Last Call

Saints fail to lose, 31-17.

Who dat?  Super Bowl Champs.

Seriously, best Super Bowl since Panthers-Patriots.  Hats off to the Saints.  Been a long, long damn road for that franchise and for New Orleans.

Greek Fire

Pretty disturbing stuff from Greece on the country's economy.  Tyler Durden:

Remember the proverbial run on the bank? Well, that was the norm (or rather the outlier) before governments decided to backstop entire financial industries  residing within their territory. As a result, the post-Lehman version of "the bank run" will henceforth be referred to as "the country run" and for an example of one in practice, look no further than Greece. The Guardian reports that investors have pulled a stunning €8-10 billion since the Greek crisis commenced in earnest last November. If true, this is the beginning of the end for the troubled EMU-member country.

Ten billion Euros gone in six weeks.  That's one huge cliff Greece has fallen off of.  Monday's numbers are going to be bad...really bad.

It's a good old fashioned bank run.

If you will recall a mere 15 months back, the one factor that truuly excerbated the pre and post-Lehman fiasco, both domestically and globally, was investors' loss of conifdence in the system: first in the deposit custodians and then in money markets themselves. As the financial system is never, by definition, prepared for massive fund flows in the outward bound direction, this is the greatest nightmare of any regulator or any central bank. If indeed the money rush out of Greece has commenced, then it is too late to save the country, no matter what Papandreou or Almunia will say: the only voice that matters is that of the depositor, and what is being said is the polar opposite of the claims of those who continue lying and telling us that everything is fine.

Putting the €10 billion number in perspective: Greece is facing roughly €8 billion in near-term maturities in April and May each. This is Greece, not America, and €10 billion is still a massive number. The latest miraculous Greek bond issue, which was supposed to sound the "all clear" call, was for €8 billion. Investors in that particular GGB are already underwater. 

The chocks just got pulled from the wheels.  Will the Greek Fire spread to the other PIGS nations, Portugal, Italy, and Spain? How quickly will that fire spread?  Because like the legendary substance, once it starts burning, there's no way to put it out.

Watch carefully.  I can bet you California is.

While You Were Out At The Game

A lot of noise coming that a big nasty scandal is dropping tomorrow for NY Gov. David Paterson, one so bad it will require his resignation.  The fact the story's coming from the Business Insider says everything you need to know.

This past week, a rumor emerged that the New York Times is working on a huge bombshell with plans to "Spitzerize" New York governor David Paterson.

Several media outlets have reported on these rumors.

Elizabeth Benjamin at The Daily News describes the report as "much worse" than the governor's previous admission of an affair with a state employee, though she declines to name NYT by name.

We've now heard from a single source familiar with the goings on at the Governor's office that the story will likely drop on Monday, and that the governor's resignation will follow.

If so, the Wall Street fatcats are 2 for 2 on getting rid of NY Governors who try to go after the banks. The next guy who's been swinging at that pinata has been current AG and favorite in 2010, Democrat Andrew Cuomo.

He'd better be ready.  This pinata swings back.  Hard.

[UPDATE 7:40 PM] And now the Business Insider says the Governor's office denies everything and the Times story will not run tomorrow.

Bowl Of The Superness

No no, Obama's having a half a day with the Party of No to talk to them about health care reform.  Televised.  Live.  And he's saying "Bring your A-game."

The president made the offer in an interview with CBS News anchor Katie Couric just hours before the Superbowl. Obama challenged Republicans to come to the discussion armed with their best ideas for how to cover more Americans and fix the health insurance system.

"I want to consult closely with our Republican colleagues," Obama told Couric. "What I want to do is to ask them to put their ideas on the table... I want to come back and have a large meeting, Republicans and Democrats to go through, systematically, all the best ideas that are out there and move it forward."

The invitation to join him later this month follows comments he made on Thursday during a speech at a Democratic fundraiser in which he said he wanted to sit with Republicans and "walk through the [health care plans] in a methodical way so that the American people can see and compare what makes the most sense."

That rain-like noise you hear is several of gallons of collective flop sweat from Republicans hitting the floor at roughly the same time.

On the other hand, it means Obama still stupidly believes that there are GOP votes on health care to be had.  Perhaps he should be holding this session with Democrats instead.  It would be far more productive.

Gas Power Plant Explosion In Connecticut

A power plant in Connecticut exploded going through a test run today, killing at least two:

The plant was under construction and had not opened, Middletown Officer Kevin White told CNN. It was set to go online later this year, he said, and was in a "testing phase."

People up to 20 miles away reported hearing or feeling the blast.

"It felt like the house was shaking," Peter Moore, who lives about 10 miles away in Durham, told CNN. He said he thought at first there had been a traffic accident on his street or there was a problem with his house. "It was really big," he said.

Moore said his mother, who lives in Woodbridge, about 20 miles away from the plant, also said she heard the explosion, and said it "sounded like someone pounded on the back door a couple of times."

"It was almost like an earthquake," nearby resident Lynn Townsend told CNN affiliate WTNH. She said she heard the explosion and went outside to see "a very big, bright orange flame" between the plant's two smokestacks, and immediately dialed 9-1-1.

"It really shook the house," she said. "Everybody was scared. The kids started to cry."

Bernadette Nyland told WTNH she was in her yard when the explosion occurred.

"They were doing the firing of the engines this morning and so something went wrong and it blew up and flames came shooting up almost as tall as that stack," she told the station. 

Hoping this isn't as bad as it appears to be.  It also goes to show you that infrastructure is important in this country, and sources of power other than fossil fuels and nuclear are generally less prone to explode.

Quote Of The Week

Atrios:

Reporters complaining about newsroom cutbacks and blaming bloggers should consider the resources used to cover the Tea Party and the former governor who will never again hold elected office.

Just sayin'.

When will the Village get the point that the Tea Party hates them nearly as much as they hate the Dems?

Sunday Funnies

This week's Bobblespeak Translations are up.  Hammerin' Hank, Old Man Greenspan in one comic book and Timmy and Jake Tapper on the other:

Tapper: you’re not serious about cutting the debt
are you?

Geither: for god’s sake Obama promised a fake spending freeze

Tapper: oh pshaw anyone can do that

Geithner: deficits matter and we have to raise
taxes and cut spending

Tapper: sure-fire election winner genius

Geithner: I iz smart

Tapper: You and I know we have to cut Medicare and Medicaid

Geithner: I am giving you a serious look

Tapper: I also giving you my serious look

Geithner: I also - look at my serious face

Tapper: speaking of right wing talking points -
will you promise to never raise taxes?

Geithner: I iz deeply serious

And we are deeply screwed.

Zandar's Super Bowl Prognostications

Go Saints.  Just so Drew Brees can fly to San Diego and go "Suck it."

Also, every Republican save the ones from Louisiana are picking the Colts.  The GOP loves an underdog unless that underdog is from French Guyana, or whatever that city with the ethnic people is called again.

Morning In Palinland

Although General Blogosphere Rule #17 states Andrew Sullivan will eventually ruin any legitimate Sarah Palin argument by going after Trig Palin, he hasn't quite descended that far yet this week and still has a real point to bring up about the Cult of Sarah:

If you are one of those people who think this person cannot become president of the United States, think again.

Two lines stood out for me. The first is a sign that she believes and her followers believe that she has a divine destiny. She is Esther, with a touch of martyrdom:

"I will live, I will die for the people of America."

The second was the Dolchstoss attack on the duly elected president of the United States:

"We need a commander-in-chief not a professor of law."

These two potent messages - delegitimizing Obama as "the other" and as a weak-kneed traitor to the troops, and casting herself as the avatar of the real America, ready to die for its survival - are political gold. Most politicians in liberal democracies shy somewhat from stating them so obviously, because they clearly invoke certain, shall we say, non-democratic forms. Not she.

The media, too scared be tarred as elitists, will never demand policy specifics from her; there is a huge constituency out there (rightly) outraged by Washington corruption and she now has the critical mantle of the rogue outsider; she can channel Christianism and fuse it with the slogans of phony "fiscal conservatism"; she will blame every lost job on Obama; and she will accuse him of betraying the troops and befriending America's enemies. Behind her are the Cheneyites. 

And if they Cheneyites view Sarah as their best ticket back to the White House, you'd better believe she'll get the nomination in 2012.  Political history has taught us that we always get the elected leaders that the electorate deserves to have, and right now we have a cranky, know-nothing electorate that demands instant gratification and is still quite creeped out by the black guy in the White House talking about giving health insurance, political asylum, first-class citizen rights and clean air to gays, terrorists, brown people and people who don't pay taxes.  It's coming at their expense.  "Where's my cut?" they say.  "I worked hard.  I played by the rules.  Where's my American Dream?"

And they think Sarah will give it to them.  She just threw her hat into the ring for 2012.

Sarah Palin doesn't have to have any answers, or policy specifics, or anything.  God will provide.  That's her platform.

We're screwed.

Event Horizon

I honestly didn't think Sarah Palin could get any more incoherent.

I was wrong.  It was 45 minutes of propaganda from 2008, followed by 15 minutes of a beauty pageant interview.

On the other hand, she scammed these idiots out of a six-figure number.



No really.  It was that bad.



She read notes off her hand at one point.

Throwing Icy Chunks Of Populism

So, more people showed up for the impromptu Facebook-organized SNOWPOCALYPSE snowball fight (3k plus) in Washington's Dupont Circle than the Teabagger Convention (600) in Nashville this weekend.  Five times as many people.



Where are the NY Times reporters to declare this a major game-changing force in America's culture and politics that represents millions of ordinary Americans who clearly want to settle partisan political battles with snowball fights the way our Founding Fathers would have wanted?

The Tyranny Of The GOP Minority Continues

Via Digby, the Republican minority that Americans from Massachusetts to Massachusetts so clearly elected into power last month continues to make demands of former President Barack Obama as is their god-given Constitutional mandate to do so, and if you diusagree you're a socialist anyway so screw you.

A top House Republican has warned Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner that unless the administration consults with Republicans on the make-up and mandate of a fiscal commission, the party won't cooperate, an aide said Friday.

House Minority Leader John Boehner (R., Ohio) spoke to Geithner by telephone Friday about the commission, details of which are expected to be finalized next week, an aide to Boehner said.

According to the aide, Boehner told Geithner that President Barack Obama needs to consult Republicans on who will sit on the panel. He also said that everything needs to be up for discussion, including spending cuts, and that the panel should deliver its report to Congress before the November mid-term elections.

Despite attempts by Obama to restart relations with the Republican minority, it's looking increasingly unlikely that the party will cooperate.

Why should they cooperate?  They own all the power in Washington and none of the responsibility. Scott Brown counts as 20 Senators because he's a Republican from Massachusetts.

And the voters will continue to flock to the GOP because the Democrats in Washington are completely okay with this arrangement.

The Shelby Shuffle

Matt Osborne's been covering Alabama politics from the left for some time now, so when the Shelby Shakedown story broke, I figured there had to be a pretty compelling local angle besides just plain old pork to put a blanket hold on everything, and it could possibly be related to recent Democrat-turned-Teabagger Parker Griffith, who now looks like Tuscaloosa roadkill to both parties.  Matt does the political calculus and has more of the story...

Alarm bells must have gone off at some point. When did Griffith talk to Senator Shelby, I wonder? Oh, to be a fly on the wall... Which brings us to the strangely coincidental timing of the Politico article and the Senator's sudden, unprecedented bid to hold America's national security hostage.

It is a dead certainty Politico called Griffith for comment. Alabama politics are only slightly more incestuous than Washington's. Griffith must have reached out to Shelby in panic -- or minority leadership.

This is more than just speculation. As reported by the Mobile Press-Register, Shelby's extortion centers on two items: a military aircraft contract in the southern port city of Mobile, and an FBI experimental program in Improvised Explosive Devices for Redstone Arsenal...which just happens to be in Huntsville, the metropolitan heart of AL-5.

Set aside the question of how badly the FBI needs such a facility. The scope and apparent arrogance of Shelby's move is hard to overstate and smells of the usual hypocrisy (I recall a Democrat named Richard Shelby hammering the incumbent Republican over earmarks and pork in 1986). But more importantly, it smacks of desperation.

If Shelby is making a bid to save Griffith, it will almost certainly fail. Obama will have no reason to help Griffith; he may offer Huntsville a bone, but rest assured no shovels will be digging before November. The Arsenal just doesn't work that fast. Any eventual ceremony will feature Barack Obama and Artur Davis.

Parker Griffith has nothing to show for his switch. Even if he wins the nomination, the entire Democratic machine (which remains larger and better-structured than the GOP) is highly motivated against him and enthusiastically participates in oppo research to the benefit of Griffith's primary opponents. Friday's one-of-a-kind holding action could be a Hail Mary pass; Parker Griffith needs a miracle. But the optics for the GOP are terrible, and I expect a savaging on the Sunday shows.

Next, watch as Senator Shelby makes a mess and the party apparatus scrambles to pick up the pieces. As I predicted here, the flip has turned into a fiasco. Griffith's error was to think of himself as the second coming of George Wallace. I believe that I actually watched the strange transformation of Griffith before my very eyes at that town hall in August, and I have to say I almost...almost feel sorry for him.

And what lessons can we take from Griffith's short and mostly profitless career? That the Republican Party is terrified of its own creation. We have all seen this movie; it's the one in which the brilliant scientist attempts to create life -- and cannot see the monster he has unleashed until it is too late.

It'll be interesting to see if Griffith gets craphammered, and there is actually a challenger to Shelby now.  Things could get real interesting.  Matt's right about the Sunday shows...not even the Village can play the bipartisan card on this one.

Son Of The Revenge Of 1.9 Million Invisible Teabaggers

The "Two-Million Teabagger march on DC lie" continues unabated at the National Tea Party Convention.  To them it's the truth, the reality for these mouthbreathers is that the evil liberal media covered up the biggest story of 2009.  FOX News contributor Angela McGlowan:



And so it goes.  They lie with impunity.

[UPDATE 3:49 PM] That impunity part means that the Village press freely repeats Teabagger lies as fact, verbatim and unchallenged, like the NY Times. Eric Boehlert:

I'm getting the feeling that if Tea Party conventioneers told the Times' Kate Zernike that the world was flat she'd run with it.

As noted earlier, she referenced Tea Party organizers who claimed "millions" had marched at Tea Party protests within the last year; a figure that appers to be fabricated.

Now in a follow-up piece, Zernike writes [emphasis added]: 

 Susan and Gil Harper from Cushing, Me. — she a lawyer who telecommutes to New York, he a furniture maker — said they had limited their political involvement to voting. But Mr. Harper said the bank bailout outraged them, and pushed him to his first Tea Party rally.
By Christmas, he told his wife that what he wanted was a ticket to the Tea Party Convention. When she gave it to him, she said she would go along, but only incognito, wearing a hat and sunglasses.
“Because of Nancy Pelosi calling people who believe in the Tea Party movement Nazis,” she explained. “My grandfather’s family, as Polish Jews, escaped Nazism. To call us Nazis is an abomination.”

Fact: Nancy Pelosi never called Tea Party supporters "Nazis." Period. But the Times quotes a conservative making that slanderous claim. The Times treats the outlandish allegation as fact.

Impunity.  They can lie at will.  It becomes news.

Stupid By Proxy

The Hill's Alex Bolton declares the GOP Senate primary here in Kentucky as the GOP vs. Teabagger fight for "the direction of the party", but the direction of the party has already been decided.

Sarah Palin, who gave her handlers headaches during the 2008 presidential campaign, isn’t making things any easier.

She has thrown her support behind Rand Paul, a favorite of anti-establishment conservatives such as RedState.com and Gun Owners of America, who is running for Senate in Kentucky.

Palin waded into the race despite it being widely known among political insiders that McConnell backs Rand’s opponent, Kentucky Secretary of State Trey Grayson.

GOP strategists in Washington believe Grayson has a much better chance of winning the general election but Palin has channeled conservatives' frustration over “go-along-to-get-along” Republicans in Washington.

Palin’s not-so-subtle challenge to McConnell’s political authority shows the overall difficulty GOP leaders have in taming the resurgent conservative base, which has made Palin and the Tea Party newly powerful political forces.

Don't believe it for a second.  That battle was decided the second Sarah Palin became a FOX drone:

Without leaving home, Sarah Palin will be able to reach much of her political base, courtesy of a soon-to-be-built television studio in her living room paid for by her newest media patron, Fox News. From her house in Wasilla, Alaska, Ms. Palin also sends missives to 1.3 million Facebook “fans,” writes newspaper columns, Tweets and signs copies of her book for donors.

There's not a single person in this state who will vote for the Democrat in Kentucky just to teach the GOP a lesson that Rand Paul is too extreme.  That's because in Kentucky, the GOP and the Teabaggers are one and the same.  Grayson's a ghost walking, he just doesn't know it yet.  This state already put Mitch McConnell and Jim Bunning in office as Senators, two of the most insane people in the Senate GOP caucus and that's saying something.

Hell, they are one and the same in the other 49 states too.  And the longer it takes the Dems to figure this out, the more damage they will suffer in November.   Don't buy this proxy battle crap.  It's all to sell fascism as populism, under a cross and wearing a flag.

And you'd better believe the people in the Bluegrass State and across the nation are buying into it.

Rand Paul will fit right in.