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Monday, December 8, 2008
‘Shut up about the birth certificate’
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Conservative writer David Horowitz, writing in the conservative National Review, advises his fellow conservatives to “shut up about the birth certificate,” as the headline on his article puts it.
“The continuing efforts of a fringe group of conservatives to deny Obama his victory and to lay the basis for the claim that he is not a legitimate president is embarrassing and destructive,” Horowitz writes. “The fact that these efforts are being led by Alan Keyes, a demagogue who lost a Senate election to the then-unknown Obama by 42 points, should be a warning in itself….
“It is not conservatism; it is sore loserism and quite radical in its intent,” concludes Horowitz. “Respect for election results is one of the most durable bulwarks of our unity as a nation. Conservatives need to accept the fact that we lost the election, and get over it; and get on with the important business of reviving our country’s economy and defending its citizens, and — by the way — its Constitution.”
I confess I do have some sympathy for the “birthers,” though. As an outsider, it’s hard to distinguish between the zany arguments that get official approval by the conservative establishment — things like Bill Ayers, Michelle Obama’s infamous “whitey” tape, the claim that Obama is a closet Marxist — and those arguments that are considered beyond the pale. I mean, where does one draw the line between acceptable lunacy and unacceptable lunacy?
Apparently those within the movement have a hard time figuring it out as well, which is why Horowitz had to send out a memo explaining the official ruling.
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Merrill Lynch exec wants $10 million for job ‘well done’
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Merrill Lynch stock drops 80 percent, the company loses $11 billion in the last year, it is forced to sell itself to be acquired by Bank of America, with as many as 30,000 people losing their jobs as a result, and now Merrill’s CEO demands a bonus of $10 million?
What planet is this again?
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo called “shocking” reports that Merrill Lynch & Co.’s board is considering giving Chief Executive Officer John Thain a $10 million bonus.
Cuomo said in a letter today to Merrill’s board that a bonus that large “appears unjustified.” The company told Cuomo Nov. 5 that any bonuses would be based on performance and retention needs. New York-based Merrill is being bought by Charlotte, North Carolina-based Bank of America Corp.
“The performance of Merrill’s top executives throughout Merrill’s abysmal year in no way justifies significant bonuses for its top executives, including the CEO,” Cuomo wrote. “Merrill’s decision to be taken over by Bank of America seems to have been the only thing that saved Merrill from collapse.”
Merrill’s board planned to discuss executive bonuses for 2008 at regular meeting scheduled for today in New York, a person familiar with the matter said.
The Wall Street Journal reported today that Thain proposed to directors that he be paid a bonus of $5 million to $10 million for 2008. The board’s compensation committee was resisting as much as $10 million, the newspaper said.
Thain, who received $15 million when he joined the brokerage in December 2007, already is set to get a change-of-control bonus of as much as $5.22 million if the Bank of America takeover is completed by Dec. 31, according to regulatory filings.
Merrill was forced into the takeover after its share price tumbled 80 percent and it lost $24 billion over five quarters.
Merrill and Bank of America Corp. were among the banks that received money in the initial $125 billion bailout. The others were Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Citigroup Inc., Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase & Co., Wells Fargo & Co., State Street Corp. and Bank of New York Mellon Corp.
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Georgia’s red paint job may be fading
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Georgia Republicans breathed a sigh of relief last week, reassured that order had been restored to their universe with Sen. Saxby Chambliss’ decisive victory.
“The basic principles that Ronald Reagan talked about in the ’80s are just as important today,” Chambliss said afterward. “If we return to those basic core values we can continue to be successful in future elections.”
Forgotten, at least for the moment, was the fact that John McCain had carried Georgia by only five percentage points, compared to George Bush’s margin of 17 points in 2004, and that in the general election Chambliss had led Jim Martin by only three points.
Those tight margins can perhaps be dismissed as a one-time phenomenon attributable largely to Barack Obama. But there’s good reason to think otherwise.
According to exit polls, for example, Georgians age 44 and under voted for Obama by a healthy margin; McCain built his victory among older Georgians. Those same polls also report that self-described conservatives (39 percent of Georgia voters) outnumber liberals (13 percent) by a 3-to-1 margin, which is good news for Republicans. However, among the 48 percent who describe themselves as moderate, Obama beat McCain by 17 points.
Political change can happen in a hurry —- a switch of just three votes out of a hundred, for example, would have put Georgia in Obama’s column. And other states have recently gone from red to blue in a flash.
A few years ago, Colorado was one of the reddest of the red states and seemed destined to remain that way for a generation. But this year it favored Obama by eight points and elected a Democrat to the U.S. Senate by 10 points.
Virginia and North Carolina —- both Southern states with rapidly growing suburban areas like Georgia —- have gone through similarly quick transitions. Bush carried Virginia by eight points in 2000 and 2004, and even Robert Dole carried it in 1996. Today Virginia has two Democratic senators and a Democratic governor, and it gave Obama a six-point victory in November.
Obama also won North Carolina, a state Bush carried by more than 12 points four years ago, and a Democrat beat the incumbent Republican senator, Elizabeth Dole, by 12 points.
Such examples worried David Hill, a Texas pollster with long professional, personal and emotional ties to the Texas Republican Party. So after the election, he polled more than 600 Texas voters to try to gauge their sentiments about the GOP.
On its Web site, the Texas Republican Party brags that “without a doubt, Texas is the strongest Republican state in the nation,” and it went for John McCain by 10 percentage points. But that may be changing. Six years ago, for example, the GOP dominated the Texas House of Representatives, holding 88 seats compared to just 62 for the Democrats. That margin has been shrinking ever since, and is now down to a razor-thin 76-74.
And when Hill conducted his poll, results shocked him.
“On most every measure tested,” he found, “the generic Republican ‘brand’ is significantly less appealing than the Democratic one” among Texans.
Overall, Lone Star voters used terms such as arrogant, racist, corrupt and angry to describe Republicans, and as Hill puts it, “that’s untenable for the party’s long-term health.”
“Grassroot Texas Republicans are firm in their convictions and confident they are right,” Hill concluded, warning that “these admirable attributes cannot be allowed to desensitize us to the fact that even in Texas, committed, principled conservative voters are a minority.”
According to Hill, moderate Texans still lean to the conservative side, but they don’t care much about illegal immigration or traditional values, the issues that fascinate the GOP base. Moderates are more interested in issues such as education and health care for children.
“There is a natural human tendency to resist change until the necessity of having to do so can no longer be avoided,” Hill warned, noting that in politics, “a realization that the political landscape is shifting and you must adjust often only comes once it’s too late.”
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Putting politicians in charge of Detroit?
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
There’s no question that the bailout billions flowing to Wall Street firms have been granted too freely, with few if any conditions on their use. So as Congress considers bailing out Detroit as well, there’s a real desire not to repeat the mistake. But at first glance you have to wonder whether a board of Cabinet secretaries is the right kind of oversight for such an effort.
Among other things, would its decision-making be more political than business-oriented?
But then again, what would be the model for such a board? We’ve never done this kind of thing before on this kind of scale, so if this mode of oversight is too intrusive and political, what would the right kind of oversight look like?
We are straying into dangerous and unknown waters, and the bad part is, we probably have no choice but to do so.
WASHINGTON - A bailout plan for the failing U.S. auto industry could include a Cabinet-level oversight board and a provision to withdraw the money if the overseers decide the companies are failing to take steps to overhaul themselves.
The plan would draw the emergency aid from an existing loan program meant to help the automakers build fuel-efficient vehicles. The size of the package hasn’t been finalized, but it is expected to be about $15 billion, several congressional aides said.
It would create a board composed of Cabinet secretaries from the departments of Treasury, Energy, Labor, Commerce and Transportation plus the Environmental Protection Agency administrator to oversee a broad auto industry restructuring. A congressional aide outlined the emerging measure on condition of anonymity because it is not yet completed.
In return for the money, the carmakers would have to agree to terms similar to those placed on banks that receive funds under the $700 billion Wall Street bailout: to limit their top executives’ pay packages, cease paying dividends, give the government a chunk of future gains and guarantee that taxpayers would be reimbursed before any other shareholders, the aide said.
The bill under discussion would place the special investigator overseeing the bank rescue in charge of keeping tabs on the auto bailout.
The White House and Democratic congressional leaders are narrowing their differences over the auto bailout, but had yet to agree on specific legislative details, officials said.
Sen. Chris Dodd, D-Conn., chairman of the Banking Committee, said Sunday that General Motors Corp.’s chief executive, Rick Wagoner, “has to move on” as part of a government-run restructuring.
“I think you have got to consider new leadership,” Dodd said on CBS’ “Face the Nation.”
Criticized for staying on the sidelines until now, President-elect Barack Obama voiced support Sunday for the bailout legislation being drafted in Congress. He accused car industry executives of a persistent “head-in-the sand approach” to long-festering problems.
In an appearance on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Obama said Congress was doing “the exact right thing” in drafting legislation that “holds the auto industry’s feet to the fire” at the same time it tries to prevent its demise.
UPDATE: I hadn’t seen numbers like this before. To borrow Gen. Petraeus’ famous line about the invasion of Iraq, “so tell me how this ends.”
From the NY Times:
“A comprehensive bailout for Gerneral Motors, the Ford Motor Company and Chrysler could cost as much as $125 billion, and even the companies themselves are hard-pressed to dispute that figure.
Mark Zandi, chief economist of Moody’s Economy.com, testified before Congress last week that the Big Three’s request for $34 billion in loans “will not be sufficient for them to avoid bankruptcy a some point in the next two years.” He said from $75 billion to $125 billion would be needed to pay for a full-scale reorganization of the automakers.”
