With oil prices up sharply, investors sold shares of consumer-oriented companies, including Procter & Gamble, down 3.3 percent at $68.04. Shares of Target Corp, the No. 2 U.S. discount retailer, dropped 6.6 percent to $49.80 after Lazard Capital Markets cut the stock to "hold" from buy." Earlier during the session, U.S. oil futures prices shot up as high as $130 a barrel.
Uncertainty about the bailout overshadowed news that Japan's largest bank, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, planned to buy a stake in Wall Street bank Morgan Stanley
The world must awake to the threat this man poses to all of us. Ahmadinejad denies that the Holocaust ever took place. He dreams of being an agent in a "Final Solution" - the elimination of the Jewish people. He has called Israel a "stinking corpse" that is "on its way to annihilation."
Such talk cannot be dismissed as the ravings of a madman -not when Iran just this summer tested long-range Shahab-3 missiles capable of striking Tel Aviv, not when the Iranian nuclear program is nearing completion, and not when Iran sponsors terrorists that threaten and kill innocent people around the world.
What happened next was extraordinary. For the first time in history, a serious Fannie and Freddie reform bill was passed by the Senate Banking Committee. The bill gave a regulator power to crack down, and would have required the companies to eliminate their investments in risky assets.
If that bill had become law, then the world today would be different. In 2005, 2006 and 2007, a blizzard of terrible mortgage paper fluttered out of the Fannie and Freddie clouds, burying many of our oldest and most venerable institutions. Without their checkbooks keeping the market liquid and buying up excess supply, the market would likely have not existed.
But the bill didn't become law, for a simple reason: Democrats opposed it on a party-line vote in the committee, signaling that this would be a partisan issue. Republicans, tied in knots by the tight Democratic opposition, couldn't even get the Senate to vote on the matter.
That such a reckless political stand could have been taken by the Democrats was obscene even then. Wallison wrote at the time: ``It is a classic case of socializing the risk while privatizing the profit. The Democrats and the few Republicans who oppose portfolio limitations could not possibly do so if their constituents understood what they were doing.'
Up to 10,000 staff at the New York office of the bankrupt investment bank Lehman Brothers will share a bonus pool set aside for them that is worth $2.5bn (£1.4bn), Barclays Bank, which is buying the business, confirmed last night.
The revelation sparked fury among the workers' former colleagues, Lehman's 5,000 staff based in London, who currently have no idea how long they will go on receiving even their basic salaries, let alone any bonus payments. It also prompted a renewed backlash over the compensation culture in global finance, with critics claiming that many bankers receive pay and rewards that bore no relation to the job they had done.
The Community Reinvestment Act (or CRA, Pub.L. 95-128, title VIII, 91 Stat. 1147, 12 U.S.C. § 2901 et seq.) is a United States federal law that requires banks and thrifts to offer credit throughout their entire market area and prohibits them from targeting only wealthier neighborhoods with their services, a practice known as "redlining." The purpose of the CRA is to provide credit, including home ownership opportunities to underserved populations and commercial loans to small businesses.
He's particularly peeved with the $700 billion proposed Wall Street bailout and its architect, Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson.
In a CNN interview, Stein said Paulson should be "fired yesterday."
Paulson is a disgrace to the Republican Party and to his country, said Stein. Another target of Stein's ire is Wall Street itself.
"It's a first-class disaster. The worst Treasury regulation of the economy in my lifetime. ... The effect of this on the ordinary investor and pre-retiree ... is just catastrophic for the free enterprise system."
The report of the World Health Organization’s Commission on Social Determinants of Health called for “special health taxes and global tax options” to deal with gaps and problems in health care coverage around the globe. The WHO report cited “a strong argument in favor of the development of a system of global taxation” and said that an international tax on airline tickets for the purpose of fighting HIV/AIDS, which is already being implemented by some countries, was a good start.
The report, entitled, “Closing the gap in a generation: health equity through action on the social determinants of health,” also urged “effective taxation of transnational corporations” and the possibility of an International Tax Organization to collect revenue.
In comments posted on the commission’s website, neither Satcher nor Wilensky disputed any of the report’s calls for international tax increases.
Satcher has not yet responded to requests for additional comments on the WHO commission report.
But Philip Stevens of the free market-oriented International Policy Network said, “The comrades in the old USSR would have loved this manifesto.”
Fannie Mae CEO calls Obama and Dems the "Family" "Conscience" of Fannie Mae. This is video from 2005 of Fannie Mae CEO Daniel Mudd praising Democrats and Barack Obama at a Congressional Black Caucus gathering.
Pakistani troops and tribesmen opened fire on two U.S. helicopters that crossed into the country from neighboring Afghanistan, intelligence officials said Monday.
The helicopters did not return fire and re-entered Afghan airspace without landing, the officials said.
Pakistan's army and the U.S. military in Afghanistan said they had no information on the reported incursion late Sunday, which will likely add to tensions between Islamabad and Washington.
A spate of suspected U.S. missile strikes into Pakistan's border region and a raid by U.S. commandos said to have killed 15 people have angered and embarrassed Pakistani leaders while signaling Washington's impatience with Pakistani efforts to clear out militant havens.
Our research suggests that a subdivision of one of the largest public relations firms in the world most likely started and promulgated rumors about Sarah Palin that were known to be false. These rumors were spread in a surreptitious manner to avoid exposure.
It is also likely that the PR firm was paid by outside sources to run the smear campaign. While not conclusive, evidence suggests a link to the Barack Obama campaign. Namely:
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) said Sunday that bank executives who take the mortgage bailout should have an annual salary limit of $400,000, a substantial pay cut that could dramatically reduce participation in the program.
McCain also told CNBC's John Harwood that the mortgage bailout should be overseen by an oversight board of "respected people" like former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and legendary investor Warren Buffett.
In the aftermath of two major terrorist attacks on Western targets, America's counterterrorism community is warning that Al Qaeda may launch more overseas operations to influence the presidential elections in November. Call it Osama bin Laden's "October surprise."
The veteran Government adviser said pensioners in mental decline are "wasting people's lives" because of the care they require and should be allowed to opt for euthanasia even if they are not in pain.
She insisted there was "nothing wrong" with people being helped to die for the sake of their loved ones or society.
The 84-year-old added that she hoped people will soon be "licensed to put others down" if they are unable to look after themselves.
"Oh those zany internet pranksters... It seems that the anonymous message forum "/b/" over at 4chan.org, posted a link to an alleged BBC news article claiming that Oprah Winfrey had been found dead in her home."
Interesting. Last week Oprah opted to take on the freaks at 4Chan, everyone's favorite online bathroom stall... and a few media outlets buy the idea that 'Oprah has died' hook, line and sinker. Nothing like getting 'punk'd' by a bunch of obnoxious pedophiles...
FTA-"A week after a high-profile send-up of Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on "Saturday Night Live," the NBC comedy show returned to making fun of the Alaskan governor in a skit where New York Times reporters sought to probe the possibility Palin's husband, Todd, was having sex with the couple's own daughters.
"What about the husband?" asked a Times reporter during a mock assignment meeting for the paper. "You know he's doing those daughters. I mean, come on. It's Alaska."
Once again the Left shows us that they have absolutely no class, no character and will end up defeating themselves.
Rush Limbaugh wishes John McCain’s economic proposals would stop bashing Wall Street, thinks the Arizona senator is running against the wrong people, and deplores his demand that SEC Chairman Chris Cox be fired -- and he wants everybody to know it...“I don't think bashing Wall Street, with the Democrats already doing that, is a way for Sen. McCain to separate himself. What he ought to be doing is what he did in Green Bay this morning, which is attack the people responsible for the Fannie Mae disaster -- and that’s all Democrats. It’s Chris Dodd, it’s Barney Frank, it is Barack Obama, it’s Franklin Raines, and Jim Johnson -- people associated with the Obama campaign.
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