Little CBO Packs an Authoritative Punch

By Suzy Khimm, Washington Post, Thursday, July 28,11:06 PM

In recent months, Republicans have seemed impervious to outside pressure. They don’t fear the president. They don’t fear the debt ceiling. They don’t fear the market. But on Tuesday afternoon, when the Congressional Budget Office announced that House Speaker John A. Boehner’s (R-Ohio) proposal for raising the debt ceiling would save significantly less money than promised, Republicans’ response was instantaneous. They backed down. Immediately.

Within hours, Boehner vowed to rewrite the bill to deliver the promised savings. The CBO soon concluded that Boehner’s revised plan would save $915 billion — news that quickly resuscitated the proposal.

As in previous high-stakes debates, the CBO has become a key arbiter in the legislative process as lawmakers scramble to react to its analyses. But how has a small agency of budget analysts gained such authority in Washington, helping to determine whether a bill lives or dies?

Congress created the CBO through the 1974 Congressional Budget Act. Until then, Congress had relied on the budget expertise of the executive branch, and the CBO was intended to give legislators an independent source of information.

The CBO director — currently Douglas W. Elmendorf — is appointed by the House speaker and Senate president pro tempore and oversees some 250 economists, policy analysts and other experts. Elmendorf was previously at the Brookings Institution, the White House’s Council of Economic Advisers and the Treasury Department — all institutions his predecessors have passed through. Although some CBO directors have worked in the private sector, most have remained within the realms of policymaking, think tanks and academia.

Although legislators regularly contest the CBO’s findings, they have deferred to its authority more often than not. Lawmakers’ frustrations are rarely attributed to bias on the part of the number-crunchers. Instead, they are more often related to the agency’s methodological caution: The CBO uses existing evidence and historical analogues when judging legislation, and some say that makes the agency too cautious when assessing new approaches.

On several major occasions, the CBO’s numbers have almost single-handedly doomed some of Congress’s biggest priorities, regardless of which party had appointed the agency’s director at the time. In 1994, for example, under a Democrat-appointed director, the CBO decided to include the cost of premiums in evaluating President Bill Clinton’s health-care proposal. As a result, the estimated cost of the bill skyrocketed — a moment many believe was the beginning of the end for that proposal.

Such experiences have strengthened the CBO’s credibility by proving the agency’s political independence. At the same time, the CBO’s power has led some to question whether the agency has an undue amount of influence on Washington policymaking. “You know you’re not God,” Senate Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) told Elmendorf in 2009. But some think such complaints speak more to the frustration of dealing with an honest agency than the CBO itself.

Whether legislation passes “depends on the judgment of members of Congress,” Elmendorf told The Post in 2009. “We’ll provide information that helps them make that judgment. But the decisions are theirs.”

Somebody get this man a tissue - and a cab ride back to Ohio.

House Speaker John Boehner failed to muster enough GOP votes to pass his plan to raise the debt limit on Thursday night, throwing into question the fate of Boehner's proposal as well as that of his speakership. Republican leaders must now rewrite the legislation in order to attract more conservatives as they try to pass a revised version on Friday. But considerable damage has been done. Boehner's negotiating stance in the ongoing effort to trim deficits and raise the debt ceiling by next Tuesday's deadline is hobbled; any credibility he had in claiming that his restive members could get behind a consensus debt deal has vanished. The Speaker has gone lame.

The House was expected to vote Thursday evening on Boehner's legislation, which would raise the debt ceiling through the end of 2011 in exchange for $917 billion in spending cuts and the creation of a special committee to find more savings that would accompany a second debt-ceiling vote in January. It looked as if Boehner would have the votes early Thursday, but by 5 p.m., Republican leaders announced that the vote would be postponed. As hours slipped by, dozens of reporters congregated outside the Speaker's offices on the second floor of the Capitol. The sun set. Pizzas and sodas were brought in. (See "Unable to Rally Support, House GOP Postpones Key Debt Vote.")

House Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy met with Republicans who were leaning against voting for the legislation. Freshmen Reps. Mick Mulvaney, Tim Scott, Jeff Duncan and Trey Gowdy were among those pressured to change their votes. "I'm going to go pray for the leadership because I'm still a no," Mulvaney said, emerging from McCarthy's office. Rumors swirled: They were down two votes, then four, then 10. At 10:20 p.m., McCarthy left the Speaker's office and tersely informed reporters that there would be "no vote tonight."

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had already declared the House Republican plan dead on arrival in the Senate. But House leaders worked to push the measure through because, as they told their members, it would give them greater leverage in negotiations with the Senate and, perhaps more importantly, their own credibility as dealmakers was on the line. Boehner hoped to force the Senate - and President Obama - to take his version of the debt bill. The Speaker was crafting legislation with Reid until last weekend, but the two split over whether to raise the debt ceiling through 2012 in one vote, as Democrats wanted, or to try for a second debt limit hike in six months. Reid and Obama argued that holding another tortured debt ceiling debate in January, on the eve of the Iowa caucuses, would be politically unwise and economically dangerous.

But after he split with Reid, Boehner was left with a bill that was too far to the left for the ideological purists in his conference. Conservatives balked at $18 billion in Pell Grants for low-income students that Boehner had included to lure Democratic votes. They were also disappointed that the bill only called for $917 billion in cuts. Their preferred legislation - a conservative dream bill known as Cut, Cap and Balance that passed the House earlier in July on a near party-line vote - would've halved the projected $7.1 trillion federal 10-year deficit by next year. That bill died in the Senate.

In a highly embarrassing development, Boehner must now move his bill to the right in order to secure enough votes from his own party. The Speaker's failure exposes an uncomfortable reality for the GOP: A final debt ceiling compromise will likely require a coalition of Democrats and moderate Republicans to pass the House, and the outspoken conservative wing of the party will not be on board. That could embolden Democrats to seek a more favorable deal, and it leaves Senate Republicans like Minority Leader Mitch McConnell with a weaker hand to negotiate. (See the top 10 government showdowns.)

Boehner won the speakership last November when Republicans swept into power on a Tea Party tide of discontent. From the outset, it was unclear whether Boehner would be able to keep his unruly freshmen class in line. He surprised the skeptics when he managed to unite most of them behind a 2011 budget deal, which achieved $38.5 billion in cuts - far less than the $100 billion the newcomers had demanded. But many freshmen felt betrayed when a Congressional Budget Office score later found that many of those cuts were gimmicks that amounted to less than $400 million in net savings.

In the months since, Boehner has wrestled with his freshmen. He tried twice to pass legislation in limited support of President Obama's action with NATO in Libya. Both bills failed. He was forced to yank a bipartisan patent bill - a version of which passed the Senate 95-5 - before it was voted down in the House. It took a month of heavy whipping to convince enough of his herd to pass the bill.

Thursday's failure was partly a tactical error on Boehner's part. When he took office, he said he would be unlike other modern Speakers. He wanted to give the power back to the rank-and-file. Instead of twisting arms, Boehner believed in education. He prided himself on the being the opposite of former House Majority Leader Tom DeLay, a Texas Republican called "the Hammer" for his heavy handed - and at times ethically questionable - whipping tactics. Boehner tried to open the process up, allowing the minority to put forward amendments and re-empowering committees. "When we took the majority we promised to end the practice of forcing substantial bills through the House in the dark of night," a GOP leadership aide said late Thursday, "and we take that pledge seriously."

It was Newt Gingrich in the 1990s who began to consolidate power in the Speaker's office. That trend peaked with Nancy Pelosi, who was one of the most powerful Speakers in a generation. Members could hardly hold a press conference without her blessing, let alone win plum committee assignments or pass legislation. Boehner often mocked Pelosi for not allowing amendments, and for her use of frivolous post office naming votes to lure members to the floor where she could whip them.

 

Though heavy handed, Pelosi's tactics worked. She pushed through health care reform in the House after Reid lost his 60-vote super majority in the Senate. More than a few reporters who covered health care remarked how similar Thursday night's drama was to the final health care reform vote, albeit with vastly different outcomes. Both votes could have cost the Speakers their jobs; in Pelosi's case, for overreach, and in Boehner's, for failing to grasp far enough. During the final push on Boehner's debt bill this week, the Speaker did finally crack the whip, telling his conference on Wednesday to "Get your ass in line." But it was too little too late. Boehner's "leadership is clearly at stake," Senator John McCain, an Arizona Republican and the 2008 GOP presidential nominee, said on Thursday night.

Boehner may have made strategic miscalculations as well. Democrats pushed hard to include a debt ceiling increase in the extension of the Bush-era tax cuts last December. Republicans resisted, sensing that debt and deficits would be winning issues for them in the Tea Party-infused 112th Congress. But every attempt by Boehner, who has a legacy of reaching across the aisle to produce No Child Left Behind and sweeping pension reform legislation with the late Senator Teddy Kennedy, to craft a grand bargain of more than $4 trillion in deficit reduction with President Obama has been stymied by protests from his own flock.

So, what comes next? "We have faith that the Senate will reach a compromise that a majority of the folks in the House and a majority of folks in the Senate can support," White House press secretary Jay Carney said on MSNBC late Thursday night. "And that is what the American people want." Reid has been waiting in the wings to either craft a compromise with Boehner and McConnell, or pass his own version of deficit reduction legislation. But it's clear now that Speaker Boehner will need Democratic votes to get any compromise through the House. And that leaves the Republican leader with two options: abandon Tea Party freshmen and form a coalition between his most moderate members and 150+ Dems, or potentially allow the last best hope for a debt ceiling deal to fail in his chamber, with nothing but market panic left to make his members reconsider. Either would be a bruising choice for the embattled Speaker.

McCain blasts "bizarro" Tea Party debt limit demands

Republican Sen. John McCain today railed against conservatives who stand in opposition to House Speaker John Boehner's plan to raise the debt ceiling and reduce the deficit. He called their insistence on passing a balanced budget amendment "worse than foolish" and "bizarro."

Passing an amendment to the Constitution requiring a balanced federal budget is simply not possible with a Democratic majority in the Senate, McCain said, and to suggest otherwise is doing a disservice to voters.

"That is not fair to the American people to hold out and say we won't agree to raising the debt limit until we pass a balanced budget amendment to the Constitution," McCain said on the Senate floor today. "It's unfair, it's bizzaro. And maybe some people have only been in this body for six or seven months or so really believe that."

Boehner's plan to raise the debt ceiling would call for the House and the Senate to vote on a balanced budget amendment -- but not necessarily pass it. Democrats have dismissed Boehner's plan as a "big wet kiss" to the Tea Party and impossible to pass in the Senate. Even so, some of the most conservative members of the House are saying Boehner's plan doesn't go far enough.

McCain has come out in support of the GOP's earlier deficit plan -- "cut, cap and balance" -- which would have made raising the debt ceiling contingent upon the passage of a balanced budget amendment in Congress. Still, McCain said today that it's not worth risking letting the U.S. default on its loans to push for the amendment.

The White House and the Treasury Department maintain that the U.S. risks defaulting if the debt ceiling isn't raised by August 2.

"The idea seems to be that if the House GOP refuses to raise the debt ceiling, a default crisis or gradual government shutdown will ensue and the public will turn en masse against Barack Obama," McCain said, quoting a Wall Street Journal op-ed. "Then Democrats would have no choice but to pass a balanced budget amendment and reform entitlements and the Tea Party Hobbits could return to Middle Earth."

"This is the kind of crack political thinking that turned Sharron Angle and Christine O'Donnell into GOP Senate nominees," McCain continued, still quoting the Wall Street Journal in reference to the two failed 2010 Senate candidates.

By rejecting the Boehner plan, McCain warned, conservatives would not only undermine the speaker but also "go far to re-electing Mr. Obama and making the entitlement state that much harder to reform."

This article was updated to clarify that in part of his remarks today, McCain was quoting a Wall Street Journal op-ed.

Protect The Poor

Don't ask the poorest to pay off our debt

by Donna Brazile              

(CNN) -- My fellow Americans: In a matter of weeks you have become studied on the issues of budgets and deficits. You've also formed opinions on these issues, and these opinions are reflected in poll after poll. Isn't it strange that Congress has yet to listen?

Recently, I reviewed a poll completed in late May for the Pew Charitable Trust. They found that a majority of Americans believes the government is "generally helping the wrong people." This discontent stems in part from the perception that the government helps those who need it least -- the rich rather than the middle class or the working poor.

A majority of citizens, 54%, think their government helps the rich economically "a great deal." Much smaller percentages of the public say the same about "the poor, 16%; "the middle class," 7%; or "people like you." Anyone.

Because of a loophole, hedge fund managers are likely to pay a lower rate of taxes than their secretaries. Warren Buffett, one of the world's richest men, has spoken out about the injustice of the fact that his tax rate was less than the cleaning lady's. Both parties agree that reform of the tax code is necessary, but one thing should be clear: As it stands, the tax system disproportionately benefits the wealthiest Americans. Passing a debt deal that exclusively cuts programs that benefit middle- and lower-income Americans will only exacerbate this difference.

Another fact that has been largely ignored in this debate is the origin of all this debt. We are, after all, raising the debt limit to pay for things we've already bought or purchased.

Let's take an earnest look at who broke the bank. This week, Ezra Klein, in The Washington Post, reported that the cost of policies that began under George W. Bush top out at more than $5 trillion -- this includes long-term and recurring spending from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, decreases in revenue like the Bush tax cuts, as well as additions to the structural deficit like the Medicare prescription drug plan. The cost of policies beginning under President Obama top out at $1.44 trillion, and these policies are largely one-off, short term, or non-recurring spending -- like the stimulus package.

Americans are worried about whether their shot at the American dream is slipping away. We are at the point where we worry most about achieving economic stability rather than getting rich. We are in agreement the government gives the rich better breaks than anyone else in our country.

Let's take a moment to think of the working poor, those among us who live not just from paycheck to paycheck, but who go hungry at the end of every month before their Social Security, veterans or unemployment benefits checks arrive. By the way: My dad is a retired janitor who relies on his Social Security and veteran benefits each month.

That's exactly what more than 60 leaders of Christian denominations and religious organizations did this last week, when they joined in an open letter called a "Circle of Protection," which urged President Obama to protect the poor.

Their statement read, "As Christian leaders, we are committed to fiscal responsibility and shared sacrifice. ... Budgets are moral documents, and how we reduce future deficits are historic and defining moral choices.

They told the president: "As Christians, we believe the moral measure of the debate is how the most poor and vulnerable people fare. We look at every budget proposal from the bottom up -- how it treats those Jesus called 'the least of these.' (Matthew 25:45).

"They do not have powerful lobbies, but they have the most compelling claim on our consciences and common resources. The Christian community has an obligation to help them be heard."

It wasn't only the Christian community that signed the "Circle of Protection" letter. In addition to the 60 leaders of Christian faiths, several heads of development agencies plus leaders of other faiths signed on. Over 5,000 clergy signed the original document and 30,000 average citizens have signed it online since its publication.

It is the working poor who will be hurt first, and hardest, if we default on our debt. Millions of Americans live on less than $1,000 a month. They depend on their Social Security or veterans checks to pay their rent. Come August 2, they may find themselves in danger of eviction if they don't pay up -- because the U.S. Congress refused to pay our own bills.

Republican leaders must understand that we can't make the least among us, who have the least, bear all of the burden. Not while the top 1% continue to benefit disproportionately, allowing them to capture 20% of the nation's earned income.

We know tough days are ahead. Americans have demanded, after the crash of 2008, that government live within its means. But, we never meant that our grandmothers and grandfathers, our war veterans, each of whom sacrificed all their lives to enable you and me to come down through the years, should pay the debt.

Are we to ask them to sacrifice what little they have, while some in Congress vehemently defend tax benefits for the wealthiest Americans?

For over two years now, most of the Republicans in Congress have listened to their party's donors and not to their constituents who live on Main Street. It's important that Americans make their voices heard before it's too late.

May Congress vote on and pass a balanced approach to reducing our nation's debt and obligations.

 Donna Brazile, a CNN contributor and a Democratic strategist, is vice chairwoman for voter registration and participation at the Democratic National Committee, a nationally syndicated columnist and an adjunct professor at Georgetown University. She was manager for the Gore-Lieberman presidential campaign in 2000 and wrote "Cooking With Grease."

The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Donna Brazile & me

Debit-card overdraft suit gets class-action status

Bank accused of shifting transactions’ order to increase customers’ risk

By Ylan Q. Mui, Wednesday, July 27,12:56 AM

Consumers who say they were wrongfully charged overdraft fees won class-action status Tuesday in their lawsuit against a San Francisco bank, the first in a series of cases pending against some of the nation’s largest financial institutions.

The suit claims that Union Bank processed debit-card transactions from largest to smallest, rather than chronologically, to increase the risk that customers would overdraw their checking accounts.

Cynthia Larsen of Riverside, Calif., said the bank charged her three overdraft fees of $32 each in 2009. If her purchases had cleared in the order she made them, she would have overdrafted once, she said.

According to her attorney, the bank estimated that reordering transactions would generate $18 million in fees annually.

A spokesman for Union Bank declined to comment, citing the pending litigation.

The case is part of multidistrict litigation, involving about 30 banks, that is before U.S. District Judge James Lawrence King in the Southern District of Florida.

Bank of America agreed to settle its suit for $410 million this year.

The judge has yet to decide the status of the cases against Chase and U.S. Bank, among others. But co-lead attorney Bruce Rogow of the Alters Law Firm said that Tuesday’s action sets the stage for similar decisions.

Rogow said the class could encompass hundreds of thousands of consumers charged millions of dollars in fees. Last year, Wells Fargo was forced to return $203 million to consumers after it lost a separate class-action suit.

“All the banks will fall, ultimately,” Rogow said. “The class certification order is a precedent that will apply to all of the other banks because they all engaged in the same practice.”

Overdraft fees have long been a target of consumer advocates, who say they unfairly punish low-income people.

Last year, after a public outcry over the charges and congressional scrutiny, the Federal Reserve instituted rules that largely prohibited banks from allowing customers to overdraw their accounts and get hit with a fee unless they signed up for the service.

Although the Fed rules did not address the order in which transactions are processed, many banks have dropped the practice — or discontinued their overdraft programs altogether.

Still, the service remains popular with some people. The financial consulting firm Moebs Services said that about 77 percent of bank customers have opted in.

Based on first quarter results, overdraft revenues would be $30 billion, the lowest level since 2006.

Don't Bother to Apply

By Liz Goodwin | The Lookout – Tue, Jul 26, 2011

Hundreds of job opening listings posted on Monster.com and other jobs sites explicitly state that people who are unemployed would be less attractive applicants, with some telling the long-term unemployed to not even bother with applying.

The New York Times' Catherine Rampell said she found preferences for the already employed or only recently laid off in listings for "hotel concierges, restaurant managers, teachers, I.T. specialists, business analysts, sales directors, account executives, orthopedics device salesmen, auditors and air-conditioning technicians." Even the massive University of Phoenix stated that preference, but removed the listings when the Times started asking questions.

The concerted shunning of unemployed Americans by prospective employers was a common theme that cropped up in the thousands of responses that poured in when we asked Yahoo! readers to share their experiences of unemployment for our "Down But Not Out" series.

Reader Susan W. said she was being treated "as if it were my fault I was unemployed, regardless of the fact that I had put out hundreds of resumes and applications."

Legal experts told the Times that explicitly barring unemployed people from applying does not qualify under the statutory definition of discrimination, since unemployment is not a federally protected status like age or race. But the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission recently set out to establish whether employers were discriminating against certain protected groups because they are overrepresented in the ranks of the unemployed, such as African-American and older workers. (We covered that meeting here.) New Jersey recently passed a law barring employment ads that seek to rule out applications from those who are unemployed.

Even if the practice of weeding out unemployed applicants doesn't fit the legal definition of discrimination, it sure feels unfair for the more than 6.3 million Americans who have been out of work for more than six months to be told they are automatically disqualified for the few openings that are out there. "I feel like I am being shunned by our entire society," Kelly Wiedemer, an unemployed information technology specialist, told the Times.

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Bachmann benefited from loan programs she decried

Took out a $417,000 mortgage weeks before blasting Fannie Mae & Freddie Mac

By Kimberly Kindy, Tuesday, July 26,11:01 PM

Like many members of Congress, Rep. Michele Bachmann has been a fierce critic of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, blaming the government-backed loan programs for excesses that helped create the financial meltdown in 2008.

And like millions of other home purchasers, Bachmann took out a home loan in 2008 that offered lower costs to the borrower through one of the federally subsidized programs, according to mortgage experts who reviewed her loan documents.

Just a few weeks before Bachmann called for dismantling the programs during a House Financial Services Committee hearing, she and her husband signed for a $417,000 home loan to help finance their move to a 5,200-square-foot golf-course home, public records show. Experts who examined the loan documents for The Washington Post say that they are confident the loan was backed by Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.

Seeing problems with the programs — especially the high costs to taxpayers — hasn’t stopped a concerned public or other members of Congress from taking advantage of the lower interest rates that come due to government backing.

Bachmann has been the most outspoken critic of the loan programs and other government subsidies among Republican presidential candidates. Former Minnesota governor Tim Pawlenty also has called for dismantling Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Experts who reviewed his mortgage documents said that there was no way to tell whether his home loan from 1994 had government backing.

Bachmann’s mortgage was part of a package of debt that she and her husband, Marcus, assumed to buy their home, public records show. They also have other loans, including a home equity line of credit, a business mortgage and another business loan for their Christian counseling clinics, bringing their liabilities to more than $1 million, according to the most recently available public records.

The Bachmanns’ assets, according to her latest financial disclosure statement, range between $862,018 and $2 million.

Their total income has not been disclosed, but Bachmann gets a $174,000 salary as a member of Congress. There is no evidence that they cannot support their current debt.

In her public life, Bachmann has criticized government subsidies and said that federally backed home lending programs place an undue burden on taxpayers.

She also is a leading critic of expanding the federal debt limit. “When managing your family budget, you don’t spend money you don’t have,” she said in a statement last year, “and our government should be no different.”

The couple’s personal finances have come under scrutiny with disclosures that they and family members have accepted subsidies for both a family farm and for Bachmann & Associates counseling clinics.

Bachmann’s campaign declined to comment on her loans. In an e-mailed statement, a Bachmann spokesman, Doug Sachtleben, said, “The Congresswoman’s personal financial disclosures will speak for themselves.”

The experts said the Bachmanns bought a more expensive home using typical strategies during a time of easier credit. With their existing home still on the market, they assumed liability on the same day for the $417,000 mortgage and a $249,999 secured line of credit backed by the residence, records show.

The $417,000 mortgage was the cap of what Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac would loan at the time in her region.

“The overall borrowing harkens back to the days of easy credit. A lot of people leveraged themselves like this,” said Guy D. Cecala, CEO and publisher of Inside Mortgage Finance.

The Post found Bachmann’s loans in Minnesota property records. Financial disclosures filed with the House list her business loans, but she is not required to divulge personal property debts. She and other presidential candidates have not yet filed required disclosure forms.

Bachmann bought a home in the upscale Stillwater community on Aug. 29, 2008, as she campaigned for a second congressional term, financing $666,999 of the $760,000 home, records show.

Three experts who examined the mortgage documents said it appears the Bachmanns put down about $93,001 or 12 percent. Experts said the down payment would have been fairly common in 2008; most lenders now require at least 20 percent.

The couple’s previous home was on the market at the time and had two loans outstanding. When the house sold a few months later for $334,423, the Bachmanns paid off whatever remained on two prior equity loans for $100,000 and $200,000, records show.

Their golf-course home was custom built with a panelled library, spa and wine cellar for former NFL player Ross Verba in 2005. Verba faced foreclosure after sinking more than $2 million into the property, court and mortgage records show. He originally listed the home for $1.75 million in 2007.

“They [the Bachmanns] had to put a lot of work into it because all the landscaping had died,” said neighbor Nick Dragisich in a telephone interview.

Four months after they took out the mortgage, interest rates dropped, and the Bachmanns refinanced the $417,000 loan for another one of equal value.

The mortgage documents do not disclose the interest rates or other terms. Bachmann campaign officials declined to provide details.

Bachmann’s 2010 financial disclosures reveal a modest financial portfolio. Along with her congressional salary, she reported that their two counseling clinics make no profit aside from her husband’s annual salary, which is not disclosed.

She reported bank account interest income between $2 and $400 and mutual fund investments that earned income between $2,002 and $9,700, which was reinvested.

Bachmann’s portfolio contrasts sharply with other top White House contenders. Mitt Romney, a former Massachusetts governor and venture capitalist, listed assets valued between $190 million and $250 million on his 2008 presidential financial disclosures. Jon Huntsman, a former ambassador to China and Utah governor, is an heir to his family’s chemicals company.

Pawlenty received $120,000 a year as governor, and his wife worked for years as a district court judge. His home is valued at $319,800 in county records.

Mortgage records show that Pawlenty has paid off a number of home equity loans and has one for $45,000 outstanding. Pawlenty’s last state disclosure statement showed he has money market accounts and other securities, but state law does not require disclosure of the assets’ value. He listed no liabilities.

Research editors Alice Crites and Lucy Shackelford contributed to this report.

Blogger's Advice: "Plan" to go to the beach.

The Undefeated," the documentary about Sarah Palin, appears to have suffered box office defeat.

The film opened in 10 locations last week and upped its exposure to 14 cities this weekend. But Reuters today reports that even as the number of screening venues increased, box office revenue has declined by more than 63 percent. It grossed only $24,000 this past weekend.

Victory Film Group and distributor ARC Entertainment announced Sunday that the doc about the former Alaska governor will be available via video on demand and pay-per-view starting Sept. 1. "ARC will continue to expand the limited engagement theatrical release nationwide throughout August and September as demand across the country remains high," the companies announced in a press release.

But reports such as the one in Reuters suggest lagging sales and attendance prompted the hasty pay-per-view push.

The film was largely panned by critics, despite invoking cheers from Palin supporters. Reports prior to this weekend indicated a per-screen average of $7,500, a figure Atlantic Wire editor Gabriel Snyder (former box office reporter for Variety) said last week was "not a number that anyone should brag about."

The companies backing the movie said in their release Sunday that per-screen averages were "above $11,000 in top markets."

Supporters hoped the film (which was made without Palin's participation) coupled with Palin's bus tour (which is currently stalled) would boost Palin's popularity ahead of her official 2012 decision. The potential candidate has stated she will announce her 2012 plans this August or September.

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Oooh This is So Good!

James Murdoch contradicted by his ex-legal manager

By CASSANDRA VINOGRAD - Associated Press,JILL LAWLESS - Associated Press

....LONDON (AP) — James Murdoch was under pressure Friday over claims he misled lawmakers about Britain's phone hacking scandal, as a lawmaker called for a police investigation and Prime Minister David Cameron insisted the media scion had "questions to answer" about what he knew and when he knew it.

The presumed heir to Rupert Murdoch's media empire testified before a parliamentary committee that he was not aware of evidence that eavesdropping at the News of the world went beyond a jailed rogue reporter. But in a sign that executives are starting to turn against the company, two former top staffers said late Thursday they told him years ago about an email that suggested wrongdoing at the paper was more widespread than the company let on.

The claim brings more trouble for the embattled James Murdoch, who heads the Europe and Asia operations of his father's News Corp., as his family fights a scandal that has already cost it one of its British tabloids, two top executives and a $12 billion-dollar bid for control of lucrative satellite broadcaster British Sky Broadcasting.

Tom Watson, a legislator from the opposition Labour Party, called for Scotland Yard to look into the allegation and said it "marks a major step forward in getting to the facts of this case."

"If their version of events is accurate, it doesn't just mean that Parliament has been misled, it means police have another investigation on their hands," Watson told the BBC.

James Murdoch, who was not testifying under oath at Tuesday's parliamentary hearing, could face sanction if it becomes clear he deliberately misled lawmakers — but the prospect is highly unlikely. The last time the House of Commons fined anyone was in 1666.

The House of Commons no longer has the power to imprison a nonmember, but it could refer a case to the Metropolitan Police.

Still, News International, News Corp.'s British newspaper arm, said James Murdoch stood by his statement about the scandal, which exploded after revelations journalists at the News of the World tabloid hacked the phone of a 13-year-old murder victim while police were still searching for her and broadened to include claims reporters paid police for information.

That set off a firestorm which hit at the highest reaches of British society. It forced Rupert Murdoch to shutter News of the World, prompting a spate of high-profile resignations and departures at News Corp. and delivering the 80-year-old media baron and his son to be grilled before lawmakers.

The scandal continued to spread Friday, as Scottish police said they were opening their own perjury and corruption investigations related to the phone hacking — one that has the potential to further taint ex-News of the World editor Andy Coulson, who served as Cameron's top media aide.

They say they will focus on whether any witnesses lied at the trial of a Scottish politician who was jailed earlier this year for perjuring himself during a lawsuit against the now-defunct News of the World. Coulson was one of the trial's most prominent witnesses.

Cameron continued to distance himself from a once-cozy relationship with the Murdochs.

"Clearly James Murdoch has got questions to answer in Parliament and I am sure that he will do that," Cameron said Friday, adding the Murdochs had "a mess to clear up."

James Murdoch, in his testimony, batted away claims he knew the full extent of the illegal espionage at the News of the World when he approved a 700,000 pound ($1.1 million) payout in 2008 to soccer players' association chief Gordon Taylor, one of the phone hacking victims.

News International had long maintained that the eavesdropping was limited to a single rogue reporter, Clive Goodman, and the private investigator he was working with to break into voice mails of members of the royal household.

But an email uncovered during legal proceedings seemed to cast doubt on that claim. It contained a transcript of an illegally obtained conversation, drawn up by a junior reporter and marked "for Neville" — an apparent reference to the News of the World's chief reporter, Neville Thurlbeck.

Because it seemed to implicate others in the hacking, the email had the potential to blow a hole through News International's fiercely held contention that one reporter alone had engaged in hacking. If James Murdoch knew about the email — and was aware of its implication — it would lend weight to the suggestion he'd approved the payoff in an effort to bury the scandal.

James Murdoch told lawmakers he was not aware of the email at the time, but former legal adviser Tom Crone and ex-editor Colin Myler contradicted him.

"We would like to point out that James Murdoch's recollection of what he was told when agreeing to settle the Gordon Taylor litigation was mistaken," they said. "In fact, we did inform him of the 'for Neville' email which had been produced to us by Gordon Taylor's lawyers."

The Conservative lawmaker who heads the committee, James Whittingdale, said James Murdoch would be asked in writing to clarify his testimony, but would not be recalled before the committee.

Murdoch's News Corp. is trying to keep the damage from spreading to its more lucrative U.S. holdings, including the Fox network, 20th Century Fox and the Wall Street Journal.

British politicians have felt the heat too, with the country's top two party leaders falling over each other to distance themselves from papers they once courted assiduously.

Cameron's former communications director — Murdoch newspapers veteran Andy Coulson — came under fresh scrutiny Thursday after it was reported that he did not have a top-level security clearance, which spared him from the most stringent type of vetting.

The former News of the World editor was arrested this month in connection with allegations that reporters at the tabloid intercepted voice mails. Victims included celebrities, crime victims and politicians.

Lawyers could also have been targeted, according to The Law Society. It said solicitors had been warned by police that their phones may have been hacked by the paper.

Scotland Yard, accused of failing to properly investigate the scandal for years, has also been asked to investigate another explosive claim: That journalists bribed officers to locate people by tracking their cell phone signals.

The practice is known as "pinging" because of the way cell phone signals bounce off relay towers as they try to find reception. Jenny Jones, a member of the board that oversees the Metropolitan Police Authority, called for the inquiry into the alleged payoffs by journalists at the News of the World.

THE TRUTH HURTS

by Holly Bailey/The Ticket

The debate over the nation's debt crisis turned ugly late Tuesday when GOP Rep. Allan West unleashed an email tirade on a Florida colleague after she trashed his support for a GOP budget bill on the House floor.

In an email promptly leaked to the press, West, a first-term tea party favorite from South Florida, trashed Democratic Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz for her "unprofessional and inappropriate sophomoric behavior" after she suggested he supported a plan the would raise costs for Medicare beneficiaries.

"Look, Debbie, I understand that after I departed the House floor you directed your floor speech comments directly towards me. Let me make myself perfectly clear, you want a personal fight, I am happy to oblige," West wrote, per ABC News. "You are the most vile, unprofessional and despicable member of the U.S. House of Representatives. If you have something to say to me, stop being a coward and say it to my face, otherwise, shut the heck up. Focus on your own congressional district!"

West sent the email to Wasserman Schultz and copied several House leaders, including Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, Majority Leader Eric Cantor and Majority Whip Kevin McCarthy.

"From this time forward, understand that I shall defend myself forthright against your heinous characterless behavior," West wrote. "You have proven repeatedly that you are not a Lady, therefore, (you) shall not be afforded due respect from me!"

West's office did not dispute the authenticity of the e-mail. A spokesman for West said in a statement to reporters that Wasserman Schultz's behavior was "unprofessional and cowardly."

Wasserman Schultz, who is chair of the Democratic National Committee, had taken to the House floor Tuesday to criticize the "cut, cap and balance" legislation that was ultimately approved by the GOP-led House, which she claimed would "end Medicare as we know it." While she did not mention West by name, she alluded to his support of the bill.

"The gentleman from Florida, who represents thousands of Medicare beneficiaries, as do I, is supportive of this plan that would increase costs for Medicare beneficiaries," she said of West. "Unbelievable from a member from South Florida."

The Florida Democrat gave no indication she plans to backtrack on her comments. In a statement emailed to reporters, Wasserman Schultz spokesman Jonathan Beeton said West is angry because the speech "highlighted that he and other Republicans are once again trying to balance the budget on the backs of seniors, children in the middle class."

"The truth hurts," Beeton said.

Another element that makes the West v. Wasserman Schultz showdown even more interesting: As the Miami Herald's Marc Caputo notes, the two lawmakers might have to run against each other in 2012 because of redistricting.

On Saturday morning, Rupert Murdoch apologized to the British public in a full-page advertisement that will run for three days in seven national newspapers stating:

“We are sorry. The News of the World was in the business of holding others to account. It failed when it came to itself. We are sorry for the serious wrongdoing that occurred. We are deeply sorry for the hurt suffered by the individuals affected.”

The apology was first published the day after two of Murdoch’s senior executives resigned over a phone hacking scandal that has engulfed his media empire as it also shines a light on a lack of journalistic integrity and ethical behavior.

Police in the United Kingdom have identified almost 4,000 potential targets of phone hacking from a private investigator working for the paper, with one being Milly Dowler, a murdered British teenager whose voice mail was allegedly hacked by staff working for the News of the World. There were also allegations that News Corp. reporters may have bribed police officers.

The FBI is also investigating News Corp. employees or associates who may have tried to hack into phone conversations and voice mail of September 11 survivors, victims and their families.

Keith Rupert Murdoch is an Australian-born American media magnate and the founder, chairman, and chief executive officer of News Corporation.

In the late 1950s he began dabbling in television, and his first foray into TV in the USA, was when he created Fox Broadcasting Company in 1986.

When Rupert Murdoch won his bid to take over Dow Jones and the Wall Street Journal in 2007, the Australian media baron brought one of America’s oldest, most respected and widely-circulated newspapers into his vast media empire.

Murdoch’s News Corp media conglomerate owns more than 175 other newspapers as well as the Fox Television network, 21st Century Fox film studios, several satellite networks, MySpace.com, and HarperCollins.

Besides amassing a media empire, Murdoch has repeatedly been accused of using his media holdings to advance his political agenda.

In 2003, all of Murdoch’s 175 newspapers supported the Iraq invasion. He spoke to former British Prime Minister Tony Blair in the lead-up to the invasion; some in Blair’s inner circle even called him “the 24th member of the [Blair] Cabinet.”

Murdoch has also played host at numerous private meetings with influential Democrats and Republicans who all dismiss the gatherings as politically insignificant and claim they are merely social events with dinners and drinks.

America’s most forward thinking founding father, Thomas Paine warned that if the majority of the people were denied the truth and the ideas of truth, it was time to storm the “Bastille of words” for “True democracy is never handed down by elites. It is always fought for and struggled for” and dissent is the only thing that can keep a democracy healthy.

“We must not confuse dissent with disloyalty. When the loyal opposition dies, I think the soul of America dies with it.” - Edward R. Murrow

In 1958, journalist Edward R. Murrow gave a speech at the Radio-Television News Directors Association, which nailed the network television establishment and its emphasis on popular entertainment over programs that would enlighten and educate the public.

That speech was the climax of the 2005 motion picture Good Night, And Good Luck

Isidor Feinstein, better known as I. F. Stone or Izzy Stone was an independent radical investigative journalist who noted:  “All governments are run by liars and nothing they say should be believed.”

“I made no claims to inside stuff. I tried to give information, which could be documented, so the reader could check it for himself…Reporters tend to be absorbed by the bureaucracies they cover; they take on the habits, attitudes, and even accents of the military or the diplomatic corps. Should a reporter resist the pressure; there are many ways to get rid of him… But a reporter covering the whole capital on his own — particularly if he is his own employer — is immune from these pressures.”

“The only kinds of fights worth fighting are those you are going to lose, because somebody has to fight them and lose and lose and lose until someday, somebody who believes as you do wins. In order for somebody to win an important, major fight 100 years hence, a lot of other people have got to be willing – for the sheer fun and joy of it – to go right ahead and fight, knowing you’re going to lose. You mustn’t feel like a martyr. You’ve got to enjoy it.”

Stone’s peers and colleagues viewed him as a pariah for Stone spent his career challenging government deception and press complicity and confronted deceptions and outright lies of the American government in a time when nobody else had the integrity, ethics; guts/kerbangers/thatcher’s to do it.

Izzy Stone was one lone voice out of the wilderness of spin that emanated out of D.C., and he lived long enough to see himself vindicated on “searing issues such as the Holocaust and fascism, the McCarthy purges, the nuclear arms race, the civil rights movement, the war in Vietnam, and the endless struggle between Israelis and Palestinians.” [1]

Murdoch’s vindication remains to be seen, but may Murdoch’s trials be the wake up call to The Media who have lost their way by neglecting their commission: to go out, seek and report the brutal truth, and NOT meddle, tamper, alter, damage, falsify, nor secretly or improperly engage with Power that the Media is charged with investigating and reporting on.

Wall Street:  “A great nation — like a great company — has to be relied upon to pay its debts when they become due,” the letter reads. “This is a Main Street not Wall Street issue. Treasury securities influence the cost of financing not just for companies but more importantly for mortgages, auto loans, credit cards and student debt. A default would risk both disarray in those markets and a host of unintended consequences.”

By Jia Lynn Yang, Wednesday, July 13,12:35 AM

The message, sent in a letter to President Obama and every member of Congress, puts pressure on GOP lawmakers, who have staked out an uncompromising stance against raising taxes in the partisan wrangling over the country’s borrowing limit.

Republicans rely heavily on corporations for political support and have regularly cited the opinions of these “job creators” in their opposition to new tax revenue. Many of the House GOP freshmen most opposed to a compromise were swept into office with the help of financial support from groups behind the letter.

But the business community, which has largely kept quiet on the issue until now, does not uniformly share the Republican orthodoxy on taxes, according to some lobbyists who helped craft the statement.

The letter conspicuously avoided any mention of tax revenue partly because of differences of opinion among executives over whether to compromise on taxes to get a deal done, said a senior industry lobbyist, who spoke on the condition of anonymity because the internal deliberations were private.

“The debt default would be exponentially more painful than anything else,” said another senior executive at a major business lobbying group.

The letter, signed by hundreds of senior company executives and groups including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the Business Roundtable, said that “it is critical that the U.S. government not default in any way” and urges lawmakers “to put aside partisan differences and act in the nation’s best interest.”

“The business community in large numbers is saying to our leaders in Washington, ‘Do your job,’ ” said Business Roundtable President John Engler, a former Republican governor of Michigan. “Failure to raise the debt ceiling would strike an immediate and serious blow to any economic recovery, and failure to make significant progress on long-term debt reduction will continue the uncertainty which is hampering our investment climate.”

Republican lawmakers had a muted response to the business groups’ warnings. A spokesman for House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio) said Obama was to blame for the standoff and pointed to a House Republican proposal to slash tax rates and transform Medicare into a voucher program.

“We already voted for a long-term deficit reduction plan,” Boehner spokesman Michael Steel said in a statement. “Since the president is asking for the debt-limit increase, we’d like to see such a plan from him — but haven’t.”

The developments underscore the increasingly awkward marriage between corporate leaders and the ambitious House GOP freshman class, which has joined the business lobby in opposing Obama’s health-care law and financial regulations but has shown no sign of budging on the debt ceiling. Boehner and other Republicans abandoned White House talks over the weekend aimed at formulating a “grand bargain” of spending cuts and revenue increases before an Aug. 2 deadline, when the country would default on its debt.

The differences over the debt ceiling present a problem for corporate donors, who helped create the House Republican majority by shifting their contributions away from Democrats last year. The Chamber, which is Washington’s biggest lobbying organization, also spent millions on advertising in support of GOP challengers.

The Public Campaign Action Fund, a liberal-leaning advocacy group that favors public financing of elections, calculates that the Chamber and the financial services sector together spent nearly $20 million on GOP midterm candidates affiliated with the conservative tea party movement. Those rank-and-file Republicans now form the backbone of opposition to any new tax revenue, including Democratic proposals to end loopholes benefiting hedge fund managers, corporate jet owners, and oil and gas companies.

Lobbying groups for Wall Street — a sector that would take a direct and devastating hit if the debt ceiling is not raised — have largely avoided public statements on the issue. That is in contrast to their vehement campaigning against parts of the Dodd-Frank financial regulatory bill, including the limits on the fees they can charge merchants for debit transactions.

Wall Street lobbyists and other business groups preferred private meetings with GOP members to educate them on the consequences of a default. Several lobbyists also met Monday afternoon with Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner to repeat their concerns.

Some Democrats have criticized business leaders for failing to speak up forcefully in the debt-limit debate.

“Maybe business leaders think that this debate is just political theater and assume that a deal will emerge,” Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.) wrote in an op-ed article in The Washington Post last week. “Maybe they don’t believe politicians who declare that they will never vote to raise the debt ceiling or casually rule out entitlement reform or a penny of additional revenue.”

In their letter, the business groups warned that even a “technical default” is “a risk our country must not take.”

“A great nation — like a great company — has to be relied upon to pay its debts when they become due,” the letter reads. “This is a Main Street not Wall Street issue. Treasury securities influence the cost of financing not just for companies but more importantly for mortgages, auto loans, credit cards and student debt. A default would risk both disarray in those markets and a host of unintended consequences.”