The biggest bank meltdown in US history and it has to be Washington Mutual, the bank that's holding most of my money. Geezus! This from the Financial Times :

JPMorgan Chase has acquired the banking operations of Washington Mutual which was seized by US regulators on Thursday night in the biggest bank failure in US history.

Under the deal, which was brokered by government, JPMorgan will pay $1.9bn to the banking regulator, and acquire all insured and uninsured deposits, assets and some of the liabilities of WaMu’s banking operations, including its troubled mortgage portfolio.

Holy crap! Where's my money? AUUUUUUUGH!

I was actually going to take all my money out earlier in the week but decided to leave it for today. I should have done what the thousands of other depositors did. Take my money out of WaMu. Of course, the deposits run killed the bank, but now I have to run over there and find out if I have access to my cash.

Oh, wait! Here's the Federal Deposit Insurance Commission (FDIC) :

Doesn't he look like Matthew Broderick?

The close up :

Here. Shed a tear for the Yankees before I start ranting about them.

This from Newsday, Balking at stadium deal:

The New York City Industrial Development Agency and state Assemb. Richard Brodsky agree on little when it comes to the new Yankee Stadium deal. Here's where they differ:

Luxury suite: City officials say the luxury suite at the new stadium has been cited in public records since 2006, specifically the lease agreement between the Yankees and the development authority. Brodsky claims it was "secretly acquired" and he only discovered it this summer after a public hearing. The box seats about 12 people and was envisioned for the use of the mayor to entertain dignitaries and reward city employees for exemplary service. City officials also have the right to purchase 180 seats at face value before they go on sale.

Jobs: NYCIDA has stated that more than 900 part-time workers will be the equivalent of an additional 550 to 770 full-time workers at the stadium. Brodsky has said the NYCIDA's records show an additional 15 full-time workers.

Threat to leave: When citing its reasons for allowing public-backed financing of the stadium, the NYCIDA cited the likelihood the Yankees would "relocate outside the city" if a new stadium deal wasn't struck. Brodsky said an investigation by his oversight committee found no evidence of a Yankee threat to leave. The closest thing to a fresh threat to leave were 1993 news clippings supplied by the NYCIDA in which such threats were discussed, Brodsky said.

NYC is going to get rimmed by this Wall Street bailout. There's no other way to describe this. We not only lost something in the order of 30 to 40 billion dollars in bonuses ALONE, we've lost over 11,000 jobs since the Lehman meltdown.

Doubt the headline's premise? Check out this YouTube of audio from the Rush Limbaugh show, featuring a rendition of

Barack

Negro

by an Al Sharpton impersonator.

Hello, Federal Communications Commission?

"You don't need to be smart to be President."
- J.C. Watts, R-OK, referring to George Bush, quoted by the Washington Post, 06.11.2000

...and...

“Everybody likes Tom DiNapoli,” one of his supporters said during the vote. Mr. Silver argued that Mr. DiNapoli was the most qualified, “based on his demeanor, integrity and ability to get along with people, staff and others.”
- The New York Times, 02.08.2007

I've got nothing against Carl Kreuger, really. I know he means well here. But surely there's better legislation he could be spending his time on.

Having rescued the populace from dancing, trans-fats, and the Mr. Softee jingle (actually, credit for that last one), the lawmakers of New York now propose to save us from our ipods:

New Yorkers who blithely cross the street listening to an iPod or talking on a cell phone could soon face a $100 fine. [...]

Kruger says he will introduce legislation on Wednesday to ban the use of gadgets such as Blackberry devices and video games while crossing the street. [...]

"[W]hat's happening is when they're tuning into their iPod or Blackberry or cell phone or video game, they're walking into speeding buses and moving automobiles. It's becoming a nationwide problem."

I presume that some Senator will follow up with legislation forbidding us to daydream about Eliza Dushku while stepping off the curb?

Might I suggest an entire menu of rather-more-effective options for policymakers seeking to reduce pedestrian fatalities?

Update: As a commenter has pointed out, there are a lot of things to have against Senator Kreuger. I apologize for the moment of gentility, especially in light of my earlier post. Back to the trenches.

Or should we describe these as Cujo in the making?

Answer after the jump.

No wonder Matt had a huge grin on his face after this happened. I was so oblivious about who she was, I took it as one lesser mortal trying to upstage this goddess and blogdiva.

Oh yeah baby, I'm having a moment here.

The Democratic National Committee Winter Meeting was exactly that --a meeting to discuss the order of business within the DNC and it's caucauses. Fascinating stuff to witness for someone who is as clueless as I am on what people actually do within political parties.

So, during the general session there was some kind of a discussion lull involving financial reports. I stepped out to get a soda --an endeavor that at the horrid Washington Hilton took an eternity to complete.

When I come back to my seat, I see a woman sitting on my chair --notwithstanding the fact I had left my laptop, purse, camera, podcasting gear and basically everything that no self-respecting blogdiva would blog without.

My first thought was "bitch, get off my seat". Being the marginally professional diva that I am, I calmly requested the woman's attention and said to her : "Excuse me, you're in my seat."

Now, you have to understand something about this : This woman happened to be sitting in the credentialed bloggers section. This was were a big chunk of the top bloggers were covering the action. We were even making fun of Ezra loosing his coolness credentials because he was working that day and had to sit in the press section.

Several published reports - here's Norman Oder - indicate that Barclay's, the British bank recently in the news for sponsoring the Atlantic Yards arena, is sending out cease and desist letters to publications that have weighed in on the story.

We're still waiting, but here are a few thoughts. All correspondence should be addressed to editors – at – dailygotham – dot – com, by the way, just to be helpful. If we get something, we will publish it.

The bank asserts that it, contrary to published reports, had no connections to the slave trade, and that its founders were in fact abolitionists. There's no reason to doubt the latter assertion – Quakers, such as the founders of Barclay's, were in fact a driving force behind the early British abolitionist movement, which concluded in the Slavery Abolition Act of 1833. The trade in slaves, which is at issue here, was banned by Act of Parliament in 1824; the Slave Trade Act banned the practice within the British Empire and, more importantly, was extra-territorial in its application, giving the Royal Navy the right to intercept slavers on the high seas. In consequence, the large-scale trade in slaves ceased, much to the annoyance, one might add, of the American slave states and their bankers on Wall Street.

So I cruise on over to the web site of Wingnut Maureen Maureen O'Connell, mainly to check whether she's got any mention of a woman's right to choose (nope) or has finally acknowledged being a republican (ditto). These are sore subjects, it seems, for that campaign.

While there, I checked her District Map page, reproduced above. And here's my question: what do the shadings of that map signify?

Please tell me the shades of brown don't stand for 'this is where the brown people live'. That would be just unbelievably crass.

[Update]: Okay, Okay, it's not about the brown people. Still, considering the republican track record, it's not as if that would be a totally unheard-of assumption.