Dinah Lord

Colorado: Obamacare meet and greet in Brighton

Local Rep Ed Perlmutter, D - CO had a grocery store gabfest in Brighton today.  It was held at the local King Soopers and the format was highly structured and restricted to constituents only.   After seeing Ed Perlmutter on the video, I DO wonder if he read the bill.  From the article accompanying the video:  

"This was never set up to be a town hall, we're at a private business and King Soopers has been nice enough to accommodate us," said Perlmutter.

Many carried signs outside the Brighton grocery story, and as the weather got hotter, so did the debate among opposing sides in the crowd.

"Hey, hey, ho-ho, the status quo has got to go," chanted supporters of healthcare reform.

The opposition followed with, "Obama's got to go!"

Brighton Police and King Soopers security kept a close eye on the crowd, but despite their efforts, one King Soopers customer reported being accidentally knocked down by the crowd outside the store.

Perlmutter got a bull horn and asked the crowd for their cooperation, and the event continued without incident, however businesses in the area complained the crowd kept regular customers away for much of the afternoon.

Channel 7 ABC's report pretty much toes the Democratic party line and can be found here.  CBS Channel 4 video reveals that Mr. Perlmutter is still "plowing through the details" of the bill but has learned his talking points quite well.

His next meeting will be a 'telephonic town hall'.    (Another Democratic chicken shi&)

Denver: Nancy Pelosi's Astroturfers revealed

I just discovered that fellow Coloradan, El Marco over at Looking at the Left, has put up a fantastic photo essay on the Pelosi scrum in Denver this week.  Not only are there some great photos (way better than Dinah's) there is also a thorough expose of the techniques used by the left to gin up  'support' for the hideous Obamacare.  Can you say "Quien sabe?"

What we were up against...
Photo from El Marco - muchas gracias.

Please do yourself a favor and check it out.  I think you'll find it to be very enlightening.

Related:  La Pelosi comes to town and a moonbat attacks.
                   Dinah didn't go down without a fight.

More liberals behaving badly - this time it's HR David Cook D-GA

Disgraceful.  So this is what passes for public service today.  In this meeting with constituents, David Cook chastises them, his responses dripping with condescension.  He's downright rude and goes so far as to accuse the audience members of 'lacking decency' for having the temerity to ask a health care question when the floor was opened up to questions.   What an arrogant little SOB.   He even infers that the questioner is not one of his constituents (he is) and attempts to belittle him. 

Thanks to the folks at Hot Air for bringing his atrocious conduct to light.  (there's more raw video of the incident at the link) 

I pray it will result in a career change in Mr Cook's not too distant future.  Like 2010.

UK: Government's £285m Mortgage Rescue Scheme helps just TWO families

The program's been up and running since January.  Two families.

The Obama admin's plan isn't working so well, either.

FNMA: I threw up a little bit in my mouth when I read this...

I haven't been doing much on the financial front because I have been so freaked out by the thought of having a real job again.  But, I read this from Bloomberg  and just had to share.  (tip of the sick bag to FReeper Lorianne.)

Give money away. That was a solution to the housing crisis mortgage giant Fannie Mae hit on last year.

Faced with growing numbers of homeowners unable to make mortgage payments, Fannie decided to fund loans to borrowers that were instant losers.

The point was to buy time. Even though those loans resulted in a $453 million loss, they helped keep troubled homeowners from defaulting. That meant Fannie for now didn’t have to make good on loan guarantees that may have cost it as much as $2.4 billion.

The big game of kick the can strikes at a deep-seated fear among many investors -- that banks and others faced with mounting housing losses are finding all manner of dubious ways to push a day of reckoning into the future.

If that’s the case, any improvement in the housing outlook might be a mirage obscuring even greater pressures building in the financial system. That would eventually counter better-than- expected first-quarter results from many banks.

'The ditch carp of democracy'

PJ O'Rourke preaches to my choir.

America has wound up with a charming leftist as a president. And this scares me. This scares me not because I hate leftists. I don't. I have many charming leftist friends. They're lovely people - as long as they keep their nose out of things they don't understand. Such as making a living.

When charming leftists stick their nose into things they don't understand they become ratchet-jawed purveyors of monkey-doodle and baked wind. They are piddlers upon merit, beggars at the door of accomplishment, thieves of livelihood, envy coddling tax lice applauding themselves for giving away other people's money. They are the lap dogs of the poly sci-class, returning to the vomit of collectivism. They are pig herders tending that sow-who-eats-her-young, the welfare state. They are muck-dwelling bottom-feeders growing fat on the worries and disappointments of the electorate. They are the ditch carp of democracy.

And that's what one of their friends says.

Read it all.

Bidness Briefs...

Happy days are here again?  The stock market is acting like it with the Wells Fargo first quarter results, but I wouldn't pop the cork on the champagne yet, my bullish possums.  One quarter does not a trend make.   Is all really well with Wells?  "Wells' announcement, came on a day of thin trading in New York. Crucial details -- including revenue mix and non-performing asset trends -- are still almost two weeks away."

Looks like the government has attached another string to that TARP money.  Now the government is saying that all TARP recipients MUST participate in the HUD loan modification program.  You vill obey and you vill write crap loans ven ve tell you to!  Gee, then why is the program performing so miserably?  Does this sound that impressive to you?:  "Lenders began delivering refinanced loans under that program to Freddie Mac on April 1, and within 48 hours, 20 lenders had submitted applications. Fannie Mae received "several thousand" applications on Monday when its computer systems were updated for the program.  ...  And it is taking even longer for some lenders to launch the foreclosure-prevention part of Obama's housing program...

The Obama administration has been crowing about this all day and NPR makes it sound like the greatest thing since sliced bread:  A big order for Detroit:  US to buy 17,600 autos.  Yahoo's title - not so much irrational exuberance: Government to buy 17,600 US cars by June 1: Obama  What do you think? Car companies sold 13.2 million new vehicles in the U.S. in 2008.  Personally, I don't think "the largest one-time purchase of hybrid vehicles for the government fleet in history" is going to do all that much.

Heh.  Harry Reid blows a gasket on the Senate floor and proves he has no shame when the Members voted 51-48 to cut permanently the death tax rate to 35% and exempt all estates of less than $10 million per couple ($5 million for a single taxpayer) from any tax. (President Obama wanted a 45% rate with only a $7 million exemption.)

Creeping bailouts, cont'd.  The next wave:  Look for TALF to be amended to include Commercial Real Estate.  What will be changed and why?  TALF will begin offering 5 year loans in addition to the 3 year loans currently offered.  The "longer-term debt is critical to saving the commercial real-estate business, which faces a record amount of debt coming due in the next three years. Industry observers are expecting the delinquency rate to double by the end of this year and go higher next year. Problems could be magnified if the credit drought continues and owners of even healthy properties are unable to refinance."

Joltin' Joe Biden has been busy playing 'Stimulus Czar' with today's announcement of $2.3 Billion in Child Care Stimulus ($300 million of that will go to pay for vaccines for the 'less fortunate' otherwise Joe would have been wearing his Middle Class Czar hat, I guess.) 

Well, Obama may be meeting tomorrow with key financial regulators to discuss the banking stress tests, "Obama will talk with Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke and Federal Deposit Insurance Corp Chairman Sheila Bair, as well as top White House economic adviser Larry Summers, on a "broad" range of financial topics, said spokesman Robert Gibbs."  The fact remains they have delayed the announcement to avoid disrupting the market.  Look for leaks to start filtering out soon.

Going green just keeps costing us green.  The increased use of ethanol could cost the government up to $900 million for food stamps and child nutrition programs, according to a congressional report by the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office.

Bidness Briefs...

Just a few things to remark upon...

You didn't hear much about the government extending the deadline for firms that want to apply for a position in PPIP did you?  Well, extend it they did  - gee, it looks like they're having trouble getting people to sign up. (You heard it here first that firms weren't exactly lining up to join the fun?  You sure did, possums.  And that was way back BEFORE Wall Street banks and the last broker-dealer left standing became Public Enemy #1 to the Obama admin AND Obama axed GM's CEO, Rick Wagoner.)

Another delay?  Treasury to delay stress test results - why?  They want to avoid 'complicating the stock market's reaction' and 'avoid setting off a panic'.

And you knew this one was coming:  Insurance Bailouts are next in line to drain the TARP fund.  (To discuss these bailouts in more depth at this time would harsh my mellow.)

Hey - look who else wants to jump on the bandwagon?  Should public pensions go toxic to sell off their crap in Timmy's PPIP fund?

Somebody must have woken Moody's up.  Because they had to have been in a coma or something during the run up to this global financial meltdown and were unconscious the whole time. That is the only reasonable excuse for their behavior. Talk about asleep at the switch! Well, believe it or not they are now offering up a negative outlook for the public sector and downgrading the entire US local government sector.

I love the way the author of this piece entitled Light TALF Participation For April says "Only $1.7 billion in TALF loans was used in the second round of financing yesterday."  Only $1.7 billion, sir?  That's still serious money in my book. 

According to Fitch's (another sleepyhead rating agency) Ford still has a liquidity problem - even after their recent move to improve the condition of their balance sheet with $9.9 billion repurchase of debt and issuance of equity.

Chrysler is having the same sort of liquidity problem and is engaged in a stare down with the banks.  If they can't negotiate their debt down and get further concessions from the UAW the Fiat deal is DOA and if that deal is DOA - so is Chrysler.

Oh and about the actual cost to the taxpayer of all these voodoo bailouts? They are already starting to creep upward.  Surprised?  Me neither.

Remember when we all thought this lady was the crazy one?

Hah! Who da fool now?

Help for Homeowners.

Ford, GM to make your car payments.

G-20: Looks like that Messiah syndrome is contagious

Gordon Brown seems to have come down with a touch of it as he calls for society and economy to be rebuilt around "THEMBA" the Zulu word for HOPE and wait for it - says that 'market forces should be replaced by those of the 'heart' because it was now clear they could 'become the enemy of the good society'.

Give me air.

Gordo goes all Messiah on us.  -->

From the Daily Mail: 

Gordon Brown has made an overtly religious call for a new world order based on the 'deep moral sense' shared by all faiths.

Making the first speech by a serving Prime Minister at St Paul's Cathedral in London, he quoted scripture as he urged people to unite to forge a new 'global society'.

The Prime Minister argued that through all faiths, traditions and heritages runs a 'single powerful modern sense demanding responsibility from all and fairness to all'.

He quoted the Christian doctrine of 'do to others what you would have them do unto you' and highlighted similar principles in Judaism, Islam, Hinduism and Sikhism.

'They each and all reflect a sense that we share the pain of others, and a sense that we believe in something bigger than ourselves - that we cannot be truly content while others face despair, cannot be completely at ease while others live in fear, cannot be satisfied while others are in sorrow,' he said.

'We all feel, regardless of the source of our philosophy, the same deep moral sense that each of us is our brother and sisters' keeper . . . we cannot and will not pass by on the other side when people are suffering and when we have it within our power to help.'

He went on to suggest the world economy and society should be rebuilt around a Zulu word for hope - themba - which is also an acronym for 'there must be an alternative'.

There's more at the link if you can stomach it.