Abbreviated Pundit Round-Up

post from Daily Kos on 20 November 2008 06:33:05 AM. © Daily Kos

Your one stop pundit shop.

Nicholas Kristof warns Barack Obama that he:

...needs a new approach to Russia if we want to avoid a new cold war, and we also need to get over our crush on Misha.

Chris Suellentropp makes the case that this has been the worst year ever for mavericks.

David Ignatius is concerned that Barack Obama is lonely.

Gary Andres says that an apathetic GOP cost John McCain the election.

Donald Lambro ~~solemnly~~ gleefully predicts that Barack Obama won't be able to keep his campaign promises of tax cuts and health care.

Karl Rove is worried about comity, legalities, and playing politics with the Justice Department.

Matthew J. Kotchen and Laura E. Grant argue that:

While daylight time reduces demand for household lighting, it increases demand for heating in the early spring and late fall (in the mornings) and, even more important, or cooling on summer evenings. Benjamin Franklin was right about candles, in other words, but he did not consider air-conditioners. [...]

Eliminating daylight time would thus accord with President-elect Barack Obama’s stated goals of conserving resources, saving money, promoting energy security and reducing climate change. At the very least, we should abandon the notion that we are saving energy while enjoying the extra hour of sunlight on hot summer evenings.

Michael Kinsley says that smoking is a digusting habit that can kill, but Barack Obama should just quit pretending and light one up if it's what helps him keep his cool.

Joan Vennochi thinks that Mitt Romney wants to run again in 20012, and points out that:

If the auto industry could reinvent itself as quickly as Mitt Romney, it wouldn't need a bailout.

Let Detroit go bankrupt, Romney opined in yesterday's New York Times...Just last January, Romney won Michigan's Republican primary by telling autoworkers what they wanted to hear...

Back then, he never mentioned bankruptcy as the way to do it.

Never underestimate Romney's willingness to shamelessly reverse direction, to get where he wants to go.

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Will Henry Paulson Sink Detroit

post from TPMCafe on 20 November 2008 06:31:00 AM. © TPMCafe

Henry Paulson's main claim to fame is getting just about everything wrong in his tenure as Treasury secretary. However, he now stands to gain lasting notoriety as the person who destroyed the domestic U.S. auto industry, and the economies of the Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana along with them.

The story is that the big three automakers are struggling with record sales declines. This collapse in car sales in turn is the fallout from the collapse of the Greenspan-Bernanke housing bubble. While the domestic automakers have been hit hardest, all manufacturers have seen sharp drops in sales. Toyota's sales were down 23.0 percent compared with its year ago levels. Honda's sales were down 25.2 percent, and Nissan's sales fell 33.0 percent.

These huge plunges in year over year sales by the world's top car manufacturers can't be blamed on the industry. Responsibility for this plunge lies with Mr. Paulson and other economic policy makers, and their Wall Street friends.

The basic arithmetic is simple. General Motors saw its sales fall by 45 percent compared to its year ago levels. That means its revenue has been cut nearly in half. While it has made some reductions in employment and can ease back its production, there is no way it can reduce its expenses by the same amount. Many of its expenses, like interest costs, property taxes, and health insurance for retirees are largely fixed independent of short-term fluctuations in output.

As a result General Motors is now losing close to $2 billion a month. At this rate, it will burn through its capital in around 2 months and be forced into bankruptcy. Chrysler and Ford are in somewhat better shape, but the basic story is the same. Furthermore, the fallout from a GM bankruptcy could sink Chrysler and Ford as well, as common suppliers shut down and credit for the industry vanishes and customers flee to manufacturers with longer life expectancies.

There have been analysts, presumably including Henry Paulson, who think that bankruptcy is a reasonable solution for the auto industry. This is yet another of Mr. Paulson's famous mistakes. (Remember, this guy missed the housing bubble completely, thought its impact would be small when it burst, didn't see a problem with letting Lehman Brothers fail, and thought the TARP [RIP] was a good idea.)

Bankruptcy would allow GM, Ford and Chrysler to more quickly cut back their bloated dealer networks and adjust their car lines with current market demand, as its proponents claim. Bankruptcy would also void union contracts, which will thrill the millionaire bankers by forcing workers earning $57,000 a year to take pay cuts. And, all those lazy retirees will see the health care benefits that they worked for taken away.

That's the good part. Realistically, bankruptcy is likely to kill all three manufacturers, taking down much of the region's economy with them.

First, some folks may recall the credit crunch. Lenders are extremely reluctant to take risks. In the absence of government guarantees, it is unlikely that any banks will step forward to provide GM and the others the money they need to keep operating in bankruptcy. In other words, bankruptcy is very likely to mean a complete shutdown of the Big Three.

Let's say that the anti-bailout crowd suddenly gets a soft spot and decides to guarantee loans to the firms operating under bankruptcy protection. There is still the problem of selling cars. Customers will be very reluctant to buy cars produced by a manufacturer in bankruptcy, since they won't know if a dealer and supplier network will exist in 3 or 4 years so that they can get their car serviced and buy replacement parts.

While people don't mind flying an airline in bankruptcy, buying a car is to some extent an investment in the company. Many fewer customers will be willing to invest in a bankrupt car company.

But let's assume that the investment financing is arranged and that customers are still willing to come through the doors. The bankruptcy itself is still likely to be devastating to the economies of Michigan, Ohio, and Indiana, the three states where Big Three employment is concentrated.

Bankruptcy protects the firm from its creditors. The creditors of these firms are thousands of suppliers who are heavily concentrated in the same states. In most cases, the Big Three manufacturers were their major customers. These suppliers have already been squeezed by falling demand and lower product prices. If they cannot collect the money owed them by the Big Three, there will be a whole chain of secondary bankruptcies.

The impact in these states is potentially huge. According to the Center for Automotive Research, auto related employment accounts for almost 7 percent of total employment in Michigan, 6 percent in Indiana, and 5 percent in Ohio. Losing 7 percent of total employment in Michigan would be equivalent to losing more than 9 million jobs nationwide.

That is Mr. Paulson's latest plan for the auto industry and these three states. This will be quite a legacy.

There is one last point that should really gall just about everyone. Mr. Paulson has argued that he does not have the legal authority to use the money appropriated for TARP for bailing out the auto industry.

This claim is outrageous for two reasons. As many of us who opposed the TARP argued, it gave Paulson a virtual blank check, and that is pretty much how he has interpreted it, using the money to bail out a wide range of non-bank institutions.

The other reason why this is so galling is that this is an administration that has taken pride in claiming virtually unlimited powers in a wide range of areas, including the conduct of war and holding of prisoners without charges or trial. It would be incredible if they allow Detroit to sink because they claim that they don't have the legal authority to save it.

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Obama Family Secret Service Code Names

post from DemConWatch on 20 November 2008 06:27:00 AM. © DemConWatch

Back in the days before encrypted technology, the Secret Service used to attribute code names to the First Family for security purposes. They no longer serve as a security function, but the Secret Service still grants names for brevity and tradition. This list reveals code names for the incoming administration:

President-elect Barack Obama: Renegade

Michelle Obama: Renaissance

Malia Obama: Radiance

Sasha Obama: Rosebud

Vice President-elect Joe Biden: Celtic

Jill Biden: Capri

Traditionally, Secret Service code names are common terms which are easily understood. Typically the First Family names all start with the same letter.

As an aside: ever wonder why Secret Service agents seem to always wear sunglasses? Part of the reason is the same reason we all wear sunglasses - to reduce glare. But they also serve as a screen so that would-be assailants have a harder time figuring out exactly where the agents are looking.

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Dinosaur Dingell goes down!

post from AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth on 20 November 2008 06:26:00 AM. © AMERICAblog News| A great nation deserves the truth

Hallelujah.

Congressman John Dingell of Michigan just lost his chairmanship of the House Energy and Commerce Committee to California congressman Henry Waxman. Ding dong.

Dingell was horrible. A suck up for the auto industry, he stymied efforts to increase the fuel efficiency of American cars (how's that going for the industry now that everyone is buying more fuel efficient foreign cars?) This committee will oversee global warming legislation. Do we really want some dinosaur in the pocket of the auto industry deciding whether we cut back on our fuel emissions? Dingell was a disaster for any kind of progressive politics. He was an auto industry spokesman, and now he's history. The House shows us how change is really done.

(If only Dingell had pulled a Lieberman and stabbed Obama in the back he could have been made Speaker.)

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You Don't Know Dick - Indictments

post from uncomfortably numb on 20 November 2008 06:21:00 AM. © uncomfortably numb

November 19, 2008You Don't Know Dick - Indictments From The Daily Show with Jon StewartGuess which prison-related business Dick Cheney is getting indicted for.

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Endangered Species Act may become extinct
tomorrow

post from Docudharma - Front Page on 20 November 2008 06:19:30 AM. © Docudharma - Front Page

While the Bush administration is certainly in its last throes, their officials still have a significant amount of damage left to inflict on our country. Furthering the Republicans war against science, the Bush administration is near finalizing a[...]

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A New Day, a New Cycle, a New Blog!

post from Boyda Bloc on 20 November 2008 06:16:00 AM. © Boyda Bloc

First off, to all of the people out there who visited this blog more than 35,000 times in the last year, we simply can't say how honored we are you took time out of your day to read us.

Isn't that amazing? 35,000 hits since Oct. 15 of 2007. On top of that, we've got more than 500 friends on Facebook, we've been featured on the front pages of the biggest blogs in the nation- not bad for team of kids from Kansas.

This race certainly, certainly didn't end the way we wanted it to- Congresswoman Nancy Boyda wasn't beaten because she was a poor Member of Congress, she was beaten by the same forces this blog was started in order to combat: Unfounded, unsubstantiated attacks from the Republican Party. Nancy's right- It's ironic she ran a campaign to prove to the country you can win without being negative, only to be defeated by a pointedly negative campaign.

But one must move on.

So, today we're here to say goodbye to Boyda Bloc, but to invite all of you to read a new blog, just launched yesterday by a few of our team members: KansasJackass.com

KansasJackass.com will operate in the sound tradition of right-wing blogs like The Kansas Republican and Stay Red Kansas- covering Kansas politics as a whole, legislative on up to federal, with has much witty and pith as humanly possible. 'Course, our former colleagues will be significantly better at it than the Republican currently are (or, at least, you can expect them to post more than once ever full moon).

So, please, bookmark, subscribe, or otherwise follow the new Kansas lefty blog KansasJackass- we're sure you won't be disappointed.

Democratically yours,

The Boyda Bloc Team

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A document saved from the Army's shredder

A soldier who was ordered to shred documents about two soldiers killed in an apparent friendly fire incident rescued some of the paperwork and provided it to Salon.From Salon - Editor's note: On Oct. 14, 2008, Salon published an article about the deaths of Army Pfc. Albert Nelson and Pfc. Roger Suarez. The Army attributed their deaths in Iraq in 2006 to enemy action; Salon's investigation, which included graphic battle video and eyewitness testimony, indicated that their deaths were likely...

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House: Commerce and Energy

Henry Waxman, of California, is taking over the chair of the House Committee on Commerce and Energy from John Dingell of Michigan, based on a secret ballot this morning.

Why you care:

1. This upends the seniority system that has always been in place in the House. (Or at least as long as I can remember).

2. Waxman is an environmentalist. Dingell, not so much.

More to follow.

Read The Full Article:
http://www.demconwatchblog.com/2008/11/house-commerce-and-energy.html

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How an Anarchist society could function

The author of these videos is an anarcho-capitalist. I would personally tweak a few points and make it much more worker-centric and communal, however, what I'm attracted to in these videos are the problems the left hasn't been able to solve, namely currency and defense/police. I still consider myself very much on the left, but we must stop assuming human nature will change. Whenever we're asked about money or the police in a future, stateless arrangement the best we offer is: "From each according to his abilities to each according to his needs" and "People won't want to commit crimes in the future." Which is just gobbiltygook. No matter how corrupt a person is he or she will respond to incentives and that's what these videos attempt to articulate.

Like it or not a stateless society must be a "free market", a patchwork of communists, syndicalists, agorists, mutualists, capitalists, etc. and that's what will make that future system so beautiful. Don't like capitalism? No problem join a commune, or become a hard-line individualist and journey out into the woods Thoreau style. There can even be a mixing of approaches such as an internally socialistic community with direct democracy and mixed labor roles that sells their commodities on the open market. The concepts are worth your time and merit closer inspection for anyone who upholds liberty as an essential value.

Monopolies

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Police

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Health Care

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Roads

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Education

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Defense

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Courts

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Currency

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