Our Gilded Age

By Doug Henwood

It has become a cliché to say that we live in a new Gilded Age. True enough, up to a point. Money, mostly new money, rules politics and culture. Corporations merge into ever larger corporations. You have to go back to before World War I to match today's levels of income and wealth inequality.

In some ways, the second Gilded Age is worse than the first. Sure, we live longer now, more of us can read and you don't have to be a white man to be able to vote. But to prove my point, consider two big parties, thrown 110 years apart.

Today's Must Read

By Andrew Tilghman - June 13, 2008, 9:35AM

If the special-rate Countrywide loan that led to Jim Johnson's resignation from Barack Obama's VP screening team was shady, then there's a few other Washington insiders who may have some explaining to do.

A new article from Portfolio rattles off a list of top Washington officials, current and former, who also received discounted loans because they were personally approved by Countywide Financial's top exec Angelo Mozilo.

TPM: McCain Signs on For More Bush Bamboozlement!

For those of you who remember President Bush's 2005 crusade to phase out Social Security by privatizing the program and converting it into a system of private investment accounts, you know that one of the biggest lines of bamboozlement was the White House's attempt to take the word for Social Security privatization -- i.e., 'privatization' -- and pretend that it was a word Democrats had come up with and one that was unfair for any members of the press to use.

This Land Is Their Land

I took a little vacation recently--nine hours in Sun Valley, Idaho, before an evening speaking engagement. The sky was deep blue, the air crystalline, the hills green and not yet on fire. Strolling out of the Sun Valley Lodge, I found a tiny tourist village, complete with Swiss-style bakery, multistar restaurant and "opera house." What luck--the boutiques were displaying outdoor racks of summer clothing on sale! Nature and commerce were conspiring to make this the perfect micro-vacation.

So Much For Free Speech

By Mary Kane 06/13/2008 12:13PM

A funny thing happened to University of Illinois law professor Robert Lawless on his way to a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing this week. Lawless, an expert on credit and bankruptcy, was set to testify before the Committee on how the U.S. Supreme Court decisions affect people in their everyday lives. Lawless said he was looking forward to talking about how the high court's decisions in the financial services area sometimes take away state protections against deceptive lending practices. Lawless cited the way Jon Stewart once described a regulatory development - "Yes, it's boring. That's how they get away with it" - to explain how he hoped the hearing would shed light on seemingly arcane rulings that have major impacts on people's lives.

Data on Housing Relief Questioned

By David Cho and Renae Merle
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, June 13, 2008; D01

Banks and mortgage firms are providing questionable information about the number of subprime mortgage borrowers they are helping and the rate at which homeowners are falling into foreclosure, according to the top regulator for the nation's largest banks.

Those details are crucial for regulators to gauge the severity of the housing crisis and evaluate the effectiveness of the steps lenders are taking to address the problems.

Paul Krugman: Bad Cow Disease

“Mary had a little lamb / And when she saw it sicken / She shipped it off to Packingtown / And now it’s labeled chicken.”

That little ditty famously summarized the message of “The Jungle,” Upton Sinclair’s 1906 exposé of conditions in America’s meat-packing industry. Sinclair’s muckraking helped Theodore Roosevelt pass the Pure Food and Drug Act and the Meat Inspection Act — and for most of the next century, Americans trusted government inspectors to keep their food safe.

Tomgram: Michael Klare, The Pentagon as Energy Insecurity Inc.

If you thought things were bad, with a barrel of crude oil at $136 and the oil heartlands of our planet verging on chaos, don't be surprised, but you may still have something to look forward to. Alexei Miller, chairman of Russia's vast state-owned energy monopoly, Gazprom, just suggested that, within 18 months, that same barrel could be selling for a nifty $250. Put that in your tank and… well, don't drive it. It will be far too valuable.

Underweight babies hit highest rate, aided by poverty

Mississippi, South Carolina, Louisiana among the worst

By STAFF AND WIRE REPORTS
Published on: 06/12/08

The percentage of underweight babies born in the United States has increased to its highest rate in 40 years, with Georgia ranking seventh from the bottom in delivering healthy infants, according to a new report that also documents a recent rise in the number of children living in poverty.

The data on low birth weights is troubling because such babies — those born at less than 5.5 pounds — are at greater risk of dying in infancy or experiencing long-term disabilities.

Emulate Japan to cope with oil shocks

By Dilip Hiro

With the price of oil rocketing to the unprecedented level of US$130 a barrel and more, there is a talk of another oil shock. Unlike past instances, this one is unlikely to subside and may indeed keep intensifying. The only way out is for Western nations, the gluttonous users of petroleum, to cut their consumption and emulate Japan in its consistent drive for energy efficiency and alternate sources.

The present explosion in oil prices, the fourth of its kind, is different from the previous ones in 1973-74, 1980 and 1990-91. The earlier oil shocks were caused by interruption of supplies from the Middle East, respectively due to the war between the Arabs and Israel, the Iranian revolution, and Iraq's invasion and occupation of Kuwait. Once peace returned, the new order became established or the invader was expelled, supplies returned to normal.

On the Economy Debate, The Gloves Come Off

By Robert Borosage
June 11th, 2008 - 9:17am ET

Monday in Raleigh, North Carolina, Illinois Sen. Barack Obama opened the general election fight, taking the gloves off against the "tired and misguided [economic] philosophy that has dominated Washington for too long," and offering a clear challenge to the Bush-McCain economic misrule. In Washington before the National Federation of Independent Business, McCain counterpunched, suggesting the choice was between low taxes and "the largest tax increase since World War II."

This argument will be the big kahuna in this election. Despite ritual boosterism, soothing rhetoric and quiet prayers by Wall Street pundits, the economy is foul and likely to get much worse. We've lost jobs for five months in a row. Gas, food, health care costs are soaring. For workers, the mess is worse than the stagflation of the 1970s. Then, growth was stagnant while prices and wages were spiraling up. Now we've got stagflation squared; growth and wages are stagnant and prices on basics are soaring, while the value of homes, the largest investment Americans have, is plummeting.

Glenn Greenwald: NYT circulates fear-mongering claims on FISA debate

The White House and Congress prepare to tell Americans: If you want to stay safe, you must give the president the power to spy on you without warrants, and immunize telecoms from the consequences of lawbreaking.

Glenn Greenwald

Jun. 10, 2008 | (updated below)

The New York Times' Eric Lichtblau has a long, prominent article today on the pending debate over FISA and telecom amnesty -- headlined: "Return to Old Spy Rules Is Seen as Deadline Nears" -- that features (and endorses) virtually every blatant falsehood that has distorted these spying issues from the beginning, and which is built on every shoddy journalistic practice that has made clear debate over these issues almost impossible. The article strongly suggests that a so-called "compromise" is imminent, a "compromise" which will deliver to the President virtually everything he seeks in the way of new warrantless eavesdropping powers and telecom amnesty.

One paragraph after the next in Lichtblau's article features shrill warnings, mostly from unnamed "officials," about all the scary things that will happen if Congressional Democrats do not quickly pass a new FISA bill that is similar to the Rockefeller/Cheney Senate bill and that is agreeable to the President. If a "compromise" isn't reached, reports the article, then we'll all have to live under the so-called "old" FISA law -- meaning the law used by the U.S. to defend itself from 1978 until August, 2007 and then again from February, 2008 until the present. Moreover, the one-year surveillance orders obtained last August under the now-expired Protect America Act are set to expire in August, 2008.

Do we really expect the Bushies to go quietly?

By Dan Froomkin

As we enter the twilight of the Bush era, with the distinct possibility of a Democrat moving into the White House next January, it’s reasonable to suppose that top administration officials are spending a lot of their energy trying to make it as difficult as possible for their successors to roll back their policies.

What are the Bushies doing to lock in their current course – even if it’s Barack Obama in the Oval Office on inauguration day? What agreements and contracts are they committing the country to? What rules, line-items, and executive orders will live on beyond their creators? What Trojan horses, landmines and Manchurian Candidates have they put in place throughout government?

Justice Department Official Awards $500,000 Grant to Golf Group

Former Staffer Tells ABC News Anti-Crime Funds Given to Programs With The "Right" Connections.

By BRIAN ROSS, ANNA SCHECTER, and MURRAY WAAS

June 9, 2008 —

A senior Justice Department official says a $500,000 federal grant to the World Golf Foundation is an appropriate use of money designed to deal with juvenile crime in America.

"We need something really attractive to engage the gangs and the street kids, golf is the hook," said J. Robert Flores, the administrator of the Justice Department's Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention.

The Justice Department, in a decision by Flores, gave the money to the World Golf Foundation's First Tee program, even though Justice Department staffers had rated the program 47th on a list of 104 applicants. The allegations were first reported earlier this year by the trade journal Youth Today.

Attempted Intimidation of career Justice Department employees

So what happens when career Justice Department employees blow the whistle on their boss and talk to the media and Congress about favoritism and cronyism going on in their office? An internal Justice Department investigation commences.

Why We Need Another Recount

Now that the presidential race is finally under way, a lot of Democrats are giddy with excitement, certain that Barack Obama will demolish John McCain; and those Democrats apparently have every reason to believe that it will happen. On the other hand, there also are some others who aren't quite so sure: others who recall the outcomes of the last two presidential races, both of which resulted in surprising "wins" for yet another dubious far-rightist candidate. Those uneasy types are wondering -- and the Democrats too should be wondering -- if history might yet again repeat itself, despite the rosy way things seem to look right now.

The question is, of course, unpleasant; but it's also necessary. And we might best begin to answer it by taking a close look at Recount, which just ended its first run on HBO (although subscribers can still see it On Demand). For all its strengths, the film is deeply flawed by the same weird denial that has kept the Democrats both in the dark and out of power--and that could keep them there beyond Election Day, regardless of the will of the electorate.

Oil soars on dollar, Energy Department report

Wednesday June 11, 4:02 pm ET
By John Wilen, AP Business Writer Oil soars as high as $138 a barrel as dollar falls and Energy Department reports supply drop NEW YORK (AP) -- Oil prices regained their stunning upward momentum Wednesday, rising as crude's biggest drivers -- a weak dollar and supply concerns -- brought buyers back in force. At the pump, gas prices rose to a new record over $4.05 a gallon.

Oil futures that were falling a week ago on concerns about declining gasoline consumption have dramatically reversed course and appear poised to set new records above $140 a barrel. While the market remains concerned about the effect of high prices on demand, several weeks of falling oil inventories and the dollar's inability to make headway against the euro have combined to turn market sentiment decidedly bullish.

Financial Weapons of Mass Destruction

Credit Default Swaps Are a Valuable Invention, But Largely Unregulated

By Charles R. Morris 06/10/2008 | 1 Comment

Warren Buffet calls credit derivatives "financial weapons of mass destruction." When his company, Berkshire-Hathaway, Inc., took over an insurance company in 2002, it took him four years to unwind its portfolio of credit derivatives -- at a cost of $400 million. Buffet didn’t entirely follow his own advice, however, because in the first quarter this year Berkshire-Hathaway took another $500 million loss on credit derivatives.

Why worry about credit derivatives? One reason is that the "notional value" of the most important credit derivatives, credit default swaps, or CDS, is now $62 trillion. That’s trillion, with a "‘T," and it is more than the whole world’s gross domestic product. Numbers that big automatically make people nervous, especially when they see the canniest investors like Buffet taking losses.

Algae oil promises truly green fuel

THIS is one biofuel that lives up to its green billing in more ways than one. It's an emerald-green crude oil, produced by photosynthesis in algae, which could fuel cars, trucks and aircraft - without consuming crops that can be used as food.

U.S. seeking 58 bases in Iraq, Shiite lawmakers say

U.S. seeking 58 bases in Iraq, Shiite lawmakers say

Leila Fadel | McClatchy Newspapers
last updated: June 09, 2008 08:20:15 PM

BAGHDAD -Iraqi lawmakers say the United States is demanding 58 bases as part of a proposed "status of forces" agreement that will allow U.S. troops to remain in the country indefinitely.

Leading members of the two ruling Shiite parties said in a series of interviews the Iraqi government rejected this proposal along with another U.S. demand that would have effectively handed over to the United States the power to determine if a hostile act from another country is aggression against Iraq. Lawmakers said they fear this power would drag Iraq into a war between the United States and Iran.