TARP money for auto bailout

It makes perfect sense actually. The idea of TARP was to get the credit markets flowing again. Instead, the banks have taken our tax money and hoarded it, exacerbating the problem instead of improving it. Why not just skips the banks and loan the TARP money directly? Now whether loaning it to a possibly losing proposition like GM is a good idea remains to be seen, but clearly giving it to the banks has already proven to be a waste. I'd rather see the bankers that caused the housing crisis (and thereby the credit crisis) in the first place in the unemployment line than auto workers. And Rick Wagoner and Bob "global warming is a crock" Lutz too: they've gotta go.

That is all.

Where our bailout tax money is going

Less than a week after the federal government offered an $85 billion bailout to insurance giant AIG, the company held a week-long retreat for its executives at the luxury St. Regis Resort in Monarch Beach, Calif., running up a tab of $440,000, Rep. Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) said today at the the opening of a House committee hearing about the near-failure of the insurance giant.

Washington Post

Memo to Wall Street:

Brilliant

Even in the 1950s people became assholes behind the wheel.

40 years ago today

The more things change, the more they stay the same.

Cross us and we will crush you

“If anyone thinks that they can kill our citizens and escape unpunished, we will never allow this. If anyone tries this again, we will come out with a crushing response,” Mr Medvedev said, according to Reuters.

“We have all the necessary resources, political, economic and military. If anyone had any illusions about this, they have to abandon them."

Sound familiar?

Best buds

"I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straight forward and trustworthy and we had a very good dialogue. I was able to get a sense of his soul."


Georgian woman in front of one of several apartment buildings hit by Russian airstrikes in Gori (outside of disputed South Ossetia). Russia is pressing their attacks from Georgian South Ossetia into Georgia proper.

Justice Dept. offers guide on getting away with torture

Here's a story about the Justice Department's handy guide for the CIA on how to torture and get away with it. Basically, between the wink wink nudge nudge it says to me that officers can tell the interrogators that it's not torture, and therefore there's no intent to torture on the part of the interrogators, and it's all good. "To violate the statute, an individual must have the specific intent to inflict severe pain or suffering. Because specific intent is an element of the offense, the absence of specific intent negates the charge of torture. . . . Although an honest belief need not be reasonable, such a belief is easier to establish where there is a reasonable basis for it." Clearly the Bush administration knew that what they were doing was illegal, and thus felt the need to issue this memo to try to skirt the law. No matter whether it's morally wrong or would provide reliable information of course.

Even Bush can't take away habeas corpus

Top court allows Guantanamo prisoners' appeals

Unbelievable

Another military regime orders out aid workers so that their own citizens can slowly die of hunger and disease, in order to maintain their hold on power. In this case it also allows the regime to massacre people without aid workers being able to witness it. How do these people live with themselves? I can't fathom how people can be so truly evil.

A catastrophe of monumental proportions

What's happening in Burma right now is becoming way worse than anything that's happened in recent history, in large part because the military junta there is actively preventing aid from reaching their own citizens in desperate, desperate need. Supplies are being stolen from aid packages for the military, and rotten provision are being substituted and handed out to the smallest fraction of those in need. It's too bad they don't have oil. What kind of human being does this to his fellow citizens?

The U.N. said Myanmar faces a catastrophe of monumental proportions unless relief efforts reach the scale of the Indian Ocean tsunami, as soldiers barred foreign aid workers from reaching cyclone survivors in hard-hit areas.

Supplies were piling up at Yangon's main airport — which does not even have equipment to lift cargo off Boeing 747s. It took 200 Burmese volunteers to unload a plane carrying more than 60 tons of relief supplies, including school tents, said the United Arab Emirates aid group, Dubai Cares.

State television said the death toll from Nargis Cyclone stood at 34,273, with 27,838 missing. The United Nations says the actual death toll could be between 62,000 and 100,000.

Survivors were packed into Buddhist monasteries or camping in the open, drinking water contaminated by fecal matter, with dead bodies and animal carcasses floating around. Food and medicine were scarce.

The international Red Cross said its delegation in Myanmar found an urgent need for more medical supplies in the Irrawaddy delta.

"During the cyclone, many people held onto trees to avoid being blown away," Red Cross official Bridget Gardner said. "They were almost 'sand blasted' by dirt and saltwater; (many) lost the top layer of their skin and it's important that these injuries are treated before infections can set in."

The few foreigners experienced in managing catastrophes who have succeeded in reaching the delta in recent days have been forced to return to Yangon. Checkpoints manned by just two officers Monday had 10 or more on Tuesday.

Some victims and aid workers, meanwhile, said in many cases spoiled or poor-quality food was reaching survivors.

A longtime foreign resident of Yangon told The Associated Press angry government officials were complaining that high-energy biscuits rushed in on the World Food Program's first flights were sent to a military warehouse.

They were exchanged for what the officials described as "tasteless and low-quality" biscuits produced by the Industry Ministry to be handed out to cyclone victims, he said on condition of anonymity because identifying himself could endanger him.

People suck

Twenty cyclists, including one Olympic hopeful, hurt after conflict with irate driver in Australia.

Her father, 1984 Olympic gold medalist Kevin Nichols, said the cyclists were traveling at about 60 kilometres (37 miles) per hour when the car began swerving into the pack.

"He sped ahead and pulled in front of the pack. I though, 'Uh oh' and began warning riders around me to slow down," he told The Daily Telegraph.

"Then suddenly he slammed the brakes on and it was too late for anyone to get out of the way."

Hi Nancy

Great post on the Surly blog.