Category: Congress

Pass the Popcorn

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A Judge in Alaska has ordered that the Fairbanks North Star Borough* personnel records of teabagger Senate candidate Joe Miller are to be released on Tuesday.

The judge set a Tuesday release date to allow an appeal to be filed on Monday:

A judge ruled Saturday that the Fairbanks North Star Borough must release personnel records of U.S. Senate candidate Joe Miller.

In an unusual weekend hearing, retired Superior Court Judge Winston Burbank ruled that the public’s right to know about candidates outweighed Miller’s right to privacy.

“I hold that although Mr. Miller has a legitimate expectation of privacy in those documents, Mr. Miller’s right to privacy is indeed outweighed by the public’s significant interest in the background of a public figure who is running for the U.S. Senate,” the judge said. He noted that U.S. senator is among the highest elected offices in the nation.

Burbank ordered that nothing actually will be released until Tuesday afternoon, however, to allow for the ruling to be appealed to the Alaska Supreme Court.

Mr. Miller has been fighting this kicking and screaming, which implies that this his personnel file is packed with lots crunchy goodness.

If this is true, I would think that an appeal by Mr. Miller is likely though. All he has to do is delay the ruling by 7-8 days, and it becomes moot.

My sense is that he was not a model employee, since we have heard whispers from both the City of Fairbanks, as well as his old law firm, that they were not sad to see him go.

*A borough in Alaska is roughly equivalent to a county.

Why the Aqua Buddha Works

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I suggested that Rand Paul might be pushed into doing something stupid, but I missed an obvious point, one that Talking Points Memo‘s Josh Marshall got, which was that by making the attack, and by Paul responding with indignation, “How dare you,” rather than a strong denial and push-back, “My opponent is a liar,” he has shown himself to be weak, and the voters hate weakness.

He calls it the, “Bitch slap theory of electoral politics“:

Let’s call it the Republicans’ Bitch-Slap theory of electoral politics.

It goes something like this.

On one level, of course, the aim behind these attacks is to cast suspicion upon Kerry’s military service record and label him a liar. But that’s only part of what’s going on.

Consider for a moment what the big game is here. This is a battle between two candidates to demonstrate toughness on national security. Toughness is a unitary quality, really — a personal, characterological quality rather than one rooted in policy or divisible in any real way. So both sides are trying to prove to undecided voters either that they’re tougher than the other guy or at least tough enough for the job.

In a post-9/11 environment, obviously, this question of strength, toughness or resolve is particularly salient. That, of course, is why so much of this debate is about war and military service in the first place.

One way — perhaps the best way — to demonstrate someone’s lack of toughness or strength is to attack them and show they are either unwilling or unable to defend themselves — thus the rough slang I used above. And that I think is a big part of what is happening here. Someone who can’t or won’t defend themselves certainly isn’t someone you can depend upon to defend you.

Rand Paul was bitch slapped by Jack Conway, and now he’s acting like a bitch, not shaking hands and implying that he will skip the last debate.

Josh Green at The Atlantic notes, “The issue isn’t Paul’s Christianity, but his manhood,” and that his talk about skipping the final debate is all anyone is talking about.

Mortgage Backed Security Holders Stir……A Little…

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Institutional investors who purchased mortgage backed securities issued by Countrywide, now Bank of America have sent a demand letter requesting that Bank of America repurchase their mortgages for non-performance.

What makes this a big deal is just who is writing this.

Pacific Investment Management Co. [PIMCO], BlackRock Inc. and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York are seeking to force Bank of America Corp. to repurchase soured mortgages packaged into $47 billion of bonds by its Countrywide Financial Corp. unit, people familiar with the matter said.

A group of bondholders wrote a letter to Bank of America and Bank of New York Mellon Corp., the debt’s trustee, citing alleged failures by Countrywide to service loans properly, their lawyer said yesterday in a statement that didn’t name the firms. The New York Fed acquired mortgage debt through its 2008 rescues of Bear Stearns Cos. and American International Group Inc.

Bank of America responded that it would, “defend its shareholders,” which might make for an interesting conflict between two groups of too big to fail financial institutions.

In either case, it makes Congressional Deus Ex Machina hail Mary play less likely, since the constituencies that normally bribe lobby the House and Senate appear to be fairly evenly divided.

My guess is that this is actually not as big a deal as it sounds.

I agree with Yves Smith, that this is primarily posturing:

  • This is not litigation, it’s just a nastygram that was release.
  • The claim appears to be an extension of a claim against trusts.
  • They are claiming that the lack of due diligence was because the former Countrywide is not going after Countrywide, that sold the loan.
  • That BoA/Contrywide has been too slow in forclosing. (!?!)

Still, if it prevents Congress from bailing out the banksters, it would be a good thing.™

The full press release from the bond holders is below the fold:

Institutional Holders of Countrywide-Issued RMBS Issue Notice of Non-Performance Identifying Alleged Failures by Master Servicer to Perform Covenants and Agreements in More Than $47 Billion of Countrywide-Issued RMBS

Oct. 18 /PRNewswire/ –Today, the holders of over 25% of the Voting Rights in more than $47 billion of Countrywide-issued RMBS sent a Notice of Non-Performance (Notice) to Countrywide Home Loan Servicing, as Master Servicer (“Countrywide Servicing”), and to Bank of New York, as Trustee, identifying specific covenants in 115 Pooling and Servicing Agreements (PSAs) that the Holders allege Countrywide Servicing has failed to perform.

The Holders’ Notice alleges that each of these failures has materially affected the rights of the Certificateholders under the relevant PSAs. Under Section 7.01 of the PSAs, if any of the cited failures “continues unremedied for a period of 60 days after the date on which written notice of such failure has been given … to the Master Servicer and the Trustee by the Holders of Certificates evidencing not less than 25% of the Voting Rights evidenced by the Certificates,” that failure constitutes an Event of Default under the PSAs.

In a previous release, the Holders emphasized their intent to invoke all contractual remedies available to them to recover their losses and to protect their rights. Kathy Patrick of Gibbs & Bruns LLP, lead counsel for the Holders, emphasized that the Holders’ notice does not seek to halt loan modifications for troubled borrowers. Instead, it urges the Trustee to enforce Countrywide Servicing’s obligations to service loans prudently by maintaining accurate loan records, demanding the repurchase of loans that were originated in violation of underwriting guidelines, and compelling the sellers of ineligible or predatory mortgages to bear the costs of modifying them for homeowners or repurchasing them from the Trusts’ collateral pools.

Patrick also noted that the group of Holders that tendered today’s Notice of Non-Performance is larger, and encompasses more Countrywide-issued RMBS deals, than were included in the August 20 instruction letter. When asked why the group of holders was larger, Patrick replied, “Ours is a large, determined, and cohesive group of bondholders. We have a clearly defined strategy. We plan to vigorously pursue this initiative to enforce Holders’ rights.”

The Notice of Non-Performance, which is the first step in the process of declaring an Event of Default, was issued on behalf of Holders in the following Countrywide-issued RMBS:

Deal Name Deal Name Deal Name
CWALT 2004-32CB CWHL 2004-22 CWL 2006-15
CWALT 2004-6CB CWHL 2004-25 CWL 2006-16
CWALT 2004-J1 CWHL 2004-29 CWL 2006-19
CWALT 2005-14 CWHL 2004-HYB9 CWL 2006-2
CWALT 2005-21CB CWHL 2005-11 CWL 2006-20
CWALT 2005-24 CWHL 2005-14 CWL 2006-22
CWALT 2005-32T1 CWHL 2005-18 CWL 2006-24
CWALT 2005-35CB CWHL 2005-19 CWL 2006-25
CWALT 2005-36 CWHL 2005-2 CWL 2006-26
CWALT 2005-44 CWHL 2005-3 CWL 2006-3
CWALT 2005-45 CWHL 2005-30 CWL 2006-5
CWALT 2005-56 CWHL 2005-9 CWL 2006-7
CWALT 2005-57 CB CWHL 2005-HYB3 CWL 2006-9
CWALT 2005-64 CB CWHL 2005-HYB9 CWL 2006-BC2
CWALT 2005-72 CWHL 2005-R3 CWL 2006-BC3
CWALT 2005-73CB CWHL 2006-9 CWL 2006-BC4
CWALT 2005-74T1 CWHL 2006-HYB2 CWL 2006-BC5
CWALT 2005-81 CWHL 2006-HYB5 CWL 2006-SD1
CWALT 2005-AR1 CWHL 2006-J2 CWL 2006-SD3
CWALT 2005-J5 CWHL 2006-OA5 CWL 2006-SD4
CWALT 2005-J9 CWHL 2006-R2 CWL 2006-SPS2
CWALT 2006-14CB CWHL 2007-12 CWL 2007-2
CWALT 2006-20CB CWHL 2007-16 CWL 2007-5
CWALT 2006-37R CWHL 2008-3R CWL 2007-6
CWALT 2006-41CB CWL 2005-10 CWL 2007-7
CWALT 2006-HY12 CWL 2005-11 CWL 2007-9
CWALT 2006-OA11 CWL 2005-13 CWL 2007-BC1
CWALT 2006-OA16 CWL 2005-16 CWL 2007-BC2
CWALT 2006-OA17 CWL 2005-2 CWL 2007-BC3
CWALT 2006-OA6 CWL 2005-4 CWL 2007-QH1
CWALT 2006-OA9 CWL 2005-5 CWL 2007-S3
CWALT 2006-OC10 CWL 2005-6
CWALT 2006-OC2 CWL 2005-7
CWALT 2006-OC4 CWL 2005-8
CWALT 2006-OC5 CWL 2005-9
CWALT 2006-OC6 CWL 2005-AB2
CWALT 2006-OC7 CWL 2005-AB3
CWALT 2007-17CB CWL 2005-AB4
CWALT 2007-23CB CWL 2005-BC5
CWALT 2007-24 CWL 2005-IM1
CWALT 2007-OA7 CWL 2006-10
CWALT 2008-2R CWL 2006-12

SOURCE Gibbs & Bruns, LLP

Here is a Big Surprise

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The astroturf group Concerned Taxpayers of America represents just two of said taxpayers:

A few weeks ago, a group called Concerned Taxpayers of America emerged out of nowhere and started to spend large sums of money attacking Rep. Peter DeFazio (D) in his re-election bid in Oregon. At the time, both DeFazio and his opponent, Tea Party favorite Art Robinson, claimed complete ignorance of the group, and DeFazio even tracked it to a townhouse in the Capitol Hill neighborhood of Washington to demand that the group identify itself — but to no avail.

Friday’s FEC filings, however, finally reveal that the Concerned Taxpayers of America consists of exactly two concerned taxpayers:

………

This sh%$ really needs to stop.

This Election is Getting Weird

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First, Joe Miller says that the Berlin Wall is a good thing, and now he has his own merry band of Brownshirts

So, it appears that Alaska Republican Senate nominee has hired hired goons to harass the press in order to prevent them from asking him questions, and they just assaulted and handcuffed a journalist:

The editor of the Alaska Dispatch website was arrested by U.S. Senate candidate Joe Miller’s private security guards Sunday as the editor attempted to interview Miller at the end of a public event in an Anchorage school.

Tony Hopfinger was handcuffed by the guards and detained in a hallway at Central Middle School until Anchorage police came and told the guards to release Hopfinger.

I keep expecting this crowd to burst into Tomorrow Belongs to Me.

Christine O’Donnell may be the sane one of this lot.

Our political culture is broken in some very profound ways, and I have no clue as to how to fix it.

Wasp

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Here is the windup


And here is the unforced error

For those of you who don’t know, Wasp is a book by Eric Frank Russell. It’s conceit is that a man is sent to infiltrate and subvert a planet held by the enemy.

Rather than conventional methods of espionage, like sabotage, the goal of the agents is to engender over-reactions from the authorities which would have them weakening themselves, much like a driver distracted by a wasp can kill himself and his passengers by driving into a bridge abutment.

Well, in the Kentucky Senate Race, Democrat Jack Conway ran an ad against Randroid nut job Republican Rand Paul bringing up his involvement in an anti-religious group at Baylor, and his frat hazing style “kidnapping” of a coed who he made to bow down to the “Aqua Buddha.”

I cannot claim to have a deep understanding of the politics, or the religiosity, of Kentucky, so I cannot speak to the direct effects of the advertisement (1st video), but I can speak to the secondary effects of the ad (2nd video) and it ain’t pretty.

Rand Paul is acting like a complete bitch, and his bit at the end where he huffily declares that he won’t shake hands at the end of the debate.

I’m with Theda Skocpol on the nervous Nellies who are wringing their hands over this:

One reason that Dems do not seem to be able to play hardball — in a viciously hardball political world — is that Dems often lack conviction or the will to be eloquently honest (for example, on taxes). But an equal problem is that when someone does play hardball, the rest of the prissy liberal Mugwumps tut-tut them about it.

The professional losing class can go Cheney themselves.

Honestly, I don’t care about Rand Paul’s religion. My guess is that his protestations of religion are a less than honest, since his idol Ayn Rand loathed religion, but politically, the important bit of electoral politics here here is that Rand Paul seriously lost his sh%$ on camera, and that was the real success of this ad.

BTW, if you wanted to use a cinematic reference rather than a literary reference, I would suggest that Jack Conway just Gaslighted Rand Paul.

I Hope that He is Wrong, But I Fear that He is Right

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John Carney at CNBC says that Congress will make the illegal actions of banks retroactively legal in the lame duck session:

The put-back crisis is not driven by economics. It is driven by legal rights. And there’s simply zero probability that the politicians in Washington are going to let Bank of America or Citigroup or JP Morgan Chase fail because of a legal issue.

So here’s what I expect will happen. The lame duck session of Congress will pass a bill that essentially papers over the misdeeds of the banks that originated mortgage securities. Every member of Congress and every Senator who has been voted out of office will cast a vote for the bill. And the President will sign it.

He is suggesting that you buy stock in Bank of America, because when Congress does this, the stock will rebound.

He’s right, the bankers own our government.

Not Feeling Hopey Changey

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The Obama administration has lifted the moratorium on deep water drilling in the Gulf.

Well, at least this means that Mary Landrieu has dropped her hold on Obama’s OMB chair, right?

Wrong.

It appears that she wants to be sure that the EPA and the Department of the Interior are sufficiently compliant:

“I am not going to release my hold on Jack Lew. Instead, I will take this time to look closely at how [Interior] is handling the issuing of permits and whether or not drilling activity in both shallow and deep water is resuming. When Congress reconvenes for the lame duck session next month, I will have had several weeks to evaluate if today’s lifting of the moratorium is actually putting people back to work,” Landrieu said in a prepared statement Tuesday after the Interior Department announced the lifting of the deepwater ban ahead of schedule.

You just got called a c*cks*ck*r by Mary F%$#ing Landrieu, and you are supposed to be the umpire, to mangle a Bull Durham moment.

What are you going to do now?

This is what happens when people know you have no guts.

They Do This Because They Believe that Minorities Should Not Vote

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I have to invoke this when discussing the travails of anyone named “Kirk”.


In any case, let’s roll tape*

That is why Republicans like Mark Kirk spend enormous amounts of time and effort trying to keep minorities from voting.

The difference is that this time, he got caught on tape:

In a private phone conversation that was secretly recorded, Mark Kirk, the Republican U.S. Senate candidate in Illinois, told state Republican leaders last week about his plan to send “voter integrity” squads to four predominately African American neighborhoods of Chicago “where the other side might be tempted to jigger the numbers somewhat.”

Kirk’s campaign confirmed the candidate was secretly taped last week as he was talking about his anti-voter fraud effort.

Someone taped this discussion, and then released it into the wild.

There are some values of the Republican party that have been present since its founding, like opposition to organized labor, and there are some that are the product of the politically expedient decision to embrace the white racist portion of the electorate with the “Southern Strategy.”

It started with Barry Goldwater, was embraced and extended by Nixon, and finally came to full fruit under Ronald Reagan, who did his best to make bigotry look cool.

In the process, the bigots subsumed the party.

Thus we are left with the Republican definition of “vote fraud”: to them, it means allowing n*gg*rs to vote.

*The “tape” is actually illegal, as Illinois, like Maryland is a 2 party consent state, but that is largely irrelevant to the fact that a rock got turned over, and the slime beneath was revealed.

Well, This is Nice…

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Now if only he would continue his attacks on corrupt Republicans after the election:

The White House intensified its attacks Sunday on the powerful U.S. Chamber of Commerce for its alleged ties to foreign donors, part of an escalating Democratic effort to link Republican allies with corporate and overseas interests ahead of the November midterm elections.

………

David Axelrod, a top Obama adviser, said on CBS’s “Face the Nation” that secret political donations to the chamber and other groups pose “a threat to our democracy.”

Axelrod also took the unusual step of calling on the chamber to release internal documents backing up its contention that foreign money is not being used to pay for U.S. political activities. Democrats have seized on a report by a liberal blog alleging that dues from chamber-affiliated business councils could be used in that way.

“If the chamber opens up its books and says, ‘Here’s where our political money’s coming from,’ then we’ll know,” Axelrod said. “But until they do that, all we have is their assertion.”

The chamber has vehemently denied the allegations, characterizing them as part of a desperate strategy to stave off a GOP takeover of Congress. The business lobby has vowed to spend up to $75 million on the midterm elections, primarily in favor of Republicans.

On November 3, Obama will be back to kissing their asses.

They should be beating this drum every day.

Veto

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The White House has announced that Barack Obama is vetoing HR 3808, the Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act, which created a South Dakota/Delaware credit card processing style race to the bottom, only this time with forged foreclosure paperwork.

They are actually claiming that it is a pocket veto, but they are also sending it back to Congress with a notice of disapproval, since the Senate is entering into pro forma sessions, making that whole “pocket veto” thing dicey, as you can only pocket veto a bill when Congress is in recess.

This is his second veto, his first was when he vetoed a stop-gap spending bill when the regular bill came in on time, so this is his first real veto, the last one was about cleaning up the bookkeeping.

I would note that there is an important lesson here: If you hold the White House’s feet to the fire, the Obama administration will do the right thing ……… at least occasionally.

It’s why the Fanboi who maintain that it’s all eleventy dimensional chess are so wrong.

Were it not for the firestorm that erupted in the past 72 hours or so, largely due to the efforts of Ohio Secretary of State Jennifer Brunner, not only would have Obama not vetoed it, but he probably would likely have seen it as an innocuous bill streamlining interstate commerce.

If there is not vigorous criticism from liberals directed toward the White House, then they will continue to follow the path of least resistance and do the wrong thing when they can.

Full statement from the White Houseafter the break:

Why President Obama is Not Signing H.R. 3808
Posted by Dan Pfeiffer on October 07, 2010 at 01:15 PM EDT

Today, the White House announced that President Obama will not sign H.R. 3808, the Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act of 2010, and will return the bill to the House of Representatives. The Interstate Recognition of Notarizations Act of 2010 was designed to remove impediments to interstate commerce. While we share this goal, we believe it is necessary to have further deliberations about the intended and unintended impact of this bill on consumer protections, including those for mortgages, before this bill can be finalized.

Notarizations are important for a large range of documents, including financial documents. As the President has made clear, consumer financial protections are incredibly important, and he has made this one of his top priorities, including signing into law the strongest consumer protections in history in the Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. That is why we need to think through the intended and unintended consequences of this bill on consumer protections, especially in light of the recent developments with mortgage processors.

The authors of this bill no doubt had the best intentions in mind when trying to remove impediments to interstate commerce. We will work with them and other leaders in Congress to explore the best ways to achieve this goal going forward.

Dan Pfeiffer is White House Communications Director

Least Surprising News of the Day

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Former HHS Secretary nominee, and enthusiastic free rider Tom Daschle* has let slip that Obama cut a deal with pharma and insurers to kill the public option at the start of the healthcare reform process.

Eleventy dimensional chess, my ass. We are dealing with someone who has created faux reform because he does not want real reform.

*The great Matt Taibbi noted, when he talked about his lobbying activities, “Tom Daschle would suck off a corpse for a cheeseburger.'”

Not Enough Bullets

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So, once again, Congress refuses to act, so billionaire hedge fund managers can continue to pay less in taxes than the janitors who clean their offices:

Once again a key piece of news has passed virtually without comment.

While the entire nation argues over nonsense like the WTC Mosque, Rick Sanchez, and, yes, blue-red culture war stuff like the Tea Party, congress yesterday quietly took a knee on the “carried interest” tax question. In doing so they decided not to take a vote on changes already approved by both houses that would scale back perhaps the most preposterous tax break in the entire federal code, one that leaves hedge-fund gazillionaires like Stevie Cohen and John Paulson paying less than half the top tax rate paid by most middle and upper-middle class Americans.

In case you don’t recognize the writing style, it’s Matt Taibbi, and I suggest that you read the whole article, because he communicates the disgust that I feel far more cogently that I ever could.

I Believe That the Term Here is “Vigorish”*

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Bummer of a birth mark, Sharron Angle

Nevada Republican Senate Candidate Sharron Angle had a meeting with the 3rs party Scott Ashjian in an attempt to get him out of the race.

Unfortunately for her Mr. Ashjians recorded the conversation, and she was offering a piece of the action:

Says the grass roots movement “gives me juice. That’s really all I can offer to you (Ashjian) is whatever juice I have, you have as well…You want to see DeMint, I have juice with him….I go to Washington, DC and want to see Jim DeMint, he’s right there for me. I want to see Tom Coburn, he’s right there for me. I want to see Mitch McConnell, he’s there.”

She goes on to say that Republicans are corrupt, and that she will lose if the Teabagger Ashjian stays in the race.

Let me make this clear: I do not support the surreptitious taping, and if this happened in a state where it’s illegal, like Maryland, I would support prosecution.

That being said, these revelations could not happen to a more deserving character.

Pass the popcorn.

*I believe that the “juice” in the quote is a reference to transactional profits similar to those of a bookie, hence “vigorish”.