Magpie

Wednesday, April 18, 2012

The new place.

It's over here.

| | Posted by Magpie at 1:49 PM | Get permalink

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Look for me at Pacific Views.

Yes, it's been a long time since my last post here. But no, I haven't been completely silent.

I've been posting from time to time at Pacific Views. Look for new stuff there.

| | Posted by Magpie at 11:49 AM | Get permalink

Sunday, October 19, 2008

How come this story isn't on the front pages of US newspapers?

From today's UK Guardian:

Financial workers at Wall Street's top banks are to receive pay deals worth more than $70bn (£40bn), a substantial proportion of which is expected to be paid in discretionary bonuses, for their work so far this year - despite plunging the global financial system into its worst crisis since the 1929 stock market crash, the Guardian has learned.
Staff at six banks including Goldman Sachs and Citigroup are in line to pick up the payouts despite being the beneficiaries of a $700bn bail-out from the US government that has already prompted criticism. The government's cash has been poured in on the condition that excessive executive pay would be curbed.
Pay plans for bankers have been disclosed in recent corporate statements. [...]
The sums that continue to be spent by Wall Street firms on payroll, payoffs and, most controversially, bonuses appear to bear no relation to the losses incurred by investors in the banks. Shares in Citigroup and Goldman Sachs have declined by more than 45% since the start of the year. Merrill Lynch and Morgan Stanley have fallen by more than 60%. JP MorganChase fell 6.4% and Lehman Brothers has collapsed.

Why oh why am I not the least bit surprised to find out that the bailout is going directly into the personal pockets of the same people who made the bailout (allegedly) necessary?

Read the whole thing here.

Thanks to The Sideshow for the tip.

Labels: Bailout, Corruption and Graft, Economy, Politics as usual, Wall Street

| | Posted by Magpie at 1:39 PM | Get permalink

Sunday, September 28, 2008

Five reasons to vote against the latest version of the Wall Street bailout plan.

David Sirota's got em.

Pay particular attention to #4. If I were a member of the House or Senate, I'd think at least twice before I voted for the bailout.

Labels: Bailout, Economy, Elections, Politics, Wall Street

| | Posted by Magpie at 4:22 PM | Get permalink

Will the Wall Street bailout fix the ailing US economy?

Nope, says an excellent piece by McClatchy's Kevin Hall:

A principal risk now for the American economy is that the spate of bad news will feed on itself, creating a downward spiral.
For example, the wave of bank failures and mergers is sure to lead to large layoffs in the financial sector, and already computer makers like Dell and Hewlett Packard have announced job cuts in the expectation of a worsening sales environment.
As the number of jobless grows, the number of delinquent home loans grows larger. And defaults on car loans rise. More consumers will fall behind on credit card payments, restaurants will shutter their doors because of fewer diners, and fewer restaurants will cut demand for farm and processed food products. It's all inter-linked and becomes a spiral.

Kinda like the spiral already caused by the collapse of the housing bubble. Which, of course, many of the architects of the current bailout plan didn't see as a problem.

You can read the full article here.

Labels: Bailout, Economy, Incompetence, Wall Street

| | Posted by Magpie at 3:57 PM | Get permalink

Saturday, September 27, 2008

Where was Sarah, hmmm?

Here's the latest sign that Republicans know what a disaster Sarah Palin is as a VP choice: While Dem VP nominee Joe Biden was all over the media after last night's debate, praising Obama's performance, Sarah Palin wasn't anywhere to be seen.

Palin's absence from the debate postmortems isn't all that surprising, given this item from progressive radio host Ed Schultz:

The campaign has held a mock debate and a mock press conference; both are being described as "disastrous." One senior McCain aide was quoted as saying, "What are we going to do?" The McCain people want to move this first debate to some later, undetermined date, possibly never. People on the inside are saying the Alaska Governor is "clueless."

This magpie is, of course, anxiously awaiting Palin's performance in next week's VP debate—allowing, of course, that the Republicans don't find a way to keep her from fulfilling her obligation.

Labels: Elections, GOP, Incompetence, McCain, Politics, Sarah Palin

| | Posted by Magpie at 11:54 AM | Get permalink

Make the bastards pay for their own bailout.

It doesn't take an MBA or degree in economics to figure out that people in the US are pissed off at the possibility that they'll have to shell out hundreds of billions of dollars to bail out the big financial institutions responsible for the current economic disaster. Given this, you'd think that the Dems could come up with a response to the Dubya administration's bailout plan that relieves the average taxpayer from paying the costs of any bailout, wouldn't you? But no. Democratic leaders in Congress are instead settling for minor tweaks to Dubya's bailout—tweaks that leave most of us holding the financial bag.

This magpie isn't a financial genius, but I've been paying attention to proposed solutions that some really smart people are making. Here are some of those ideas:

Put a 0.25% tax on the transfer of stocks, bonds, and other financial instruments. According to estimates I've seen, this could raise US $160 billion each year—enough by itself to pay for a bailout on the scale of what Dubya's administration is proposing. This tax should be made permanent.
For at least five years, put a 10% income tax surcharge on any individual whose pre-tax income is US $500,000 or more.
Instead of lowering the capital gains tax (as proposed by right-wing Republicans), add a 25% surcharge to the existing tax for any individuals whose pre-tax income is US $500,000 or more. This capital gains surcharge should last at least five years.
Lastly, impose a windfall profits tax on the obscene profits being made by the oil industry. No, this isn't directly related to the bailout. It's a good idea, though, and one that would be broadly supported—especially if the proceeds from this tax were used to help taxpayers meet the high cost of heating oil and gasoline.

This 'modest proposal' to the Democrats puts the cost of the bailout on the people and institutions responsible for—and who have reaped financial benefits from—our current economic problems. Just as importantly, it prevents the Republicans from tying Barack Obama and the Democrats to Dubya's unpopular bailout plan.

What do you think?

Labels: Bailout, Economy, Politics, Wall Street

| | Posted by Magpie at 11:51 AM | Get permalink

Tuesday, April 1, 2008

No fooling.

Fafblog is back.

Yipppeeeee!!!!!

| | Posted by Magpie at 3:36 PM | Get permalink

Monday, March 31, 2008

Testing

This is just to see how posting via email works.

| | Posted by Magpie at 9:43 PM | Get permalink

Happy birthday!

To Magpie! It's this blog's 5th blogiversary!

I was going to post a flurry of stuff today, but my 'real job' interfered. So it's a poorly celebrated blogiversary, but at least I'm still here.

Thanks to all the usual suspects, and I promise to get back up to speed soon.

Labels: Blogiversary

| | Posted by Magpie at 9:16 PM | Get permalink

Sunday, March 30, 2008

Nobody seems to know much about this ...

And some folks think it's 'creepily lifelike' and 'awesome'. But I think it's just plain creepy. I mean, just imagine Karl Rove working this technology.

(Oh, maybe Karl Rove has already been working this technology.)

Go look for yourself.

Labels: 1984, Creepiness

| | Posted by Magpie at 1:12 PM | Get permalink

Monday, March 24, 2008

Not dead yet.

Really.

This magpie's time away from the blogosphere will end Real Soon Now. Stay tuned.

Labels: Housekeeping

| | Posted by Magpie at 8:14 PM | Get permalink

Friday, September 28, 2007

Sorry for being so scarce lately.

I spent a bunch of time trying to land a contract job. And now that I have the job, I've been too busy to blog. Plus both of my computers had catastrophic hardware failures on the same day, and it took five days to get even one of them back again.

Hopefully I'll be able to slip in a few Magpie posts soon.

Labels: Housekeeping

| | Posted by Magpie at 1:02 PM | Get permalink