Sullivan said that when credit markets seized up, AIG was forced to mark its $70 billion in CDO swap positions at "fire-sale prices" even though it believed the positions would have much higher values if held to maturity.Yeah, I feel for you. Even though my morale wasn't being pumped up by a nearly half million dollar retreat on the taxpayer's dime, I too can understand how it sucks to have to report on real value instead of what you "believe" should be. I remember trying to get a home loan based on my belief that I'd find a sack of money in the next few months that would allow me to pay off the loan while supporting my crack habit and stable of women too high priced for Eliot Spitzer.
08 October 2008
High Plains Grifters.
It's funny how AIG never complained about the mark-to-market rule while it was making them tons of phony money, but once the economy soured and they did nothing about it other than booking spa retreats in exclusive resorts, they're trying to blame the rule for their own poor oversight. Here's a summary of ousted CEO Martin Sullivan's attempt to cast blame on regulation:
07 October 2008
Down the drain.
The Guardian is reporting that the IMF recalculated their estimates of US banking losses to 1.4 trillion US dollars, up from 945 billion dollars. To put that number in perspective, it’s way higher than A-Rod’s current contract and all his future contracts as well as twice the federal government bailout amount. We’re talking Iraq Quagmire War numbers here.
Bush – the latest Republican who was going to “shrink government” but did exactly the opposite (I still can’t figure out why morons out there fall for that line) – has blessed us with the double-whammy of emptying the government coffers for his vanity war, while simultaneously ignoring domestic troubles to the extent that we find ourselves reaping the bitter harvest of the decades-long assault on regulation.
In the meantime, we’re now learning that the sunny outlook on the economy that Bush and his cronies like John “the fundamentals of our economy are strong” McCain is due quite possibly to the faulty information being supplied by private companies (e.g. RealtyTrac) who found it more profitable not to do proper surveys – kind of like the DC Police find it more useful not to take crime reports. Following demands from Congress – in the form of the Foreclosure Prevention Act (why these acts get such lofty names is beyond me – how about the Foreclosure Information Act…that’s more accurate) – HUD conducted its own survey of foreclosures. A sample difference between the private company’s numbers and HUD’s numbers: 500 v. 12,000 in West Virginia:
Bush – the latest Republican who was going to “shrink government” but did exactly the opposite (I still can’t figure out why morons out there fall for that line) – has blessed us with the double-whammy of emptying the government coffers for his vanity war, while simultaneously ignoring domestic troubles to the extent that we find ourselves reaping the bitter harvest of the decades-long assault on regulation.
In the meantime, we’re now learning that the sunny outlook on the economy that Bush and his cronies like John “the fundamentals of our economy are strong” McCain is due quite possibly to the faulty information being supplied by private companies (e.g. RealtyTrac) who found it more profitable not to do proper surveys – kind of like the DC Police find it more useful not to take crime reports. Following demands from Congress – in the form of the Foreclosure Prevention Act (why these acts get such lofty names is beyond me – how about the Foreclosure Information Act…that’s more accurate) – HUD conducted its own survey of foreclosures. A sample difference between the private company’s numbers and HUD’s numbers: 500 v. 12,000 in West Virginia:
RealtyTrac, based in California, compiles data that government officials — and journalists — rely on for a picture of the nation's housing market. But in West Virginia last year, it counted fewer than 500 foreclosure notices. New federal statistics counted 12,000 notices in the state, since the start of 2007.
Now I’m not going to go into NPR’s sleight of hand statistics of comparing RealtyTrac’s “last year” numbers to the 12,000 counted “since the start of 2007” (which could be over a year and a half of data). Why do journalists have to obfuscate? It’s clear that RealtyTrac’s numbers are way off, so why not compare apples to apples?
$1.4 trillion sure could buy a lot of homes…and I’m willing to bet much of it did…at least for a while.
06 October 2008
The Google reveals all. The Google speaks to me of the reading public.
Back in 1914 a man by the name of MacGregor Jenkins -- publisher of the Atlantic Monthly which in those days wasn't the complete right wing rag it is now -- published The Reading Public. It's something of a tongue-in-cheek book published a few months after the outbreak of the Great War and so perhaps was a bit untimely in its glib presentation. I don't know how well the book did as a critical or commercial success, but I do know that google books has digitized it and anyone who cares to read it can.
Jenkins divides the "reading public" into book readers and magazine readers. He further subdivides the book readers into three categories from least to greatest numbers: the sponge reader, the sieve reader, and the duck-back reader. The sponge reader reads "fewer and better books than his fellows" -- resulting, according to Mr. Jenkins, in his being ignored by authors and publishers. The sieve reader reads quite a bit and is full of surface facts and plots and literary gossip, but doesn't have the critical acumen of the sponge reader. Meanwhile, the lowly duck-back reader, while great in number, absorbs absolutely nothing and is entirely unchanged by reading because reading is for the duck-back simply a way to kill time (Jenkins believes the swelling of this number to be caused by the increasing phenomenon of commuting).
I'm not entirely sure if Jenkins takes these classifications seriously. He warns us at the outset that in his professional job he's not "a man of letters" and therefore is used as a stand in for the nebulous "man in the street." Secondly, he warns us -- after having classified readers -- that "it is very easy to classify the readers of books, but like all generalizations, such a classification is only half true" (36). So he's either taking the piss or he's a nascent poststructuralist or maybe both, as many traditionalists believe all poststructuralists to be. However, he seems to fall squarely in the traditionalist camp when he states that the "day of real literary criticism has past [sic]" (36). In 1914.
Jenkins clearly believes -- and I think without irony -- that one should not waste time reading inferior books (he uses the term "inferior," yes). However, he leaves the door open with his definition of "literature" as "only a form of expression, an interpretation of the phenomena of human existence, the painting of pictures of life" (41), and suggests that such a thing can be found in many genres. As many a literary scholar schooled in the 1980's and beyond knows, this definition is almost as wide-open as that of a "text."
In the end, Jenkins reveals almost nothing about the reading public; he is much more preoccupied with advocating "proper" dedication to reading and reading choices. So I don't know that I'm any closer to understanding what the hell the reading public actually is, although I was greatly interested in his obvious understanding that lifestyle shapes reading patterns, as in his belief that "duck-back" readers have increased exponentially due to the growing pattern of commuting in the early 20th century.
In this day and age, it may be that the duck-backs are all that keep publishing houses afloat, since reading as a recreational activity has long-since ceded top billing to the television and has lost serious ground to the internet and video games (and by reading I mean reading as the activity, not reading as a skill that facilitates the activity). "Reading" is both everywhere and nowhere; more people read today than ever before, but a smaller percentage of them "read" today.
If you catch my drift.
Jenkins divides the "reading public" into book readers and magazine readers. He further subdivides the book readers into three categories from least to greatest numbers: the sponge reader, the sieve reader, and the duck-back reader. The sponge reader reads "fewer and better books than his fellows" -- resulting, according to Mr. Jenkins, in his being ignored by authors and publishers. The sieve reader reads quite a bit and is full of surface facts and plots and literary gossip, but doesn't have the critical acumen of the sponge reader. Meanwhile, the lowly duck-back reader, while great in number, absorbs absolutely nothing and is entirely unchanged by reading because reading is for the duck-back simply a way to kill time (Jenkins believes the swelling of this number to be caused by the increasing phenomenon of commuting).
I'm not entirely sure if Jenkins takes these classifications seriously. He warns us at the outset that in his professional job he's not "a man of letters" and therefore is used as a stand in for the nebulous "man in the street." Secondly, he warns us -- after having classified readers -- that "it is very easy to classify the readers of books, but like all generalizations, such a classification is only half true" (36). So he's either taking the piss or he's a nascent poststructuralist or maybe both, as many traditionalists believe all poststructuralists to be. However, he seems to fall squarely in the traditionalist camp when he states that the "day of real literary criticism has past [sic]" (36). In 1914.
Jenkins clearly believes -- and I think without irony -- that one should not waste time reading inferior books (he uses the term "inferior," yes). However, he leaves the door open with his definition of "literature" as "only a form of expression, an interpretation of the phenomena of human existence, the painting of pictures of life" (41), and suggests that such a thing can be found in many genres. As many a literary scholar schooled in the 1980's and beyond knows, this definition is almost as wide-open as that of a "text."
In the end, Jenkins reveals almost nothing about the reading public; he is much more preoccupied with advocating "proper" dedication to reading and reading choices. So I don't know that I'm any closer to understanding what the hell the reading public actually is, although I was greatly interested in his obvious understanding that lifestyle shapes reading patterns, as in his belief that "duck-back" readers have increased exponentially due to the growing pattern of commuting in the early 20th century.
In this day and age, it may be that the duck-backs are all that keep publishing houses afloat, since reading as a recreational activity has long-since ceded top billing to the television and has lost serious ground to the internet and video games (and by reading I mean reading as the activity, not reading as a skill that facilitates the activity). "Reading" is both everywhere and nowhere; more people read today than ever before, but a smaller percentage of them "read" today.
If you catch my drift.
04 October 2008
The state of the profession.
I may be crazy, but it seems there are fewer English jobs out there this year than last year on the old JIL. Maybe people just don't need to read books and analyze texts anymore. An increasing number of job listings also are calling for "new media" specialists and despite the fact that most major universities force their graduate students into "American" or "British" tracks, many jobs are specifically asking for "transnational" or "transatlantic" or "cross cultural" approaches.
I'm not saying these are bad developments; after all, it's silly to think that American authors were influenced solely by American literary developments or American society. Despite the wailings of the right wing who would most likely decry the "leftist assault on our national identity" should universities stop insisting on nationalist study tracks, the authors themselves rarely gave half of a rat's ass about where their peers were from. Most of the American authors we still care about from the 1920's were hanging out in Europe with their European buddies.
Which is not to say that the study of national literatures doesn't have its place, but the reading public (whatever that may be when you finally get down to trying to analyze it) by and large does not distinguish between American and British in its consumption. Most of the individuals who compose that group are just trying to read things that interest them, that they think they're "supposed to read" to be cultured, or that are current best-sellers. Or that Oprah told them to read.
What is the reading public anyway?
I'm not saying these are bad developments; after all, it's silly to think that American authors were influenced solely by American literary developments or American society. Despite the wailings of the right wing who would most likely decry the "leftist assault on our national identity" should universities stop insisting on nationalist study tracks, the authors themselves rarely gave half of a rat's ass about where their peers were from. Most of the American authors we still care about from the 1920's were hanging out in Europe with their European buddies.
Which is not to say that the study of national literatures doesn't have its place, but the reading public (whatever that may be when you finally get down to trying to analyze it) by and large does not distinguish between American and British in its consumption. Most of the individuals who compose that group are just trying to read things that interest them, that they think they're "supposed to read" to be cultured, or that are current best-sellers. Or that Oprah told them to read.
What is the reading public anyway?
03 October 2008
You can't handle the truth...
Looks like Republicans are up to their old tricks again, employing the classic dirtball tactics that have helped empty shells like George Bush defeat far more qualified opponents (Seriously, though, can you imagine what the right-wing media would be yacking about if Kerry were President during this economic debacle? And don't tell me there wouldn't have been one, because the Democrats on economic issues especially are way too ideologically close to the Republicans).
It seems Republican operatives -- knowing that it's near to impossible to absolutely pin it on the McCain campaign or the official party -- are conducting fake polls in swing states that try to link Barack Obama to Hamas and the PLO. This report from the Guardian (UK):
racist Republican voters about McCain's "Black love child."
I'm willing to bet the Democrats are no angels in this category, either; however, it always seems like the Republicans are far better at it. And the risk of getting caught is almost negligible, given how pathetic political coverage is in the US media (outside of the Daily Show), because seriously, how much of the US electorate reads left-leaning British papers?
It seems Republican operatives -- knowing that it's near to impossible to absolutely pin it on the McCain campaign or the official party -- are conducting fake polls in swing states that try to link Barack Obama to Hamas and the PLO. This report from the Guardian (UK):
"They said; 'Are you Jewish?' and I said 'Yeh'. Then they said 'if you knew Barack Obama was supported by Hamas, would it change your vote? Would it change your vote if you knew his church had made antisemitic statements?'. All the hot button issues on Israel." She said she will vote for Obama as planned.If you can't beat 'em, smear 'em. As the Guardian points out, the tactic was fundamental in George Bush's overcoming John McCain's double-digit leads in the 2000 primary...double-digit leads that began evaporating when "pollsters" started asking
In Key West, Florida, another swing state, Joelna Marcus, 71, a retired professor, had a similar experience. She was asked if she would be influenced if she learned that Obama had donated money to the Palestine Liberation Organisation.
I'm willing to bet the Democrats are no angels in this category, either; however, it always seems like the Republicans are far better at it. And the risk of getting caught is almost negligible, given how pathetic political coverage is in the US media (outside of the Daily Show), because seriously, how much of the US electorate reads left-leaning British papers?
02 October 2008
Shortening of Days
Autumn comes crisp,
a silver edge on the grass,
dappled with the uncollected
offerings of trees, their branches
growing barer by the day.
And against the cold stone stacked
to parcel this from that,
leaves gathered in corners
tremble with every chilled breath
that mocks their makeshift shelters
and troubles their thinning husks.
Those that were young and green,
that danced with each insistent gust,
that reveled in the wind’s warm rush
across their bright clean faces,
now huddle fragile,
twisted and brittle
against the dying earth.
a silver edge on the grass,
dappled with the uncollected
offerings of trees, their branches
growing barer by the day.
And against the cold stone stacked
to parcel this from that,
leaves gathered in corners
tremble with every chilled breath
that mocks their makeshift shelters
and troubles their thinning husks.
Those that were young and green,
that danced with each insistent gust,
that reveled in the wind’s warm rush
across their bright clean faces,
now huddle fragile,
twisted and brittle
against the dying earth.
01 October 2008
I die a little death each time a bookstore closes.
Olsson's has finally succumbed to the Big Box and teh Internets.
I remember their Georgetown store, long gone now, but what a wonderful quirky joint it was, with shelves stacked high and bare floorboards creaking.
How long do any of these places have? How long to do books have?
After libraries, small bookstores were great repositories of knowledge and new ideas. Book warehouses like Borders and Barnes and Noble may have the selection, but much of the staff would be useless without computers.
I remember their Georgetown store, long gone now, but what a wonderful quirky joint it was, with shelves stacked high and bare floorboards creaking.
How long do any of these places have? How long to do books have?
After libraries, small bookstores were great repositories of knowledge and new ideas. Book warehouses like Borders and Barnes and Noble may have the selection, but much of the staff would be useless without computers.
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