THIS WAS A GIMME...

Anyone familiar with the right-wing Noise Machine could've predicted that the tragedy at Ft. Hood would be spun into an attack on "political correctness" and that's exactly what's been happening. Even a former LTC joined in.

PAID LINKS?

I've wondered how the Drudge Report makes money because it doesn't carry many ads and now I may have the answer: sources pay Drudge for links. Greg Beato at Soundbitten writes that Reuters seems to have paid both Drudgereport.com and Breitbart.com for links to Reuters news stories.

A PERFECT DOPE FOR THE RUBES

Sarah Palin addressed a gathering of the forced-birth movement in Wisconsin and shared this little gem of paranoia:

Noting that there had been a lot of “change” of late, Palin recalled a recent conversation with a friend about how the phrase “In God We Trust” had been moved to the edge of the new coins.

“Who calls a shot like that?” she demanded. “Who makes a decision like that?”

She added: “It’s a disturbing trend.”

The implication is that the godless liberals were behind this change and even POLITICO can admit that this is wingnut BS:

But the new coins – concerns over which apparently stemmed from an email chain letter widely circulated among conservatives – were commissioned by the Republican-led Congress in 2005 and approved by President Bush.

ANOTHER GOP CHICKENHAWK

Markos Moulitsos calls out out krazy Tom Tancredo on his lack of military service in a war he supported and little Tommie can't take it and walks off the show. It's pretty amazing how many chickenhawks are in the GOP. For reference purposes, here's the source about little Tommie and Vietnam:

Firebrand Tancredo puts policy over party line
By Anne C. Mulkern
Denver Post Staff Writer
Posted: 11/27/2005 01:00:00 AM MST
Updated: 09/04/2006 12:34:55 AM MDT

Born in 1945, "Tommy" Tancredo grew up in an Italian neighborhood in north Denver. His parents, he says, were apolitical.

As a Republican student activist, Tancredo spoke out in favor of the Vietnam War. After graduating from the University of Northern Colorado in June 1969, he became eligible to serve in Vietnam. Tancredo said he went for his physical, telling doctors he'd been treated for depression, and eventually got a "1-Y" deferment.

IF CANTOR DOESN'T END UP APOLOGIZING TO LIMBAUGH

UPDATE: Here's a list of previous grovelers.

That would make him the first GOP pol or official this year who hasn't recanted. This is a little more interesting because Cantor is a rising star in the GOP Establishment. Let's see what happens next week.

Cantor Calls for Inclusive Party, Criticizes Limbaugh Rhetoric
By Lorraine Woellert
Nov. 7 (Bloomberg) -- The second-ranking Republican in the U.S. House, Eric Cantor, criticized some comments by talk-show host Rush Limbaugh as inappropriate and said his party needs to be inclusive.

“The Republican Party in its roots is a party of inclusion and we ought to be promoting that and making sure that voices are heard,” Cantor, of Virginia, said in an interview on Bloomberg Television’s “Political Capital with Al Hunt,” airing this weekend.

Cantor, when asked about Limbaugh’s comments that “Adolf Hitler, like Barack Obama, also ruled by dictate,” and his comparison of the administration’s health-care logo to a swastika, said the comparisons were wrong.

“Do I condone the mention of Hitler in any discussion about politics?” Cantor said. “No, I don’t, because obviously that is something that conjures up images that frankly are not, I think, very helpful.”

Cantor was critical of Republicans such as Representative Virginia Foxx of North Carolina, who called the Democratic health-care plan a greater threat to America than terrorists, and Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty, who took fellow Republican Olympia Snowe to task for voting with Democrats. Pawlenty later said the Maine senator is “absolutely welcome” in the party.

Cantor defended Snowe, saying she “is talking to Democrats the way she does a lot, the way we all do.”

PAT CADDELL IS A USEFUL IDIOT

UPDATE: The WH denies making any threats.

Caddell is a fossil who has turned into a cranky conservative and ALWAYS blasts liberals when he appears on FAUX News, so it's no wonder he objects to the WH telling another Dem strategist not to appear on the propaganda network.

White House: FOX off-limits -- strategist
Posted November 6, 2009 11:04 AM
by Peter Nicholas
The Swamp

But Patrick Caddell, a Fox News contributor and a former pollster for Democratic President Jimmy Carter, said he has spoken to Democratic consultants who have been told by the White House to avoid appearances on Fox. He declined to give their names.

Caddell said he had not gotten that message himself from the White House. "They know better than to tell me anything like that,'' he said.

Caddell added: "I have heard that they've done that to others in not too subtle ways. I find it appalling. When the White House gets in the business of suppressing dissent and comment, particularly from its own party, it hurts itself.''

They know better because Caddell has gone over the cliff.

I GUESS WE JUST CAN'T STOP KILLING THE WRONG PEOPLE

We've been killing Afghan civilians for years and this is only the latest in a tragic series of blunders that has turned the population against us. Note the choice of words by the Afghan spokesman.

Afghans killed during search for missing U.S. troops
Sat Nov 7, 2009 9:06am EST

KABUL (Reuters) - NATO forces mistakenly killed seven Afghan soldiers and police in an air strike during a battle while searching for two missing American soldiers in Afghanistan, the Afghan Defense Ministry said on Saturday.

"Yesterday, in a NATO air strike, seven Afghan (soldiers and police) were martyred in Badghis province," Afghan Defense Ministry spokesman General Zaher Azimy said.

STILL STUCK IN THE 60S

I've written before that conservatives of a certain age are still angry about the hippies of the 60s and yesterday's Bachmann protest in DC provided a little more evidence. (via Greg Sargent)

Large chunks of Bachmann’s base are still culturally stuck in the 1960s. Perhaps the most interesting speaker of the day — one that drew loud, emotional cheers and boos — sounded tones that were completely indistinguishable from the hippie-bashers of 50 years ago.

The speaker was John Ratzenberger, a.k.a. Cliff Clavin (sigh). He told a tale that dripped with still-fresh resentment about how he was a techie building the stage at Woodstock — Woodstock! — when the rains came and the National Guard had to be called in to save the day. Clavin, still visibly angry, excoriated all the love children for bashing the military even as they relied on the military to save their precious, America-hating festival.

Clavin then drew a direct line from the sixties longhairs right to Nancy Pelosi and Obama, saying that our current leadership is culturally akin to “Wavy Gravy.” Gives you a strong sense of the cultural roots of today’s strain of angry, resentful Bachmannalia and Tea Party-ism. Are we really still fighting this battle?

The conservatives even have a modern novel, Mr. Sammler's Planet, that describes their fear of the Dirty Fucking Hippies.

NOT EXACTLY "WORD OF MOUTH"

A lot of Bachmann's Baggers chanted "Kill the Bill" yesterday and there's no chance at all that this was spontaneous. Think Progress pointed out that the new site Don'tKillGrandma, an offshoot of FreedomWorks, instructed attendees in what to chant:



(Click on for larger image)

UH OH, TWO MORE MARXIST GROUPS

UPDATE: (h/t Steve Benen) Make that 3 more because the American Cancer Society also supports the House bill.

THEY'RE EVERYWHERE!!!

AMA, AARP back House health care bill
November 6, 2009 4:09 a.m. EST

Washington (CNN) -- The push to overhaul health care received a major boost Thursday as the American Medical Association and AARP endorsed legislation drafted by top House Democrats.

IS IT WINGNUT OR IS IT SPONTANEOUS?

On his radio show yesterday, Mark Levin claimed that the Bachmann protests was "word of mouth" and I guess it was if you count Rep. Michelle Bachmann going on Hannity's TV show to promote it "word of mouth."

THE NY TIMES OMITS CRUCIAL FACT

In this tendentious story - "Democrats Push Climate Bill Through Panel Without G.O.P. Debate" - John M. Broder of the NYT decided to downplay the fact that the GOP decided to boycott the committee meetings. Worse, this is all he tells us about the troglodyte Sen. Inhofe:

The senior Republican on the environment committee, Senator James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma, said the bill would harm the American economy and cost millions of jobs. He said the Democrats’ decision to ram the bill through “marked the death knell” of efforts to enact a comprehensive climate change bill.

Inhofe doesn't think there is global warming, man-made or otherwise, and therefore wouldn't pass any kind of global warming legislation.

THIS QUOTE DOESN'T MAKE SENSE

Not because Bachmann isn't a loon but because it was attributed to a conservative Republican. I suspect POLITICO didn't check with Mark Levin to confirm that this person was a real conservative.

Bachmann aide no longer taking care of business
By JONATHAN ALLEN | 11/4/09 2:34 PM EST

The aide who helped turn Rep. Michele Bachmann into a controversial mainstay of cable news has informed colleagues that she’s quitting — just as the firebrand Republican congresswoman prepares for her biggest media moment yet.

Multiple sources have confirmed that Michelle Marston, a veteran Hill aide, is leaving Bachmann’s office.

A conservative Republican House member, speaking on the condition of anonymity, suggested that Bachmann’s views — and her willingness to state them — make it hard for her to keep staff.

“When your captain’s crazy, it’s time to find a new ship,” the lawmaker said.

MIKE MALLOY JUST SAID BACHMANN'S CROWD WAS ALL WHITE

And from this picture I found at Gateway Pundit, he's pretty much correct.

RADIO GASBAG AUDIENCES

Look like the wingers have slightly increased their audience size. Numbers are estimates done in Spring 2009 from TALKERS Magazine.

TWO GOOD POINTS

Despite the wingers absurd attempts to turn the Nov. 3 Elections into a great conservative revival, the conservatives have done very poorly and even POLITICO has noticed.

GOP's special elections losing streak
By ERIKA LOVLEY | 11/5/09 8:47 PM EST

...Republicans have lost 20 of the past 29 House special elections, dating back to January 2003. And in perhaps the most worrisome aspect of the trend, the GOP lost its fifth consecutive competitive special election in Republican-friendly territory.

In New York’s historically Republican 23rd District, where Democrat Bill Owens prevailed Tuesday, the GOP squandered a 43 percent to 31 percent voter registration advantage over the Democratic Party. In New York’s 20th District, where Scott Murphy — like Owens, another unknown Democrat with no experience in elective office — won a March special election, the GOP blew a 65,000-voter registration edge.

In Foster’s March 2008 upset victory, Republicans found a way to lose the seat belonging to former Speaker Dennis Hastert — a district that Hastert had held for more than two decades and that twice voted for George W. Bush by comfortable margins.

Two more embarrassing losses followed in May of that year, when Democrats snatched GOP-held seats in Louisiana and Mississippi. In the Mississippi race, the Republican special election nominee managed to defy political gravity by losing a seat in an area where voters delivered 62 percent to Bush in 2004 — and where they gave 62 percent to John McCain a few months later, in November.

The second good point for liberals is the enormous decline of prominent elected officials from the South, first noted by Kevin Drum and given a little more exposure by Ezra Klein. Creeps like "Gingrich, Armey, Lott, Bush, Frist, and DeLay" who held power in the 90s are GONE.

NEWSMAX & CARIBOU BARBIE

Newsmax has been running ads on wingnut radio shows promoting a joint offer: get Palin's book and a Newsmax subscription.


If you subscribe for a year ($49.95), you get her book for free. If you buy the book for $4.97 plus $5.95 shipping, you get a 4 month subscription.

WE NEED BETTER MOTU

(h/t Digby)

And by "better" I mean both ethically and technically. Felix Salmon gives us some telling descriptions of a few former heads of Goldman Sachs, America's premier Ayn Rand company. Stephen Friedman went on to become head of the NY Fed and after helping to arrange a couple of sweet, non-market, deals for GS, he forgot his moral bearings and purchased thousands of shares of GS stock. Shortly after that, he resigned under a cloud.

Perhaps more interesting is the Hank Paulson story, the man who initially wanted to be Holy Roman Emperor for Wall Street Bailing Out. Let's reflect that Goldman Sachs, like most modern firms, relies heavily on computers and electronic communications in order function at all. Mr. Paulson? Not so much:

Similarly, he hobbled his ability to communicate by refusing to ever touch email: instead, any time he wanted to say anything to anybody he’d have to do so over the phone or in person.

WHY IS CRAMER STILL ON THE AIR?

(h/t Mike Finnegan at Crooks & Liars)

Jon Stewart demolished Jim Cramer's pretence of being a stock market whiz and Nouriel Roubini piled on, calling Cramer a "buffoon." I have recently heard Cramer pitching membership into his investing practices on wingnut radio stations and I think I should send the station managers this tidbit:

Cramer Buy Recommendation CIT Goes Bankrupt

MEDVED THE IMMORALIST

In a USA Today op-ed, Michael Medved offers a defense of Sarah Palin urging us to avoid personal attacks, ignore her resume and read her book. Medved has no problem ignoring this advice when he attacked Marty Peretz for marrying a rich woman and made personal attacks on John Edwards and Al Franken.

I'M NOT SURE IF I BELIEVE DOWD

But in this column, she briefly recounts a dinner she had with Fats Limbaugh and notes:

At our long-ago dinner, Limbaugh credited his success with being “one-dimensional.” “I’m totally concerned with me,” he said.

Now, that may not be a true recollection but it does fit in with Bill O'Reilly's remark about talk shows:

"Conservative people tend to see the world in black and white terms, good and evil," says O'Reilly in an interview. "Liberals see grays. In any talk format, you have to pound home a strong point of view. If you're not providing controversy and excitement, people won't listen, or watch."

GOP A-HOLES IN THE SENATE

All these jerks needlessly tried to hold up a bill to extend unemployment benefits.

Jon Kyl
David Vitter
Mike Johanns
John Thune
Bob Corker
Jeff Sessions
Mitch McConnell
Orrin Hatch
Jim DeMint

GOD'S TEAM 7 PHILLIES 3

JUST TO KEEP SCORE

UPDATE: Fred Thompson also pimped for Hoffman.

(via Media Matters)

Doug Hoffman, the Bagger who ran in NY-23, was supported by "Glenn Beck, Lou Dobbs, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, Rush Limbaugh, Mike Huckabee, Michelle Malkin, and Andrew Breitbart's BigGovernment.com."

That's a LOT of free publicity.

THE WINGERS ARE USUALLY EURO-PHOBIC...

except when they can fool the rubes by praising the election of a "conservative" European politician, as was the case with Chancellor Angela Merkel. I don't imagine they are too keen on her now.

Tear down mental walls on climate, German chancellor says
By William Douglas | McClatchy Newspapers
Posted on Tuesday, November 3, 2009

WASHINGTON — German Chancellor Angela Merkel made an impassioned plea Tuesday to a joint session of Congress to work together on efforts to curb global warming and to help forge a binding climate-change deal at an international meeting next month.

"We need an agreement on one objective: Global warming must not exceed 2 degrees Celsius," Merkel said, or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. "To achieve this, we need the readiness of all countries to accept internationally binding obligations. We cannot afford missing the objectives in climate protection that science tells us have to be met."

MORE BACHMANN KRAZINESS

On Hannity's Monday radio show, she made the freaky claim that the Federal government now owns 30% of the private sector and if heatlh care reform is passed, that will increase to 48%. Back on October 15th, she was a little more explicit in a press release:

States News Service

October 15, 2009 Thursday

REP. MICHELE BACHMANN: MOVING AWAY FROM PRIVATE SECTOR

BYLINE: States News Service

LENGTH: 233 words

DATELINE: WASHINGTON

The following information was released by the office of Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann:

"Free markets have failed us, and there's no place else to turn other than the federal government," seems to about sum up Washington's approach over the past year.

This spring, an economist from Arizona State University calculated that since the beginning of bail-out nation, the federal government now owns or controls 30% or more of private business profits. Add to that almost 8% for their cap-and-trade takeover of the energy sector and another 18% for the health care takeover they're maneuvering right now, and that's 56% of the economy in government's hands.

That's downright frightening. Free markets are the engine which has grown our nation to the economic powerhouse that it is today, but even this top notch status is beginning to crumple with ever-increasing deficits, debts, and borrowing - drastically weakening the U.S. dollar.

Consider this: A few weeks ago, we actually voted to nationalize the student loan industry. Twenty five years ago, all student loans were private but Congress decided we needed a public option for higher education. This behavior is nonsense, and is setting a bad precedent if we wish to right our economic ship. If we don't, the economy will continue to drag an anchor in the federal government and will never be able to fully recover. Future generations deserve better.

MORE GOOD NEWS

Despite losing a seat that's been GOP for over 100 years, the baggers and the blowhards are gung ho about purging the GOP of anyone remotely moderate. I was a bit worried about the mid-term elections because in addition to the usual pattern of losses for the party that controls the WH, the economy may still be in the tank by the Fall of 2010.

If the GOP gets consumed with internecine warfare, then the Dems won't have much to fear.

ERICK THINKS APPLES AND ORANGES ARE IDENTICAL

In a vain attempt to convert the historical defeat in NY-23 to a victory for conservatives, Erick Erickson of Red State writes:

Were we to combine Scozzafava and Hoffman’s votes, Hoffman would have won.

You can't combine them, Erick, because they represent votes for two radically different ideologies.

THE BAGGERS AND THE RADIO GASBAGS LOSE IN NY-23

Despite all the pimping they did for the idiot-rube Doug Hoffman, he still couldn't manage to win a district that has historically been represented by a Republican.

POLITICO ON NY-23

Josh Kraushaar thinks Jefferson County was the crucial battleground and I'm not sure why.

Here's the voter breakdown:

Democrat 16,542
Republican 24,449
Independent 2,665
Conservative 691
WOR 168
GRE 89
(all others 0)

With 99% of the precincts reporting, Owens has a slight lead:

OWENS 9,996
HOFFMAN 9,439

THE COMPOSITION OF NY-23

The NYS Board of Elections has a breakdown of the voters in the 23rd Congressional District as of 11/1/2009. Here they are for the active voters:

Democrats 114,387
Republicans 158,807
Independents 18,506
Conservative 5,304
WOR 1,371
GRE 765
LBT 75
RTH 0
SWP 4
Blank 70,265

RTH stands for the "Rent is Too High" Party.

CONNECTION AND DIVERGENCE

I was moved to note the connection that Ayn Rand and Isaiah Berlin have (the Russian Revolution) and their divergent responses because of something Isaiah Berlin wrote about the great empiricist philosopher David Hume and the German irrationalist Johann Hamann (click on for larger image):



Last night I found another odd connection, this time betweem the libertarian socialist Pierre-Joseph Proudhon and one of the great defenders of laisser-faire, Ludwig Von Mises. You may recall one line from Proudhon:

Eventually, in 1838, a scholarship awarded by the Besançon Academy enabled him to study in Paris. Now, with leisure to formulate his ideas, he wrote his first significant book, Qu'est-ce que la propriété? (1840; What Is Property?, 1876). This created a sensation, for Proudhon not only declared, “I am an anarchist”; he also stated, “Property is theft!”

In his critique of Socialism in all it's flavors, Von Mises admitted that Proudhon was at least half-correct:

All ownership derives from occupation and violence. ... That all rights derive from violence, all ownership from appropriation or robbery, we may freely admit to those who oppose ownership on considerations of natural law. ... Violence and Law, War and Peace, are the two poles of social life; but its content is economic action.

THE NOISE MACHINE AT WORK

Yesterday provided a good example of how the conservative Noise Machine works. Rep. Michele "Krazy" Bachmann was on both Hannity's and Beck's radio shows pimping her planned Thursday demonstration in DC against health care reform. Hannity also had her on his TV show last Friday to do the same thing.

Mark "Foamer" Levin, a second-tier wingnut radio host, will also make an appearance at Bachmann's Thursday protest and he's undoubtedly pimping it on his radio show.

The Machine also gives "in kind" donations to conservative candidates. For example, Hannity had Doug Hoffman (NY-23) on both his radio show and his TV show on Monday.

FATS PUTS HIS INCOME OVER THE HEALTH OF HIS LISTENERS

Back in June, the FDA warned that the use of 3 Zicam products could cause permanent loss of smell. That doesn't stop Fats from still pimping the stuff (10/15/2009):

Warning, ladies and gentlemen, I woke up in the middle of the night and I said, "Uh-oh, I'm coming down with something." Now, my voice has been hoarse for the past couple of days. I have one of these little hacking coughs in the upper respiratory tract and I have felt sleepy and watery eyes all day long. When that happens, you start thinking flu. But it's gotten somewhat better. I grabbed a couple of Zicams since this all happened, I swabbed my nose and we will see. Every time I've tried this and it's been a cold, Zicam has gotten rid of it.

The FDA warning included the nasal swabs.

PAT BUCHANAN GETS A MUSICAL BACKUP

Last month, he wrote another column bemoaning the fate of working class white rubes and concluded with "America was once their country. They sense they are losing it. And they are right."

(Once their country? What did these people ever do for America, beyond what others have done?)

Now, Lynyrd Skynyrd has come out with a new album, God and Guns, which is expressly made for the white rubes and that's why Hannity likes the group, especially the Buchanan-style cut, "This Ain't My America."



Hannity will be using the cut "This Ain't My America" as an anti-Obama. anti-liberal theme song. Here's the first two stanzas:

Sometimes I wanna light up underneath the no-smoking sign
Sometimes I wish they'd tell me, how justice got so blind
I wish they'd just leave me alone 'cause I'm doing alright
You can take your change on down the road and leave me here with mine

'Cause that ain't my America
That aint this country's roots
You wanna slam old Uncle Sam
But I ain't letting you
I'm mad as hell and you know I still bleed Red, White, and Blue
That ain't us
That Ain't My America

MONDAY WAS ANOTHER SICK DAY

And worse than that, the Yankees lost. :-)

A STUPID QUESTION

George Stephanopolous asks Valerie Jarett:

And our polling shows that this partisan divide persists on issue after issue after issue. Why has that core promise of the president's campaign, healing the divide, gone unfulfilled?

Here's why, George: Rush Limbaugh, the most well-known spokeman for conservatism in America, accuses Pres. Obama of not caring for our troops in Afghanistan, destroying the private sector on purpose and of wanting to destroy America.

A NICE PRIMER ON KEYNESIAN ECONOMICS

It's by Prof. Alan S. Blinder of Princeton and does an admirable job explaining the key tenets and modern interpretations of Keynes. Here's a crucial excerpt:

Keynesian theory was much denigrated in academic circles from the mid-1970s until the mid-1980s. It has staged a strong comeback since then, however. The main reason appears to be that Keynesian economics was better able to explain the economic events of the 1970s and 1980s than its principal intellectual competitor, new classical economics.

THE FINANCIAL TIMES IS ALSO "ECO-MARXIST"

That's a term Mark Levin uses to describe those who want to do something about man-made global warming.

Follow the science on climate change

Published: November 1 2009 17:30 | Last updated: November 1 2009 17:30
EDITORIAL

As next month’s Copenhagen conference approaches, politicians should not be distracted by the apparently growing volume of sceptical voices challenging the need for global action against climate change. Some of the sceptics may have scientific backgrounds but they are not in the mainstream of contemporary climate research. The real experts – hundreds of scientists worldwide who are examining the link between climate and carbon dioxide emissions – have no doubt that man-made global warming is a real crisis that must be addressed urgently.

PAID FOR IGNORANCE

Why does Liz Chadderdon still go on FAUX? She admits to POLITICO that she doesn't know anythng about economics and gets her butt kicked when she goes on Cavuto's show:

More recently, Chadderdon has been invited to talk business with Fox’s Neil Cavuto — on the main network and on the two-year-old Fox Business Network — even though she readily admits that she has no background in economics.

“Speaking about those issues is not my forte,” said Chadderdon. “And I’m getting the tar kicked out of me.”

She seems to admit she does it for her business:

Chadderdon is skeptical that her Fox hits do much to advance the progressive cause. But she says they’re good for business.

“The clients I have dealt with will say to me that they are impressed I have gone on [Sean] Hannity and O’Reilly,” she says.

PROF. MANKIW COMES CLEAN

In this NYT column, he admits that one of supply-side economics biggest claims is FALSE:

The verdict on supply-side economics is mixed. The most striking claim associated with the theory — that cuts in marginal rates could generate so much extra work effort that tax revenue would rise — is unlikely to apply except in extreme cases.

MR. RICH LETS ME DOWN A LITTLE

In an otherwise terrific column exposing the Tea Baggers as the modern version of the John Birch Society, he repeats a myth that the Villagers seem to love:

The same Republicans who once deplored Democrats for refusing to let an anti-abortion dissident, Gov. Robert Casey of Pennsylvania, speak at the 1992 Clinton convention now routinely banish any dissenters in their own camp.

Casey wasn't allowed to speak because he didn't endorse the ticket, not because of his position on abortion.

LOOKING OUT FOR #1

(h/t Atrios)

That's the Prime Directive for the MOTU. Customers and country don't matter much as long as they get billions in bonuses.

How Goldman secretly bet on the U.S. housing crash
Posted on Sunday, November 1, 2009

WASHINGTON — In 2006 and 2007, Goldman Sachs Group peddled more than $40 billion in securities backed by at least 200,000 risky home mortgages, but never told the buyers it was secretly betting that a sharp drop in U.S. housing prices would send the value of those securities plummeting.

Goldman's sales and its clandestine wagers, completed at the brink of the housing market meltdown, enabled the nation's premier investment bank to pass most of its potential losses to others before a flood of mortgage defaults staggered the U.S. and global economies.

These thieves did the same thing during the dot com bubble.

YAHOO NEWS GETS IT RIGHT

It files this AP report about Fats Limbaugh under "ENTERTAINMENT"



Here's the complete story on Yahoo...