Strong banks will be allowed to repay federal bailout funds, but only if such a move passes a test to determine whether it is in the national economic interest, the Financial Times reported on Sunday, citing a senior U.S. administration official.

The report said banks that had plenty of capital and demonstrated an ability to raise fresh capital from the market should, in principle, be able to repay government funds.

But the judgment would be made in the context of the wider economic interest, the report said.

The unnamed official told the Financial Times the government had three basic tests. It needed first to “make sure the system is stable.” Second, to not create “incentives for more deleveraging which would deepen the recession.” Third, to make sure the system had enough capital to “provide credit to support the recovery.”

The comments come as Goldman Sachs Group, JPMorgan Chase & Co and other banks are pressing to be allowed to repay their bail-out funds.

The report also cited the official as saying former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson was right to treat banks the same way in late 2008, at the peak of the crisis, but it was now necessary to differentiate more between institutions.

Stronger ones should be encouraged to raise more capital, while the government would target its interventions to support weaker ones, the official told the paper.

found here
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2009/04/20/report-banks-repaying-bailout-funds-face-national-test/

Can anyone tell me whats the definision of ‘the national economic interest?
as I always thought that in the system that we live, the market decided what was in its econonmic interest

as for Old Harry I’m not allowed to share my feeling on that numbnuts, as per the rules, ‘NO Profanity”

Although to me it feels like about 5 years.

Disengenuosity may or may not be a word, but you get my drift.

It describes Harry Reid to a T.

Speaking of which, Reid has raised 2.2 mil already in the first quarter for his re-election campaign in 2010. I can only imagine the special interests (casinos?) who have the (hopefully erstwhile) senator in firmly in their hip pocket.

Enquiring minds need to know. And his name was popular on tea partiers’ signs.

You have got to love it.

Obama could still blow it.

He’s done quite well raking in the cash from mob-backed real estate deals.

Regarding the banks repaying the bailout money; Imagine if a credit card company said “you can’t pay off your balance, we need the cash from your interest payment and fees.”

disgusting.

Story link:

Leading scientist Stephen Hawking is “very ill” in hospital, his employer Cambridge University has said.

A spokesman said Professor Hawking was undergoing tests at Addenbrooke’s Hospital, Cambridge.

The spokesman said the 67-year-old, who has motor neurone disease, had “been unwell for a couple of weeks”.

Here’s hoping that one of the greatest minds of our time can pull through this and make it out of the hospital soon.

It only looks that way, and do not question their patriotism. That’s reserved for Tax Day protesters.

you should have won for your defiance of the crowd and the obvious attempt to push an agenda. It is a shame that you almost pandered to the audience, but in the end you exercised what make a strong woman, your opinion and belief. You are one hot babe in my book, sorry Eve, but she is.

The rant, contra factual opine, or providing some measure of excuse, mentally challenged outburst went something like this;

“The Kid Rock video supporting the National Guard is a prime example of propaganda because everybody knows we are not doing anything to reconstruct the country or help the people and is another example of baseless propoaganda and lies.”

Really? Let’s start with some facts like these from the Army Core of Engineers in Iraq. You do remember facts- right?

Who we are:
• GRD is joint – comprised of Civilians, Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Contractors
•More than 400 Iraqis work directly for GRD as contractors
• Nearly 75% of contracts are awarded to small, Iraqi-owned businesses, and many supplies are purchased through local companies, stimulating economic growth in Iraq
• $183 million in projects contracted to Iraqi women-owned businesses
• GRD projects employ on average 17,000 – 20,000 Iraqis
What we do:
• More than 4,400 projects complete, valued at nearly $7 billion
• Electricity—U.S. and Iraqi efforts adding 6,000 megawatts to the grid
• Oil—3 million barrels per day capacity met
• Public Works & Water—Water/sewer projects directly benefit more than 5 million people
• Medical facilities—treating millions of people/year
• Schools—more than 1,100 schools serving hundreds of thousands of children
• Transportation—hundreds of roads, railroads, aviation and port projects
• Security/Justice—hundreds of border posts, entry facilities, courthouses, fire stations, etc.

As of 01 Mar 09, GRD has:
• 4,497 projects completed – construction cost of $6.8 billion; program cost (construction + administration) of $7.2 billion
• 344 projects ongoing (started not completed and awarded not started) – construction cost of $1.8 billion; program cost of $2.0 billion

Oh, and the Stock Market in Iraq received a major upgrade yesterday.

More “baseless” propaganda at the following, asshat.
http://www.mnf-iraq.com/images/stories/reconstruction_report/reconstruction_report_feb_2009.pdf

Somewhere in upstate NY there is a teacher reading DKOS, finger up her nose.

By the way, my kid is smarter than you.

The rant, contra factual opine, or providing some measure of excuse, mentally challenged outburst went something like this;

“The Kid Rock video supporting the National Guard is a prime example of propaganda because everybody knows we are not doing anything to reconstruct the country or help the people and is another example of baseless propoaganda and lies.”

Really? Let’s start with some facts like these from the Army Core of Engineers in Iraq. You do remember facts- right?

Who we are:
• GRD is joint – comprised of Civilians, Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen and Contractors
•More than 400 Iraqis work directly for GRD as contractors
• Nearly 75% of contracts are awarded to small, Iraqi-owned businesses, and many supplies are purchased through local companies, stimulating economic growth in Iraq
• $183 million in projects contracted to Iraqi women-owned businesses
• GRD projects employ on average 17,000 – 20,000 Iraqis
What we do:
• More than 4,400 projects complete, valued at nearly $7 billion
• Electricity—U.S. and Iraqi efforts adding 6,000 megawatts to the grid
• Oil—3 million barrels per day capacity met
• Public Works & Water—Water/sewer projects directly benefit more than 5 million people
• Medical facilities—treating millions of people/year
• Schools—more than 1,100 schools serving hundreds of thousands of children
• Transportation—hundreds of roads, railroads, aviation and port projects
• Security/Justice—hundreds of border posts, entry facilities, courthouses, fire stations, etc.

As of 01 Mar 09, GRD has:
• 4,497 projects completed – construction cost of $6.8 billion; program cost (construction + administration) of $7.2 billion
• 344 projects ongoing (started not completed and awarded not started) – construction cost of $1.8 billion; program cost of $2.0 billion

Oh, and the Stock Market in Iraq received a major upgrade yesterday.

More “baseless” propaganda at the following, asshat.
http://www.mnf-iraq.com/images/stories/reconstruction_report/reconstruction_report_feb_2009.pdf

Somewhere in upstate NY there is a teacher reading DKOS, finger up her nose.

By the way, my kid is smarter than you.

I was going to write a diary entry about this over the weekend but I didn’t have the time. Short version: high-tax states like California and New York are tired of people buying things over the Internet and thus not paying their exorbitant sales taxes, so they want Congress to impose state sales taxes on all Internet purchases:

If a little-known but influential alliance of state politicians, large retailers, and tax collectors have their way, the days of tax-free Internet shopping may be nearly over.

A bill expected to be introduced in the U.S. Congress as early as Monday would rewrite the ground rules for mail order and Internet sales by eliminating what its supporters view as a “loophole” that, in many cases, allows Americans to shop over the Internet without paying sales taxes.

Currently, Americans who shop over the Internet from out-of-state vendors aren’t always required to pay sales taxes at the time of purchase. Californians buying books from Amazon.com or cameras from Manhattan’s B&H Photo, for example, won’t pay sales taxes at checkout time that they would if shopping at a local mall.

…

The final legislation is expected to be introduced by Sen. Mike Enzi, a Wyoming Republican, and Rep. Bill Delahunt, a Massachusetts Democrat, who have championed similar proposals in the past. Delahunt’s office on Wednesday confirmed he was interested; Enzi’s did not respond.

On the other side are the Direct Marketing Association, the Electronic Retailing Association, and companies including eBay, L.L. Bean, and Overstock.com. One of their biggest objections to the idea of collecting sales taxes on out-of-state shipments is the dizzying complexity of state laws.

Take candy, which would seem to be a straightforward item to tax. It isn’t. During a 2003 discussion of tax policy, a representative of Indiana, James Turner, noted that a proposed definition of candy would have taxed the Milky Way Midnight candy bar but not the original Milky Way bar.

But further investigation showed that Turner’s counter-proposal would have treated “certain flavors of Pop Tarts” and Cookies and Twix Crunchy Cookie Bars as candy–but not Cookies and Snickers Crunchy Cookie Bars. Peanut butter Girl Scout cookies would be candy, but Thin Mints or Caramel deLites would be classified as food.

Bizarre distinctions like this, coupled with the existence of more than 7,000 different tax agencies, are why the U.S. Supreme Court ruled that out-of-state retailers generally couldn’t be obligated to collect sales taxes unless Congress changes the law. The justices noted in a 1992 case called Quill v. North Dakota: “Congress is now free to decide whether, when, and to what extent the States may burden interstate mail order concerns with a duty to collect use taxes.”

One exception to that rule is a legal concept called “nexus,” which means a company can be forced to collect sales taxes if it has a sufficient business presence. If Amazon had an office in California, it already would be collecting sales tax for Golden State residents. (Another exception is the sale of cigarettes, which is covered by the Jenkins Act.)

I don’t know what Enzi is thinking, but he needs to learn that small businesses in Wyoming that sell on the Internet would, under his law, be forced to learn and comply with the sales tax laws in the 45 states that collect sales taxes, including all the local taxes and particular rules of each of those states. Since this will be a prohibitively large obstacle, I foresee small business traffic on the Web dropping off drastically. Just the thing we need in the teeth of a recession!

I just wish I’d found out about this before the Tea Parties last week. Don’t Tax Our Internet!

contrary to what we heard in November.

“LOS ANGELES — The 71-member board of the Screen Actors Guild has voted to recommend acceptance of the two-year contract offered by the Alliance of Motion Picture and Television Producers.
The recommendation was approved by a narrow margin of 53 to 46 percent, almost one year after the two sides began talks.”

Source: http://www.ktla.com/landing_news/?SAG-Board-Votes-to-Accept-New-Contract-w=1&blockID=220143&feedID=171

Dear Leader ZerO appears on TV daily, Speeches here, speeches there. All his speeches are variations of the same thing. At first I thought it was simply because he was useing the tried and true formula from his campaign speech. The variations of his speech he has been repeating since his community organizer days that jolted him to national forefront at the 2004 Dems convention. But he is President now, he does not need to campaign now. But then thinking about it, he is an empty suit, all he has is his ability to give good speech (with a teleprompter). And his speechs include so many errors. Like his Mexican speech repeating the ’90% of the guns in the mexican drug wars come from America’ misfact. So now I know his intent and his inspiration for his speeches.

William James (1842-1910) The father of modern Psychology “There’s nothing so absurd that if you repeat it often enough, people will believe it.”

“A lie told often enough becomes truth” Vladimir Lenin.

Per Drudge

The former VP is accusing the Obama administration of cherry picking the memos that were released.

Reported quote from former Vice President Dick Cheney on Hannity tonight in a two part interview FNC 9:00EST.

“One of the things that I find a little bit disturbing about this recent disclosure is they put out the legal memos, the memos that the CIA got from the Office of Legal Counsel, but they didn’t put out the memos that showed the success of the effort. And there are reports that show specifically what we gained as a result of this activity. They have not been declassified.”

“I formally asked that they be declassified now. I haven’t announced this up until now, I haven’t talked about it, but I know specifically of reports that I read, that I saw that lay out what we learned through the interrogation process and what the consequences were for the country.”

“And I’ve now formally asked the CIA to take steps to declassify those memos so we can lay them out there and the American people have a chance to see what we obtained and what we learned and how good the intelligence was, as well as to see this debate over the legal opinions.”

taking bets tonight, episode prior to the season finale. Shocking twist, garofalo’s character is another one of the moles within the FBI, that is my take, now if this doesn’t happen the show will continue to seem contrived.