Not much detail yet, but breaking after the bell on CNBC, Ireland has said it will only accept a bank bailout and not a government bailout.

Meetings expected to continue tomorrow.

Update:

Irish rebuff bailout call in euro zone crisis

By Jan Strupczewski and Julien Toyer, Reuters

1 hr 1 min ago

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – Ireland said it was discussing stabilization measures with its European partners on Tuesday and ways to cut its heavily indebted banks’ funding costs in what a top EU official called a “survival crisis” for the euro zone.

A euro zone source said finance ministers of the 16-nation currency area meeting in Brussels would declare support for Dublin’s austerity measures and express readiness to help financially, if it asks for aid, but would not announce any practical measures.

In Dublin, Prime Minister Brian Cowen rebuffed calls to request a bailout, saying the government was fully funded until mid-2011, and insisted that only the banks may need help.

In other news, kiss goodbye any Stock Market gains in November.  As Atrios says is seems that only when the Market goes down do our “leaders” in Washington pay attention, so, more days like this please.

In about half an hour (2:30 pm ET) the Senate Banking Committee will be holding hearings on Title Fraud.  You can watch it here @ senate.gov (h/t dday).  It’s not on C-Span unfortunately.

Among the scheduled witnesses are- Barbara Desoer, president of Bank of America Home Loans, and David Lowman, chief executive of Chase Home Lending.  Also Tom Miller, Attorney General of Iowa, Adam J. Levitin of Georgetown University Law, and Diane E. Thompson with the National Consumer Law Center.

There may be fireworks but attentive readers will remember I’ve been outlining many of the myriad problems for a long time and once again as recently as yesterday so I’m not really expecting any surprises.

The good news is that finally at least some of our brain dead political class seems to be waking up to the facts which have been apparent for months and years now.  emptywheel highlights a newly released study from the TARP Congressional Oversight Panel that’s worth taking a look at.

Pretty much premiers.

I suppose I should say a word or 2 about Sarah Palin’s Alaska.  Yes I kinda sorta watched it in that face down on the keyboard in a puddle of drool sort of way which gives me nightmares about Stephen Colbert beating me with his Platinum membership card because I don’t buy enough Prescott Pharmaceuticals.

Sarah is absolutely right.  Yelling at Bears and their cubs while you’re stealing their fish is kind of begging Darwin to smite you Piper.  What was more interesting to me is that she didn’t wait 5 minutes to call out Joe McGinniss which sort of set the tone for her 40 minute campaign ad that plodded leadenly from talking point to talking point.

Mama Grizzlys indeed.

Now you may have a different impression and if not you have a chance to form a totally new one based on my particular prejudices tonight when it repeats, but when I say it lacks the drama and sincerity of Ochocinco: The Ultimate Catch I’m making a professional judgement as a critic.

Because I’m not a journalist, just a deadline writer.

• ABC Family– Freaky Friday (not the good 1976 version), Mean Girls
• AMC– The Abyss
• Bravo– Real Housewives marathon
• Comedy– American Pie
• Discovery– Sr. v. Jr marathon
• ESPN– Eagles @ Redskins
• Food– The Best Thing I Ever Ate, Triple D (premiers)
• FX– Anger Management, The Girl Next Door
• History– Pawn Stars, American Pickers
• Lifetime– Sins of the Mother, One Angry Juror
• TBS– Family Guy night
• Turner Classic– Sunrise (shhhhh)
• TLC– New Cake Boss
• Toon– Adventure Time with Finn & Jake, Regular Show, MAD, Robotomy (premiers), Total Drama World Tour (Season Finale premier)
• TV Land– Jerry Maguire
• Vs.– Blues @ Avalanche
• Oxygen– Catwoman x 2 (ugh)

Later-

• AMC– Deep Blue Sea
• Disney– Phineas and Ferb
• ESPN– College Hoopies, Miami @ Memphis
• Style– Sweet November (the Golden Rasberry version not the good 1968 one)
• Turner Classic– The Iron Horse (shhhhh)
• TLC– Sarah Palin’s Alaska (Season Premier repeat)
• USA– Bad Boys II x 2

Dave hosts Emma Watson (easily the brightest witch of her generation), Scott Caan, and Rascal Flatts.  Jon has Marion Jones, Stephen David Stern (Hoopies).  Alton does Fried Turkey and Stuffing.  Conan hosts LL Cool J, B.J. Novak, and Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings.

Boondocks– Attack of the Killer King-fu Wolf Bitch

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Newly freed Suu Kyi calls for ‘non-violent revolution’

by Hla Hla Htay, AFP

53 mins ago

It’s Title Fraud Damnit!

Of the 10 diaries I’ve posted in the last 2 weeks about economics, fully 5 of them have been on bank fraud.

• The Morality of the Market Mon Nov 01, 2010 at 09:12:22 AM EDT
• BoA: Feeling The Heat? Fri Nov 05, 2010 at 06:14:02 AM EDT
• BoA: The Heat Is On Sat Nov 06, 2010 at 07:34:48 AM EDT
• Allonge! Thu Nov 11, 2010 at 11:21:45 AM EST
• Just a scrap of paper Sat Nov 13, 2010 at 10:06:40 AM EST

The latest develoment is rumors that Washington and Wall Street are conspiring to retroctively “legalize” the MERS records under the general Versailles Villager principle of looking foward and never punishing anyone important no matter how badly they fuck up.

I mean, if it works for torture, war crimes, anonymous indefinite detetion, and targeted assassination, what’s $1.4 Trillion between friends?

So I duly reported this on Saturday and today dday has a piece that is not quite as sanguine that this is a problem that can be solved by brute force-

This Week’s Developments in Foreclosure Fraud

By: David Dayen Monday November 15, 2010 8:18 am

Finally, a word on the "MERS Whitewash bill" floated by John Carney last week. Carney has been bloviating about this for well over a month, based mainly on speculation. He may have the history of Congress making mischief on behalf of the banks on his side, but he really doesn’t have a clue on this issue. Foreclosure operations are state issues governed by state laws, and lawmakers know they would have a difficult go of trying to adjudicate a constitutionally viable solution that would indemnify the banks in this case. They’d have to stick out their necks quite far, and it would almost certainly be challenged all the way up the legal ladder. The outcry that would ensue during that time would be tremendous. I’m not sure it’s something that risk-averse politicians would want to put up with. And Carney certainly has no evidence one way or the other. I’m happy to fight something that exists, but nothing does at the moment.

I am quite happy to fight potential problems, because the Vacuity, Vanity, and Venality of our Versailles Villagers shouldn’t ever be underestimated.

And there are other problems-

One Mess That Can’t Be Papered Over

By GRETCHEN MORGENSON, The New York Times

Published: October 23, 2010

O(n) the other hand, resolving paperwork woes in the world of mortgage-backed securities may be trickier. Experts say that any parties involved in the creation, sale and oversight of the trusts holding the securities may be held responsible for any failings – and if the rules weren’t followed, investors may be able to sue the sponsors to recover their original investments.

Mind you, the market for mortgage-backed securities is huge – some $1.4 trillion of private-label residential mortgage securities were outstanding at the end of June, according to the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association.

…

All of this suggests that while a paperwork cure may eventually exist for foreclosures, higher hurdles exist when it comes to remedying flaws in mortgage-backed securities. The only way to wrestle with the latter, some analysts say, is in a courtroom.

“The whole essence of this crisis is fraud and unless we restore the rule of law and transparency of disclosure, we are not going to fix this,” said Laurence J. Kotlikoff, an economics professor at Boston University.

These are groups like PIMCO, Blackrock, and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York.  So far.

Then there’s also the problem pointed out by bmaz on Friday originally, these banks and real estate trusts owe a lot of money in filing fees in States hard hit by the Bank Induced Financial Collapse and Depression.

Are Obama and Congress Set To Screw American Counties, Homeowners and Give Wall Street Mortgage Banksters a Retroactive Immunity Bailout?

By: bmaz Friday November 12, 2010 7:40 pm

There are rapidly emerging signs the Obama Administration and Congress may be actively, quickly and covertly working furiously on a plan to retroactively legitimize and ratify the shoddy, fraudulent and non-conforming conduct by MERS on literally millions of mortgages.

…

As quoted above, even the most conservative estimate (and that estimate is based on only a single recording fee per mortgage, when in reality there are almost certainly multiple recordings legally required for most all mortgages due to the slicing, dicing and tranching necessary to accomplish the securitization that has occurred) for the state of California alone is $60 billion dollars. That is $60,000,000,000.00. California alone is actually likely several times that.

And there are those pesky Sections 9 and 10 of Article I.

There are at least 11 criminal frauds going on and the charitable and optimistic part of me thinks that they cain’t git all them thar’ worms back in the bait can.

Monday Business Edition

One of the emergent stories this weekend has been the question of whether Ireland is going to accept a bailout from the EU or the IMF.  The proximate problem is that interest rates on Irish debt (bonds) and the price of insuring it against defaults (Credit Default Swaps) rose quite sharply on Thursday and Friday.

No holding back the tide

By David Clerkin, Markets Correspondent, The Sunday Business Post

14 November 2010

The rate attached to Irish ten-year bonds, which days earlier had touched the already eye-watering level of 7.8 per cent, quickly eclipsed 8 per cent on Monday and smashed through 9 per cent on Thursday.

…

To put this spiral into context, it is worth noting that the rate stood at 6.8 per cent less than two weeks ago. It was 6.5 per cent a month ago. It was 4.7 per cent a year ago.

…

Some bond traders zeroed in on the market for credit default swaps (CDSs) – the insurance policies on offer to protect investors from a borrower becoming unable to repay their money. The CDS market, though thinner than the market in government bonds, exhibited equally grim characteristics last week. The CDS premiums on AIB debt – insurance against AIB defaulting – exceeded 10 per cent, and those on debt issued by other Irish banks continued their unwelcome rise.

As the market fate of the Irish government has been intertwined with those of the banks it guaranteed since September 2008, some traders spoke of a vicious circle. As Irish banks fell increasingly out of favour, fears over the Irish government’s creditworthiness intensified.

Andrea Merkel made some remarks at the G20 Summit (which was so unproductive for Obama, but that’s another story) about using the European Financial Stability Fund for another bailout that the Irish government is objecting to strenuously.

The Irish people?  Maybe not so much.

German solution seems irresistible to Irish people but not to the State

JOHN McMANUS, The Irish Times

Monday, November 15, 2010

Why is the Government against accessing the European Financial Stability Fund?

(Ireland, we) are led to believe, is a source of endless fascination, no little bafflement and some affection for the Germans. Right now they must be wondering why their chancellor, Angela Merkel, is being blamed for our latest crisis by the Taoiseach when she appears far more in tune with the Irish national mood than he does.

At a very fundamental level, all the German chancellor wants to do is change the rules of global finance so that the investors who lend money to feckless governments and banks must share the cost when things go wrong and thus be incentivised to act more responsibly. It’s a sentiment that pretty much everyone in Ireland would support.

Her proposals have an added populist attraction in Ireland as, inter alia, they would involve the burning of bank bondholders, the cause célèbre of much of the economic commentariat. This is because it is hard to see how Ireland could restructure its own debt – the nub of Merkel’s plan – without also restructuring the debts of the almost completely nationalised banking system.

…

From this point of view, the European Financial Stability Fund is starting to look irresistible. Not only do you get to burn the bond holders, you may even be able to help people out of negative equity! “What’s not for these Irish to like?” Merkel can legitimately ask. “Nothing” is the answer most of us would give.

So why is it then that we have a situation where the German chancellor and most Irish people seem to want one thing and our Government and the financial establishment want the other?

The answer is that, unfortunately, we must live with the immediate consequences of what is a laudable effort to reverse the balance of power between the financial system and sovereign governments. It is admirable – and indeed necessary – because the overriding lesson of the global financial crisis has been that governments have found themselves servants of the financial markets rather than the other way around. But while we would all like to get to the sun-lit uplands envisioned by Merkel, Ireland unfortunately might not survive the journey.

What does Merkel get out of it?  The Euro is teetering on the brink and a lot of people are heavily invested in it, financially and politically.

Ireland and Greece should ditch the euro

By Peter Oborne, The Daily Telegraph

November 15th, 2010

This is what the Spanish prime minister, Jose Zapetero, declared in an interview with the Wall Street Journal as recently as September 22: “I believe that the debt crisis affecting Spain, and the eurozone in general, has passed.”

Or let’s listen to Patrick Honohan , governor of the Central Bank of Ireland, who soberly informed the markets last week that surging yields on Irish government debt would soon be back to normal levels. Both men are deluding themselves – and us. From time to time, events take a turn which is too grave, unsettling and unfathomable for politicians to cope with. They enter a state of denial. We are now living through one of those times.

The European Single Currency cannot be saved. Yet the euro elite are unable to bring themselves to acknowledge the magnitude of this disaster. They have convinced themselves that all is well. The pattern is familiar and indeed we in Britain experienced something very similar in the months leading up to Black Wednesday and the eviction of sterling from the Exchange Rate Mechanism in September 1992.

…

The euro elite is utterly ruthless. In its mission to save the euro, it is ready to throw tens of millions out of work and in the process destroy businesses, lives and whole economies. Consider the terrifying facts. The Irish economy has gone through recession and entered what economists call a depression. Its output contracted by an extraordinary 10 per cent last year, and may well do so again over the next 12 months.

In Spain, unemployment stands at 20 per cent, and youth unemployment a horrifying and tragic 40 per cent. The depths of misery lying behind these statistics cannot be exaggerated. A friend of mine who lives in the Spanish province of Andalusia tells me that some children in his village cannot go to school. This is because their parents cannot afford to buy them shoes. Effectively large parts of Europe are de-industrialising. In Greece, the economy may contract by 15 per cent over the next two years as a result of massive cuts in state spending.

For Greece and Ireland, there is an absurdly easy way back to economic growth: return to the drachma and the punt. Such a move would enable national currencies to fall back to levels where they can be internationally competitive – which in the case of hapless Greece would be approximately one third of where it stands today.

Assertions by the big bankers and eurocrats that such a move is technically impossible are self-serving and false. It would of course be very messy in the short term, but there are many examples of countries pulling out of currency unions with no lasting ill-effect.

The peripheral eurozone nations are being prevented from taking this sensible move by a cynical alliance between the big banks and the Brussels elite. The banks cannot countenance any contraction of the eurozone because once Greece, Ireland, Portugal and Spain pull out, they will have no choice but to default on their debts. Such a move would bankrupt almost all European banks. Between them these four countries have a combined sovereign debt of well over £1 trillion. A very large part of this debt is owned by the major European banks. The Bank of International Settlements estimates, for example, that French financial institutions have lent the equivalent of 37 per cent of total French GDP to these failing countries.

However there are also hugely powerful political considerations. The collapse of the euro project will come as a shattering blow from which the European project cannot recover. That is why key members of the Euro elite are so determined to use this moment to press forward with their plans for political and economic integration.

More about Ireland-

• How’s that austerity thing working out for you? Mon Nov 08, 2010 at 10:04:33 AM EST
• Again- How’s that austerity thing working out for you? Tue Nov 09, 2010 at 09:50:46 AM EST

Business News below.  Now with 51 Stories.

Amazing Race premier.  New Simpsons, Cleveland Show, Family Guy, American Dad.  Throwball- Patriots @ Steelers.  Tina Fey accepts the Mark Twain Prize.  Everything else is just premiers.

This record here’s about twelve years old. Parliament buried it and it stayed buried until River here dug it up. This is what they were afraid she knew. And they were right to fear. There’s a universe of folk who’re gonna know it, too. Someone has to speak for these people.

Y’all got on this boat for different reasons, but y’all come to the same place. So now I’m asking more of you than I have before. Maybe all. Sure as I know anything, I know this – they will try again. Maybe on another world, maybe on this very ground swept clean. A year from now, ten? They’ll swing back to the belief that they can make people… better. And I do not hold to that. So no more runnin’. I aim to misbehave.

• ABC Family– Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
• AMC– The Walking Dead marathon (with premier)
• Bravo– Real Housewives marathon (with premier)
• Comedy– Wedding Crashers
• Disney– Good Luck Charlie, Shake It Up!, Sonny With a Chance (premiers)
• E!– Knocked Up
• Food– Challenge, Next (premiers)
• FX– There’s Something About Mary, What Happens in Vegas
• History– Ice Road Truckers (premier)
• Lifetime– No Reservations x 2 (without Anthony Bourdain), Waitress
• National Geographic– Great Migrations marathon (3 premiers)
• Sci Fi– Hollywood Treasure marathon
• TBS– Meet the Fockers x 2
• Turner Classic– Night Tide, The Big Country
• TLC– Sarah Palin’s Alaska (Series Premier?  You betcha!)
• TNT– Diary of a Mad Black Woman x 2
• Toon– Shrek
• Travel– Man v. Food marathon (thank goodness)

Later-

• ESPN2– World Series of Poker (2010 Final Table repeat)
• FX– Money Talks
• TBS– Road Trip
• Turner Classic– The Hoodlum (shhhhh)
• TNT– The General’s Daughter
• TV Guide– Weeds marathon (useless)
• USA– The Golden Compass, Serenity

Not just the Spanish Main, luv. The entire ocean. The entire world. Wherever we want to go, we’ll go. That’s what a ship is, you know. It’s not just a keel and a hull and a deck and sails, that’s what a ship needs but what a ship is… what the Black Pearl really is… is freedom.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Pilgrims pour into Mina camp from Mecca as the hajj begins

by Ali Khalil, AFP

57 mins ago

One and done.

An interesting feature of the Yas Marina race is that it takes place at dusk and will finish under the lights like Singapore.

All the Top Qualifiers used Softs and they start on the same rubber.  The Bridgestone guys still swear they’re only good for about 10 laps, so perhaps we’ll see some early pits that mix up the field.  Were I a back marker I’d at least consider giving the Prime tire tactic a shot.  They take 2 laps to warm up and then they’re just as good as the Softs.

Something that doesn’t often get mentioned is that now days Drivers, while they are paid by the Teams, are also expected to bring their own sponsorship money to the table, effectively buying their seat.  While I don’t think any Team would start a Driver they thought was slow just for the money, I can’t see how this situation is good for the sport.

For all it’s recent expansion Formula One is on the financial edge and a lot of the rule changes are compromises to make it cheaper to field a Team (not that this helped the US effort much because it’s still very expensive).  I think this is an unfortunate development.

One change in particular I disagree with is the restriction on track testing time.  While it makes it cheaper for new Teams, it also prevents them from learning the things they need to know to be competitive.  For instance the Virgin Cars still don’t have enough fuel on board to go the whole race at top speed.

If “cost cutting” rule changes continue Formula One will degenerate into the Open Wheel NASCAR Bumper Car sport that IndyCar and all the ‘strict’ formulas have become and while you may think it’s thrilling to have the cars all bunched up so there are lots of chunks of twisted flaming metal, I don’t really watch for the wrecks.

That’s what Monster Jam is for.

I promised I’d talk about Auto World and Ferrari World, but I think most of it is in the links.  I will say that I had a chance to go to Auto World twice and I found it kind of sad in the same way Lake Compounce is sad.  The second time was the revival and they were only running the ‘Historic Flint’ front end, not that the back was much of a much.  An up escalator past painted walls with a sound track about making cars.  A moving Airport slide walk past cam driven HMS Pinafore wave cut outs of engines and stuff with a sound track about making cars.  A down escalator past painted walls with a sound track about making cars.  No wonder my Grandma thought Michael Moore was a smart ass.  Ferrari World is said to have the world’s fastest roller coaster.  We’ll see how long it lasts.

I really, really, really encourage you to click through on Yas Marina Qualifying, it’s a much better piece.

Pretty tables below.

• Yas Marina Qualifying
• F1 Official Site
• Speed Racecast

Repeat at 4:30 pm.

Some premiers.  College Throwball, ABC’s choice of 3- Clemson @ Florida State or Oklahoma State @ Texas or USC @ Arizona.

People go, man aren’t you afraid that you’re going to hell?  No, no, BECAUSE I WAS MARRIED FOR TWO FUCKING YEARS!

Hell would be like Club Med, I could be a Tour Guide in Hell.

• ABC Family– Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (arguably the best novel of the bunch.  The movie’s cinematography is too dark at the climax, but the entry of the rival Schools is a lot of fun.)
• AMC– Troy (Joey?)
• Bravo– House marathon
• Comedy– Sam Kinison Tribute
• Discovery– Swamp Loggers marathon
• E!– Bridget Jones’s Diary
• ESPN– College Throwball, South Carolina @ Florida, Nevada @ Fresno State
• ESPN2– College Throwball, Mississippi State at Alabama
• FX– Baby Mama
• Oxygen– America’s Next Top Model (premier), Welcome Home Roscoe Jenkins
• Sci Fi– The Land That Time Forgot (not the good 1975 version), The Lost Future x 2
• Turner Classic– The Best Years of Our Lives
• TBS– Meet the Parents,
• TNT– Why Did I Get Married?, Daddy’s Little Girls
• Toon– Shrek
• TV Guide– Driving Miss Daisy (in the news), Coal Miner’s Daughter (useless)
• USA– The Golden Compass, National Treasure: Book of Secrets
• Vs.– College Throwball, Oregon at California

Later-

• ABC Family– Trading Places (you should see it if you haven’t, economics)
• AMC– The Perfect Storm
• FX– It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia, The League
• Sci Fi– Lost City Raiders
• TBS– The Longest Yard (not the good 1974 version)
• Turner Classic– Mrs. Miniver, The Little Foxes
• TNT– The Preacher’s Wife
• USA– The Bourne Ultimatum
• Vs.- Semi-Pro Throwball, Nighthawks @ Mountain Lions

SNL- Scarlett Johansson and Arcade Fire.  GitS: SAC 2nd Gig– Night Cruise, Cash Eye (Episodes 2 & 3 of the 2nd Gig Series)

I WANT MY RECORDS BACK!  I WANT MY FUCKING RECORDS BACK!

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