the zero decade

12-21-09—Since the end of 1999, US Stocks’ performance has been the all-time clunker. Even 1930s beat it. (1930s -0.2%, 2000s, 0.5%)—WSJ C1

--The political scientist Barbara Sinclair has done the math. In the 1960s, she finds, “extended-debate-related problems” — threatened or actual filibusters — affected only 8 percent of major legislation. By the 1980s, that had risen to 27 percent. But after Democrats retook control of Congress in 2006 and Republicans found themselves in the minority, it soared to 70 percent.—Krugman, NYT A29

12-20-09

12-20-09--If there’s been a consistent narrative to this year and every other in this decade, it’s that most of us, Bernanke included, have been so easily bamboozled. .... As of Friday, the Tiger saga had appeared on 20 consecutive New York Post covers. For The Post, his calamity has become as big a story as 9/11. And the paper may well have it right. We’ve rarely questioned our assumption that 9/11, “the day that changed everything,” was the decade’s defining event. But in retrospect it may not have been. A con like Tiger’s may be more typical of our time than a one-off domestic terrorist attack, however devastating.
Indeed, if we go back to late 2001, the most revealing news story may have been unfolding not in New York but Houston — the site of the Enron scandal. That energy company convinced financial titans, the press and countless investors that it was a business deity. It did so even though very few of its worshipers knew what its business was. Enron is the template for the decade of successful ruses that followed, Tiger’s included. ... The most lethal example, of course, were the two illusions marketed to us on the way to Iraq — that Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction and some link to Al Qaeda. That history has since been rewritten by Bush alumni, Democratic politicians who supported the Iraq invasion and some of the news media that purveyed the White House fictions (especially the television press, which rarely owned up to its failure as print journalists have). ...You’d think after Enron’s collapse that financial leaders and government overseers would question the contents of “exotic” investments that could not be explained in plain English. But only a few years after Enron’s very public and extensively dissected crimes, the same bankers, federal regulatory agencies and securities-rating companies were giving toxic “assets” a pass. ...But after a decade in which two true national catastrophes, a wasteful war and a near-ruinous financial collapse, were both in part byproducts of the ease with which our leaders bamboozled us, we can’t so easily move on. –Frank Rich, NYT WK 7

12-17-09

12-17-09—France plans to tax bank employees’ bonuses above $40,000 at 50% next year... WSJA1

--...my favorite explanation comes from Jonathon Chait of The New Republic, who theorized that Lieberman was able to go from Guy Who Wants to Expand Medicare to Guy Who Would Rather Kill Health Care than Expand Medicare because he “isn’t actually all that smart.”—Collins, NYT A41

ides of December

12-15-09—[Experiments show that] fruit fries are choosing to consume alcohol ... until they are intoxicated, even if they don’t like the taste. They are also falling off the wagon. NYT D3
--The wonder, madame, is that you do not appreciate the inducement. --Samuel Johnson [responding to a lady’s negative comments on alcohol consumption]
--A quarter of top executives at major US companies had gains in their supplemental retirement-savings plans in 2008, even as employees had sizale losses in the companies’ retirement accounts. WSJ A1, C1
--12-14-09--You know life has gotten surreal when we have to beg a pro golfer to be boring. WSJB6

this is the way the empire ends

12-13-09—Citing finances, Kansas National Guard closes 18 armories—NYT A36

--In North Carolina, [removal] Lawsuit is threatened over councilman’s lack of belief in God—NYT A43

bang bang

12-10-09—With a Mighty Smash, Europe Seizes the Lead in Big Physics. NYT A1
--“Senator Baucus is currently in a mature and happy relationship with Melodee Hanes.” This is a turn of phrase that could be put to good use on so many sensitive occasions, the Baucus press office should really go for a copyright. Joe Bruno, the former majority leader of the New York State Senate who was convicted of corruption this week, is in a mature and happy relationship with Kay Stafford, the chairwoman and president of CMA Consulting Services. (Actually, the relationship is really, really mature, since Bruno is 80.) When Bruno resigned from the Senate last year, he quickly got a great job as C.E.O. of CMA. A guy who was being investigated by federal prosecutors for his consulting activities would not normally be regarded as a perfect hire for an information technology consulting business, particularly when he seems to know as much about information technology as he does about quantum physics. Still, it was nice to finally see a woman on the powerful, job-dispensing side of these stories.- --Gail Collins, NYT A35

hoosier holiday, jews, included

12-09-09—Senator Orrin G. Hatch [Mormon and Republican from Utah]... has penned a catchy holiday tune “Eight Days of Hanukkah.” ... In short, he loves the Jews....the song is performed by Rasheeda Azar, a Syrian-American vocalist from Indiana. NYT A18