;)
March 13, 2023
Late Morning/Afternoon Update:
Summer Concepcion of NBC News: "President Joe Biden said Monday that people should 'rest assured' after his administration acted to ease uncertainties about the banking system in the wake of the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank last week, the second-largest bank failure in U.S. history.... 'Thanks to the quick action of my administration over the past few days, Americans can have confidence that the banking system is safe,' Biden said. 'Your deposits will be there when you need them.' Biden explained that he instructed his team to protect U.S. workers and small businesses and detailed their actions to protect customers' deposits and not put taxpayer dollars at risk, to hold those responsible accountable, and not to protect investors in the bank. The president said the management of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank, a second institution that was included in the plan, would be fired. 'If the bank is taken over by FDIC, the people running the bank should not work there anymore,' he said.... The president said he will ask Congress and the banking regulators to strengthen rules for banks to make it 'less likely this kind of bank failure would happen again.'" ~~~
~~~ Tolja So. Elizabeth Warren in a New York Times op-ed: "... These recent bank failures are the direct result of leaders in Washington weakening the financial rules.... Greg Becker, the chief executive of Silicon Valley Bank, was one of the many high-powered executives who lobbied Congress to weaken the [Dodd-Frank] law. In 2018, the big banks won. With support from both parties..., Donald Trump signed a law to roll back critical parts of Dodd-Frank. Regulators, including the Federal Reserve chair Jerome Powell, then made a bad situation worse, letting financial institutions load up on risk.... S.V.B. suffered from a toxic mix of risky management and weak supervision. For one, the bank relied on a concentrated group of tech companies with big deposits, driving an abnormally large ratio of uninsured deposits.... [Similarly, New York State's Signature Bank, which the FDIC also took over this weekend, relied heavily on] risky cryptocurrency firms....Congress, the White House& and banking regulators should reverse the dangerous bank deregulation of the Trump era.... Mr. Powell's disastrous 'tailoring' of these rules has put our economy at risk, and it needs to end -- now." Read on.
Comer Pleads Ignorance of Trump Inquiry. Plus and Hunter Biden! Luke Broadwater & Jonathan Swan of the New York Times: "House Republicans have quietly halted a congressional investigation into whether Donald J. Trump profited improperly from the presidency, declining to enforce a court-supervised settlement agreement that demanded that Mazars USA, his former accounting firm, produce his financial records to Congress. Representative James R. Comer, Republican of Kentucky and the chairman of the Oversight and Accountability Committee, made clear he had abandoned any investigation into the former president's financial dealings -- professing ignorance about the inquiry Democrats opened when they controlled the House -- and was instead focusing on whether President Biden and members of his family were involved in an influence-peddling scheme. 'I honestly didn't even know who or what Mazars was,' said Mr. Comer, who was the senior Republican on the oversight panel during the last Congress, while Democrats waged a lengthy legal fight over obtaining documents from the firm." Rep. Jamie Raskin, the top Democrat on the committee, accused Comer of coordinating the shutdown with Trump's attorneys, and Raskin produced receipts. An NBC News story is here. ~~~
~~~ Zachary Cohen, et al., of CNN: "House Oversight Chairman James Comer has quietly subpoenaed Bank of America asking for records relating to three of Hunter Biden's business associates, the committee's ranking Democrat, Rep. Jamie Raskin, disclosed in a letter sent to Comer on Sunday. The subpoena was broad and called for 'all financial records spanning 14 years, beginning in 2009, according to a copy of the letter obtained by CNN. Bank of America has since turned over a considerable number of materials in compliance with the subpoena, a source familiar with the communications told CNN. The subpoena specifically targets US citizen John Robinson 'Rob' Walker and other associates of President Joe Biden's son, Hunter, who formed ... 'a joint venture' with executives of CEFC China Energy, a now-bankrupt Chinese energy conglomerate, according to the letter."
Charlie Savage of the New York Times: Beryl A. Howell, the chief judge of the D.C. Federal District Court, has reach the end of her term, and "a new chief judge, James E. Boasberg, takes over..., dropping Judge Boasberg into tangled disputes over executive privilege and other grand jury issues central to the federal special counsel investigation into the events surrounding Jan. 6, along with [Donald] Trump's handling of classified documents after leaving office. There is no obvious reason to believe that the turnover will bring a major new approach: Both are experienced jurists and Obama appointees, and in handing down sentences to ordinary Jan. 6 defendants, neither has been a particularly harsh nor usually lenient outlier.... Judge Boasberg is also a former homicide prosecutor in Washington who has been a judge for more than 20 years. He has bipartisan credentials: President George W. Bush appointed him in 2002 to the D.C. Superior Court, which handles state court-style criminal and civil cases in Washington, before President Barack Obama elevated him in 2011 to the Federal District Court." Savage provides more biographical information & touches on some of the high-profile matters Boasberg has adjudicated.
Christopher Kane of the Washington Blade: "White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre issued a statement Monday condemning the homophobic and misogynistic remarks made by former Vice President Mike Pence during the Gridiron Club dinner Saturday night. At the event, Pence said Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg -- the country's first openly gay cabinet secretary -- 'took maternity leave' following the birth of his and husband Chasten's twins in 2021, adding that the country subsequently suffered postpartum depression via airline and air travel issues. 'The former vice president's homophobic joke about Secretary Buttigieg was offensive and inappropriate, all the more so because he treated women suffering from postpartum depression as a punchline,' Jean-Pierre said in a statement she shared with the Washington Blade.... Associated Press Chief White House Correspondent Zeke Miller reported Pence's 'jokes' were not well received by the room."
Michelle Yeoh, who won the Oscar yesterday for Best Actress in a Leading Role, is also a United Nations Development Program goodwill ambassador. She writes in a New York Times op-ed about her first-hand experience of an earthquake in Nepal. "To fully recover from a disaster and be prepared for the next one, the specific needs of women and girls must be factored into the humanitarian response. Women must also play leadership roles in the recovery process. But women are woefully underrepresented in the decision making that affects their prospects of survival in times of crisis.... This year we are halfway toward the 2030 target date to achieve what the United Nations calls Sustainable Development Goals, a blueprint for a shared global vision of a world without poverty or inequality. What I have learned through my work with U.N.D.P. is that realizing these global goals will be possible only if we achieve true gender equality, everywhere, and in all aspects of life -- especially in times of crisis -- and in anticipation of the next disaster."
Ed Pilkington of the Guardian: "As Rupert Murdoch's Fox Corporation battles to contain the Dominion lawsuit scandal that has engulfed its top executives and stars, another crisis is building in the wings that has the potential to cause further turbulence for the media empire. Smartmatic's lawsuit against Fox News has attracted only a fraction of the attention garnered by the legal action of Dominion Voting Systems. Yet both firms are suing Fox for defamation related to its coverage of Donald Trump's stolen-election lie, and both pose a serious threat to Fox's finances and reputation.... Smartmatic ... [is' demanding damages of $2.7bn [in damages].... Last week the New York state supreme court in Manhattan gave the green light for the case to proceed against Fox News, the Fox Business host Maria Bartiromo, the former business anchor Lou Dobbs and Trump's former lawyer Rudy Giuliani.... Smartmatic claims that more than 100 false statements were broadcast by Fox News hosts and guests. Smartmatic was falsely said to have been involved in 2020 election counts in six battleground states -- in fact, it was present only at the count in Los Angeles county."
Gail Collins & Bret Stephens of the New York Times have a conversation about Tucker Carlson, Biden's budget proposal & oil-drilling approval, and Mitch McConnell, and the 2024 presidential election: "Stephens: They say that hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue, but in this case it's the tribute that cynicism pays to cowardice.... As for Fox, the way in which it is trying to 'respect' its viewers is to lie to them."
Marlise Simons of the New York Times: "The International Criminal Court intends to open two war crimes cases tied to the Russian invasion of Ukraine and will seek arrest warrants for several people, according to current and former officials.... The cases represent the first international charges to be brought forward since the start of the conflict and come after months of work by special investigation teams. They allege that Russia abducted Ukrainian children and teenagers and sent them to Russian re-education camps, and that the Kremlin deliberately targeted civilian infrastructure.... It was not clear whom the court planned to charge in each case.... Some outside diplomats and experts said it was possible that President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia could be charged, as the court does not recognize immunity for a head of state in cases involving war crimes, crimes against humanity or genocide. Still, the likelihood of a trial remains slim, experts say, as the court cannot hear cases in absentia and Russia is unlikely to surrender its own officials."
U.K. Karla Adam of the Washington Post: "Britain's state broadcaster and its highest-paid presenter announced Monday that they reached a deal that would put sports legend Gary Lineker back on the air after he was suspended for criticizing the government's migration policies.... The director general of the BBC, Tim Davie, apologized and said the broadcaster would launch an independent review of its social media guidelines, with a focus on freelancers, like Lineker."
~~~~~~~~~~
Maxine Joselow & Timothy Puko of the Washington Post: "The Biden administration will approve one of the largest oil developments ever on federal land Monday, according to three people familiar..., a day after announcing sweeping protections for more than 16 million acres of land and water in Alaska. Opponents hoped [President] Biden would reject energy giant ConocoPhillips's multibillion-dollar drilling project, called Willow, on Alaska's North Slope. But facing the prospect of having such a decision overturned in court, the administration plans to let the oil company build just three pads in the National Petroleum Reserve-Alaska (NPR-A), the nation's largest expanse of public land, these three individuals said. The decision shrinks the project from the five pads that ConocoPhillips originally proposed but allows what company officials have described as a site large enough for them to move forward and start construction within days." ~~~
~~~ Softening the Blow. Emily Czachor of CBS News: "President Biden is expected to prohibit oil and gas leasing across the entirety of the United States' territory in the Arctic Ocean, an administration official confirmed on Sunday.... The Biden administration will also announce its plans to issue new rules protecting more than 13 million acres in the National Petroleum Reserve in Alaska from oil and gas leasing when the president unveils his Arctic drilling declaration, the administration official said. The anticipated protections will extend to the Teshekpuk Lake, Utukok Uplands, Colville River, Kasegaluk Lagoon and Peard Bay Special Areas.... The administration hopes these restrictions will serve as a 'fire wall' that will block future gas leasing and expansion across federal lands and waters in the U.S. Arctic Ocean and on the North Slope of Alaska..., a region that is rich in petroleum and currently the focus of a mounting national controversy."
Edward Wong of the New York Times: "President Biden plans to announce on Monday a landmark agreement with the leaders of Britain and Australia to develop fleets of nuclear-powered attack submarines that the three nations would use to strengthen their naval forces across the Asia-Pacific region as China bolsters its own navy. The purchase and training agreements on submarines amount to the first concrete steps taken by the three English-speaking nations to deepen the ambitious strategic partnership called AUKUS that they announced 18 months ago."
The New York Times is live-updating developments surrounding the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank: "U.S. authorities, invoking rarely used regulatory authority, took action late Sunday to contain the damage from the collapse of Silicon Valley Bank.... Officials announced that depositors with money at the California bank, which was closed by state regulators on Friday, would be paid back in full and be able to start accessing their money on Monday morning. They also disclosed that a second bank [-- Signature Bank --] had been shuttered by New York regulators and that its depositors would also be made whole." ~~~
~~~ The Washington Post's story on these developments, by Jeff Stein & others, is here. An ABC News story is here. ~~~
~~~ Rob Wile of NBC News: "In a joint statement Sunday, the U.S. Treasury, the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. said the extraordinary measures they were taking to shore up SVB deposits would not come at taxpayers' expense.... The government also reiterated that only SVB depositors, as well as those at New York-based Signature Bank -- a second institution it took over and shut down -- would be made whole. Shareholders of the failed banks, as well as some bondholders, will 'not be protected' by the actions, the agencies' statement noted. Instead, the cost of covering the deposits, including uninsured amounts in excess of the FDIC's $250,000 limit, will be paid for in part out of the agency's Deposit Insurance Fund -- a reserve that is paid for by a quarterly fee on banks.... Funding for the emergency measures will also come from selling off SVB's assets, said Morgan Ricks, a banking professor at Vanderbilt Law School.... Assuming there are losses, Ricks said, the costs of the guarantee of all depositors will be borne by banking customers -- in other words, the wider public.... By designating their backstop measures as a 'systemic risk exception' event, Washington regulators sidestepped a vote that would otherwise be required from Congress on whether to backstop the banks' depositors...." ~~~
~~~ Pranshu Verma & Tony Romm of the Washington Post: "... Silicon Valley Bank ... chief executive Greg Becker['s] sold $3.6 million worth of shares on Feb. 27, according to SEC filings. Becker is now coming under scrutiny, including from a personal acquaintance, Democratic California Rep. Ro Khanna, who said Sunday that Becker should give that money back. 'There should be a clawback of any of that money,' Khanna said in an interview with The Washington Post. 'It should be going to the depositors." MB: Gee, that's funny. The bank was about to fail & the CEO took his money out of it. Coincidence? Ha ha. ~~~
~~~ Annabelle Timsit of the Washington Post: "HSBC has agreed to buy Silicon Valley Bank's subsidiary in the United Kingdom for 1 pound -- just over $1 -- under a deal facilitated by the British government and the Bank of England following the U.S. lender's collapse."
Marie: Yesterday I opined that mike pence's decision to diss Donald Trump's January 6 attempt to, well, "hang mike pence" was a calculated one: ~~~
~~~ Adam Wren of Politico: Pence's "advisers ... believed [his comments condemning Trump at Saturday's Gridiron dinner] would help Pence win over his most skeptical audience these days: Washington insiders and journalists who have given him short shrift in the early 2024 primary.... While the Gridiron remarks were harsh, they were not done with a camera rolling -- though Pence's advisers disputed that played into their calculation in attacking Trump.... Pence will campaign in New Hampshire on Thursday and Iowa on Saturday...."
Azi Paybarah of the Washington Post: "House Speaker Kevin McCarthy on Sunday again defended giving access to more than 40,000 hours of security video from the U.S. Capitol when it was attacked on Jan. 6, 2021, to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, who recently used that video to describe most of the people who entered the building that day as 'peaceful, orderly and meek' individuals who 'revere' the Capitol. Appearing on Fox News's 'Sunday Morning Futures' [with Sidney Powell fangirl Maria Bartiromo,] McCarthy said he will 'slowly roll out to every individual news agency' access to the same trove, so 'they can come see the tapes as well.'... The siege led to at least seven deaths, resulted in assaults on at least 174 police officers and caused more than $2.7 billion in losses, according to a recent report from the Government Accountability Office." A Guardian story is here. ~~~
** ~~~ Steve M. "... Kevin McCarthy still intends to play stall ball on the release of the January 6 security videos.... It's disgraceful that our supine mainstream media hasn't been angrily demanding access to these tapes.... McCarthy is normalizing the idea of selective access to information generated by public agencies.... McCarthy compounded the offense to democracy by trotting out a whataboutist lie about January 6 that just won't die: 'McCarthy also wielded a common rightwing talking point, likening January 6 -- a violent assault linked to nine deaths including law enforcement suicides -- to protests for racial justice after the police murder of George Floyd in summer 2020 which sometimes turned violent [Guardian citation],'... McCarthy said there was 'nobody arrested' [in the Floyd protests].... 'A June 22, 2020, article from The Washington Post tallied over 14,000 arrests made since May 27. The Hill reported over 17,000 arrests had been made in the first two weeks of protests' [USA Today citation].'... 'An Associated Press review of court documents in more than 300 federal cases stemming from the protests ... shows that dozens of people charged have been convicted of serious crimes and sent to prison' [AP citation]... none of the George Floyd protests threatened our system of government. The Capitol rioters threatened to overturn a democratic election."
Beyond the Beltway
Colorado. Kyle Melnick of the Washington Post: "Colorado's Republican Party voted in former state representative Dave Williams, a 2020 election-results denier, as its leader Saturday. Williams is known for suing to get the anti-Joe Biden phrase 'Let's go Brandon' added to his name on voters' ballots last year. Williams defeated six other candidates after delivering a speech in which he promised to be a 'wartime' leader for the Colorado GOP, a two-year role."
Way Beyond
Ukraine, et al. The Washington Post's live briefing of developments Monday in Russia's war on Ukraine are here: "Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said his forces are continuing to inflict heavy losses on attacking Russian fighters in the besieged front-line city of Bakhmut, as Kremlin-backed mercenaries concede the fight is growing more difficult as they approach the city center, bombarded by artillery and tank fire. Ukraine killed 'more than 1,100' Russian fighters in Bakhmut in the past week, Zelensky said in his nightly address, while another 1,500 were out of action because of the severity of their injuries. Russian equipment and ammunition depots were also destroyed, he said."
News Lede
Washington Post: "Eight people have died and several more are believed to be missing after two fishing boats capsized late Saturday near the coast of San Diego as part of what city and federal authorities suspect was a human smuggling operation.... Agencies including U.S. Customs and Border Protection, U.S. Coast Guard, local police and state and city lifeguards all responded. When rescuers rushed to the scene, they found eight bodies on the beach and in the water. Both boats were capsized, while several life jackets and fuel barrels were strewn. No survivors were found, leaving several individuals unaccounted for, including [a] woman who had called 911."
Share Article
Reader Comments (10)
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/13/opinion/supreme-court-conservatives-standing.html
A thoughtful analysis of legal "standing," and where the author thinks the conservatives robes on the SCOTUS might stand on the subject when deciding the student loan case.
Wherever it's convenient, he believes.
Marie,
Concerning the half pence’s apostasy, I was of the same mind as soon as I read that little mikey, obsequious, butt-kissing little mikey who was too terrified to tell the truth about what Trump was planning on Jan. 6 is all of a sudden a warrior for democracy and justice: consultants told him what to say.
And where. And how. No cameras, no mob of armed MAGA morons ready to strap him into a tumbril, no Qanon boogeymen to send him scurrying behind Mother’s skirts.
Some $1,000 an hour political fixit guys wrote his lines for him and told him that continuing on as Trump’s little puppy dog would get him exactly two votes in whatever contest he envisions: Mother’s and his own. And Mother’s wasn’t a lock.
Here’s the thing. Most of these Party of Traitor lemmings have no moral core, no guiding deontological ethics. Their sole raison d’etre* is power. Well, and money, of course. When lying on the stump doesn’t work anymore, you get a nice seven figure bump to go on Fox and lie.
But proof of little mikey’s personal deontology would have come with a follow up to his brave announcement that Fatty will be held accountable, a coda in which he said “…and it starts with me. I’m going to tell the grand jury everything I know about the plot to steal the election”.
Instead we got “I’m a brave little boy. No more questions”.
They’re all fatuous frauds. Devoid of the sliverest of tiny slivers of personal home grown morality. Their morality comes out of a bottle labeled “Career Saving Political Consultants”.
*Otto kept trying to change this to “raisin d’etre”. On further review, he might be right. Some of these monkeys are better described as being soft as grapes, shriveled in the sun.
We’re gonna be hearing a ton over the next few days and weeks about this Silicon Valley Bank collapse. The big reason now, from the right is…the bank was too woke. TOO WOKE. Seriously? This is the theory of one of the recipients of My Kevin’s invertebrate kowtowing to the loons, Kentucky’s favorite know-nothing drooler, James Comer.
Did his stunning announcement that purports to traitor-splain the bank collapse come with anything else? Ya know, facts, figures, some indication that he himself is steeped in the ins and outs of the banking industry? Nope. Just…”Woke! Aieee!!”
Well hey, why didn’t you say so? That makes perfect sense.
If your lobotomy stitches are still fresh.
What you won’t hear is anything about the culpability of Trump and his Republican dereg cheerleaders who rolled back banking regulations that would have prevented this collapse. Neither will you hear much about how Trump fan Peter Thiel set the withdrawal fire by calling all his rich friends telling them to pull all their money out, right now, today.
And, once again, Democrats are left to clean up the mess left by idiot right-wing demagogues, something for which they’ll be roundly excoriated by the assholes, like Trump, who helped cause this collapse.
And you can take that to the bank.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/03/11/business/dealbook/silicon-valley-bank-collapse.html
Akhilleus,
Yeah, not "woke" at all. Some would say asleep at the (interest rate) switch.
From the Weird History Files
So this weekend, I heard about a completely whacko plot to, um, soften Hitler, so to speak (dunno about you kids, but I’ve always thought Hitler was already pretty fucking soft).
NPR’s news quiz/comedy show, Wait, Wait, Don’t Tell Me, has a segment in which the panel of comics invents some cockamamie sounding news reports, only one of which is true. A guest caller has to pick the right one.
The winner this weekend? A plot to turn Hitler into a woman!! (Can’t you hear the haters screaming about a trans Hitler?) I am not even kidding. This was a thing. Some bright bulbs in British intelligence came up with a plan to put estrogen in Hitler’s food. How this would be accomplished, they didn’t say. But the thinking was that by feminizing Adolf Hitler, he would be kinder and gentler. These guys clearly never envisioned a Bobo or an MTG. Geez…that would have been waaaay worse.
But the hoped for outcomes would be, in addition to that kinder, gentler thing, that he could grow boobs and lose that stupid mustache. These guys never imagined that a Hitler going bra shopping might become just a tad unhinged? I mean more unhinged?
Anyway, I wouldn’t suggest this be tried on Trump. He’s already around the bend. Adding some MTG to the mix, he’d be even loonier.
As historians go, Herodotus would have loved this one. He always had the best stories.
Not only is DiJiT around the bend, but his man-boobs need no more encouragement from an estrogen regimen. And his voice is already in the upper registers.
I think it was that Floriduh governor who once said that gays are
putting estrogen in the water supply to turn everyone gay.
Maybe that's why trump got in the bottled water business?
Or was it just the Disney water supply? I should google it.
@Patrick. True enough. Still, let's hope Trump's doctor (maybe Ronnie Jackson) doesn't try to render Trump more manly with shots of testosterone.
In the meantime, I'm surprised those geniuses who came up with spiking the beer at the ratskeller with estrogen didn't get the Nobel Prize. Hitler with PMS. Terrific.
@Forrest Morris: You were close. According to CNN: "An appointee [Ron Peri] to Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis’ new oversight board in control of Disney’s special tax district called homosexuality 'evil' last year and shared a baseless conspiracy theory that tap water could be making more people gay."
I am living proof that Peri is partially right (totally wrong about the "evil" thing of course). I drink well-water mostly, and I'm straight. So there ya go. I could hook up to the town's water system in the house I'm building, so then I would get lots of girlfriends, which could be a good thing that would bring me great joy in my later years.
Come to think of it, I plan to make the new house my summer house and the cottage with the well-water my summer house, so I could have boyfriends in winter & girlfriends in summer; thus, the best of two worlds and a more interesting life.
@Marie
I've been told it's nice to have options.
Some might call it "freedom."