I think Obama may be looking for a stimulus and jobs deal with Congress in the wrong places. While parts of the jobs bill may be passed, time is being lost and the continuing acrimony is making the economy weaker. The Tea Party is attempting to bring down both Obama and establishment Republicans with a no compromise strategy aimed at killing confidence and destroying the rest of an already weak economy. Obama's strategy to either get cooperation from Congress or run against a "do nothing" Congress may work, but it is not the best strategy.

The essence of the economic crisis is a banking crisis. The essence of the banking crisis is housing and mortgage finance. The answer to the economic crisis is to fix housing--both in terms of working through excess inventory and foreclosures, and to allow a broad spectrum of homeowners to refinance their current mortgages to lower rates. Geithner's policies have done little to address housing. Hamp and Harp have been ineffective because of bank resistance and self defeating regulations.

POLICE POSING OVER PABLO ESCOBAR'S BODY

These third world countries just piss me off as far as how they treat their workers!

Some workers at Amazon.com’s Allentown, Pennsylvania warehouse are reportedly willing to contend with working at a brutal pace in dizzying heat so long as it means having a job.

Only one out of 20 Allentown-based current or former Amazon employees interviewed by The Morning Call reported that the online retailer was a good place to work. During summer heat waves Amazon had paramedics on standby to treat any employees who couldn’t stand the heat, the paper reported. But many workers pushed through difficult working conditions after seeing what happened to other employees who didn’t meet expectations — they were fired and escorted out of the warehouse.

Some employees worked 11-hour days during the holiday season and others were forced to maintain their productivity levels, even during the summer heat, The Morning Call reported. That might be what it takes to get the giant boost in sales Amazon saw last year.

Normally I only watch CNBC with the sound turned off but this morning I forgot to turn the volume down and Nelson was being interviewed. I say "Nelson" because the little capitalists were "stroking" Nelson shamelessly, he warmly responded to their cues and as I do with T.V. characters like "Dexter" and "Roger Sterling" I began to think of "Nelson" as a friend. I felt so much at one with Nelson and his worship of capitalism that I overcooked my oatmeal and then spilled my skim milk.

About breakfast--Nelson is a noted investor in "food" and runs the Trian Fund. He has doubled and trebled his wealth by investing variously in Wendy's, Arby's, Snapple, Cadbury, and most notably in this morning's money-orgy discussion, the Kraft foods company. I must admit I felt a momentary lapse in my adoration for Nelson because all the food "brands" I just mentioned I wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole, and count part of my longevity to having avoided consuming such "brands". (Of course, that's just my opinion and not the opinion of the management of this site.)

There is the basic concept of human scale which asserts humans interact with their social and physical environments based on their dimensions, capabilities and limits. We generally encounter the concept in architecture and city planning.  But it is just as important in the political and social realm. 

The past few weeks said much about who we are, what kind of people we are and how we see our country and our mission.  It included, of course, the need to have our attention brought back to the day when we were attacked as a people and as a nation, and all of that caused many to both weep for what we lost that day, and for the mistakes and waste that followed.

These weeks also have encompassed, maybe illustrated better than ever, the vastly different views that many of us hold, from those of a large number of our fellow citizens.  In short order we have seen audiences applaud one presidential candidate for the large number of executions his state has undertaken since he became its Governor, and another suggest that a person without medical insurance who suddenly is in a coma, be allowed to die as a consequence.

We are told that liberals want a "mommy state" and that the government that does the least is the best government there can be.  We are all on our own.  Regulations should be curtailed.  If you want to eat food, you just have to be careful and take your chances.  If it is true that this view can elect a president and a Congress, then we are no longer the United States of America.  We are just random individuals sharing space. 

It is hard to believe we have sunk so low.

Journalism is reduced down to the story of a Binder paper clip instead of scrutinizing the information in the papers it is holding.

Shortly before Obama's jobs speech I posted that it should include a Mortgage Refinancing program. What actually happened was a 15 second reference in the speech to working with the FHFA to facilitate more refinancing. The next day a CBO report, a generic study of refinance obviously on-going before O's speech, underwhelmed the entire idea of Refinance, particularly in scope and possible stimulative effect. Others stated in the Senate Housing Subcommittee hearing two days ago that the CBO's "take-up" estimates of 2.9 million borrowers were far too conservative.

The fact is that the existing stakeholders in the mortgage mess constitute a circular firing squad, each entity trying to maximize its own agenda against the interests of others. Until a consensus is formed which balances all of the interests, including tax payers and borrowers, any movement in mortgage refinance is going to be limited. Leadership from Obama is essential, but so also is action from Congress. Here are some of the stakeholders, their positions and some other facts.  

I'm afraid Dave

There is something in human history like retribution; and it is a rule of historical retribution that its instrument be forged not by the offended, but by the offender himself. The first blow dealt to the French monarchy proceeded from the nobility, not from the peasants. The Indian revolt does not commence with the ryots, tortured, dishonoured and stripped naked by the British, but with the sepoys, clad, fed and petted, fatted and pampered by them. Karl Marx