28
Oct
While worrying about everyone else, Nancy Pelosi has apparently forgotten about problems in her district. After undergoing a patch repair a month ago, the Golden Gate Bridge is falling apart again and has been closed. Accordingly, several community activist groups are demanding the bridge be fixed immediately. Everyone has a right to safe bridges, it says so in the Constitution somewhere. Anyone who thinks they should waste their time figuring out what’s actually wrong with the bridge before fixing it just wants babies to fall into the bay while they wear white gowns with swastikas and disrupt peaceful meetings just because that’s what they do.
( That’s sarcasm folks. According to Pelosi, anyone who doesn’t agree with the clandestine health care reform exacttly has she wants it just wants people to die in the streets, or worse. For suggesting Obama might be spending too much, I was once again vilified on Facebook as someone who supports slavery. Real rational stuff we got going on right now huh? )
I get the newsletter from the Kentucky Legislative Research Commission. It’s full of all kinds of neat stuff that doesn’t make the news a whole lot. In fact, more often than not I have to just paste the text in here because no media feels like fooling with it. So far, this has been the case with this little piece of information:
Community banks across Kentucky are finding the general economic slowdown and federal regulations their biggest challenges, not foreclosures and other mortgage-related issues, a panel of lawmakers heard today.
The Interim Joint Committee on Banking and Insurance, meeting at Centre College, heard testimony both from industry leaders as well as state regulators on the conditions of banks in the commonwealth.
“Kentucky banks are some of the strongest in the nation,” said Debra Stamper, general counsel to the Kentucky Bankers Association. “Kentucky banks hold firm to a long history of conservative, well-managed banking practices.” The result, she said, is that state banks do not show the headlining results of major banks in other states, both in good times and bad.
Charles Vice, who heads the state’s Department of Financial Institutions, detailed various measures of financial stability for state banks. While Kentucky’s nonperforming assets — generally loans delinquent for 90 days or more — have increased by about three-fourths since the end of 2007, the number across the nation has tripled, he noted.
Both KBA and DFI pointed to the economy rather than irresponsible loan practices as a prime reason for the increase in foreclosures in Kentucky. The nationwide economic meltdown caused in part by Wall Street’s downturn has caused a spike in unemployment, harming otherwise reasonable loans in Kentucky, the Midwest, and other manufacturing-heavy regions.
Rep. Steve Riggs, D-Jeffersontown, asked why subprime mortgages got most of the media attention even though they composed only about 10 percent of all home loans in the state. “What’s being gained by pointing fingers at the wrong group?” he asked. Vice responded that the subprime percentage was higher in some states and that subprime borrowers made convenient scapegoats while noting that subprime borrowers were not necessarily lower-income borrowers, an important distinction that many have failed to note.
The one Kentucky bank failure this year, Vice pointed out, involved an institution that had only moved its headquarters to Louisville this year and was federally chartered and regulated. Of the more than 150 banks the state regulates, he said, about 20 percent are facing some sort of action plan that may be as simple as developing their own program for improvement.
Only 12 Kentucky institutions have received federal TARP funding aimed at troubled banks, with $191 million spread among them — less than the nationwide average for a single bank.
Vice also pointed to a new bank that opened in Kentucky earlier this year, with another group inquiring about opening a new bank despite the increased capital requirements that now are mandated on new banks. “That’s a positive sign,” he said.
Vice, Stamper, and KBA’s Jim Cooper also pointed to increased FDIC requirements as putting a crimp in banks’ profits. Vice noted that the FDIC’s reserves, collected as a fee from member banks and used to cover the assets of banks that go out of business, was down to $10 billion, or 0.22 percent of nationwide assets, because the number of failing banks has sapped the reserve fund. The FDIC minimum is 1.15 percent. As a result, the FDIC has instituted a special supplement that banks must pay along with requiring pre-payment of their insurance premiums through 2012.
“The FDIC assessment is taking 30 or 40 percent of bank profits in some cases,” said Rep. Mike Denham, D-Maysville.
Stamper also railed against federal legislation, not yet passed by the U.S. House of Representatives, to create a Consumer Financial Protection Agency. Such a law would overburden an industry that is largely working well, she said.
Denham and House Majority Caucus Chair Bob Damron, D-Nicholasville, said legislation to regulate credit default swaps and other derivatives was a more pressing need. “If we don’t fix this core problem, we’ll have another financial crisis in the future,” Denham said.
Damron said the National Conference of Insurance Legislators, of which he is president-elect, will likely pass model legislation in November to put pressure on Congress in that area.
Pretty heady stuff huh? Gotta read it all before we go on. If you don’t, then what I’m arguing here will make no sense at all. What particularly bothered me was:
“The FDIC assessment is taking 30 or 40 percent of bank profits in some cases,” said Rep. Mike Denham, D-Maysville.
That just ain’t right folks. What you’re seeing is a situation where banks that went the high-risk route and got burned are now being propped up by the banks that stuck with traditional, more conservative business practices.
Now, toss in this part:
Denham and House Majority Caucus Chair Bob Damron, D-Nicholasville, said legislation to regulate credit default swaps and other derivatives was a more pressing need. “If we don’t fix this core problem, we’ll have another financial crisis in the future,” Denham said.
Now, what you’ve got is a situation where, for some reason, the Obama administration is worried about some people at financial institutions making any money, while at the same time taking a huge percent of the profits from smaller banks. All the while ignoring the core problems that people who understand all this stuff have complained about for YEARS. Now, the FDIC is compounding and spreading pain as opposed to remedying the problem. That’s just wrong. By taking substantial amounts of cash flow from the areas that should be doing OK, they are risking the smaller economies that otherwise would be propping up the economy right now. You take X amount of capitol from a bank, that reduces their ability to loan by X times a fraction. Now, IMO, rather than punishing banks that did not cause the problem, they should be punishing the hell out of the banks that did. I want to know that every single penny of excess profits at Bank of America and the like are going back to the FDIC before a single penny is taken from a community bank that is otherwise performing in a prudent, profitable manner.
If the FDIC fails, it will be the end of our culture as we know it. I’d like to know one single person in the is country who does not access credit in some form or another.
In a perfect world, the places that caused the problem would be expected to remedy the problem. As such, the burden would fall more like this:
AK 0.05% AL 0.44% AR 3.64% AZ 2.49% CA 26.81% CO 6.42% CT 0.24% DC 0.15% DE 0.02% FL 7.88% GA 24.95% ID 1.14% IL 1.99% IN 0.03% KS 0.23% LA 0.02% MA 0.18% MD 0.51% MI 2.50% MN 0.34% MO 0.77% MS 0.06% MT 0.08% NC 0.98% NE 0.00% NH 0.01% NJ 0.46% NM 0.06% NV 0.46% NY 0.84% OH 0.22% OK 0.04% OR 1.71% PA 0.20% RI 0.03% SC 0.34% TN 0.15% TX 2.95% UT 4.01% VA 1.27% VT 0.34% WA 4.48% WI 0.10% WV 0.09% WY 0.33%
The beauty of this is it spreads the pain where the pain came from. We’ve done a good job in Kentucky, why should we be expected to bail out California again?
Bottom line is once again the only answer the federal government has it to throw more money at a failing concept. The logic behind the FDIC is solid, but the core is the problem. As is noted here, we’ve got a scapegoat, and we’ve got a misdirect. However, even these people can’t pinpoint the overt underlying problem. The Community Reinvestment Act of 1977 wrecked the concept of shared responsibility. Therefore, the concept of shared risk no longer applies. So, to keep addressing symptoms is just kinda stupid. If the feds are going to compel financial institutions to make loans that make no financial sense, then the FDIC needs to be more of a broker than an insurance entity. They just need to be the federal E-bay. The problem of course, is no one would buy the garbage in the first place. So, they most likely won’t now either.
Disclaimer here, I own bank stock. That’s 30% out of my pocket. I have the right to bitch about it. I also have the right to demand that before I’m forced to give up another penny of my money, the Community Reinvestment Act be ditched or the FDIC dissolved since it no longer serves a legitimate purpose due to the concept of risk management being perverted by said Act. And, of course, the Consumer Financial Protection Agency serves no fundamental purpose either. Drop it.
Oh, BTW, the FDIC is yet another troubled “public insurance option”. Remember Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac? Those public options are what’s got this public option in such a mess now. Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and President Obama think health care should be run just like all the other public options.
In 2003 Nancy Pelosi was disgusted. The Republican president inherited a slumping economy. The events of 9/11 hammered the economy for 2002. By May of 2003 Nancy Pelosi had had enough. Totally ignoring the ramifications of 9/11, she laid all of the blame for the economy squarely on George Bush’s shoulders. She’s so proud of that fact that she still has that speech on her web site. I’m linking to it there.
“Ten years ago, faced with a struggling economy and a growing deficit, a new Congress and a new President courageously passed a budget bill that took us on a path to fiscal soundness. The stock markets responded, the economy prospered, and we had a record of economic growth that is unsurpassed in our nation’s history.
“We did that with Democratic votes only. Not one Republican was willing to step up to the plate for fiscal soundness and economic growth and job creation.
“At the end of the Clinton Administration, 22 million new jobs had been created, the country was on a path to a record surplus of $5.6 trillion, and the unemployment rate was at an all-time low. To achieve that, it took leadership and it took courage.
Wait, let’s go back just a minute, shall we?
For starters, Clinton didn’t inherit a slowing economy, he inherited an improving economy. It wasn’t anything magical Clinton did. The economy rebounded under his predecessor. By the time Clinton was an experienced President, he lost the House. The House is where the federal budget comes from. For the rest of his tenure, it was mostly out of his hands. The Republicans had to beat the daylights out of Clinton to get him to approve the budgets. The showdowns led to several federal shutdowns. Somehow or another, even with the Republicans in majority, Nancy Pelosi claims they did nothing to support Clinton’s economy.
She lied. No one questioned her on that.
“What a difference two years make. President Bush and the Republicans in Congress have presided over the most dramatic deterioration in our economic health in our nation’s history.
“Since President Bush took office, we have gone from the strongest economy ever in the United States to a weak, struggling economy that was described by the Majority Leader just a moment ago. We have gone from historically low unemployment rates to losing 2.7 million jobs in the first two years of the President’s term. In fact, it’s 27 months, 2.7 million jobs- the worst record of job creation in nearly six decades.
Not one mention of the events of 9/11. It’s as if it never happened. That’s kinda lieing dontcha think? Also:
That’s a chart on how much unemployment changed from year to year. Clinton’s just not nearly what Pelosi is making him out to be. Using her definition, George HW Bush was the best since he scored the most improvement years. However, he had one really bad one. Clinton did too. For that matter, Clinton had a couple of historically bad years. They were the years the Democrats wrote the budgets. Coincidence? That or Nancy is lieing.
“Under Republican leadership, April’s unemployment rate reached 6 percent, nearly 9 million Americans are out of work – the worst job slump since the Great Depression. Another 9 million Americans have either given up looking for work at all or are working part time.
“That’s why today is so tragic. Tragedy is about missed opportunities. We have an opportunity today to create jobs and build a strong economy without endangering our fiscal responsibility.
“Instead, the reckless tax plan the President and the Republicans in Congress have set forth is not only irresponsible in its substance, it is irresponsible in the bad example that the President and the White House has set. They created a feeding frenzy of tax cuts trying to outdo each other, making matters worse.
Something funny happened IMMEDIATELY after the Republicans passed their “feeding frenzy of tax cuts”:
The only year that saw a drop in Republican job creation was replaced by four straight years of steady job growth, as well as economic growth. Things were looking pretty good. Then in 2005, people listened to Nancy Pelosi and put the Democrats in charge of federal spending. Job creation in 2005 and 2006 was fairly steady as the Democrats didn’t mess with the “feeding frenzy of tax cuts”. But, in 2008 people put a Democrat in the White House. As of 2009, the Democrats control it all. Nancy Pelosi is basically in charge of it all now. She started eliminating those economic disasters that she considered the tax breaks. Spending has focused on government spending moreso than stimulus for private business. In 2009 especially, the private sector was repeatedly vilified while the government sector was propped up with wildly out-of-control spending that promised to not lose as many jobs as would have been lost without it. Net result? This has been the worst year in history for jobs creation. The general malaise of the late 70′s? Nothing compared to 2009. The economic recession that destroyed Bush I’s re-election efforts? Nothing compared to this. Nancy Pelosi and Obama constantly tell us it’s the economy they inherited. They inherited from Nancy Pelosi.
And no one in media says a word about that. Now, after seeing what the “feeding frenzy of tax cuts” did for the economy, versus eliminating those cuts and expanding the government has already done to our economy in the last three years, I read this today in The Wall Street Journal:
Pelosi’s economic policies were built on lies. They can’t even lie in a logical way about how this is supposed to help the economy. Preventing losing jobs is NOT job creation. Every penny they put in the government at the expense of the private sector reduces the GNP. That’s where the tax revenues are, not the government. By increasing spending and decreasing taxable revenue, you’ve got a disaster looming. By having a feeding frenzy of uncontrolled spending by the Democrats, you’re just magnifying that disaster. People think the last economic crash of 2008 was caused by Bush, that’s what CNN, MSNBC, and most of the rest along with Nancy Pelosi have told people, mostly unchallenged. The fact is it was caused by a policy that skewed the free market. It imposed the will of the government on the banking industry and forced it to accept loans that were not supportable via the Community Reinvestment Act.
Now, we’re being sold the same concept in the health care industry. We’re being promised that the private sector won’t be hurt having to compete against the federal government. That’s exactly what happened when the mortgage industry started having to compete with the “public option”, Fannie Mae. Think about it. In the meantime, the economy continues to tank.
Chris Matthews blurts that out as the screen is fading. His guest was not given any chance to respond other than to blurt out “rubbish”.
I think he’s nuts.
What do you think?
23
Oct
I complained about Kenneth Feinberg going where no federal government should ever go. Without any constitutional authority whatsoever, he decided TARP recipients’ salaries. That’s just communism. When Karl Marx wrote the Communist Manifesto, one of the key elements was controlled income. I’m sure Anita Dunn is thrilled. Now, in my previous post I pointed out that the policy he uses to justify this totally un-Constitutional power grab allows him to go after basically anything he chooses.
Now they’re going after banks. We’re not even talking about the bailed out banks. We’re talking any member of the Federal Reserve. That’s right, anyone who works for a federally insured bank. The logic is that since they receive federal money………
Obama is also wanting to expand loans to small businesses. Somehow I’m gonna bet a lot of small businesses will think twice before accessing this funding. I know I would. Obama loves strings.
22
Oct
Kenneth Feinberg is Obama’s “pay czar”. Bank of America, American International Group, Citigroup, General Motors, GMAC, Chrysler and Chrysler Financial all received part of the last TARP bailout. As such, Kenneth Feinberg has decided that he sets the salaries of whoever he wants at those companies.
Guess what other “companies” have the federal government as an investor?
Public colleges, state administrations, local high schools, area development districts, community service programs, you name it. Using the logic of Feinebrg, they all answer to him now. No president is needed. No Congress to authorize it. No Senate to OK it. Whatever he sees fit, that’s the final word.
Someone care to explain to me when I authorized Kenneth Feinberg to randomly decide who makes what? When did Congress cede their right to authorize budgeting by Feinberg and his staff?
This is a duty that falls squarely under the auspices of Congress. Not the president. And most certainly not someone who has no Constitutional authority over anything. If Feinberg dicked around with my compensation, I’d sue him personally in a heartbeat.
The second aspect of this that bugs me is the mere concept of income control by a central government figure. You just don’t get any more communist than that. Just ask Anita Dunn. She knows all about communism and should therefore know the Communist Manifesto by heart. Quite frankly, the President’s staff seems to know and respect the Communist Manifesto a lot moreso than the US Constitution.
Anita Dunn, White House Communications Director. Handpicked of course, by President Obama. She apparently flew through the “vetting” process to assure she had some goofball felony charge pending or supported some radical element such as the Bolizean Grove or Bill Ayers. At first it just seemed a couple of bad apples slipped through the “vetting”. However, at this point, it’s just a process of picking what looniness will be exposed on anyone that has anything to do with The White House. For ten months, anyone who claimed that members of the Democratic Socialists of America might be socialists have been attacked endlessly by people like Anita Dunn. Although the evidence is in black and white, video, pictures, and about every imaginable media, anyone who pointed that out just wanted Obama to fail and was just a bitter rural Christian radical. So, imagine how a lot of people felt when they saw this video:
Yeah, you heard that right. That’s Anita Dunn, the WHITE HOUSE Communications Director, putting Mao Tse Tung in the same context as Mother Teresa.
Do I need to repeat that? This woman respects Mao Tse Tung equally with Mother Teresa.
Sheez, I could repeat that one hundred times and it would still sound crazier than hell.
OK, so now we’ve got communist sympathizers in THE WHITE HOUSE. Before people get too crazy, Mao Tse Tung was a communist. Anita Dunn sympathizes with his philosophy. She is therefore a communist sympathizer in THE WHITE HOUSE.
And she’s telling us now not to trust anyone on Fox. Now you know why. CNN, CBS, ABC, NBC, MSNBC, didn’t bring this to light. And, they never would have.
I think my conclusion is rather obvious on having a communist sympathizer IN THE WHITE HOUSE. My conclusion also is that since so many radicals and potential felons have cleared The White House vetting process, maybe Congress needs to look a little closer into Obama’s liberal use of appointing czars without Congressional approval. I hear Nancy Pelosi’s looking closely at The White House in her ongoing fight against the culture of corruption.
While we’re waiting for Pelosi’s announcement, and during the time it takes Obama to throw Anita under the Obama bus, I think some music would be enjoyable:
And, before I forget, no two “philosophers” could be any more different than Mao Tse Tung and Mother Teresa. To put them on the same level is disgusting. One respected all people. The other respected no one. Considering the weight Anita Dunn gave to each “philosopher”, it’s obvious which she identifies with more.
Truly disgusting. This lady makes Van Jones look good.
And when exactly are the other networks going to start taking a closer look at the people Obama are handing incredible power to with our money?
First, the obvious:
Per Eric Holder, the new hate crimes bill was not intended to protect everyone equally under the law.
I got a problem with that. The ONLY intent of the US Constitution and the Bill of Rights is to insure everyone is protected equally by the law. For the US Attorney General to not recognize the ONLY intent of the US Constitution and US Bill of Rights is absurd. Being as it obviously discriminates, it should most likely be struck down if anyone cares to challenge it in court. Not that the previous version was any better, this one’s just worse. Now, before all the gay rights people get all worked up, it’s not because of who it supports. It’s the fact that it’s a pretty stupidly worded piece of legislation.
In a prosecution for an offense under this section, evidence of expression or associations of the defendant may not be introduced as substantive evidence at trial, unless the evidence specifically relates to that offense.
Got that?
1 Corinthians 6:8-10 (New International Version)
Do you not know that the wicked will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor male prostitutes nor homosexual offenders nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.
OK, so a preacher recites this part and condemns all immoral behaviors, the members shout “AMEN!”. One of them gets a little carried away and kills a homosexual, a greedy person, a drunk, a slanderer, and a swindler. Killing the homosexual would get him in a lot of trouble. Killing the greedy person, the drunk, the slanderer, or the swindler, not so much. Unless of course, the greedy person, the drunk, the slanderer, and the swindler were homosexual. Then he’s really screwed. It doesn’t stop there:
“We also sent Lut: He said to his people: Do ye commit lewdness such as no people in creation (ever) committed before you? For ye practice your lusts on men in preference to women: ye are indeed a people transgressing beyond bounds. And his people gave no answer but this: they said, “Drive them out of your city: these are indeed men who want to be clean and pure!”" (Qur’an 7:80-82)
Islam, ditto, if not worse.
Judaism?
“[A man] shall not lie with another man as [he would] with a woman, it is a to’eva” (Leviticus 18:22).
Ditto.
I’m not EVEN going to go into the more radical beliefs. Some of them are rather harsh and unforgiving. But, the way this law is written, if the person committing the crime attended a church, and the church condemns homosexual activity, the leader of the church, at the very least, could be held liable. I can’t wait till someone claims “God told me to.:. Then it will get real interesting real quick.
Now, of course, where this bugs me is I am an average white guy, not overtly religious, not gay, and not from a protected ethnicity ( Indians and whatnot ). And, to top it off, I don’t hate any group of people. So, hate crime bills just don’t do much for me. But, what if I wonder into the wrong bar in a big city? Let’s say, it’s a bar full of black gay Jews who hate Americans. Yeah, I know, broad sweeping generalization as there are black gay Jewish bars all over the country. But, it serves a purpose. One of the members of this bar full of black gay Jews takes offense to my life choices of being an average white heterosexual male and does me great harm. That is not a hate crime under Eric Holder’s interpretation of what the law should be in the United States.
To me, it most definitely is no different than singling out a person because they are gay. I have a real problem with Eric Holder discriminating against groups of people for any reason whatsoever. Some ignorant hick doing it is one thing, the person in charge of assuring the law is applied under the terms of the contract he agreed to enforce for all of the United States is totally another. Eric Holder should not be OK with this, he should be screaming mad against it.
How’s about this for a concept? Any crime committed against another person because of who that person is shall be considered a hate crime.
Now, under MY scenario, and do understand, this is MY scenario, even that kid that beat the other kid to death in Chicago a couple of weeks ago would be prosecuted as a hate crime. As it is now, it won’t be. However, I would argue that the kid was beat to death because he wasn’t “like” the boys who beat him. He wasn’t a gang-banging piece of trash. However, gang banging pieces of trash killing good kids isn’t a hate crime in Eric Holder’s mind so long as those doing the killing weren’t white. If they had been white, all hell would have befallen them. But, since they weren’t white, in order to really get them put away for a long time, they’ll have to claim they thought the victim was gay. If they expressed that thought at any time publicly, watch out.
Wild concept huh? Treating everyone equally. That’ll get the support of no one. Especially this administration.
This is flat out an attack on all religion. Christians seem to think they are being targeted, but it’s not just them. It’s all religion. Any situation where a person is speaking to a group of people on the issue of morality runs the very real risk of incriminating themselves if anyone listening to them commits a crime.
In the long run I think this will be struck down in the Supreme Court. Not so much because it discriminates against non-gays. But, because it infringes on the free rights of speech of others who might be legally implicated under this law for expressing their view. Regardless of what John Conyers and Eric Holder desire, Free Speech is still a right in this country.
President Obama won a Nobel Peace Prize. Although some are scratching their heads over why, I’m not. It’s quite obvious and the Nobel peeps even said why:
Some were somewhat dubious of his accomplishments:
But, they tend to forget the fact that in those eleven days, he did not declare war on anyone, endured no terrorist attacks, and repeatedly mentioned the fact he’s not a Republican. They knew he was going to end all US wars, rid the world of nuclear weapons, and bring peace between the Muslims and the rest of the world even if the Muslims didn’t want it. They KNEW that simply by stating the fact he wanted Iran and North Korea to quit developing nuclear weapons, they would destroy all their efforts. They KNEW that by simply stating that he wanted to end poverty in the US by taxing the rich, the poor would become productive and wealthy. They KNEW that by stating his disdain for corporate greed that the US would become a prosperous socialist state. They KNEW that by simply telling Congress he wanted a public health insurance plan for everyone, everyone would support whatever change he deemed desirable whether it made things better or not. They KNEW all this. How do you ask? Because Obama said so. There is no law that says the Nobel Peace Prize has to be awarded to someone who’s actually done anything is there? For that matter, there are no laws at all governing the Nobel Peace Prize. If there were, it would be kind of contradictory awarding a peace prize named after the man who contributed to the deaths of hundreds of millions of people over the last 100 years or so. So, it makes more sense to ignore logic and run with whatever makes those peeps feel good at the moment. In the eleven days after Obama was elected, for some reason or another, they were convinced this had changed the world for the better in regards to world peace.
Now, before those people get all uppity trashing the Nobel Peace Prize over Obama, they need to consider some of the people who Obama will be joining:
- 2007 – Al Gore wins the Peace Prize for making a movie and only charging $10,000 to promote companies he’s invested in.
- 2002 – Jimmy Carter wins the Peace Prize for informing the world he knows the United States is evil because aliens told him so. Some also felt this was a belated award for his efforts in passing the Community Reinvestment Act of 1977 that made sure banks loaned money to those who could not afford it. Some horribly misguided people would blame this act for the financial meltdown of 2007. He also got bonus points for failing to recognize the political situation in Iran, which, along with the Carter negotiated Egypt-Israel peace agreement of 1979, led to a guy named Saddam Hussein assuming a leadership role not only in Iraq, but with the League of Arab States. Some contend it was the overt support for Iraq that encouraged their invasion of Iran. That’s why I find it ironic that the Nobel committee cited “finding peaceful solutions to international conflicts, to advance democracy and human rights, and to promote economic and social development”.
- 2001 – Kofi Annan wins for only allowing genocide in a handful of continents.
- 1994 – Yasser Arafat wins for agreeing to blow up fewer buses with children. He lied.
- 1919 – Woodrow Wilson for his “Fourteen Points”. The heart of the Fourteen Points would be the formation of an international body to oversee conflicts between countries. The League Of Nations’ complete failure would set the stage for World War II. The failure of the League of Nations was mainly due to the opposition of one person, Woodrow Wilson.
- 1906 – Teddy Roosevelt for allowing Russia and Japan use a room to negotiate the Treaty of Portsmouth, ending the Russo-Japanese War of 1904-1905. It didn’t matter that Russia was in the midst of a revolution to oust the tsarist regimes. The more or less total surrender by Russia sealed by the Treaty of Portsmouth and the arrangements made before, during, and after the Treaty would lead directly to both World Wars. By allowing Japan to keep all of it’s territories taken during the war while requiring Russia to cede all of theirs, it pretty much forced Russia to side with China during the Second Sino-Japanese War that broke out in 1937. The escalation created by Russia’s entry into the Sino-Japanese War created a major war in the Pacific. The Second Sino-Japanese War was completely a result of Japan’s unfettered efforts to expand their territories in efforts to obtain more mineral resources. By allowing Japan to continue it’s expansion as a result of the Treaty of Portsmouth, Japan took that as a signal that the US was tacitly condoning their expansion as an ally. When the US started invoking economic sanctions as a result of those efforts to expand that were allowed under the Treaty of Portsmouth, Japan took that as a sign the US could no longer be trusted. Fearing a US alliance with Britain due to the conflict in Europe and Japan’s intended aggression into British held territories in the Pacific, the Japanese sought to prematurely negate the US’s naval superiority, the Japanese attacked Pearl Harbor. Immediately recognizing the US’s alliance with Britain would force the US to be strained defending the Pacific against Japan, Germany declared war against the US in their effort to restore lands lost during Woodrow Wilson’s “Fourteen Points”.
Pretty hefty company for Obama. I’m hoping his “peace” efforts are a lot less catastrophic than some of his predecessors. Maybe the Nobel Prize committees should do what most other organizations do to reward humanitarian efforts: wait five or ten years to see what the results are.
Poman Polasnki pled guilty to drugging and raping a 13 year old girl in 1977. Rather than face his time, he fled and has been a fugitive for over thirty years.
Now, thirty years later, he’s been nabbed in Switzerland. He’ll be extradited and sent to prison if all goes well. Some Hollywood types seem to think drugging and raping a thirteen year old girl’s not that big a deal. The primary person who feels that way is, get this, Woody Allen. Here are some of the others on that list:
- Faith Akin
- Stephane Allagnon
- Woody Allen
- Pedro Almodovar
- Wes Anderson
- Jean-Jacques Annaud
- Alexandre Arcady
- Fanny Ardant
- Asia Argento
- Darren Aronofsky
- Olivier Assayas
- Alexander Astruc
- Gabriel Auer
- Luc Barnier
- Christophe Barratier
- Xavier Beauvois
- Liria Begeja
- Gilles Behat
- Jean-Jacques Beineix
- Marco Bellochio
- Monica Bellucci
- Djamel Bennecib
- Giuseppe Bertolucci
- Patrick Bouchitey
- Paul Boujenah
- Jacques Bral
- Patrick Braoudé
- André Buytaers
- Christian Carion
- Henning Carlsen
- Jean-michel Carre
- Mathieu Celary
- Patrice Chéreau
- Elie Chouraqui
- Souleymane Cissé
- Alain Corneau
- Jérôme Cornuau
- Miguel Courtois
- Dominique Crevecoeur
- Alfonso Cuaron
- Luc Dardenne
- Jean-Pierre Dardenne
- Jonathan Demme
- Alexandre Desplat
- Rosalinde Deville
- Michel Deville
- Georges Dybman
- Jacques Fansten
- Joël Farges
- Gianluca Farinelli
- Etienne Faure
- Michel Ferry
- Scott Foundas
- Stephen Frears
- Thierry Frémaux
- Sam Gabarski
- René Gainville
- Tony Gatlif
- Costa Gavras
- Jean-Marc Ghanassia
- Terry Gilliam
- Christian Gion
- Marc Guidoni
- Buck Henry
- David Heyman
- Laurent Heynemann
- Robert Hossein
- Jean-Loup Hubert
- Alejandro Gonzalez Inarritu
- Gilles Jacob
- Just Jaeckin
- Alain Jessua
- Pierre Jolivet
- Kent Jones
- Roger Kahane
- Nelly Kaplan
- Wong Kar Waï
- Ladislas Kijno
- Harmony Korinne
- Jan Kounen
- Diane Kurys
- Emir Kusturica
- John Landis
- Claude Lanzmann
- André Larquié
- Vinciane Lecocq
- Patrice Leconte
- Claude Lelouch
- Gérard Lenne
- David Lynch
- Michael Mann
- François Margolin
- Jean-PierreMarois
- Tonie Marshall
- Mario Martone
- Nicolas Mauvernay
- Radu Mihaileanu
- Claude Miller
- Mario Monicelli
- Jeanne Moreau
- Sandra Nicolier
- Michel Ocelot
- Alexander Payne
- Richard Pena Michele Placido
- Philippe Radault
- Jean-Paul Rappeneau
- Raphael Rebibo
- Yasmina Reza
- Jacques Richard
- Laurence Roulet
- Walter Salles
- Jean-Paul Salomé
- Marc Sandberg
- Jerry Schatzberg
- Julian Schnabel
- Barbet Schroeder
- Ettore Scola
- Martin Scorsese
- Charlotte Silvera
- Abderrahmane Sissako
- Paolo Sorrentino
- Guillaume Stirn
- Tilda Swinton
- Jean-Charles Tacchella
- Radovan Tadic Danis Tanovic,
- Bertrand Tavernier
- Cécile Telerman
- Alain Terzian
- Pascal Thomas
- Giuseppe Tornatore
- Serge Toubiana
- Nadine Trintignant
- Tom Tykwer
- Alexandre Tylski
- Betrand Van Effenterre
- Wim Wenders
- Isabelle Adjani
- antoine Aronin
- Paul Auster
- Morgane Beauverger
- Candice Belaisch-Goldchmit
- Yamina Benguigui
- Pascal Bruckner
- Jessika Cohen
- Philippe Corbé
- Jean-Paul Dayan
- Katarina De Meulder
- Arielle Dombasle
- Nathalie Faucheux
- Corinne Figuet
- Pierre Forciniti
- Louis Garrel
- Albert Gauvin
- Johanna Gozlan
- Davide Homitsu Riboli
- Taylor Hackford
- Isabelle Ruppert
- Neil Jordan
- Thierry Kamami
- Milan Kundera
- Gaelle Lancien
- Claude Lanzmann
- Bernard-Henri Lévy
- Sam Mendes
- Camille Meyer
- Patrick Mimouni
- Yann Moix
- Mike Nichols
- Sandra Nicolier
- Marie Nieves
- Perez Neël
- Salman Rushdie
- Carine Sarna
- Ysabelle Saura Del Pan
- William Shawcross
- Olivier Soares Barbosa
- Steven Soderbergh
- Nil Symchowicz
- Danièle Thompson
- Eugenia Varela Navarro
- Diane von Furstenberg
- Scott Foundas
- Margaret Walker
- Elsa Zylberstein
And why do you suppose so many movie people think Polanski’s rape conviction should be dropped? Why, because he’s one of them. Ain’t that just special?
* For what it’s worth, Hollywood’s getting the brunt of criticism because of Woody Allen and Martin Scorsese I’m sure. However, a huge majority of these people are not US citizens. As such, they may not realize just how seriously we take child molestation and rape in the United States.
