The Atheist Communist Caliphate Made Flesh, Spread the Clusterfuck Around Thread

[RV]

This is an excellent rundown of the whole AIG shitstorm. It being Rolling Stone, the opinion aspect of the article is biased to the left. But if you can take that stuff with a grain of salt, the AIG blow-by-blow is worth a read. And really disturbing.

Known for his boldness and arrogance, Cassano took over as chief of AIGFP in 2001. He was the favorite of Maurice "Hank" Greenberg, the head of AIG, who admired the younger man's hard-driving ways, even if neither he nor his successors fully understood exactly what it was that Cassano did. According to a source familiar with AIG's internal operations, Cassano basically told senior management, "You know insurance, I know investments, so you do what you do, and I'll do what I do — leave me alone." Given a free hand within the company, Cassano set out from his offices in London to sell a lucrative form of "insurance" to all those investors holding lots of CDOs. His tool of choice was another new financial instrument known as a credit-default swap, or CDS.

What Cassano did was to transform the credit swaps that Morgan popularized into the world's largest bet on the housing boom. In theory, at least, there's nothing wrong with buying a CDS to insure your investments. Investors paid a premium to AIGFP, and in return the company promised to pick up the tab if the mortgage-backed CDOs went bust. But as Cassano went on a selling spree, the deals he made differed from traditional insurance in several significant ways. First, the party selling CDS protection didn't have to post any money upfront. When a $100 corporate bond is sold, for example, someone has to show 100 actual dollars. But when you sell a $100 CDS guarantee, you don't have to show a dime. So Cassano could sell investment banks billions in guarantees without having any single asset to back it up.

[*In a Nutsack]

The irony of it is that she has burned her star out too quickly by doing this. Too much of a lightning rod. If she can just go back to being a governor and worry less about the national scene, the better off everyone is.

I have no idea who gives her advice...

Her husband. This is a chick who wants to be a star, not a leader. Sportscenter is her goal.  If the goal changes to giving policy platitudes from the White House instead of sports platitudes from Bristol, she's down with that.

She also wants to make money.

SportsCenter seems to be the President's goal, as well.  Excuse me for not liking him being on ESPN filling out brackets or on Leno cracking retard jokes (which, I don't have anything against his remark...I make tard wisecracks that aren't wise, ever, all the time).

On Palin, I was a fan.  A big fan.  However, I was a big fan in the very beginning and I agree with Chuck (oh noz) that her star has burned out far, far too quickly and that she's doing everything she can to draw attention to herself and her efforts in 2012, when all she really should do is shut up and deal with her tasks at hand in Alaska which got her in the spotlight in the first place.  She's become fairly annoying to me much in the same way that Obama annoys me...try being more of a statesman and less of a rockstar.

[Quality Start Machine]

Wonder if Palin and Jindal feel the same way about volcano observation.

[*In a Nutsack]

Wonder if Palin and Jindal feel the same way about volcano observation.

They go boom.

[Tank]

...when all she really should do is shut up and deal with her tasks at hand in Alaska which got her in the spotlight in the first place...

You'd suggest a tit job?

[Eli]

A few days old, but it made me laugh.  The Onion:

BREAKING: Obama On Special Olympics Gaffe: "Sorry, I Acted Like A Retard"

[Tank]

"Well, Miss Terkel is certainly a villain..."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B5vXDe1o9bI
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,510360,00.html

(Background here.)

Adding...

Along with "America's Most Wanted," "The Factor" has done more for the victims of crime in America than any other television program on the air.

Except maybe "moronic girls" who dress slutty and drink booze. Because, you know... "there you go."

And because "nothing good" comes of getting drunk.

Or, for that matter, women who foolishly try to resist the mighty O'Reilly falafel.

[Wheezer]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,510360,00.html

With NBC's programming a disaster, [Zucker] is almost single-handedly ruining a once-great brand.

That one's not too far from the mark.

[Internet Apex]

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,510360,00.html

With NBC's programming a disaster, [Zucker] is almost single-handedly ruining a once-great brand.

That one's not too far from the mark.

Leave Oleg out of this.

[Eli]

I don't know what a Burt Prelutsky is, but he certainly was able to pen an insightful piece about Michelle Obama:

Take Michelle Obama...please. Every time I turn around, there she is on a magazine cover. Now, normally, like the Mafia, I lay off the spouses, but inasmuch as this particular spouse attended the same racist church as her hubby for 20 years, I'll make an exception in her case. After all, in spite of the fact that affirmative action got her an Ivy League degree and a $7,000-a-week salary and, moreover, has sent billions of dollars for no particularly good reason to Africa, she insists this is a mean country.

Naturally, the left-wing media is now trying to convince us that this James Brown-look-alike has all the allure, glamour and fashion sense of Jackie Kennedy.

Similarly, I don't know what a Tammy Bruce is either, but it would probably complement Burt Prelutsky pretty well:

Discussing the first lady's recent visit to a Washington, D.C., classroom, Bruce incredulously recalled [Michelle] Obama's story about wanting to get A's in school and called out her use of a "weird, fake accent."

"That's what he's married to," Bruce said. "... You know what we've got? We've got trash in the White House."

"Trash is a thing that is colorblind, it can cross all eco-socionomic ... categories," she said.

I guess all that makes today's story from CNN all the more timely.

[Tank]

I don't know what a Burt Prelutsky is, but he certainly was able to pen an insightful piece about Michelle Obama:

... After all, in spite of the fact that affirmative action got her an Ivy League degree and a $7,000-a-week salary and, moreover, has sent billions of dollars for no particularly good reason to Africa, she insists this is a mean country.

If Affirmative Action wants to send billions of dollars to Africa, I'm sure Affirmative Action has a perfectly good reason for doing so.

[Jon]

I don't know what a Burt Prelutsky is, but he certainly was able to pen an insightful piece about Michelle Obama:

... After all, in spite of the fact that affirmative action got her an Ivy League degree and a $7,000-a-week salary and, moreover, has sent billions of dollars for no particularly good reason to Africa, she insists this is a mean country.

If Affirmative Action wants to send billions of dollars to Africa, I'm sure Affirmative Action has a perfectly good reason for doing so.

It's a black thing. You wouldn't understand.

[Quality Start Machine]

I don't know what a Burt Prelutsky is, but he certainly was able to pen an insightful piece about Michelle Obama:

... After all, in spite of the fact that affirmative action got her an Ivy League degree and a $7,000-a-week salary and, moreover, has sent billions of dollars for no particularly good reason to Africa, she insists this is a mean country.

If Affirmative Action wants to send billions of dollars to Africa, I'm sure Affirmative Action has a perfectly good reason for doing so.

You'd never see a Republican Persident send any money to Africa.

This is the one thing I will concede that GWB did right.

[Tonker]

I don't know what a Burt Prelutsky is, but he certainly was able to pen an insightful piece about Michelle Obama:

... After all, in spite of the fact that affirmative action got her an Ivy League degree and a $7,000-a-week salary and, moreover, has sent billions of dollars for no particularly good reason to Africa, she insists this is a mean country.

If Affirmative Action wants to send billions of dollars to Africa, I'm sure Affirmative Action has a perfectly good reason for doing so.

You'd never see a Republican Persident send any money to Africa.

This is the one thing I will concede that GWB did right.

Are you sure about that?  Do you have a Datase to back you up?

[morpheus]

Just in case you were worried that Congress is not addressing the issues that matter to you...

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/article/ALeqM5hV4mOJQgUsQthrydU_Vty4iVgC5gD9759GG00

Everyone from President Barack Obama on down to fans has criticized how college football determines its top team. Now senators are getting off the sidelines to examine antitrust issues involving the Bowl Champion Series...

Obama and some members of Congress favor a playoff-type system to determine the national champion. The BCS features a championship game between the two top teams in the BCS standings, based on two polls and six computer ratings.

Behind the push for the hearings is the subcommittee's top Republican, Sen. Orrin Hatch of Utah. People there were furious that Utah was bypassed for the national championship despite going undefeated in the regular season...

In the House, Rep. Joe Barton of Texas, the top Republican on the Energy and Commerce Committee, has sponsored legislation that would prevent the NCAA from calling a football game a "national championship" unless the game culminates from a playoff system.