Last Call

Your call cannot be completed as dialed, AT&T.  Please try again.

The decision by US authorities to challenge AT&T's $39 billion takeover of T-Mobile is a bitter blow for the US telecoms giant, but it could benefit consumers, analysts said.

As it filed a lawsuit to block the takeover on Wednesday, the US Department of Justice said the takeover bid -- which would give AT&T a daunting 39-percent share of the US wireless market -- was anti-competitive.

Shares of AT&T plunged 4.6 percent on Wall Street after the DoJ's move was announced, even as the company vowed to contest it in court.

"There are really no good options for AT&T at this point," said Harold Feld, legal director of Public Knowledge, a digital-rights advocacy group in Washington.

I'd have to agree.  It's either a lengthy court battle that could take years, or abandon the deal altogether.  Either way, Sprint and Verizon have to be licking their chops knowing that they can continue to expand at AT&T's expense.

Here's the question:  can anybody buy T-Mobile and not exceed that 39% market share mark and still remain competitive?

Eye Of The Hurri-Cantor

Me, last week on Eric Cantor's trial balloon to hold Hurricane Irene relief money hostage to federal spending cuts:

Boy, if I lived in Cantor's district, I'd be thrilled to know that if Irene went through my hometown and wrecked power, traffic, water and city streets, that Eric Cantor's office was more interested in scoring political talking points than helping people in need.  And if I were one of Cantor's Virginia delegation colleagues, I'd be ringing up his office and saying "Look, pal, my constituents are going to need this money.  Don't be pulling this nonsense."

And lo and behold, now Cantor has quite the revolt on his hands from Virginia Republicans, including Gov. Bob McDonnell:

Virginia GOP Gov. Bob McDonnell, breaking with Cantor, on Tuesday suggested that deficit-spending concerns should not be a factor as Congress and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) respond to the hurricane.

“My concern is that we help people in need,” McDonnell said during his monthly radio show. “For the FEMA money that’s going to flow, it’s up to them on how they get it. I don’t think it’s the time to get into that [deficit] debate.”

Yeah, and here's the kicker:

But Cantor hasn’t always believed that disaster aid should be contingent on budget cuts. In fact, in 2004, he requested federal aid following Tropical Storm Gaston, saying that “the magnitude of the damage suffered by the Richmond area is beyond what the Commonwealth can handle,” without a word about offsetting cuts being necessary.

So when Cantor's district needed disaster relief, he was all for it.  You know, when Bush was President.  When a Republican is President, deficits don't matter, you see.

Giving The People A Choice

It's no coincidence that today the White House announced that President Obama will be addressing a joint session of Congress the same night as a scheduled GOP candidate presidential debate on September 7, a week from today.  In fact, White House press secretary Jay Carney said that if the Republicans had a problem with it, they should reschedule.  Hey, it's good being the President.

"There were a lot of considerations," White House Press Secretary Jay Carney told reporters today. "And, obviously, one debate of many that's on one channel of many was not enough reason not to have the speech at the time that we decided to have it."

Politico and NBC News are sponsoring the debate, one of three among the GOP presidential candidates scheduled for September. The organizers have not yet announced what they intend to do about the President's request for airtime during their debate.

Carney suggested the organizers could move it.

"The network could make a decision to alter of timing of the debate by an hour if it so decided," Carney said. "There is no perfect time."

"There has not been a time in my short period of time of this job where I called the networks and said, 'How about now for, does this time work for the president to speak?'" Carney added. "There is always, 'well, it works for two of us but not the other three.'"

It'll be interesting to see what kind of pushback the White House gets on this.  It'll be even more interesting to see what the Republicans have to say, and if the Village goes along with it.   But we'll see what happens.

Oh, and I like this new White House going after the GOP.  Like I said, this was absolutely not a coincidence.  Meanwhile, Orange Julius says the President needs to move his address to preempt next Thursday's NFL season opener, because the Republicans you know, hate the President enough to publicly disrespect him like this.  When's the last time a Speaker of the House told the President "hey, just reschedule, we're too busy trying to ruin you to deal with you speaking to us."

Nice guy.

Steven Seagal Stars In Lawsuit - Maximum Overkill

Seagal, along with Maricopa County Sheriff Joe Arpaio, has been served with an official notice of claim from Jesus Sanchez Llovera -- who contends Seagal and the Maricopa County Sheriff's Department performed an "unfounded" raid on his home because they believed Jesus was operating an illegal cockfighting farm. Jesus denies the allegation -- insisting he only raises the roosters "for show."

Jesus claims Seagal arrived to his home on March 9 with a TANK -- and rammed into a gate on his property. Seagal was backed up by an MCSO Tactical Operations Unit -- armed in full riot gear -- which stormed the house. The entire incident was captured by a camera crew taping for Seagal's reality show, "Steven Seagal Lawman."

Jesus claims his 11-month old puppy was shot and killed during the raid -- and his home sustained "substantial damage." He also claims the cops killed more than 100 roosters that belonged to him.

The notice of claim is the first step towards a lawsuit -- and Jesus' lawyer tells us his client is demanding $100,000 for the damage and he wants Seagal to issue a "formal written apology" to his children "for the death of their 11-month old puppy, a beloved family pet.

Technically, these allegations have not been proven.  Let us hope this guy is blowing it out of proportion and angling for a settlement.  Because if somebody comes on my property and threatens my pet, I would shoot them with a smile (if you don't believe me, ask Zandar, who has witnessed my love for my pets and my shotgun).  Destroying property, killing an innocent animal and terrorizing citizens for reality TV is way beyond the line.  And how does killing the roosters actually help them?  Can anyone explain that?

I hope more comes out about this, in the meantime I can't help but feel a little sickened.  I know I am way softer about animals than most, but life is life and suffering is suffering, whether it is ours or another's.  Taking life should never be easy, and certainly never done for something as ridiculous as ratings on a show for a has-been trying to stay tough.  Making a statement about cockfighting should not come at the death of the roosters and an innocent animal that was just home with his family.

Taking Plug And Play To Exciting New Levels

We can't help but project our humanity onto devices.  Our phones were a failure when they just made calls.  Computers were lame when all you could do was data entry and peck out letters.  Even television was ho-hum when it was programmed by someone else.  When the Internet revolution came and porn flooded the web, it became obvious that adding a sexual side to devices cemented them with the population.  Now we have webcam shows, sexting and on-demand adult programming that has added spice to technology.

That means the following article shouldn't be much of a surprise, but boy was it (at least to me!).

There is now a USB vibrator (yes, you read that right).  It comes with 8 or 16 GB of storage, like anyone cares. It now "discreetly" gives users a way to keep their fun... ahem... portable.  I thought it was a joke at first, but CNET assures me it is not.  Adult or not, I had to get an initial giggle attack out of the way, then I began to write this.

Christmas gift? I think not.  Gift for the geek who has everything (except a boyfriend)?  I suppose so.  At any rate, this was one of the most amusing tech articles I've written in a while.  Enjoy!

Turn On The Lights, Watch The Roaches Scatter Part 77

So, turns out Bank of America had plenty of notification that AIG was going to sue them.  Like seven months worth of warning.  And no, they didn't tell shareholders.

Top Bank of America Corp lawyers knew as early as January that American International Group Inc was prepared to sue the bank for more than $10 billion, seven months before the lawsuit was filed, according to sources familiar with the matter.

Bank of America shares fell more than 20 percent on August 8, the day the lawsuit was filed, adding to worries about the stability of the largest U.S. bank. It wasn't until Warren Buffett stepped up with a $5 billion investment that those fears were eased, though hardly eliminated.

The bank made no mention of the lawsuit threat in a quarterly regulatory filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission just four days earlier. Nor did management discuss it on conference calls about quarterly results and other pending legal claims.

The SEC's rules for litigation disclosure are murky, and some lawyers said Bank of America may have been justified in not revealing AIG's lawsuit before it was filed. The bank's litigation disclosures are in line with those of many rivals.

But other lawyers said banks have an obligation to disclose legal threats that could have major consequences.

"Publicly owned companies are supposed to disclose material threatened litigation under generally accepted accounting principles," said Richard Rowe, a former director of the SEC's Division of Corporation Finance, who was commenting generally and not specifically about Bank of America.

The odds of this little tidbit becoming an even larger headache for Bank of America this week is pretty high, especially since shareholders are already suing the bank to block the settlement deal with New York State.  Something tells me this injunction will be carried out in all due haste.

The wolves are circling the tree, and Bank of America is running out of branches to hold on to.  Because it gets even worse for the company.

The attorney general of Nevada is accusing Bank of America of repeatedly violating a broad loan modification agreement it struck with state officials in October 2008 and is seeking to rip up the deal so that the state can sue the bank over allegations of deceptive lending, marketing and loan servicing practices.

In a complaint filed Tuesday in United States District Court in Reno, Catherine Cortez Masto, the Nevada attorney general, asked a judge for permission to end Nevada’s participation in the settlement agreement. This would allow her to sue the bank over what the complaint says were dubious practices uncovered by her office in an investigation that began in 2009.

In her filing, Ms. Masto contends that Bank of America raised interest rates on troubled borrowers when modifying their loans even though the bank had promised in the settlement to lower them. The bank also failed to provide loan modifications to qualified homeowners as required under the deal, improperly proceeded with foreclosures even as borrowers’ modification requests were pending and failed to meet the settlement’s 60-day requirement on granting new loan terms, instead allowing months and in some cases more than a year to go by with no resolution, the filing says. 

And if this is granted, I just don't see how the bank survives.  The Nevada complaint accuses Bank of America ,among other things, of actually punishing their loan modification staff if they spent more than ten minutes trying to help a single customer.  Their job was to get them off the phone in such a way that they wouldn't call back and would basically give up on getting a loan modification.  These guys are pretty much toast.

And B of A is the largest bank in the country.  You do the math as to what that will do to the markets when the hammer drops on them.

I fear we'll find out pretty soon.

Still Furious, Not Particularly Fast However

Republicans looking for their Pentagon Papers to use on President Obama have managed to claim another administration scalp as ATF chief Ken Melson got a "lateral" promotion.

US authorities Tuesday named a new chief for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) after a scandal in which the agency lost track of weapons that ended up in the hands of drug cartels in Mexico.

B. Todd Jones, a federal prosecutor in Minnesota, was appointed acting director of ATF, while the current acting director Kenneth Melson was named a senior adviser to the agency on forensic science.

So what's this "Fast And Furious" mess all about, anyway?

The shakeup comes weeks after a congressional report showed an estimated 2,000 weapons smuggled into Mexico as part of a US sting operation -- and then lost -- have been linked to numerous killings, including that of an American federal agent.

The report found that ATF lost track of the weapons after allowing them to be smuggled into Mexico under an operation called "Fast and Furious," which drew harsh criticism in Congress after the revelations.

At least 122 of the weapons were used in crimes in Mexico, according to the report.

Two of the weapons were found at the scene of the killing of Brian Terry, a border patrol agent who was shot and killed in Arizona December 14 while trying to apprehend armed men preying on illegal immigrants.

The ATF program, which angered Mexico when it came to light, allowed hundreds of weapons to be smuggled into Mexico between 2009 and 2010 as part of a plan to capture major arms traffickers.

Good idea, terrible execution.  You tag weapons for a sting and then they get smuggled into Mexico, you lose them, they end up being used to kill a Border Patrol agent.  That's reaching a Bush-era incompetence level right there and frankly I'm not sad to see Melson get shuffled off to Buffalo.  Even worse, we kinda didn't tell the Mexican government, and those weapons ended up being used in dozens of criminal acts.

Yeah, somebody's head had to roll here, no question.

Still A War Or Three Going On, Folks

Remember Afghanistan, people?  You know, that whole war for nearly a decade thing?  Just hit a new monthly record for US troop deaths in August.

Sixty-six American troops have died this month, topping July 2010 when 65 troops died, according to a CNN tally.

Almost half the August troop deaths took place on August 6 when insurgents shot down their helicopter in the eastern central province of Wardak. The Taliban claimed militants downed the helicopter with a rocket-propelled grenade.


Thirty U.S. service members - including 17 Navy SEALs - were killed in that attack, the single largest loss of life for U.S. troops since the Afghan war began in late 2001.

In contrast, 36 U.S. service members were killed in all of July. Prior to the August attack, the most U.S. troops killed in a single month this year was 47 in June.

A "surge" of 33,000 additional troops in 2009 - in response to increased insurgent attacks - led to an uptick in U.S. deaths over previous years, with 499 killed in 2010. Prior to the surge, the most U.S. troops killed in a single year was 155 in 2008, according to CNN figures.

More troops in the combat theater equals more casualties.  Whocoodanode?  You know what I'd like to see observed on September 11th this year as we approach ten years since 9/11?  Bringing our friggin troops home.  All of them.

StupidiNews!

• Gen. David Petraeus will officially take over as CIA Director on September 6th.
• Ruling that requiring a sonogram for women seeking an abortion in Texas was an undue burden on doctors, a federal judge has partially blocked the state's new abortion law.
• Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is under fire from both sides of the aisle for deportation statistics for the last two years.
• President Obama may be considering tax incentives and infrastructure projects to create 900,000 new jobs, but Republicans are expected to block any measures.
• HP is expected to make one more production run of its doomed TouchPad at the fire sale price of $99, capping the end of failed device after less than two months on the market.

Last Call

Looks like Mitt Romney's brilliant strategy of "lay low until everyone else in the GOP Clown Car self-destructs" isn't working too well in South Carolina as Governor Goodhair pulls ahead.

The fact that Perry is now dominating in South Carolina, a conservative state, is probably not news to campaign watchers. The PPP survey shows him with 36 percent of the potential vote, followed by Romney with 16 and Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN) at 13, the second poll in five days to show Perry with a big lead. But the crosstabs show that Romney, the presumed "moderate" candidate (or at least more moderate), cannot even defend his own turf in the middle of the GOP electorate in a conservative state. He faces an implacable right wing of the party, which is fully in Perry's column, and moderate sect that is willing to support Perry despite his more strident views.

OK see, here's the thing:  what Republican moderates?  Can you really consider anyone flocking to Rick Perry's banner a moderate at this point?  Can you consider a Republican in South Carolina to be a moderate at this point, even?  Let's take a look at the PPP poll a little more closely.

Only 25% of SC Republicans believe in global warming and 61% said no.  Even more staggering, only 32% believe in evolution while again a majority, 57%, say they don't believe in it.  Of the Republicans who do believe in global warming, some 51% have a favorable view of Rick Perry.  Of those who believe in evolution, 60% have a favorable view of Rick Perry.  They aren't bothered in the least by the fact Perry has publicly denied either exists.  So again I say, what moderates?

And when it comes to those voters who like the Tea Party, Perry dominates, one of many examples in the data showing he's sewing up the conservative vote in the early going. South Carolina GOP voters like the Tea Party at 71 percent clip, against only 13 percent who don't, so it's an enormous cross section of voters in the primary. Perry is viewed favorably by those who like the Tea Party (73 - 9) and spilts fairly evenly with those who don't (42 - 46), thus locking up his base. But Romney actually has higher unfavorable ratings among voters who also see the Tea Party negatively, 40 percent, than he does of those GOP voters who actually like the conservative movement, 33 percent. Perry then builds an insurmountable lead among the large sample of Tea Party supporters, of which he is the first choice of 41 percent, versus Romney's take of 27 percent of the Tea Party haters. Even among those who aren't fans of the Tea Party, Perry manages to come in second, with 16 percent.

If 71% of South Carolina Republicans like the Tea Party, they're not moderates in any way shape or form.  Rick Perry is doing well precisely because he is an anti-science, anti-choice knuckle-dragger, and that plays in the Palmetto State, period.

Anyone who expected Mitt Romney to do well in South Carolina needs their head examined.

But He Has A Blimp

Hey America?  Can we stop pretending that Ron Paul is anything other than a Republican anti-science conservative who likes pot and hates central bankers?



Yes, Ron Paul doesn't believe in evolution. Yggy:

As I’ve been saying, a lot of progressives seem to be slightly confused as to who Ron Paul is. They think he’s like that one rich uncle you have, shares a lot of your basic values but hates paying taxes and seems to take a dim view of poor people. The reality is that Paul is much closer to Pat Buchanan, a socially conservative nationalist whose idea of nationalist foreign policy is to withdraw troops from South Korea and deploy them to the Mexican border. Given what a strong force nationalism is in American life, I do wish that we had more nationalist isolationism and less nationalist enthusiasm for global contrast. But Paul’s view is that the quest to ban abortion is “the most important issue of our age,” his signature economic policy idea (“End the Fed!”) is a crank slogan that has nothing to do with free market economics, etc. Fortunately, in Paultopia there won’t be any public schools, federal funding of scientific research, etc., so it probably doesn’t matter what he believes in evolution.

And please don't get me started on Ron Paul's views on civil rights, either.  He's exactly like his son Rand in a number of respects.  Compassionless Conservatives, you can call them.  The only difference between Ron Paul and the rest of the GOP Clown Car field is that Paul has been playing the firebagger game for a far longer period of time.

Go Big Or Go Home

There are two schools of thought on what President Obama should do for his jobs program announcement next month:  One, that he should announce a major new jobs initiative to help the millions of long-term unemployed and dare the GOP to block it (and they will and nobody will receive any help at all), or two, that he should announce a smaller program though the aegis of the executive branch.  The GOP will attack the President anyway and call the measure a failure, but some people will get some help.

Eugene Robinson at the Washington Post is all about Option One here.

Obama and his advisers know very well that this is the wrong time to cut government spending. They know that using federal money to seed big new initiatives — to upgrade the nation’s crumbling infrastructure, jump-start the “clean” energy industry, retrain the unemployed so they can compete in tomorrow’s job market — would give the economy a much-needed boost. They know, too, that federal action to buoy the housing market would help revive consumer spending, thus giving corporations a reason to invest the estimated $1 trillion they’re sitting on.

Such ambitious proposals would demonstrate that the president is willing to think big — that he is not willing to accept the Republican narrative of massive retrenchment and, by implication, inevitable decline.

So Obama should go big, not small, with his jobs plan. It is hard to overstate how apprehensive most Americans are about the future. Boldness from the president may or may not get the nation’s mojo working again. Timidity surely won’t.

On one hand, Robinson has a real point.  Pushing the Overton Window to the left is long, long overdue. Reframing the argument as President Obama's decisive, strong plan to create American jobs through a major public works initiative would help combat the conservative rhetoric that all government jobs are theft bordering on immorality.   It would also draw a huge, stark contrast between the Democrats and Republicans heading into 2012.  But Republicans would kill the measure instantly, and therein lies the problem.

Republican leaders in the House of Representatives would immediately declare any such ambitious program dead on arrival. The president should welcome their opposition — and campaign vigorously against it. He can offer voters a choice between a pinched, miserly vision of the country’s prospects on the one hand and an optimistic, expansive view on the other. He needs to demand what’s right, not what the other side is willing to give.

We know Obama can be rational, realistic and eminently reasonable. Right now, he needs to be anything but. 

And here's where I disagree with Robinson.  A plan doomed from the beginning will help with the battle of rhetoric, but it will not help the tens of millions out of work right now put food on the table.  Like it or not, the President's job is to steward the country, not tilt at windmills.  In a perfect world, President Obama dropping a new Public Works Administration proposal would be the right thing to do.  But if the plan is destined to fail immediately, and for the President to spend political capital defending it, how does that help people who are out of work now and need help now in order to help their families?

But couldn't the President do both, then?  Immediately enact executive branch measures through the departments of Labor and Commerce to help the country and push for a new PWA?  That I think would be much more effective in the short and long term.  A combination of both approaches is what is needed, because if there's anything Robinson and I agree on, it's that any jobs proposal taken before Congress will be blocked by the Republicans, period, end of line.

In that respect, anything that President Obama does propose to put forth in front of Capitol Hill must be a doozy, Robinson is right on that.

We'll see what happens.

Debate Is A Good Thing

After two wars, the Arab Spring, and the death of Osama bin Laden, is it finally time to end the war on terror?

Four days before the 10-year anniversary of 9/11, a group of homeland security and terrorism experts will tackle this very question in a live Oxford-style debate in New York City. CNN National Security Analyst Peter Bergen and Homeland Security expert Juliette Kayyem will argue for the motion that "It is time to end the war on terror." Former Deputy Homeland Security Adviser Richard Falkenrath and former CIA and NSA Director Michael Hayden will argue against the motion.

I voted yes, and see that I am with the majority (at the time of writing, 82% said yes, it is time to end the war on terror).  However, I am willing to listen to what the other side has to say.  A good reason may come to light, or a laundry list of things that we should have in check before ending the war.  My reasons include lack of faith in our government (I think the Patriot Act and other actions have been allowed only because of the war on terror), realization that thanks to the diligence of our protectors we have so far been safe from many attacks, and suspicious that a catchphrase has taken over common sense.  I am glad to see debates like this give us a chance to listen and take in new information.  Regardless of which side wins, this is a major victory for people who dream of reform.  It starts here, with debates like this.

What say you?  I am curious what you all have to say about this.

The Apology Of The Year

I have a warped sense of humor, this is a fact.  But I was not the only one laughing when Andy Levy apologized to Chris Brown for their Twitter war.

Seriously, I agreed with everything he said here.  He beat the crap out of her, not just a single slap or a melodramatic arm grab.  He beat her.  Then he tried to deny it.  Then he just shut up.  Why the hell is this punk still on our radar at all?  Because he's a modestly talented ass, and we have yet to see him get his due.  He claims momentary lapse of judgement, a one-time step off the righteous path.  Bullshit.  That type of behavior doesn't leap to the surface, it simmers over time.  One semi-public incident couldn't be covered up, so he has been forced to answer for his actions.  Was Levy's response in poor taste?  You betcha.  Was Brown's sin more offensive?  No contest.  Which incidentally, is his stance on the whole beating the hell out of a 110 lb. woman.

150 Years Later, Things Haven't Changed Much

The Department of Justice would apparently like to have a word with GOP Gov. Nikki Haley about the state's new Voter ID law.

On Friday, the state Senate's Democratic caucus filed an official objection to the law with the Justice Department.

"This is just wrong," said state Sen. Gerald Malloy. "With all the problems we have in this state relating to the economy, and we end up having a partisan bill that would disenfranchise poor and primarily African-American voters -- this is not where we want our state to go."

Haley has insisted the law isn't meant to discriminate against any group and that showing a photo ID at the polls is common sense.

"If you can show a picture to buy Sudafed, if you can show a picture to get on an airplane, you should be able to show a picture to make sure that we do what is incredibly inherent in our freedoms and that is the ability to vote," Haley said.

That's a talking point that Democrats have been pushing back against in recent months.

"You wanna know something? Getting a video from Blockbuster is not a constitutional right. Getting liquor from the liquor store is not a constitutional right," Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI) said at at news conference on Capitol Hill in July.

And there's what Democrats across the country need to be responding with.  Voting is a right under the Constitution, and Voter ID laws are designed by conservatives to put barriers in front of that right for certain groups, based on time and money constraints.  The laws were passed to make voting more difficult and to reduce the number of people who have their vote count, period.

It doesn't get any simpler than that.  We should be making voting easier to accomplish, so that more people can exercise their right to vote, not less.  But Republicans do not believe that, and that's all you really need to know about the truth behind these laws.

Voting really is the most sacred duty a citizen can perform in our country, and doing so should be as painless as possible, not made more difficult in order to restrict it to the "right" people.