The New York stock exchange, like international markets earlier, rallied today on the strength of rising microchip sales for California-based Intel and higher corporate earnings.
** NEW COLUMN COMING UP … HILLARY’S BACK! (SORT OF).
** QUICK HITS. US Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor completed a third day of confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee with no miscues. On her part. Oklahoma Senator Tom Coburn, a very conservative Republican, did preface a question with a stereotypical Ricky Ricardo impression: “Lucy, you got some ’splaining to do.” The GOP has a decided tin ear, needless to say. … US and NATO casualties in Afghanistan for the first half of July have, as expected, already equaled the bloodiest month there since 9/11 due to the Obama-ordered offensive against the Taliban. 46 US and allied troops have died so far this month. A high number for Afghanistan. A low number for a war. … No real news on California’s chronic-turned-chaotic budget crisis today. The Big 5 meeting started late, but there’s been little sniping. … The California Democratic Party is trying a legal move to get Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s TV ad on the budget crisis off the air, on the grounds that he is not promoting either his own candidacy or an initiative. … San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, trailing badly in his campaign for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination against his family’s patron, former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown, appointed state Senator Alex Padilla of LA as his campaign chairman in an attempt to get some traction in Southern California and with Latinos. But Padilla is a very mixed bag with both. … Two Californians, former state Treasurer Phil Angelides and former Central Valley Congressman Bill Thomas (a Democrat and a Republican), were named today as co-chairs of the Congressional commission probing the nation’s financial meltdown. The report is due on December 15, 2010. Angelides, the 2006 Democratic gubernatorial nominee, lost by 17 points to Schwarzenegger.
** BROWN AND FEDERAL TRADE COMMISSION GO AFTER ALLEGED MAJOR MORTGAGE FRAUD ARTISTS. At a press conference and media conference call today in Los Angeles, former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown and Federal Trade Commission chairman Jon Leibowitz announced that they are suing 14 corporations and 21 individuals for allegedly ripping off homeowners desperately seeking mortgage relief.
Since the housing collapse, hundreds of loan modification and foreclosure-prevention companies have cropped up, charging thousands of dollars in upfront fees and claiming that they can help to reduce mortgage payments. Yet, loan modifications of significance are rarely, if ever, obtained. Less than 1% of homeowners receive principal reductions of any kind.
“The loan modification industry is teeming with confidence men and charlatans, who rip off desperate homeowners facing foreclosure,” Brown said. “Despite firm promises and money-back guarantees, these scam artists pocketed thousands of dollars from each victim and didn’t provide an ounce of relief.”
The suits were filed in Los Angeles and Orange County, which Federal Trade Commission chairman Leibowitz described as one of the national centers of this deceptive industry.
Leibowitz, former chief counsel to the US Senate anti-trust subcommittee, was appointed by President Barack Obama as head of the FTC in March.
He praised Brown as the best attorney general in the country on the mortgage crisis and described him as an important ally of the Obama Administration on pharmaceutical issues.
President Barack Obama, speaking at the same time as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s ballyhooed major address, pushed hard on a universal health care reform plan to avoid further economic instability.
** OBAMA PUSHES AGAIN ON HEALTH CARE. President Barack Obama, appearing with reps of the American Nurses Association in the White House Rose Garden, alternated between praising and prodding Congress on health care reform.
“This progress should make us hopeful, but it can’t make us complacent,” said Obama, as he pressed for congressional action before the August recess.
The midday event was meant to highlight nurses’ support for the kind of comprehensive revamp Obama says is necessary to ensure the country’s fiscal health and save American businesses and families millions of dollars in rising premiums and out-of-pocket costs.
The president stressed the cost savings an overhaul would bring, while repeating his assurances that those who like their health-care provider and their plan would be able to keep them, even though the government cannot force companies to continue to provide the plans they provide now.
He used the recent progress in Congress — the House proposal introduced yesterday and a Senate Health Committee proposal introduced today — to say Washington was “now closer to the goal of health reform than we have ever been.” Both proposals would include a public option.
What was interesting about Obama’s remarks, in addition to the ongoing health care push, was that they came at the same time that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton was giving what her aides touted as her major address on American’s foreign policy at the very time that Obama appeared in the Rose Garden. The White House released formal text for Obama about 10 minutes after Clinton’s speech began.
Visit msnbc.com for Breaking News, World News, and News about the Economy
President Barack Obama, accompanied by San Francisco Giants Hall of Famer Willie Mays, attended the Major League All-Star Game last night and threw out the first pitch.
** OBAMA TODAY. President Barack Obama is receiving his daily intelligence and economic briefings in the Oval Office.
He is appearing on various morning TV shows discussing health care reform.
At 10:05 AM Pacific, Obama delivers remarks on health care reform in the Rose Garden.
At 12:10 PM Pacific, Obama and Vice President Joe Biden meet with Secretary of State Hillary Clinton in the Oval Office.
At 2:30 PM Pacific, Obama and Biden meet with Secretary of Defense Bob Gates in the Oval Office.
Before their meeting with Gates, Biden meets with General David Petraeus, the head of US Central Command.
In the evening, Biden hosts a dinner for freshmen House members at the Naval Observatory, his vice presidential residence.
Hillary Clinton’s “3 AM” attack ad against Barack Obama in the 2008 Democratic presidential primaries. Now Secretary of State Clinton, overshadowed by President Obama on geopolitics and slowed by elbow surgery, gives a resurfacing speech today.
While Obama is speaking on health care, the White House focus of the day, in the Rose Garden, Clinton will be giving what is billed as a major address to a Council on Foreign Relations event in Washington.
Meanwhile, Obama’s Supreme Court pick, Judge Sonia Sotomayor, is in her third day of confirmation hearings before the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is in the Middle East for another day, conferring with Gulf Arab leaders, talking up better news on tech orders and saying the US wants to work with them on developing a stronger financial framework. The six nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council, taken together, are America’s second largest creditor behind China, as well as a source, through sovereign wealth funds, of massive investment in US banks and industry.
And Energy Secretary Steve Chu is in Beijing, where the Nobel Prize-winning physicist is challenging China to cut its greenhouse gas emissions.
** FROM THE ARNOLD FILE. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger holds private meetings and discussions in and around the Capitol, focusing on California’s chronic-turned-chaotic budget crisis.
Schwarzenegger swears in new members of the state’s nursing board at 11:45 AM, makes some remarks, and then takes questions from the press.
The event will be webcast live at www.gov.ca.gov.
Schwarzenegger just fired most members of the board, mostly appointed by him, after revelations by Pro Publica and the Los Angeles Times that the board was lax in disciplining problem nurses. The deeper problem may lie with the board’s staff, the director having been in place since early in the Pete Wilson Administration.
Most questions are expected to be on the state’s budget crisis.
On that front, Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders met from late yesterday afternoon till just before midnight. They are scheduled to begin meeting again at 1:30 PM today.
Big 5 negotiations between Schwarzenegger and Democratic and Republican legislative leaders began again late Friday afternoon, continued over the weekend, took a break Monday for staff consultation, then continued yesterday.
Progress is reportedly being made, but we’ve been down that road before.
** DIMINISHING RETURNS FOR OBAMA’S SUMMITEERING. President Barack Obama returned early Sunday morning from a near week-long international tour that took him to a key summit in Moscow, a G-8 summit, and his first appearance in Africa as president. But some suggested, with his poll numbers down a bit and media attention mostly elsewhere, that his summiteering is having diminishing returns.
Perhaps. But I think it has at least as much to do with the media culture.
American media, especially cable TV news, is moving more into infotainment mode, stuck on a few areas. Geopolitics has never been its strong suit, and political coverage is mostly focused on food fights. Which was unfortunate, as following on to his addresses in Prague and Cairo, Obama gave the final two of his advertised four major speeches on his new geopolitics last week, in Moscow and in Accra, Ghana. …
** OBAMA DOES MOSCOW, AND VICE VERSA. Flying to Italy Wednesday morning for the troubled G-8 summit, President Barack Obama departed Moscow after a very intriguing summit with Russian President Dmitri Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin.
This was the so-called “Reset Summit” to bring American/Russian relations out of the neo-Cold War depths they’d sunk to last year. It certainly succeeded at that, and at some other things as well, especially with regard to sharp reductions in nuclear weapons, aid for the US effort in Afghanistan, and a pullback on NATO expansion, a longtime thorn in the side of Russia. But other sticking points remained, on a US anti-missile shield and on Iran.
All amidst some notable intrigue, some of it generated from the Obama side. …
Unlike most of the rest of Europe, Russia is hardly in the grip of Obamamania. He’s certainly more popular than George W. Bush or John McCain, but that’s damning with faint praise. … From my July 8th column.
** OBAMA’S CONSEQUENTIAL FIRST 4TH: NOKO, AFPAK, IRAQ, RUSSIA, PALIN (PALIN?!) Quite a consequential first 4th of July as president for Barack Obama.
Not only did he have 20 of daughter Malia’s schoolgirl friends over for a Camp David sleepover in honor of her 11th birthday on the 4th of July — just wait till her “Independence Day,” Dad — he had a few other things on his plate, as well as the barbeque for military families and the fireworks show. Not counting his inherited worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
North Korea was to have been the drama of the day. But it turned into a major fizzle. … From my July 4th column.
** THE GOP’S PALIN FOOD FIGHT: WHY NOW? You have to hand it to Sarah Palin. For a sideshow, she’s very good at being the center of attention. Even when she doesn’t want to be.
She had a few big controversies earlier this year — her on-again/off-again headlining of the big GOP congressional fundraiser, her pregnant teenage daughter, the usual Alaska stuff — but she’s hit the jackpot this week with a huge food fight among big name Republicans. What’s unexamined is this question: Why now? … From my July 2nd column.
** TRANSFORMATIVE: LE CINEMA DE MICHAEL BAY. … From my June 29th essay.
** STAR TREK FIRSTS … 43 YEARS ON. … From my June 23rd essay.
** OBAMA AND THE AYATOLLAH. . … From my June 19th column.
** OBAMA’S CRISIS MANAGEMENT: NORTH KOREA, AGAIN. … From my June 12th column.
** REMEMBERING AMERICA: OBAMA’S D-DAY SPEECH AND TWO DAYS IN JUNE. … From my June 8th column.
** REPOSITIONING AMERICA: OBAMA’S CAIRO SPEECH AS THE ULTIMATE IN EVENT MARKETING. … From my June 4th column.
** TERMINATING THE DARKNESS: HOPE FLOATS, BUT ANXIETY ABIDES. … From my May 31st column.
** THE AVOIDABLE TRAGEDY OF CALIFORNIA’S PROP 8. … From my May 26th column.
** OBAMA: RIDING WITH HISTORY. (NOTE: As Barack Obama was inaugurated as the 44th president of the United States, this column was the featured column on the top of the front page of the Huffington Post.) … From my January 19th Huffington Post column.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM RUSSIA TODAY. Russia has re-emerged as one of the world’s great powers. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer, bringing you English-language, jargon-free, fast-paced coverage of global and Russian news from the new Russia Today channel. You probably already know about CNN International, BBC World, and Al Jazeera. Russia Today, which also features culture, entertainment, and sports, is based in Moscow and is owned and operated by the TV Novosti division of Russia’s state news agency, RIA Novosti. While it’s quite foolish to expect to see, say, criticism of Vladimir Putin on Russia Today, which I know as a former DemRussia advisor, the channel is very interesting nonetheless. With U.S. cable news chattering away as it does, this sort of respite can be informative. The NWN live link to RT does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** 24/7 LIVE TV NEWS FEED FROM AL JAZEERA. With the US entangled in two wars in the region, it’s valuable to keep up with news and perspectives from the leading Middle Eastern-based TV news network. Based in the Gulf Arab state of Qatar, Al Jazeera is very influential and more than a bit controversial. Click here for a live TV news feed on your computer. The NWN live link to AJ does not constitute an endorsement of the channel’s views. It’s presented as an otherwise unavailable new media window.
** SCHWARZENEGGER’S CALIFORNIA. Here is my series of five columns on the governorship of Arnold Schwarzenegger for the Los Angeles Times in debate last fall, prior to the global economic meltdown, with Pulitzer Prize-winning former Times reporter/editor Bill Boyarsky, whose columns are also included. Among them is what I’m sure is the first piece examining Schwarzenegger’s legacy as governor of California. Since he will actually be governor of California until 2011. No technology known to be disruptive to the space/time continuum was used in its preparation.
You can listen to my recent video webchat with Schwarzenegger here.
** TRACK GLOBAL AND NATIONAL ENERGY PRICES IN NEAR REAL TIME VIA BLOOMBERG ENERGY MARKET WATCH. Having crashed over $147 for yet another record last July 11th, crude oil is trading around $61 per barrel.
This is up about $27 from the low of $34 per barrel prior to enactment of the Obama economic recovery program. But oil has been slumping over the past week or so from recent highs on fears that the global economic recovery is happening too slowly.
Your posts are welcome in the Forum.
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| Comments (43) |
Obama looked good on the pitcher’s mound with Willie Mays.
I meant “AND with Willie Mays.”
Hillary’s “3 A.M.” ad, very funny.
Say hey, Willie Mays!!
onas Blane says:
July 15, 2009 at 7:30 am
Obama looked good on the pitcher’s mound with Willie Mays.
Hillary should never have run that ad.
Jonas Blane says:
July 15, 2009 at 7:32 am
Hillary’s “3 A.M.” ad, very funny.
“3am” is a pretty good ad. Trouble was, within a month after Super Tuesday, the delegate numbers just weren’t there for HRC. After that, she needed Obama to implode, and he didn’t.
This is the longest running show in history.
BB:On that front, Schwarzenegger and legislative leaders met from late yesterday afternoon till just before midnight. They are scheduled to begin meeting again at 1:30 PM today.
Big 5 negotiations between Schwarzenegger and Democratic and Republican legislative leaders began again late Friday afternoon, continued over the weekend, took a break Monday for staff consultation, then continued yesterday.
Progress is reportedly being made, but we’ve been down that road before.
The Hillary C ad is very ironic.
Wow, Obama did his live health care presser during HRC’s speech. That’s cold.
Bradley had that in his morning report.
BB: While Obama is speaking on health care, the White House focus of the day, in the Rose Garden, Clinton will be giving what is billed as a major address to a Council on Foreign Relations event in Washington.
Hey, where’s my post?
Hillary shouldn’t have run that ad …
Jonas Blane says:
July 15, 2009 at 7:32 am
Hillary’s “3 A.M.” ad, very funny.
Obama was a Willie Mays fan as a kid? Let’s see, he was born in 1961 and Mays was in his heyday in the ’60s. Maybe…
Hey, my post showed up this time.
You got crazy software, man.
Indeed.
Mays was past his prime but was still the most famous baseball player when Obama was old enough to pay attention …
> Jack Aubrey says:
July 15, 2009 at 11:04 am (Edit)
Obama was a Willie Mays fan as a kid? Let’s see, he was born in 1961 and Mays was in his heyday in the ’60s. Maybe…
She’d already lost the nomination by that point.
> Jack Aubrey says:
July 15, 2009 at 10:32 am (Edit)
Hillary shouldn’t have run that ad …
Jonas Blane says:
July 15, 2009 at 7:32 am
Hillary’s “3 A.M.” ad, very funny.
Correct.
> Jack Aubrey says:
July 15, 2009 at 10:31 am (Edit)
Bradley had that in his morning report.
BB: While Obama is speaking on health care, the White House focus of the day, in the Rose Garden, Clinton will be giving what is billed as a major address to a Council on Foreign Relations event in Washington.
He’s his own secretary of state and she is mousetrapped.
> Clutch J says:
July 15, 2009 at 10:24 am (Edit)
Wow, Obama did his live health care presser during HRC’s speech. That’s cold.
It really wasn’t that long ago. But it sure feels like it.
> Jonas Blane says:
July 15, 2009 at 7:32 am (Edit)
Hillary’s “3 A.M.” ad, very funny.
He looked like an athlete out there.
> Jonas Blane says:
July 15, 2009 at 7:30 am (Edit)
Obama looked good on the pitcher’s mound
Exec. Director of the Nursing Board has resigned. I bet a purge of the staff is next. Sounds like she treated it as her fiefdom and the agency wasn’t doing its job. How come it took the Times and ProPublic expose to get some action? Does speak well to the state’s ability to find and fix problem entities in its web of various bodies…
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-terry-nurse15-2009jul15,0,6112190.story?track=rss
I meant does not speak well to the state’s ability to find and fix problem entities in its web of various bodie Is it time to rethink our appraoch to regulation? This isn’t the first panel that wasn’t doing the job and finally had to be overhauled after years of dysfunction…
Good talk on health care by the Big O.
“He’s his own secretary of state and she is mousetrapped.”
No chit!
But what motivates this rather overt nose-rubbing in that reality? I think we know by now that nothing he does is not carefully thought through, several chess moves ahead.
Back to Obama-HRC. Publicly, the story is that Obama knew for months that he wanted HRC as SoS. Then, as you note, he becomes his own de facto SoS. Now, after she breaks her elbow, he adds insult to injury by stepping all over her big speech. That’s hardcore. The guy really is a Chicago pol.
They shouldn’t have messed with Barack.
All right, JB!
BB: Leibowitz, former chief counsel to the US Senate anti-trust subcommittee, was appointed by President Barack Obama as head of the FTC in March.
He praised Brown as the best attorney general in the country on the mortgage crisis and described him as an important ally of the Obama Administration on pharmaceutical issues.
Good news from Intel and its mighty microchips.
I’ve finally gotten over Coburn’s “Ricky Ricardo” impersonation. He was questioning the next Supreme Court Justice.
What a stupid ass.
HILLARY DIANE RODHAM-CLINTON POOL
Now, Hillary is being called the Saudi Wife of the Media Messiah Imperial President of the Empire, has been said to have been off page with the Messiah, and the latest having been upstaged by a Rose Garden announcement by the Messiah during the Hillary Diane Rodham-Clinton State Department Under New Management cutting of the ribbon. And, the International Community has been openly questioning why the Messiah is performing the tasks that are normally done by the State Department.
So, the question is have you bought into the office pool of just how long Hillary Diane Rodham-Clinton will remain the Secretary of State? What are the odds that it is less than (4) four years, less than (2) years, no more than (18) months?
Obama’s “Saudi Wife” Hillary? You think that is reality-based?
On behalf of white men everywhere, I apologize …
> marcos leon says:
July 15, 2009 at 5:18 pm (Edit)
I’ve finally gotten over Coburn’s “Ricky Ricardo” impersonation. He was questioning the next Supreme Court Justice.
What a stupid ass.
Yep. The slow economic recovery is on.
> Jonas Blane says:
July 15, 2009 at 5:12 pm (Edit)
Good news from Intel and its mighty microchips.
Unfolding …
> Capitol Boy says:
July 15, 2009 at 4:41 pm (Edit)
All right, JB!
BB: Leibowitz, former chief counsel to the US Senate anti-trust subcommittee, was appointed by President Barack Obama as head of the FTC in March.
He praised Brown as the best attorney general in the country on the mortgage crisis and described him as an important ally of the Obama Administration on pharmaceutical issues.
Trying to appoint Sid Blumenthal, as I mentioned a while back, was not a brilliant move on Hillary’s part.
> Clutch J says:
July 15, 2009 at 2:50 pm (Edit)
Back to Obama-HRC. Publicly, the story is that Obama knew for months that he wanted HRC as SoS. Then, as you note, he becomes his own de facto SoS. Now, after she breaks her elbow, he adds insult to injury by stepping all over her big speech. That’s hardcore. The guy really is a Chicago pol.
I had some technical glitches when I had writing time earlier, but the new column will be available shortly …
> Wilbur says:
July 15, 2009 at 2:48 pm (Edit)
“He’s his own secretary of state and she is mousetrapped.”
No chit!
But what motivates this rather overt nose-rubbing in that reality? I think we know by now that nothing he does is not carefully thought through, several chess moves ahead.
The director of the board seems to have been the real bottleneck.
Typical for a state bureaucracy.
> Dana says:
July 15, 2009 at 1:03 pm (Edit)
Exec. Director of the Nursing Board has resigned. I bet a purge of the staff is next. Sounds like she treated it as her fiefdom and the agency wasn’t doing its job. How come it took the Times and ProPublic expose to get some action? Does speak well to the state’s ability to find and fix problem entities in its web of various bodies…
http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-terry-nurse15-2009jul15,0,6112190.story?track=rss
We all understand about Alex Padilla, a prima donna lightweight.
Gavin Newsom is being very badly advised.
… San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, trailing badly in his campaign for the Democratic gubernatorial nomination against his family’s patron, former Governor-turned-Attorney General Jerry Brown, appointed state Senator Alex Padilla of LA as his campaign chairman in an attempt to get some traction in Southern California and with Latinos. But Padilla is a very mixed bag with both. …
President Obama has cast a very strong course on world affairs.
I look forward to your new column.
What new video today?
Hillary’s big speech, and Obama in Africa.
Thanks.
> marcus waldron says:
July 15, 2009 at 11:18 pm (Edit)
President Obama has cast a very strong course on world affairs.
I look forward to your new column.