StupidiNews!

• A magnitude 7.1 earthquake rocked central Philippines early Tuesday, killing at least 28 and injuring dozens, with the epicenter on the island province of Bojol. 
• In Wisconsin, former GOP vice-presidential candidate Rep. Paul Ryan will face Democratic challenger Amar Kaleka, the son of the slain Sikh temple leader killed in Ryan's House district last year.
• Some of the nation's airport chiefs are tired of uncertain federal funding for improvements and are demanding a straight per-ticket fee to pay for billions in needed infrastructure repairs and expansion.
• US spending on clean energy dropped more than 40% in the third quarter as the fracking boom in the Midwest and stretched state budgets combined for less green investment in energy.
• Brazil plans to take on the NSA under order of President Dilma Rouseff as the country will introduce a national secure e-mail outlet.

Last Call For A Deal Maybe?

Looks like Harry and Mitch have banged out the terms of the GOP surrender.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) have finally hammered out what seems to be a viable deal both to fund the government and raise the nation’s debt limit, opening up the potential to end the government shutdown and pull the country back from the brink of default. 

The plan will only work if House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) agrees to take it to the House floor for a vote; there, an estimated 30-50 Republicans would surely vote against it, but it would garner enough bipartisan support to pass.

Details of the plan are still emerging, but Politico reports that it will likely include funding the government through January 15, and raising the debt limit through February 7th. It would keep in place the the automatic spending cuts known as sequestration, but would give government agencies flexibility in how they cut funding. 

January 15, 2014 is also the date when sequestration will bring more austerity to government programs in the form of an additional $21 billion in cuts. 

The deal also apparently sets up further budget negotiations (which in all likelihood would mean more cuts), to be figured out by a bipartisan group made up of both Senators and Representatives. Their proposal would need to be completed by December 13th.

So, the question then becomes "Can Orange Julius sell this in the House?" which is a very viable and unknown concern due to his near zero influence in the GOP right now, and given the fact that the Tea Party will certainly make some sort of move to oust him again if he does try to sell it.

It's still possible of course that Ted Cruz or another Republican senator or three could simply use the byzantine rules of the Senate and try to kill the deal there, too.  What Harry Reid would do in response to that is also unknown, but we're down to 48 hours and some change now left.

Running Out Of Patience

China isn't the only country sick of American governance by hostage situation. The rest of the world believes the situation we're in to be a global embarrassment (yet again) only this time around they're facing a US debt default brought on by Republican petulance, which would hurt the entire world economy.  Our neighbors want us to resolve this nonsense permanently.

Leaders at World Bank and International Monetary Fund meetings on Sunday pleaded, warned and cajoled: the United States must raise its debt ceiling and reopen its government or risk “massive disruption the world over,” as Christine Lagarde, the fund’s managing director, put it.

The fiscal problems of the United States overshadowed the official agendas for the meetings, with representatives from dozens of countries — including two of Washington’s most important economic partners, Saudi Arabia and China — publicly expressing worries about what was happening on Capitol Hill and in the White House. 

The leaders came to Washington to talk about the international recovery, Ms. Lagarde said in an interview on the NBC News program “Meet the Press.” “Then they found out that the debt ceiling was the issue,” she added. “They found out that the government had shut down and that there was no remedy in sight.” 

“So it really completely transformed the meeting in the last few days,” Ms. Lagarde said. 

And something better happen sooner rather than later, because even the chance of a US default is likely to damage the global economy.

Many leaders at the World Bank and I.M.F. meetings said they believed the impasse would be resolved before Thursday, when the government would be at severe risk of not having enough money to pay all its bills on any given day going forward. 

But they pressed Treasury Secretary Jacob J. Lew and the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke — who were both at the I.M.F. meeting — on the issue, predicting that even a near-default would lead to higher borrowing costs and a slowdown of the global economy. 

“This cannot happen, and this shall not happen,” Baudouin Prot, chairman of the French bank BNP Paribas, said at a meeting of the Institute of International Finance also being held in Washington. “The consequences of this would be absolutely disastrous.” 

Mr. Lew acknowledged the threat. “Our work begins at home,” he said. “We recognize that the United States is the anchor of the international financial system. With the deepest and most liquid financial markets, when risk rises, the flight to safety and to quality brings investors to U.S. markets. But the United States cannot take this hard-earned reputation for granted.” 

Participants at the meetings remained on edge, given the gravity of the threat. Ms. Lagarde said “that lack of certainty, that lack of trust in the U.S. signature” would disrupt the world economy. 

Wolfgang Schäuble, the German finance minister, issued his own urgent appeal. “The fiscal standoff has to be resolved without delay,” he said in a statement released by the I.M.F. 

In other words, we don't have until Thursday.  We could see damage even as early as today if it becomes clear idiot Republicans will let the country burn just to hurt President Obama.

And that should be painfully clear to all of us by now.  the entire world could pay for the Tea Party's Obama Derangement Syndrome, and they're going to come calling to collect.

No Roses, Very Little Sunshine

Just a gentle reminder, dear readers, of the global economic scenario should we reach Friday with no debt ceiling deal.

Three of the world's most powerful bankers warned of terrible consequences if the United States defaults on its debt, with Deutsche Bank chief executive Anshu Jain claiming default would be "utterly catastrophic." 

"This would be a very rapidly spreading, fatal disease," Jain said on Saturday at a conference hosted by the Institute of International Finance in Washington. 

"I have no recommendations for this audience...about putting band aids on a gaping wound," he said.

Jain, JPMorgan Chase chief executive Jamie Dimon and Baudouin Prot, chairman of BNP Paribas, said a default would have dramatic consequences on the value of U.S. debt and the dollar, and likely would plunge the world into another recession.

Wall Street is scared, people.  The Masters of the Universe are now in panic preparation mode.  If the rest of the world has decided that America is an insane ungovernable mess due to the GOP, they will take action to save themselves, and leave us holding the anvil in the middle of the deep end.

Here's my current theory:  the GOP is going to default at this point and is waiting for President Obama to use the 14th Amendment to suspend the debt ceiling on executive order, setting up what the GOP hopes is a Constitutional crisis and grounds for impeachment, or a SCOTUS slapdown of the President, or both. Suddenly you'll have Republican after Republican warning of "tyrant Obama" and things will rapidly devolve, and they may very well get violent, if not deadly.  Suddenly the GOP shutdown is no longer the issue, but a "lawless President who must be removed from office."

This is what the GOP is hoping for.  President Obama is smarter than this, and we'll see how he handles these clowns.

StupidiNews!

• With New York State lawmakers voting to pick up the tab to keep it open, the Statue of Liberty is back in business for now as the partial government shutdown heads into week three.
• A stampede by 20,000 on a bridge outside a Hindu temple in India has turned tragic as more than 90 people are confirmed dead, with dozens leaping into the water below.
• As shutdown and debt ceiling talks now move to the Senate, Republicans say demands by Democrats to increase spending above sequestration levels are unacceptable.
• Prices for country manors outside London are reaching record levels as the British elite seek "Downton Abbey" style.
• Government IT workers aren't sure exactly how long it will take to iron out glitches in the federal health care exchange web sites.

Last Call For The Stars And Bars

So the protest over the WWII Memorial at the national Mall, closed by the GOP shutdown, turned into the small crowd moving to the White House to protest.  That produced this image:



The message a Confederate flag at a White House protest where the first African-American president resides is unmistakable if you grew up even moderately familiar with the civil rights movement.

Right-wing bloggers of course believe the man in the red shirt there must be a "liberal plant".  If that's the case, why is nobody trying to stop this guy?

Think really long and hard about that as we head into this week with a debt default only about 100 hours away or so, and what kind of true, lasting damage such a default would cause to America, our economy, and our standing in the world, damage which the GOP would lay at Obama's feet after dousing the place in gasoline and throwing a lit match over their shoulder.

China Is Officially Sick Of The GOP

Right now the Chinese government looks like a Swiss watch compared to the time bomb that is our dysfunctional mess, and until we jettison the GOP, the rest of the planet is simply going to go around us.

China's official news agency has called for the creation of a "de-Americanised world", saying the destinies of people should not be left in the hands of a hypocritical nation with a dysfunctional government. 

Heaping criticism and caustic ridicule on Washington, the Xinhua news agency called the US a civilian slayer, prisoner torturer and meddler in others' affairs, and said the 'Pax Americana' was a failure on all fronts. 

The official news agency of China, which is seen as the pretender to the world's superpower crown, then rubbed in more salt, calling American economic pre-eminence just a seeming dominance. 

"As US politicians of both political parties are still shuffling back and forth between the White House and the Capitol Hill without striking a viable deal to bring normality to the body politic they brag about, it is perhaps a good time for the befuddled world to start considering building a de-Americanised world," the editorial said. 

It asks why the self-declared protector of the world is sowing mayhem in the financial markets by failing to resolve political differences over key economic policy. 

"... the cyclical stagnation in Washington for a viable bipartisan solution over a federal budget and an approval for raising debt ceiling has again left many nations' tremendous dollar assets in jeopardy and the international community highly agonised," the agency said.

After all, it's not just our economy that will be sunk if the GOP suicide bombers detonate a debt default.

According to US Treasury Department data, China is the biggest foreign owner of US Treasuries at $1.28 trillion as of July. Besides, China also holds close to $3.5 trillion of dollar-denominated assets. 

A US debt default and consequent credit downgrade would significantly erode the value of China's holdings.

So yes, China stands to lose billions, if not more, on a default situation.  The GOP plans to pull the trigger, and now China is telling us to get our act together pronto.

On To The Next Hostage Situation

You would think our "moderate" GOP friends would take the hint and stop making hostage demands after the massive beatdown this week, but Very Serious Paul Ryan simply can't help himself, and the fanatical Republican crusade to punish the people who supported this President continues.  This week it's the return of the War on Women!

Since negotiations to avert a national default on the debt have shifted from the House to the Senate, Republicans in the lower chamber are still hoping to use the talks as “leverage” to limit women’s access to contraception. 

According to the Washington Post, in a private meeting with House Republicans Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI) — who earlier this weak floated a compromise that would raise the debt ceiling in exchange for cuts to entitlement programs — railed against emerging Senate proposals and argued that the “House could not accept either a debt-limit bill or a government-funding measure that would delay the next fight until the new year”: 

According to two Republicans familiar with the exchange, Ryan argued that the House would need those deadlines as “leverage” for delaying the health-care law’s individual mandate and adding a “conscience clause” — allowing employers and insurers to opt out of birth-control coverage if they find it objectionable on moral or religious grounds — and mentioned tax and entitlement goals Ryan had focused on in a recent op-ed in the Wall Street Journal. 

Ryan’s speech appeared only to further rile up the conservative wing of the GOP conference, which has been agitating the shutdown strategy to try to tear apart the health-care law.

That's right folks, it's the return of the "conscience clause" (not to mention delaying the mandate that pays for Obamacare) and the GOP will never, ever, ever stop with the hostage taking until they are broken completely.

President Obama remains strong.

Last Call For The Young GOP Fanatics' Club

Meet the "brains" behind the GOP's disastrous shutdown/defunding plan, who, as with all Republican "strategists", will only fail upwards:  Heritage Foundation head Michael Needham.

'I really believe we are in a great position right now," says Michael Needham, the 31-year-old president of Heritage Action, the lobbying arm of the nation's largest conservative think tank. By "we" he means the Republican Party and the conservative movement; their "great position" refers to the potential to win the political battle over the government shutdown. 

Though Texas Sen. Ted Cruz is the public face of the high-risk strategy to "defund" ObamaCare, the masterminds behind it are a new generation of young conservatives, chief among them Mr. Needham. From a tactical view, the strategy has been deployed with precision. In August, only Mr. Cruz and a band of renegade tea-party Republicans in the House favored this approach, and the media collectively scoffed. But by September, House Republicans couldn't pass a budget without attaching the defunding rider that has grounded much of government. 

"We rallied the conservative grass roots across the country," Mr. Needham says, and ran ads in more than 100 districts on the health law. It worked. During the August recess, these activists demanded that their members of Congress stop ObamaCare. 

To most observers, who think the GOP is losing this fight, Mr. Needham's optimism that Republicans will carry the day may seem astonishing. But Mr. Needham says the second-guessers are wrong.

Of course he says that.  In a sense he's partially right, the GOP will most likely keep the House in 2014 because America (and our "liberal" media) will conveniently forget all this nonsense come this time next year. So many folks will happily vote for the same Congresscritter who hung them out to dry in 2013, or at least 50% plus one will.

These young guns are convinced they can succeed where their elders failed simply by being willing to destroy the country in order to "win".

Mr. Needham thinks, by the way, that the stalemate may drag on well beyond Oct. 17, the day the U.S. Treasury may reach the federal borrowing limit. He has little problem with the latest strategy to pass a temporary debt-ceiling extension, viewing the debt-default debate as a distraction from the battle over the future of ObamaCare funding. 

President Obama is the one in an "untenable position," Mr. Needham says. It is "totally unfair to say, 'We're going to give a delay of the employer mandate, but we will not give that same delay to the individual mandate, and we're going to exempt members of Congress.' A united conservative party making the case, day in and day out, about the fundamental unfairness of the way the president is implementing this law is a winning argument," he says. And it "inspires people and gets them on our side."

So yes, the tactical genius here believes that by destroying America's credit, jacking up interest rates and costing the country possibly millions of jobs that it will "inspire people and get them on his side."  And yet, he'll continue to give the GOP advice, and the "moderate" GOP will listen to and go along with every word of it, just like they are now.

The Conserva-Schism Is Not The "End Of The GOP"

I'm with Steve M. on this one:  the only people who believe that this shutdown debacle is the "end of the GOP" and the beginning of a libertarian-ish third party in this country are libertarians who don't seem to understand that the volcanic rancor various factions of the GOP have for a black Democrat in the White House (or any Democrat, but especially that one) will always exceed their own differences.  They are forever united by hatred, and always will be, as Steve points out:

Trust me, these folks are going to work this out. First of all, crazy-base disappointment with the GOP is not exactly new. Crazy-base voters thought John McCain was a pathetic RINO. Did they bolt for a third party? No. They felt the same way in 2012 about Mitt Romney. Did they bolt then? No. They never bolt, because they hate liberals, Democrats, and the Democratic voter base as they perceive it (i.e., non-white moochers) far more than they hate one another.

And they've been disappointed for years anyway -- abortion is still legal, government is still (in their eyes) big and socialist, America is still (in their eyes) perpetually under assault by gays, Christian-bashers, gun-grabbers, etc., etc.

And unlike Democrats in 2010, the notion of Republicans sitting at home in fits of pique while the other party gets elected will motivate the GOP to go to the polls in 2014, mainly because of that "united by hatred" thing.  The only question is whether or not there will be enough Democrats who turn out to counter them.  That's really the only question in voting politics these days.  When Democrats show up, they win.  When they don't, America hands the keys back to the drunk drivers in the GOP.

Look at the last 20 years.  The 95-96 shutdown cost Newt Gingrich his speakership and then impeached Clinton over a blowjob, but the GOP held on to the House for another decade and got the White House back four years later.  Show me the part where the shutdown back then was a loss for the GOP, because when the smoke cleared from the 2000 elections, America had given them total control of the country, and then they brought around two ridiculous wars and a financial catastrophe, and ten years after Bush was appointed POTUS by the Supremes, we sat on our asses and gave the GOP not only the House but a majority of state governments to boot.

Where's the point where the GOP is "losing" here?  Suddenly, NOW is the end of the GOP?

Now if we throw the GOP out of the House in 2014, that will be the start of something, but will we do that given all this horrific history of GOP "rule"?

Since we keep putting ourselves back into this situation, I'm going to say "probably not."

StupidiNews, Weekend Edition!

• Hundreds of thousands have been evacuated from coastal areas of Andhra Pradesh and Odisha states in India ahead of today's expected landfall of massive Tropical Cyclone Phailin.
• Missouri Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon has suspended execution by lethal injection in the state due to the German manufacturer of the drug refusing to release it for that purpose.
• More and more Syrian rebel groups are leaving the US-backed Free Syrian Army, putting the ability of a moderate group to counter hard-line Islamist rebels at risk.
• House Republicans are gathering today for a meeting to hammer out terms of a deal to re-open the government and raise the debt ceiling, but it will be a tough sell to Tea Party faithful.
• After losing multiple battles in lower courts, TV networks are going to the US Supreme Court in order to block online startup Aereo from broadcasting their shows over the internet.

Last Call For Getting The Shaftan

Just in case anyone still thought Republican Steve Lonegan had any realistic shot at upsetting Democrat and Newark Mayor Cory Booker for New Jersey Senate next week, the answer to that question is "Lonegan just fired his senior staffer over a massive gaffe".

Republican New Jersey Senate candidate Steve Lonegan said Friday he planned to fire his senior staffer Rick Shaftan after Shaftan made several several profanity-filled remarks about Lonegan's opponent, Newark, N.J. Mayor Cory Booker, earlier in the week.

"Mr. Shaftan's comments are not reflective of my views or that of my campaign," Lonegan said in a statement through his campaign spokesman. "His comments are distasteful and offensive, and his contract as a vendor for my campaign will be terminated immediately."

Shaftan gave an interview to TPM on Thursday in which he described Twitter messages Booker sent to an Oregon stripper as "weird" and "like what a gay guy would say." A spokeswoman for Booker's campaign described Shaftan's remarks as "disgraceful and demeaning."

Republicans can't run away from the Pretty Hate Machine they've constructed, and America is sick of it. The federal shutdown is going to hand Cory Booker a huge win (Terry McAuliffe too in VA for Gov) and the goal now is to remind everyone that this is the GOP and will be until the Tea Party is expunged.

The Punishers Continue

Meanwhile, the Indiana GOP's response to "Obamacare is raising health insurance premiums on working-class families!" is apparently "We're suing the feds to stop health insurance premium subsidies for working class families!"

This week, Indiana Attorney General Greg Zoeller filed a lawsuit against the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) challenging its authority to fund Obamacare’s insurance subsidies for individuals and enacting penalties against public employers (such as state and local governments) that don’t meet the health law’s minimum worker coverage requirement. If successful, the challenge would prevent Americans from receiving the government assistance that makes Obamacare’s insurance marketplace plans affordable in the first place. 

Zoeller claims that the health law doesn’t permit people living in the 36 states that have refused to set up their own Obamacare marketplaces — including Indiana — to qualify for federal insurance subsidies. He also says that local government employers which don’t meet Obamacare’s requirements cannot be penalized under the law to help fund those subsidies.

Yes, let's ignore the Supreme Court and keep suing until they give us the outcome we want.  Never mind the practical upshot of the suit is to make health insurance unaffordable for people.

The argument is based on a technical ambiguity in the law that state-level GOP officials and congressional Republicans have previously seized on in an attempt to undermine the ACA’s consumer assistance. The IRS has issued regulations saying that the law permits and intends the agency to extend subsidies to Americans in all 50 states. 

“The fact that many citizens lack health insurance is an issue for policymakers, and my office takes no position regarding the congressional debate over funding the ACA. I never complain when private plaintiffs file lawsuits to challenge the state authority that my office defends; but now our role is reversed and Indiana has initiated this lawsuit asking the court whether the IRS has exceeded its federal taxing authority over state governments,” said Zoeller in a statement. “This respectful challenge is an appropriate role for the Office of the Attorney General to vigorously assert the ability of the State and its political subdivisions to manage their workforces in our American system of federalism.”

And yet Indiana takes federal money for all sorts of federal services.  This one is somehow illegal, despite the IRS and SCOTUS ruling on it, because, well nobody seems to have a good argument, but we're more than happy to waste taxpayer money suing over the bad ones.

But that's today's GOP for you.

Never Give Up, Never Surrender...OK We Surrender!

Given Thursday's abysmal NBC/WSJ poll for the Republicans, it now looks like surrender is in the cards for the Crazy Caucus.

President Barack Obama and House Republicans clashed in a meeting Thursday afternoon over how soon the government can be reopened, even as the GOP offered to lift the debt limit for six weeks, according to sources familiar with the session. 

House Republicans told Obama at the White House that they could reopen the federal government by early next week if the president and Senate Democrats agree to their debt-ceiling proposal. A GOP aide said they would seek some additional concessions if they advance a government funding bill next week.

As I said last night, now we dictate the terms of the GOP surrender, what it will include, what face-saving measures will be used, etc, but Obama's just won this fight.

Having said that, I dealt some cold reality on Twitter last night:

Reminder: GOP lost the 95/96 shutdown too. Then promptly kept the House for another decade and voters gave them back the keys in 2010.
— Zandar (@ZandarVTS) October 10, 2013

Something to keep in mind.

StupidiNews!

• This year's Nobel Peace Prize has been awarded to the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, the watchdog group overseeing the destruction of Syria's stockpile.
• Astronaut Scott Carpenter, one of the original Mercury seven and the second American to orbit the Earth after John Glenn, has passed at the age of 88.
• The US Supreme Court will hear oral arguments Tuesday involving Michigan's ballot measure to ban the use of race as a factor in college admissions.
• The possible breakup of Blackberry is closer to reality as the deal for a Canadian venture capital firm to buy the ailing smartphone maker may not come to pass.
• The multi-billion dollar Grand Theft Auto V is expected to get a PC release next spring as over half a million have signed a petition asking to bring the console game to computers.