Why Is the White House Against Freezing Foreclosures in the Face of Rampant Fraud?

Treasury and Obama are facing huge financial pressure.

AlterNet / By Nomi Prins

At first, there was a deafening silence from Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner and Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke on the foreclosure front. It was as if they: 1) didn’t read the news; or 2) were afraid someone would notice afresh their incompetence in dealing with the ongoing housing crisis and deteriorating economy, while convincing everyone that the bank bailouts and subsidizations were good for us.

Last week, while Senator Harry Reid, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and others in Congress were dispensing irate pre-election sound-bites, attorneys general across the country were gearing up for investigations. Banks were reluctantly announcing foreclosure moratoriums because it’s quarterly earnings season and uncertainty is bad for stock prices, and Geithner was defending TARP and mixing it up with China over the dollar. Meanwhile, the Fed was gearing up to buy more Treasuries, like some kind of rapacious alien that eats its progeny, because no one else wants our debt.

But that changed when Geithner came out of hiding yesterday with a stance. (Bernanke is still in hiding, but will support Geithner’s view soon.) Unsurprisingly, Geithner chose to side with the likes of conservatives and CNBC. Thus, his response to Charlie Rose when asked whether he supported banks in declaring a foreclosure moratorium was: “No, I wouldn’t say it that way.”

Why? Geithner’s logic follows the typical blame-the-little-guy-for-taking-on-too-much-debt-to-buy-a-house-he-couldn’t-afford pattern, coupled with old-style fear-mongering: if you wait and analyze what’s really going on, it might be bad for the housing recovery. And, what housing recovery is that? The one in which 25-30 percent of homes being sold are REOs (bank owned real-estate, a.k.a. foreclosed properties). On a trading floor, that’d be considered "churning," not new value.

US would make Internet wiretaps easier

From AP

By LOLITA C. BALDOR (AP) – 3 days ago

WASHINGTON — The Obama administration is pushing to make it easier for the government to tap into internet and e-mail communications. But the plan has already drawn condemnation from privacy groups and communications firms may be wary of its costs and scope.

Frustrated by sophisticated and often encrypted phone and e-mail technologies, U.S. officials say that law enforcement needs to improve its ability to eavesdrop on conversations involving terrorism, crimes or other public safety issues.

Critics worry the changes are an unnecessary invasion of privacy and would only make citizens and businesses more vulnerable to identity theft and espionage.

The new regulations that would be sent to Congress next year would affect American and foreign companies that provide communications services inside the U.S. It would require service providers to make the plain text of encrypted conversations — over the phone, computer or e-mail — readily available to law enforcement, according to federal officials and analysts.

The mandate would likely require companies to add backdoors or other changes to the systems that would allow a wiretap to capture an unscrambled version of a conversation.

Those affected by the changes would include online services and networking sites such as Facebook and Skype, as well as phone systems that deliver encrypted e-mail such as BlackBerry.

'Tea Party Coloring Book' is kiddie propaganda art

From LA Times

As kids, lots of people had their first participatory art experience with coloring books. Simplified contour drawings in thick black lines leave blank spaces to be filled in with crayons or colored pencils.
 
Now, just in time for the November election, a small Midwest publisher has come up with a distinctive hybrid: a coloring book merged with kiddie propaganda.

"The Tea Party Coloring Book for Kids" is a 32-page "special edition" on the right-wing political movement, produced by a division of Really Big Coloring Books Inc. The online imprint of the St. Louis-based publisher produces one other special-edition product: a 2008 coloring book on then President-elect Barack Obama.

Cheerful in tone, semi-literate in its writing and factually challenged, "The Tea Party Coloring Book for Kids" offers itself as "a teaching and learning tool" for children ages 2 and up.

There aren't any drawings of tea bags suspended from sun hats, nor racist depictions of Obama as a witch doctor with a bone through his nose. Instead, puzzles, lyrics to patriotic songs and line drawings of the Statue of Liberty, edifices in Washington and the facade of the New York Stock Exchange are interspersed with free-market-obsessed texts.

Next to a big dollar sign, "Freedom of Choice and Economics" extols the "ability to choose your job in America's free market." Bright-eyed teen doctors flank "Good Health Care for All Americans," which means private medicine "not restricted by federal or state governments." "No more taxes!" is largely self-explanatory, a sentiment floating in the clouds above Mt. Rushmore.

Underwrite by Chris Revelle, Full Video

Finally got the full video uploaded. Enjoy.

Obama invokes 'state secrets' claim to dismiss suit against targeting of U.S. citizen al-Aulaqi

By Spencer S. Hsu
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, September 25, 2010; 1:49 AM 

The Obama administration urged a federal judge early Saturday to dismiss a lawsuit over its targeting of a U.S. citizen for killing overseas, saying that the case would reveal state secrets.

The U.S.-born citizen, Anwar al-Aulaqi, is a cleric now believed to be in Yemen. Federal authorities allege that he is leading a branch of al-Qaeda there.

Government lawyers called the state-secrets argument a last resort to toss out the case, and it seems likely to revive a debate over the reach of a president's powers in the global war against al-Qaeda.

Civil liberties groups sued the U.S. government on behalf of Aulaqi's father, arguing that the CIA and the Joint Special Operations Command's placement of Aulaqi on a capture-or-kill list of suspected terrorists - outside a war zone and absent an imminent threat - amounted to an extrajudicial execution order against a U.S. citizen. They asked a U.S. district court in Washington to block the targeting.

New Work!

Underwrite, Video, 2010

The following clip is a selection of clips from the 33 min video.

Stephen Colbert Testifies Before Congress

'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' Set For Key Vote Next Week

by Liz Halloran for NPR

The move to repeal a 17-year-old law barring openly gay Americans from serving in the military faces a crucial test Tuesday when senators are scheduled to vote on the annual defense authorization bill, which includes a provision to end the practice.

Its passage remains uncertain as the day approaches.

Republican senators, led by ranking Armed Services Committee member John McCain of Arizona, have threatened to block passage of the bill if the repeal language and an immigration-related amendment remain in the $726 billion measure.

The immigration measure, known as the "DREAM Act," would allow undocumented immigrant students who have been in the U.S. since childhood to enlist in the military, go to college and earn citizenship.

McCain, in a speech from the Senate floor this week, accused Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid of scheduling the vote in advance of November's election to promote the Democrats' social agenda, turning debate on the annual Defense Department funding bill into a "political football."

Repeal advocates, meanwhile, have been scrambling to line up the 60 votes needed to stymie GOP efforts to block the showdown vote on the law, known as "don't ask, don't tell.”

The House in May endorsed repeal of the measure in its defense authorization bill.