MMV
06/03/08
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( 0 / 0 )When it comes to popularity, George W. Bush is the worst president ever. They got numbers to prove it.
In a USA TODAY/Gallup Poll taken Friday through Sunday, 28% of Americans approve of the job Bush is doing; 69% disapprove. The approval rating matches the low point of his presidency, and the disapproval sets a new high for any president since Franklin Roosevelt.
The previous record of 67% was reached by Harry Truman in January 1952, when the United States was enmeshed in the Korean War.
Bush's rating has worsened amid "collapsing optimism about the economy," says Charles Franklin, a political scientist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison who studies presidential approval. Record gas prices and a wave of home foreclosures have fueled voter angst.
Bush also holds the record for the other extreme: the highest approval rating of any president in Gallup's history. In September 2001, in the days after the 9/11 attacks, Bush's approval spiked to 90%. In another record, the percentage of Americans who say the invasion of Iraq was a mistake reached a new high, 63%, in the latest poll.
Assessments of Bush's presidency are harsh. By 69%-27%, those polled say Bush's tenure in general has been a failure, not a success.
Click here for full article from USA Today.
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Barak Obama's recent speech at a fund-raiser in Pennsylvania drew intense criticism - not only from the camps of Hillary Clinton and John McCain - but also from the Republican main brass, Republican mouth pieces Fix News and The Wall Street Journal. Here is what he said:"You go into these small towns in Pennsylvania and, like a lot of small towns in the Midwest, the jobs have been gone now for 25 years and nothing's replaced them. And they fell through the Clinton Administration, and the Bush Administration, and each successive Administration has said that somehow these communities are gonna regenerate and they have not. And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
The WSJ editorial today commented:
As political psychoanalysis, this is what they believe in Cambridge and Hyde Park. Guns and God are the opiate of the masses, who are being gulled by Karl Rove and rich Republicans. If only they embraced their true economic self-interest, these pure saps wouldn't need religion and they wouldn't dislike non-white immigrants.
It is irrelevant what they believed in Cambridge or Hyde Park. It is 100% true. Most Republican party voters - from the southern states to the plains to the northeast - have one thing in common. They vote for a party which doesn't represents their economic best interest. Republicans are good at throwing debate bones on guns, abortion, religion, and gay rights to win these voters.
Read the book, "What's wrong with Kansas." by Thomas Frank. It is a fascinating book that reveals the true nature of this Republican strategy.
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Prof Randy Paush is fighting Pancreatic Cancer. The doctors gave him only a few months to live. In September 07 he gave his last lecture at Carnegie Mellon University. The video of that lecture has become quite a sensation on the internet. He appeared on the Oprah Show and gave a condensed version of the same lecture. It is inspiring and he definitely wants to be heard. If you have 70+ minutes, just watch. Or, if you want the condensed version on Oprah, click here.
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( 3.9 / 8 )
Recall my earlier story about Don Siegelman? Now Don Siegelman is free, pending appeal, and challenges Rove to testify under oath. Click on the image to see CBS 60 min update.
Click here for Dan Abrams Coverage of this case on MSNBC
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( 0 / 0 )Credit losses due to recent sub-prime lending fiasco are estimated to be as much as $1.2 trillion. There is an old saying on the Street - you don't need the brokers when the market goes up and you don't need the brokers when the market goes down. Investment banking is vital to economy and it supplies much needed capital and credit, and spreads risk. However, many a times these bankers and/or major players in the markets always come-up with new ways to screw things up. Here are some examples
1994: Mexican Peso crisis nearly threatened to take CitiGroup belly-up. the Feds bailed them out by loaning billions of dollars to Mexico on very liberal terms. In placing their bets, the gurus at various investment banks made one simple assumption - Peso would not lose its value. Yes, they were surprised to see the reality!
1998: Longterm Capital Management (LTCM) Crisis: One of the main partners of LTCM is none other than Dr. Scholes, the Nobel Memorial Prize winner for Economics [Note the emphasis on 'memorial.' There is no such thing as Nobel Prize for Economics. The economists loosely call it "Nobel Prize" just to enhance their image. Alfred Nobel never intended to give a prize to economists. The REAL five Nobel Prizes are only in the fields of medicine, chemistry, physics, literature and peace.] One of the simplified assumptions LTCM traders made is that when they want to sell, there will be buyers. When they turned around to close the trades that turned sour in the wake of Russian Ruble crisis, there were no buyers. Consequently, financial markets around the world were frozen. Then came a fed bailout after the OEX futures markets were closed on a Thursday which turned things around.
2004-2007: In the wake of booming real estate market, investment bankers found a new cash-cow in writing insurance on mortgages and mortgage backed securities. that too on very liberal terms with very little risk premiums. Many credit analysts made one simple and stupid assumption. Real estate prices will continue to go up. The prices didn't go up. They didn't stay flat. They went down, and down and more down. Every banker and his naive grandson who wrote these credit risk policies caught with their pants down. Big investment banks like Bear Stearns have extensive exposure to such credit swaps. Problems at CitiGroup are similar.
2008: Credit woes at many investment bankers was getting worse with no turn around in RE market in sight. No wonder Bear Stearns went under. Thanks to the overly simplified assumption: "real estate prices don't go down."
Of course, this analysis itself is an oversimplification of the complex problems in financial markets. What next? Conventional wisdom is that it is time to buy when a high profile company goes under. By that measure, I think that the worst in financial markets is over.
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( 3.4 / 9 )
The overall U.S. death toll in Iraq rose to 4,000 after four soldiers were killed in a roadside bombing in Baghdad, a grim milestone that is likely to fuel calls for the withdrawal of American forces as the war enters its sixth year.While 4000 is just one more than 3999, the number has a psychological impact. When will this ill-conceived, poorly executed human and economic tragedy called Iraq war end?
More from MSNBC....
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( 0 / 0 )Recently I've been to India and back. Catching up with a lot of things. As you would have guessed, I am a bit too busy lately. Regular porting on this blog will commence shortly.
Stay tuned.
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What a difference one year makes!! just one year ago Bear Stearns stock was hovering above $150 per share. Today, after the Fed's intervention, the stock was taken over by JP Morgan for a mere $2.00. To top this, Feds cut interest rates by another 25 basis points. The question everybody is asking today is, "how many Bear Stearns are out there to be bailed out?" I don't know the answer to this question. But the carnage in the market is much worse than what the indices are indicating. Many major stocks are down more than 60%.
But back in August 07 just after a massive rally in reaction to the first 50 basis point cut by the Feds, I remember warning listeners on my show "caveat emptor." Well, I wish I took my own advice. In a sense I did. Expecting a major downturn in US markets, I went into China stocks. Chinese stocks got hit just as bad as the US stocks.
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( 0 / 0 )'Crude'ly speaking, the price of gasoline at the pump is on fire. Are you having fun yet? One of the big and untold reasons for this illegal war in Iraq is to control the oil supplies of the country which has the third highest petroleum reserves. One might get tempted to ask, "How is that working out?" Not so well, of course.
The price of gasoline when Bush invaded Iraq was about $36/barrel. Yesterday it closed above $104. This Iraq adventure, just like every other simple venture Bush tried, is an utter failure. When his investment in oil exploration ventures soured in Texas, only a handful of people were hurt. Now, his decisions as the president are hurting billions of people around the world. Yeah, right. Who says one person cannot make a difference?
A typical owner of Hummer probably doesn't care about the environment and probably voted for Bush - both times. Those Hummer drivers could care less if the whole world went to hell in a hand basket as long as they have their freedom to pollute. The following photograph posted at crooksandliars.com caught my attention. The photo was taken at Homewood, Alabama March 5, 2008 by Bluegal. The Hummer drove off just as she was pulling in and she took a quick photo. Sh asks, "Is it fun to drive, sucker?"
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( 5 / 1 )Indict and Win. That's the way Karl Rove's political machinery operates. When some prosecutors didn't indict democrats before elections, as per the wishes of Rove and the White House, the prosecutors were fired. You may recall the scandal about firing US attorneys. Here is an example of how they operate to win elections. Indict a prominent Democrat just before the election. In this case, it was former Alabama Governor Siegelman. CBS 60 minutes ran a story about this bizzare case. The White House, the Justice Department are refusing to cooperate with congress on how this case was prosecuted. I am totall utterly disgusted with these Republigoons. See the following two 60 minutes videos to see how the former Governor of Alabama was victimized by the Republican operatives:
CBS 60 minutes video (Part 1 of 2)
CBS 60 minutes video (Part 2 of 2)
The following video gives an explanation of the reason for the "grudge" in Governor's own words.
Why Rove hates Siegelman?
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So, Obama wore a Turban and part of a traditional Muslim dress. - Big Deal!! Clinton released itt trying to appeal for some bigots in the populace. She will get some, no many, on-board the hate-train. I am sure that this picture will get a lot of airtime for the remainder of the campaign. Excerpts from an article on CNN.com about this issue:
(CNN) — Barack Obama’s campaign accused Hillary Clinton’s team Monday of circulating a photo of the Illinois senator donning traditional Somali attire – clothing worn by area Muslims – as a goodwill gesture during an overseas trip.
In a statement, the Clinton campaign called the charge “an obvious and transparent attempt to distract” voters from serious issues – but did not issue a denial.
The picture, which appeared on the Drudge Report this morning, was attributed to sources within the Clinton campaign – although the Web site did not reveal how many, or who, might have received the photo.
In a statement, Obama’s campaign manager, David Plouffe, said Clinton’s campaign was engaged in “shameful, offensive fear-mongering,” though he did not point to any proof beyond the original item that appeared on Matt Drudge’s blog.
For any Republicrook trying to make this a big issue, please show the following picture of Laura Bush wearing a veil in Middle East.
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To all the Indian women who are waiting for the perfect man, here comes Mills and Boon. To all the men out there, would you like to know how to attract a mate? Simple! Just be like the "perfect" male lead characters in any Mills and Boon Novels. The mate you attract herself may not be perfect, but you will appeal to her. :) Anyway, BBC.com reports that publishers of romantic fiction, Mills and Boon, was launched in India recently.The company hopes that its amorous storylines will eventually seduce the country and become their biggest market.
So what does an all-female reading group in Delhi think of romantic novels where the dark and brooding hero almost invariably ends up wooing and winning the fair maiden?
[More...]
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This is funny. Click here and here for more political caricatures like these.
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