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Economic downturn took a detour on Capitol Hill - (www.nytimes.com) When Representative Ed Pastor was first elected to Congress two decades ago, he was comfortably ensconced in the middle class. Mr. Pastor, a Democrat from Arizona, held $100,000 or so in savings accounts in the mid-1990s and had a retirement pension, but like many Americans, he also owed the banks nearly as much in loans. Today, Mr. Pastor, a miner’s son and a former high school teacher, is a member of a not-so-exclusive club: Capitol Hill millionaires. That group has grown in recent years to include nearly half of all members of Congress — 250 in all — and the wealth gap between lawmakers and their constituents appears to be growing quickly, even as Congress debates unemployment benefits, possible cuts in food stamps and a “millionaire’s tax.”
Federal judge accuses SEC of misleading court - (www.washingtonpost.com) A federal judge who has accused the Securities and Exchange Commission of negotiating weak settlements in Wall Street cases on Thursday accused the agency of misleading a federal appeals court. U.S. District Court Judge Jed S. Rakoff said the SEC also withheld from him important information that he needed to do his job. Rakoff spelled out his allegations in an order that he said was intended to inform the appeals court and prevent anything similar from happening in the future. Meanwhile, the SEC took the dramatic step of asking the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 2nd Circuit to overrule a recent Rakoff decision by issuing a special writ generally reserved for cases in which a judge has grossly overstepped his bounds. Called a writ of mandamus, such a direct and personal challenge to a judge is far from a routine gambit. The judge and the SEC are locked in an extraordinary battle over how the government should police financial fraud, and just when it seemed that the conflict could not get more contentious, Thursday’s development added a dimension
"There Will Be Violence, Mark My Words" - (www.readersupportednews.org) This time, I fear, the public anger will not be deflected. Confessions, not false, will be exacted. Occupy Wall Street has set the snowball rolling; you may not think much of OWS - I have my own reservations, although none are philosophical or moral - but it has made America aware of a sinister, usurious process by which wealth has systematically been funneled into fewer and fewer hands. A process in which Washington played a useful supporting role, but no more than that. Over the next year, I expect the "what" will give way to the "how" in the broad electorate's comprehension of the financial situation. The 99 percent must learn to differentiate the bloodsuckers and rent-extractors from those in the 1 percent who make the world a better, more just place to live. Once people realize how Wall Street made its pile, understand how financiers get rich, what it is that they actually do, the time will become ripe for someone to gather the spreading ripples of anger and perplexity into a focused tsunami of retribution. To make the bastards pay, properly, for the grief and woe they have caused. Perhaps not to the extent proposed by H. L. Mencken, who wrote that when a bank fails, the first order of business should be to hang its board of directors, but in a manner in which the pain is proportionate to the collateral damage. Possibly an excess-profits tax retroactive to 2007, or some form of "Tobin tax" on transactions, or a wealth tax. The era of money for nothing will be over.
Sears to Close 100 to 120 Kmart, Sears Stores - (www.nytimes.com) After a disastrous holiday shopping season, the parent company of Sears and Kmart will close at least 100 stores to raise cash — a move that sparked speculation about whether the 125-year-old retailer can avoid a death spiral fed by declining sales and deteriorating stores. Sears Holdings Corp., a pillar of American retailing that famously began with a mail-order catalog in the 1880s, declared Tuesday that it would no longer prop up "marginally performing" locations. The company pledged to refocus its efforts on stores that make money. Sears' stock quickly plunged, dropping 27 percent. The closings are the latest and most visible move by Eddie Lampert, the hands-on chairman who has struggled to reverse the company's fortunes. As rivals Wal-Mart and Target Corp. spruced up stores in recent years, Sears Holdings confronted falling sales and perceptions of dowdy merchandise.
Congress worried about deficit, ignored jobs - (www.washingtonpost.com) Lori Montgomery has a terrific piece on how little deficit reduction actually got done this year. But perhaps that shouldn't be surprising. The pressure for deficit reduction comes from interest rates. Interest rates, as noted in yesterday's Wonkbook, haven't been this low since 1995. So though there's a lot of talk about the deficit, there's not actually a lot of economic pressure to do anything about it. But the same can't be said for another neglected category of policymaking: jobs. There has been less done for the jobless than for the deficit. After all, the debt-ceiling deal did lead to $900 billion in cuts to domestic discretionary spending, and to the spending trigger that threatens to make a trillion more in cuts starting in 2012. But the jobless? Save for a two-month extension of the payroll tax cut and unemployment insurance benefits, they got nothing.
A world in denial about what it knows - (www.nytimes.com)
I Just Got Here, But I Know Trouble When I see it! - (www.nytimes.com)
Spain revises up deficit and raises taxes - (finance.yahoo.com)
A year of me firsts, and lessons relearned - (www.nytimes.com)
'If You Think This Is A Bad Economy, You Haven't Seen Anything Yet' - (www.businessinsider.com)
Keynes was right - (www.nytimes.com)
Factory Jobs Gain, But Wages Retreat - (www.nytimes.com)
Deflation's Grip Returns in Japan as Factory Production Declines - (www.bloomberg.com)
Italian Business Confidence Falls to Two-Year Low - (www.bloomberg.com)
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