There really is only one solution: let the marketplace work and let the lenders and borrowers take the heat. It's not pleasant, but it will be better in the long run. Those of us with homes that have lost value [roughtly 90+%] have the choices to either stay and pay or leave and pay. Eventually, the home market will recover and so will home prices. It may take quite a few years, but it will be a lesson worth learning and heeding in future.Treasury Pushes Mortgage Firms for Loan Relief
The administration said Monday that it would increase the pressure on banks to help troubled homeowners permanently lower mortgage payments.The Treasury Department said that mortgage servicers would be required to submit plans on how they would decide whether a loan would be permanent modified. Bank that fall short of the guidelines of their agreement could face fines or sanctions, the Treasury said.
Monday’s push was the latest evidence that a $75 billion taxpayer-financed effort aimed at stemming foreclosures was struggling. Even as lenders have accelerated the pace at which they are reducing mortgage payments for borrowers, most loans modified remain in a trial stage lasting up to five months, and only a tiny fraction have been made permanent.
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Tree stumps displayed in Trafalgar Square, London, as part of an art piece entitled "Ghost Forest"
The politics of Climategate threatens the climate change conference in Copenhagen. The UN climate change conference in Copenhagen opens next week.
The political fall out from the release of hacked emails from one of the UK's leading climate research centers threatens the climate change consensus.
Climate change sceptics have used the hacked emails to try and prove climate change researchers are playing fast and loose with the figures. More than this, it has emboldened climate change deniers, and spawned a great deal of misinformation.
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Iran rebuked over nuclear 'cover-up' by UN watchdog
Iran's second uranium enrichment facility came to light in SeptemberThe UN nuclear watchdog's governing body has passed a resolution condemning Iran for developing a uranium enrichment site in secret.
The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) also demanded that Iran freeze the project immediately.
The resolution, the first against Iran in nearly four years, was passed by a 25-3 margin with six abstentions.
But Iran's envoy to the watchdog denounced the move, calling it intimidation.
Iran says its nuclear programme is for peaceful energy purposes, but the US says it is seeking nuclear weapons.
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Obama to attend beginning of U.N. climate meeting
Wed Nov 25, 2009 3:05pm EST
By Jeff Mason
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. President Barack Obama will go to Copenhagen for a U.N. climate change meeting on December 9, hoping to add momentum to an international process despite slow progress on a domestic bill to cut carbon emissions.
Obama planned to make a visit at the beginning of the climate negotiations in Denmark, an administration official told Reuters on Wednesday, before picking up the Nobel Peace Prize at a ceremony in neighboring Oslo.
Obama did not plan to return for the end of the December 7-18 meeting, when roughly 65 other heads of state and government are expected to attend, the official said.
Obama has made climate change a top priority of his administration, but a bill to cut U.S. emissions is bogged down in the U.S. Senate. The U.S. House of Representatives has passed its version of climate change legislation.
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Navy SEALs Face Assault Charges for Capturing Most-Wanted TerroristHow about sitting down over a few beers?Tuesday, November 24, 2009
By Rowan Scarborough
March 31, 2004: Iraqis chant anti-American slogans as the charred and mutilated bodies of U.S. contractors hang from a bridge over the Euphrates River in Fallujah, Iraq.
Navy SEALs have secretly captured one of the most wanted terrorists in Iraq — the alleged mastermind of the murder and mutilation of four Blackwater USA security guards in Fallujah in 2004. And three of the SEALs who captured him are now facing criminal charges, sources told FoxNews.com.
The three, all members of the Navy's elite commando unit, have refused non-judicial punishment — called an admiral's mast — and have requested a trial by court-martial.
Ahmed Hashim Abed, whom the military code-named "Objective Amber," told investigators he was punched by his captors — and he had the bloody lip to prove it.
Now, instead of being lauded for bringing to justice a high-value target, three of the SEAL commandos, all enlisted, face assault charges and have retained lawyers.
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Now about that $1.5 trillion health care program....Wave of Debt Payments Facing U.S. Government
WASHINGTON — The United States government is financing its more than trillion-dollar-a-year borrowing with i.o.u.’s on terms that seem too good to be true.
But that happy situation, aided by ultralow interest rates, may not last much longer.J. Emilio Flores for The New York Times“What a good country or a good squirrel should be doing is stashing away nuts for the winter. The United States is not only not saving nuts, it’s eating the ones left over from the last winter.” WILLIAM H. GROSS
Multimedia
Payback Time
The Debt BombArticles in this series will examine the consequences of, and attempts to deal with, growing public and private debts.
Treasury officials now face a trifecta of headaches: a mountain of new debt, a balloon of short-term borrowings that come due in the months ahead, and interest rates that are sure to climb back to normal as soon as the Federal Reserve decides that the emergency has passed.
Even as Treasury officials are racing to lock in today’s low rates by exchanging short-term borrowings for long-term bonds, the government faces a payment shock similar to those that sent legions of overstretched homeowners into default on their mortgages.
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Senator Reid and the Power of Persuasion
By THE EDITORSGeorge Tames/The New York Times Lyndon B. Johnson, as Senate majority leader in 1957, giving Theodore F. Green, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, “the treatment.”
Senator Harry Reid, the majority leader, having unveiled the Senate health care bill now needs 60 votes to stave off a Republican filibuster and begin formal floor debate. That means getting all 58 Senate Democrats and the two independents on board for a vote set for Saturday evening. But even among the Democrats, Senators Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, Ben Nelson of Nebraska and Mary Landrieu of Louisiana have been cagey about whether they will support the bill.
How do Senate leaders persuade fence-sitters to vote against their own political instincts (either because they or their constituents oppose some part of the legislation or because political adversaries will use the vote against them in the next election)? What is in the Senate arm-twister’s bag of tricks — carrots as well as sticks — that’s most effective?
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California restricts energy-guzzling TV sets
Marisa Lagos, Chronicle Staff Writer
In a move that brings California's pioneering greenhouse gas reduction drive into the living room, state regulators Wednesday approved limits on how much energy televisions can consume, citing the increased use of power-guzzling flat-panel sets.
The new rules, adopted unanimously by the California Energy Commission, will require manufacturers to cut the power televisions use by one-third in two years and in half by 2013 by setting wattage ceilings.
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Obama warns on US public debt pile
By Edward Luce in Beijing and Krishna Guha in Washington
Published: November 18 2009 13:35 | Last updated: November 18 2009 21:07
US President Barack Obama warned that the US economy could head into a “double-dip recession” unless urgent steps were taken to rein in mounting public debt.
The US president’s remarks – in an interview with Fox News in Beijing on Wednesday, towards the end of his eight-day tour of Asia – marked his strongest language yet on the necessity of putting public finances back on a sound footing.
“It is important though to recognise if we keep on adding to the debt, even in the midst of this recovery, that at some point, people could lose confidence in the US economy in a double-dip recession,” said Mr Obama.
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New rule to exempt baby-sitters
Day care amendment to settle flap over neighbors watching each other’s kidsBY CATHERINE JUN
The Detroit News
Lansing — An amendment could take effect this week that will exempt babysitting from the state’s day care laws, a change several parents in Irving Township applaud.
“It was dumb,” said Lisa Snyder, a mother who challenged the law after she got a letter in the fall saying she may be running an illegal day care by watching her neighbors’ kids in the morning. The amendment, approved by legislators within a month of its introduction, showed her “how ridiculous the law was,” Snyder added.
Gov. Jennifer Granholm is expected to sign the bill this week.
In September, the governor directed the Department of Human Services to work with legislators to amend the law after she heard Snyder had received a letter from the agency urging her to stop baby-sitting.
Snyder defended herself, saying she was helping three neighborhood moms by watching their children — two 5-yearolds and a 7-year-old — for free before they board the school bus outside her door.
The amendment won unanimous votes in the House and Senate.
“It’s an issue that anybody can relate to,” said Rep. Brian Calley, R-Portland, the bill’s sponsor and a father of two. The amendment will exempt uncompensated childcare and baby-sitting from licensing requirements. Baby-sitting is defined as caring for another’s child for less than $600 a year.
Human Services agreed that once the law is enacted, it will revise the warning letters sent to future suspected violators, softening the language by eliminating any mention of penalties.
“DHS supports this new legislation,” said Colleen Steinman, spokeswoman for the state agency. “We were able to work closely with the legislature to come up with something that was in the best interest of children in care.”
The state received 300 complaints of unlicensed care last year, said Jim Gale, director of the bureau of children and adult licensing. All incidents were resolved without resorting to prosecution, he said. Mindy Rose is a single mother and registered nurse. Though state investigators questioned her in the fall, she didn’t stop driving her 5-year-old son, J.C., to Snyder’s house on her way to work.
“It was a lot of time spent and a lot of stress that we went through, but I’m glad I can explain to my children: This is the way communities should work and help each other out,” Rose said.
Hillary Clinton is open to coffee with Sarah PalinReuters
Sunday, November 15, 2009; 11:24 AM
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton is open to having coffee with former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, whose forthcoming book about the 2008 presidential campaign is stirring controversy.
"I absolutely would look forward to having coffee," Clinton said from Singapore during an interview aired on Sunday on NBC's "Meet the Press."
Palin, the 2008 Republican vice presidential candidate and a popular figure among some U.S. conservatives, is on a tour promoting her book, "Going Rogue: An American Life."
In it, Palin says she and Clinton would disagree on many issues if they ever sat down for coffee, but praised Clinton for her hard work on the 2008 campaign trail. Clinton lost the race for the Democratic presidential nomination to Barack Obama.
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Muhammad executed for sniper killing
By Josh White and Maria Glod
Wednesday, November 11, 2009
JARRATT, Va. -- John Allen Muhammad, the sniper who kept the Washington region paralyzed by fear for three weeks as he and a young accomplice gunned down people at random, was executed Tuesday night by lethal injection.
Muhammad, a man who directed what many law enforcement officials consider one of the worst outbursts of crime in the nation's history, died in Virginia's death chamber while relatives of his victims looked on.
Read more... if you really want to.
Obama Still Can Save His Presidency
Joel Kotkin, 11.10.09, 12:01 AM EST
Here's how.
A good friend of mine, a Democratic mayor here in California, describes the Obama administration as "Moveon.org run by the Chicago machine." This combination may have been good enough to beat John McCain in 2008, but it is proving a damned poor way to run a country or build a strong, effective political majority. And while the president's charismatic talent -- and the lack of such among his opposition -- may keep him in office, it will be largely as a kind of permanent lame duck unable to make any of the transformative changes he promised as a candidate.
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Health reformers prepare for Senate hurdle
By Edward Luce in Washington
Published: November 8 2009 20:19 | Last updated: November 8 2009 20:19
The first thing Barack Obama did late on Saturday night following the passage of the healthcare bill in the House of Representatives was to phone the heads of three industry lobby groups to thank them for their support. Not included on the list was the largest insurance lobby group, American Health Insurance Plans, which doggedly continues to oppose Democratic reform efforts.
Amid all the late night celebrations after the razor-thin 220-215 vote for the bill, Karen Ignagni, head of AHIP, warned that it would be a much tougher battle to push reform through the Senate in the weeks ahead. “The current House legislation fails to bend the healthcare cost curve and breaks the promise that those who like their current coverage can keep it,” she said. “The result will be increased costs and massive disruptions in the quality of coverage individuals and families rely on today.”
The final vote, which included a lone Republican in favour and 39 Democrats against, was achieved after a last-minute amendment that ruled out public funding for healthcare plans that offer coverage for abortion. That concession – and Mr Obama’s personal appeal for Democratic unity in a visit to Capitol Hill on Saturday – enabled a sufficiently large bunch of wavering conservative Democrats to put their support behind the $1,200bn 10-year reform effort.
Of the 39 Democrats who voted against the bill – just two short of the critical mass needed to defeat it – 31 were from districts that John McCain won in last November’s presidential election. Among the others were Dennis Kucinich, the former Democratic candidate and one of the most liberal congressmen, who said it would ensure the “the perpetuation, indeed the strengthening, of the for-profit health insurance industry, the very source of the problem”.
That division, between liberals who want a much stronger public role in the new healthcare system, and centrist Democrats who bitterly oppose it, looks much tougher to bridge in the Senate, where a simple majority will not be enough to enact the bill. Under Senate rules, 60 votes (out of 100) are required to stave off an opposition filibuster.
From FT.com
She Ran to Gunfire, and Ended It
KILLEEN, Tex. — The police officer who brought down a gunman after he went on a shooting rampage at the Fort Hood Army base here was on the way to have her car repaired when she responded to a police radio report of gunfire at a center where soldiers are processed before being sent overseas, the authorities said Friday.
Agence France-Presse — Getty Images, via TwitterSgt. Kimberly D. Munley, is credited with saving lives.
As she pulled up to the center, the officer, Sgt. Kimberly Denise Munley, spotted the gunman, later identified as Maj. Nidal Malik Hasan, brandishing a pistol and chasing a wounded soldier outside the building, said Chuck Medley, the director of emergency services at the base.
Sergeant Munley — a woman with a fierce love of hunting, surfing and other outdoor sports — bolted from her car, yanked her pistol out and shot at Major Hasan. He turned on her and began to fire. She ran toward him, continuing to fire, and both she and Major Hasan went down with several bullet wounds, Mr. Medley said.
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Too bad all of that bravery would not have been necessary if the PC police in the military had not kept someone with his record in the service... but also promoted him despite the fact that he was an obvious misfit. This touchy-feely approach to "diversity" has no place in the military. Either you are a soldier that belongs... or you are not. All the evidence points to the fact that Hasan should have been booted long ago.
US unemployment rate tops 10%
By Simone Baribeau in New York
Published: November 6 2009 14:18 | Last updated: November 6 2009 15:35
The unemployment rate shot up to 10.2 per cent in October, its highest level in over 26 years, according to official data released on Friday, disappointing Wall Street and underscoring concerns about the effectiveness of the Obama administration’s efforts to turn the economy around.
”The bottom line is that although labour market deterioration is clearly not occurring at the pace suffered late in 2008 and early this year, conditions remain brutal,” said Joshua Shapiro, chief US economist at MFR. ”Moreover, we continue to believe that the healing process will be a slow one, and that households will be contending with weak income growth and balance sheet issues for some time.”
The economy shed an additional 190,000 jobs, against economists’ expectations of 175,000 and an unemployment rate of 9.9 per cent. Wall Street shrugged off the results, swinging between gains and losses in midmorning trade. The S&P 500 was almost flat, down 0.06 per cent at 1,065.96 and the Dow Jones Industrial Average was down 0.3 per cent at 9,974.37.
October marks the twenty-second consecutive month of job losses in the US. Since the start of the recession in December 2007, 8.2m Americans have lost their jobs. August and September’s numbers were revised upward, showing 91,000 fewer jobs were lost than originally thought.
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Israel: Commandos seize Hezbollah-bound arms shipLet's see, Islam is the religion of peace; Islamic clerics are the leaders of Iran; therefore, the Nation of Peace... Iran... is simply trying to get rid of some old weapons they found. Want more fairy tales. Come back later.Amy Teibel / Associated Press
Jerusalem -- Israeli commandos seized a ship Wednesday that defense officials said was carrying hundreds of tons of weapons from Iran bound for Lebanon's Hezbollah guerrillas -- the largest arms shipment Israel has ever commandeered.
The Israeli military said an Iranian document was found on board, showing that the arms shipment originated from Iran, although the paper was not shown to reporters. Rear Admiral Roni Ben-Yehuda, the deputy Israeli navy commander, said that despite its size, the shipment of weapons was "a drop in the ocean" of arms being shipped to Hezbollah.
"It's a cargo certificate that shows that it was from a port in Iran," military spokeswoman Lt. Col. Avital Leibovich said. "All the cargo certificates are stamped at the ports of origin, and this one was stamped at an Iranian port."
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Be Prepared for the Worst
Ron Paul, 10.29.09, 09:20 AM EDT
Forbes Magazine dated November 16, 2009
The large-scale government intervention in the economy is going to end badly.
Any number of pundits claim that we have now passed the worst of the recession. Green shoots of recovery are supposedly popping up all around the country, and the economy is expected to resume growing soon at an annual rate of 3% to 4%. Many of these are the same people who insisted that the economy would continue growing last year, even while it was clear that we were already in the beginning stages of a recession.
A false recovery is under way. Read more....
Fed Chief Says Recession Probably Over
Oh, wait. They already have pirated the park... and the products... so it looks like the pirated versions are already ahead.China Approves Disney Theme Park in Shanghai
LOS ANGELES — After a courtship of about 20 years, the Walt Disney Company has won approval from the central government of China to build a Disneyland-style theme park in Shanghai, Robert A. Iger, Disney’s chief executive, said Tuesday.
The agreement for a Shanghai Disneyland is a landmark deal that carries enormous cultural and financial implications. Analysts estimate the initial park — not including hotels and resort infrastructure — will cost $3.5 billion, making it one of the largest-ever foreign investments in China.
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The Worst Bill Ever
Epic new spending and taxes, pricier insurance, rationed care, dishonest accounting: The Pelosi health bill has it all.
Speaker Nancy Pelosi has reportedly told fellow Democrats that she's prepared to lose seats in 2010 if that's what it takes to pass ObamaCare, and little wonder. The health bill she unwrapped last Thursday, which President Obama hailed as a "critical milestone," may well be the worst piece of post-New Deal legislation ever introduced.In a rational political world, this 1,990-page runaway train would have been derailed months ago. With spending and debt already at record peacetime levels, the bill creates a new and probably unrepealable middle-class entitlement that is designed to expand over time. Taxes will need to rise precipitously, even as ObamaCare so dramatically expands government control of health care that eventually all medicine will be rationed via politics.
Yet at this point, Democrats have dumped any pretense of genuine bipartisan "reform" and moved into the realm of pure power politics as they race against the unpopularity of their own agenda. The goal is to ram through whatever income-redistribution scheme they can claim to be "universal coverage." The result will be destructive on every level—for the health-care system, for the country's fiscal condition, and ultimately for American freedom and prosperity.
Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.
The spending surge. The Congressional Budget Office figures the House program will cost $1.055 trillion over a decade, which while far above the $829 billion net cost that Mrs. Pelosi fed to credulous reporters is still a low-ball estimate. Most of the money goes into government-run "exchanges" where people earning between 150% and 400% of the poverty level—that is, up to about $96,000 for a family of four in 2016—could buy coverage at heavily subsidized rates, tied to income. The government would pay for 93% of insurance costs for a family making $42,000, 72% for another making $78,000, and so forth.
Do read more....
A national effort has been developed by a company in Michigan where unemployment is about 15%.
Also see this article in Crain's Detroit Business.
