Dancing With The Treasury Stars

Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, the Hamlet of the Potomac, has frozen important markets with his inability to announce a definitive plan of action for the banking crisis.  There might be private equity investors intrigued by Citigroup's plunging share price but they will not put their money on the table while rumors float that nationalization is the only viable option for Citi.

And there might be private investors intrigued by the toxic waste held by banks but they will not put money on the table while rumors float that Treasury may offer generous financing to those who wait.

Tim Geithner is the leader of the band and until he strikes up a tune no one is going to dance.

Paul Krugman also blasts Geithner's dithering.  I take exception to Krugman's ongoing misunderstanding of the benefits of a plan in which Treasury helps buy up toxic waste:

Why do officials keep offering plans that nobody else finds credible? Because somehow, top officials in the Obama administration and at the Federal Reserve have convinced themselves that troubled assets, often referred to these days as “toxic waste,” are really worth much more than anyone is actually willing to pay for them — and that if these assets were properly priced, all our troubles would go away.

Thus, in a recent interview Tim Geithner, the Treasury secretary, tried to make a distinction between the “basic inherent economic value” of troubled assets and the “artificially depressed value” that those assets command right now. In recent transactions, even AAA-rated mortgage-backed securities have sold for less than 40 cents on the dollar, but Mr. Geithner seems to think they’re worth much, much more.

And the government’s job, he declared, is to “provide the financing to help get those markets working,” pushing the price of toxic waste up to where it ought to be.

It's interesting that as an earnest liberal economist Krugman can cite a hundred examples of market failure yet he can't embrace the possibility that the market for mortgage-backed securities is systematically mispricing these assets.

Let me exhort Krugman and others to consider the power of the self-fulfilling prophecy.  Suppose a private investor is weighing the value of a mortgage-backed security under three alternative scenarios:

Grim Depression:    20% probability;  Security Value =   0
Weak Recovery:     40% probability;  Security Value = $20
Robust Recovery:    40% probability; Security Value = $80  (Finally, leverage working on the way up!)

The expected value of the security across these three scenarios is $40.  Does that mean that any price above $40 represents a subsidy if paid by the Treasury (or its co-investors)?

Well, suppose the keen economists in Treasury actually believe their own forecasts on which they based Obama's budget (and why not - they can actually command the tides, or at least nudge the economy a bit).  Their analysis of the security might look like this:

Grim Depression:    0% probability;  Security Value =     0
Weak Recovery:     40% probability;  Security Value = $20
Robust Recovery:    60% probability; Security Value = $80

With these revised probabilities the security is worth $ 56.  Would it really be absurd for Treasury to pay, say, $50 for the security, and is that really a subsidy? If the Obama Administration fails to avert a depression then Treasury (i.e., we the people) will have overpaid, but it is the Obama Administration that is trying to prevent a depression.  This is something like expecting the fire department to also sell fire insurance, which does not seem inappropriate as long as everyone buys similar policies.

MAMMA MIA!  Nothing other than nationalization will placate Krugman:

The answer, I fear, is that officials still aren’t willing to face the facts. They don’t want to face up to the dire state of major financial institutions because it’s very hard to rescue an essentially insolvent bank without, at least temporarily, taking it over. And temporary nationalization is still, apparently, considered unthinkable.

But this refusal to face the facts means, in practice, an absence of action. And I share the president’s fears: inaction could result in an economy that sputters along, not for months or years, but for a decade or more.

Nationalizing one bank will freeze private equity investment in many others while people await developments.  But setting that aside, what is the precedent?  Krugman is taking his inspiration from the successful nationalization of some Swedish banks in the 90's.  For heaven's sake - two banks no one ever heard of on the periphery of international finance were successfully nationalized by the Swedes, so therefore the US government can manage two (or more!) of the largest, most complicated, most interwoven institutions in global finance.

My simple test for advocates of nationalization - name the Swedish banks that were nationalized.  And good luck; most people will have a better chance naming the members of ABBA.  (You might find the names here, here, or here or in two efforts by the Cleveland Fed.)

[end of thread]

Comments

[kim]

Call TCO, he has it all figured out.
===================================

[bgates]

It's interesting that as an earnest liberal economist Krugman can cite a hundred examples of market failure yet he can't embrace the possibility that the market for mortgage-backed securities is systematically mispricing the underlying assets.

That theory of market malfunction depends on the idea that new and/or newly inapplicable regulations have a role in the mispricing. As an earnest progressive economist, Krugman can't imagine a failure by government. At least, Democratic government.

Personally, I think 40 cents on the dollar is a great price, and I would be willing to invest tens of hundreds of dollars if anybody was selling them in those amounts.

[pagar]

Kim, I've always looked forward to your posts, but now I'm not so sure.

[kim]

Don't worry, pagar, TCO is sure enough for all of us.
======================================

[narciso]

Seriously, don't awaken the TCO; we're so screwed it's not even funny anymore, and nothing this twit does has any good effect.
Handing the banks over to the same people who forced this crisis; doesn't make any sense. Raising taxes, cuts revenue flow. cap and trade, does the former and slows commercial activity, the stimulus doesn't really stimulate, our Vice President is down in Miami, to try to elide that point. Shutting down Yucca mountain, so where does that stuff go now, shutting down deep water oil research, How does any one in their right mind want any of this to succeed, It marks the end of this country, at least as a major power. I don't see a solution in the short term, can we even wait to 2010 to start reversing this.

[hit and run]

http://media.dcexaminer.com/images/090305beelertoon_c.jpg>If Obama Twittered

[hit and run]

Hey, just got a captcha check. Woohoo!

But why was my alphanumeric code this...

bg8srlz

I mean, I don't disagree with the sentiment in the slightest. But I do find it somewhat troubling.

[bad]

Krauthammer has a must read. Nothing new for JOMmers but maybe someone else will notice.

LUN

[bad]

LOL Hit

On second thought, I'm gonna cry.

[narciso]

So the wonderful days of the ChurchCommittee
/Turner "Halloween Massacre, seem ready to resume according our old Salafi friend from Baghdad and lately Islamabad, Bobby Ghosh

[bad]

bg8srlz

WOW, I have incredible power. I bow to him a few times and VOILA!! electronics are riffin' on my vibes...

[kim]

It's whack, I say; whack. Krauthammer's description of Obama's non sequitor about the causes of our mess lead me back to the side of considering that Obama's destructiveness is deliberate, not incompetent. Show me the birth certificate, you gold-plated fraud.
=========================

[hit and run]

Well. Instapundit has this:

BLOOMBERG IS CALLING IT http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=washingtonstory&sid=aGJ_.gr_awkY>the “Obama Bear Market.”

Feh. Rick was publishing the http://justoneminute.typepad.com/main/2008/07/the-next-energy.html?cid=121714580#comment-121714580>Obama Bear Market Report back last summer.

[centralcal]

From the Daily Telegraph:

"The President and his wife Michelle will then be flown in Marine One, the presidential helicopter, to Winfield House, the residence of the American ambassador to London, in Regent's Park.

The following day, April 1, will see Mr Obama travel the short distance to Buckingham Palace. It is unusual for a United States President to meet the Queen outside a state visit.

Reflecting the slightly less flown-blown nature of the meeting, it was described by one official in Washington as "an informal, formal meeting."

A source said: "There is a wish to do these things as discreetly when they meet for the first time."

Why does this have the feel of the Pope Benedict and Pelosi meeting?

[bgates]

Im in ur captcha, makin u nrvs.

[kim]

Malhoni soit, qui ebon y pense.
===============================

[centralcal]

Oh I cannot stop laughing . . . more from the UK:

"President Obama has been rudeness personified towards Britain this week. His handling of the visit of the Prime Minister, Gordon Brown, to Washington was appalling. First Brown wasn't granted a press conference with flags, then one was hastily arranged in the Oval office after the Brits had to beg. Obama looked like he would rather have been anywhere else than welcoming the British leader to his office and topped it all with his choice of present (*) for the PM. A box of 25 DVDS including ET, the Wizard of Oz and Star Wars? Oh, give me strength. We do have television and DVD stores on this side of the Atlantic. Even Gordon Brown will have seen those films too often already."

[bgates]

I see in the sidebar that David Brooks is complaining about Obamatons.

I'd like to remind everyone that David Brooks is a cancer on America, and if anyone takes that phrase to mean Brooks should be exterminated to save something larger and more important, and goes after Brooks with the tools normally used to combat cancer like a scalpel or radiation poisoning, well, I'm hardly worldly and sophisticated enough to be able to see that coming, am I?

[Rick Ballard]

H&R,

Bloomie has to get his ideas somewhere. Did you notice that your cohort size is officially 651,000? You're in the first 'over 8%' cohort and one of 2.6 million Americans who now have more time to reflect upon the Democrat NewD irection being received by the whole country.

OTOH - I'll outbid bgates at 54 cents for MBS based upon the continuing and rising pace of market clearing in the economic state of disaster, California. Florida is also clearing at the bottom.

[centralcal]

So much humor on the internest this morning and so little time (gotta get ready for work):

"Barack's name ain't Jesus. Barack ain't gonna improve your child's reading score. There are things we've got to do on our own," he said.

So sayeth, The Rev. Wright!

[hit and run]

Rick:
Did you notice that your cohort size is officially 651,000?

Not good enough. I've always been told that I'm one in a million.

[bad]

I'd like to remind everyone that David Brooks is a cancer on America,

Pleeeeease, cancers everywhere are insulted....

[hit and run]

one of 2.6 million Americans who now have more time to reflect upon the Democrat NewD irection being received by the whole country.

That's more like it.

Some of us "too busy to protest because of work" types are suddenly becoming alarmingly un-busy. And alarmingly not very happy about it.

I'm just sayin'

[Jane]

So why is everyone quitting? Is it because they know that O's presidency will be the worst ever? Is it because they have a glimpse into his agenda and find it repulsive? Is something illegal going on there?

I'm ready to take bets on who will be the first to drop a dime. It should have been Gregg, but no...

[Sue]

I am starting to believe the meme that is taking hold. Obama is doing this on purpose. You can't really be that incompetent, can you?

[narciso]

I guess they haven't sent the formersubprime
peddler, Sussman, ahead as Ambassador to the Court of St. Janes. Frankly the Queen should a vacation, and go up wherever their
winter retreat is, due to fog or whatever, embarrasing insult on an ally, if Prince William's around, maybe he could ask if he
killed any civilians in Helmand province, when 'air raiding villages one understands':

[Robert Bell]

"With these revised probabilities the security is worth $ 56. Would it really be absurd for Treasury to pay, say, $50 for the security, and is that really a subsidy?"

A question about this reasoning, apart from the usual "whose probabilities" when considering expected value, is in the definition of the information set on which the forecast is based. I.e. if the Treasury and the private investor are coming to a different calculation based on today's information, fine. However the Treasury seems to be reasoning that the toxic waste will "bounce back" in value - but surely that presumes changes in the information set.

In other words, I think today's market price (problematic because they are mostly not trading) is still today's market price. If the Treasury pays more than that, it's a subsidy.

[boris]

Obama is NOT going to fail to advance his domestic agenda. That is going forward and nothing is going to stop it. “Hoping” for it to stop is not realistic. Period.

The pain and suffering that results from that agenda may anger American voters to remove Obama’s domestic power base in the 2010 congress elections. That should halt the damage, stop the bleeding. So if I want that to happen I must be hoping for Americans to experience sufficient pain and suffering to turn congress Republican like 1994.

In that sense I want Obama to fail. I want Americans to suffer. At one time I hoped Obama might use his leftist street cred to keep that base on his side while he governed as a sensible moderate, but was not surprised by how it turned out.

The worst case expectation was that his ideaology would lead him to tear down the American economy in order to replace it with a more collectivist utopian one. So far it looks like that is what he is doing. If so then I hope that fails.

[Ranger]

Apparently, the revolt of the moderates has Obama and Company running scared. After Brooks tore into them, no less then four members of Obama's top circle called to explain what they are doing. Here is an interesting bit:

The budget, they continue, isn’t some grand transformation of America.

Really? They said that? Isn't that kind of the opposite of what Obama said in his grand speach? I thought the whole point of this budget was that we are beginning the transformation they were elected to carry out.

So, was Obama lying then to America, or is he lying now to Brooks?

[Jack is Back!]

Homeless guy in median strip by stop light near where I live usually had one of those "Vietnam Vet Needs Food" but today he had sign that read "Nationalize Me".

[Rick Ballard]

"You can't really be that incompetent, can you?"

There is absolutely nothing in Zero's background to suggest competence in any area other than elections. I don't believe him to be competent even as a commie. As to people leaving or refusing positions - he's a very dirty man, even for a politician. It takes someone like Turbo, completely lacking in ethics, to work for common scum.

There is also the "second raters hire third raters" conundrum that militates against general competency within those willing to work for the bum.

You just need to lower your expectations, Sue.

[jean]

I think I can call Mr. Brooks and tell him I'm a 25 yr old hottie,and according to him I then would be a 25yr old hottie

[bad]

jean, I heard you are a 25 year old hottie.

In fact, everbody pass it on

[hit and run]

I heard that too.

[bad]

Brooks via the Corner:

He [Obama] is extremely committed to entitlement reform and is plotting politically feasible ways to reduce Social Security as well as health spending. The White House folks didn’t say this, but I got the impression they’d be willing to raise taxes on the bottom 95 percent of earners as part of an overall package.

He's so often wrong, but there it is.

[Jim Ryan]

raise taxes on the bottom 95 percent of earners

Mr. Brooks, decrease the tax-credit welfare payments handed out to the bottom 95 percent of earners. FTFY.

[Rick Ballard]

In other words, I think today's market price (problematic because they are mostly not trading) is still today's market price. If the Treasury pays more than that, it's a subsidy.

Did you apply that reasoning to oil at $147 on the basis of Goldman Sachs pimping the Peaker crap? The snag with MBS is even worse. Any common fool could fall for the GS bull and get suckered into oil but the purchase of MBS is limited to a very select group of fools whose fantastic models for buy and sell decisions are currently in the shop for some serious warranty work.

Pretending that MBS is traded on an "open" market doesn't really cut it. It's a restricted market - you know, only qualified, sophisticated customers like Bernie Madoff's are allowed to play.

[MayBee]

I'm beginning to think Grandpa used to complain about Grandma's selfish banker bosses to young O.
Either that, or O thought the banks took his Grandma's and mother's time away from him.

[bad]

Brad Pitt met privately with potus yesterday. I hope they exchanged autographs.

[narciso]

Cut to the chase, when has David Brooks been right about anything that mattered; crickets, so he reacted to a little pressure
from the Obamatons. You got it wrong David, maybe you should go back to U Chicago, and retake those courses you've obviously forgotten like economics, history, logic. You get this kind of insight for 300 K, cut it in half and find some one else to share
the burden fo getting the facts

[Sue]

Didn't some celebrity meet privately with Scooter Libby during the time frame that he talked to reporters?

[jean]

NOW NOW Folks Davids world is a very nice place.You can be anything you want,just as long as you wear the right tie and don't speak too harshly

[Old Lurker]

"...like Bernie Madoff's "

And since we now learn Bernie never actually executed any of those trades he reported to his clients, we can just "say" these trades are occuring at whatever value they want. Once an administration is completely untethered from real facts and reality (stock markets are just tracking poles, eg), then all things are possible.

Welcome to Wonderland, Alice.

:-)

[Sue]

Yeah, Libby met privately with Tom Cruise, which came out only after the trial had begun. I am now on the hunt to find out what the left said about THAT meeting. As opposed to this very public private meeting Pitt had with Obama.

[Old Lurker]

polls

[bgates]

The White House folks didn’t say this, but I got the impression they’d be willing to raise taxes

Oh, he's a clever one, that Brooks. Figured that out all on his own, that Obama would be willing to raise taxes.

He [Obama] is extremely committed to entitlement reform and is plotting politically feasible ways to reduce Social Security as well as health spending.

The caller went on to explain how images of human beings have deep mystical significance in Hawaiian and Indonesian culture, which is why the DVD package for the prime minister was such a meaningful gift from Obama.

[MayBee]

Yeah, Libby met privately with Tom Cruise, which came out only after the trial had begun. I am now on the hunt to find out what the left said about THAT meeting.

I remember clearly. They couldn't believe he had time to meet with Cruise if he was so busy with the war, etc. So it made his "too busy to remember" defense void.

[Sue]

MayBee,

Exactly. http://crooksandliars.com/2007/01/24/libby-is-dreamy-over-scientology/>John Amato at Crooks and Liars on Scooter and Cruise...

According to the CIA briefer Craig Schmall at the Libby trial today, while Scooter Libby was so busy with hugely important issues like, oh. I don't know---the outing of an undercover agent---he was also fascinated with listening to Tom Cruise and his very own Penelope complain about Germany's treatment of Scientology. He got really excited too. That's our boy----to hell with national security issues and remembering who you're calling on the phone. No sir. Nobody messes with the Church of Cruise

Now, the serious question. Do these people remember what they write and hope no one else does? Or does it go down the memory hole?

[Sue]

And this was the VP's chief of staff. Not the president of the freakin' USofA.

[MayBee]

O is in Columbus. He'll be on the ground there for 3 hours, talking about the stimulus (which has already passed)

[MayBee]

Sue- I don't think they remember. When they do, I think they justify.

[hit and run]

Sue:
Yeah, Libby met privately with Tom Cruise

Feh. Tom Schmom. He met with Penelope Cruz.

[hit and run]

And why was http://justoneminute.typepad.com/main/2007/01/neil_lewis_of_t.html?cid=28303929#comment-28303929>Penelope important to the whole ordeal?

[Paul Zrimsek]

The expected value of the security across these three scenarios is $40.

No risk premium, no sale.

[MayBee]

Why does Obama have to fly around to talk about this bill that's already passed?

[kim]

Zero fiddles, while Rome burns.
=============================

[Amused bystander]

Can we get a day with out this creep?

Was Bush on the air like this all the time, even during the worst of 911, or the invasions of Iraq or Afghanistan? I do not recall it.

He is just a disaster, his "policies" are just ripping the market apart and he behaves like he is the second coming.

[bad]

O says we should put aside our selfish ambitions so I'm going to try to stop eating, then I won't need as much earthwarming toilet paper....

[MayBee]

A 10 minute speech about saving jobs and pulling together.

[Amused bystander]

Did he just give it? if so, may I ask, what was the response? (thanks in advance)

[MayBee]

We have the Wednesday Night Austerity Parties and the Weekly AF1 Carbon & Cost Cutting Field Trips

[Fresh Air]

There is absolutely nothing in Zero's background to suggest competence in any area other than elections...

Rick, your post rings in my ears this morning like the strains of Mahler's 5th, such is the eternal truth it bestows upon our world. Andrew Johnson has never slept as soundly as he sleeps today.

I just have one question: How sad is it that Tom is so hard up for reading material that Paul Krugman's column makes its way into the bathroom each morning? Seriously. Can't we take up a donation and get him some old copies of the New Criterion or something? I've got some back issues with coffee stains I can send. Even a few dog-eared Claremont Reviews (except the articles by Angelo Codevilla, of course).

[Tom Maguire]

I.e. if the Treasury and the private investor are coming to a different calculation based on today's information, fine. However the Treasury seems to be reasoning that the toxic waste will "bounce back" in value - but surely that presumes changes in the information set.

In other words, I think today's market price (problematic because they are mostly not trading) is still today's market price. If the Treasury pays more than that, it's a subsidy.

I am firmly of two minds on this. On the one hand, the Treasury may be looking at the same information as everyone else, including the speculation that Treasury is over its head (or out of its mind) and asserting, through a combination of inside info and faith, that their policy responses will be better than everyone else expects. (This is sort of like asking whether it is OK for a manager to bet on his own team...)

ON the other hand, there is a moral hazard issue - one rationale for these securities was that the housing market could never get *that* bad or the Feds would ride to the rescue. And here they are!

[DebinNC]

"Pulling together" as dumb oxen dociily laboring under the yoke of government...BO's dream for America.

[kim]

Until now Obama has never had to perform on a stage or give a performance that has not been adjustable by a publicity campaign. All his previous endeavours have been in areas that can be manipulated by advertising, or media disinformation. He now has natural forces(global cooling), implacable international forces(the Russkies, the Chinese, and the Arabs, not to mention banana republic jokers like Chavez) and market forces(capital) which will not move by an effort of the will. Sadly, what we are witnessing now is his effort to 'charm' capital. I get the feeling of a mouse dancing around in front of a snake to distract him from his business. We should be feeling sorry for this poor joker, but we are, instead, too hung up on our own misfortunes. How did we actually get here? What about eligibility? Is this man, manifestly unprepared and inadequate for the task, even eligible for it? Someone ought to ask.
===============================

[Amused bystander]

DebinNC: don't you think that this is going to fall a little flat across The Nation?

Particularly when they ignore investors, attack the middle class and hound anyone that disagrees with them.

This guy thinks it is 1930.

[Old Lurker]

"Did he just give it? if so, may I ask, what was the response? "

Very good question. As the market was up 125 or so but then went to neg 40, recent experience would suggest he is opening his mouth somewhere.

[RichatUF]

Jim-

I read that as raisng Social Security and Health Insurance taxes and means testing (which he already includes re: Medicare in his budget as "savings").

[kim]

The following wind of favorable press coverage has blown him heedlessly up against a lee shore. Too bad we'll all perish in the breakers.
======================================

[Thomas Collins]

Rick,

Would Hank Paulson's going through with the reverse auction, in addition to propping up the short term commercial market (which seemed to work pretty well in 2008), have put us in a better position today? I never bought the line that there wasn't enough time to put into place the reverse auction. I think the real problem was that after the auction, it would have been crystal clear which zombies had to go into Chapter 11, and Paulson (and now Geithner) have been trying to do a Chapter 11 on certain big financial institutions without calling it a Chapter 11. Paulson and Geithner have been operating on the "too big to fail" principle, when the reality may well be that some zombies are too big to ever succeed.

[kim]

And why does Brooks allow himself to be a mouthpiece for the administration to sound competent and moderate. Who the Hell does he work for, anyway?
===============================

[narciso]

No, I've knocked Angelo and Mark Halprin, on the maximalist militant camp in the past; you can also throw Bill Quick in those ranks, but they serve their role in small doses. Now one could say, that TM is serving the function that TimeSelect used to do; reading Krugman, so we don't have to.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Who the Hell does he work for, anyway?

Is that a trick question?

[Fresh Air]

Who the Hell does he work for, anyway?

Is that a trick question?

Of course it is: He works for the administration. Sheesh...

[Pofarmer]

The govt sure is giving itself a lot of jobs.

[Old Lurker]

Kim: "Sadly, what we are witnessing now is his effort to 'charm' capital."

Joke, right Kim?

Maybe like a rapist charms his next victim.

[Rick Ballard]

TC,

The Paulson/Bernanke moves on short term credit were necessary IMO. I'm not sure that all the "analysis" of the MBS/CDS serves much of a purpose without laying the foundation by analyzing the value of the underlying asset in depth.

If Krugman buys a 20% MBS valuation, then take his house and give him 20% of its market peak value. He should accept the deal calmly because it is a "rational" offer that incorporates today's evaluation of the proper risk premium.

I believe that your assessment of a reverse auction revealing the parlous state of many of the zombies' health is the correct. I'm not sure that a 'Market of the Living Dead' is a bad thing for the long term. I believe I'll side with Boris' comment concerning the necessity of the country undergoing a 'learning experience' with regard to hiring commies - or letting credentialed morons cloak something as stupid as MBS in "best intentions" hogwash while pocketing commissions and fees for determining 'by golly, enough bad apples do spoil the whole damned barrel!'.

[TCO]

You are a socialist moron, to think that the taxpayers should buy "toxic waste" (underwater assets). Let the companies go bankrupt. Let the speculators take losses. Let the counterparties take losses. It's THEIR loss. Not the taxpayers. No wealth is created by transferring money from taxpayers to speculators. And in fact wealth is destroyed since you destroy free market incentives.

You deserve Obama. He's almost the same as a bailout loving Republican. A real Reagan Goldwater type would be way too conservative for you Maguire. Moron. Socialist.

[MikeS]

"He's from the government and he's here to help!"

[roux]

Has anyone noticed that Geithner has become the goto expert on everything from the Obama administration. I saw him talking about healthcare the other day.

All this from a guy who can't use Turbo Tax?

[Matt]

you gotta love TCO's hard core conservatism.....I haven't really listened to Limbaugh in 20 years, but he's on a roll. He just played Whoopie Goldberg freaking out about how government is just heaping taxes on the rich. If Oblunder is losing Whoopie and Krugman, he's losing the country.

Regime Change Now!

[Fresh Air]

If he's lost Whoopie, he's lost the war.

Somebody has to say it.

NEXT!

[Neo]

Forty-one percent (41%) of voters nationwide have a favorable opinion of the $3.6-trillion budget proposed by President Obama in the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey. But 46% hold an unfavorable view, and 13% are not sure.

[bad]

"Did he just give it? if so, may I ask, what was the response? "

I hurled a little in my mouth but not enough to disturb the cat.

[Sue]

No house investigation into Murtha and PMAs. ::sigh:: Maybe republicans and democrats could switch names, that way a democrat/republican who isn't a republican/democrat would be investigated.

[bad]

Has anyone noticed that Geithner has become the goto expert on everything from the Obama administration. I saw him talking about healthcare the other day.

All this from a guy who can't use Turbo Tax?

I love you roux!

[Neo]

I noticed that (tiny) Tim Geithner always seems to lead with ... You're absolutely right yada yada

[bgates]

Forty-one percent (41%) of voters nationwide have a favorable opinion of the $3.6-trillion budget proposed by President Obama

And if Rasmussen had said it was a $3,600-trillion budget, those people would not have blinked. Which I say not to make fun of people with Nancy Pelosi's lack of facial nerves, but to make fun of people with Nancy Pelosi's lack of intelligence.

[DebinNC]

This ought to be interesting.

[Rick Ballard]

Russia fumigates portfolio. No more of that stinky US agency debt - it's all gonna be nice, fresh Turbo Treasury stuff now. Good thing too. Timmy has $63 billion of new debt coming to market next week.

Does anyone else think that Turbo and Rahm together look like a brace of ferrets? Separately they just look like regular rats.

[bad]

I prefer weasal, Rick.

Ferrets just seem higher class, some how...

[MayBee]

Did the police cadets Obama spoke to today get a Stimulus Emblem to sew on their uniforms?

[Danube of Thought]

Greetings from sunny Los Barriles. Difficult to read/post from here but I did want to check in at least. I get online every few hours to watch the Dow slide. Gotta go--Margaritas coming up. Adios amigos.

[bad]

Drink several for me, DoT. I like a salty rim.

[Old Lurker]

DoT!

[bad]

We have the Wednesday Night Austerity Parties and the Weekly AF1 Carbon & Cost Cutting Field Trips

GO Maybee!!

[DebinNC]

AP doesn't show the new logos on the cadets, but they don't show the ever present telepromptor either. I'm sure the new O was on display off camera.

[DebinNC]

The money Obama delivered will cover the officers' salaries for one calendar year, but police officials aren't sure where the funding will come from for next year's pay. They've halted all recruit training for the time being. But Obama's hope is that the cash flow from the $787-billion economic stimulus, his first major accomplishment when it passed last month, will help spur a local recovery.

Time will tell, but the MSM might not.

He also announced $2 billion in stimulus funding for state and local law enforcement -- more than $61 million will be distributed in the state of Ohio.

And when that's soon gone, what?

[Jane]

Does anyone else think Geithner is just creepy with that crooked finger and that wiry posture? He looks like someone who forgets to bathe.

Hi DOT - have a few for me!

[bad]

A comment elsewhere noted the logo is 50% government, 25% agriculture and 25% manufacturing.

The O-team isn't big on accuracy but that 50% government looks like an understatement of proposed policies.