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Occasionally the Washington Post does some real reporting. Yesterday Zachery Goldfarb did an analysis of the aggregate profits over the past three years for the major banks and financial institutions as compared to the eight years of the Bush administration. The finding: these firms have accumulated more profit in the three years of the Obama administration than they did in the two terms of George W. Bush. In an interview with Mr. Goldfarb on NPR when asked what kind of companies and how this happened, replied: We're talking about banks, the big ones you've heard of, Citigroup, Bank of America....

As California solar panel maker Solyndra teetered on the brink of financial collapse, Obama administration officials weighed and rejected a last-ditch plan to keep the ccompany afloat. Under the August plan, which was outlined in nearly 1,200 pages of documents the Obama administration released Wednesday evening, private investors would have put about $100 million into Solyndra, the company that received a $535 million loan guarantee in 2009. Meanwhile, the Energy Department would have agreed to convert some of Solyndra’s debt to the federal government into a partial stake in the company. The agreement would have also authorized the Energy Department...

Freedom Radio, November 2, 2011 Wednesday morning at 10 AM EST has the distinct honor and pleasure to welcome Colonel Frank Ryan, USMC, retired. Col. Ryan has more military, business and professional experience than any or all of the current Presidential candidates. Col Ryan is a retired Marine and CPA who served on General Tommy Franks staff in Iraq, as an expert in economic warfare. When forming his staff, Gen. Franks said, "Get me Ryan". His decades of public service have not ended with his retirement from the military. For nearly twenty years, Frank Ryan has been president of the...

Italian deputies exchanged blows in parliament on Wednesday as tensions over a tough economic reform program came to a head. At least two deputies from the Northern League, a member of the ruling center-right coalition, fought with members from the opposition FLI party of speaker Gianfranco Fini. Two deputies grabbed each other by the throat as other parliamentarians rushed to separate them.

Another Sentelli hammer-nail rant of truth .. Rick Santelli Highest Wage Earners in DC, What Does That Tell US?

Some fascinating survey data from Democratic pollster Douglas Schoen: On Oct. 10 and 11, Arielle Alter Confino, a senior researcher at my polling firm, interviewed nearly 200 protesters in New York's Zuccotti Park. Our findings probably represent the first systematic random sample of Occupy Wall Street opinion. Our research shows clearly that the movement doesn't represent unemployed America and is not ideologically diverse. Rather, it comprises an unrepresentative segment of the electorate that believes in radical redistribution of wealth, civil disobedience and, in some instances, violence. Half (52%) have participated in a political movement before, virtually all (98%) say they...

Rick Perry's campaign is pointing to Mitt Romney's defense of the Wall St. bailouts as the latest sign that he's President Obama's Republican twin. "This is just one more example about how Mitt Romney has more in common with Obama and the Democrats than with the Republicans," the Texas governor's spokeswoman Catherine Frazier told the Daily News. Romney defended parts of the bank bailout program during the Republican presidential debate on Tuesday, arguing it was necessary to "keep the entire currency of the country worth something." The former Massachusetts governor added, "We could have had a complete meltdown of our...

When a man like Steve Keen says the trillions spent on refinancing the banks has truly stuffed us, we really should listen I stumbled out into the autumn sunshine, figures ricocheting around my head, still trying to absorb what I had heard. I felt as if I had just attended a funeral: a funeral at which all of us got buried. I cannot claim to have understood everything in the lecture: Sonnenschein-Mantel-Debreu theory and the 41-line differential equation were approximately 15.8 metres over my head. But the points I grasped were clear enough. We're stuffed: stuffed to a degree that...

Here in the U.S. we have an SEC rule... Rule 10b-5 -- Employment of Manipulative and Deceptive Devices "It shall be unlawful for any person, directly or indirectly, by the use of any means or instrumentality of interstate commerce, or of the mails or of any facility of any national securities exchange, 1. To employ any device, scheme, or artifice to defraud, 2. To make any untrue statement of a material fact or to omit to state a material fact necessary in order to make the statements made, in the light of the circumstances under which they were made, not...

The desperate search for an acceptable Republican Party presidential candidate continues. Republican leaders apparently are pushing New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who previously said no, to jump into the race. The GOP's frustration is palpable. Mitt Romney has been running for four years but generates little enthusiasm. Rick Perry was an instant front-runner before losing much of his support after unimpressive debate performances. Michelle Bachmann briefly streaked across the political firmament but now barely registers in the polls. Newt Gingrich committed political seppuku shortly after announcing his candidacy. Ron Paul's support is fervent but limited. However, the real Republican problem...

ATHENS, Greece (AP) -- Angry and frustrated, Greek civil servants walked off the job Wednesday, paralyzing the government and public transport to protest ever-deeper austerity measures and seemingly ineffectual financial policies. As Greece struggles to avoid a catastrophic default, demonstrators in Athens expressed outrage over their misfortune and bewilderment at a crisis that shows no signs of easing. "Nobody knows what's going on. Every day they say something different. It's all so unclear," said Irini Sypsomou-Arapogianni, a 57-year-old Finance Ministry employee. "I don't know where all this will lead."

Deputy Education Minister Evi Christofilopoulou suggested that police might be mobilized to break up hundreds of sit-ins at schools on Monday a few hours after hundreds of pupils protesting cutbacks clashed with riot officers in central Athens ----------------------------------------------------Christofilopoulou added that a controversial scheme, finalized by the government on Monday, to put 30,000 civil servants on labor standby status, which would see them receiving a heavily docked wage for 12 months before early retirement or dismissal, would also apply to schoolteachers. Unionists accused the ministry of “artificially inflating teacher numbers.”

Bank of America Corp plans to charge customers who use their debit cards to make purchases a $5 monthly fee beginning early next year, joining other banks scrambling for new sources of revenue. U.S. banks have been looking for ways to increase revenue as regulations introduced since the financial crisis limited the use of overdraft and other fees.

GOP House Oversight and Government Reform chair Rep. Darryl Issa has questions for Ford CEO Alan Mulally about the White House Ford fiasco. In a new letter Mulally received today, Rep. Issa requests more information and notes that he is “deeply concerned about undue political pressure exerted by the White House on public companies. Issa asks Mulally the same question I asked White House press flack Dan Pfeiffer yesterday (and which Pfeiffer refused to answer): Did any White House officials — or any other current or former administration officials — contact any Ford officials/employees to discuss the anti-bailout ad? He...

What was designed as a “man-on-the-street” style commercial for Ford Motor Co. turned into a potent political statement when F-150 owner Chris McDaniel, asked about the importance of buying American, explained why Ford was the company for him: “I wasn’t going to buy another car that was bailed out by our government,” McDaniel explained. “I was going to buy from a manufacturer that’s standing on their own, win, lose or draw.” The TV spot was so popular, the video went viral on YouTube. But it was not until the ad was pulled off the air that people really started talking...

DEARBORN, Mich. -- Ford's turnaround over the last five years has resulted in big profits and won its CEO a reputation for brilliant management. But those same achievements are stirring resentment among many of its factory workers. And that is complicating contract talks between the company and its union employees. GM and Chrysler needed government bailouts and bankruptcy protection to stay in business, but Ford took billions in private loans and endured on its own. As a result, Ford became a consumer favorite and the company prospered. It paid Mulally for engineering the turnaround and restored merit pay and some...

Ford Motor Company has shelved a television commercial indirectly criticizing its competitors for accepting government bailouts to avoid bankruptcy in the wake of media criticism and, reportedly, a call from the White House. The ad, first uploaded to YouTube months ago, was part of a series featuring real-life customers who were thrust into press conferences where actor/reporters asked them to explain their decisions to buy a Ford. "I wasn't going to buy another car that was bailed out by our government," the customer, Chris, said in the ad. "I was going to buy from a manufacturer that's standing on their...

Is this just a business seeing a competitive edge against two of its rivals — or a political statement meant for wider purposes? Ford has a new ad series called “Press Conference,” in which sales staff escort a Ford buyer into a room supposedly to finalize paperwork but finds “reporters” and cameras on hand to ask why he or she bought a Ford. The responses are unscripted, according to US News and World Report, but the decision to publish this response while the nation still debates the auto bailouts might have some Obama supporters questioning the timing: It’s brilliant in...

Voters, warns Democrat pollster Stanley Greenberg, “feel ever more estranged from government.” ... Greenberg essentially boils down Americans’ complaints with government to two: (1) “Government works for the irresponsible, not the responsible.” (2) a new class, in and out of government, uses government to enrich themselves. On the first point, Greenberg’s voters tell him they disapprove of bailouts large and small, whether the beneficiary is a Wall Street firm whose speculations have gone south, a homeowner who bought too much house for his income, or an immigrant who entered the country illegally. On the second point, Greenberg quotes a voter...

According to this report the odds that Greece defaults on its obligations to the EuroZone is now at 98% which only proves, once again, that bailouts works....works to grind the economy to a halt and ensure that any recovery is impossible. Greece has a 98 percent chance of defaulting on its debt in the next five years as Prime Minister George Papandreou fails to reassure investors his country can survive the euro-region crisis. “Everyone’s pricing in a pretty near-term default and I think it’ll be a hard event,” said Peter Tchir, founder of hedge fund TF Market Advisors in...