Facts speak louder than loudmouths!

Suggestion from a fellow memo reader. My suggestion was prison uniforms would be better. The crime - fraudulent management of nation's trust funds. (See 1 below.)

Some interesting military statistics forwarded by another memo reader. Facts always speak louder than loudmouths! (See 2 below.)

Unheeded warnings from Richard Baker.

It should be read in conjunction with these other reprints from today's Wall Street Journal because question ACORN and Obama's judgement and you become a nut case or worse, a racist!

Wake up America, smell the roses and think! It is the American way to question. I seldom believe new is improved until tested. It is patriotic to be independent of mind and the tripe we so often hear. Particularly is this so when the press and media have abdicated their responsibility of objective reporting. Don't believe government styled fairness , aka Obama, is benign. It comes with a very controlling and costly future price.

Obama is good at selling Socialist "snake oil" and as for McCain he reminds me of when I am down 5 to 1 and I tell my opponent I have him where I want him and then go on to lose 6-1. (See 3, 3a and 3b below.)

Nationalizing banks is good for your health? (See 4 below)

Another fellow memo reader and one of my most intelligent and severest critics sent this David Brooks article to me. (See 5 below.)

Dick

1)Members of Congress should wear uniforms like NASCAR drivers, so we could identify their corporate sponsors. (might require some really BIG uniforms!)

2) Subject: These military losses may surprise you

Very interesting and very true and very disheartening. Please don't take
this as a slap in the face (demo or repub); these stats need to be part of
our thoughts in the ongoing presidential rhetoric. These military losses
may surprise you! These statistics are published by Congressional Research
Service, and they may be confirmed by anyone at:
http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/natsec/RL32492.pdf

Military losses, 1980 through 2006
As tragic as the loss of any member of the US Armed Forces is, consider the
following statistics:
The annual fatalities of military members while actively serving in the
armed forces from 1980 through 2006:
1980 ........ .2,392 (Carter Year)
1981 ..........2,380 (Reagan Year)
1984 ......... 1,999 (Reagan Year)
1988 ..........1,819 (Reagan Year)
1989 ......... 1,636 (George H W Year)
1990 ......... 1,508 (George H W Year)
1991 ......... 1,787 (George H W Year)
1992 ......... 1,293 (George H W Year)
1993 ......... 1,213 ( Clinton Year)
1994 ......... 1,075 ( Clinton Year)
1995 ..........2,465 ( Clinton Year)
1996 ..........2,318 ( Clinton Year)
1997 ........... 817 ( Clinton Year)
1998 ..........2,252 ( Clinton Year)
1999 ..........1,984 ( Clinton Year)
2000 ......... 1,983 ( Clinton Year)
2001 .......... 890 (George W Year)
2002 ......... 1,007 (George W Year)
2003 ..........1,410 (George W Year)>2004 ......... 1,887 (George W Year)
2005 .......... 919 (George W Year)
2006 .......... 920 (George W Year)
2007........... 899 (George W Year)

Clintonyears (1993-2000): 14,000 deaths
George W. years (2001-2006): 7,932 deaths
If you are surprised when you look at these figures, so was I. These
figures mean that the loss from the two latest conflicts in the Middle East
are LESS than the loss of military personnel during Bill Clinton's
presidency when America wasn't involved in a war!
And, I was even more shocked when I read that in 1980, during the reign of
President Jimmy Carter, (Nobel Peace Prize winner), there were 2,392 US
military fatalities!

Consider the latest census of Americans.
It shows the=2 0following FACTS about the distribution of American citizens,
by Race:
European descent ..................... 69.12%
Hispanic ..............................12.5%
Black ................................ 12.3%
Asian ..................................3.7%
Native American ........................1.0%
Other ..................................2.6%

Now... here are the fatalities by Race; over the past three years in Iraqi Freedom:

European descent (white) ............. 74.31%
Hispanic .............................10..74%
Black ................................. 9.67%
Asian ..................................1.81%
Native American ........................1.09%
Other ................................. 0.33%

It's all about politics, and some politicians are now famous for turning
American against American for a vote. The Hillary-Obama campaigns say the
current administration does not 'listen' to anyone and continues the war,
costing precious American lives.
The Clinton administration, without having an actual war, sent more
soldiers to death than the Bush Administration; in addition, Clinton also
forced the military to release Osama Bin Laden when we actually had himdetained!

I hope that during the time between now and November, intelligent Americans
can decipher facts from the spin and the spinners from the leaders;those who seek even more power from those who seek justice; and the dividers from the uniters.
Over the next 2 0months let's be good listeners and see and hear who tries to
divide our nation and who wants to unite our nation; who wants to control
how our money is spent and who wants our money spent the way we would spend
it. Who seeks power and who seeks justice? Who spins the facts and who is genuine?

3) Shouting 'Fannie!' in a Crowded Congress: Advice from the man who foresaw the GSE collapse.
By WILLIAM MCGURN

Richard Baker says that he's not in the business of advising presidential candidates. That's too bad. The candidates and the American taxpayer might be in a better place if he were.

Mr. Baker, of course, is the former Louisiana Republican who spent nearly a decade crying in the wilderness . . . er, Congress . . . that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were ticking time bombs. Earlier this year he was named CEO of Managed Funds Association, a lobbying firm that represents the hedge-fund industry. And amid the financial carnage, he is somewhat bemused to hear people say they are shocked, shocked to learn that someone had predicted it all.

"Everyone writes as though there were just one hearing or one piece of legislation," says Mr. Baker. "I think I must have had eight bills and maybe 40 hearings going back to 1996."

Mr. Baker's interest in Fan and Fred grew out of the savings-and-loan debacle. "My background was in real estate and home building," he says. "At the time I ran for Congress, we were dealing with the S&L problem -- lax lending standards, and the American taxpayer on the hook for risks other people were taking. I saw how destructive that was to the personal wealth and businesses of many of my friends and associates. And when I looked into Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, I saw the same problems -- only a lot bigger and a lot more dangerous."

Mr. Baker declines to comment on any of the proposals put forward by either Barack Obama or John McCain. But he does outline some general principles that should have some resonance with each of the candidates. Sen. Obama, for example, might like Mr. Baker's idea of returning the mission of affordable housing to a revitalized Department of Housing and Urban Development (working with the Federal Housing Administration and the Department of Veterans Affairs).

There are several advantages to such a reform. First, the risk to the financial sector would be removed. Second, the congressionally protected monopoly that Fan and Fred exploited would be gone -- and with that the obscene salaries enjoyed by its top executives. Finally, HUD might actually get more housing built for low-income Americans, as opposed to the $200,000 to $300,000 loans that Mr. Baker says characterized a good chunk of Fan and Fred's portfolios.

For Sen. McCain, Mr. Baker's distinctions between deregulation of the private sector and the lack of oversight for a federally backed enterprise might help him push back on the Democratic talking point that the whole mess was caused by GOP-inspired financial deregulation.

"My starting principle is this," says Mr. Baker. "The closer an enterprise is to the taxpayer's wallet, the more congressional oversight it requires. The further away you get from that wallet, the more freedom you should give people, because they are risking their own money, not the taxpayers'."

On Capitol Hill, he notes, we had just the opposite. In terms of accountability, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were the worst of both worlds. On the one hand, they lacked the congressional oversight that would have come had there been an explicit and acknowledged taxpayer guarantee. On the other hand, the privileged position represented by this implicit guarantee removed the discipline that market competition forces on other private enterprises.

Mr. Baker goes further. He points out that it wasn't the unregulated part of the financial markets that got us here. It was the regulated part. In his own industry, he notes, the lack of a government guarantee means folks do a lot more due diligence before they part with their money.

Today all this sounds wise -- and obvious. But back when he was sounding the alarms in Congress, it was a different story. When he made public the outrageous compensation of Fan and Fred's executives, they threatened to sue him. When he questioned Franklin Raines, the now-disgraced former head of Fannie Mae, a fellow congressman accused him of a "lynching." When he suggested Fan and Fred's paper was not solid, he was dismissed as a crank. And on one of his early reform proposals, he couldn't find a single cosponsor.

For the past few weeks, the loudest voices debating the way forward belong to those who told us these government-sponsored enterprises were safe and sound. As Messrs. Obama and McCain go into their third and final debate tomorrow night, maybe it's time to do the real maverick thing: Start looking for solutions to our Fan and Fred-induced meltdown from the fella who got it right.

3a) Obama and Acorn: Community organizers, phony voters, and your tax dollars.


At the recent Emmy Awards, historian Laura Linney averred that America's Founders had been "community organizers" -- like Barack Obama. Too bad they aren't like that any more. Mr. Obama's kind of organizers work at Acorn, the militant advocacy group that is turning up in reports about voter fraud across the country.
[Review & Outlook] AP

Acorn -- the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now -- has been around since 1970 and boasts 350,000 members. We've written about them for years, but Acorn is now getting more attention as John McCain's campaign makes an issue of the fraud reports and Acorn's ties to Mr. Obama. It's about time someone exposed this shady outfit that uses government dollars to lobby for larger government.

Acorn uses various affiliated groups to agitate for "a living wage," for "affordable housing," for "tax justice" and union and environmental goals, as well as against school choice and welfare reform. It was a major contributor to the subprime meltdown by pushing lenders to make home loans on easy terms, conducting "strikes" against banks so they'd lower credit standards.

But the organization's real genius is getting American taxpayers to foot the bill. According to a 2006 report from the Employment Policies Institute (EPI), Acorn has been on the federal take since 1977. For instance, Acorn's American Institute for Social Justice claimed $240,000 in tax money between fiscal years 2002 and 2003. Its American Environmental Justice Project received 100% of its revenue from government grants in the same years. EPI estimates the Acorn Housing Corporation alone received some $16 million in federal dollars from 1997-2007. Only recently, Democrats tried and failed to stuff an "affordable housing" provision into the $700 billion bank rescue package that would have let politicians give even more to Acorn.

All this money gives Acorn the ability to pursue its other great hobby: electing liberals. Acorn is spending $16 million this year to register new Democrats and is already boasting it has put 1.3 million new voters on the rolls. The big question is how many of these registrations are real.

The Michigan Secretary of State told the press in September that Acorn had submitted "a sizeable number of duplicate and fraudulent applications." Earlier this month, Nevada's Democratic Secretary of State Ross Miller requested a raid on Acorn's offices, following complaints of false names and fictional addresses (including the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys). Nevada's Clark County Registrar of Voters Larry Lomax said he saw rampant fraud in 2,000 to 3,000 applications Acorn submitted weekly.

Officials in Ohio are investigating voter fraud connected with Acorn, and Florida's Seminole County is withholding Acorn registrations that appear fraudulent. New Mexico, North Carolina and Missouri are looking into hundreds of dubious Acorn registrations. Wisconsin is investigating Acorn employees for, according to an election official, "making people up or registering people that were still in prison."

Then there's Lake County, Indiana, which has already found more than 2,100 bogus applications among the 5,000 Acorn dumped right before the deadline. "All the signatures looked exactly the same," said Ruthann Hoagland, of the county election board. Bridgeport, Connecticut estimates about 20% of Acorn's registrations were faulty. As of July, the city of Houston had rejected or put on hold about 40% of the 27,000 registration cards submitted by Acorn.

That's just this year. In 2004, four Acorn employees were indicted in Ohio for submitting false voter registrations. In 2005, two Colorado Acorn workers were found to have submitted false registrations. Four Acorn Missouri employees were indicted in 2006; five were found guilty in Washington state in 2007 for filling out registration forms with names from a phone book.

Which brings us to Mr. Obama, who got his start as a Chicago "community organizer" at Acorn's side. In 1992 he led voter registration efforts as the director of Project Vote, which included Acorn. This past November, he lauded Acorn's leaders for being "smack dab in the middle" of that effort. Mr. Obama also served as a lawyer for Acorn in 1995, in a case against Illinois to increase access to the polls.

During his tenure on the board of Chicago's Woods Fund, that body funneled more than $200,000 to Acorn. More recently, the Obama campaign paid $832,000 to an Acorn affiliate. The campaign initially told the Federal Election Commission this money was for "staging, sound, lighting." It later admitted the cash was to get out the vote.



The Obama campaign is now distancing itself from Acorn, claiming Mr. Obama never organized with it and has nothing to do with illegal voter registration. Yet it's disingenuous to channel cash into an operation with a history of fraud and then claim you're shocked to discover reports of fraud. As with Rev. Jeremiah Wright and William Ayers, Mr. Obama was happy to associate with Acorn when it suited his purposes. But now that he's on the brink of the Presidency, he wants to disavow his ties.

The Justice Department needs to treat these fraud reports as something larger than a few local violators. The question is whether Acorn is systematically subverting U.S. election law -- on the taxpayer's dime.

3b) John Lewis's Race Grenade: A former civil-rights leader fans racial tensions.

Georgia Democrat John Lewis was a brave civil-rights leader, but that doesn't give him moral license to fan racial tensions today. Yet that's precisely what he did on Saturday by suggesting that John McCain and Sarah Palin were inciting violence a la segregationist George Wallace.

By raising questions about Barack Obama's relationship with terror-bomber William Ayers, the Republicans are "sowing the seeds of hatred and division," Mr. Lewis said. "During another period, in the not-too-distant past, there was a governor of a state of Alabama named George Wallace who also became a presidential candidate. George Wallace never threw a bomb. He never fired a gun, but he created the climate and conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans who were simply trying to exercise their Constitutional rights. Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed on Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama."

Mr. Lewis's over-the-top analogy is nastier by far than anything the GOP nominees have said during this campaign. In any case, Mr. Ayers is white. The angry shouts last week at a couple of McCain-Palin rallies were ugly, but Mr. McCain earned boos himself by correcting supporters about Mr. Obama's ethnicity and calling him an honorable man. The Arizona Senator has also declined to make an issue of Mr. Obama's 20-year association with radical black preacher Rev. Jeremiah Wright, though that association is also about Mr. Obama's honesty, not race.

Mr. Lewis later tried to clarify what he called "misinterpretations" of his statement and that he never meant to compare the GOP candidates to Wallace, but the damage was done. Because of his civil-rights record, Mr. Lewis gets a pass from the media and his fellow politicians even when he makes incendiary comments. But with remarks like those on Saturday, he deserves to be seen less as a racial healer and more like any other politician who uses race as a sword.

4) U.S. Announces Plan to Buy Stakes in Largest Banks: Recipients Include Citi, Bank of America, Goldman; Government Pressures All to Accept Money as Part of Broadened Rescue Effort
By DEBORAH SOLOMON, DAMIAN PALETTA, JON HILSENRATH and AARON LUCCHETTI

WASHINGTON -- U.S. government officials released a plan to take stakes in nine large financial institutions in an effort to help revive the banking sector and fight the global credit crunch.

In one of the most dramatic actions taken by regulators to address the financial crisis, officials plan to funnel up to $250 billion from the $700 billion financial rescue package into potentially thousands of banks through the new, voluntary program.

The government is set to buy preferred equity stakes in Goldman Sachs Group Inc., Morgan Stanley, J.P. Morgan Chase & Co., Bank of America Corp. -- including the soon-to-be acquired Merrill Lynch -- Citigroup Inc., Wells Fargo & Co., Bank of New York Mellon and State Street Corp.

Banks have a month to join Treasury's capital purchase program. They must elect to participate before 5 p.m. on Nov. 14.

"The efforts are designed to directly benefit the American people by stabilizing the financial system and helping the economy recover,'' President George W. Bush said in a morning announcement.

Additionally, federal regulators announced that they'd guarantee new bank debt and expand insurance for non-interest-bearing accounts. They also issued new details on a plan to backstop the commercial paper market, where major corporations go for critical loans to fund their daily operations.

"They've exposed the whole toolkit," said Vincent Reinhart, former head of the Fed's monetary affairs division. "What do you do if this doesn't work? You do more of it."

Under the last step announced by Mr. Bush, the Federal Reserve will finalize a program to serve as a buyer of last resort for commercial paper, an important source of short-term financing for businesses banks.
Paulson, Bair, Bernanke Announce Moves

Treasury Secretary Henry M. Paulson, Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, and FDIC Chairman Sheila Bair also made comments Tuesday.

Mr. Bernanke said the U.S. will not "stand down" until financial system and prosperity restored. Mr. Paulson, in his own remarks, said financial institutions in the new program will limit executive compensation. He said that "government owning a stake in any private U.S. company is objectionable to most Americans," but said the alternative "of leaving businesses and consumers without access to financing is totally unacceptable."

Some of the big banks were unhappy about the government taking equity stakes, but acquiesced under pressure from Mr. Paulson in a meeting Monday. During the financial crisis, the government has steadily increased its involvement in financial markets, culminating with a move that rivals the breadth of the government's response to the Great Depression. It intertwines the banking sector with the federal government for years to come and gives taxpayers a direct stake in the future of American finance, including any possible losses.

Formulated jointly by the Treasury, the Fed and the FDIC, these moves announced Tuesday are designed to keep money flowing through the financial system, ensuring that banks continue lending to companies, consumers and each other. A freeze in these markets rippled through the economy and helped cause stocks to crater last week.

"Government owning a stake in any private U.S. company is objectionable to most Americans -- me included," Mr. Paulson said in a statement Tuesday. "Yet the alternative of leaving businesses and consumers without access to financing is totally unacceptable."

Along with the government's involvement come certain restrictions, such as caps on executive pay. For example, firms can't write new employment contracts containing golden parachutes and their ability to use certain executive salaries as a tax deduction is capped. These restrictions are relatively weak compared with what congressional Democrats had wanted when they approved this spending, a potential flash point.

Some critics also say Treasury should have formulated a comprehensive plan earlier in the crisis. Even if this move helps mend credit markets, the economy is likely to suffer in the months ahead from the aftershocks of the recent turmoil.
[Image] Reuters

Paulson and Bernanke

A central plank of these new efforts is a plan for the Treasury to take about $250 billion in equity stakes in potentially thousands of banks, using funds approved by Congress through the recently approved $700 billion bailout plan.

Treasury will buy $25 billion in preferred stock in Bank of America -- including Merrill Lynch -- as well as J.P. Morgan and Citigroup; between $20 billion and $25 billion in Wells Fargo; $10 billion in Goldman and Morgan Stanley; $3 billion in Bank of New York Mellon; and about $2 billion in State Street.

The government will purchase preferred stock, an equity investment designed to avoid hurting existing shareholders and deterring new ones. Such shares typically don't come with voting rights. They will carry a 5% annual dividend that rises to 9% after five years, according to a person familiar with the matter. By investing in several big firms at once, the government hopes to avoid placing a stigma on any one firm for getting government help.

The plan will be structured to encourage firms to bring in private capital. For instance, firms returning capital to the government by 2009 may get better terms for the government's stake, a person familiar with the discussions said.
FDIC Moves

Among the other key components of the plan is the FDIC temporarily guarantee, for a fee, certain types of new debt called senior unsecured debt issued by banks and thrifts. This would apply to debt issued by June 30 with maturities up to three years. One problem plaguing credit markets has been a fear among financial institutions that it is unsafe to lend to each other even for periods of a few days. U.S. officials hope this guarantee removes that fear, which could bring down short-term lending rates, such as the London interbank offered rate, or Libor, a benchmark for consumer and business loans.

The FDIC is also temporarily offering banks unlimited deposit insurance for non-interest bearing bank accounts typically used by small businesses, through 2009. This would be voluntary for banks, and would extend the $250,000 per depositor limit lawmakers agreed on two weeks ago. To use these new powers, the FDIC is invoking a "systemic risk" clause in federal banking law that allows it to take extreme steps to prevent shocks to the economy.

The FDIC's central role in the plan is consistent with its presence during past banking crises, the Great Depression and the savings and loan crisis. Each crisis sparked a major boost in the agency's power.

The shift brings U.S. policy more in line with that of other countries. Monday, the U.K., Germany, France, Spain and Italy provided further details of measures to buy stakes in struggling banks and offer lending guarantees. The U.K., which first formulated such a plan, is planning to issue some £37 billion ($63.1 billion) in new government debt to pay for purchases of the common and preferred shares of three big banks.

5) Thoughtful piece by David Brooks


Modern conservatism began as a movement of dissident intellectuals. Richard Weaver wrote a book called, “Ideas Have Consequences.” Russell Kirk placed Edmund Burke in an American context. William F. Buckley famously said he’d rather be governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than by the faculty of Harvard. But he didn’t believe those were the only two options. His entire life was a celebration of urbane values, sophistication and the rigorous and constant application of intellect.
Driven by a need to engage elite opinion, conservatives tried to build an intellectual counter establishment with think tanks and magazines. They disdained the ideas of the liberal professoriate, but they did not disdain the idea of a cultivated mind.

Ronald Reagan was no intellectual, but he had an earnest faith in ideas and he spent decades working through them. He was rooted in the Midwest, but he also loved Hollywood . And for a time, it seemed the Republican Party would be a broad coalition — small-town values with coastal reach.

In 1976, in a close election, Gerald Ford won the entire West Coast along with northeastern states like New Jersey , Connecticut , Vermont and Maine . In 1984, Reagan won every state but Minnesota .

But over the past few decades, the Republican Party has driven away people who live in cities, in highly educated regions and on the coasts. This expulsion has had many causes. But the big one is this: Republican political tacticians decided to mobilize their coalition with a form of social class warfare. Democrats kept nominating coastal pointy-heads like Michael Dukakis so Republicans attacked coastal pointy-heads.

Over the past 15 years, the same argument has been heard from a thousand politicians and a hundred television and talk-radio jocks. The nation is divided between the wholesome Joe Sixpacks in the heartland and the over sophisticated, over educated, over secularized denizens of the coasts.

What had been a disdain for liberal intellectuals slipped into a disdain for the educated class as a whole. The liberals had coastal condescension, so the conservatives developed their own anti-elitism, with mirror-image categories and mirror-image resentments, but with the same corrosive effect.

Republicans developed their own leadership style. If Democratic leaders prized deliberation and self-examination, then Republicans would govern from the gut.

George W. Bush restrained some of the populist excesses of his party — the anti-immigration fervor, the isolationism — but stylistically he fit right in. As Fred Barnes wrote in his book, “Rebel-in-Chief,” Bush “reflects the political views and cultural tastes of the vast majority of Americans who don’t live along the East or West Coast. He’s not a sophisticate and doesn’t spend his discretionary time with sophisticates. As First Lady Laura Bush once said, she and the president didn’t come to Washington to make new friends. And they haven’t.”

The political effects of this trend have been obvious. Republicans have alienated the highly educated regions — Silicon Valley, northern Virginia , the suburbs outside of New York , Philadelphia , Chicago and Raleigh-Durham. The West Coast and the Northeast are mostly gone.

The Republicans have alienated whole professions. Lawyers now donate to the Democratic Party over the Republican Party at 4-to-1 rates. With doctors, it’s 2-to-1. With tech executives, it’s 5-to-1. With investment bankers, it’s 2-to-1. It took talent for Republicans to lose the banking community.

Conservatives are as rare in elite universities and the mainstream media as they were 30 years ago. The smartest young Americans are now educated in an overwhelmingly liberal environment.

This year could have changed things. The G.O.P. had three urbane presidential candidates. But the class-warfare clichés took control. Rudy Giuliani disdained cosmopolitans at the Republican convention. Mitt Romney gave a speech attacking “eastern elites.” (Mitt Romney!) John McCain picked Sarah Palin.

Palin is smart, politically skilled, courageous and likable. Her convention and debate performances were impressive. But no American politician plays the class-warfare card as constantly as Palin. Nobody so relentlessly divides the world between the “normal Joe Sixpack American” and the coastal elite.

She is another step in the Republican change of personality. Once conservatives admired Churchill and Lincoln above all — men from wildly different backgrounds who prepared for leadership through constant reading, historical understanding and sophisticated thinking. Now those attributes bow down before the common touch.

And so, politically, the G.O.P. is squeezed at both ends. The party is losing the working class by sins of omission — because it has not developed policies to address economic anxiety. It has lost the educated class by sins of commission — by telling members of that class to go away.