REWIND - A Week of Quotes & Cartoons

SUNDAY

Quote of the Day
December 5, 2010

'Better late with the data than never, of course. And
the release of these figures just ahead of Friday's
grim employment data - the jobless rate rose to 9.8
percent in November - makes them even more compelling.
Clearly, the federal government was much more willing
to deliver mountains of money to big banks that made
big mistakes than it was to lend a financial hand to
rank-and-file Americans struggling through
foreclosures.'

Columnist Gretchen Morgenson,
assistant  business and
financial editor at the New
York Times, on the disclosure
of the recipients of $3.3
trillion from emergency lending
programs put in place during the
economic crisis days of 2008

NYT
December 5, 2010
http://tinyurl.com/22vt8bw

Toon of the Day
http://tinyurl.com/2cyh3yf
Bad Santa
Stuart Carlson

MONDAY

Quote of the Day
December 6, 2010

'In my view, it is an obvious conflict of interest for
C.E.O.'s of banks and large corporations who serve on
the Fed's board of directors to have received cheap
loans from the Fed.

'While they got a huge amount of government support,
small businesses are going bankrupt because they can't
receive affordable credit, workers are losing their
homes to foreclosure, and consumers are being charged
25 percent to 30 percent interest rates on their credit
cards by the very same banks that were bailed out,'

Senator Bernard Sanders, a Vermont
independent who wrote the legal
provision requiring the Federal Reserve
to disclose which companies received
government support during the economic
crisis.

[On Sept. 15, 2008, the day Lehman
Brothers filed for bankruptcy
protection, JPMorgan Chase received
a $3 billion loan from the Fed and
one for $16.1 billion went to General
Electric The two companies received
help even as their chief executives,
Jeffrey R. Immelt of G.E. and Jamie
Dimon of JPMorgan, sat on the nine-
member board of the Federal Reserve
Bank of New York.]

New York Times
December 6, 2010
http://tinyurl.com/2bknhr7

Toon of the Day
http://tinyurl.com/2c4qlll
The Iceberg
Rob Rogers

TUESDAY

Quote of the Day
December 7, 2010

'Forget about electoral mandates or campaign promises.
This president has a historic mandate. Just as Abraham
Lincoln had to lead the nation from slavery and
Franklin Roosevelt from the Depression, this president
must lead the nation from the calamitous failures of
three decades of conservative dominance. This requires
beginning to reverse the perverse tax policies that
have contributed to gilded-age inequality and starved
the government of resources needed for vital
investments. This demands correcting destabilizing
global imbalances, laying a new foundation for reviving
American manufacturing and shackling financial
speculation. It means ensuring the United States leads
rather than lags in the green industrial revolution.
And it requires unwinding the self-destructive military
adventures abroad. The president must strengthen
America's basic social contract in a global economy,
not weaken it.

'This daunting project is not a matter of ambition or
appetite - or even unconscious Kenyan socialism. It is
the necessary function of a progressive president
elected in the wake of calamitous conservative misrule.
Every entrenched corporate and financial interest
stands in the way; it is easier to take a less
confrontational path. President Bill Clinton, for
example, found it convenient to join in the
conservative project of corporately defined trade,
financial deregulation and social welfare constriction.
From NAFTA to the repeal of welfare and the failure of
labor law reform, to deregulating derivatives and
repealing Glass-Steagall, he got his agenda wrong. He
was seduced far more by Wall Street's Robert Rubin than
by Monica Lewinsky.

'Now Obama faces the same challenge. This isn't about
conventional politics. This is simply about the fate
and future of our country. This president has a clear
and imperative historic mandate. If he shirks it, he
risks more than failing to get reelected. He risks a
failed presidency.'

Katrina vanden Heuvel, editor
and publisher of The Nation
Washington Post
December 7, 2010
http://tinyurl.com/286ako5

Toon of the Day
http://tinyurl.com/29bwqxr
I Want It All
Tom Toles - Washington Post

WEDNESDAY

Quote of the Day
December 8, 2010

'It's what I'm calling the Obama-McConnell plan. We're
going to borrow $46 billion from the poor, from the
middle class, from businesses of all sizes basically to
give a tax cut to families in America today, that
despite the recession, are making over a million
dollars. I mean, this is unprecedented. Unprecedented.
I want to repeat that.

'The median net worth of African-American
families -- net worth, not income -- in this country
today, according to our census, is $5,000. You want me
to repeat that? $5,000. So we are borrowing money from
constituencies, and large segments of the population
like this. I want you all to get your
heads around this.'

Sen. Mary Landrieu, a conservative
Democratic from Louisiana, lashing
President Obama's deal with
congressional Republicans that
allows tax cuts for the wealthy
to be extended for two more years.

Huffington Post
December 8, 2010
http://tinyurl.com/34lz2cf

Toon of the Day
http://tinyurl.com/29emgyb
Pie-partisanship
Tom Toles - Washington Post

THURSDAY

Quote of the Day
December 9, 2010

'Please use the term "government-run health insurance,"
or, when brevity is a concern, "government option,"
whenever possible. When it is necessary to use the term
"public option" (which is, after all, firmly ensconced
in the nation's lexicon), use the qualifier "so-
called," as in "the so-called public option." Here"s
another way to phrase it: "The public option, which is
the government-run plan".'

Fox's Washington managing editor,
Bill Sammon's October 2009 memo
to network's staff about how to
describe the then proposed a public
healthcare insurance option

Daily Beast
December 9, 2010
http://tinyurl.com/2athwhx

Toon of the Day
http://tinyurl.com/23wg4rn
Ghosts of Christmas Past
Mike Luckovich

FRIDAY

Quote of the Day
December 10, 2010

'Time to secure a sustainable peace is fast running
out.It is clear that without a rapid and dramatic
move. a two-state solution, which forms the one and only
available option for a peaceful resolution of this
conflict, will be increasingly difficult to attain.'

Statement issued by 26 former
European Union diplomats urging
the EU to adopt a tougher stance
towards Israel including taking
'concrete measures' and exacting
'consequences' over continued
settlement building on occupied
land, which they say is illegal
under international law.

Guardian (UK)
December 10, 2010
http://tinyurl.com/2a5eg5n

Toon of the Day
http://tinyurl.com/2fsq8ry
Been There
Tony Auth - Philadelphia Inquirer

SATURDAY

Quote of the Day
December 11, 2010

'The states - many of them broke - are still firing
teachers, doing away with pre-school programs,
and raising tuitions and fees at public universities.
And now that the stimulus is about over, there
won't be any more money to rehabilitate the roads,
bridges, sewers, and energy systems that are still
falling apart all over America.

'"We can win the competition," the President said,
Monday. His words were inspiring. But his deed that
day, approving a tax deal that continues George W.
Bush's fiscal policies, makes that goal harder to
achieve.'

Economist Robert Reich
blog
December 9, 2010
http://tinyurl.com/25h5fvx

Toon of the Day
http://tinyurl.com/2cz4v7y
Scam Artists
Ben Sargent

___________________________________________

Portside aims to provide material of interest to people
on the left that will help them to interpret the world
and to change it.

Submit via email: [log in to unmask]

Submit via the Web: http://portside.org/submittous3

Frequently asked questions: http://portside.org/faq

Sub/Unsub: http://portside.org/subscribe-and-unsubscribe

Search Portside archives: http://portside.org/archive

Contribute to Portside: https://portside.org/donate