Don’t forget to call your state AG today and ask him to get tough on mortgage fraud. Go to CrimeShouldn’tPay for contact information.
Inside the anti-kettling HQ Guardian (hat tip reader Buzz Potamkin)
Cracking the Scratch Lottery Code Wired (hat tip reader bob)
NASA Kepler finds family of habitable, Earth-size planets NetworkWorld
WikiLeaks Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize for Promoting Freedom of Speech AlterNet (hat tip reader furzy mouse)
WikiLeaks: US and China in military standoff over space missiles Telegraph (hat tip reader Paul S)
Erdogan’s Cairo speech Foreign Policy
ElBaradei’s Role Cast in Doubt Wall Street Journal. While this may be true, the cynic in me reads a second level into this. Remember how the US promoted Ahmed Chalabi as a possible leader of Iraq, when he hadn’t been in the country since, what, 1956? I wonder if this is a sign that the Administration is trying to find another horse to back.
Egypt Protests – Tweets Mapped Mibazaar (hat tip Lambert Strether)
“No One Could Have Predicted the Housing Bubble Middle East Status Quo Would Crash” March Wheeler, FireDogLake
Irish bank flight quickens despite EU rescue Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, Telegraph. Hhm, has everyone gone into “Mission Accomplished” mode a tad early?
Learning the art of greasing the wheels Sydney Morning Herald (hat tip reader Crocodile Chuck). Bribery, Chinese style. Frankly, it may be that everything looks better at a remove, but their version looks a lot more refined than ours.
Rally ‘Round the “True Constitution” American Prospect (hat tip reader furzy mouse)
Democrats and Allies Missing the Big Picture on “Rape Redefinition” Bill Dave Dayen, FireDogLake
Foreclosed Homeowners Go to Court on Their Own New York Times. This story confirms something we’ve argued, that the stereotyped “borrowed too much and lived high for a while” types have for the most part already lost their homes and the current crop of seriously delinquent borrowers is heavy on collateral damage from the financial crisis:
When people went into default in 2008, it was generally because of the exploding cost of a subprime loan. Unable or unwilling to handle sharply higher payments, the homeowner walked away with little protest.
Now many defaults are prompted by stretches of unemployment like Ms. Perea’s. These owners do not have the resources to come up with all their missed payments at once. But if they can persuade their lender to restructure the loan instead of seizing the house, they have a chance of staying put.
Why Oh Why Can’t We Have a Better Press Corps? (MIchael Fletcher of the Washington Post Edition) Bred DeLong and The Problem of Structrual Unemployment: Really Incompetent Managers Dean Baker. Debunking a the “structural unemployment” meme.
US employers unsure about economic recovery Financial Times
Proposed class action targets BofA on foreclosures Reuters (hat tip Lisa Epstein)
Calif. settles lawsuit against Countrywide execs Associated Press (hat tip reader Tawal)
CMBS takes a beating as delinquencies reach record high Housing Wire
Fraudclosure: Will State AGs Step Up to Their Moment in History? Bankster USA
Bill Gross: Devil’s Bargain Ed Harrison
Legerdemath Boston Review (hat tip reader bob). It is good to see someone in the industry come forward and discuss abuses in derivatives land in some detail, but the fact that this sort of thing is standard operating procedure is not news. I am still mystified that customers buy this stuff, given what a cesspool the industry is.
Antidote du jour:
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Comments are closed.
Cats look down on us. Pigs is equals.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1352874/Louie-pig-thinks-hes-dog-earns-place-CANINE-display-team.html
You meant to say dogs, not cats. Right?
Remember, only dogs are awarded the honor of being “Man’s best friend”.
Dogs rule! You go puppies! Dogs are number 1!
You may be a billionaire fat cat, but it snows on everyone just the same.
Clean and unpolluted snow is to everyone’s benefit.
Dogs have owners, cats have staff.
The rally around the constitution article is odd.
It comments on some less then deep thinkers: Baucman and Beck. Then seems to find the restrictions of the constitution inconvenient.
The 10th Amendment has always been a thorn in the side of Federalists to varying degrees. It is one of the main reasons that Eisenhower couched the interstate highway construction in defense terms.
Legerdemath piece has a weird mistake in it:
“Most brazenly, we taught clients phony math that involved settling Treasury-rate locks by referencing Treasury yields rather than prices.”
Nothing phony about it – that’s how you *should* settle Treasury rate locks. It this a typo or does this guy know less than he thinks he does? Undermines an interesting piece.
“Remember how the US promoted Ahmed Chalabi as a possible leader of Iraq, when he hadn’t been in the country since, what, 1956? I wonder if this is a sign that the Administration is trying to find another horse to back.”
That’s entirely possible, but El Baradei’s future fate in Egypt may have more in common with:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Abulhassan_Banisadr
Someone who was physically not present in the country for some time, that returned from “exile”, played a role in the changes, but gets quickly marginalized or worse after a short time.
This is the very first time that I have ever seen a liberal website openly “get” how the Republicans work in Congress, and why they continually, consistently, outmaneuver the Dems. The entire system is set up to throw sops to the left so that they can say to themselves, “well, at least they didn’t do x” when that was never the goal of the other side at all. They completely work to create where the middle ground will fall, while the other side is either truly clueless or willfully playing along with their common owners to create the illusion of compromise.
At least that is progress. Somebody out there has finally been paying attention. Now they just need to decide whether the Dems are incompetent or malicious. I have come to my own conclusions, of course. But I actually have some hope if large portions of the populace start seeing the pattern for what it is.
What makes you think they are not incompetent AND malicious?
Ina:
What is this “other side” of which you speak?
Best article on how the legacy parties work: “the ratchet effect”.
Just want to point out that there’s plenty more room at the bottom of the home page for more of the ‘click-through’ posts to appear. Right now not even all of yesterday’s posts are on the home page, though there’s room, because the side bar is so long.
To Ina Deaver:
Which link are you talking about?
Sorry,me: Democrats and Allies Missing the Big Picture on “Rape Redefinition” Bill
Just the other day I got an email from my favorite spamming cousin that she forwarded from a left-leaning group that she belongs to — and they fell for this hook, line and sinker. It does little good to point out to her that they will win the battle and lose the war if they take that approach — but I sent her the above link for thought.
I’ve been complaining for a long, long time that the true target of the right wing movement is the Griswold decision, not the Roe v. Wade one. And that is a profound attack indeed, not just for women but for the entire concept of privacy in our society.
I’ve been very impressed at the command of nonviolent methods and strategy displayed in Egypt. It’s clear that the secular activist strata has acquired a very good background, and that even in violent confrontations such as at Tahrir Square on Wednesday there are elements pushing nonviolent action to keep a lid on things. I’d wondered where they got that background, and reading up it’s become clear. The April 6ers deliberately copied the Otpor movement in Serbia that did in Milosevic. And that movement explicitly drew on the writings and direct support of Gene Sharp, who is the leading scholar of nonviolence. The seeds that are planted find the ground on which to grow; now we have the bloom.
But doesn’t it upset you that the MSM is reporting that it is “Mubarak supporters” who began this violence, rather than secret police dressed in plainclothes? Sure, Mubarak has supporters. . .that is not who began this violence, it was targeted to throw the protests into riot mode so that the military would be forced to clamp down.
Incredible restraint is being exercised by the protestors. Before dawn, someone opened fire on them with an automatic weapon. Several were killed. Some buildings are burning, but it is unclear who started the fires. I think that they are doing everything that they can. . .may God protect them.
To tear the mask of hypocrisy from the face of the enemy, to unmask him and the devious machinations and manipulations that permit him to rule without using violence, that is, to provoke action even at the risk of annihilaton so that the truth may come out—these are still among the strongest motives in today’s violence on the campuses and in the streets.
▬Hannah Arendt, Crises of the Republic
Both the temper and the method of non-violence yield another very important advantage in social conflict. They rob the opponent [read Obama and Mubarak] of the moral conceit by which he identifies his interests with the peace and order of society. This is the most important of all the imponderables in a social struggle. It is the one which gives an entrenched and dominant group the clearest and the least justified advantage over those who are attacking the status quo. The latter are placed in the category of enemies of public order, of criminals and inciters to violence and the neutral community is invariably arrayed against them. The temper and the method of non-violence destroys the plausibility of this moral conceit of the entrenched interests. If the non-violent campaign actually threatens and imperils existing arrangements the charge of treason and violence will be made against it none-the-less. But it will not confuse the neutral elements in a community so easily.
▬Reinhold Niebuhr, Moral Man and Immoral Society
I hope that Egyptians and the Tunisians are successful in re- shaping their country toward a true people’s democracy… But a big question is still the army and it’s generals. Hopefully, the fact that the army is full of conscripts may result in more empathy between the soldiers
and the protesters ( who themselves were ex- soldiers). The next important question is the composion of the officers and the top generals… What are their attitudes and interests and empathies? The protest now needs leadership to reach out to the soldiers, lower officers, and generals if it hopes to form a transition governemnt effectively…
Even if the protesters fail to gain full democracy, A key demand wil be to transfer authority of the police to active civillians oversight (to remove the terror of the secret police And to start the exposure of endemic corruption that has paralyzed Egypt .) Transparency, oversight, and re- algnmnet
of objectives of certain institutions, along with removal of corrupt I individuals, are probably more important to the prosperity of the nation than a democracy where leadership can be changed but corruption is hidden or disguised, but also endemic. Of course, to buy peace, some accomodation to the ‘Powers’ within Egypt will be necessary.
The new transition government must offer peace with Israel it is to avoid American direct intervention.
You think these are people like us, and you think the leadership is the english speakers you see being interviewed on TV. Wrong on both counts. Neither we nor the western journalists out there now have the slightest idea what is going on. The people who are really in charge of it all are not talking, and most of them don’t even speak english.
This is not the fall of the Eastern European regimes. Not at all. As for peace with Israel? What???
Gene Sharp’s site at
The Albert Einstein Institution
http://www.aeinstein.org/
offers many publications to be freely downloaded
found via Scientific American site: http://www.scientificamerican.com/blog/post.cfm?id=egypts-revolution-vindicates-gene-s-2011-02-11
Egypt’s revolution vindicates Gene Sharp’s theory of nonviolent activism
By John Horgan
The necessary first step toward changing an unjust regime, Sharp emphasizes, is for people to reject the self-fulfilling view of themselves as weak; after all, even the most brutal tyrants must rely to some extent on the cooperation of citizens, not just in the military but throughout the society.
Nonviolent Actions he lists in the index of
“From Dictatorship to Democracy”:
Appendix One
The Methods of Nonviolent Protest and
Persuasion
Formal Statements
1. Public speeches
2. Letters of opposition or support
3. Declarations by organizations and institutions
4. Signed public statements
5. Declarations of indictment and intention
6. Group or mass petitions
Communications with a Wider Audience
7. Slogans, caricatures, and symbols
8. Banners, posters, and displayed communications
9. Leaflets, pamphlets, and books
10. Newspapers and journals
11. Records, radio, and television
12. Skywriting and earthwriting
Group Representations
13. Deputations
14. Mock awards
15. Group lobbying
16. Picketing
17. Mock elections
Symbolic Public Acts
18. Display of flags and symbolic colors
19. Wearing of symbols
20. Prayer and worship
21. Delivering symbolic objects
22. Protest disrobings
23. Destruction of own property
24. Symbolic lights
25. Displays of portraits
26. Paint as protest
27. New signs and names
28. Symbolic sounds
29. Symbolic reclamations
30. Rude gestures
Pressures on Individuals
31. “Haunting” officials
32. Taunting officials
33. Fraternization
34. Vigils
Drama and Music
35. Humorous skits and pranks
36. Performance of plays and music
37. Singing
Processions
38. Marches
39. Parades
40. Religious processions
41. Pilgrimages
42. Motorcades
Honoring the Dead
43. Political mourning
44. Mock funerals
45. Demonstrative funerals
46. Homage at burial places
Public Assemblies
47. Assemblies of protest or support
48. Protest meetings
49. Camouflaged meetings of protest
50. Teach-ins
Withdrawal and Renunciation
51. Walk-outs
52. Silence
53. Renouncing honors
54. Turning one’s back
The Methods of Social Noncooperation
Ostracism of Persons
55. Social boycott
56. Selective social boycott
57. Lysistratic nonaction
58. Excommunication
59. Interdict
Noncooperation with Social Events, Customs, and Institutions
60. Suspension of social and sports activities
61. Boycott of social affairs
62. Student strike
63. Social disobedience
64. Withdrawal from social institutions
Withdrawal from the Social System
65. Stay-at-home
66. Total personal noncooperation
67. Flight of workers
68. Sanctuary
69. Collective disappearance
70. Protest emigration (hijrat)
The Methods of Economic Noncooperation:
(1) Economic Boycotts
Action by Consumers
71. Consumers’ boycott
72. Nonconsumption of boycotted goods
73. Policy of austerity
74. Rent withholding
75. Refusal to rent
76. National consumers’ boycott
77. International consumers’ boycott
Action by Workers and Producers
78. Workmen’s boycott
79. Producers’ boycott
Action by Middlemen
80. Suppliers’ and handlers’ boycott
action by owners and management
81. Traders’ boycott
82. Refusal to let or sell property
83. Lockout
84. Refusal of industrial assistance
85. Merchants’ “general strike”
Action by Holders of Financial Resources
86. Withdrawal of bank deposits
87. Refusal to pay fees, dues, and assessments
88. Refusal to pay debts or interest
89. Severance of funds and credit
90. Revenue refusal
91. Refusal of a government’s money
Action by Governments
92. Domestic embargo
93. Blacklisting of traders
94. International sellers’ embargo
95. International buyers’ embargo
96. International trade embargo
The Methods of Economic Noncooperation:
(2) the strike
Symbolic Strikes
97. Protest strike
98. Quickie walkout (lightning strike)
Agricultural Strikes
99. Peasant strike
100. Farm workers’ strike
Strikes by Special Groups
101. Refusal of impressed labor
102. Prisoners’ strike
103. Craft strike
104. Professional strike
Ordinary Industrial Strikes
105. Establishment strike
106. Industry strike
107. Sympathetic strike
Restricted Strikes
108. Detailed strike
109. Bumper strike
110. Slowdown strike
111. Working-to-rule strike
112. Reporting “sick” (sick-in)
113. Strike by resignation
114. Limited strike
115. Selective strike
Multi-industry Strikes
116. Generalized strike
117. General strike
Combinations of Strikes and Economic Closures
118. Hartal
119. Economic shutdown
The Methods of Political Noncooperation
Rejection of Authority
120. Withholding or withdrawal of allegiance
121. Refusal of public support
122. Literature and speeches advocating resistance
Citizens’ Noncooperation with Government
123. Boycott of legislative bodies
124. Boycott of elections
125. Boycott of government employment and positions
126. Boycott of government departments, agencies and
other bodies
127. Withdrawal from government educational institutions
128. Boycott of government-supported organizations
129. Refusal of assistance to enforcement agents
130. Removal of own signs and placemarks
131. Refusal to accept appointed officials
132. Refusal to dissolve existing institutions
Citizens’ Alternatives to Obedience
133. Reluctant and slow compliance
134. Nonobedience in absence of direct supervision
135. Popular nonobedience
136. Disguised disobedience
137. Refusal of an assemblage or meeting to disperse
138. Sitdown
139. Noncooperation with conscription and deportation
140. Hiding, escape and false identities
141. Civil disobedience of “illegitimate” laws
Action by Government Personnel
142. Selective refusal of assistance by government aides
143. Blocking of lines of command and information
144. Stalling and obstruction
145. General administrative noncooperation
146. Judicial noncooperation
147. Deliberate inefficiency and selective noncooperation by enforcement agents
148. Mutiny
Domestic Governmental Action
149. Quasi-legal evasions and delays
150. Noncooperation by constituent governmental units
International Governmental Action
151. Changes in diplomatic and other representation
152. Delay and cancellation of diplomatic events
153. Withholding of diplomatic recognition
154. Severance of diplomatic relations
155. Withdrawal from international organizations
156. Refusal of membership in international bodies
157. Expulsion from international organizations
The Methods of Nonviolent Intervention
Psychological Intervention
158. Self-exposure to the elements
159. The fast
(a) Fast of moral pressure
(b) Hunger strike
(c) Satyagrahic fast
160. Reverse trial
161. Nonviolent harassment
Physical Intervention
162. Sit-in
163. Stand-in
164. Ride-in
165. Wade-in
166. Mill-in
167. Pray-in
168. Nonviolent raids
169. Nonviolent air raids
170. Nonviolent invasion
171. Nonviolent interjection
172. Nonviolent obstruction
173. Nonviolent occupation
Social Intervention
174. Establishing new social patterns
175. Overloading of facilities
176. Stall-in
177. Speak-in
178. Guerrilla theater
179. Alternative social institutions
180. Alternative communication system
Economic Intervention
181. Reverse strike
182. Stay-in strike
183. Nonviolent land seizure
184. Defiance of blockades
185. Politically motivated counterfeiting
186. Preclusive purchasing
187. Seizure of assets
188. Dumping
189. Selective patronage
190. Alternative markets
191. Alternative transportation systems
192. Alternative economic institutions
Political Intervention
193. Overloading of administrative systems
194. Disclosing identities of secret agents
195. Seeking imprisonment
196. Civil disobedience of “neutral” laws
197. Work-on without collaboration
198. Dual sovereignty and parallel government
Because at some level we know what it means when real physical evidence is removed or hidden behind computer counts, like with the electronic voting/scanning/tabulating machines used in most elections now…all machine counts…all vulnerable on purpose. Then look who owns them. Any question why Bush was able to muscle his way in…twice.
To prevent future rule by theft, we need hand counted paper ballots, a preference for real physical evidence counted and posted in precinct on election night, and cross checked at county, state levels. Then we might be able to rely on a democracy to solve problems and work better for more people. Then we could get more Public State or City Banks using unbacked debt-free fiat and silver certificate/coin money to prevent bankruptcy and to build infrastructure and jobs.
http://www.thelandesreport.com/VotingMachineCompanies.htm
http://www.thelandesreport.com/VotingSecurity.htm
http://electiondefensealliance.org/
http://www.blackboxvoting.org/
http://www.velvetrevolution.us/#110508
http://sixthestate.net/?p=262
More rants about the SEC clowns
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2011-02-03/pity-the-hedge-fund-cops-who-can-t-carry-guns-commentary-by-jonathan-weil.html
“Debunking a the “structural unemployment” meme.”
Yves, perhaps you can also debunk a persistent confusion of mine. Is the only thing meant by “structural unemployment” that (as Dean Baker says) “workers don’t have the right skills for the available jobs”?
And is the only alternate to “structural unemployment” the equally nebulous-sounding “cyclical employment”?
This argument always makes me shake my head. If it’s not structural then it’s cyclical? Seems like that’s an argument for inaction, or at least complacency, if the problem will get better on its own – just extend and pretend.
That doesn’t seem like the thing to do. American wages are too high and so is consumer debt. Our economy (if not individual workers) is geared towards inflating bubble after bubble. A huge percentage of our economic output is unproductive electronic “money”. I suppose it will take a decade or more (if ever) to sort it all out. How is that not “structural”? And what structure are we talking about, here?
Sorry, “cyclical UNemployment”
Structural un – employment legalize medical cannabis Oregon style: One Medical Marijuana grower can only supply 5-10 patients. This would assure a New Steady Broad Base Economic stimulus across the Country. The refuse off of the cannabis plant could be collected like plastic bottles are collected at the dump. The cannabis plant is suitable for many industrial applications Remove the schedule ranking of Marijuana. Recycle/Green and Low Cost commodity.
Our Money needs to be MADE By The PEOPLE in this Nation( slam un-employment plus a new product for the market), NOT A DAM PRINTING PRESS then giving it to some foreign countries sovereign wealth fund,and Maybe then they will invest some of it with us if we’re nice.
Legalizing Marijuana would also starve out a lot of Crime and save a lot of Lives not mention the COUNTRY. What a Dream.
Re: “Cracking the Scratch Lottery Code”
Fascinating. Thanks for linking, though this part makes me sick:
“There was a time when scratch games all but sold themselves. But in the past two decades the competition for the gambling dollar has dramatically increased. As a result, many state lotteries have redesigned their tickets.”
The incentives are perverse once governments start to rely on gambling for revenue. It means they have to compete for gambling dollars. It means they design marketing messages to make a surefire loser look like a winner.
It also means that the more our foolish(and usually poor) neighbors play these loser games, the better off “we” are.
Say I not rightly that the LESS the poor waste on these stupid things, the healthier a society is?
And I LOVE this:
“One important strategy involves the use of what lottery designers call extended play. Although extended-play games—sometimes referred to as baited hooks—tend to look like miniature spreadsheets, they’ve proven extremely popular with consumers. Instead of just scratching off the latex and immediately discovering a loser, players have to spend time matching up the revealed numbers with the boards.”
Last week I went to a conference in Vegas. Some of my coworkers spend the evening at dollar blackjack tables, and in a couple hours they lost maybe ten bucks.
Pshaw I said. So inefficient. I can lose ten dollars in five seconds.
An small child is afraid of darkness but has no problem with silence.
On the other hand, a modern adult has no problem with darkness (hopefully), but is scared to death of silence – hence the earphones while jogging on the beach and the radio when driving.
A real Neanderthal would not have gone to the bright and noisy casino after a day of conferencing, but would have wondered at the stars in the open, quite desert.
The rooms at the Wynn are really quite ideal in this regard for a non-gambler. One whole side of the room is a giant window. The sunrise dazzles, the distant mountains are very visible, and at night, well, “It’s like looking DOWN on the stars”.
true… but i’ve also noticed that my dogs are a lot more relaxed with some type of noise–if not from live social interaction, then radio and tv often suffice.
That headline “US employers unsure about economic recovery” is quite funny. It seems like only a week or two ago I was hearing all these breathless stories about how US employers were planning on hiring this year. But that’s the pattern: happy talk and then a splash of cold reality then more happy talk.
The BLS jobs report tomorrow should be interesting because it needs to show marked improvement and probably won’t.
Structural unemployment and jobs-skills mismatches are just elite mumbo jumbo to justify the failure to address the country’s 20% level of disemployment. Dean Baker is right that employers could find more workers with the right skills set if they raised wages to attract them. But it’s also true that employers could *gasp* train workers for these positions rather than leaving them vacant.
Yves, respecting your N.Y. Times piece, “Follow the Money”, where is it going? The Qe2-3. How do we follow this?
Micheal Lewis’ article in Vanity Fair is a must read- re the Irish problem. I guess the CRA and the GSE’s must have made it over there to screw things up this bad.
“Hhm, has everyone gone into “Mission Accomplished” mode a tad early?”
And perhaps, they understand the one feature of a loan is that it has to be paid back. A growing liability looks pretty awful, even if it comes due later. Later is still too soon.
The only loans voluntarily forgiven are those to close family, good friends, and people who won’t take a good, honest bribe. The loans let drop from no recourse are done with ill grace and every intention to collect in some blue sky future. Weren’t Weimar Germany bonds taken to court late last year?
Since the Irish central bank’s been given (has taken?) issuing rights, it could be they’ll print their way out of it. Or they might have to bite the bullet. Figuratively, one hopes.