Worst Defense of Timothy "Eddie Haskell" Geithner Ever!

I'm with The Bloodhound Gang, on Banks,
Burn Motherf%$#er, Burn!

John Talbot is suggesting that Geithner's scheme to save the banks is dependent on their ability to screw retail consumers and small business consumers:

And this is where defeat of the nomination of Elizabeth Warren becomes critical for Geithner. For Geithner's strategy to work, the banks have to find increasing sources of profitability in their business segments to balance out their annual loan loss recognition from their existing bad loans in an environment in which they continue to recognize new losses in prime residential mortgages, commercial real estate lending, sovereign debt investments, bridge loans to private equity groups, leverage buyout lending and credit card defaults.

The banks have made no secret as to where they will find this increase in cash flow. They intend to soak their small retail customers, their consumer and small business borrowers, their credit card holders and their small depositors with increased costs and fees and are continuing many of the bad mortgage practices that led to the crisis (ARM's, option pay deals, zero down payments, second mortgages, teaser rates, etc). American and Banking Market News reports this week that the rule changes in the financial reform bill may lead banks to start implementing fees that had essentially disappeared from the industry early in the new millennium, such as fees for not meeting minimum balance requirements on a checking account, or reinstituting fees for certain online banking transactions that are currently free or charging to receive a paper statement or to talk to a live teller as Bank of America's CEO has recently proposed.

Let me be clear here. Mr. Talbot does not endorse this strategy, and he supports Ms. Warren as head of the CFPB, he is explaining what he believes the calculus of the Geithner/Summers axis.

So, he is saying that in addition to actual taxpayer funded bailout, he is saying that Geithner and Summers see a back door taxpayer bailout as the only way to save the banks.

The thing is that the costs here, if Mr. Talbot is right, are enormous.

Excessive bank charges, won't just generate excess profits, they will also reduce economic growth and tax receipts, since consumer spending and small business is where growth comes from, and this is where they will be extracting their money.

I do hope that he is wrong, because for this to be their strategy means that we do have a bunch of Republicans in all ways that matter, running the White House economic policy.

My guess is rather less tinfoil hat.

I think that Geithner has never in his life thought outside of the "what is good for Wall Street" box, and that this, juxtaposed with what appears to be an antipathy towards women in the field,^* has led to yet another one of his petty and self destructive vendettas.

At least that is what I hope.

If John Talbot is correct, then these Cossacks Republicans work for the Czar, who knows what they are.

^*I do not think that Geithner, who has spent his entire professional career getting ahead by kissing up, has only come out strongly against two people that I know of, Elizabeth Warren and Sheila Bair, both of whom lack a Y chromosome.

The Latest Country to Ban the Burqa is……

Syria.

No, really:

The Syrian minister of higher education has prohibited the entrance of veiled female students into universities and colleges throughout the country, news agencies reported Sunday.

Dr. Ghitath Barakat explained that the donning of face veils, which cover everything but the woman's eyes, "opposes the morals and values of the academy".


Barakat's decree followed similar ones approved by a number of European parliaments, including Belgium and France.

Obviously, while Syria is a part of both the Arab world and the Islamic world, it is in a number of ways atypical. Its rulers are Alawites, who are not considered normative Muslims by Sunni or Shia, and the government is rather stridently secularist, it is the sole remaining Ba'athist regime, but it does provide an interesting counterpoint to European bans.

Shakespeare?

Click for full size

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The Sun Glasses Conceal the Tears

After using a non-existent word, "Refudiate," in a twitter post, Sarah Palin compares herself with William Shakespeare, who she notes may have made up some words too.

In related news, it now turns out that Sarah Palin knows nothing about Alaska either, claiming that Kodiak is the largest island in the United States. (It isn't, it's Hawaii, aka the "Big Island," where Palin lived briefly)

Oh for the day when she gets a few wrinkles, and fades into well deserved obscurity, so that I can put her on my list of They Who Must Not Be Named, but as she is still a political figure about which people speculate on her Presidential prospects, I do not feel comfortable putting my hands over my ears and saying, "I can't hear you!"

Your Daily Dose of Schadenfreude

The Teabaggers are now going after former Republican Senate Leader Trent Lott.

Heh.

Damn.

While I believe that the Supreme Court's ruling that the "theft of services" statute was unconstitutionally vague, I am bumming right now that this decision has gotten right wing newspaper publisher and con-man Conrad Black out on bail.

It's a real mixed emotions situation.

Because the Banks and Insurance Companies Own Us

Hungary has just broken off talks with the IMF and the EU, because the IMF and EU only want deficit reduction on the backs or ordinary people, so throw pensioners into the streets, destroy your healthcare and education systems, and raise the VAT, but whatever you do, don't raise taxes on banks and insurance:

Mr Orban had intended to raise some half a billion euros (187 billion forints) via a new tax on banks and insurance firms. The IMF however said this ""is likely to adversely affect lending and growth."

More subtlely, the EU's Mr Rehn said: "Care will also be needed to ensure a stable environment for both domestic and international investors."

Brussels and the IMF will be hoping a swift sharp spanking from the markets will chasten Mr Orban's government, but the move will also unnerve investor thinking about the condition of economies across the bloc, particularly in eastern Europe.

The truth here is that the bailout package is more a bailout of western banks than it is of Hungary, which is why the EU and the IMF find it unacceptable that banks actually pay taxes in Hungary.

If I were the Hungarian PM, I would start drawing up plans to reverse Hungary's commitment to joining the Euro, and start immediate preparations to exit the European Exchange Rate Mechanism and allow the Forint to float.

It is clear that the deal with the Euro is that if you join, you don't just lose sovereignty to the EU institutions, but to French, German, and British banks as well.

A Foreseeable Result of Pandering to the US Nuclear Industry

Now that the US deal to sell nuclear technology to India is pretty much a done deal, the Chinese are selling nuclear power plants to Pakistan:

China is expected to formally announce the plans to build the 650-megawatt reactors in Punjab province at a meeting in New Zealand of the Nuclear Suppliers Group - the 46 countries that dominate and try to control the world's atomic trade.

The US has already voiced its disapproval before the meeting, which starts today, and will try to forge a consensus on updating the rules designed to prevent the spread of nuclear weapons.

US officials say that the plan requires special exemption from the NSG, [Nuclear Suppliers Group] which China joined in 2004, as Pakistan has not signed the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty and could, therefore, divert some technology to its nuclear weapons program or to another country.

China and Pakistan disagree, pointing out that the US set a precedent by sealing a deal to sell civilian nuclear fuel and technology to India in 2006, even though Delhi had yet to sign the treaty.

That someone would sell nuclear reactors to the Pakistanis in response to the US making a joke of the NNPT was pretty much a done deal, and a predictable consequence of this decision.

I made note of this some time ago, and when my predictions prove true, it implies a level of blatantly obvious that buggers the mind.

The original deal with India was all about Bush and His Evil Minions^™ wanting to reward their friends in the US domestic nuclear power industry, US interests be damned, and the consequences are potentially disastrous.

We'll probably see a few more blips on Isao Hashimoto's animations.