Stimulating America, One State at a Time: Arizona Edition

It must be galling to be against economic stimulus, and yet stuck as a Republican governor having to highlight said stimulus. It's like having to talk out of both ends of your body at the same time. You can find Arizona's humble site here, and we assume every state has something similar. Interestingly we see our good Governor Brewer holding fake stimulus checks, but we see no images of the man, Barrack Obama, who helped make it possible.

Listening to enough people, you get the impression that stimulus money was (and is) entirely vapor, or money tossed into the Grand Canyon, poorly spent and adding to the burdens on our grandchildren... mind you, different grandchildren from the ones we had during the Bush Administration when we didn't really give a hoot about deficits, debt, birth certificates, or, grandchildren.

It amazes that even some of the homeless here in sun country are ranting about Obama. A friend of mine, who feeds a few guys who have managed to stay off their feet and struggling for at least six years, was subject to their invective and ridicule of the President. Stun me and stun me again.. You are sitting in someone else's home, eating their food, being permitted to use their shower, you have no job and are not trying to get one, you are drinking every spare dime you have away, and yet, you have plenty of time to absorb the zeitgeist and come out against Obama the Socialist, while you practice lifestyle socialism. Apparently flawed Republican trickle down economic thought has reached new lows, trickling down to the very people who would benefit by the type of funding the stimulus is designed to temporarily provide.

Boldnesses and nonsenses, I say in outrage and mangled English. Take a look at who has received funds from the Recovery Act here in Arizona, and stop pretending that your feet do not touch the earth, or that your life is not impacted by the President's initiatives. You can debate whether people need this help during the worst financial crisis in 75 years, or whether instead to let citizens take the financial hit in full, but to impart evil intentions to the people making this possible is simply unpatriotic.

The list of benefactors goes on and on, so we included just enough to make a point.

Arizona:
Top Recipients Amount
(Feb 17, 2009 - June 30, 2010)
TRANSPORTATION, ARIZONA DEPT OF $404,556,264
PHOENIX, CITY OF $258,073,381
OFFICE OF THE GOVENOR, ARIZONA OFFICE OF ECONOMIC RECOVERY, THE $234,665,262
UNIVERSITY OF ARIZONA $171,454,609
ARIZONA STATE UNIVERSITY $155,942,726
CHICANOS POR LA CAUSA, INC. $141,104,620
HENSEL PHELPS CONSTRUCTION CO $116,911,168
ROUGH ROCK SCHOOL BOARD, INC. $107,958,319
DEPT OF EDUCATION ARIZONA $107,222,392
ELECTRIC TRANSPORTATION ENGINEERING CORPORATION $100,196,560
ARIZONA DEPARTMENT OF ECONOMIC SECURITY $75,494,068
ARIZONA PUBLIC SERVICE COMPANY $74,068,312
NAVAJO NATION DEPARTMENT OF CORRECTIONS $70,242,837
PIMA COUNTY $68,853,131
SALT RIVER PROJECT AGRICULTURAL IMPROVEMENT AND POWER DISTRICT $56,859,359
DEPARTMENT OF COMMERCE ARIZONA $55,608,603
MESA UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT 4 $53,614,990
GILA RIVER INDIAN COMMUNITY $48,180,007
TUCSON UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT $46,430,582
MARICOPA, COUNTY OF $46,302,869
NAVAJO TRIBAL UTILITY AUTHORITY COMPANY $43,965,703
CITY OF TUCSON $43,146,993
GENERAL DYNAMICS ADVANCED INFORMATION SYSTEMS, INC. $41,561,916
VALLEY METRO RAIL, INC. $40,122,519
NORTHERN ARIZONA UNIVERSITY $37,491,154
ARCHER WESTERN CONTRACTORS, LTD. $36,247,473
NAVAJO HOUSING AUTHORITY $34,412,126
MESA, CITY OF $29,216,958
TEMPE, CITY OF $28,456,033
INTERNATIONAL SURFACING SYSTEMS, INC. $27,255,485
PASCUA YAQUI TRIBE $24,475,405
PEORIA UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT 11 $23,626,318
SULPHUR SPRINGS VALLEY ELECTRIC COOPERATIVE, INC $23,482,107
GILBERT UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT #41 $23,442,056
THE NAVAJO NATION TRIBAL GOVERNMENT $22,842,953
PHOENIX UNION HIGH SCHOOL DISTRICT NO 210 $22,325,159
DEER VALLEY SCHOOL DISTRICT #97 $22,178,709
Chandler Unified School District $21,828,706
MARICOPA COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE DISTRICT $21,392,257
EXECUTIVE OFFICE OF THE STATE OF ARIZONA $21,282,122
PARADISE VALLEY UNIFIED SCHOOL DISTRICT NO. 69 $21,041,111
HONEYWELL INTERNATIONAL INC. $21,038,852
YUMA, COUNTY OF $20,000,873
Washington Elementary School District 6 $19,661,728
Cartwright School District 83 $18,703,186

Don't Let Republican Stubbornists Touch Your No No Spot on Tuesday

Just a reminder a few days before the election. Don't be fooled.

That will be hard for many people, who under the coordinated Republican onslaught of figmentations and outright nonsense are determined to oust Democrats and any politician connected to the evils associated with President Barrack Obama.  It amazes to see the number of people who are easily swayed every time they hear the words Pelosi, or Stimulus, or Obamacare.

It's like the holy trinity in reverse, invoked as damnation by knowing political operatives and naive political stooges alike.

Don't be fooled.

Let us talk about the stimulus for just sec. It's officially the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, and while the title borders on the grandiose, it cannot be dismissed and ridiculed in the manner that it has without some mental disconnect in a willfully stupid segment of the population that is intent on not eating its spinach, but perfectly comfortable in letting strange Republicans touch their no no spot.

The broad provisions of this $787 billion piece of legislation?

• $288 billion was allocated toward tax cuts, including $116 billion to individuals in the form of payroll tax credits. Throw into this amount child tax credits, unemployment tax exemptions, college and home buyer credits. $51 billion was directed toward businesses.

• $155.1 billion was directed toward health care related issues. This included an allocation of  $86.8 billion for Medicaid, $25 billion in Cobra subsidies for the unemployed, and various veteran related initiatives.

• $100 billion was aimed at education. $53.6 billion of this went toward local states and municipalities to prevent layoffs and maintain schools. The next highest allocations were toward expanding Pell Grants and increasing support for low income kids.

Let's pause a moment. Remember Jesus? A guy we all claim to love, and that conservatives claim an especially close relationship with? I recall him saying something like, "Suffer the little children to come unto me," which is really hard to do when they are sick, or can't read the map to find Jesus hang'in in Washington Square Park. And will they have the energy to pull themselves up to Jesus's lap by their stolen bootstraps? (Ah, I see your skepticism with that "Are there no prisons, no workhouses" face on your face).

• $82.2 billion was set aside for retirees, unemployed workers and low income workers. This amount included $40 billion to increase and expand unemployment benefits. Another $20 billion was cut out for food stamps, and $14.2 to give a few extra dollars to the old folks on Social Security. Additional funds went to such nonsense like "Meals on Wheels" and local food banks.

Clearly, and thus far, this Stimulus, this Stimuli, this beast of unnecessary legislation is pure horror and waste. According to some Republicans, many conservatives and virtually all Tea Partisans, the opposite of this bill was the better path. No state medicaid help. No unemployment benefit increase. No modernizing Defense Department facilities. No education funding. None of that crazy stuff, that wanton, lewd spending stuff.

The opposite. Because Stimulus is bad. Just saying it should make it's badness self evident. And unfortunately there is a large enough group of narrow thinkers out there who can buy into the rhetoric and see black as white, up as down, and their President as the evil democracy destroying trickster.

The above is only part of the American Recovery Act (the Stimulus). Wikipedia lists most of it, including the various portions allocated to infrastructure, scientific and technology investment, and rebuilding. We focused on the pure people part, because while you might argue that $100 million for upgraded National Guard facilities does not directly affect you, you cannot ignore the funding stimuli that raises your paycheck, or keeps your kid's teachers employed, or your neighbor from losing all while being laid off. (And mind you, these layoffs are coming at a time of huge corporate profits, so who is the real problem, government or the private sector?)

One could make the argument that you don't spend money you don't have, and that's often the argument being made by the critics of President Obama. But consistency is not a strong point in this line of reasoning when America's economic structural problems have been ongoing for many years. It is a strange world when a middle of the road centrist president can inspire such vocal and irrational opposition after the worst economic collapse in 75 years, and a collapse he had no hand in creating and made every effort to offset.

Don't be fooled, by fools.

Fair State of Arizona

All the bloody world is asleep--friends, foes, lovers, the indifferent multitudes--and I am awake. Jesus knows what it feels like when people are asleep to you, on you, near you, from afar. Every night he goes to bed probably saying, "Oh come on world, am I that dull, are you that tired?" Of course today he and his crew choose to remain invisible, willing to risk the lack of company in the present, to gain loyal friends and company later. But a God can hardly complain too much when his earthly friends are asleep, can he? Especially when he often chooses to speak only in sign language.

As for me, my flesh was made word, and dwelt among those who know me, but nobody reads, or cares. Every mind for itself, and perhaps that is my sin too.

Was at the Arizona State Fair today on opening day. Went there after work with others, mostly to eat and shop, not to go on any rides. It was a motley crowd full of the young and their still younger offspring. Women in ill fitting garb playing the sexy potato. The female Hispanics of high school age had their hair poofed like a wind slap, or flattened down over the eye, neither flattering or respective of unique head shapes. And lamb, sheep, was on the grill too. Barbecued, along with chicken and huge turkey legs.

People walked around with kids, with girlfriends, with friends, with turkey legs, sifting sands killing moments beneath the high loop of two ferris wheels, Ferris Buellering the early evening hours. One could see sausages, both on the grill and walking down the long path, plus numerous fried things from bugs to butter to bread to people too tired or dazed to walk or eat anymore. One middle class couple sat on the next bench over. They had a maybe two year old and the father insisted that the best way to keep the kid from crying was to roll a basketball back and forth in the main path in front of the oncoming hoards. The crowd could not penetrate the sanctity of his personal family unit, nor distort the clarity of his inconsideration of their existence. He was in his own world, acting as though all was delightful, as though putting on a delightful show, and stealing glances your way as if to say, "See me playing with my delightful boy."  Deep inside you laugh meanly when he accidentally pegs delightful two year old in his delightful head with delightful basketball. Maybe, just maybe he will sit down and get out of people's way now. But no. Two year old is resilient and bounces back from pegged head.

Dirty. Arizona's fair distorts all visual imagery one might have in the head upon hearing the words "state fair". If sufficiently innocent, maybe from one of the real cities, like New York or Chicago or Boston, you imagine a fair to have grass and trees and apple butter, and cows and jam and livestock judges and horses and rhubarb and the you name it Family Singers and cheese and biggest pumpkin contests. Not here in Phoenix. It's the only city-like feature the city has, that it can make a fair seem quite filthy and urban.

I exaggerate some, but I can do that, because my friends are gone or asleep, and nobody can hear me. A pox on you sleepers and faders. May you dream of me and remember my name when I am gone.

Top Financial Firms Make Huge Money Under Socialist President

In case you were worried that Obama de Socialiste is killing business, think again.

Pay on Wall Street is on pace to break a record high for a second consecutive year, according to a study conducted by The Wall Street Journal.

Compensation on Wall Street is on pace to break a record high for a second consecutive year, as more than three dozen top banks and securities firms will pay $144 billion in salary and benefits. Elizabeth Rappaport, Bob O'Brien and Neal Lipschutz discuss. Also, Guggenheim Partners's Scott Minerd discusses why he thinks that despite record highs, gold can be expected to rise even higher.

About three dozen of the top publicly held securities and investment-services firms—which include banks, investment banks, hedge funds, money-management firms and securities exchanges—are set to pay $144 billion in compensation and benefits this year, a 4% increase from the $139 billion paid out in 2009, according to the survey. Compensation was expected to rise at 26 of the 35 firms. 

The data showed that revenue was expected to rise at 29 of the 35 firms surveyed, but at a slower pace than pay. Wall Street revenue is expected to rise 3%, to $448 billion from $433 billion, despite a slowdown in some.

(WSJ)

Which is why some progressives are deeply moody over the President, and most conservatives are absolutely delusional over the President, and why we remain quite content with the Goldilocks president. As much as people like to demonize entities--Ivy League graduates, lawyers, Mark Zuckerber, corporations, bankers, Wall Street, Chinese, you name it, we still think it's a good thing when our financial sector is beginning to function according to normative levels of greed and ingenuity.

Government Efficiency vs. Business Efficiency: Sign Language Edition

 "Mind Your Business!"

Let's ask ourselves again if the private sector is more efficient than government. It's an ongoing debate in politics and finance, and one that fuels the Republican strategy of doing nothing. Government is the problem, they say. We know that is artful nonsense.

One of the reasons unemployment remains stuck at 9.6% despite low interest rates, government spending (stimulus) and targeted tax cuts is because the business world is relentlessly refusing to cooperate in a manner befitting the times. Pundits, economists and politicians put out the line that businesses are confused, frozen even, amidst the uncertainty of life under the Obama Administration. This discounts the very real resistance that is going on that prevents any sort of finality that would create more optimism. In the same way that Republicans weaken or kill new policies by virtue of a solid stone wall, so too businesses do their little bit to slow down progress. And if slowing progress means a meandering economy, so be it. Better to profit now by processing mortgage foreclosures in half baked fashion, or to stop writing new child insurance policies, than do something that benefits middle Americans and America long term.

Today we have the 50 attorney generals across the United States looking into how the banks rushed through foreclosures. This news has led, and will continue to lead, to moratoriums on further action against homeowners.

This might seem good, even humane, but in actuality it further delays the process of forcing assets into the right hands and at the right price. Without a final unwinding of inflated assets, the economy cannot fully normalize.
Our large banks in their desire to speed the process, cut corners. So while raking in bundles of money on the one end, they sacrificed deliberate and careful process on the other, shafting homeowners out of adequate home settlement resolutions.

"The depositions paint a surreal picture of foreclosure experts who didn't understand even the most elementary aspects of the mortgage or foreclosure process -- even though they were entrusted as the records custodians of homeowners' loans. In one deposition taken in Houston, a foreclosure supervisor with Litton Loan couldn't define basic terms like promissory note, mortgagee, lien, receiver, jurisdiction, circuit court, plaintiff's assignor or defendant. She testified that she didn't know why a spouse might claim interest in a property, what the required conditions were for a bank to foreclose or who the holder of the mortgage note was. "I don't know the ins and outs of the loan, I just sign documents," she said at one point."

(Huffingtonpost.com)

The argument is not that people should be allowed to keep their homes. In fact we feel the contrary. Those who woefully overpaid will likely default even with an adjustment, and cases like that need to be allowed to find their own natural death. Equally, we are not suggesting that businesses are evil, or that the banking sector bares any sort of blanket responsibility for our economic situation.

What remains egregious is that the financial sector can push back at President Obama, even as they now rake in profits and bonuses, while at the same time not taking care of business. They were bailed out, rightfully so, but the minimal least they can do, is to keep their mouths shut, and focus on handling the mess they helped create.

That would mean looking at the foreclosure documents and making wise and careful decisions on who should be allowed to keep their homes, and who remains a lost cost. You can't do this if you are shedding workers, or better, devoting profits to massive bonuses. That money could be put to use hiring better staff, and thus lowering the unemployment rate.

With that hiring you get a double economic bang. More people working, and used to unclog the mortgage mess that lingers across the system like a fat lady on a chaise.

But nope. Instead it's all push back and political funding and outrage. And this:

For a housing recovery to occur, all the foreclosed properties -- which could account for 40 percent of all residential sales by 2012 -- need to be re-scrutinized by the banks and resold on the market. Now, with so much inventory under a legal threat, the process will become severely delayed.

"This just adds more uncertainty to the whole mortgage process, so buyers are asking themselves: do I want to buy a home in this environment?" says Cris deRitis, director of credit analytics at Moody's Analytics. "We need to fix these issues before the economy can recover."

(Huffingtonpost.com)

Now whose fault is that, and who is being inefficient?

Christine Has No Light Under Her Bushel.

This is what we are getting from Tea Party candidates... nothing. One would expect a little more thoughtfulness from someone entering a high level of government, but the electorate, or perhaps merely Republican financiers, are thoroughly willing to dispense with the pesky requirements of the job at hand. A pox upon all that book learn'in and command of facts. Better to hide your lack of light under a bushel. The N.Y. Times reports that Maryland Senate candidate Christine O' Donnell has perfected the invisibility cloak, largely avoiding interviewers, voters, and uncontrolled environments.

It is not clear, however, when or where she has been meeting the people of Delaware, at least since the primary. She has canceled a series of public events and television interviews and has barely been seen in public, though she re-emerged Friday at an opening for her campaign headquarters in Wilmington.

(N.Y. Times)

She is pretty much following the Palin Way of all Truth. Don't let yourself be caught facing people who are smarter or better informed, and definitely not in front of cameras. Keep a low profile except when in carefully calibrated settings, surrounded by a security blanket of unquestioning supporters.

She seems likable enough, if scattered, and thus totally inappropriate for the times we are in.

TARPY Goodness

Today, Sunday, the Troubled Asset Relief Program, or TARP, comes to a close. Two points. This was Bush's baby, and strongly supported and run by Obama. Now, two years later, and after much hullabaloo about bailing out "THE BANKS" at taxpayer expense to the tune of $700, we see that the program was largely successful. If anyone has suggested you could prevent the collapse of our economic system for $100 billion or less, those with a clear understanding of these matters might have laughed.

Yet here we are, and better for it.

A wildly unpopular government rescue program credited by economists with preventing another Great Depression will go out of business Sunday, two years to the day it was created.

On Oct. 3, the Troubled Asset Relief Program, known as the bank bailout bill, loses authorization to make new expenditures. From that point forward, TARP will be in wind-down mode, although much of money lent out already has been repaid - at a profit for taxpayers.

Originally envisioned as a blank check for the government to spend as much as $700 billion to rescue the financial system, the actual cost to taxpayers is estimated now to be only a seventh of that amount. The government has earned almost $13 billion in dividends from the bank stock it received in exchange for the taxpayers' investment, and earned another $8.2 billion from the sale of preferred stock.

The Treasury Department estimates that taxpayers are still on the hook for about $100 billion at this point - a number expected to shrink with continued repayments and asset sales. The nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office recently put the estimated total TARP cost at around $66 billion.

(Miami Herald)

Don't expect many of the candidates to herald any of this. A certain portion of the electorate is caught between personal ignorance and shotgun dissatisfaction and lacking a framework to address the hydra that is our economic situation. The Tea Party in particular has formalized and personified this ignorance with a slate of candidates that will be entirely useless should they actually get hired by voters. Intellectual garbage in, intellectual garbage out.

Sen. Mike Johanns, R-Neb, said, "TARP turned out to be a slush fund,"  and it's this type of nonsense that we should expect to hear repeated, no matter how stupid or unreflective of what it means to do nothing and let credit dry up for the entire financial, corporate or entrepreneurial sector. You cannot hold capitalism in your right hand and indifference to credit markets in your left, clap, and make a coherent sound.