AMERICAN CONSERVATISM IN 2008 AND BEYOND

Unfortunately, far too many news anchors and journalists are being replaced by unethical pundits (like Limbaugh, Hannity, and Beck) who sidestep the facts (because facts are inconvenient) and resort to unsupportable grandstanding to inflame their viewers and to boost their ratings (and the money in their pockets).

Surely you remember the Dan Rather debacle, when he and his network tried to ambush Bush with forged documents....

Fox News Channel
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"Fox News" redirects here. For other uses, see Fox News (disambiguation).
The satellite radio rebroadcast is not to be confused with Fox News Radio.
Fox News Channel
Launched October 7, 1996

Slogan "Fair & Balanced";
"We Report. You Decide";
"The Most Powerful Name in News"


Fox News Channel (colloquially known as FOX News and abbreviated as FNC) is a major American-based Cable News and satellite news channel owned by the Fox Entertainment Group, a subsidiary of News Corporation. As of April 2009, it is available to 102 million households in the U.S. and further to viewers internationally, broadcasting primarily out of its New York City studios.

The channel was created by Australian-American media mogul Rupert Murdoch, who hired Republican political strategist and former NBC executive Roger Ailes as its founding CEO. The channel was launched on October 7, 1996[1] to 17 million cable subscribers. The network slowly rose to prominence in the late 1990s. In the United States, Fox News Channel has been rated as the cable news network with the largest number of regular viewers.[2]

Critics and some observers of the channel say that Fox News Channel promotes conservative political positions. Fox News Channel publicly denies any bias in the channel's reporting.

The Fox Report with Shepard Smith remains the top-rated newscast in cable news and is ranked third in the top programs in cable news.[3] Shepard Smith tied for second (along with Dan Rather and Peter Jennings) most trusted news anchor on both network and cable news in a 2003 TV Guide poll.[4] In addition to anchoring Fox News Channel's flagship news program, Smith also anchors most prime time news presentations provided by Fox News for the Fox television network.

You dare talk to ME about HONOR? Now that is funny.

I just have a hard time believing two guys about the same age on opposite sides of the country would walk in 100% lockstep, would use identical style of sentence structure, identical misspellings, identical phraseaology, agree on every point, and would so consistently show up to reinforce each other when one gets into a sticky situation. But it's possible.

(At least that is the case since you stopped pretending to not be able to spell, capitalize, or punctuate at all.)

However, if I am wrong, I of course will say so.

I will be on the east coast in the late summer. Where can we meet?

Meanwhile, since you refused my challenge, you are still checkmated.

Busting Bank of America
A case study in how to spread systemic financial risk.

The cavalier use of brute government force has become routine, but the emerging story of how Hank Paulson and Ben Bernanke forced CEO Ken Lewis to blow up Bank of America is still shocking. It's a case study in the ways that panicky regulators have so often botched the bailout and made the financial crisis worse.

In the name of containing "systemic risk," our regulators spread it. In order to keep Mr. Lewis quiet, they all but ordered him to deceive his own shareholders. And in the name of restoring financial confidence, they have so mistreated Bank of America that bank executives everywhere have concluded that neither Treasury nor the Federal Reserve can be trusted.

Mr. Lewis has told investigators for New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo that in December Mr. Paulson threatened him not to cancel a deal to buy Merrill Lynch. BofA had discovered billions of dollars in undisclosed Merrill losses, and Mr. Lewis was considering invoking his rights under a material adverse condition clause to kill the merger. But Washington decided that America's financial system couldn't withstand a Merrill failure, and that BofA had to risk its own solvency to save it. So then-Treasury Secretary Paulson, who says he was acting at the direction of Federal Reserve Chairman Bernanke, told Mr. Lewis that the feds would fire him and his board if they didn't complete the deal.

Mr. Paulson told Mr. Lewis that the government would provide cash from the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) to help BofA swallow Merrill. But since the government didn't want to reveal this new federal investment until after the merger closed, Messrs. Paulson and Bernanke rejected Mr. Lewis's request to get their commitment in writing.

"We do not want a disclosable event," Mr. Lewis says Mr. Paulson told him. "We do not want a public disclosure." Imagine what would happen to a CEO who said that.

After getting the approval of his board, Mr. Lewis executed the Paulson-Bernanke order without informing his shareholders of the material events taking place at Merrill. The merger closed on January 1. But investors and taxpayers had to wait weeks to learn that the government had invested another $20 billion plus loan portfolio insurance in BofA, and that Merrill had lost a staggering $15 billion in the last three months of 2008.

This was the second time in three months that Washington had forced Bank of America to take federal money. In his testimony to the New York AG's office, Mr. Lewis noted that an earlier TARP investment in his bank had a "dilutive effect" on existing shareholders and was not requested by BofA. "We had not sought any funds. We were taking 15 [billion dollars] at the request of Hank [Paulson] and others," Mr. Lewis testified.

But it is the Merrill deal that raises the most troubling questions. Evaluating the policy of Messrs. Bernanke and Paulson on their own terms, this transaction fundamentally increased systemic risk. In order to save a Wall Street brokerage, the feds spread the risk to one of the country's largest deposit-taking banks. If they were convinced that Merrill had to be saved, then they should have made the public case for it. And the first obligation of due diligence is to make sure that their Merrill "rescuer" of choice -- BofA -- had the capacity to bear the losses. Instead they transplanted the Merrill risk to BofA shareholders, the bank's depositors and the taxpayers who ensure those deposits. And then they had to bail out BofA too.

Messrs. Bernanke and Paulson also undermined the transparency that is a vital source of investor confidence. Disclosure is not a luxury to be enjoyed only when markets are rising. It is the foundation of the American regulatory system and a reason investors have long sought to keep their money within U.S. borders. Could either man have believed that their actions wouldn't eventually come to light, with all of the repercussions for their bank rescue plans?

Mr. Paulson told Mr. Cuomo's investigators that he also kept former SEC Chairman Christopher Cox out of the loop while forcing BofA to rescue Merrill. Mr. Cox wasn't the only one. Mr. Paulson and Mr. Bernanke both sit on the Financial Stability Oversight Board, comprised of federal regulators who oversee TARP. Two days after Mr. Lewis told the dynamic duo that Merrill's losses were exploding and that he was looking for a way out, Mr. Bernanke chaired and Mr. Paulson attended a meeting of this board. Minutes of the meeting show no mention of BofA or Merrill.

At the next meeting on January 8, a week after the merger had closed, the minutes again make no mention of either regulator telling their colleagues that they had committed tens of billions of dollars. Yet the minutes helpfully note that among the topics discussed were "coordination, transparency and oversight."

Meeting minutes suggest Messrs. Bernanke and Paulson finally informed fellow board members at 4:30 p.m. on January 15, after news outlets had already reported a pending new taxpayer investment in BofA. What exactly did Mr. Bernanke and Mr. Paulson tell their colleagues about their plans for TARP prior to January 15?

Let's hope they treated their government colleagues better than they've treated Ken Lewis, whom they hung out to dry. After making him an offer he could hardly refuse, they've let him endure a public flogging from shareholders and the press, lengthy discussions with prosecutors, plus new hiring and compensation rules that limit his bank's ability to compete.

No wonder no banker in his right mind trusts the Fed or Treasury, and no wonder nobody but Pimco and other Treasury favorites is eager to invest in the TALF, the PPIP, or any of the other programs that require trusting the government as a business partner.

The political class has spent the last few months blaming bankers for everything that has gone wrong in the financial system, and no doubt many banks have earned public scorn. But Washington has been complicit every step of the way, from the Fed's easy money to the nurturing of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and since last autumn with regulatory and Congressional panic that is making financial repair that much harder. The men who nearly ruined Bank of America have some explaining to do.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB124078909572557575.html

STERLING HEIGHTS, Mich. -- The United Auto Workers union would eventually own 55% of the stock in a restructured Chrysler LLC under the deal reached by the union and the auto maker, according to a summary of the agreement that was reviewed by the Wall Street Journal.

The summary also says Fiat SpA will "eventually" own 35% of Chrysler, and that the U.S. government and Chrysler's secured lenders together will end up owning 10% of the company, once it is reorganized.

The summary was distributed Monday afternoon at a gathering of union leaders to discuss the pact. The deal was announced Sunday night. The UAW aims to have Chrysler workers vote to ratify the agreement, which requires changes to the union's current contract with the company, by April 29.

According to the summary, Chrysler will also pay a $4.587 billion note into the trust fund, or VEBA, that the union will manage and use to take over the cost of providing health care for retired workers. The agreement says Chrysler will pay $300 million in cash into the VEBA in 2010 and 2011, and increasing amounts up to $823 million in the years 2019 to 2023.

The VEBA will also own a "significant" amount of Chrysler stock and will be allowed to appoint a representative to Chrysler's board, the summary says. In the future the VEBA will be allowed to sell the stock to other parties, it says.

Among other cost-cutting measures Chrysler and the UAW have agreed to are a suspension of cost-of-living-adjustments, or COLAs, and new limits on overtime pay. Workers will only be paid for overtime after they have worked at least 40 hours in a week. Chrysler workers will also lose their Easter Monday holiday in 2010 and 2011, the summary says.

Fiat has agreed to produce at least one small car in a Chrysler plant in the U.S., and to allow Chrysler to use a 3.0-liter diesel engine and a 1.4-liter gasoline engine in its vehicles. Fiat's investment, which the summary said Chrysler estimates is worth $8 billion, will "create 4,000 new UAW jobs in the U.S."

To ensure all Chrysler stakeholders are sacrificing to help the company recover, Chrysler will provide the UAW with quarterly "updates" and the contributions by "executives, CEOs, dealers, suppliers and other constituents." The summary says.

Sean Hannity said last week he would volunteer to be waterboarded for charity last weekend, but he hasn't even responded to Keith Olbermann's offer to pay him $1000/second.

Typical conservative all talk and no action.

When this happens with someone from Obama's admin in 2013, no pissing and moaning from liberals. And it will happen, next admin and far into the future…

Your threat that payback is a bitch is meaningless. By advocating immunity from investigation and prosecution of criminal activity for government officials, you are inviting them to break the law. In this country, however, no one is above the law. We don't carve out exceptions for government officials.

Janet Reno was investigated by the Janet Reno Justice Department, among other entities.

It would have been much more impartial if the Bush admin had launched an investigation after the Clinton admin left office, right?

In fact, with a repub president and a repub congress, they could have certainly examined the issue in detail, leading to prosecutions.

They could determine Clinton admin officials had broken the law, violating the constitution, and brought the appropriate people to justice.

Didn't happen then, but something similar will occur in the future.

In fact, it pales next to interning US citizens, wouldn't you say?

When you stop worshipping Bush's imperial presidency, maybe your head will be clear enough for you to understand that torture and abuse is never acceptable. How much restitution do we owe a human being for nearly suffocating him to death 183 times? How do we make amends to the whole world and regain our moral center? We can start by investigating and prosecuting those responsible for the torture and abuse.

Moreover the events at hand involved only three people

The previous administration claimed the information so gathered contributed significantly to the interception of a planned attack in Los Angeles and unspecified others.

War crimes will be prosecuted, war criminals will be punished and it will be no defense to say, “I was just following orders.”