A short recon of what’s out there that might draw your attention, updated throughout the day...so check back often.
In the News: (Registration may be required to read some stories)
Frank: Bailout Money To Be 'Phased In'- Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.), chairman of the House Financial Services committee, speaking on CNBC moments ago, said the Wall Street bailout plan will be "phased in" in installments, rather than giving Treasury $700 billion up front. (
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GOP, Democratic Negotiators Reach Agreement in Principle - House and Senate negotiators emerged from a closed-door meeting today and said they have reached agreement on basic principles governing a massive financial rescue plan that they hope to pass soon. (
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Lawmakers' distrust of Bush stymies bailout - Lawmakers' resistance to a financial-rescue plan reflects their distrust of the Bush administration and a growing opposition from constituents across the political spectrum to the proposed $700 billion credit-industry bailout. (
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New home sales plummet in August - WASHINGTON (AP) -- Government data show sales of new homes dropped sharply in August, falling to the slowest pace in 17 years. The average sales price fell by the largest amount on record, too. (
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Stocks open higher on bailout hopes - NEW YORK (AP) -- Stocks are higher in early trading as government officials move closer to a deal aimed at saving the crippled financial system. (
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McCain steps up in maverick style - Democrats had dared Sen. John McCain to show leadership on the Wall Street crisis and he stepped up. He put his campaign on hold Wednesday and challenged Sen. Barack Obama to postpone Friday's debate, which Democrats had hoped to turn into a forum on failed Republican economic policies. (
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Deal reached by Congress on bailout plan - Congressional leaders Thursday said they had reached a "fundamental agreement" on the principles of a bill to implement the Bush administration's $700 billion Wall Street rescue package, hours before President Bush convened an emergency White House summit with presidential rivals Sen. Barack Obama and Sen John McCain in a bid to seal a deal. (
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On the Web:
Ann Coulter:
They Gave Your Mortgage To A Less Qualified Minority - On MSNBC this week, Newsweek's Jonathan Alter tried to connect John McCain to the current financial disaster, saying: "If you remember the Keating Five scandal that (McCain) was a part of. ... He's really getting a free ride on the fact that he was in the middle of the last great financial scandal in our country." McCain was "in the middle of" the Keating Five case in the sense that he was "exonerated." The lawyer for the Senate Ethics Committee wanted McCain removed from the investigation altogether, but, as The New York Times reported: "Sen. McCain was the only Republican embroiled in the affair, and Democrats on the panel would not release him." So John McCain has been held hostage by both the Viet Cong and the Democrats. Alter couldn't be expected to know that: As usual, he was lifting material directly from Kausfiles. (
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Victor Davis Hanson:
Dr. Frankenstein's Wall Street - When the mortgage bubble burst, Americans were “shocked” at how many Wall Street buccaneers had been gambling in a vast pyramid scheme with someone else’s money. Paper fortunes were made buying and selling questionable sub-prime mortgages on the silly assumption that such gargantuan inside profiting would always expand — even as the number of homebuyers able to buy overpriced properties was shrinking. Now after the recent crash in sub-prime mortgages and the stock of several investment firms, a trillion dollars in “assets” could be nearly worthless. An already indebted American government must restore some sort of trust to banks and markets by either printing money or borrowing hundreds of billions of dollars from foreign creditors to guarantee loans. All that remains of this Ponzi scheme is the election-year blame game. (
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Michael Medved:
Biden's Financial History Disqualifies Him For High Office - If a candidate for high office does a spectacularly poor job in managing his own family's finances, why on earth should we trust him in a national leadership position at a time of acute economic crisis? Senator Joe Biden's recently disclosed tax returns display a consistent pattern of poor judgment and shabby values that ought to disqualify him for the vice presidency or any other post of significant responsibility. Over the course of ten years (1998 through 2007) the Bidens averaged an adjusted gross income of $245,000 – placing them uncomfortably close to that threshold of $250,000 a year that Senator Obama considers “wealthy” and deserving of sharply increased taxes. In several years during the last decade Biden and his educator wife Jill definitely entered into that privileged territory, reporting income of $319,853 last year (and even more in 2005). (
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Cal Thomas:
Judgment Day - It isn't often that public outrage peaks so close to an election, but this is a rare moment in history when "we the people" can exact a price from the political leadership that has duped, scammed and lied to them, contributing mightily to the current financial mess. At the Senate Banking Committee hearings Tuesday, Democrats, led by Chairman Chris Dodd of Connecticut, seemed to think the mortgage crisis, aided and abetted by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, AIG, Bear Stearns, Lehman Brothers and other disasters, occurred on someone else's watch. Dodd, joined by ranking Republican Richard Shelby of Alabama, criticized what he said was the ad hoc nature of the government's response to the financial crisis and complained that the Bush administration's proposals lack detail. Some history is important. It was pressure from the Carter and Clinton administrations that forced Fannie and Freddie to grant more high-risk loans to people who otherwise would never qualify. (
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Floyd & Mary Beth Brown:
McCain Should Say No to Bush and Senate Democrats on Wall Street Bailout - "Fearing a political backlash against Democrats," Roll Call reported, "Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) has told the White House that it must serve up support from Republican presidential nominee Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) if it hopes to ensure bipartisan backing for a massive economic bailout package by week's end." Falling for this trick by Sen. Reid and the other Obama supporters in the U.S. Senate could severely damage Sen. McCain's campaign. McCain should reject the plan and use the issue to draw a distinction between himself and President Bush for good policy reasons. Wall Street is in trouble because of misplaced bets on derivatives and other financial instruments. It is not the purpose of tax dollars to limit the damage to multi-millionaires for trading mistakes they have made. (
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Emmett Tyrrell:
The Taranto Principle Examined - WASHINGTON -- Years from now in journalism schools, they will call it the "Taranto Principle." At least, that is what they will call it if they still have journalism schools years from now. In the future, the great republic may only have blog schools, those being schools where students are taught to sit in their underwear in front of their luminescent laptops and pound out semiliterate diktats to an -- for the most part -- unobservant world. Today the amalgamation of all this indignation is called the "blogosphere." Its competing rants are treated occasionally as significant in the media, though lunatics howling on street corners are not. Very curious. What is the Taranto Principle? It is a principle laid down by The Wall Street Journal's perceptive editorialist James Taranto. Taranto -- in his column, "Best of the Web Today" -- surveys the media and reports daily on their output with special emphasis on their contradictions... (
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Lawhawk:
Another Haditha Marine Set To Sue Rep. Murtha - The reprehensible Democrat Rep. John Murtha, who claimed that the Haditha Marines murdered Iraqis in cold blood, must be held accountable for his outrageous statements. Expect to hear crickets from Murtha and his press flacks when yet another lawsuit is filed against him for slander by one of those Marines smeared by the Member of Congress. “A local Marine cleared in the deaths of civilians in Iraq says Congressman John Murtha made public comments that were unproven, untrue and unfair. Now, Lance Corporal Justin Sharratt is planning to file suit in federal court against Murtha on Thursday morning. The suit accuses the congressman of slander and violating the Marine's right to a fair trial and due process.” (
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Dafydd:
John McCain Chooses Sarah Palin... Again - Today, John S. McCain announced that he will suspend his presidential campaign for a few days, so he can return to Washington D.C. and -- funnily enough -- work on the people's business; to wit, participate in the negotiations on the Paulson-Bernanke rescue proposal. The announcement knocked the Barack H. Obama campaign, the Democrats, the congressional leadership, and the elite news media (to the extent that those are not simply synonyms) back on their heels... like walking up an unlit stairway and taking that last step that isn't there. They scrambled around like prats, denounced McCain, called it a "political stunt," contradicted each other (and themselves two minutes later), and in general, ran around like chickens with their legs cut off. In other words, just exactly what they did when McCain named Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin as his vice-presidential running mate. (
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Bear Creek Ledger:
What? Military Personnel can’t be the subject of a hate crime? - According to the Dallas police crimes against military personnel cannot be considered a hate crime. From NBC5i.com - Soldier’s Car Vandalized At Dallas University “DALLAS — Dallas police are looking into a shocking crime against an Iraq War vet that took place on a college campus. Overnight Tuesday, someone took vandalized 23-year-old Army veteran Viktor Whitlow’s vehicle while it was parked at Dallas Baptist University. Ironically, the mascot at DBU is the Patriot. The vandals used a box cutter to destroy the inside of his jeep, they slashed five tires and smashed through the windshield. Perhaps the most shocking detail to the vandalism was the message spray painted on his hood.” (
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Big Dog:
Who Is Responsible For This Financial Mess? - Barack Obama and his fellow Democrats have been putting the blame for the current financial crisis on the back of the president and the Republican Party who Democrats claim failed to address the issue. The Democrat’s parrots in the media have been shouting to anyone who will listen trying to make the accusations stick. This is a coordinated attack to take the focus off all the Democrats who have been bought and paid for by the greedy people on Wall Street. Fox News had a story and this should provide documented proof, with audio and video, as to whom the blame lies. In reality, this news story shows the efforts of the Bush Administration in trying to reign in the mortgage giants, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. The complete history goes back decades and involves Democratic plans that allowed people to buy things they had no hope of ever affording. (
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Blonde Sagacity:
Never Did Trust Those Quakers... - The area surrounding my house is chock full of Quakers, their $20K a year Friends schools and their candle vigils. The Man's brother's ex-girlfriend was a Quaker and I found it interesting that his vegetarianism and nasty Birkenstocks exited his life the same time she did. Yeah, the "Peace IS THE WAY" banners have always rubbed me the wrong way because of the infantile naiveté of the slogan...but they're pretty innocuous right? They just sit in their meeting houses until someone is moved to speak and espouse peace. That's what I thought...until this: “An event organized by several religious groups to honor Iranian president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in New York Thursday has drawn ire from the Catholic League and several Jewish organizations, UPI reported. Catholic League President Bill Donohue called on supporters to attend a rally to disrupt Thursday’s ‘obscene’ Ramadan event.” (
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Don Surber:
Reversal - Poll: Republican John McCain turned things around by suspending his campaign. Stunt, the liberal bloggers brayed. Ploy, they cried. Fool, they said. McCain’s decision to go back to Washington and do the job to which he was elected was roundly denounced. Guess what? The public understood. Washington is trying to shove a $700 billion bailout down the throats of taxpayers. This looked like a job for a grown-up. Country first, McCain went. Maybe he can tone down the bailout. Pollsters John zogby said it worked. His interactive poll had McCain down 3 points. After McCain returned to Washington, McCain is up by 2. (
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GayPatriotWest:
NYC Protest Today Against “Lovefest” for Ahmadinejad - If you’re in New York this afternoon, try to make it to mid-town Manhattan for a protest across the street from the Grand Hyatt Hotel, East 42nd St between Park and Lexington Avenues at 6 PM today. There, a group of fifty prominent Jewish and Christian leaders, and public policy groups will protest a dinner meeting between Iranian president Ahmadinejad, anti-American U.N. officials and American religious leaders. Yeah, you read that right, American religious leaders, including representatives of The American Friends Service Committee, Mennonite Central Committee, Quaker UN Office, Religions for Peace, and the World Council of Churches-UN Liaison Office will be breaking bread with a man who murders his own people. (
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Allahpundit:
Alarm raised: Reid quietly trying to extend ban on oil shale - Two days after leaving through the front door he’s trying to sneak back in through the side. Jim DeMint is up in arms, as is Heritage: “This comes as both a stunning and ridiculous development; Americans are still coping with high energy prices and coming to grips with a plan to bailout Wall Street, and Senator Reid is denying access to potentially one of America’s most abundant energy reserves. Just how much energy you ask? Dr. Daniel Fine of MIT reported that 750 billion barrels worth of oil shale have been discovered in Colorado alone. That amount is enough to potentially power the U.S. economy for many decades. Furthermore, if full-scale production begins within five years, the U.S. could completely end its dependence on OPEC by 2020…” (
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Ed Morrissey:
Did McCain answer a 3 AM call? - CBS News reports that John McCain suspended his campaign as a response to a call from Henry Paulson to rescue the bailout plan, which would have headed for defeat without his leadership. Bob Schieffer reported this morning that McCain flew back to Washington to help reach a compromise that would allow Republicans to support a form of bailout, and that without his help, efforts to resolve the crisis would have collapsed: “I am told, Maggie, that the way McCain got involved in this in the first place, the Treasury Secretary was briefing Republicans in the House yesterday, the Republican conference, asked how many were ready to support the bailout plan. Only four of them held up their hands. Paulson then called, according to my sources, Senator Lindsey Graham, who is very close to John McCain, and told him: you’ve got to get the people in the McCain campaign, you’ve got to convince John McCain to give these Republicans some political cover. If you don’t do that, this whole bailout plan is going to fail. So that’s how, McCain, apparently, became involved.” (
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Michael J. Totten:
The Scorching of Georgia - Last month Russia invaded, occupied, and de-facto annexed portions of Georgia. During that time it was difficult, if not impossible, for reporters to see for themselves what was actually happening. I wanted to see for myself what Russia had wrought, but everything behind the front lines was closed. The breakaway regions of Abkhazia and South Ossetia were off-limits to anyone without a Russian visa. It takes months to acquire a Russian visa, so traveling to those areas was out of the question. I tried to get into the occupied city of Gori with Caucasus expert and author Thomas Goltz, but even that city was closed to us though it is inside Georgia proper and beyond Russia's acquired new territories. Occasionally Russian soldiers would let journalists pass, but Thomas and I weren't among the lucky few. (
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neoneocon:
Barney Frank says… - "years of irresponsible failure to regulate have led us” to this crisis. He fails to add the little detail that the “irresponsible failure to regulate” was his own, as Chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, when he was the leader of attempt after successful attempt to block Republican calls for better regulation of Fannie and Freddie. Fox News points it out, but how many people know? And Frank counts on most of the MSM to cover his sorry butt, just as the Boston Globe does here. Monica Crowley was also on the minute or two of Fox cable news where I just viewed the hypocritical Frank quote. (
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Rightwing Nuthouse:
THE McCAIN GAMBIT - With the momentum of the campaign swinging decisively against him, John McCain has rolled the dice once again, hoping to alter the dynamics of a race where events over the last 10 days were playing directly into his opponent’s strengths while blunting his own post convention surge. The suspension of his campaign is a gimmick, of course – a stylized Kabuki play where Obama was to meekly acquiesce, following the older man’s lead by going to Washington and help bring Congress together on a bailout package. But Obama didn’t want to come out and play. He is calling McCain’s bluff and will show up at the debate in Mississippi on Friday night even if McCain eschews participation. He also declined McCain’s gracious invitation to play second fiddle in Congressional negotiations on the package. (
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Melanie Phillips Blog:
Dirty politics from Camp Obama - Earlier this week, I wrote about the dirty tricks campaign against journalist Amir Taheri following his revelation that, in a private meeting in Iraq last July with Iraqi leaders, Barack Obama tried to persuade them to delay the agreement being hammered out with the US government on a draw-down of the American military presence. According to this account, which quoted Iraq’s foreign minister Hoshya Zebari (pictured), Obama had thus privately sought to undermine an American government foreign policy initiative – an explosive revelation. Taheri subsequently dismissed as tendentious Camp Obama’s response which he said deliberately confused two separate agreements under discussion; and he also revealed that, following publication of his story in the New York Post, he had been subjected to death threats, menacing calls about his tax status and passport, and a cyber-attack which disabled two of his email accounts. Then Camp Obama tried another tactic. (
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Eric Posner:
Paulson v. Dodd: distributional considerations - What is the difference between the two bills? Broadly, we can identify two dimensions: technocratic and distributional. On the technocratic side, Dodd supporters argue that the financial crisis will be resolved more cheaply if (for example) the government demands equity warrants or must submit to judicial review. Maybe, maybe not. The main difference, it seems to me, is distributional. This difference is reflected both in political rhetoric (with the Democrats arguing that their bill favors the taxpayer) and the substance of the bills. If you think that the average over-indebted homeowner and the average taxpayer are less wealthy than those who operate and hold shares in big financial institutions, then the Dodd bill favors lower-income people relative to the Paulson bill, at least if its provisions work as intended. (
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Ilya Somin:
How Political Fans are Like Sports Fans - Why Voters are Highly Biased in their Evaluation of Political Information - Both Slate and the Washington Post have interesting new article summarizing recent social science research showing that voters tend to be highly biased in their evaluation of political information. Voters tend to overvalue the importance of new information that supports their preexisting views or makes their preferred party look good; and they tend to discount any information that cuts the other way. As the Slate article puts it: “This has nothing to do with ideology. Politics isn't about ideology. It's about joining a team, and we judge fairness as partisans. In 1951, Princeton and Dartmouth students watched a film of a football game and were asked to take note of foul play. Princeton stalwarts saw all the penalties that should have been called on the Dartmouth players. Dartmouth students were convinced the refs missed clips and offsides committed by the Princeton players. We judge politics the same way:” (
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DJ Drummond:
Protecting The Economy - The news has been scary lately. I worried about it for a while, but the grey cells kicked in after a bit and reminded me that the source of most of the noise was from people in the business of trying to scare folks. A lot of folks forget that whether it's broadcast news, cable, or even an internet outlet, they are looking for ratings and the most popular way to do that is do a variation of Chicken Little. The media is - basically - dishonest in its priorities and focus, and always has been. This does not mean that you should not pay attention to the media, but you should keep in mind that they always have an ulterior motive, one which often skews how the present information. So how big a deal is the present financial mess? Big enough that Democrats and Republicans are seriously talking about spending $700,000,000,000 of your money and mine to face it, with a minimum of narcissistic posturing. (
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Meryl Yourish:
The echoing silence of the world on Iranian Jew-hatred - The president of Iran stands in front of the world body whose charter calls for peace among nations and blames Jews for causing wars, working against world peace, worshipping only money, having no god—and the silence of the response is deafening. Not a single world leader outside Israel or the U.S. condemned the speech. There’s a laughable piece in Ynet that says they did: “Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s anti-Semitic address to the United Nations General Assembly has incurred the wrath of many public figures worldwide.” Really? Name six. Israelis and Jews don’t count. The only non-American, non-Israeli I can find condemning the speech is the French foreign minister. Who is frowning heavily in Iran’s direction. (
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Sigmund, Carl and Alfred:
The Gender Dance - Men and women are different psychologically because they are different biologically. We know this to be the case because biology has been shown to play a pivotal role in the perceptions we have of ourselves and our identity, both as individuals and as members of society. One of the great ‘culture wars’ of the last century has been fought over gender identity. Differences in human biology were minimized or eradicated entirely. There is entire generation that has been taught that what is good for men is good for women and what is good for women is good for men. As a result, the reality that men and women have different needs is ignored. What separates men and women, according to the cultural dogma 0f this western new world order, is gender as defined by sexual organs only. There are of course, other truths. Men spend most of their lives focused on leaving a mark, a legacy of some kind. They need to prove that their existence matters. (
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