Below The Magic 50

Obama's approval rating has dropped below 50% in the Gallup daily tracking poll for the first time. How does his first foray below 50% approval compare to other post-war presidents?[...]

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_50.php

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Abeckalypse Now!

They just don't make them any crazier than Glenn Beck:

Transcript (new line signals edit point):

   What's in this legislation? The end of America as you know it, I believe.

   We are taking about massive, sweeping change. American's showed up by the hundreds of thousands at various tea parties to demand the opposite of this: stop spending money. But look at these bills. Look at this. This is a fundamental transformation of America.

   Massive changes to the way you live your life. The Senate plans to pass this mess before Christmas.

   I don't want to believe the things I believe about what's happening in Washington, but we have a President who has surrounded himself not with free-market system lovers. These are people that don't want to increase America's prosperity, they are spending us into oblivion for their own purposes.

   Obama is trying to overwhelm the system right now with massive new government takeover programs. I mean look at these bills. This is just for health care. Stimulus. This is insanity.

   Obama is insisting on this all at once. His entire transformation America package all with twelve months of his administration.

   We are talking here America about the end of our way of life.

   This is not some wild conspiracy tale.

   They already control our banks.

   They control the auto industry.

   Control the temperature inside of your home.

   Control of one-sixth of the economy.

   Taking over the internet in the name of neutrality.

   They are moving at the speed of light and we've got to get up off of our couches and get into their offices.

   If we don't stop this insanity now, they will fundamentally transform America. It must end. You must make a choice. This, or this.

Well, Beck's got one thing right. This is insane.

Read The Full Article:
http://feeds.dailykos.com/~r/dailykos/index/~3/iHyjwdK1iC8/-Abeckalypse-Now!

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Bush Justice officials support trying terror
suspects in civilian court.

Saying that critics are “understating the criminal justice system’s capacities,” two top Bush Justice officials came out in support of Attorney General Eric Holder’s decision to try Khalid Sheik Mohammed and other Guantanamo detainees in federal court. Writing in the Washington Post, Jim Comey, former deputy attorney general and U.S. attorney in Manhattan, and Jack Goldsmith, a former assistant attorney general who now teaches at Harvard Law School, wrote that the move is “unlikely to make New York a bigger target” and that civilian courts are a proven venue for terror trials:

[T]here is no question about the legitimacy of U.S. federal courts to incapacitate terrorists. Many of Holder’s critics appear to have forgotten that the Bush administration used civilian courts to put away dozens of terrorists, including “shoe bomber” Richard Reid; al-Qaeda agent Jose Padilla; “American Taliban” John Walker Lindh; the Lackawanna Six; and Zacarias Moussaoui, who was prosecuted for the same conspiracy for which Mohammed is likely to be charged. Many of these terrorists are locked in a supermax prison in Colorado, never to be seen again.

In terrorist trials over the past 15 years, federal prosecutors and judges have gained extensive experience protecting intelligence sources and methods, limiting a defendant’s ability to raise irrelevant issues and tightly controlling the courtroom.

Comey and Goldsmith are hardly the first conservatives to support Holder’s faith in the U.S. justice system. In a joint statement prepared by the Constitution Project, David Keene, founder of American Conservative Union, Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, and former representative and presidential candidate Bob Barr wrote Sunday, ?We are confident that the government can preserve national security without resorting to sweeping and radical departures from an American constitutional tradition that has served us effectively for over two centuries. ? The scare-mongering about these issues should stop.?

Read The Full Article:
http://thinkprogress.org/2009/11/20/comey-goldsmith-ksm/

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Smart Grid ETF Launched by First Trust Advisors

Amid the flurry of new ETFs coming to market this week, it appears I missed the launch of First Trust NASDAQ Clean Edge Smart Grid Infrastructure Index Fund (GRID) on Tuesday (11/17/09). This ETF focuses on stocks in the electric energy infrastructure and distribution grid subsector. The fund will typically invest in companies engaged in electric grid, metering equipment and devices, networks, energy storage and management, and enabling software used within the smart grid infrastructure.

The underlying index uses a modified capitalization weighting with “pure play” companies receiving an 80% allocation and “diversified” companies receiving just a 20% allocation. The expense ratio…

Read The Full Article:
http://jutiagroup.com/2009/11/20/smart-grid-etf-launched-by-first-trust-advisors/

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Two Questions

Being into the whole history thing enough to have written a book on it, I tend to take a long view[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/OpenLeft-FrontPage/~3/-pL3OSuaX3U/two-questions

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"And The Slimy, Shiftless Bastards Aren't Gonna
Try To Fix The Planet, Either"

Susie Madrak (Suburban Guerilla), with what--under her circumstances--seems to me to be quite admirable sang froid, quotes, at some length, a recent text by Clenis' former Labor czar and persistent economic gadfly Robert Reich's which analyzes the array of missed chances that's going to come out of Congress as a "health insurance reform."

Reich says he still has hope.

But he's paid to have hope. He's at LEAST gotta pretend.

Not me.

That slimy, slippery Obama as much as told 'em, right from th start, that all he wanted was a bill he could claim/spin was 'reform.' It didn't actually have to do anything.

And that's all that we're gonna get: What we'll settle for...

It's all spectacle. Will he sign it at half-time at the Superbowl?

What (TF--W) Happened?
Nov 19th, 2009 at 4:53 pm by Susie
Robert Reich on Harry Reid and the public option:

First there was Medicare for all 300 million of us. But that was a non-starter because private insurers and Big Pharma wouldn't hear of it, and Republicans and "centrists" thought it was too much like what they have up in Canada - which, by the way, cost Canadians only 10 percent of their GDP and covers every Canadian. (Our current system of private for-profit insurers costs 16 percent of GDP and leaves out 45 million people.)

So the compromise was to give all Americans the option of buying into a "Medicare-like plan" that competed with private insurers. Who could be against freedom of choice? Fully 70 percent of Americans polled supported the idea. Open to all Americans, such a plan would have the scale and authority to negotiate low prices with drug companies and other providers, and force private insurers to provide better service at lower costs. But private insurers and Big Pharma wouldn't hear of it, and Republicans and "centrists" thought it would end up too much like what they have up in Canada.

So the compromise was to give the public option only to Americans who wouldn't be covered either by their employers or by Medicaid. And give them coverage pegged to Medicare rates. But private insurers and ... you know the rest.

So the compromise that ended up in the House bill is to have a mere public option, open only to the 6 million Americans not otherwise covered. The Congressional Budget Office warns this shrunken public option will have no real bargaining leverage and would attract mainly people who need lots of medical care to begin with. So it will actually cost more than it saves.

But even the House's shrunken and costly little public option is too much private insurers, Big Pharma, Republicans, and "centrists" in the Senate. So Harry Reid has proposed an even tinier public option, which states can decide not to offer their citizens. According to the CBO, it would attract no more than 4 million Americans.

It's a token public option, an ersatz public option, a fleeting gesture toward the idea of a public option, so small and desiccated as to be barely worth mentioning except for the fact that it still (gasp) contains the word "public."

And yet Joe Lieberman and Ben Nelson mumble darkly that they may not even vote to allow debate on the floor of the Senate about the bill if it contains this paltry public option. And Republicans predict a "holy war."

But what more can possibly be compromised? Take away the word "public?" Make it available to only twelve people?

Our private, for-profit health insurance system, designed to fatten the profits of private health insurers and Big Pharma, is about to be turned over to ... our private, for-profit health care system. Except that now private health insurers and Big Pharma will be getting some 30 million additional customers, paid for by the rest of us.

Upbeat policy wonks and political spinners who tend to see only portions of cups that are full will point out some good things: no pre-existing conditions, insurance exchanges, 30 million more Americans covered. But in reality, the cup is 90 percent empty. Most of us will remain stuck with little or no choice - dependent on private insurers who care only about the bottom line, who deny our claims, who charge us more and more for co-payments and deductibles, who bury us in forms, who don't take our calls.

I'm still not giving up. I want every Senator who's not in the pocket of the private insurers or Big Pharma to introduce and vote for a "Ted Kennedy Medicare for All" amendment to whatever bill Reid takes to the floor. And if this fails, a "Ted Kennedy Real Public Option for All" amendment. Let every Senate Democratic who doesn't have the guts to vote for either of them be known and counted.

(Boldface Emphases, Susies; others supplied--W)

This was never NOT gonna turn out this way, was it?
No, it wasn't. There was NEVER the least, slightest scintilla of a chance that it would eventuate in any way other than it has proven to go.
And, may I say that, though I am not happy to report it, this was exactly what I have long said anyone with more cognitive competence than a mollusk should have anticipated?
The grip of the enormous financial interests is just too tight.

"thePrez" is not the one to loosen their stranglehold.  If he posed even the slightest threat to the established order, he would NOT be in the exalted position he now occupies. He'll never nip a finger--much less take a chunk out of--the hands that curried and cosseted and carried him to this present pre-eminence. Are you 'Ucking kidding me?

It mighta been different if, like the auto industry, the Health Insurance parasites had had a well-cared-for, grateful unionized work-force the Owners needed to bust. But the cubicle drones a re passive, compliant, unresisting, grateful for any suck-ass job.

And here's the thing all this tells me, loudly: The 'uther'uckers aren't gonna try to fix the climate, either.

Hide and watch...

Read The Full Article:
http://www.myleftwing.com/showDiary.do?diaryId=25859

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Central Banks Continue to Buy Gold

Zero Hedge: The latest development in the gold bubble saga, and one which will likely cause the precious metal’s price to spike even higher, comes from the tiny island of Mauritius which according to Dow Jones has purchased 2 metric tons of Gold from the IMF for $71.7 million. The price works out to approximately $1,115 per ounce. More as we get it.

My comment: More and more countries, investors, and individuals are protecting themselves from the runaway inflationary policies of the US government. You have to at this point begin questioning the sanity of Congress with their ridiculous trillion dollar healthcare…

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http://jutiagroup.com/2009/11/20/central-banks-continue-to-buy-gold/

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wierd times

Strange day, when all sorts of things are mixed in juxtaposition. Republican Ron Paul and Democrat Alan Grayson getting a terrific transparency of the Fed bill out of Committee and it will for certain pass the House (many progressive Democrats voting[...]

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/mydd/~3/pVSEOLm-BLU/758

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Crisis in US women's leadership

John met someone promoting equality for the new EU cabinet but as I mentioned earlier, we need to do much better with promoting women. The current numbers are rightly called a crisis, whether you are looking at business or government. Shouldn't we expect more?

The majority of Americans are comfortable with women leading in all sectors, but the reality is women hold only 18% of leadership positions across the 10 sectors we examined, including politics, business, law, sports, academia, journalism, religion, film/TV, nonprofit, and military.

In politics, for example, women have lost ground in the last decade as elected statewide executive officials and have made only incremental gains in Congress, where they currently comprise 17% of leadership. On a global scale, the U.S. ranks a dismal 71st out of 189 countries, according to the Inter-Parliamentary Union, in terms of women in legislatures, trailing behind nations such as Pakistan, Cuba, and United Arab Emirates.

At Fortune 500 companies, women hold only 15% of board seats, 16% of corporate officer positions, and a mere 3% of CEO positions, while women of color make up only 3% of board officers and 1.7% of corporate officer positions.

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Americablog/~3/EW5R8PiT_nE/crisis-in-us-womens-lea
dership.html

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CREW Files Complaint Over Landrieu Camp's
'Mysterious' $25K Donation

Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington has filed its complaint with the FEC over that mysterious $25,300 donation made to the US Treasury by Sen. Mary Landrieu's campaign -- framing the issue as one of transparency.

The Landrieu camp continues to refuse to reveal the reason for the donation, citing the need to protect the privacy of the original contributors. That's prompted CREW to suggest that the campaign may have feared a federal probe into the source of the money.

"We all know politicians don't give up campaign contributions - much less $25,000 - without a very good reason," said CREW's Melanie Sloan. "It appears Sen. Landrieu's reason may have been to avoid a scandal or, even worse, a federal investigation into some of her contributions."

TPMmuckraker reported earlier this week that the complaint was in the works.

As CREW explains:

Under federal campaign finance law, the only time campaign committees can transfer an illegal contribution to the Treasury rather than return it to the original donor is when the committee learns the source of the funds: a) is under a Department of Justice investigation or indictment, or b) has been convicted for making illegal contributions. Even in such cases, a campaign committee must make the contributor's identity public before turning the money over to the Treasury.

CREW's complaint alleges that because there has been no suggestion of an ongoing Justice Department investigation into illegal contributions to the Landrieu campaign, the committee improperly turned the money over to the Treasury.

You can read the complaint here (pdf).

"Our campaign finance laws were designed to ensure transparency," said Sloan. "Sen. Landrieu cannot ignore a law she finds inconvenient simply to save herself the embarrassment of acknowledging she received illegal campaign contributions. If Sen. Landrieu did nothing wrong, she has no reason not to come clean with the American people and explain why she turned over $25,000 in contributions to the Treasury."

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http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/TPMmuckraker/~3/pIcebeSopRA/crew_files_complaint_o
n_landrieu_camp.php

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