Wash. Post misleads on Obama administration plan
for GM ownership

In a June 2 Washington Post article about former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's (R) criticism of President Obama, reporter Chris Cillizza wrote that "Romney was on 'Fox News Sunday' taking issue with the administration's plan to put General Motors into bankruptcy to restructure the company," and then quoted Romney as saying: "We don't want a president and a head of the [United Auto Workers] running General Motors. ... The American public ought to own that enterprise." However, in quoting Romney's criticism, Cillizza did not note that the Obama administration has said it has "no desire" to own equity in GM "any longer than necessary," or that the administration reportedly plans to sell all of its shares in the company within 12 to 18 months.

In a May 30 document outlining the framework for restructuring GM, the Obama administration stated that one of its "core principles" regarding government ownership in private firms -- which "will apply to the U.S. government's equity stake in GM" -- is that it has "no desire to own equity stakes in companies any longer than necessary, and will seek to dispose of its ownership interests as soon as practicable." The White House also stated, "The government will not interfere with or exert control over day-to-day company operations," will "only vote on core governance issues," and will be "extremely disciplined" in how it exercises its shareholder rights. A "senior administration official" reaffirmed the government's position in a May 31 briefing, saying, "GM will emerge as part of the [Section 363 of the bankruptcy code] process; and then the company will continue, as we said, as a private company operating in the for-profit commercial role and so forth. And the government, as we indicated, is a reluctant -- will be a reluctant shareholder for only as long as is necessary, for as long as -- we will be out as soon as is practicable." The official continued: "During that period of time, we imagine that the taxpayers want us to be looking after their money, and so as we indicated, there will be people here watching over that investment, but as I indicated, in the nature of passive shareholders similar to Fidelity or some other large investment firm that has a large stake in a company."

According to a June 2 Los Angeles Times article, "[White House auto adviser Steve] Rattner said GM would emerge from bankruptcy a private company and become public again in 12 to 18 months. The government expects to sell its shares in a series of transactions over time to maximize the return." The article quoted Rattner as saying, "[W]hile we want to exit as soon as possible, we also want to exit as soon as practicable in terms of being good custodians of the taxpayers' money." Similarly, a June 1 Detroit News article reported that "GM will remain privately held for at least six to 18 months," and that "U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Detroit, said Monday it could be 'a few years' before the government sells its entire stake." The article also reported: "The government will have to sell its shares in chunks, likely in at least three separate transactions, Rattner said. Each sale could take at least six months."

From the Washington Post:

Less than 24 hours before hitting Obama on defense and national security, Romney was on "Fox News Sunday" taking issue with the administration's plan to put General Motors into bankruptcy to restructure the company.

"We don't want a president and a head of the [United Auto Workers] running General Motors," Romney said during the appearance. "The American public ought to own that enterprise."

Although Romney is derided by many Democrats, he is one of the most popular figures among the Republican faithful, many of whom believe his work on behalf of Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the GOP presidential nominee last year, proved his mettle.

Republicans also regard Romney as perhaps their most effective economic messenger, able to draw on his success in the private sector in combating Obama.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.mediamatters.org/~r/mediamatters/latest/~3/Ez3mdFBgZsk/200906020004

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Wash. Post 's Cillizza misled on Obama
administration plan for GM ownership

In a June 2 Washington Post article about former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney's (R) criticism of President Obama, reporter Chris Cillizza wrote that "Romney was on 'Fox News Sunday' taking issue with the administration's plan to put General Motors into bankruptcy to restructure the company," and then quoted Romney as saying: "We don't want a president and a head of the [United Auto Workers] running General Motors. ... The American public ought to own that enterprise." However, in quoting Romney's criticism, Cillizza did not note that the Obama administration has said it has "no desire" to own equity in GM "any longer than necessary," or that the administration reportedly plans to sell all of its shares in the company within 12 to 18 months.

In a May 30 document outlining the framework for restructuring GM, the Obama administration stated that one of its "core principles" regarding government ownership in private firms -- which "will apply to the U.S. government's equity stake in GM" -- is that it has "no desire to own equity stakes in companies any longer than necessary, and will seek to dispose of its ownership interests as soon as practicable." The White House also stated, "The government will not interfere with or exert control over day-to-day company operations," will "only vote on core governance issues," and will be "extremely disciplined" in how it exercises its shareholder rights. A "senior administration official" reaffirmed the government's position in a May 31 briefing, saying, "GM will emerge as part of the [Section 363 of the bankruptcy code] process; and then the company will continue, as we said, as a private company operating in the for-profit commercial role and so forth. And the government, as we indicated, is a reluctant -- will be a reluctant shareholder for only as long as is necessary, for as long as -- we will be out as soon as is practicable." The official continued: "During that period of time, we imagine that the taxpayers want us to be looking after their money, and so as we indicated, there will be people here watching over that investment, but as I indicated, in the nature of passive shareholders similar to Fidelity or some other large investment firm that has a large stake in a company."

According to a June 2 Los Angeles Times article, "[White House auto adviser Steve] Rattner said GM would emerge from bankruptcy a private company and become public again in 12 to 18 months. The government expects to sell its shares in a series of transactions over time to maximize the return." The article quoted Rattner as saying, "[W]hile we want to exit as soon as possible, we also want to exit as soon as practicable in terms of being good custodians of the taxpayers' money." Similarly, a June 1 Detroit News article reported that "GM will remain privately held for at least six to 18 months," and that "U.S. Sen. Carl Levin, D-Detroit, said Monday it could be 'a few years' before the government sells its entire stake." The article also reported: "The government will have to sell its shares in chunks, likely in at least three separate transactions, Rattner said. Each sale could take at least six months."

From the Washington Post:

Less than 24 hours before hitting Obama on defense and national security, Romney was on "Fox News Sunday" taking issue with the administration's plan to put General Motors into bankruptcy to restructure the company.

"We don't want a president and a head of the [United Auto Workers] running General Motors," Romney said during the appearance. "The American public ought to own that enterprise."

Although Romney is derided by many Democrats, he is one of the most popular figures among the Republican faithful, many of whom believe his work on behalf of Sen. John McCain (Ariz.), the GOP presidential nominee last year, proved his mettle.

Republicans also regard Romney as perhaps their most effective economic messenger, able to draw on his success in the private sector in combating Obama.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.mediamatters.org/~r/mediamatters/latest/~3/Ez3mdFBgZsk/200906020004

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Rush Limbaugh: Sotomayor is a Threat to
Republicans Civil Rights

I'd say that GOP pundits and politicos had jumped the shark, but I'm not even certain they know where the limits of ethical, sane discourse are any longer. Rush Limbaugh really has been Exhibit A.[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://christyhardinsmith.firedoglake.com/2009/06/02/scotus-rushgop-say-protect-t
he-wealthy-and-the-powerful-by-torpedoing-sotomayor/

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ThinkFast: June 2, 2009

President Obama hit back at former Vice President Dick Cheney’s recent criticism yesterday, saying that “he?happens to be wrong.” “Last time, immediately after his speech, I think there was a fact-check on his speech that didn’t get a very good grade,” said Obama in an interview with NPR.

General Motors (GM) marked “the lowest point” in its 100-year history yesterday, filing for bankruptcy and announcing plans to close 14 plants and three warehouses. With the federal government now a majority shareholder, President Obama said that his goals are: “To get G.M. back on its feet, take a hands-off approach and get out quickly.” In response, GOP leaders that they will use the government takeover of GM as “ammunition in their bid to defeat congressional Democrats next year.”

President Obama reversed his decision to release detainee abuse photos “after Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki warned that Iraq would erupt into violence and that Iraqis would demand that U.S. troops withdraw from Iraq a year earlier than planned.” Maliki told Obama, “Baghdad will burn” if the photos are released, a U.S. military official told McClatchy.

Hours before he leaves for the Middle East and Europe, Obama will meet at the White House today with the Democrats on two Senate committees that are drafting health legislation. The White House is also releasing a report today that asserts that revamping America’s health care system “would increase the income of a typical family of four by $2,600 in 2020, and by $10,000 in 2030.”

Last week, the State Department “sent a cable to its embassies and consulates around the world notifying them that ‘they may invite representatives from the government of Iran‘ to their Independence Day celebrations,” which usually “feature hot dogs, red-white-and-blue bunting and some perfunctory remarks about the founding fathers.” Obama administration officials “characterized the move as another in a series of American overtures to Iran.”

Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor today will attempt to “woo key senators who will decide if she merits a seat on the Supreme Court” in a series of 10 meetings on the hill. She will lunch with “two boosters, her home state Sens. Kirsten Gillibrand and Chuck Schumer.”

Hate radio host Michael Savage has officially sued British Home Secretary Jacqui Smith for banning Savage from the UK for “fomenting hatred.” While Smith declared “herself ready for a fight,” the BBC is reporting today that Smith “is expected to stand down as home secretary in a reshuffle.”

Education Secretary Arne Duncan “wants to take school turnaround efforts nationwide on a scale never tried before,” aiming to close and reconstitute 250 schools next year. “Mr. Duncan controls $3 billion in the economic stimulus law that could go to school turnarounds, and the administration?s 2010 budget requests $1.5 billion more.”

And finally: NBC’s Brian Williams goes inside the White House. Watch the segments here.

Sign up here to receive our daily e-newsletter, The Progress Report.

Read The Full Article:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/06/02/thinkfast-june-2-2009/

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Group friendly to GOP equates Sotomayor with Klan

The Council of Conservative Citizens, a southern group that has been wooed by former GOP Senate leader Trent Lott and current GOP presidential hopeful Haley Barbour, has a doctored photo on its Web site of Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor in KKK garb. The CCC also calls Sotomayor "whitey hating."

The ADL says that the CCC is an "extremist group" that is "squarely within Southern racist traditions." The Southern Poverty Law Center calls the CCC "brazenly racist." More from SPLC on the CCC:

[A] hate group that routinely denigrated blacks as "genetically inferior," complained about "Jewish power brokers," called homosexuals "perverted sodomites," accused immigrants of turning America into a "slimy brown mass of glop," and named Lester Maddox, the baseball bat-wielding, arch-segregationist former governor of Georgia, "Patriot of the Century."

The ADL and the SPLC both note that former GOP chairman, and current GOP presidential hopeful, Haley Barbour spoke to a CCC gathering after the scandal that ensued when Trent Lott's associations with the group were revealed (in other words, Barber knew full well what the group was about and he still wooed them). Someone needs to ask Republican party chair Michael Steele, who is himself black, what he thinks of the Council of Conservative Citizens, of Haley Barbour wooing them, and of the CCC comparing Sotomayor to the Klan.

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Americablog/~3/2RaHIKlQtq8/group-friendly-to-gop-e
quates-sotomayor.html

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Pro-Life States Have Lower Abortion Rates

States with higher numbers of adults who identify themselves as "pro-life" have lower rates of abortion among both teenage and adult women.

The chart below compares the percentage of pregnancies in each state that ended in abortion in 2005 to a SurveyUSA poll conducted in that same year that asked residents of all 50 states to identify themselves as pro-choice or pro-life. A couple of caveats about the abortion data: although it comes from the CDC (.pdf), it relies on voluntary reporting from each state health agency. Some states, like Florida and Louisiana, do not report their abortion statistics, and in other cases -- Kentucky's figures are suspiciously low when compared to Tennessee's, for instance -- it may be subject to various sorts of imperfections, as the reporting of abortion statistics can have some political implications. Also, there is some ambiguity about the number of abortions in a particular state versus the number by residents of that state; for instance, a lot of women in Idaho travel to Washington to get abortions, which has more liberal abortion laws (there appear to be similar flows from Mississippi into Alabama, South Dakota into North Dakota, and Missouri into Kansas, among others). We report the latter total, with a correction for those women whose state of residence was not identified. Nevertheless, those caveats aside, the relationship is pretty strong:



The modest outlier you see in the top left-hand corner is New York, which was one of four states (the others are Alaska, Hawaii and Washington) in which abortion was completely legal prior to the Roe v Wade decision and has particularly liberal abortion laws. It seems, however, that people do practice what they preach. For each increase of about 10 percent in the number of residents who identify themselves as pro-life, the percentage of pregnancies ending in abortion is reduced by about 5 percent.

The pattern is slightly more profound when we look at teenage (girls aged 15-19) pregnancies, among whom a higher fraction of pregnancies (at least a quarter) end in abortion and where there is larger state-to-state variance: more than half of teenage pregnancies in New York end in abortion, for instance, versus less than 15 percent in some states like West Virginia, Arizona and South Dakota (and purportedly only 5 percent in Kentucky, but as we mentioned before we find that figure dubious). For teenagers, the CDC reports data based only on the number of abortions in a particular state and not by state of residence; we apply a correction for this to attempt to identify the latter figure.



The correlation there is quite strong -- about .77.

It might be objected that those states that have more pro-life residents may have more restrictive abortion laws; I ran a regression analysis to test for the impact of things like parental notification requirements and waiting periods and generally did not find any significant relationships, although it does appear that the four states in which abortion was legal before Roe maintain somewhat higher abortion rates today. I also tested for the impact of a few types of demographic variables and some were statistically significant in some formulations of the model (higher rates of teenage pregnancy, for instance, were correlated with higher abortion rates after controlling for other variables). None of these, however, invalidated the pro-life variable, which was highly statistically significant in all versions of the analysis.

One complication, however, is that of access. According to the Guttmacher Institute, approximately one-third of American women live in a county where there is no abortion provider. There is a very strong (inverse) relationship, additionally, between having access to an abortion provider in one's county, and the pro-life leanings of that state.



Do pro-life states have fewer abortion providers because there is less demand for abortions in those states? Or, alternatively, is there social stigma attached in these states to running an abortion clinic, meaning that less of the demand is met?

Undoubtedly the answer is some of both. The regression analysis hints that access is not a strong causal factor -- from what it can gather, the pro-life tendencies of a state drives both the lower number of abortions among its residence and the relative absence of abortion clinics, rather than access directly impacting the abortion figures. On the other hand, because all of these variables are so strongly correlated, it is hard for the model to disentangle them.

The Guttmacher institute data, however, suggests that abortion providers in pro-life states carry a larger caseload. Abortion clinics in the 15 most pro-life states performed an average of 949 abortions in 2005; those in pro-choice states performed an average of 576. (In this case, we are reverting back to using data based on the state in which the abortion was actually performed -- not the woman's state of residence). This may imply that there are either too few providers in pro-life states to meet the demand for abortion (or too many in pro-choice states) -- although clearly many women who want an abortion are willing to travel for one.

State Clinics Abort. Ratio
15 Most Pro-Life States   
UT 6 3,630 605
LA 9 11,400 1,267
AR 3 4,710 1,570
ID 7 1,810 259
AL 13 11,340 872
MS 2 3,090 1,545
WV 4 2,360 590
KY 3 3,870 1,290
TN 13 18,140 1,395
IN 15 11,150 743
SD 2 790 395
MO 7 8,400 1,200
OK 6 6,950 1,158
NE 6 3,220 537
ND 1 1,230 1,230
TOTAL 97 92,090 949
   
State Clinics Abort. Ratio
15 Most Pro-Choice States   
VT 12 1,490 124
CT 52 16,780 323
NY 261 155,960 598
MA 45 27,270 606
CA 424 208,430 492
NH 13 3,170 244
MD 41 37,590 917
NJ 85 61,150 719
DE 9 5,150 572
WA 49 23,260 475
RI 4 5,290 1,323
NV 8 13,530 1,691
OR 32 13,200 413
ME 13 2,770 213
IL 38 50,970 1,341
TOTAL 1086 626,010 576

What would be interesting for both pro-lifers and pro-choicers to know, however, is the relationship between access and abortion rates. If it's a three-hour drive to the nearest clinic, how many women will ultimately wind up forsaking an abortion (and how many will have an illegal abortion instead)? I'm not going to try and sum this up with a nice, sugary conclusion. This is a complicated issue and, appropriately enough, it has complicated answers, even when it comes to its statistics.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.fivethirtyeight.com/2009/06/pro-life-states-have-lower-abortion.html

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Election day in NJ

The 2009 election season officially starts today with the Republican primary for Governor in New Jersey:

Former U.S. Attorney Chris Christie and former Bogota Mayor Steve Lonegan spent months sparring over taxes, spending, the state Supreme Court and a host of other issues, meeting in four debates in May.
...
While Christie outpaced Lonegan by about 20 points in recent polls, both spent the weekend crisscrossing the state to scrounge up every last vote.
...
There are slightly more than 1 million Republicans registered to vote in New Jersey, up by 21 percent from the last gubernatorial primary four years ago. Registered Democrats number about 1.8 million, an increase of 55 percent from 2005. The state's 2.4 million unaffiliated voters can also take part in the primary if they register with a party when voting today.

However, past primaries have been marked by low turnout. In 2005, just under 580,000 people -- or 12 percent of those registered -- turned out to vote. It's been 20 years since as many as one-fifth of New Jersey's eligible voters cast ballots in a gubernatorial primary. -Newark Star-Ledger

Democratic Governor Jon Corzine will face the winner in November. Polls close at 8:00 Eastern tonight. We'll have results here.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.Demconwatchblog.com/diary/1640/election-day-in-nj

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Pat Buchanan Calls Sotomayor a "Lightweight" and
"Anti-White" Judge

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Pat Buchanan on Washington Journal continues his trashing of Sonia Sotomayor as an affirmative action, lightweight, anti-white judge. He repeats the better portion of his May 29th op-ed Obama's Idea of Justice with a few additional insults thrown in for good measure.

Media Matters has an article with his op-ed posted and links to some of his talking points that they've already debunked.

During this interview Buchanan went even further than the op-ed and said this when asked about calling her a "lightweight":

Buchanan: Well I, again in that Saturday piece, she went to Princeton. She graduated first in her class it said. But she herself said she read, basically classic children's books to read and learn the language and she read basic English grammars and she got help from tutors. I think that, I mean if you're, frankly if you're in college and you're working on Pinocchio or on the troll under the bridge, I don't think that's college work.

Here's the portion of the New York Times article Buchanan was referencing.

Judge Sotomayor is not known to have identified herself as a beneficiary of affirmative action, but she has described her academic struggles as a new student at Princeton from a Roman Catholic school in the Bronx ? one of about 20 Hispanics on a campus with more than 2,000 students.

She spent summers reading children?s classics she had missed in a Spanish-speaking home and ?re-teaching? herself to write ?proper English? by reading elementary grammar books. Only with the outside help of a professor who served as her mentor did she catch up academically, ultimately graduating at the top of her class.

I've heard a lot of ignorant B.S. from Buchanan over the last week or so, but this one takes the cake. He questions whether she actually even graduated at the top of her class or at best deserved to when you see him qualifying the reporting on her class rank with "it said". Then he tries to equate someone doing what they needed to in order to make up for a less than stellar education growing up and equates that with her "college work". Never mind "it said" that she did eventually make her way to the head of the class and overcome that hurdle.

You're a real piece of work Buchanan. I expect we'll be treated to more of this on Morning Joe or one of Pat's other countless appearances on MSNBC for the week.

Buchanan goes on to compare Sotomayor's intellectual rigor to that of, among others, .... Clarence Thomas.

Buchanan: But I will say this. She's going to have an opportunity up before that hearing to demonstrate she's a Scalia, or an Alito, or a John Roberts, or a Clarence Thomas in terms of understanding the law.

Yeah, Clarance Thomas. The guy who doesn't even want to stay awake during court. He then says that her "whole career is about affirmative action". Where the hell is Lawrence O'Donnell when you need him? C-SPAN treated everyone to an hour of this garbage this morning.

Think Progress and their wonderful think tank over there took Buchanan to task for me as well. Thank you Amanda for and the rest of the crew there for the great work you're doing and for some additional analysis on Buchanan's remarks.

Read The Full Article:
http://videocafe.crooksandliars.com/heather/pat-buchanan-calls-sotomayor-lightwei
ght

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If you build it....

The real field in Dyersville is actually borne of division, two feuding families each owning half the ballfield property... that is really not what I expected when searching for this image, but why I am I not surprised it fits this introduction[...]

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Docudharma/~3/T_ryfDVT_ok/if-you-build-it

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Daily Futures Commentary June 2, 2009

Read The Full Article:
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/jutiagroup/~3/JkGTOUJnepU/

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