge Insider Trading Probe

November 21, 2010 12:

Dozens of arrests are expected during the holiday season.



The investigation is headed by Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara and the Securities and Exchange Commission. (AP Photo/Robert Mecea)By Yepoka Yeebo

DNAinfo Reporter/Producer

MANHATTAN — Holiday arrests are coming for dozens of Wall Street insider traders as a three-year investigation comes to a close, according to reports.

Federal authorities are preparing charges for investment bankers, attorneys, fund managers, consultants and analysts across the country, the Wall Street Journal said.

"Prosecutors particularly like the pressure that perp walks have on families and friends during the holidays," attorney Bill Singer told the New York Post. "This is going to be the big target of the federal prosecutors in 2011 and the next several weeks," he added.

Investigators believe attorneys who handled sensitive Wall Street deals may have shared information for money, and that consultants offered insider information to investors.

Some traders at trading firm First New York profited by anticipating health-care and other mergers unveiled in 2009, people familiar with the firm told the Journal.

The investigation, headed by Manhattan US Attorney Preet Bharara and the Securities and Exchange Commission, ordered several firms to hand over transaction records, and compared them with news reports to see if any were carried out before official announcements were made, according to the Journal.


www.dnainfo.com/20101121/manhattan/arrests-looming-huge-insider-trading-probe

[sandi66]

Headline News

President Obama meets with Hispanic lawmakers to discuss immigration reform
11/22/2010

President encourages Congressional leaders to push for approval of DREAM Act

President Obama and leaders of the Congressional Hispanic Caucus discussed the options on immigration reform immediately facing the Congress. The President and Caucus leaders (U.S. Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, U.S. Representative Nydia Velazquez of New York and U.S. Representative Luis Gutierrez of Illinois) believe that, before adjourning, Congress should approve the DREAM Act.
The President reiterated his support for fixing the broken immigration system and urged the Caucus leaders to work to restore the bipartisan coalition backing comprehensive immigration reform. The President said he hoped with the election season’s pressures past, Congressional Republicans and Democrats would work together to not only strengthen security at the nation’s borders, but also to restore responsibility and accountability to a broken immigration system.


--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
www.gmpromagazine.com/president-obama-meets-with-hispanic-lawmakers-to-discuss-immigration-reform.aspx

[sandi66]

FDIC announces three more bank closures, bringing 2010 total to 149

November 20, 2010

announces three more bank closures, bringing 2010 total to 149.

The number of banks that have failed in 2010 has already surpassed previous records, and with the announcement from the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. on late Friday, November 19, the number continues to increase.

The FDIC announced that three regional banks in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Florida have gone into receivership, bringing the total of bank failures this year to 149.

Gulf State Community Bank in Carrabelle, Florida was forced to close its doors on Friday. The bank totaled $112.2 million in total deposits.

Allegiance Bank of North America, based in Bala Cynwyd, Pennsylvania was also shut down by regulators. It totaled $92 million in deposits.

And the First Banking Center of Burlington, Wisconsin was also shut down by regulators. First Banking Center had $664.8 million in total deposits.

The FDIC will be responsible for covering almost $200 million in total.

All three of the banks had been suffering from recurring losses due to bad commercial real estate loans and other non-performing assets, including repossessed real estate due to foreclosures.

Gulf State Community Bank had its assets acquired by Centennial Bank, and the FDIC has agreed to cover 80% of the losses on the assets.

All five branches of Gulf State were to reopen on Saturday, November 20, 2010 as Centennial Bank branches.

As for Allegiance Bank, their assets were acquired by VIST Bank of Wyomissing, Pennsylvania, with the FDIC covering 80% of its assets losses as well.

The assets of First Banking Center were acquired by First Michigan Bank, and were to reopen as First Michigan Bank branches on Saturday, November 20 as well.

FDIC announces three more bank closures, bringing 2010 total to 149.

aomid.com/fdic-announces-three-more-bank-closures-bringing-2010-total-to-149/224462/

[sandi66]

Basel III Bank Capital Shortage; Recent ARM Stats; HAMP Running Out of Applicants; High Cost Loan Limits; Investor Updates

November 22, 2010, 8:54 AM

Is it a sign of mortgage dementia to be listening to the oldies station on the radio and hear Martha and the Vandellas singing about Jimmy Mack coming back, and instead hear:

"Hey Indy, Indy, oh Indy Mac, when are you coming back?

Indy, Indy, oh Indy Mac, when are you coming back?"

Was IS coming back for another year are the loan limits. Fannie told folks, "The general loan limits for 2011 remain unchanged from 2010 (e.g., $417,000 for a one-unit property in the continental U.S.). High-cost area loan limits for 2011 remain unchanged from the 2010 high-cost area loan limits ($729,750 for a one-unit property in the continental U.S.) for mortgage loans originated on or before September 30, 2011. For mortgage loans originated after September 30, 2011, revised "permanent" high-cost area limits will apply."

Freddie Mac echoed this. "We are announcing that we are maintaining the temporary maximum loan limits for mortgages secured by properties located in designated high-cost areas through September 30, 2011. Our base conforming loan limits will also be maintained at the current 2010 levels through December 31, 2011, with the maximum loan limit for a 1-unit single-family property in the contiguous United States remaining at $417,000. As a reminder, the loan limits in designated high-cost areas are the higher of the temporary limits established by the Economic Stimulus Act of 2008 (maximum of $729,750 for 1-unit single-family properties in the contiguous United States) and the permanent limits established by the Housing and Economic Recovery Act of 2008 (maximum of $625,500 for 1-unit single-family properties in the contiguous United States). Actual loan limits for a specific high-cost area may be lower than the maximum permitted loan limit...There are no changes to our super conforming mortgage requirements as a result of the extension."

What if someone gave a refi boom party, and ARM's didn't come? Prepayment speeds for conventional hybrid ARMs were flat in October since faster speeds for lower rates were offset by slower prepayments for higher coupons. 2008-2010 production continues to prepay the fastest, still showing that credit is still a key determinant for prepayment activity. According to a report by Sterne Agee, new issuance of conventional hybrid ARMs was $4.6 billion, up $562 million from September. However, net issuance continues to be negative and therefore the Agency ARM market continues to contract. Falling supply and a Fed with limited ability to lower short term rates further should bode well for the mortgage ARM basis.

News came out from a study done by Barclays Capital that the top 35 US banks will be short of between $100-150 billion in equity capital (8% of total assets) after the new Basel III global bank regulations are imposed, with 90% cent of the shortfall concentrated in the biggest six banks. The impact on mortgage banks is not lost, and servicing (and the sale of it) is seen as a big wild card. Just last week Chase sold $47 billion in servicing to non-bank IBM. The Basel III reforms will hit banks in two ways: by gradually tightening the definition of what counts as tier one capital and by forcing banks to increase the risk adjustment for certain portions of their businesses. So if you're a bank, you can respond by increasing your capital through retained earnings or equity issuance, or you can cut your risk-weighted assets through sell-offs and by cutting back on risky business lines.

Speaking of banks, on Friday, through the usual state banking regulator and FDIC's actions, First Banking Center (WI) became part of First Michigan Bank. Allegiance Bank of North America (PA) opened today as part of VIST Bank (PA), and Gulf State Community Bank (FL) is now part of Centennial Bank (Arkansas).

HAMP (Making Home Affordable Program, which always confuses some since it that is really MHAP) seems to be rolling along. The report noted that nearly 520,000 permanent modifications were begun, with an average of 37,000 new permanent modifications per month over the last six months. 18 servicers have signed up for the Second-Lien Modification Program (2MP), covering nearly two-thirds of the second-lien mortgage market, and unemployed homeowners may be offered a minimum of three months' forbearance prior to being considered for a HAMP trial modification. Interestingly, most measures of the program were lower during the latest period, the month ended October 10, than in the period ended in September. FULL STORY

CitiMortgage told its clients of several credit policy updates late last week. These included issues on property unit numbers, investment properties (for LP loans if rental income is not used to qualify, PITIA plus operating expenses must be used in calculating the debt ratios, and if the borrower owns more than 1 financed investment property, the product for the subject investment property transaction must be a fixed rate or 7/1 or 10/1 ARM), recovery times for deed-in-lieu/short sale/pre-foreclosures ("the amount of time that must pass before the borrower is eligible for mortgage financing has increased from 24 months to 48 months"), commission incomes, and removing borrowers from Freddie's Relief Refinance loan. Citi also addressed appraiser independence requirements, higher priced mortgage loans, and several other issues. As with any update, it is best for clients to read the specifics in the bulletin.

Starting in January, Flagstar FHA TPO customers (i.e. those without FHA Direct Endorsement or Authorized Agent approval as of January 1, 2011) "must close all FHA loans in Flagstar's name and they must be table funded. Per the Final Rule, this restriction is regardless of when the case number was originally assigned or the current status of the case (e.g. approved, closed). Please note that customers may continue to close non-FHA loans in their own name where applicable. FHA loans intended to close in your company's name as a Flagstar-sponsored Loan Correspondent must meet" several deadlines, including being submitted to underwriting prior to December 1.

Pinnacle Capital Mortgage has told broker clients of its underwriting updates. The changes include adding additional non-permanent resident alien status requirements, updating the list of unacceptable source of funds, and adding additional guidance on student loans. Pinnacle also put in updated MI requirements, and updated 1007 requirements when exercising a fieldwork waiver under the standard DU Refi Plus program. On the FHA side, it updated loan terms on High Balance loans, added definition of "Cost to Acquire," added clarification of outstanding principal balance calculation, added no Cash Out or Streamline on EEM, and added appraisal requirements for declining markets on High Balance loans. There were other changes - it is best to consult the actual announcement.

Mortgage security prices ended Friday about where they started, worse by a few "ticks" (less than .125) on only $800 million of sales. So locks are way down, or everyone sold their pipeline already. Either way, if demand is steady or strong, and fewer mortgages result in less supply, look for mortgage prices to improve relative to Treasury prices. But over the weekend, one interesting thing to note is that apparently Ireland has decided, or is about to, to accept a bailout plan by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), and the euro has improved on the news.

"Markets" around holidays can be fickle creatures. Sometimes they are illiquid, and prone to move dramatically one way or the other. Other times the markets are slow, and just sit, with much of the rate move due to whatever happened in Asia or Europe overnight. Due to the Thanksgiving holiday, all of our news comes out tomorrow and Wednesday - Thursday is a holiday, and Friday may-as-well be. Tomorrow are revisions to third quarter GDP and Existing Home Sales, along with some Fed minutes, and on Wednesday we have Durable Orders, New Home Sales, Personal Income, Consumer Sentiment, and jobless claims in addition to the Treasury auctions today ($25 billion), Tuesday, and Wednesday. Mortgage bond markets will be closed on Thursday and will close early on Friday. With this, and the Ireland bailout news, we find the 10-yr yield at 2.84% and mortgages security prices better by about .125. ECON CALENDAR


A gas station owner in Mississippi was trying to increase his sales. So he put up a sign that read, "Free Sex with Fill-Up."

Soon a local citizen pulled in, filled his tank and asked for his free sex.

The owner told him to pick a number from 1 to 10. If he guessed correctly he would get his free sex.

The citizen, some would say redneck, guessed 8, and the proprietor said, "You were close. The number was 7. Sorry. No sex this time."

A week later, the same redneck, along with his brother, Bubba, pulled in for another fill-up.

Again he asked for his free sex.

The proprietor again gave him the same story, and asked him to guess the correct number.

The redneck guessed 2 this time.

The proprietor said, "Sorry, it was 3. You were close, but no free sex this time."

As they were driving away, the redneck said to his brother, "I think that game is rigged, and he doesn't really give away free sex."

Bubba replied, "No it ain't, Billy Ray. It ain't rigged. My wife won twice last week."

www.mortgagenewsdaily.com/channels/pipelinepress/11222010-refinance-loan-mortgage-limits.aspx

[sandi66]

Irish government teeters on brink


Sunday, Nov. 21, 2010

DUBLIN — Ireland’s deeply unpopular government began to unravel on Monday, with the junior coalition party demanding an early election in January, as soon as an EU/IMF bailout package is in place, and the budget under threat.

The Greens withdrew their support from Prime Minister Brian Cowen’s cabinet a day after European partners and the International Monetary Fund agreed to rescue Ireland with loans to tackle a banking and budget crisis that has aroused public fury.

Two independent lawmakers on whom the government relies for its parliamentary majority said they could not even commit to supporting a crucial austerity budget due to be adopted on Dec. 7, casting doubt on its passage.


The adoption and implementation of a deficit-cutting budget is usually a condition for EU/IMF aid disbursements, subject to quarterly monitoring by the international watchdogs.

A top euro zone official said the first loans could flow in January but a short-lived relief rally on financial markets fizzled as investors weighed the new political uncertainty and the risk of pressure spreading to other vulnerable EU countries.

European shares and the euro reversed early gains on fears the package would not prevent contagion reaching Portugal and possibly Spain.

European and IMF officials began thrashing out details of the rescue package — expected to total 80 to 90 billion euros — on Monday, while the government put finishing touches to a drastic 15 billion euros (US$20.5 billion) austerity plan.

The coalition of Fianna Fail, the Greens and independent politicians has a three-seat majority, which will be wiped out if the six Green lawmakers withdraw their support, or indeed if the two independents switch sides.

"We have now reached a point where the Irish people need political certainty to take them beyond the coming two months. So, we believe it is time to fix a date for a general election in the second half of January," the Greens said in a statement.

The leader of Ireland’s main opposition party, Fine Gael, called for an immediate election and its finance spokesman told Reuters the government would have difficulty surviving long enough to pass next month’s budget.

The centre-left opposition Labour party also called for an immediate dissolution of parliament and fresh elections.

In response, the cost of insuring Irish debt against default jumped to 530 basis points, up 23 on the day, according to Markit data.

But political analysts said the probable next coalition of the centre-right Fine Gael party and Labour were unlikely to depart radically from the outgoing government’s austerity plans.

Even if the Irish loans flow, economists doubted whether the second euro zone rescue in six months, after Greece, would stop markets targeting fellow straggler Portugal, or prevent heavily indebted EU states defaulting in the longer run.

"I think it means Portugal is next (to request help). I don’t know if it will happen before the end of the year or after, but it’s almost inevitable now," said Filipe Garcia at Informacao de Mercados Financeiros in Porto.

But euro zone policymakers expressed greater optimism.

"I don’t think any immediate contagion effect could be the case," Jean-Claude Juncker, chairman of euro zone finance ministers, told reporters.

Portuguese Prime Minister Jose Socrates said he hoped the Irish decision would end uncertainty and stressed on TSF radio that his country "does not need any help."

Spanish Economy Minister Elena Salgado said Spain’s financial sector was stronger than Ireland’s and Madrid had "absolutely no" need for a bailout.

Moody’s Investors Service said a "multi-notch" downgrade of Ireland’s credit rating, still leaving it in the investment grade category, was now the most likely outcome.

While the rescue package is expected to be less than the 110 billion euros provided for Greece in May, it will be larger as a proportion of national wealth and in per capita terms.

Cowen said the government’s four-year economic plan, to be announced on Wednesday, would involve 10 billion euros in public spending cuts and 5 billion euros in tax rises, on top of two years of harsh austerity and recession already endured.

It is expected to cut the minimum wage, slash social welfare spending, reduce the number of public employees and add a new property tax and higher income taxes.

But ministers said it would not touch Ireland’s ultra-low 12.5 percent corporate tax rate seen as a symbol of national independence but as an irritant by many higher-tax EU countries.

Trade unions have warned the austerity plan could spark civil unrest: a student demonstration over planned fee increases turned violent this month, and unions have organised a march to protest at the planned measures on Nov. 27 in Dublin.


A plan to restructure Ireland’s banks, which had to be rescued by the state after a property boom fuelled by reckless lending collapsed, will be a central plank of the broader international aid package.

A top financier saw more nationalisations ahead.

"It seems to me that there is at least as strong a case for saying that we need to take massive and decisive action quickly to produce at least two viable ongoing banks for the Irish system," Alan Dukes told a meeting in Dublin.

Britain, which is not part of the euro zone, said it would offer Dublin bilateral assistance on top of its share in EU and IMF aid. Finance minister George Osborne said London’s contribution could be about 7 billion pounds (US$11.19 billion).

British and German banks are the biggest creditors of Ireland’s stricken banks, according to official data.

Non-euro Sweden said it would offer up to 1.5 billion euros.
.

www.financialpost.com/news/Irish+government+teeters+brink/3865993/story.html

[sandi66]

Bernanke Is Right - Chinese Mercantilism, Not Fed Easy Money, Is Making a Mess

November 22, 2010

Ben Bernanke is right. Germany shouldn’t blame easy money in the United States for the world’s woes. Currency mercantilism in China and elsewhere is causing a mess—especially in the United States.

Last week, Bernanke fingered China, Taiwan, Singapore, and Thailand for driving down the values of their currencies. Through massive government purchases of U.S. Treasuries securities, those mercantilists accomplish huge trade surpluses and jack up their GDP growth and employment. The flip side is a huge U.S. trade deficit that sentences Americans to slow growth and 10 percent unemployment.

Sadly, such mercantilism makes free trade an unworkable strategy for the United States.

The anticipated gains from open trade harkens back to an economist’s first lessons—specialization and exchange. Let each nation do more of what it does best, and international trade will raise productivity and living standards everywhere. However, the scheme only works for everyone if trade is reasonably balanced and international commerce does not impose high unemployment on some countries.

The United States annually exports $1.85 trillion in goods and services, and these finance a like amount of imports. This trade raises U.S. GDP by about $195 billion, because workers are about 10 percent more productive in export industries than in import-competing industries—those are the gains from trade.

Unfortunately, U.S. imports exceed exports by another $560 billion, and workers released from making those goods go into non-trade-competing industries, such as retailing, where productivity is at least 50 percent lower. This slashes GDP by about $280 billion, overwhelming the gains from trade, and requiring workers displaced by imports to accept lower wages or no work at all.

Global demand for goods and services has become so distorted by subsidized Asian exports that workers in the United States face terribly high unemployment. Add in those stuck in part-time jobs that would prefer full time work, and the United States is losing the productivity of at least 10 million workers. At about $100,000 per worker, that adds another $1 trillion, bringing total lost productivity to about $1.3 trillion dollars.

Ben Bernanke estimates U.S. capacity underutilization at about 8 percent—that comes to the same $1.3 trillion. Amazing.


At the recent IMF meetings, Treasury Secretary Geithner asked European allies for help in persuading China to revalue the yuan. Led by Germany, the United States was told to pound salt and instructed to slash its budget deficit and tighten monetary policy.

No surprise. Germany enjoys huge trade surpluses with a euro that is undervalued for its economy, because it is lumped into Euroland with weak Portugal, Ireland, Greece, Spain and Italy. Germans live well and impose austerity and unemployment on those neighbors. Berlin doesn’t want any sacred mercantilist cows slayed, lest its own ruse get discovered.

If the United States cut its budget deficit in half and raised domestic interest rates two percentage points, U.S. consumption and imports would crash, unemployment would rocket to 15 percent, and a global depression would result whose horrors we all thought were long ago buried in history books.

If China and Germany won’t be reasonable, the United States is really left with no option but to take direct action to balance its trade.

China’s government purchases to suppress the yuan come to about 35 percent of GDP and provide a subsidy on exports of similar amount. Washington should even things up by imposing a comparable tax on purchases of yuan and euro for the purpose of importing from or investing in China and Germany, until their leaders agree to engineer an orderly revaluation of currencies and trade.

The Chinese and Germans shouldn’t care—after all, the Americans are nothing but whining spendthrifts whose problems are of no import. They would scream bloody murder anyway.

Beneath the howls, domestic demand and employment in the United States would fire up, manufacturing would flourish, GDP growth rise to about 5 percent, and unemployment would fall to a similar figure.

The extra growth would eventually balance the U.S. budget, as it did during the Clinton years.

Once China, Germany and others agreed to a realignment of exchange rates and the tax ended, all nations would benefit from trading with a more rapidly growing and stable U.S. economy.

seekingalpha.com/article/238096-bernanke-is-right-chinese-mercantilism-not-fed-easy-money-is-making-a-mess

[sandi66]

Keep the dual mandate and back off the Fed, Geithner says
By Peter Schroeder - 11/22/10 09:19 AM ET

The Obama administration would oppose any efforts by Congress to remove the Federal Reserve's mandate to maximize employment, according to Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner.

He also pressed back on the growing tide of political pressure on the Fed over its policies in an interview that aired this weekend on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital With Al Hunt."

“It is very important to keep politics out of monetary policy,” Geithner said. “You want to be very careful not to take steps that hurt our credibility.”

Several major GOP leaders have come out in the last week in criticism of the Fed, in particular its decision to buy back $600 billion of long-term Treasury bonds as part of a second "quantitative easing" effort. Those politicians, including pending Speaker of the House John Boehner (R-Ohio), have said that effort could lead to a devaluing of the dollar and an increased risk of inflation.

Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.) and Rep. Mike (R-Ind.) also announced plans last week to introduce legislation that would strip the Fed of its dual mandate of pursuing policies that maximize employment and minimize inflation. Instead, they argued the Fed should focus exclusively on the inflation issue, while Congress should carry the load when it comes to encouraging employment.

Pence has already introduced legislation to this effect, while Corker is waiting to unveil his bill until the next Congress is sworn in in January.

thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/banking-financial-institutions/130323-keep-the-dual-mandate-and-back-off-the-fed-geithner-says