Agnosticsherbet
Agnosticsherbet's JournalIf it's Yellen, Wall Street gets the Fed chief it wanted, not expected
Wall Street looks set to get who it wants as Federal Reserve chairman, but definitely not who it expected.
The CNBC September Fed Survey, conducted Thursday and Friday, found Wall Street participants by a 2-to-1 margin believed President Barack Obama would nominate former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers to be the next Fed Chairman.
But by about a 5-to-1 margin, they wanted current Vice Chairwoman Janet Yellen to accede to the top post over Summers.
In a surprise announcement on Sunday, Summers, the presumed frontrunner, told President Obama he no longer wanted to be considered for the job. Summers, who was strongly opposed by some Democrats on the left, cited the high political price the president might have to pay for the nomination to succeed.
After watching the calls here from the my fellow lefties, it is hard to believe this article. Is she the bane of Wall Street or the person they really wanted all along?
Just a weird story.
President Jimmy Carter and the War Power Act.
If it only had four letters, The War Powers Act of 1973 might well be considered one. Since it was initiated to limit the Powers of the President to unilaterally go to war (Vetoed by Nixon. Congress overrode that Veto and made it a law) it has been used successfully and ignored successfully by every President to take the country into War/Conflict/Hostilities. Jimmy Carter both used and ignored the Act when he was in office.
After an unsuccessful attempt on April 24, 1980, to rescue American hostages being held in Iran, President Carter submitted a report to Congress to meet the requirements of the War Powers Resolution, but he did not consult in advance. The Administration took the position that consultation was not required because the mission was a rescue attempt, not an act of force or aggression against Iran. In addition, the Administration contended that consultation was not possible or required because the mission depended upon total surprise.
Some Members of Congress complained about the lack of consultation, especially because legislative-executive meetings had been going on since the Iranian crisis had begun the previous year. Just before the rescue attempt, the Senate Foreign Relations Committee had sent a letter to Secretary of State Cyrus Vance requesting formal consultations under the War Powers Resolution. Moreover, shortly before the rescue attempt, the President outlined plans for a rescue attempt to Senate Majority Leader Robert Byrd but did not say it had begun. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Frank Church stressed as guidelines for the future: (1) consultation required giving Congress an opportunity to participate in the decision making process, not just informing Congress that an operation was underway; and (2) the judgment could not be made unilaterally but should be made by the President and Congress. (23)
War Powers: a Selected Bibliography
War Powers Act of 1973
President Carter, himself, did not consult with Congress until after the point. Took a little flack for it. His reason was "consultation was not required because the mission was a rescue attempt, not an act of force or aggression against Iran." However, considering that inserting a military force in a foreign country without that counties approval is an act of war. Even if successful, it could not have been done without some loss of life necessary to subdue the hostage takers.
At first glance, this seems to be the norm. Presidents take us into a limited conflict and only afterward actually let Congress know. This was followed by complaining in Congress who then promptly forget the whole thing.
I am glad President Obama has sought Congressional authority. However, we should not be fooled into thinking this changes the dynamic. Presidents, even those as revered as an elder statesman such as President Carter, ignore it unless Congress actually demands its role. It is time the Congress takes up the War Powers and fashions a better vehicle that isn't so easy to ignore when its convenient.
Syria: Drop medicines, not bombs
Now that the line has almost certainly been crossed, further attacks seem likely. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime is thought to be holding stockpiles of the nerve agent sarin, and clearly there is willingness (from whichever side) to use it.
If, as also seems likely, the West decides to intervene, what action should it take? It is highly improbable that the threat can be reduced by bombing the stockpiles (see "Wind and rockets key clues in Syrian chemical puzzle" and "Iraq offers grim lessons for Syrian gas survivors"
. Giving people the means to protect themselves is much better.
Iranian toxicologists who studied the victims of the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s found that administering antidotes to nerve agents – mainly atropine and pralidoxime injected into muscle – in the hours and days after a sarin attack can save lives and reduce the chances of chronic symptoms in survivors. Even cheap alternatives such as sodium bicarbonate and magnesium sulphate can help.
http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21929321.500-syria-drop-medicines-not-bombs.html#.Uh6Uj6nn-Ah
After all the arguing and fighting, I see something that I support. I do hope that someone who reads this has the ear of the President, the Department of Defense, or someone in power. Whether you believe we should support strikes or stay out of the situation, delivering supplies that will save people's lives should be acceptable.
Syria: Drop medicines, not bombs
Source: New Scientist
THE horrors of the Iran-Iraq war, in which tens of thousands were killed by chemical weapons, leave no doubt of the danger Syrians face from further atrocities like last week's in Damascus.
Now that the line has almost certainly been crossed, further attacks seem likely. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad's regime is thought to be holding stockpiles of the nerve agent sarin, and clearly there is willingness (from whichever side) to use it.
If, as also seems likely, the West decides to intervene, what action should it take? It is highly improbable that the threat can be reduced by bombing the stockpiles (see "Wind and rockets key clues in Syrian chemical puzzle" and "Iraq offers grim lessons for Syrian gas survivors" . Giving people the means to protect themselves is much better.
Iranian toxicologists who studied the victims of the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s found that administering antidotes to nerve agents – mainly atropine and pralidoxime injected into muscle – in the hours and days after a sarin attack can save lives and reduce the chances of chronic symptoms in survivors. Even cheap alternatives such as sodium bicarbonate and magnesium sulphate can help.
Read more: http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg21929321.500-syria-drop-medicines-not-bombs.html#.Uh5di6nn-Ag
After all the arguing and fighting, I see something that I support. I do hope that someone who reads this has the ear of the President, the Department of Defense, or someone in power. Whether you believe we should support strikes or stay out of the situation, delivering supplies that will save peoples lives should be acceptable.
King David-Era Palace Found in Israel, Archaeologists Say
Archaeologists say they've uncovered two royal buildings from Israel's biblical past, including a palace suspected to have belonged to King David.
The findings at Khirbet Qeiyafa — a fortified hilltop city about 19 miles (30 kilometers) southwest of Jerusalem — indicate that David, who defeated Goliath in the Bible, ruled a kingdom with a great political organization, the excavators say.
"This is unequivocal evidence of a kingdom's existence, which knew to establish administrative centers at strategic points," read a statement from archaeologists Yossi Garfinkel of the Hebrew University and Saar Ganor of the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA).
There is a distinct political implication in this discovery. There has been considerable speculation among archeologists that the Kingdom of David did not exist, that it was mythical. This discovery has cause developers to stop the development of a housing complex while awaiting for the site to be declared a national park, probably like Masada, another site of important national interest.
If Zimmerman is convicted, will conservative, gun wielding, white people riot?
I've seen the question and concern asked the other way around. So I am wondering, with all the concern that Zimmerman was just standing h is ground, will white people concerned that candy wielding hoodie wearing black kids run rampant in their neighborhood riot to show their anger at the injustice of profiling and killing an unarmed teenager.
Tis a sad celebration, a dark celebration of an important event in labor history, when Pinks attack
Beginning on July 6, the Homesteaders strike
1892 -- US: State militia move in to break 12-day strike
against Carnegie Steel Corp. in Homestead, PA. Strikers,
protesting wage cuts of 18-26%, suffered seven deaths
in attacks on them by the Pinks ( Pinkerton detectives).
Ending on July 23rd.
Three Pinker ton men and eleven strikers and spectators died. Where are we today?
Is it time to push to change the Bill of Rights to cover all humans on earth everywhere?
European governments are upset that the U.S. is running a massive spy system on every non-American.
The folk at Gitmo are foreign citizens on foreign territory so they don't enjoy all the rights in the Bill of Rights.
We were upset when a drone took out an American Citizen on the rather expanded notion of where the battlefield is. (Apparently everywhere but the United States.)
I know that changing the Constitution is a tall order.
But since the U.S. like to fly hither and yon and blame everyone else for denying people their human rights, it is time that we changed our Constitution to recognize that human rights are everyone's rights under U.S. law, and whether a person is a citizen born in Washington DC or Mombasa Kenya, we recognize certain inalienable rights specifically those applicable or implied to individuals under the Bill of Rights.
Agree or disagree?
Why?
Network Solutions is undergoing a Distributed Denial of Service Attack
I use Network Solutions and have had problems reaching my website and can not even log on to Manage my account. Their phone support technician explained that they are undergoing a Distributed Denial of Service Attack and that they are doing all they can to fix the problem.
I am so relieved.
There are 1,931 private companies working on intelligence, counterterrorism, or
or homeland security in the country (http://www.businessinsider.com/booz-allen-confirms-edward-snowden-as-employee-2013-6#ixzz2VmKbPJPi)
Is is possible that number might be a little high?
Considering that our government is dysfunctional, incapable of finding solutions to problems that as many as 80% of American's support (taxing the rich for instance), how can they solve a problem that stretches through every branch. They can not provide the necessary oversight for so many private corporations when they fail completely at providing oversight on Government bureaus.
Both Democrats and Republican Senators and Congressmen knew about these programs and never questioned them. It is their job to provide oversight of the Federal government. But they failed at that.
Our government is dysfunctional. It has allied itself with a corporations whose vested interest is to see that these huge, expensive, and possibly unconstitutional programs continue. I question whether there is anyone in our government that we can trust to do anything about it. The Judicial Branch can not act outside the courts and can not investigate on their own. The Congress has the power of oversight of the federal government. What they do with that power is run endless trumped up investigations of nonexistent scandals when there is a real scandal running that they know about and are part of.
I do not see anyone we can trust in our government to act in the peoples interest instead of serving the interest of their own power.
Do you?
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