06/28/2011 archive

MBIA is the Municipal Bond Insurance Association.  It is a monoline insurer that expanded into the Collateralized Debt Obligation market in the 90s and naughty aughties.

As it became undeniable that they’d engaged in Insurance Fraud and didn’t have nearly enough assets to pay off their policies their Insurance Financial Strength (IFS) rating declined from AAA in April of 2008 to BBB in March of 2010.

In 2009 they restructured the company, splitting off the original (and still profitable because they never default) municipal bond operation from the highly speculative and money losing CDO business.

The Insurance Superintendent of New York State oked this and MBIA has been using his approval to prevent defrauded customers like Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, UBS AG and RBS from bringing suit for fraudulent conveyance and breach of contract.  Well today the New York State Court of Appeals (don’t let the name fool you, this is the final court in New York) ruled that this was not legal and the suits could proceed.

NY Court: MBIA Policyholders Can Sue

By ERIK HOLM, The Wall Street Journal

JUNE 28, 2011, 12:57 P.M. ET

The judges in the majority in Tuesday’s ruling wrote that MBIA was wrong in its contention that a provision in New York state insurance law allowed the state insurance superintendent to be the “exclusive arbiter of all private claims” related to the MBIA restructuring plan.

“A cursory reading of the plain language reveals that it does not vest the Superintendent with the power to consider causes of action, such as plaintiffs’,” the judges wrote.

…

ABN AMRO and the other policyholders contend the restructuring wrongly left the account that backed the policies sold on structured securities without enough money to pay claims.

“The Court of Appeals has squarely rejected MBIA’s efforts to shut the courthouse door,” said Robert Giuffra, lead counsel for the banks and a partner with Sullivan & Cromwell LLP, in a statement. “We’re confident that MBIA’s fraudulent restructuring will be reversed.”

Much as I hate rooting for objectively bad actors like BoA to succeed, the truth is that having the vampire squid cannabilize each other in a feeding frenzy of fear and greed is the most likely avenue to punishing them the way they deserve.

It was announced that the International Monetary Fund has appointed French Finance Minister Christine Lagarde its first female head. With the backing of China, Russia and, today, the United States, Ms. Lagarde has some very tough tasks set out for her the most important being the economic crisis in Greece:

Greek Strike Overshadows Budget Vote

Greek police fired tear gas to disperse protesters in the center of Athens as labor unions shut down government services before a vote on austerity measures that may determine if the nation can avoid a default. . . . .

Papandreou faces his second survival test in a week tomorrow when lawmakers vote on the package that’s needed before the cash-strapped nation can tap a fifth loan payment from last year’s 110 billion-euro ($157 billion) rescue. Failure to pass the government’s 78 billion-euro plan may lead to the euro area’s first sovereign default. . . .

Asset Sales

State-asset sales are the “first pillar” in any new financing package for Greece and an important factor for its European Union and International Monetary Fund partners, who are supplying the aid, Finance Minister Evangelos Venizelos said in parliament today. He spoke as a debate on the second bill, the so-called Implementation Law, began under a fast-track process, to make a June 30 deadline.

The “Shock Doctrine” in full play and the Greek people are not happy

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

New York Times Editorial: The First Amendment, Upside Down

The Supreme Court decision striking down public matching funds in Arizona’s campaign finance system is a serious setback for American democracy. The opinion written by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. in Monday’s 5-to-4 decision shows again the conservative majority’s contempt for campaign finance laws that aim to provide some balance to the unlimited amounts of money flooding the political system.

In the Citizens United case, the court ruled that the government may not ban corporations, unions and other moneyed institutions from spending in political campaigns. The Arizona decision is a companion to that destructive landmark ruling. It takes away a vital, innovative way of ensuring that candidates who do not have unlimited bank accounts can get enough public dollars to compete effectively.

Eugene Robinson: The Economy Is Bad Enough

   There is no good reason for negotiations on the budget and the debt ceiling to be deadlocked, because the solution is obvious: First, do no harm.

   The Hippocratic injunction should be something befuddled economists and warring politicians can agree on. With the nation struggling to recover from a devastating recession, unemployment stuck at crisis levels, financial markets spooked by the possibility of European defaults and consumers disinclined to consume, it makes no earthly sense to suck money out of the economy.

   Democrats are right that this is a terrible moment for spending cuts. Republicans are right that this is an awful moment for tax increases. The only reasonable thing to do is kick the can down the road-but in a purposeful, intelligent way.

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

Click on images to enlarge.

June 28 is the 179th day of the year (180th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 186 days remaining until the end of the year.

In common years it is always in ISO week 26.

This date is the only date each year where both the month and day are different perfect numbers, June 6 being the only date where the month and day are the same perfect number.

On this day in 1919, Keynes predicts economic chaos

At the Palace of Versailles outside Paris, Germany signs the Treaty of Versailles with the Allies, officially ending World War I. The English economist John Maynard Keynes, who had attended the peace conference but then left in protest of the treaty, was one of the most outspoken critics of the punitive agreement. In his The Economic Consequences of the Peace, published in December 1919, Keynes predicted that the stiff war reparations and other harsh terms imposed on Germany by the treaty would lead to the financial collapse of the country, which in turn would have serious economic and political repercussions on Europe and the world.

snip

A decade later, Hitler would exploit this continuing bitterness among Germans to seize control of the German state. In the 1930s, the Treaty of Versailles was significantly revised and altered in Germany’s favor, but this belated amendment could not stop the rise of German militarism and the subsequent outbreak of World War II.

In the late 1930s, John Maynard Keynes gained a reputation as the world’s foremost economist by advocating large-scale government economic planning to keep unemployment low and markets healthy. Today, all major capitalist nations adhere to the key principles of Keynesian economics. He died in 1946.

Governments ignore Keynes at their own peril.

Afghans Build Security, and Hope to Avoid Infiltrators



By RAY RIVERA

 For someone who had once joined an insurgent group, and whose family was tied to a top Taliban commander, Akmal had a strikingly easy path into the Afghan National Army.

The district governor who approved his paperwork had never met him. A village elder who was supposed to vouch for him – as required by recruiting mandates – did little more than verify his identity.

No red flags went up when, after just six weeks in the army, he deserted. He returned more than three months later with the skimpiest of explanations and was allowed to rejoin. “I told them I got sick,” Akmal recalled.

Jon Walker at Firedoglake says that the negotiations on the debt ceiling keep moving right:

In the beginning, the idea that any political party would actively hold the debt ceiling hostage to reduce the deficit was considered absurd. Mainly because all the top politicians have admitted they don’t want the country to default and that actually forcing a default would have the exact opposite affect of sending Treasury bond rates up, making the deficit problem dramatically worse. Only a year ago, the idea the debt ceiling must be raised was not just the broad centrist position, and it has been the common sense position for decades.

Instead of holding a firm line and pointing out that Republicans were flirting with incoherent madness related to the debt ceiling, Democrats ,lead by President Obama, choose to feed the Republican deficit hysteria by actively refusing to take a stand. This moved the debate radically to the right. It made it acceptable to hold America credit worthiness hostage to demand deficit reductions despite massive unemployment.

John Amato at Crooks and Liars gives a tutorial in Negotiating for Dummies:

Every “cut” is on the table, but not revenue increasers. This is all kabuki and the debt ceiling isn’t the same type of game they played with as shutting down our own government was. But if Democrats use meaningless military cuts to justify massive cuts in education, food safety, health research and criminal justice as some kumbaya moment, then this will be not a deal, but a ritual sacrifice.

Rachel Maddow and Chris Hayes, Washington Editor of The Nation magazine, discussed the lengths to which the Republicans have gone to undermine President Obama, calling it “craven shameless, unprincipled partisan hackery”

At this point, I call it insanity on the part of the President and the Democratic leadership.

Since April 8th, 2007 I’ve relied heavily on Yahoo as the go to source for my news pieces.  Those dirty rotten scoundrels have changed the format and organization on me to the point where it’s almost unrecognizable and I’m not at all sure I’ll be able to recover.

In any event it’s going to take a day or two of button pushing to see what I can salvage and I ask my readers to bear with me while I work through this process.

This is what I get for indulging myself in mudpies.

If you do not get Current TV you can watch Keith here:

This years Netroots Nation in Minneapolis was the largest yet, over 2400 attendees from around the world. I had some reservations about going but from my past experience and being a new blog “owner”, I knew there was a lot I could learn and I did. There is this strange disconnect that we have with anonymous, faceless names on the net. We sometimes misinterpret what they say because we cannot hear their voice, or see their face, or watch their body language. At Netroots, we still may not know each others real names but we do get to put the face and the sound of the voice to what we now reading.

The other reason for my reservations was the current political climate. I knew there were going to be many Democrats there who are avid Obama supporters who would like his critics to sit down and be quiet, let the so-called “adult in the room” handle it. I thought Obama’s campaign machine, especially OFA, would have a huge presence. Was I ever wrong. The lack of support for the President was pretty evident in the booing that his Communications Director Dan Pfeiffer received and the hammering that Deputy Director of Health and Human Service Jay Angoff took when he couldn’t answer questions about the Affordable Health Care Act. I suspect next year in Providence, RI will be even tougher.

One of the best panels was Jane Hamsher, Lt. Dan Choi, John Aravosi and Felipe Matos. Besides Dan ripping up the OFA literature that was handed to the panelists, as I was walking in, Dan was getting “miked up”. I not only had the honor of saluting this brave man and personally thanking him but I got a hug and a kiss. Wow. Absolutely the highlight of the trip.

I got a hug and kiss from Sen Al Frankin at his meet and greet at my hotel and a thank you for phone banking for him from NYC. We are about the same height, too, five foot something.

On my last night, after the Daily Kos party which was very crowded and really loud. A friend and I headed back to the hotel where we were both staying in search of food. The hotel restaurant had already closed but the young lady who was tending the Martini Bar, she made a great martini by the way, directed us to a nearby restaurant that served steaks, ribs and fish. We had a great dinner, the wait staff was friendly and funny and as we were walking back to the hotel, we were stopped by a young couple. They had seen our badges from the convention (yeah, we were still wearing them) and wanted to tell us about the young lady’s immigration dilemma, so we could get the message out that there need to be some real and fair immigration reform. The young lady’s boyfriend explained that she is from a Latin American country studying for her doctorate in a science field. She has a job and applied to stay her after she graduates but has been denied a residence visa. That is insane. Seriously,  here is a young woman, intelligent, educated, contributing to this country’s economy and she is not allowed to stay? This country needs some drastic revision of its immigration policy and President Obama so missed the opportunity to use his popularity in his first two years in office to do that and so much more.

The five days in this lovely city on the upper Mississippi went fast. I was amazed and impressed with the friendly smiles and greeting from the staff at the hotel and convention center where you expect it but from people passing on the street. As a New Yorker, I’m not used to the morning dog walkers to smilingly say hello. Friday night after the New York Gay Marriage Bill passed, one of the pictures that went viral was the the photo of the new I-35W bridge illuminated in the rainbow colors of the GLBT movement. I am not at all surprised.