by Dave Johnson | Apr 21, 2010 | Blog
Conservatives claim that income from corporate dividends is "taxed twice" -- first when the corporation pays its taxes (if it does pay taxes), and then when the recipient of dividend income pays taxes on that income. They don't claim, however, that when you pay your...
by Zach Carter | Apr 20, 2010 | Blog
Tuesday's hearing on Lehman Brothers' now infamous Repo 105 scam was only tangentially related to the megabank's accounting deceptions and subsequent collapse. That story is simple: Lehman almost certainly committed fraud, regulators failed to stop it, and many of the...
by Sara Robinson | Apr 20, 2010 | Blog
We are a fickle people, ruled by a fickle media. It's astonishing how much national opinion can change in just a week or two. And if you don't believe me, just ask the Tea Party. They've had a rough couple of weeks. To summarize just some of the ongoing catastrophe: *...
by Zach Carter | Apr 20, 2010 | Blog
11:05 Rep. Anna Eshoo is laying out the case against Lehman. The company engineered a host of sham transactions to temporarily reduce the company's massive leverage levels. Top-level management knew the transactions were totally meaningless, but engaged in them to...
by Zach Carter | Apr 20, 2010 | Blog
The Hill published a truly outrageous op-ed yesterday by a payday lending front group, and didn't bother to tell their readers their publication was providing a platform for a predatory hatchet-woman. The post is here. It's an open assault on the very idea of consumer...
by Isaiah J. Poole | Apr 20, 2010 | Blog
Next week, fiscal conservatives in both parties will be dominating the airwaves even more than they have been with their calls for a style of "fiscal discipline" that is designed to impose pain on those who are least capable of bearing it—the elderly, the poor, the...
by Bill Scher | Apr 20, 2010 | Uncategorized
Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to affect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement security. How Unified Is The GOP's Unified...
by Alan Jenkins | Apr 20, 2010 | Blog
The conventional wisdom is that President Obama’s nominee to replace retiring Justice John Paul Stevens won’t change the Supreme Court much, since Justice Stevens is part of the Court’s progressive wing and President Obama’s choice is likely to be of a similar stripe....
by Richard Eskow | Apr 19, 2010 | Blog
It's looking like the SEC/Goldman Sachs lawsuit could open up a whole new can of worms, one that Tim Geithner and some bank executives aren't likely to be very happy about. The story's about AIG and I used to work there so, as much as I like to stay out of the story,...
by Bill Scher | Apr 19, 2010 | Blog
There's a strange affliction impairing several New York Times reporters, Deficit Reduction Blindness. The syndrome blocks your ability to see a government reduce a budget deficit without also seeing massive pain inflicted upon its people. Reporters with DRB can easily...
by Dave Johnson | Apr 19, 2010 | Blog, Making it in America
The Alliance for American Manufacturing is a partnership of manufacturers like US Steel and their workers, represented by the United Steelworkers. They have sent a letter asking Commerce Secretary Locke to initiate investigations and use the currency discrepancy in...
by Zach Carter | Apr 19, 2010 | Blog, Financial Reform
I generally find Andy Kroll to be both a rigorous and persuasive journalist. He knows what he's talking about on Wall Street reform, and he routinely pens informative yet approachable articles about very complicated subjects. So I was both surprised and disappointed...
by Bill Scher | Apr 19, 2010 | Uncategorized
Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to affect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement security. Goldman Fraud Case Puts Spotlight...
by Zach Carter | Apr 19, 2010 | Blog, Financial Reform
The next few weeks will be crucial for the effort to rein in the Wall Street casino and hold the bailout barons accountable. Here's a list of major Wall Street reform rallies taking place around the country in the coming weeks. With the Wall Street bill going to the...
by Sam Pizzigati | Apr 18, 2010 | Blog
The lackluster financial reform bill now nearing a floor vote in the U.S. Senate includes a surprising provision that could help reframe and revitalize the struggle against outrageously excessive CEO pay. Nearly six decades ago, at the height of the Great Depression,...
by Richard Eskow | Apr 16, 2010 | Blog
JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon knew what he was talking about when he said that ""large corporate America is in very, very, very, very good shape." It's a crude and insensitive remark, but an accurate one. Unfortunately, the rest of us are still paying for the party....
by Dave Johnson | Apr 16, 2010 | Blog
Yesterday was April 15, so I wrote about Tax Tricks. Here's a tax trick to talk about: Offshore Tax Havens for corporations. Here's one way that offshore tax havens work. You make an item in one country, and sell it at cost to a subsidiary that is based (post office...
by Bill Scher | Apr 16, 2010 | Blog, Financial Reform
While playing hardball seems to be working to maximize the chances for decent Wall Street reform, the finesse game appears to be working in the climate debate. On the heels of President Obama's offshore drilling plan Washington Post's Steven Pearlstein reports today...
by Bill Scher | Apr 16, 2010 | Uncategorized
Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to affect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement security. Wall Street Reform May Hit Senate...
by Robert Borosage | Apr 16, 2010 | Blog
President Obama got it exactly right when he said that we couldn't go back to an economy in which the banks captured 40% of corporate profits. We needed an economy built on a new foundation. Well, financial profits are soaring -- up a staggering 240% over last year....
by Tula Connell | Apr 15, 2010 | Blog, Economy, Making it in America
Donald Trump knows a few things about making money. The first step: You need a job. But a job is something more than 17 million of America’s workers don’t have. In a recent CNN interview, Trump says one big way this country can create jobs is by...
by Terrance Heath | Apr 15, 2010 | Blog
We entered a truly surreal political realm during the presidential election, when it fell to Peggy Noonan to serve as a voice of reason among conservatives. That job has since transferred to Dan Quayle, with Tom Coburn stepping into the role of "Reasonable...
by Dave Johnson | Apr 15, 2010 | Blog
How many ways can people be tricked about taxes? Here are a few tricks I have come across. * The rich already pay most of the taxes. You hear variations of this, most recently the news that 47% of Americans don't owe any federal income tax. But the fact is that the...
by Zach Carter | Apr 15, 2010 | Blog, Financial Reform
The political battle over Wall Street reform is finally being engaged in earnest. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) has formally thrown in his party's lot with the nation's largest banks, and to their credit, Democrats appear to be pushing back, both on...
by Bill Scher | Apr 15, 2010 | Uncategorized
Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to affect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement security. Bipartisanship Takes Backseat To...
by Richard Eskow | Apr 14, 2010 | Blog
When it comes to the economy, the color of wisdom is orange. Some students at Syracuse University are protesting the selection of JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon as their commencement speaker. They're absolutely right: Dimon's a poor role model. We should be proud that...
by Dave Johnson | Apr 14, 2010 | Blog
A few weeks back I wrote about Whirlpool closing their Evansville, Indiana plant and moving the work to Mexico. I wrote about the lunacy of an economic system that encourages companies to destroy lives, communities and the very economy that the Whirlpools depend on....
by Robert Borosage | Apr 14, 2010 | Blog
Were the big banks all knowingly running Ponzi schemes? That's the question that arises from the stunning hearings held this week by the Senate Permanent Committee on Investigations, chaired by Senator Carl Levin, on the collapse of Washington Mutual, the largest...
by Bill Scher | Apr 14, 2010 | Uncategorized
GOP Leaders Side With Wall Street, Against Reform Senate GOP leader plants flag against Dodd bill. NYT: "The Senate Republican leader, Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, criticized the Democrats’ plans to regulate Wall Street as arrogant and partisan, echoing the recent...
by Eric Lotke | Apr 14, 2010 | Blog
In the wake of the 2010 Census, Maryland passed a law yesterday that fixes a major problem. Maryland will now count people in prison where they actually live, not where they are confined. This first-in-the-nation law will improve the fairness and accuracy of Census...
by Zach Carter | Apr 14, 2010 | Blog, Financial Reform
There are two types of financial outrages: acts that are outrageously illegal, and acts that are, outrageously, legal. Yesterday's Senate hearing on the rise and fall of Washington Mutual was a rare examination of the former outrage, documenting the pervasive practice...
by Zach Carter | Apr 13, 2010 | Blog, Financial Reform
4:25 Levin is ripping Killinger on option-ARM delinquencies. WaMu performed a study concluding that option-ARMs were about to default like crazy, and right after that study, WaMu started pushing option-ARM securities hard to investors. The company sold a $3 billion...
by Dave Johnson | Apr 13, 2010 | Blog, Making it in America
Where I previously wrote that some things were getting worse more slowly, the trade deficit is just getting worse again. The US Trade Deficit Widened in February by 7.4 percent over the previous month, to $39.7 billion. "Imports surged 1.7 percent for the month....
by Steven Capozzola | Apr 13, 2010 | Blog
Hu knew. Chinese president Hu Jintao knew that upon coming to Washington for Obama’s nuclear security summit he would have to have a serious chat about currency with President Obama and Secretary Geithner. Hu also knew that he wasn’t ready to cooporate. On Monday,...
by Bill Scher | Apr 13, 2010 | Uncategorized
Each morning, Bill Scher and Terrance Heath serve up what progressives need to affect change on the kitchen-table issues families face: jobs, health care, green energy, financial reform, affordable education and retirement security. Battle To Curb Wall Street Heats Up...
by Dave Johnson | Apr 13, 2010 | Blog
The job of the news media is supposed to be to inform, not misinform. But Tuesday's Washington Post story, Obama team points to smaller deficit numbers, makes this claim about the cause of the huge $1.4 trillion budget deficit for FY 2009. The federal deficit was...
by Richard Eskow | Apr 12, 2010 | Blog
To call Robert Rubin an overpaid riverboat gambler would be to do a disservice to riverboat gamblers. To be sure, Rubin's salesmanship, arrogance, and cold lack of remorse fit the mold. But no card sharp ruined as many lives as the former Treasury Secretary and...
by Bill Scher | Apr 12, 2010 | Blog
Despite our demand for CNN to at least provide equal time to defenders of Social Security, Medicare and public investment when discussing issues related to debt and the deficit, the sputtering network proceeded this weekend with its planned four hours of
by Eric Lotke | Apr 12, 2010 | Blog
Big corporations still get away with it. A stunning new analysis by the Transactional Records Access Clearinghouse (TRAC) at Syracuse University shows how the IRS targets smaller corporations, while larger corporations that would yield more unpaid tax dollars go...
by Dave Johnson | Apr 12, 2010 | Blog
Last month I wrote that China was expected to report a trade deficit right about now, just before the Obama administration was scheduled to make a declaration on whether China is manipulating its currency or not, China's Coming Surprise Announcement And My Bridge On...
