Showing posts with label Press Conference. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Press Conference. Show all posts

Friday, March 6, 2009

Geithner's choice for deputy secretary withdraws

International Herald Tribune - ?12 hours ago? AP WASHINGTON: Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner's top pick to be his deputy has withdrawn from consideration. Annette Nazareth, a former senior staffer and commissioner with the Securities and Exchange Commission, withdrew after several interviews ...

At the SEC, Nazareth was a driving force in urging a merger of the NASD, an industry-funded regulator of U.S. brokerages, with most of the New York Stock Exchange’s regulatory arm. The SEC approved the consolidation, which formed the Financial Industry Regulatory Authority, in July 2007. That group has come under fire on Capitol Hill for not spotting the $50 billion Ponzi scheme allegedly masterminded by Bernard Madoff.

Before becoming a commissioner in 2005, Nazareth was the staff member in charge of overseeing brokerage firms, market surveillance and stock exchanges. She led the division in 2004 when it designed a program to monitor whether Wall Street’s biggest securities firms had adequate capital and liquidity.
SEC Inspector General David Kotz faulted the program in a September report, saying the SEC failed to respond to “numerous, potential red flags” at Bear Stearns Cos., which collapsed a year ago. Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. went bust in September.

Prior to joining the Commission staff, Ms. Nazareth held several positions in the financial services industry. As a Managing Director of Smith Barney from 1997 to 1998, she was deputy head of the capital markets legal group. As a Senior Vice President and Senior Counsel of Lehman Brothers, Ms. Nazareth was the chief legal advisor to the fixed income division from 1994 to 1997. From 1986 to 1994, she served as Managing Director and General Counsel of Mabon Securities Corp. and its predecessor business, Mabon, Nugent & Co.
Some might remember that Mabon, Nugent & Company invested 40 million dollars in the failing Global Motors that had brought us the famed Yugo.

Remember that catchy phrase?

Yugo, I go, we all go!

Saturday, February 28, 2009

LAYOFFS AND DOWNSIZING....

Has anyone out there ever been laid-off or downsized?

I can tell you one group that never has suffered this indignity. Our ELECTED REPRESENTATIVES!!


When a company falls on difficult times, one of the things that seems to happen is they reduce their staff and workers. The remaining workers need to find ways to continue to do a good job or risk that their job would be eliminated as well. Wall street, and the media normally congratulate the CEO for making this type of "tough decision", and his board of directors gives him a big bonus.

Our government should not be immune from similar risks.

Therefore: Reduce the House of Representatives from the current 435 members to 218 members and Senate members from 100 to 50 (one per State). Also reduce remaining staff by 25%.

Accomplish this over the next 8 years. (two steps / two elections) and of course this would require some redistricting.

Some Yearly Monetary Gains Include:

$44,108,400 for elimination of base pay for congress. (267 members X $165,200 pay / member / yr.)

$97,175,000 for elimination of the above people's staff. (estimate $1.3 Million in staff per each member of the House, and $3 Million in staff per each member of the Senate every year)

$240,294 for the reduction in remaining staff by 25%.

$7,500,000,000 reduction in pork barrel ear-marks each year. (those members whose jobs are gone. Current estimates for total government pork earmarks are at $15 Billion / yr)

The remaining representatives would need to work smarter and would need to improve efficiencies. It might even be in their best interests to work together for the good of our country?

We may also expect that smaller committees might lead to a more efficient resolution of issues as well. It might even be easier to keep track of what your representative is doing.

Congress has more tools available to do their jobs than it had back in 1911 when the current number of representatives was established. (telephone, computers, cell phones to name a few)

Note:
Congress did not hesitate to head home when it was a holiday, when the nation needed a real fix to the economic problems. Also, there were 3 senators that were not doing their jobs while on the campaign trail for 18+ months) but were still accepting full pay. These facts alone support a reduction in senators & congress.

Summary of opportunity:

$ 44,108,400 reduction of congress members.

$282,100, 000 for elimination of the reduced house member staff.

$150,000,000 for elimination of reduced senate member staff.

$59,675,000 for 25% reduction of staff for remaining house members.

$37,500,000 for 25% reduction of staff for remaining senate members.

$7,500,000,000 reduction in pork added to bills by the reduction of congress members.

$8,073,383,400.00 per year, estimated total savings. (that's 8-BILLION just to start!)

Big business does these types of cuts all the time.

If Congresspersons were required to serve 20, 25 or 30 years (like everyone else) in order to collect retirement benefits there is no telling how much we would save. Now they get full retirement after serving only ONE term.

IF you are happy how the Congress spends our taxes, then just ignore this post. IF you are NOT at all happy, then I assume you know what to do.


Next Week: The Administration! What we might call the CEO and Staff!

A.M.


YOU'RE FIRED!

Thursday, February 26, 2009

CONSERVATISM vs. LIBERALISIM

History 101 (Crash course)

For those that don't know about history ... Here is a condensed version:

Humans originally existed as members of small bands of nomadic hunters/gatherers. They lived on deer in the mountains during the summer and would go to the coast and live on fish and lobster in the winter.

The two most important events in all of history were the invention of beer and the invention of the wheel. The wheel was invented to get man to the beer. These were the foundations of modern civilization and together were the catalyst for the splitting of humanity into two distinct subgroups:

1. Liberals (the gatherers)
2. Conservatives. (the hunters)

Once beer was discovered, it required grain and that was the beginning of agriculture. Neither the glass bottle nor aluminum can were invented yet, so while our early humans were sitting around waiting for them to be invented, they just stayed close to the brewery. That's how villages were formed.

Some men spent their days tracking and killing animals to B-B-Q at night while they were drinking beer. This was the beginning of what is known as the Conservative movement.

Other men who were weaker and less skilled at hunting learned to live off the Conservatives by showing up for the nightly B-B-Q's and doing the sewing, fetching, and hair dressing. This was the beginning of the Liberal movement.

Some of these liberal men eventually became known as girlie-men. Some noteworthy liberal achievements include the domestication of cats, the invention of group therapy, group hugs, and the concept of democratic voting to decide how to divide the meat and beer that conservatives provided.

Over the years Conservatives came to be symbolized by the largest, most powerful land animal on earth, the elephant. Liberals are symbolized by the jackass.

Modern liberals like imported beer (with lime added), but most prefer white wine or imported bottled water. They eat raw fish but like their beef well done. Sushi, tofu, and French food are standard liberal fare. Another interesting evolutionary side note: most of their women have higher testosterone levels than their men. Most government social workers, and employee's, personal injury lawyer's, journalists, dreamers in Hollywood and group therapists are liberals. Liberals invented the designated hitter rule because it wasn't fair to make the pitcher also bat.

Conservatives drink domestic beer, mostly Bud. They eat red meat and provide for their family & community. Conservatives are big-game hunters, rodeo cowboys, lumberjacks, construction workers, firemen, medical doctors, police officers, corporate executives, attorney’s, athletes, members of the military, airline pilots, teachers who believe in our founding fathers, and generally anyone who works productively. Conservatives who own companies hire other conservatives who want to work for a living.

Liberals produce little or nothing. They like to govern the producers and decide what to do with the production. Liberals believe Europeans are more enlightened than Americans. That is why most of the liberals remained in Europe when conservatives were coming to America . They crept in after the Wild West was tamed and created a business of trying to get something for nothing.

When a fishing boat comes to the dock, Liberals want to confiscate some of the fish to feed those who cannot fish. Conservatives want to hire people to fish and let them learn how to buy their own boat.

Here ends today's lesson in world history:

It should be noted that a Liberal may have a momentary urge to angrily respond to the above.

A Conservative will simply laugh and be so convinced of the absolute truth of this history that it will be forwarded immediately to other true believers and to more liberals just to tick them off.

And there you have it. Let your next action reveal your true self.

WE LIVE IN THE LAND OF THE FREE, ONLY BECAUSE OF THE BRAVE

Thanks to Ron V.

Note: This is NOT about Republicans and Democrats. It’s a distinction as to what you believe about the Constitution, National Defense, Personal Responsibility, Fiscal Responsibility, and most importantly Freedom!
Moderates are a melding of Republicans, Democrats, Libertarians, and all others that believe in the above ideas.

War was declared on the United States of America
2,724 days, 9 hours, 24 minutes and 12 seconds ago.

Conservatives want to end the war in victory for the people of Iraq, so they may also have personal and economic freedom.
Liberals choose to walk away, because it has just ‘taken too long”, AND there would be more money to spend on people in this country who want more hand-outs.

Wednesday, February 25, 2009

WAR ON TERROR IS OVER!

It must be over! We are releasing prisoners, getting out of Iraq and cutting Defense Spending. So, it’s OVER!

Barney Frank is calling on President Obama to stop the ‘wasteful defense spending’ so that we will be able to spend that money on extended social programs. I guess we will need them, if we bring back all the troops and put thousands of defense contractors and defense workers out of jobs. High paying jobs I might add.

What happened to President Hopeful Obama promising to track down Osama Bin-Laden and ‘take him out’?

But the big thing is it’s over.

I hope so.

I would hate to see this again.

Thursday, February 19, 2009

TORONTO PRESS CONFERENCE

TORONTO PRESS CONFERENCE

The Associated Press - 2 hours ago
WASHINGTON (AP) - Barack Obama's first foreign trip as president - a down-to-business visit with an essential economic ally, Canada - is light on time but loaded with touchy matters.

Mr. President! Mr. President! “I have a question!”
“Uh, Uh, oh very well, what is your name, newspaper and your question sir?” I don’t believe you are on my posed question list!”
“Joe Schmoo from the Northern Plains Dealer, Mr. President.
In light of the following world news stories, the American people would like to know who is tracking these items in the Administration
and what the plans are to act on them?”

COLOMBO (AFP) — The United Nations humanitarian chief John Holmes held talks with leaders in Sri Lanka on Thursday over the fate of thousands of civilians trapped in the island's war zone.

CNN International - 55 minutes ago
(CNN) -- Kyrgyzstan parliament has voted to close a base the US military uses as a route for troops and supplies heading into Afghanistan, a government spokesman said Thursday.

Aljazeera.net - 44 minutes ago
The United States says it plans to press Nato allies to deploy more troops in Afghanistan for securing the troubled country. Speaking ahead of a Nato meeting in Poland starting on Thursday, Robert Gates, the US secretary of defence, said Washington was ...

JAKARTA, Indonesia — Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton visited a development program in a working-class Jakarta neighborhood and spoke about her decision to work for the man who defeated her for the presidential nomination, on her second day in Indonesia before flying to Seoul. Mrs. Clinton said she put aside the disappointment of the election to take Mr. Obama’s job offer because, she said, “We have so many of the same views of what we should do in the world.”

The Associated Press - 2 hours ago
SEOUL, South Korea (AP) - North Korea stepped up its war rhetoric Thursday, saying its troops are "fully ready for an all-out confrontation" with South Korea ahead of a visit to Seoul by US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton.

GAZA, Feb. 19 (Xinhua) -- Israeli forces on Thursday wounded and arrested a Palestinian near the border in southeast Gaza Strip, Israeli sources said.

BBC News - 1 hour ago
The leader of the far-right Israeli Yisrael Beiteinu party has said he backs Likud leader Benjamin Netanyahu to form the next Israeli government.

“Joe, I appreciate your question. Of course this is being watched at all levels of this Administration. While Secretary Clinton, Speaker Pelosi, others, including myself are out of the country at the moment, we are not out of communication. All world situations are being monitored. Having said that, I have to spend the rest of this month curing the problems we have in this country. We have to act now and without hesitation. Once we have these problems solved, we will move onto the rest of the world next month. I hope that answers your question Joe.“ “Thank you!

(Robert, Let’s make sure this guy never gets inside the press room again. Now I have to change)