(Reposted with permission. ek)

by lambert at corrente

Sun, 12/15/2013 – 5:35pm

On The Greenwald Question:

It is true that the “left” (for some definition of left that would include Greenwald’s civil liberties work, even if under the aegis of strange bedfellows) has struggled with a funding model. If Corrente were 10 times its size (with concomitant increase in size for similar blogs) that would make, I’m convinced on no evidence at all, a big difference in the discourse.

Hitherto, a reader support model — though reasonably free from conflict of interest, i.e. buying into the bullshit — has enabled survival but not growth. I don’t know why.

Another model is to become Kos or TPM or ThinkProgress, and to be funded by the Democratic nomenklatura. So here we have conflicts of interest. (“Who kidnapped Josh Marshall”?)

Another model is advertising, selling eyeballs (which, to be fair, Naked Capitalism does, in addition to reader support). At scale, and IMNSHO NC is not at scale, we have potential for a different sort of conflict.

And another model is finding a patron, which is what Hamsher did, CJR does (Soros, IIRC), and now Greenwald has done. A different sort of conflict. (Marx, we might remember, was funded by Engels, a Manchester factory owner.)

So what model do you use if you want to get a story out?

I find it hard to fault Greenwald on ethical grounds, especially if he got some up front “Fuck you” money from Omidyar. (I haven’t been following the ins and outs, and it may be that Greenwald has disqualified himself on other grounds in his various defense of himself.) If Greenwald doesn’t ruin his personal brand, he’s free to walk away. For some definition of “free.”

However, I’m not sure the funding model is the story. Let me now put on my tinfoil hat:

Call me foily, but if I were a really astute right wing billionaire who thought long term, and who wanted a lot more leverage over the government than I already had, I’d:

1. Get a technically astute and ideologically aligned mole into the NSA;
2. Have them steal a lot of extremely incriminating data;
3. Dole just enough out to the press to show what I had;
4. Keep the great bulk of it as a “fleet in being,” as it were.

I’ve also considered the idea that Snowden was the tool of an NSA faction that didn’t like the rampant illegality; that could combine with #1.

GG comes in at #3, and as an archivist/researcher in #4. He doesn’t even have to know.

I know this reads rather like a real-life late William Gibson novel, with Omidyar in the role of Hubertus Bigend, and “the data” as the McGuffin, but real life these days resembles a Gibson novel, except more convoluted, darker, and with even nastier villains.

I had always had this way of thinking in the back of my mind, but this story really brought it to the forefront for me:

   Officials Say U.S. May Never Know Extent of Snowden’s Leaks

That story reads very much like normalizing the situation to me.

So, Omidyar becomes a sort of data-driven sovereign, with informational nukes. Of course, that would imply that the tippy top global ruling class runs on blackmail, but then you knew that.

Readers?

I mean the Faux Noise one of course-

Original

Cenk Uygur

“To be clear, I’m a scholar of religion with 4 degrees including 1 in the New Testament and fluency in Biblical Greek.”

So you’re totally out of your league you vacuous news reader.

Reza Aslan: A Jesus scholar who’s often a moving target

By Manuel Roig-Franzia, Washington Post

Published: August 8

“As the crowd of vendors, worshippers, priests, and curious onlookers scramble over the scattered detritus, as a stampede of frightened animals, chased by their panicked owners, rushes headlong out of the Temple gates and into the choked streets of Jerusalem, as a corps of Roman guards and heavily armed Temple police blitz through the courtyard looking to arrest whoever is responsible for the mayhem, there stands Jesus, according to the gospels, aloof, seemingly unperturbed, crying out over the din: ‘It is written: My house shall be called a house of prayer for all nations. But you have made it a den of thieves.’?”

Aslan portrays Jesus as an illiterate peasant who was crucified by the Romans because his “messianic aspirations” threatened their occupation of Palestine and because his “zealotry” threatened the authorities at the Temple in Jerusalem. Though zealotry and zealot tend to have negative connotations now, Aslan writes that in the time of Jesus, the term referred to people who strictly observed the Torah and refused to serve a foreign master.

…

Aslan’s publisher is pitching the book as a work that “sheds new light on one of history’s most influential and enigmatic characters” and “challenges long-held assumptions.” But Aslan is not quite so hyperbolic in an interview. He says he sees his book as a way to “re-package” the story of Jesus “in an accessible way for a popular audience to read and enjoy. If you’re a Bible scholar, there’s nothing new.”

Indeed, many of Aslan’s assertions have become received wisdom for a large number of scholars. But few could deny that Aslan stitches the narrative artfully.

So are you, you Villager Idiot.

Jon is surprisingly good.

Part 1

Part 2

Transcript

Blackstone Unit Wins in No-Lose Codere Trade: Corporate Finance

By Stephanie Ruhle, Mary Childs, and Julie Miecamp, Bloomberg News

2013-10-22 15:02:47

GSO, the New York-based credit investing unit of Blackstone, the world’s largest private-equity firm, bought Codere’s bonds and credit-default swaps in the first half of this year, hoping to profit from differences in pricing of the instruments in what’s known as a basis trade, according to a person familiar with the transactions.

…

The company’s willingness to pay the coupon late helped ease restructuring negotiations as many bondholders also held credit-default swaps and would benefit from a missed payment, the person said. Codere made the August payment two days after a 30-day grace period, and the International Swaps & Derivatives Association ruled that there was a failure-to-pay credit event, resulting in a $197 million payment to holders of the swaps.

…

“As a lender, the idea is to help somebody make payments on their debt,” said Bonnie Baha, the head of global developed credit at Los Angeles-based DoubleLine Capital LP, which manages about $53 billion. “It’s generally not to pay them not to make payments on their debt so that you can benefit via a derivative instrument.”

Blackstone Made Money on Credit-Default Swaps With This One Weird Trick

By Matt Levine, Bloomberg News

2013-12-05 22:47:32Z

The Blackstone Codere trade — in which Blackstone Group LP bought credit-default swaps on troubled Spanish gaming company Codere SA, then agreed to roll a $100 million revolver for Codere on favorable terms in exchange for Codere agreeing to make an interest payment on some bonds two days late, thus creating a technical default and triggering the CDS, pocketing some gains for Blackstone at the expense of the CDS writers, without costing Codere anything — is such a glorious pinnacle of financial achievement that of course someone had to make a television show about it. I would have preferred a prime-time miniseries, but what we got is a “Daily Show” segment, and that will have to do.

…

Really, the only reason to cover this story is its majestic beauty. Which is a great reason to cover it, don’t get me wrong; it’s just that aesthetic appreciation of clever derivatives trades is sort of a specialized niche. Certainly “The Daily Show” didn’t muster much admiration and instead spent seven minutes criticizing everyone else for not covering the story. This is wrong. This trade is so lovely that the proper reaction is to love it and cherish it and hold it close to your heart, not to complain that nobody else does.

…

The credit-default swaps market is a way to express in terms of money the market’s estimate of a company’s chance of default — real default, not missing a payment by two days — in the future. Blackstone found a way to turn that expression in terms of money into money. One day it had a CDS contract with a mark-to-market value of 11 million euros or whatever; the next day it had 11 million euros. One day the banks were taking risk on Codere’s credit that had gone against them to the tune of 11 million euros; the next day they had no risk and 11 million fewer euros. The risk that they got rid of was still worth about 11 million euros.

In protest, Festivus pole put up at Fla. Capitol

By Associated Press

Wednesday, December 11, 3:33 PM

“What’s the point? There is no point. It’s ridiculous. This is the most ridiculous thing I could come up with,” said Stevens, an atheist. “This is about the separation of church and state.”

Because Florida considers the Statehouse rotunda to be a public forum, people can use the space to express themselves or protest, as long as they first apply with a state agency.

Along with the Nativity scene and six-foot Festivus pole, the Wisconsin-based Freedom From Religion Foundation has put up a banner advocating for the separation of government and religion. A Festivus pole is also on display at the Wisconsin Capitol, along with other displays.