Headlines - Friday June 8

If the US taxpayer is going to help the banks in any way (including more free money loans) it's critical that the US government gets major concessions from the banks. We've repeatedly been assured by the banks that all is well and there are no more problems but a $60 billion hole is not insignificant.

For starters, we have to get back to the critical issue of breaking up the too-big-to-fail mega banks. Somehow (cough, lobbyist money) the issue fell off the radar among the political class. What surprise will be next?

The 19 largest US banks are at least $50 billion short of meeting new capital requirements under the Basel III accords, according to rules proposed by the Federal Reserve.

The biggest among them would probably need billions of dollars more by the 2019 deadline to comply fully with the rules.

Smaller US lenders are about $10 billion short of the requirements, the Fed said on Thursday.

The Fed's proposals, which will be phased in from next year, are part of a larger package implementing the Basel III accords in the US.

 

###

 

There's a case to be made for the public horsewhipping of Roberts, Alito, Scalia, Thomas and Kennedy then sending them on a traveling roadshow where they shall be held in stocks for no less than 12 hours on the town square of every county seat in America, and citizens who hate them with every fiber of their being for selling out the country to big business can pay a buck a toss to hurl overripe produce at the bastards. They are the reason $125 million was spend in Wisconsin on Tuesday's election.

 

###

Super PAC Ad Features Republican Seeking To Replace Gabrielle Giffords With Assault Rifle | Jesse Kelly, the Republican seeking to replace Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, is featured in a new Super PAC ad holding an assault rifle:

Giffords resigned in January after being shot in the head in 2011. In a statement to NPR, Kelly's campaign said he was focused on jobs, but didn't condemn the ad.

###

The period from "June of last year to May of this year was the warmest year since record-keeping began in 1985," a new report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration shows.

###

2004 | According to data from the Internal Revenue Service, one in 189 high income Americans paid no federal income taxes in 2009. This included households making more than $200 million. As this chart by Noni Mausa at Angry Bear shows, the number of wealthy taxpayers managing to avoid the income tax spiked after 2004, while the percentage increased "eightfold":

###

###

###

###

###