:: May 2009 ::
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NHL :: Playoff Tracking
[click for latest ESPN] [click for latest TSN]
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Leap in U.S. debt hits taxpayers with 12% more red ink
[usat] Taxpayers are on the hook for an extra $55,000 a household to cover rising federal commitments made just in the past year for retirement benefits, the national debt and other government promises, a USA TODAY analysis shows.
The 12% rise in red ink in 2008 stems from an explosion of federal borrowing during the recession, plus an aging population driving up the costs of Medicare and Social Security.
That's the biggest leap in the long-term burden on taxpayers since a Medicare prescription drug benefit was added in 2003.
The latest increase raises federal obligations to a record $546,668 per household in 2008, according to the USA TODAY analysis. That's quadruple what the average U.S. household owes for all mortgages, car loans, credit cards and other debt combined.
"We have a huge implicit mortgage on every household in America — except, unlike a real mortgage, it's not backed up by a house," says David Walker, former U.S. comptroller general, the government's top auditor.
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OK, out on a limb here, but we're calling tonight's Game 5 against Detroit for The Wings. Zif.
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Not all "Compelling Personal Stories" are Equal
[th] [...] McCaskill waved the high-hurdle card after being asked to defend Sotomayor's infamous statement at a 2001 University of California at Berkeley speech asserting brown-skin moral authority: "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." McCaskill actually denied that Sotomayor had made the remarks, then argued the words were taken out of context.
You want context? It's even worse than that sound bite. As National Journal legal analyst Stuart Taylor reported, "Sotomayor also referred to the cardinal duty of judges to be impartial as a mere 'aspiration because it denies the fact that we are by our experiences making different choices than others.' And she suggested that 'inherent physiological or cultural differences' may help explain why 'our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging.'" The full speech was reprinted in something called the Berkeley La Raza Law Journal. "La Raza" is Spanish for "The Race." Imagine if a white male Republican court nominee had published in a law review called "The Race."
The selective elevation of hardship as primary qualification demeans the entire judiciary. If personal turmoil makes one "incredibly qualified to pass judgment on some of the most important cases in our country," let's put reality-show couple Jon and Kate Gosselin on the bench. Millions of viewers tune in to watch their "compelling personal story" of life with eight children on television. It's a "richly, uniquely American experience" of facing obstacles and overcoming the odds. Get them robes and gavels, stat.
The lesson is that not all compelling personal stories are equal. McCaskill's assertion that "overcoming incredible odds" is "new to the courts" is ridiculous. Is she arguing that Thurgood Marshall, Felix Frankfurter and Sandra Day O'Connor faced lower hurdles than Sotomayor? And how about Clarence Thomas, a descendant of slaves who grew up in abject poverty in the South without a father? His crime, of course, was embracing the wrong ideology.
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N. Korea reportedly tests 2nd nuke device : Bolton Calls Bingo Only A Few Days Early
| Monday, May 25, 2009
[wt] North Korea on Monday appeared to have detonated a nuclear device, its second such test in three years.
The U.S. Geological Survey said it detected a magnitude-4.7 earthquake in the region, and South Korea's Cabinet convened in an emergency session, according to Yonhap, South Korea's semi-official newswire.
Yonhap also said the North had confirmed the test.
Trading on South Korea's stock market was briefly suspended when the benchmark index plunged after the news was reported.
Experts here have long been predicting a second nuclear test.
North Korea first detonated a nuclear device in October 2006, but the test is thought to have produced a lower explosive yield than had been hoped for.
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British banks revolt against Obama tax plan
[tuk] The decision, which would make it hard for Americans in London to open bank accounts and trade shares, is being discussed by executives at Britain's banks and brokers who say it could become too expensive to service American clients. The proposals, which were unveiled as part of the president's first budget, are designed to clamp-down on American tax evaders abroad. However bank bosses say they are being asked to take on the task of collecting American taxes at a cost and legal liability that are inexpedient.
Andy Thompson of Association of Private Client Investment Managers and Stockbrokers (APCIMS) said: "The cost and administration of the US tax regime is causing UK investment firms to consider disinvesting in US shares on behalf of their clients. This is not right and emphasises that the administration of a tax regime on a global scale without any flexibility damages the very economy it is trying to protect."
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Get Ready for Another North Korean Nuke Test
MAY 20, 2009 :: By JOHN R. BOLTON
[wsj] The curtain is about to rise again on the long-running nuclear tragicomedy, "North Korea Outwits the United States." Despite Kim Jong Il's explicit threats of another nuclear test, U.S. Special Envoy Stephen Bosworth said last week that the Obama administration is "relatively relaxed" and that "there is not a sense of crisis." They're certainly smiling in Pyongyang.
In October 2006, North Korea witnessed the incredible diplomatic success it could reap from belligerence. Its first nuclear test brought resumption of the six-party talks, which gave Kim Jong Il cover to further advance his nuclear program.
Now, Kim is poised to succeed again by following precisely the same script. In April, Pyongyang launched a Taepodong-2 missile, and National Security Council official Gary Samore recently confirmed that a second nuclear test is likely on the way. The North is set to try two U.S. reporters for "hostile acts." The state-controlled newspaper calls America "a rogue and a gangster." Kim recently expelled international monitors from the Yongbyon nuclear complex. And Pyongyang threatens to "start" enriching uranium -- a capacity it procured long ago.
A second nuclear test is by no means simply a propaganda ploy. Most experts believe that the 2006 test was flawed, producing an explosive yield well below even what the North's scientists had predicted. The scientific and military imperatives for a second test have been strong for over two years, and the potential data, experience and other advantages of further testing would be tremendous.
What the North has lacked thus far is the political opportunity to test without fatally jeopardizing its access to the six-party talks and the legitimacy they provide. Despite the State Department's seemingly unbreakable second-term hold over President Bush, another test after 2006 just might have ended the talks.
So far, the North faces no such threat from the Obama administration. Despite Pyongyang's aggression, Mr. Bosworth has reiterated that the U.S. is "committed to dialogue" and is "obviously interested in returning to a negotiating table as soon as we can." This is precisely what the North wants: America in a conciliatory mode, eager to bargain, just as Mr. Bush was after the 2006 test.
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Obama in Bush Clothing
[wapo] If hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue, then the flip-flops on previously denounced anti-terror measures are the homage that Barack Obama pays to George Bush. Within 125 days, Obama has adopted with only minor modifications huge swaths of the entire, allegedly lawless Bush program.
The latest flip-flop is the restoration of military tribunals. During the 2008 campaign, Obama denounced them repeatedly, calling them an "enormous failure." Obama suspended them upon his swearing-in. Now they're back.
Of course, Obama will never admit in word what he's doing in deed. As in his rhetorically brilliant national-security speech yesterday claiming to have undone Bush's moral travesties, the military commissions flip-flop is accompanied by the usual Obama three-step: (a) excoriate the Bush policy, (b) ostentatiously unveil cosmetic changes, (c) adopt the Bush policy. [...]
On Guantanamo, it's Obama's fellow Democrats who have suddenly discovered the wisdom of Bush's choice. In open rebellion against Obama's pledge to shut it down, the Senate voted 90 to 6 to reject appropriating a single penny until the president explains where he intends to put the inmates. Sen. James Webb, the de facto Democratic authority on national defense, wants the closing to be put on hold. And on Tuesday, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, no Gitmo inmates on American soil -- not even in American jails.
That doesn't leave a lot of places. The home countries won't take them. Europe is recalcitrant. Saint Helena needs refurbishing. Elba didn't work out too well the first time. And Devil's Island is now a tourist destination. Gitmo is starting to look good again.
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Stimulus Fundage
Roll over the map to where federal stimulus dollars for transportation projects have been announced, according to an AP analysis. Zoom about and all that stuff at the page. Uhh...yea.
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The Climate-Industrial Complex
[WSJ] Some business leaders are cozying up with politicians and scientists to demand swift, drastic action on global warming. This is a new twist on a very old practice: companies using public policy to line their own pockets.
The tight relationship between the groups echoes the relationship among weapons makers, researchers and the U.S. military during the Cold War. President Dwight Eisenhower famously warned about the might of the "military-industrial complex," cautioning that "the potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist." He worried that "there is a recurring temptation to feel that some spectacular and costly action could become the miraculous solution to all current difficulties."
This is certainly true of climate change. We are told that very expensive carbon regulations are the only way to respond to global warming, despite ample evidence that this approach does not pass a basic cost-benefit test. We must ask whether a "climate-industrial complex" is emerging, pressing taxpayers to fork over money to please those who stand to gain.
This phenomenon will be on display at the World Business Summit on Climate Change in Copenhagen this weekend. The organizers -- the Copenhagen Climate Council -- hope to push political leaders into more drastic promises when they negotiate the Kyoto Protocol's replacement in December.
The opening keynote address is to be delivered by Al Gore, who actually represents all three groups: He is a politician, a campaigner and the chair of a green private-equity firm invested in products that a climate-scared world would buy. [...]
The World Business Summit will hear from "science and public policy leaders" seemingly selected for their scary views of global warming. They include James Lovelock, who believes that much of Europe will be Saharan and London will be underwater within 30 years; Sir Crispin Tickell, who believes that the United Kingdom's population needs to be cut by two-thirds so the country can cope with global warming; and Timothy Flannery, who warns of sea level rises as high as "an eight-story building."
Free speech is important. But these visions of catastrophe are a long way outside of mainstream scientific opinion, and they go much further than the careful findings of the United Nations panel of climate change scientists. When it comes to sea-level rise, for example, the United Nations expects a rise of between seven and 23 inches by 2100 -- considerably less than a one-story building.
There would be an outcry -- and rightfully so -- if big oil organized a climate change conference and invited only climate-change deniers.
The partnership among self-interested businesses, grandstanding politicians and alarmist campaigners truly is an unholy alliance. The climate-industrial complex does not promote discussion on how to overcome this challenge in a way that will be best for everybody. We should not be surprised or impressed that those who stand to make a profit are among the loudest calling for politicians to act. Spending a fortune on global carbon regulations will benefit a few, but dearly cost everybody else.
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Coyotes Chapter 11 : Moving?
[cbc] An Arizona bankruptcy judge had some harsh words for the National Hockey League and representatives for Phoenix Coyotes owner Jerry Moyes as he ordered the two sides into mediation in an attempt to untangle the team's ownership situation and potential sale.
Judge Redfield T. Baum questioned why the dispute had reached his court without any apparent attempts to settle the matter before that stage, and he ordered a report on the progress of mediation by May 27.
Coyotes owner Jerry Moyes put the team into Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on May 5 and declared his intent to sell it for $212.5 million US to PSE Sports and Entertainment, led by Canadian billionaire Jim Balsillie. Balsillie plans to relocate the club to Hamilton if successful.
Baum shot down attempts by the Moyes side on Tuesday to make public the details of Reinsdorf's or any other prospective ownership bids.
Balsillie has called southern Ontario an unserved hockey market in media interviews and has tried to stir up the nation's passion for hockey through a website, MakeitSeven[.ca.]
Bettman — portrayed by some hockey fans as anti-Canadian — was alleged in a filing to have said to Moyes's lawyer in early April that if the league headed north of the border again, it would be to Winnipeg, the original home of the franchise under the name the Jets.
It was not clear if that alleged statement was sincere or a reflection of his disinterest in a Hamilton location. Bettman has repeatedly said the issue of whether another team could succeed in southern Ontario was unrelated to the matter of the Coyotes.
It is Balsillie's third swing at owning an NHL club. He previously attempted to buy the Pittsburgh Penguins and Nashville Predators, but negotiations broke down.
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Barack Obama 'breaks four aid pledges for Africa'
[ukt] US President Barack Obama has broken four campaign promises on overseas aid and risks reversing the successes of the Bush administration, HIV-Aids activists have claimed. Key pledges to boost money for Aids funds, education programmes and poverty-reduction schemes have all been missed, the Global Aids Alliance (GAA) said.
The Washington-based organisation said that figures from Mr Obama's May 7 budget request to the US Congress set the administration on a path to breaking its campaign promises to the people of Africa.
"Underfunding these critical programmes has grave consequences, especially during the current global economic crisis," said Paul Zeitz, director of the GAA, speaking in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi.
"President Obama has a moral obligation to demonstrate global leadership on behalf of the poorest and most marginalised people of the world, especially in Africa.
"But by turning his back on those needs, the President is betraying the trust of tens of millions of people around the world."
oThe two other broken promises related to stalling promised payments to fund education, and failing to increase foreign aid as a whole by a rate which will allow the president to meet his commitment to double such assistance by 2012.
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The Eloquence of Nancy
[nro] Nancy Pelosi’s performance at her press conference re waterboarding has raised, according to the Washington Post, “troubling new questions about the Speaker’s credibility.” The dreaded T-word: “troubling.”
I doubt it will “trouble” the media for long, or at least not to the extent of bringing the Pelosi speakership to a sudden end — and needless to say I’m all in favor of Nancy remaining the face of congressional Democrats until November 2010. But her inconsistent statements do suggest a useful way of looking at America’s tortured “torture” debate:
Question: What does Dick Cheney think of waterboarding?
He’s in favor of it. He was in favor of it then, he’s in favor of it now. He doesn’t think it’s torture, and he supports having it on the books as a vital option. On his recent TV appearances, he sometimes gives the impression he would not be entirely averse to performing a demonstration on his interviewers, but generally he believes its use should be a tad more circumscribed. He is entirely consistent.
Question: What does Nancy Pelosi think of waterboarding? [...]
Does she support it? Well, according to the CIA, she did way back when, over six years ago.
Does she oppose it? According to Speaker Pelosi, yes. In her varying accounts, she’s (a) accused the CIA of consciously “misleading the Congress of the United States” as to what they were doing; (b) admitted to having been briefed that waterboarding was in the playbook but that “we were not — I repeat — were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used”; (c) belatedly conceded that she’d known back in February 2003 that waterboarding was being used but had been apprised of the fact by “a member of my staff.” As she said on Thursday, instead of doing anything about it, she decided to focus on getting more Democrats elected to the House.
It’s worth noting that, by most if not all of her multiple accounts, Nancy Pelosi is as guilty of torture as anybody else. That’s not an airy rhetorical flourish but a statement of law. As National Review’s Andy McCarthy points out, under Section 2340A(c) of the relevant statute, a person who conspires to torture is subject to the same penalties as the actual torturer. Once Speaker Pelosi was informed that waterboarding was part of the plan and that it was actually being used, she was in on the conspiracy, and as up to her neck in it as whoever it was who was actually sticking it to poor old Abu Zubaydah and the other blameless lads.
That is, if you believe waterboarding is “torture.”
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Pelosi Says She Was Misled on Waterboarding
[wsj] Under attack from Republicans, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi accused the Central Intelligence Agency and Bush administration of misleading her about the use of waterboarding to interrogate terrorism suspects, and sharply rebutted claims she was complicit in its use.
"To the contrary ... we were told explicitly that waterboarding was not being used,'' she told reporters, referring to a formal CIA briefing she received in September 2002.
Ms. Pelosi said she subsequently learned that other lawmakers were told several months later by the CIA about the use of waterboarding.
The House's top Democrat made her comments at a news conference Thursday where she was peppered with questions about her knowledge of a technique she and others have called torture. Republicans have insisted in recent weeks that she and other Democrats knew waterboarding was in use, but made no attempt to protest.
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From The Chairman
Yea, yea. We're old skoolz. Original six. Nice to some of their numbers.
Chicago kiddos are all a flutter. Hawks : First Time To Conference Final Since 1995 Against...Detroit.
- fttgac - Internal is continuing, but months behind in tally. Paperwork. Probably the last year of the 'hock' thing. Would like to go five years straight, but...who knows. We bailed on tracking and fancy stuff here this year, as noted prior, but Internal...maybe try for five.
Yea baby.
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NHL : Original Six
[wiki] The Original Six is a term for the group of six teams that composed the National Hockey League (NHL) for the 25 seasons between the 1942–43 season and the 1967 NHL Expansion. The name is a misnomer, since there were other NHL franchises that went defunct before 1942. The name the Original Six comes from the 1967 expansion which added 6 teams. The "Original Six" teams playing at the time of the expansion played in their own division after expansion. The 6 expansion teams and the original six, hence the name "Original Six". Only two of the six teams were members of the NHL in the inaugural 1917–18 season, but all six do date from the NHL's first decade, and predate the other 24 teams currently in the league by over forty years.
The Original Six:
* Montreal Canadiens (founded 1909; charter member of the NHL in 1917)
* Toronto Maple Leafs (original Toronto St. Pats franchise was charter member of the NHL in 1917; renamed Maple Leafs in 1927)
* Boston Bruins (founded 1924)
* New York Rangers (founded 1925)
* Detroit Red Wings (founded 1921; moved from Victoria, BC; originally named Cougars, then Falcons)
* Chicago Blackhawks (founded 1926, known as the "Black Hawks" throughout the period)
1967 Expansion
The National Hockey League (NHL) undertook a major expansion for the 1967–68 season, adding six new franchises to double the size of the league. This marked the first change in the composition of the league since 1942, when the Brooklyn Americans folded.
Six franchises were ultimately added. Four still play in their original cities, one has relocated and one ceased operations.
* California Seals (renamed Oakland Seals and later California Golden Seals; relocated to Cleveland as Cleveland Barons in 1976; ceased operations in 1978 with merger into Minnesota North Stars)
* Los Angeles Kings
* Minnesota North Stars (merged with Cleveland Barons in 1978; relocated to Dallas as Dallas Stars in 1993)
* Philadelphia Flyers
* Pittsburgh Penguins
* St. Louis Blues
The expansion was the end of the Original Six era, and the beginning of the modern era of the NHL. There would be further expansions in 1970, 1972 and 1974. The expansion, Bobby Orr's record contract, and the World Hockey Association forever changed the landscape of the North American professional game.
Cursed?
Some believe that several teams have been cursed since the NHL expanded from only six teams to 12 in 1967. Most notably, the Toronto Maple Leafs have not even reached the Stanley Cup Finals since their last Stanley Cup championship in 1967.
Two of the six new expansion teams of that year, the Los Angeles Kings and the St. Louis Blues, have not won a single Stanley Cup, although the Kings reached the Finals in 1993 and the Blues made the Finals for the first three seasons of their existence (1968–1970).
Furthermore, another 1967 expansion team, the Minnesota North Stars, failed to win the Stanley Cup for their entire tenure in Minnesota; although it made the Finals in 1981 and 1991, the franchise would not win a championship until 1999, by which time it had relocated to Dallas.
In addition, it can be argued that some teams that were founded in the early-to-mid 1970s are cursed as well. The Buffalo Sabres and Vancouver Canucks both entered the league in 1970 and both have yet to win a Stanley Cup, despite each team losing in the Cup Finals twice. The Washington Capitals, who joined the NHL in 1974, have also not won the Cup, although they reached the Finals in 1998.
Ironically, however, the league's expansion of the early 1990s has not resulted in a similar curse. The four NHL franchises added between the 1992–93 and 1993–94 seasons all have made a Stanley Cup Final: the Florida Panthers in 1996, the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim in 2003, the eventual Stanley Cup Champion Tampa Bay Lightning in 2004, and the Ottawa Senators in 2007, who lost that series to the re-named Anaheim Ducks. However, some attribute the Senators' loss to the Curse of Marty McSorley.
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Obama's Photo Epiphany
Why make it harder for the U.S. to defend itself?
[wsj] President Obama yesterday put American soldiers and national security ahead of political braying from his campaign allies on the left. What a pleasant reversal.
The White House said it will now seek to block the release of photographs collected as part of military probes into accusations of prisoner abuse in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Pentagon had agreed last month to release the images by May 28, acceding to an American Civil Liberties Union request under the Freedom of Information Act.
"The President strongly believes that the release of these photos, particularly at this time, would only serve the purpose of inflaming the theaters of war, jeopardizing U.S. forces, and making our job more difficult in places like Iraq and Afghanistan," a White House official said, echoing arguments made on these pages. So the Administration will renew its legal appeals, including all the way to the Supreme Court if need be.
Mr. Obama thus took the advice of Defense Secretary Robert Gates and his leading generals that the photos would complicate their efforts to win over Muslim allies for America's antiterror mission. Release of the photos would also serve no public interest since they were collected as evidence in cases that have been investigated, and adjudicated when appropriate. Our guess is that Mr. Obama's political advisers also wanted to distance him from the decision to release the photos -- the better to shield him from any nasty fallout. Now the fault will lie with the ACLU.
Mr. Obama's change of heart was quickly denounced as akin to the "stonewalling tactics and opaque policies of the Bush administration" (the ACLU) and for "reneging on its legal obligation to release the torture photos" (Amnesty International). The President is learning, albeit slowly, that secrecy has its uses in wartime, and that the real goal of his allies on the left is to make it harder for the U.S. to defend itself.
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Stimulating 8b : White House Forecasts No Job Growth Until 2010
[nyt] President Obama’s chief economics forecaster said on Sunday that the country was not likely to see positive employment growth until 2010, even if the economy began to grow later this year.
Speaking on C-SPAN, Christina Romer, chairwoman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said that she expected the G.D.P. to begin growing in the fourth quarter of this year. Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, made a similar prediction last week.
But Ms. Romer also said that she expected unemployment to rise even after the economy turns, saying that the G.D.P. has to grow at a rate of about 2.5 percent before unemployment will fall. Before that happens, she said, it is “unfortunately pretty realistic” that the unemployment rate could reach 9.5 percent. A reasonable estimate for the G.D.P.’s growth rate in 2010, she said, is three percent.
Robert Reich, who served as labor secretary under President Bill Clinton and advised the Obama campaign, said on Sunday that the rate of growth would have to be higher — 4.5 percent — to reverse rising unemployment.
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Deficit Now Projected at $1.8 Trillion for 2009
[abc] The director of the Congressional Budget Office today updated his projections for the budget and economic outlook and is now anticipating a $1.8 trillion deficit this year, and $1.4 trillion in 2010.
This is up from CBO director Douglas W. Elmendorf's January 2009 projection of a $1.2 trillion deficit this year. In short, the US government is borrowing 50 cents for every dollar it spends.
The new projected deficit is four times the 2008 deficit, which was a record high for its time. [...]
"CBO now estimates that the deficit will total almost $1.7 trillion (12 percent of GDP) this year and $1.1 trillion (8 percent of GDP) next year—the largest deficits as a share of GDP since 1945," he writes.
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Youch!
[n] [...] A measure of the absence of any realistic self-appraisal is Ms. McCain's failure to grasp that her prominence as a "writer," rather than as a Paris Hilton-style reality show performer, is owed first to her famous father, and second, to the fact that this is the Age of the Idiot.
Idiots have come into their own in a big way, courtesy of depraved consumers, and complicit TV producers and publishers, of pixel and paper alike. The duller you are and the louder you crow in contemporary America, the better you do. Clearly, Meghan McCain is not working with much ─ and is eminently qualified to dim debate in the Age of the Idiot. A familial predisposition, it would seem. John McCain finished 894th out of 899 at the Naval Academy and lost five jets. As IQ ace Steve Sailer once quipped, "To lose one plane over Vietnam may be regarded as a heroic tragedy; to lose five planes here and there looks like carelessness."
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On Wall Street: Beware of the sucker’s rally
[ft] : The market is a cruel mistress indeed. Compounding the pain of big swoons, it kicks investors when they are down by luring them into sucker’s rallies – typically sharp but fleeting bounces in the middle of a bear market.
The current recovery has propelled the S&P 500 a third above its March low in just 60 days, convincing many sceptics that a new bull market has begun. Noted bear Doug Kass of Seabreeze Partners said the recent nadir may be a “generational low” and strategist Tobias Levkovich of Citigroup claimed many large investors who had feared another bear market rally may soon capitulate, pushing markets higher.
The Bull Market Express may really be pulling out of the station, but Wall Street’s trains have a nasty tendency to derail just as passengers jostle for seats. Most recently, the S&P 500 soared 24 per cent over seven weeks ending in early January, only to plunge to a new low. It was a fairly typical sucker’s rally and bear markets often need more than one to create sufficient disillusionment for a definitive bottom.
The 2000–2002 bear market had three, with average gains of 21 per cent in the Dow Jones Industrials over 45 days.
The granddaddy of all bear markets, 1929 –1932, had six false alarms with an average gain of 47 per cent. And Japan’s ongoing bear saw the Nikkei rise by at least a third four times in its first four years with 10 more false dawns since then.
Bear markets typically end with a whimper rather than a bang, casting doubt on the latest recovery according to Hussman Econometrics, which analysed numerous US market bottoms and bear market rallies. With the exception of the 1987 crash, the month before the lowest point of a downturn saw a gradual descent. By contrast, bear market rallies were preceded by steeper declines and had sharper rebounds. Another characteristic of bear market rallies has been modest volume on the rebound compared to the decline. The current recovery fits the pattern of bear market rallies in terms of volume and the “V” shape of the trough. Analysts at Bespoke Investment Group noted that there have been only seven other periods in the past 110 years with rallies of similar magnitude for the Dow. Three preceded the Great Depression, three came during the Depression and one in 1982.
That last example is a hopeful one as it kicked off the greatest bull market of all time. Expectations of a sustainable rebound have been helped by the fact that US stocks touched a 13-year low in March. But this was also the case in 1974, the start of a long rally – technically a bull market – that lost steam after a 73 per cent gain in two years. It would take four more years to reach the 1973 high and two more, the start of the 1982 bull market, to break decisively higher.
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Worth It : $328,835 Photo
[msnbc] A top White House aide resigned Friday for his role in Air Force One's $328,835 photo-op flyover above New York City that sparked panic and flashbacks to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Louis Caldera said the controversy had made it impossible for him to effectively lead the White House Military Office. "Moreover, it has become a distraction in the important work you are doing as president," Caldera said in his resignation letter to President Barack Obama.
The sight of the huge passenger jet and an F-16 fighter plane flying past the Statue of Liberty and the lower Manhattan financial district sent panicked office workers streaming into the streets on April 27. Obama said it would not happen again.
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Obama's Budget Eliminates New Funding for Nuclear Detection
[wapo] President Obama would eliminate new funding for advanced-generation equipment to detect nuclear weapons and radiological materials at U.S. borders and ports and around New York City in his 2010 budget, homeland security officials said.
The decisions, outlined in Homeland Security Department budget documents and briefings Thursday, mark a turn away from a priority of the administration of former president George W. Bush, who with former vice president Dick Cheney championed development of new technologies that could lead to a ring of domestic sensors of weapons of mass destruction.
But the research effort -- which former homeland security secretary Michael Chertoff described as a "mini-Manhattan project" -- has run into problems. Technical flaws and doubts about the integrity of scientific testing have delayed multi-billion dollar plans to buy advanced spectroscopic portal monitors, or ASPs, and automated cargo radiographic imaging systems, or CAARs, to scan for nuclear materials aboard cars, trucks, trains and cargo moving through air and land ports.
Congress has forced DHS's Domestic Nuclear Detection Office to hold off on new purchases, and Obama declined to request funds to buy equipment under DNDO beyond the $153 million Bush obtained last year.
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Administration Proposes Significant Cuts to Benefits of Slain Officers
[fox] : The Obama administration is asking Congress to slash almost in half a 43-year-old Justice Department program that provides death, disability and education benefits to the families of slain police and public safety officers.
President Obama's 2010 budget reduces funding for the Public Safety Officers' Death Benefits Program from $110 million this year to $60 million for next year's budget.
The program, which pays benefits of more than $300,000 to the survivors of a safety officer killed in the line of duty, received $118 million in 2008.
A Justice Department finance spokeswoman told FOX News that the proposed cut is a false statistic because the program requires "mandatory funding," which means the money is automatically paid to all the families of slain officers.
The proposed reduction to $60 million pertains to a projection for the Justice Department's planning purposes and last year's figure was high because it included a number of families that weren't in the system before, Justice spokeswoman Melissa Schwartz said.
"Any family member who is eligible for benefits under this program will receive them," she said. "If the amount of claims surpasses the amount requested, the program will be further funded."
This budget cut comes days before National Police Week in Washington. As is customary, Attorney General Eric Holder is scheduled to attend ceremonies honoring slain and disabled police officers.
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Obama proposes end to oil, gas industry tax breaks
[yahoo] : President Barack Obama wants to end $26 billion in oil and gas industry tax breaks, calling them "unjustifiable loopholes" in the tax system that other companies do not get.
Obama's proposed fiscal 2010 budget, details of which were released Thursday, also more clearly spells out his intention to shut down a proposed nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada and calls for ending a government subsidy that helps utilities license and plan for new nuclear power plants.
The oil and gas industry tax breaks have often been targeted by congressional Democrats in recent years, but they have not been able to muster enough votes to rescind them. Most Republicans and the Bush administration vigorously defended the tax benefits, saying they're needed to boost domestic oil and gas development.
In the budget statement, Obama said the tax breaks, which are expected to save the oil and gas industry more than $26 billion over the next 10 years, are "unjustifiable loopholes ... costly to the American taxpayer and do little to incentivize production or reduce energy prices."
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Withholding
The Obama administration is still withholding a thousand pages of material regarding the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). Although the United States Trade
Representative (USTR) released 36 pages of material in April, most contain no substantive information, and there are still a thousand pages that need to be released.
One of the documents released implies that treaty negotiators are zeroing in on Internet regulation. Other publicly available information shows that the treaty could
establish far-reaching customs regulations over Internet traffic in the guise of anti-counterfeiting measures. [eff]
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The CIA confirms that Nancy Pelosi was briefed on Enhanced Interrogation Techniques in 2002.
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Congress leery about Obama's plan on tax loopholes
[yahoo] : President Barack Obama promised sternly on Monday to crack down on companies "that ship jobs overseas" and duck U.S. taxes with offshore havens. It won't be easy. Democrats have been fighting — and losing — this battle since John F. Kennedy made a similar proposal in 1961. Obama's proposal to close tax loopholes was a reliable applause line during the presidential campaign, but it got a lukewarm response Monday from Capitol Hill.
Sen. Max Baucus of Montana, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said the plan needed further study, even though similar ideas have been around for years.
The president's plan would limit the ability of U.S. companies to defer paying U.S. taxes on overseas profits. At the same time, Obama would step up efforts to go after evaders who abuse offshore tax shelters.
Obama said his plan would raise $210 billion over the next 10 years, though no tax increases would go into effect until 2011. That's an average of $21 billion a year, less than a 2 percent nick in a federal budget deficit that is projected to hit $1.2 trillion in 2010.
Lost revenue isn't the only problem, Obama says. He contends the current system gives companies an incentive to invest overseas rather than creating jobs in the U.S.
"It's a tax code that says you should pay lower taxes if you create a job in Bangalore, India, than if you create one in Buffalo, N.Y.," Obama said Monday.
The business community argues the deferral system helps them compete against foreign companies that pay taxes only in the countries where they generate profits.
The bottom line?
"Nobody should miss the fact that this is about revenue," said Raymond Wiacek, head of the tax practice at the law firm Jones Day. "These companies have the money, and the U.S. government needs the money."
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Prison Awaiting Hostile Bloggers
[wired] : Proposed congressional legislation would demand up to two years in prison for those whose electronic speech is meant to “coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress to a person.”
Instead of prison, perhaps we should say gulag.
The proposal by Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Los Angeles, would never pass First Amendment muster, unless the U.S. Constitution was altered without us knowing. So Sanchez, and the 14 other lawmakers who signed on to the proposal, are grandstanding to show the public they care about children and are opposed to cyberbullying.
The meaasure, H.R. 1966, is labeled the Megan Meier Cyberbullying Prevention Act. It’s designed to target the behavior that led to last year’s suicide of the 13-year-old Meier. [...]
Sanchez’s bill goes way beyond cyberbullying and comes close to making it a federal offense to log onto the internet or use the telephone. The methods of communication where hostile speech is banned include e-mail, instant messaging, blogs, websites, telephones and text messages.
We can’t say what we think of Sanchez’s proposal. Doing so would clearly get us two years in solitary confinement.
The bill has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee.
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NHL :: Playoff Tracking
[click for latest ESPN] [click for latest TSN]
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Leap in U.S. debt hits taxpayers with 12% more red ink
[usat] Taxpayers are on the hook for an extra $55,000 a household to cover rising federal commitments made just in the past year for retirement benefits, the national debt and other government promises, a USA TODAY analysis shows.
The 12% rise in red ink in 2008 stems from an explosion of federal borrowing during the recession, plus an aging population driving up the costs of Medicare and Social Security.
That's the biggest leap in the long-term burden on taxpayers since a Medicare prescription drug benefit was added in 2003.
The latest increase raises federal obligations to a record $546,668 per household in 2008, according to the USA TODAY analysis. That's quadruple what the average U.S. household owes for all mortgages, car loans, credit cards and other debt combined.
"We have a huge implicit mortgage on every household in America — except, unlike a real mortgage, it's not backed up by a house," says David Walker, former U.S. comptroller general, the government's top auditor.
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OK, out on a limb here, but we're calling tonight's Game 5 against Detroit for The Wings. Zif.::::
Not all "Compelling Personal Stories" are Equal
[th] [...] McCaskill waved the high-hurdle card after being asked to defend Sotomayor's infamous statement at a 2001 University of California at Berkeley speech asserting brown-skin moral authority: "I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn't lived that life." McCaskill actually denied that Sotomayor had made the remarks, then argued the words were taken out of context.
You want context? It's even worse than that sound bite. As National Journal legal analyst Stuart Taylor reported, "Sotomayor also referred to the cardinal duty of judges to be impartial as a mere 'aspiration because it denies the fact that we are by our experiences making different choices than others.' And she suggested that 'inherent physiological or cultural differences' may help explain why 'our gender and national origins may and will make a difference in our judging.'" The full speech was reprinted in something called the Berkeley La Raza Law Journal. "La Raza" is Spanish for "The Race." Imagine if a white male Republican court nominee had published in a law review called "The Race."
The selective elevation of hardship as primary qualification demeans the entire judiciary. If personal turmoil makes one "incredibly qualified to pass judgment on some of the most important cases in our country," let's put reality-show couple Jon and Kate Gosselin on the bench. Millions of viewers tune in to watch their "compelling personal story" of life with eight children on television. It's a "richly, uniquely American experience" of facing obstacles and overcoming the odds. Get them robes and gavels, stat.
The lesson is that not all compelling personal stories are equal. McCaskill's assertion that "overcoming incredible odds" is "new to the courts" is ridiculous. Is she arguing that Thurgood Marshall, Felix Frankfurter and Sandra Day O'Connor faced lower hurdles than Sotomayor? And how about Clarence Thomas, a descendant of slaves who grew up in abject poverty in the South without a father? His crime, of course, was embracing the wrong ideology.
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N. Korea reportedly tests 2nd nuke device : Bolton Calls Bingo Only A Few Days Early
| Monday, May 25, 2009
[wt] North Korea on Monday appeared to have detonated a nuclear device, its second such test in three years.
The U.S. Geological Survey said it detected a magnitude-4.7 earthquake in the region, and South Korea's Cabinet convened in an emergency session, according to Yonhap, South Korea's semi-official newswire.
Yonhap also said the North had confirmed the test.
Trading on South Korea's stock market was briefly suspended when the benchmark index plunged after the news was reported.
Experts here have long been predicting a second nuclear test.
North Korea first detonated a nuclear device in October 2006, but the test is thought to have produced a lower explosive yield than had been hoped for.
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British banks revolt against Obama tax plan
[tuk] The decision, which would make it hard for Americans in London to open bank accounts and trade shares, is being discussed by executives at Britain's banks and brokers who say it could become too expensive to service American clients. The proposals, which were unveiled as part of the president's first budget, are designed to clamp-down on American tax evaders abroad. However bank bosses say they are being asked to take on the task of collecting American taxes at a cost and legal liability that are inexpedient.
Andy Thompson of Association of Private Client Investment Managers and Stockbrokers (APCIMS) said: "The cost and administration of the US tax regime is causing UK investment firms to consider disinvesting in US shares on behalf of their clients. This is not right and emphasises that the administration of a tax regime on a global scale without any flexibility damages the very economy it is trying to protect."
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Get Ready for Another North Korean Nuke Test
MAY 20, 2009 :: By JOHN R. BOLTON
[wsj] The curtain is about to rise again on the long-running nuclear tragicomedy, "North Korea Outwits the United States." Despite Kim Jong Il's explicit threats of another nuclear test, U.S. Special Envoy Stephen Bosworth said last week that the Obama administration is "relatively relaxed" and that "there is not a sense of crisis." They're certainly smiling in Pyongyang.
In October 2006, North Korea witnessed the incredible diplomatic success it could reap from belligerence. Its first nuclear test brought resumption of the six-party talks, which gave Kim Jong Il cover to further advance his nuclear program.
Now, Kim is poised to succeed again by following precisely the same script. In April, Pyongyang launched a Taepodong-2 missile, and National Security Council official Gary Samore recently confirmed that a second nuclear test is likely on the way. The North is set to try two U.S. reporters for "hostile acts." The state-controlled newspaper calls America "a rogue and a gangster." Kim recently expelled international monitors from the Yongbyon nuclear complex. And Pyongyang threatens to "start" enriching uranium -- a capacity it procured long ago.
A second nuclear test is by no means simply a propaganda ploy. Most experts believe that the 2006 test was flawed, producing an explosive yield well below even what the North's scientists had predicted. The scientific and military imperatives for a second test have been strong for over two years, and the potential data, experience and other advantages of further testing would be tremendous.
What the North has lacked thus far is the political opportunity to test without fatally jeopardizing its access to the six-party talks and the legitimacy they provide. Despite the State Department's seemingly unbreakable second-term hold over President Bush, another test after 2006 just might have ended the talks.
So far, the North faces no such threat from the Obama administration. Despite Pyongyang's aggression, Mr. Bosworth has reiterated that the U.S. is "committed to dialogue" and is "obviously interested in returning to a negotiating table as soon as we can." This is precisely what the North wants: America in a conciliatory mode, eager to bargain, just as Mr. Bush was after the 2006 test.
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Obama in Bush Clothing
[wapo] If hypocrisy is the homage that vice pays to virtue, then the flip-flops on previously denounced anti-terror measures are the homage that Barack Obama pays to George Bush. Within 125 days, Obama has adopted with only minor modifications huge swaths of the entire, allegedly lawless Bush program.
The latest flip-flop is the restoration of military tribunals. During the 2008 campaign, Obama denounced them repeatedly, calling them an "enormous failure." Obama suspended them upon his swearing-in. Now they're back.
Of course, Obama will never admit in word what he's doing in deed. As in his rhetorically brilliant national-security speech yesterday claiming to have undone Bush's moral travesties, the military commissions flip-flop is accompanied by the usual Obama three-step: (a) excoriate the Bush policy, (b) ostentatiously unveil cosmetic changes, (c) adopt the Bush policy. [...]
On Guantanamo, it's Obama's fellow Democrats who have suddenly discovered the wisdom of Bush's choice. In open rebellion against Obama's pledge to shut it down, the Senate voted 90 to 6 to reject appropriating a single penny until the president explains where he intends to put the inmates. Sen. James Webb, the de facto Democratic authority on national defense, wants the closing to be put on hold. And on Tuesday, Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said, no Gitmo inmates on American soil -- not even in American jails.
That doesn't leave a lot of places. The home countries won't take them. Europe is recalcitrant. Saint Helena needs refurbishing. Elba didn't work out too well the first time. And Devil's Island is now a tourist destination. Gitmo is starting to look good again.
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Stimulus Fundage
Roll over the map to where federal stimulus dollars for transportation projects have been announced, according to an AP analysis. Zoom about and all that stuff at the page. Uhh...yea.
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The Climate-Industrial Complex
[WSJ] Some business leaders are cozying up with politicians and scientists to demand swift, drastic action on global warming. This is a new twist on a very old practice: companies using public policy to line their own pockets.
The tight relationship between the groups echoes the relationship among weapons makers, researchers and the U.S. military during the Cold War. President Dwight Eisenhower famously warned about the might of the "military-industrial complex," cautioning that "the potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist." He worried that "there is a recurring temptation to feel that some spectacular and costly action could become the miraculous solution to all current difficulties."
This is certainly true of climate change. We are told that very expensive carbon regulations are the only way to respond to global warming, despite ample evidence that this approach does not pass a basic cost-benefit test. We must ask whether a "climate-industrial complex" is emerging, pressing taxpayers to fork over money to please those who stand to gain.
This phenomenon will be on display at the World Business Summit on Climate Change in Copenhagen this weekend. The organizers -- the Copenhagen Climate Council -- hope to push political leaders into more drastic promises when they negotiate the Kyoto Protocol's replacement in December.
The opening keynote address is to be delivered by Al Gore, who actually represents all three groups: He is a politician, a campaigner and the chair of a green private-equity firm invested in products that a climate-scared world would buy. [...]
The World Business Summit will hear from "science and public policy leaders" seemingly selected for their scary views of global warming. They include James Lovelock, who believes that much of Europe will be Saharan and London will be underwater within 30 years; Sir Crispin Tickell, who believes that the United Kingdom's population needs to be cut by two-thirds so the country can cope with global warming; and Timothy Flannery, who warns of sea level rises as high as "an eight-story building."
Free speech is important. But these visions of catastrophe are a long way outside of mainstream scientific opinion, and they go much further than the careful findings of the United Nations panel of climate change scientists. When it comes to sea-level rise, for example, the United Nations expects a rise of between seven and 23 inches by 2100 -- considerably less than a one-story building.
There would be an outcry -- and rightfully so -- if big oil organized a climate change conference and invited only climate-change deniers.
The partnership among self-interested businesses, grandstanding politicians and alarmist campaigners truly is an unholy alliance. The climate-industrial complex does not promote discussion on how to overcome this challenge in a way that will be best for everybody. We should not be surprised or impressed that those who stand to make a profit are among the loudest calling for politicians to act. Spending a fortune on global carbon regulations will benefit a few, but dearly cost everybody else.
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Coyotes Chapter 11 : Moving?
[cbc] An Arizona bankruptcy judge had some harsh words for the National Hockey League and representatives for Phoenix Coyotes owner Jerry Moyes as he ordered the two sides into mediation in an attempt to untangle the team's ownership situation and potential sale.
Judge Redfield T. Baum questioned why the dispute had reached his court without any apparent attempts to settle the matter before that stage, and he ordered a report on the progress of mediation by May 27.
Coyotes owner Jerry Moyes put the team into Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection on May 5 and declared his intent to sell it for $212.5 million US to PSE Sports and Entertainment, led by Canadian billionaire Jim Balsillie. Balsillie plans to relocate the club to Hamilton if successful.
Baum shot down attempts by the Moyes side on Tuesday to make public the details of Reinsdorf's or any other prospective ownership bids.
Balsillie has called southern Ontario an unserved hockey market in media interviews and has tried to stir up the nation's passion for hockey through a website, MakeitSeven[.ca.]
Bettman — portrayed by some hockey fans as anti-Canadian — was alleged in a filing to have said to Moyes's lawyer in early April that if the league headed north of the border again, it would be to Winnipeg, the original home of the franchise under the name the Jets.
It was not clear if that alleged statement was sincere or a reflection of his disinterest in a Hamilton location. Bettman has repeatedly said the issue of whether another team could succeed in southern Ontario was unrelated to the matter of the Coyotes.
It is Balsillie's third swing at owning an NHL club. He previously attempted to buy the Pittsburgh Penguins and Nashville Predators, but negotiations broke down.
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Barack Obama 'breaks four aid pledges for Africa'
[ukt] US President Barack Obama has broken four campaign promises on overseas aid and risks reversing the successes of the Bush administration, HIV-Aids activists have claimed. Key pledges to boost money for Aids funds, education programmes and poverty-reduction schemes have all been missed, the Global Aids Alliance (GAA) said.
The Washington-based organisation said that figures from Mr Obama's May 7 budget request to the US Congress set the administration on a path to breaking its campaign promises to the people of Africa.
"Underfunding these critical programmes has grave consequences, especially during the current global economic crisis," said Paul Zeitz, director of the GAA, speaking in the Kenyan capital, Nairobi.
"President Obama has a moral obligation to demonstrate global leadership on behalf of the poorest and most marginalised people of the world, especially in Africa.
"But by turning his back on those needs, the President is betraying the trust of tens of millions of people around the world."
oThe two other broken promises related to stalling promised payments to fund education, and failing to increase foreign aid as a whole by a rate which will allow the president to meet his commitment to double such assistance by 2012.
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The Eloquence of Nancy
[nro] Nancy Pelosi’s performance at her press conference re waterboarding has raised, according to the Washington Post, “troubling new questions about the Speaker’s credibility.” The dreaded T-word: “troubling.”
I doubt it will “trouble” the media for long, or at least not to the extent of bringing the Pelosi speakership to a sudden end — and needless to say I’m all in favor of Nancy remaining the face of congressional Democrats until November 2010. But her inconsistent statements do suggest a useful way of looking at America’s tortured “torture” debate:
Question: What does Dick Cheney think of waterboarding?
He’s in favor of it. He was in favor of it then, he’s in favor of it now. He doesn’t think it’s torture, and he supports having it on the books as a vital option. On his recent TV appearances, he sometimes gives the impression he would not be entirely averse to performing a demonstration on his interviewers, but generally he believes its use should be a tad more circumscribed. He is entirely consistent.
Question: What does Nancy Pelosi think of waterboarding? [...]
Does she support it? Well, according to the CIA, she did way back when, over six years ago.
Does she oppose it? According to Speaker Pelosi, yes. In her varying accounts, she’s (a) accused the CIA of consciously “misleading the Congress of the United States” as to what they were doing; (b) admitted to having been briefed that waterboarding was in the playbook but that “we were not — I repeat — were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation methods were used”; (c) belatedly conceded that she’d known back in February 2003 that waterboarding was being used but had been apprised of the fact by “a member of my staff.” As she said on Thursday, instead of doing anything about it, she decided to focus on getting more Democrats elected to the House.
It’s worth noting that, by most if not all of her multiple accounts, Nancy Pelosi is as guilty of torture as anybody else. That’s not an airy rhetorical flourish but a statement of law. As National Review’s Andy McCarthy points out, under Section 2340A(c) of the relevant statute, a person who conspires to torture is subject to the same penalties as the actual torturer. Once Speaker Pelosi was informed that waterboarding was part of the plan and that it was actually being used, she was in on the conspiracy, and as up to her neck in it as whoever it was who was actually sticking it to poor old Abu Zubaydah and the other blameless lads.
That is, if you believe waterboarding is “torture.”
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Pelosi Says She Was Misled on Waterboarding
[wsj] Under attack from Republicans, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi accused the Central Intelligence Agency and Bush administration of misleading her about the use of waterboarding to interrogate terrorism suspects, and sharply rebutted claims she was complicit in its use.
"To the contrary ... we were told explicitly that waterboarding was not being used,'' she told reporters, referring to a formal CIA briefing she received in September 2002.
Ms. Pelosi said she subsequently learned that other lawmakers were told several months later by the CIA about the use of waterboarding.
The House's top Democrat made her comments at a news conference Thursday where she was peppered with questions about her knowledge of a technique she and others have called torture. Republicans have insisted in recent weeks that she and other Democrats knew waterboarding was in use, but made no attempt to protest.
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From The Chairman Yea, yea. We're old skoolz. Original six. Nice to some of their numbers.
Chicago kiddos are all a flutter. Hawks : First Time To Conference Final Since 1995 Against...Detroit.
- fttgac - Internal is continuing, but months behind in tally. Paperwork. Probably the last year of the 'hock' thing. Would like to go five years straight, but...who knows. We bailed on tracking and fancy stuff here this year, as noted prior, but Internal...maybe try for five.
Yea baby.
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NHL : Original Six
[wiki] The Original Six is a term for the group of six teams that composed the National Hockey League (NHL) for the 25 seasons between the 1942–43 season and the 1967 NHL Expansion. The name is a misnomer, since there were other NHL franchises that went defunct before 1942. The name the Original Six comes from the 1967 expansion which added 6 teams. The "Original Six" teams playing at the time of the expansion played in their own division after expansion. The 6 expansion teams and the original six, hence the name "Original Six". Only two of the six teams were members of the NHL in the inaugural 1917–18 season, but all six do date from the NHL's first decade, and predate the other 24 teams currently in the league by over forty years.The Original Six:
* Montreal Canadiens (founded 1909; charter member of the NHL in 1917)
* Toronto Maple Leafs (original Toronto St. Pats franchise was charter member of the NHL in 1917; renamed Maple Leafs in 1927)
* Boston Bruins (founded 1924)
* New York Rangers (founded 1925)
* Detroit Red Wings (founded 1921; moved from Victoria, BC; originally named Cougars, then Falcons)
* Chicago Blackhawks (founded 1926, known as the "Black Hawks" throughout the period)
1967 Expansion
The National Hockey League (NHL) undertook a major expansion for the 1967–68 season, adding six new franchises to double the size of the league. This marked the first change in the composition of the league since 1942, when the Brooklyn Americans folded.
Six franchises were ultimately added. Four still play in their original cities, one has relocated and one ceased operations.
* California Seals (renamed Oakland Seals and later California Golden Seals; relocated to Cleveland as Cleveland Barons in 1976; ceased operations in 1978 with merger into Minnesota North Stars)
* Los Angeles Kings
* Minnesota North Stars (merged with Cleveland Barons in 1978; relocated to Dallas as Dallas Stars in 1993)
* Philadelphia Flyers
* Pittsburgh Penguins
* St. Louis Blues
The expansion was the end of the Original Six era, and the beginning of the modern era of the NHL. There would be further expansions in 1970, 1972 and 1974. The expansion, Bobby Orr's record contract, and the World Hockey Association forever changed the landscape of the North American professional game.
Cursed?
Some believe that several teams have been cursed since the NHL expanded from only six teams to 12 in 1967. Most notably, the Toronto Maple Leafs have not even reached the Stanley Cup Finals since their last Stanley Cup championship in 1967.
Two of the six new expansion teams of that year, the Los Angeles Kings and the St. Louis Blues, have not won a single Stanley Cup, although the Kings reached the Finals in 1993 and the Blues made the Finals for the first three seasons of their existence (1968–1970).
Furthermore, another 1967 expansion team, the Minnesota North Stars, failed to win the Stanley Cup for their entire tenure in Minnesota; although it made the Finals in 1981 and 1991, the franchise would not win a championship until 1999, by which time it had relocated to Dallas.
In addition, it can be argued that some teams that were founded in the early-to-mid 1970s are cursed as well. The Buffalo Sabres and Vancouver Canucks both entered the league in 1970 and both have yet to win a Stanley Cup, despite each team losing in the Cup Finals twice. The Washington Capitals, who joined the NHL in 1974, have also not won the Cup, although they reached the Finals in 1998.
Ironically, however, the league's expansion of the early 1990s has not resulted in a similar curse. The four NHL franchises added between the 1992–93 and 1993–94 seasons all have made a Stanley Cup Final: the Florida Panthers in 1996, the Mighty Ducks of Anaheim in 2003, the eventual Stanley Cup Champion Tampa Bay Lightning in 2004, and the Ottawa Senators in 2007, who lost that series to the re-named Anaheim Ducks. However, some attribute the Senators' loss to the Curse of Marty McSorley.
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Obama's Photo Epiphany
Why make it harder for the U.S. to defend itself?
[wsj] President Obama yesterday put American soldiers and national security ahead of political braying from his campaign allies on the left. What a pleasant reversal.
The White House said it will now seek to block the release of photographs collected as part of military probes into accusations of prisoner abuse in Afghanistan and Iraq. The Pentagon had agreed last month to release the images by May 28, acceding to an American Civil Liberties Union request under the Freedom of Information Act.
"The President strongly believes that the release of these photos, particularly at this time, would only serve the purpose of inflaming the theaters of war, jeopardizing U.S. forces, and making our job more difficult in places like Iraq and Afghanistan," a White House official said, echoing arguments made on these pages. So the Administration will renew its legal appeals, including all the way to the Supreme Court if need be.
Mr. Obama thus took the advice of Defense Secretary Robert Gates and his leading generals that the photos would complicate their efforts to win over Muslim allies for America's antiterror mission. Release of the photos would also serve no public interest since they were collected as evidence in cases that have been investigated, and adjudicated when appropriate. Our guess is that Mr. Obama's political advisers also wanted to distance him from the decision to release the photos -- the better to shield him from any nasty fallout. Now the fault will lie with the ACLU.
Mr. Obama's change of heart was quickly denounced as akin to the "stonewalling tactics and opaque policies of the Bush administration" (the ACLU) and for "reneging on its legal obligation to release the torture photos" (Amnesty International). The President is learning, albeit slowly, that secrecy has its uses in wartime, and that the real goal of his allies on the left is to make it harder for the U.S. to defend itself.
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Stimulating 8b : White House Forecasts No Job Growth Until 2010
[nyt] President Obama’s chief economics forecaster said on Sunday that the country was not likely to see positive employment growth until 2010, even if the economy began to grow later this year.
Speaking on C-SPAN, Christina Romer, chairwoman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, said that she expected the G.D.P. to begin growing in the fourth quarter of this year. Ben S. Bernanke, the Federal Reserve chairman, made a similar prediction last week.
But Ms. Romer also said that she expected unemployment to rise even after the economy turns, saying that the G.D.P. has to grow at a rate of about 2.5 percent before unemployment will fall. Before that happens, she said, it is “unfortunately pretty realistic” that the unemployment rate could reach 9.5 percent. A reasonable estimate for the G.D.P.’s growth rate in 2010, she said, is three percent.
Robert Reich, who served as labor secretary under President Bill Clinton and advised the Obama campaign, said on Sunday that the rate of growth would have to be higher — 4.5 percent — to reverse rising unemployment.
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Deficit Now Projected at $1.8 Trillion for 2009
[abc] The director of the Congressional Budget Office today updated his projections for the budget and economic outlook and is now anticipating a $1.8 trillion deficit this year, and $1.4 trillion in 2010.
This is up from CBO director Douglas W. Elmendorf's January 2009 projection of a $1.2 trillion deficit this year. In short, the US government is borrowing 50 cents for every dollar it spends.
The new projected deficit is four times the 2008 deficit, which was a record high for its time. [...]
"CBO now estimates that the deficit will total almost $1.7 trillion (12 percent of GDP) this year and $1.1 trillion (8 percent of GDP) next year—the largest deficits as a share of GDP since 1945," he writes.
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Youch!
[n] [...] A measure of the absence of any realistic self-appraisal is Ms. McCain's failure to grasp that her prominence as a "writer," rather than as a Paris Hilton-style reality show performer, is owed first to her famous father, and second, to the fact that this is the Age of the Idiot.
Idiots have come into their own in a big way, courtesy of depraved consumers, and complicit TV producers and publishers, of pixel and paper alike. The duller you are and the louder you crow in contemporary America, the better you do. Clearly, Meghan McCain is not working with much ─ and is eminently qualified to dim debate in the Age of the Idiot. A familial predisposition, it would seem. John McCain finished 894th out of 899 at the Naval Academy and lost five jets. As IQ ace Steve Sailer once quipped, "To lose one plane over Vietnam may be regarded as a heroic tragedy; to lose five planes here and there looks like carelessness."
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On Wall Street: Beware of the sucker’s rally
[ft] : The market is a cruel mistress indeed. Compounding the pain of big swoons, it kicks investors when they are down by luring them into sucker’s rallies – typically sharp but fleeting bounces in the middle of a bear market.
The current recovery has propelled the S&P 500 a third above its March low in just 60 days, convincing many sceptics that a new bull market has begun. Noted bear Doug Kass of Seabreeze Partners said the recent nadir may be a “generational low” and strategist Tobias Levkovich of Citigroup claimed many large investors who had feared another bear market rally may soon capitulate, pushing markets higher.
The Bull Market Express may really be pulling out of the station, but Wall Street’s trains have a nasty tendency to derail just as passengers jostle for seats. Most recently, the S&P 500 soared 24 per cent over seven weeks ending in early January, only to plunge to a new low. It was a fairly typical sucker’s rally and bear markets often need more than one to create sufficient disillusionment for a definitive bottom.
The 2000–2002 bear market had three, with average gains of 21 per cent in the Dow Jones Industrials over 45 days.
The granddaddy of all bear markets, 1929 –1932, had six false alarms with an average gain of 47 per cent. And Japan’s ongoing bear saw the Nikkei rise by at least a third four times in its first four years with 10 more false dawns since then.
Bear markets typically end with a whimper rather than a bang, casting doubt on the latest recovery according to Hussman Econometrics, which analysed numerous US market bottoms and bear market rallies. With the exception of the 1987 crash, the month before the lowest point of a downturn saw a gradual descent. By contrast, bear market rallies were preceded by steeper declines and had sharper rebounds. Another characteristic of bear market rallies has been modest volume on the rebound compared to the decline. The current recovery fits the pattern of bear market rallies in terms of volume and the “V” shape of the trough. Analysts at Bespoke Investment Group noted that there have been only seven other periods in the past 110 years with rallies of similar magnitude for the Dow. Three preceded the Great Depression, three came during the Depression and one in 1982.
That last example is a hopeful one as it kicked off the greatest bull market of all time. Expectations of a sustainable rebound have been helped by the fact that US stocks touched a 13-year low in March. But this was also the case in 1974, the start of a long rally – technically a bull market – that lost steam after a 73 per cent gain in two years. It would take four more years to reach the 1973 high and two more, the start of the 1982 bull market, to break decisively higher.
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Worth It : $328,835 Photo
[msnbc] A top White House aide resigned Friday for his role in Air Force One's $328,835 photo-op flyover above New York City that sparked panic and flashbacks to the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Louis Caldera said the controversy had made it impossible for him to effectively lead the White House Military Office. "Moreover, it has become a distraction in the important work you are doing as president," Caldera said in his resignation letter to President Barack Obama.
The sight of the huge passenger jet and an F-16 fighter plane flying past the Statue of Liberty and the lower Manhattan financial district sent panicked office workers streaming into the streets on April 27. Obama said it would not happen again.
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Obama's Budget Eliminates New Funding for Nuclear Detection
[wapo] President Obama would eliminate new funding for advanced-generation equipment to detect nuclear weapons and radiological materials at U.S. borders and ports and around New York City in his 2010 budget, homeland security officials said.
The decisions, outlined in Homeland Security Department budget documents and briefings Thursday, mark a turn away from a priority of the administration of former president George W. Bush, who with former vice president Dick Cheney championed development of new technologies that could lead to a ring of domestic sensors of weapons of mass destruction.
But the research effort -- which former homeland security secretary Michael Chertoff described as a "mini-Manhattan project" -- has run into problems. Technical flaws and doubts about the integrity of scientific testing have delayed multi-billion dollar plans to buy advanced spectroscopic portal monitors, or ASPs, and automated cargo radiographic imaging systems, or CAARs, to scan for nuclear materials aboard cars, trucks, trains and cargo moving through air and land ports.
Congress has forced DHS's Domestic Nuclear Detection Office to hold off on new purchases, and Obama declined to request funds to buy equipment under DNDO beyond the $153 million Bush obtained last year.
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Administration Proposes Significant Cuts to Benefits of Slain Officers
[fox] : The Obama administration is asking Congress to slash almost in half a 43-year-old Justice Department program that provides death, disability and education benefits to the families of slain police and public safety officers.
President Obama's 2010 budget reduces funding for the Public Safety Officers' Death Benefits Program from $110 million this year to $60 million for next year's budget.
The program, which pays benefits of more than $300,000 to the survivors of a safety officer killed in the line of duty, received $118 million in 2008.
A Justice Department finance spokeswoman told FOX News that the proposed cut is a false statistic because the program requires "mandatory funding," which means the money is automatically paid to all the families of slain officers.
The proposed reduction to $60 million pertains to a projection for the Justice Department's planning purposes and last year's figure was high because it included a number of families that weren't in the system before, Justice spokeswoman Melissa Schwartz said.
"Any family member who is eligible for benefits under this program will receive them," she said. "If the amount of claims surpasses the amount requested, the program will be further funded."
This budget cut comes days before National Police Week in Washington. As is customary, Attorney General Eric Holder is scheduled to attend ceremonies honoring slain and disabled police officers.
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Obama proposes end to oil, gas industry tax breaks
[yahoo] : President Barack Obama wants to end $26 billion in oil and gas industry tax breaks, calling them "unjustifiable loopholes" in the tax system that other companies do not get.
Obama's proposed fiscal 2010 budget, details of which were released Thursday, also more clearly spells out his intention to shut down a proposed nuclear waste dump at Yucca Mountain in Nevada and calls for ending a government subsidy that helps utilities license and plan for new nuclear power plants.
The oil and gas industry tax breaks have often been targeted by congressional Democrats in recent years, but they have not been able to muster enough votes to rescind them. Most Republicans and the Bush administration vigorously defended the tax benefits, saying they're needed to boost domestic oil and gas development.
In the budget statement, Obama said the tax breaks, which are expected to save the oil and gas industry more than $26 billion over the next 10 years, are "unjustifiable loopholes ... costly to the American taxpayer and do little to incentivize production or reduce energy prices."
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Withholding
The Obama administration is still withholding a thousand pages of material regarding the Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement (ACTA). Although the United States Trade
Representative (USTR) released 36 pages of material in April, most contain no substantive information, and there are still a thousand pages that need to be released.
One of the documents released implies that treaty negotiators are zeroing in on Internet regulation. Other publicly available information shows that the treaty could
establish far-reaching customs regulations over Internet traffic in the guise of anti-counterfeiting measures. [eff]
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The CIA confirms that Nancy Pelosi was briefed on Enhanced Interrogation Techniques in 2002.
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Congress leery about Obama's plan on tax loopholes
[yahoo] : President Barack Obama promised sternly on Monday to crack down on companies "that ship jobs overseas" and duck U.S. taxes with offshore havens. It won't be easy. Democrats have been fighting — and losing — this battle since John F. Kennedy made a similar proposal in 1961. Obama's proposal to close tax loopholes was a reliable applause line during the presidential campaign, but it got a lukewarm response Monday from Capitol Hill.
Sen. Max Baucus of Montana, the Democratic chairman of the Senate Finance Committee, said the plan needed further study, even though similar ideas have been around for years.
The president's plan would limit the ability of U.S. companies to defer paying U.S. taxes on overseas profits. At the same time, Obama would step up efforts to go after evaders who abuse offshore tax shelters.
Obama said his plan would raise $210 billion over the next 10 years, though no tax increases would go into effect until 2011. That's an average of $21 billion a year, less than a 2 percent nick in a federal budget deficit that is projected to hit $1.2 trillion in 2010.
Lost revenue isn't the only problem, Obama says. He contends the current system gives companies an incentive to invest overseas rather than creating jobs in the U.S.
"It's a tax code that says you should pay lower taxes if you create a job in Bangalore, India, than if you create one in Buffalo, N.Y.," Obama said Monday.
The business community argues the deferral system helps them compete against foreign companies that pay taxes only in the countries where they generate profits.
The bottom line?
"Nobody should miss the fact that this is about revenue," said Raymond Wiacek, head of the tax practice at the law firm Jones Day. "These companies have the money, and the U.S. government needs the money."
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Prison Awaiting Hostile Bloggers
[wired] : Proposed congressional legislation would demand up to two years in prison for those whose electronic speech is meant to “coerce, intimidate, harass, or cause substantial emotional distress to a person.”
Instead of prison, perhaps we should say gulag.
The proposal by Rep. Linda Sanchez, D-Los Angeles, would never pass First Amendment muster, unless the U.S. Constitution was altered without us knowing. So Sanchez, and the 14 other lawmakers who signed on to the proposal, are grandstanding to show the public they care about children and are opposed to cyberbullying.
The meaasure, H.R. 1966, is labeled the Megan Meier Cyberbullying Prevention Act. It’s designed to target the behavior that led to last year’s suicide of the 13-year-old Meier. [...]
Sanchez’s bill goes way beyond cyberbullying and comes close to making it a federal offense to log onto the internet or use the telephone. The methods of communication where hostile speech is banned include e-mail, instant messaging, blogs, websites, telephones and text messages.
We can’t say what we think of Sanchez’s proposal. Doing so would clearly get us two years in solitary confinement.
The bill has been referred to the House Judiciary Committee.
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