Contrary to Reports, Obama & Treasury Doing Great Work

It seems to just be accepted that the TARP and other bailouts of American companies was a failure and cost taxpayers billions of dollars. This is a product, in part, of the incessant repetition of Republican talking points in the mainstream media. But not only are we getting paid back in full, we are making a profit for the taxpayers:

The Treasury said Thursday it sold 272.17 million warrants in an auction held because Bank of America and the government could not agree upon an acceptable price. Warrants are financial instruments that allow the holder to buy stock in the future at a fixed price. Link

The $1.54 billion total is the largest amount raised from a single institution from the sale of warrants... Link

In the auction, Treasury sold 150.38 million warrants that it labeled "A warrants" with a minimum bid price of $7 per warrant. It received a price of $8.35 for each for those warrants. Link

What does this actually mean? The Treasury got a premium over their minimum price of $1.35 more than they asked for...which is a 19% premium over their minimum asking price. Or to put it another way...the Treasury made an additional $200 million for taxpayers on this transaction alone.

Linus Wilson, a finance professor at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette and an expert in stock warrants, said he would give Teasury a high grade for how it has handled the auctions so far. "These are great results. I think the auctions have had a significantly positive impact on the prices that Treasury has obtained for the warrants," Wilson said. Link

Boccieri Now Undecided on Health Care Vote

Our congressman John Boccieri (D-OH16) is currently undecided on whether he will vote for the Senate health care bill in the House. He previously voted No on the House's health care bill. Here is what Boccieri emailed Greg Sargent of the Plum Line:

“After reviewing the President’s health care proposal and watching portions of his bipartisan health care summit, I’m encouraged the proposal contains important provisions to reduce fraud, waste, and abuse and reduce the deficit. I am hopeful that going forward from last week’s summit with bipartisan ideas, we can finally move toward providing affordable, quality coverage for everyone.” Link

John McCain: The King of Flip-Floppers (Or Just a Liar)

To recap: McCain 2010 says he was misled on the bailout because he was told that it was for the housing market, not financial institutions. McCain 2008 said the bailout was to "shore up" financial institutions, not the housing market, which he said would need support through separate measures.

Bottom-line: McCain 2008 knew exactly what the bailout was for and how it would be used. But now that it turns out to be unpopular, he's claiming that somebody lied to him about what it would be used for. Turns out, the opposite is true. The exact opposite. Link

Republicans Flip-Flopping on Reconciliation

Since Democrats have started to indicate they will use reconciliation to pass parts of the health care bill to get around Republican obstructionism, Republicans have started with the fake outrage. From claims of this ending democracy to Senator Lamar Alexander (R-TN) saying it would "end the Senate," Republicans would have you believe this is unprecedented. But surprise, the majority of Republicans currently serving in the Senate have used reconciliation themselves before:





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Republicans Flip-Flopping on Reconciliation

Analysis: Republicans Setting Filibuster Record

Once again, Republicans are accomplishing two goals at the same time — both of which are bad for the country. By blocking or slowing down every single piece of legislation and every nomination of President Obama, Republicans are simultaneously hurting the President politically while accomplishing their goal of making government seem ineffective. The problem is we just had an election where the American public overwhelmingly supported the President's agenda, while government failure is something that only seems to occur on Republican watch. But this is probably news to most people, since the media does such a poor job reporting:

The frequency of filibusters -- plus threats to use them -- are measured by the number of times the upper chamber votes on cloture. Such votes test the majority's ability to hold together 60 members to break a filibuster.

Last year, the first of the 111th Congress, there were a record 112 cloture votes. In the first two months of 2010, the number already exceeds 40.

That means, with 10 months left to run in the 111th Congress, Republicans have turned to the filibuster or threatened its use at a pace that will more than triple the old record. Link