Emergent Conspiracy

[Welcome Confluence readers! -- Lambert]

Sorry folks, there is no activism today. I'm still processing my feelings about the shocking developments of last Sunday evening.

What I've ultimately settled upon, after my initial excitement has faded, is a feeling of despair. Read below the fold...

(Author's Note: In December I posted a piece on Moody's threat to downgrade the US's Rating in International Bond markets. I argued that Moody's action was foolish. Today, Standard and Poor's actually revised the US ratings outlook from stable to negative, but continued its sovereign credit rating at ‘AAA/A-1+’. Read below the fold...

I seem to recall that someone, late last month, posted an entry arguing that it is immoral for Democrats not to run a primary challenge against Barry Obama in 2012, in light of the things he's done to institutionalize Bush-Cheney crimes. (Glenn Greenwald chronicled the latest violation of the Constitution by Obama on his own blog, which you can read here). Read below the fold...

Know anything about this: Read below the fold...

Read below the fold...

From comments at a story at Naked Capitalism on the most recent legal breakthrough in the battle against foreclosure fraud:

The SEC Acts of 1933-34 specifically deal with conspiracy to commit securities fraud. Salaries of SEC employees are trivial with respect to the amounts of money involved by conspirators. Small wonder that the SEC looks the other way to the extent it does.

If you look at the banking/economic history of the last 30 years as an insurgency, there are striking similarities:

1. cell-networks that maintain secrecy => individual frauds linked by key individuals (Lewis Raineri, Robert Rubin, Madoff?)

Read below the fold...

A little more than a week ago, I proposed a Fiscal Sustainability Teach-In and Counter-Conference to be held in Washington, DC as a response to the First Meeting of the Administration's National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform, sardonically called by some the “steal Read below the fold...

The Huffington Post published a long, long, LONG expose of the ins and outs of Democratic Party politics last week. It's been on my mind ever since I read it, since it clarified a lot of things for me.

For example, why don't the "progressives" in the Congressional Progressive Caucus seem to ever get anything progressive accomplished? Like, oh for example, the Public Option, into which the LINO (Left In Name Only) blogosphere poured its entire heart and soul?

Well, first, let's talk about their fellow combatants in the so-called "struggle for the soul of the Democratic Party," the Blue Dogs and New Democrats. Read below the fold...

Now that the health insurance bill has become law, everybody and his brother is coming out of the woodwork to tell us that it is the Heritage Foundation plan developed to counter Hillarycare. Read below the fold...

I'm sure everyone's read by now that James O' Keefe, creator of the infamous fake "Pimp and Ho" ACORN videos, was arrested today for allegedly attempting to wiretap Mary Landrieu's office. And I certainly appreciate the irony here, having been repeatedly brushed off when I called up Landrieu's office and voiced my opposition to the telecom immunity bill. Read below the fold...

Since I've already posted about a fairly tangible resistance method and a tactic that's a bit controversial, I thought I'd go more in the direction of something that bloggers could buy into pretty easily.  First, a reminder:

Activism, by definition, cannot be done online.  At best you can be an online advocate.

Read below the fold...

A money market account is a savings account that tries to offer a low rate of return in exchange for relative safety.

Zero Hedge:

[A] typical investor in a money market seeks minute investment risk, no volatility, and instantaneous liquidity, or redeemability. These are the three pillars upon which the entire $3.3 trillion money market industry is based.

Read below the fold...

Apparently, his hair got sick and he needs to take it to a good veterinary hospital.

ABC. Read below the fold...

NY Times:

The Obama administration’s $75 billion program to protect homeowners from foreclosure has been widely pronounced a disappointment, and some economists and real estate experts now contend it has done more harm than good.

[…]As a result, desperate homeowners have sent payments to banks in often-futile efforts to keep their homes, which some see as wasting dollars they could have saved in preparation for moving to cheaper rental residences. Some borrowers have seen their credit tarnished while falsely assuming that loan modifications involved no negative reports to credit agencies.

Read below the fold...

Group lobbies for single-payer health care in Pa.

On Dec. 9, Lani Frank, a board member of Health Care for All Pennsylvania, made a presentation to supervisors in East Whiteland. She has been urging municipal officials throughout Chester County to send a resolution to Harrisburg supporting the bills.

East Whiteland's supervisors said they were not ready to endorse the legislation but would support another initiative of Health Care for All Pennsylvania: an economic impact study of the program.

Read below the fold...