Irony Meter Explodes: Geithner Says European Nations Must Get ‘Fiscal House’ in Order

So says the man who helped President Downgrade get us into our current mess.

Unreal.

Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said European governments need to get their “fiscal house” in order and provide a financial backstop for economies under pressure.

“What Europe needs to do is to make sure that there’s an unequivocal financial backstop,” Geithner said, according to the transcript of an interview with NBC and CNBC television today. “So there is no doubt in anyone’s mind that those countries have the ability and the will to meet their obligations. That’s essential to managing crises.”

H/T.

Note satisfied with the destruction of the American economy, Timmy Turbo Tax assured his boss he'll be staying on the job. There's still more downgrading to be done, apparently.

'Dear IRS'

As we've seen Tea Parties break out across the country, maybe to help supplement the public outrage we should also have citizens send 'Dear IRS' letters like the one above (click image to enlarge).

One Texas man makes his point with a letter to the IRS, but I doubt they'll be too understanding.

A Texas retiree has become a cause celebre for a satirical letter he wrote his hometown paper, saying he can't pay his taxes - and asking the IRS to treat him like famous tax cheats.

"Dear IRS," Ed Barnett wrote the Wichita Falls (Texas) Times Record News in February. "I am sorry to inform you that I will not be able to pay taxes owed April 15, but all is not lost."

Barnett, 67, listed 37 other taxes he's paid, including an obscure waterfowl stamp tax. And he asked the feds to forgive him, as they did such famous tax evaders as US Reps. Charles Rangel and Barney Frank, Sen. Chris Dodd, ex-Sen. Tom Daschle and Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner.

Speaking of corrupt Democrats, the campaign contribution woes continue for New York's Anthony Weiner, a story we first noted here last week. Hey, I'm all for hanging with supermodels, but make sure their contributions are legal, OK?

Geithner Puts Home on the Market, Likely Facing a Loss

Judging by how poorly he's performed as Treasury Secretary, Tim Geithner might want to hang on to his Westchester home. He may not be staying long in Washington.

As he tries to rescue the country from an economic and housing crisis, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner is getting a firsthand lesson in the volatility of the real estate market.

Geithner, now living in Washington, is trying to sell his five-bedroom Tudor home in the New York City suburbs, and it looks like he'll be taking a loss even if he gets his asking price.

The house, which has a Larchmont mailing address but is just outside that village in the town of Mamaroneck, is listed at $1.635 million. Records show Geithner and his wife, Carole Sonnenfeld Geithner, paid a little less than that when they bought it in 2004 _ $1.602 million.

After their agent's fee and land transfer taxes, the Geithners will probably clear less than what they paid, said real estate agent Debbie Meiliken of Coldwell Banker in Scarsdale, who is among the agents showing the house to potential buyers.

Geithner was president of the Federal Reserve Bank of New York when President Obama picked him to be Treasury Secretary in the midst of a worsening recession.

Had the Geithners been selling in 2006 or 2007, the house, which sits on less than a fifth of an acre of land, might have gone for $1.8 to $2 million, Meiliken said.

Property taxes on the home total $27,039 a year.

Ouch.

It's a shame Obama pal Tony Rezko is in prison. Could have maybe helped Geithner flip it for a profit. The least Obama could do is get the guy some help, but apparently he's got other priorities.

Treasury Secretary a Global Warming Acolyte

The one common thread all of the appointees the President In Training Pants have is they are global warming acolytes. From Steven Chu, the Energy Secretary, to his EPA chief, Lisa Jackson, and now even the Treasury Secretary.

U.S. oil and natural gas producing companies should not receive federal subsidies in the form of tax breaks because their businesses contribute to global warming, U.S. Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told Congress on Wednesday.

The absolute refusal of any of the liberals in congress and all of the inner circle of Obama advisers to allow us to pursue and process a natural resource we have at our fingertips to fuel our energy needs until any of these alternative energy sources become viable or sustainable is just plain nuts.

The Treasury Secretary coming out and saying he is against any incentives for oil and gas companies while the EPA chief is vigorously pursuing having CO2 declared a greenhouse gas in her efforts to shut down coal power plants like the new Health and Human Services Secretary, Kathleen Seblius did while governor of Kansas to Steven Chu who has reservations about nuclear power due to concerns about managing the waste material, his whole inner circle is working very hard to cripple this country.

Jobs and health care won't mean much if you don't have the power to light the workplace or handle all of the high tech medical equipment in hospitals to treat the sick.

This is just unbelievable and if I have said it once I am going to say it for the hundredth time, this administration is going to use its slavish devotion to the cult of global warming to wreck this economy, beyond the stage at which it may be possible to recover.

For all you folks all excited and jumping for joy at that $13 you are getting back in your paychecks, try this on for size.

The Obama administration's budget would levy an excise tax on oil and natural gas produced in the Gulf of Mexico, raising $5.3 billion in revenue from 2011 to 2019.

This new 13 percent tax on all oil and gas production in the Gulf would only affect those companies enjoying a loophole that allows them to avoid paying royalties on the energy supplies they drill. Companies already paying royalties would get a tax credit.

Obama's budget would also place a $4 per acre annual fee on energy leases in the Gulf that are designated as nonproducing. The budget proposal projects the fee would generate $1.2 billion from 2010 to 2019.

Those fees and taxes will be passed right on to the consumer who uses gas in their car or natural gas to heat their home.

The government giveth and the government taketh away. And taketh. And taketh.

For a real eye opener read this speech given by Todd Stern, Special Envoy for Climate Change from the State Department.

Media Bailout Picks Up Steam: More Reporters Hired by Democrats

Considering the sorry state of the mainstream media, is it any wonder these "journalists" are bailing out and making the lateral move to go work for Democrats? They've been stealing money from their employers by shilling for Democrats all these years so it's only logical they go work for their pals.

On Monday we noted that the Chicago Tribune's Jill Zuckman took a job in the Obama administration, which Michelle Malkin noted was at least the fourth reporter to join up with the Hopenchange bandwagon.

Well now the Politico notes another reporter has signed on with failed presidential candidate John Kerry.

On Tuesday, Cox’s Scott Shepard joined Sen. John Kerry’s office as a speechwriter, becoming the second journalist this year to take a job under the Massachusetts Democrat. Investigative reporter Doug Frantz is now chief investigator under the Kerry-helmed Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

A week before Zuckman announced that she’s headed for Obama’s Transportation Department, her Tribune colleague Peter Gosselin signed on as speechwriter for Obama’s treasury secretary, Tim Geithner.

In December, Jay Carney relinquished his perch as Time’s Washington bureau chief to become Vice President Joe Biden’s communications director. Warren Bass left the Washington Post’s Outlook section to write speeches and advise Dr. Susan Rice at the United Nations. Daniel W. Reilly left Politico to become communications director for Rep. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) Linda Douglass left the National Journal for the Obama campaign back in May, and is expected to become assistant secretary for public affairs in the department of Health and Human Services.

On Monday, Pew’s Project for Excellence in Journalism published a report on “The New Washington Press Corps,” grim statistics confirming the high rate at which regional newspapers are shuttering their D.C. bureaus while niche and foreign outlets grow.

Of the journalists flocking to government jobs, Pew Project Director Tom Rosenstiel says: “There’s no mystery here, and I don’t think the key to this is ideological as much as economic. The newspaper industry, in Washington in particular, is suffering mightily.”

So instead of propaganda disguised as news well get propaganda disguised as news releases.

Change!

Frantz isn’t alone in downplaying the partisan aspect of his new job. Maybe it’s based on a lifetime of non-partisan conditioning, but many of the reporters who’ve made the leap to government seem hesitant to admit that they’re no longer impartial observers.

“This is a Democratic administration; we’re obviously on that side of the aisle, but I don’t see this as a partisan job at all,” Carney told the Times a couple weeks back.

Carney told the Times that he had “an affinity” with Biden and Obama, but that it didn’t influence his coverage at the newsweekly. Time staffers have told Politico that they could never tell Carney’s politics during the 2008 race.

“I didn’t even know Jay was a Democrat,” Time’s Joe Klein said.

Clueless Joe was apparently the last to know. Memo to Klein: The whole world knew Carney was a Democrat. Are you really that stupid or are you just a bad liar?

Do these people think we're all complete idiots, unable to notice when media hacks are biased? It's so painfully obvious, which is why the media is in such dire straits. Their downfall began long before the economic downturn, so blaming it on the economy is just a weak copout.

Sneaky Dodd Slips Bank Pay Limits Into Porkulus Bill

No wonder so many people detest Connecticut's Christopher Dodd. The guy who gets sweetheart mortgage deals for himself just can't accept the fact bank executives get paid more than he does. So what does he do? He sneakily slips a last-minute provision into the spendulus boondoggle capping pay for bank executives.

The economic stimulus bill passed by the Senate on Friday includes curbs on executive pay that go well beyond what Wall Street had been expecting.

Sen. Christopher Dodd (D-Conn.), the chairman of the Senate Banking Committee, slipped the provisions into the bill late in the process. The entire stimulus package now heads to President Obama for his signature.

Of course with so many banks teetering on the edge, all they need are for their top executives to jump ship now that this socialist has decreed how much they can be compensated.

Slick move.

Dodd’s move could backfire if it fuels another exodus of investors from battered bank stocks, which could weaken the institutions and force some to appeal for new government help.

The KBW index of 24 major bank shares plunged 14% this week to close at 26.11 on Friday, just above the 14-year low of 25.34 reached on Jan. 20. The index has dived 41% this year.

In a statement, Dodd said he was "delighted that my amendment to impose tough new limits on huge bonuses for executives working in firms that receive taxpayer funds will be included in the final economic recovery bill.

The man has a bottomless supply of gall. Making this even worse, it's retroactive.

The giant stimulus package that cleared Congress Friday includes a last-minute addition that restricts bonuses for top earners at firms receiving federal cash -- including those that already received it -- more severely than the Obama administration's previous pay limits.

The most stringent pay restriction bars any company receiving funds from paying top earners bonuses equal to more than one-third of their total annual compensation. That could severely crimp pay packages at big banks, where top officials commonly get relatively modest salaries but often huge bonuses.

As word spread Friday about the new and retroactive limit -- inserted by Democratic Sen. Christopher Dodd of Connecticut -- so did consternation on Wall Street and in the Obama administration, which opposed it.

The administration is concerned the rules will prompt a wave of banks to return the government's money and forgo future assistance, undermining the aid program's effectiveness. Both Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Lawrence Summers, who heads the National Economic Council, had called Sen. Dodd and asked him to reconsider, these people said.

I doubt it'll happen, but perhaps Obama could veto it.

To compound the idiocy, this move will cost the Treasury much needed tax revenue.

Turns out there is a problem with limiting the pay of highly compensated bankers: the Wall Street high flyers pay taxes, too.

Imagine this: Capping top bank executives at $400,000 a year, as the Senate version of the $800-plus billion economic stimulus had called for, would have cost the government $11 billion in lost tax revenue by 2019. That's more than $1 billion a year, according to an estimate this week by the Congressional Budget Office.

More here.

Fearing any and all of these possibilities, the Obama Administration opposed Dodd's limits. Yet Dodd insisted on them.

Why, especially since so many of the bankers who will be affected are his wealthiest constituents living in Greenwich, Conn.?

Perhaps he's really angry at Wall Street types and wants to crack down on them. even though many are presumably his friends.

Here's another possibility worth considering. Though there are a lot of wealthy Wall Streeters in Connecticut, there are a lot more middle-class people there. And Dodd needs those middle-class votes next year in what could be a very challenging re-election bid.

Part of what makes it so difficult is Dodd, Senate Banking Committee chairman, was a "friend of Angelo" as in Angelo Mozillo, the former CEO of Countrywide. As such Dodd received mortgage loans at favorable interest rates.

Being a one-time friend of Angelo's has made Dodd seem much less a friend of the people. Quinnipiac University has a recent poll that suggested that Dodd could be vulnerable.

Dodd is clearly banking on the class-warfare card.

If this isn't shameless enough, there's a possible book deal in the works for Dodd. Hey, he's got to pay off those mortgages somehow.

Crown senior editor Sean Desmond has acquired a history of the congressional bailout of the financial markets by Sen. Christopher J. Dodd with Lary Bloom. Titled "Thirteen Days: How the Financial Crisis Changed the Politics of Washington," the book will provide an intimate look at how, over the course of 13 days last September, a financial crisis led to panic and meltdown. Dodd, the chair of the Senate banking committee, will also describe how he and others acted swiftly to try to save the American economy.

His friends on the other side of the aisle were quick to help. The National Republican Senatorial Committee quickly fired off a press release, suggesting a slightly different title... "13 Weeks: The Senate Banking Committee Chairman's Time in Iowa While the Housing Market Collapsed."

Ouch.

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Geithner Imposing New Mortgage Requirements on Banks

Word is starting to get out about the new Bank plan concocted by tax cheat Tim Geithner.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told Democratic lawmakers that banks getting U.S. aid will be required to modify mortgages to help borrowers avoid foreclosure, according to a person at a briefing.

Geithner said other requirements will be imposed on banks under the Obama administration’s plan to capitalize the financial system, the person said. Geithner, who is scheduled to unveil his plan Feb. 9, spoke today in Williamsburg, Virginia, where House Democrats met for a retreat.

A requirement to modify mortgages would be a departure from the approach of Geithner’s predecessor, Henry Paulson, who rejected policies requiring the industry to modify loans for troubled borrowers. Paulson helped to launch a voluntary effort called the Hope Now Alliance to reach borrowers at risk of foreclosure and help them change their loan terms.

Democrats in Congress faulted Paulson for spending $350 billion from the $700 billion Troubled Asset Relief Program without setting requirements for use of the money. Lawmakers have urged President Barack Obama to set limits on how banks spend the fresh U.S. capital, and require stepped up lending and foreclosure relief.

I thought Geithner was supposed to be some kind of a hot shot financial wizard? Other than cheating on his taxes and getting away with it, I don't see much there.

This plan still does not address the toxic securities themselves and that is the key to the matter. It just hands more money to the banks to sit on and keep them afloat, but it does not remove the cancer form the system.

As long as "mark to market" still is in effect, banks are staring at the prospect of making a good loan to a solid borrower who pays the debt service on time, and still have to write down part of the loan due to dropping short term market values. This is absolutely insane, and the banks will continue to still back and hoard cash until that situation changes. In the mean time, real estate values will continue to fall because of that reality.

The Treasury needs to have the SEC and FASB void "mark to market" as a valuation model, which will cut the problem in half immediately and put a floor on the market. Then they need to create a Resolution Trust #2, get the toxic assets off the banks books and work out the loans long term. I bet 90% of these loans end up being good in the long run anyway.

Surprise! Another Obama Tax Cheat

We may as well just ask: Are there any Obama appointees who've paid all their taxes?

Now we have another tax cheat, and she withdraw quickly over a relatively small amount of money.

Hey, isn't this sexist?

The informal battle between members of the Obama Administration and the Taxman resulted in a casualty Tuesday, with news that President Obama's nominee to be chief performance officer, Nancy Killefer, will withdraw her nomination following the revelation that she had a $946.69 lien on her property in 2005 for failure to pay taxes.

Killefer, who was announced to much fanfare by President Obama on Jan. 7 to serve in the new position to make the U.S. government "more effective, more efficient, and more transparent," is the third high-level Obama Administration official whose failure to pay taxes in recent years was disclosed in the past month.

A former officer with McKinsey & Company and the past assistant secretary for management, chief financial officer and chief operating officer at Treasury during the Clinton administration, Killefer joins the ranks of Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, who failed to pay more than $40,000 in payroll taxes when he worked for the International Monetary Fund, and Secretary of Health and Human Services nominee Tom Daschle, who -- as ABC News was first to report last Friday -- on Jan. 2 filed more than $140,000 in back taxes and interest, having failed to disclose more than $300,000 in past income, including the use of a car and driver for three years.

The Associated Press broke the story of Killefer's tax lien placed against Killefer's home in Washington, D.C., for failing to pay unemployment compensation taxes on household help. The issue was resolved five months after the D.C. government took action.

Kerik Plays the Geithner Defense

Now that the freshly-confirmed tax-cheating Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner is safely in office, expect plenty of this.

Disgraced ex-top cop Bernard Kerik wants to be treated more like Timothy Geithner.

In new court papers, the former police commissioner complains that the feds want to send him to prison for the same sort of problems that officials overlooked in Geithner, whom the Senate confirmed yesterday as treasury secretary.

In an obvious reference to Geithner's tax troubles, Kerik's lawyers in White Plains federal court cited "recent events" showing that the vetting process for presidential appointees is "an imperfect one, during which mistakes and omissions occur."

While Geithner was allowed to pay his back taxes, Kerik was "treated differently" in his tax-fraud indictment, his lawyers charged.

Of course Kerik was treated differently. He's associated with Rudy Giuliani and George W. Bush.

Don't people realize Democrats get preferential treatment?

C'mon, Bernie, you know better.

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