Ebenezer Faces Rush Home To Make Merry

It's amazing what the threat of travel slowing snowstorms and the soon arrival of Santa can do to light the fire under Republicans. The Republicans have backed off a late night healthcare reform bill vote, agreeing to handle business early in the morning so everyone can get home in a timely fashion to make merry and eat their Christmas goose. The shenanigous delays were ridiculous to begin with, what with forcing 92 year-old man Senator Byrd to be rolled in for each carefully timed, and delayed, vote.

(The Ebenezer faces realize that you want to get home to your folks and have a little figgy pudding and maybe some pheasant with oyster stuffing. So you may go home after the 8 a.m. vote with time left over to walk through the market with Tiny Tim)

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Maureen Dowd at the N.Y. Times asks "Who is the real John McCain?" and we know the answer. We suspect that now that his shot at the presidency is over, his lottery ticket not a winner, that he is now free to be his true self and follow impulses that he previously tried to obscure while courting the praise of the press. So long as he was the maverick, he could perhaps ride that status to the POTUS position. Having fumbled the ball during his panic of a campaign, he now knows he does not need to appear to be acceptable to everyone (just the crowd back in Arizona). We know  who the real McCain is. It's like a Scooby Doo episode turned on its ear, where we pull off the non-scary mask and suddenly see the true villain. The reflection of John McCain in the mirror is Dorian Gray.

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Good news for the taxpayer. The TARP facility is pulling a profit thus far, and with the bulk of the money paid back. This outcome was not hard to predict unless one had a vested interest (politician, gold bugs, libertarians) in it all not working out. If only the Fed didn't exist, the Treasury didn't overstep, and everything just collapsed in peace, some long time gold investor is saying to himself, upset over how it's all not falling apart.

Total repayments by TARP banks should top $175 billion by the end of 2010, cutting taxpayer exposure to the sector by three-quarters, the Treasury estimated.

TARP programs aimed at stabilizing the banking system will earn a profit from dividends, interest, early repayments, and the sale of warrants, it added. Bank investments of $245 billion in Treasury's 2009 fiscal year were initially projected to cost $76 billion, but are now forecast to generate a profit.

(Marketwatch.com)