Froggy sent this along with the following note: This is a big story. B of A has moved $53 Trillion in its Merrill Lynch derivatives from a holding company onto the FDIC INSURED balance sheet which is backed by about $1 Trillion in deposits following a credit downgrade. This is a potential massive FDIC depositor bailout of epic proportions, and basically a desperate move by the bank to avoid the

Which, to be fair, is probably the last grade level he can appeal to as an intellectual superior. So there’s that. Then, not to be outdone by himself, Biden today pushed the idea that Barney Frank, Chris Dodd, Jim Johnson, Franklin Raines, Bill Clinton, et al., are all really George Bush — because otherwise, his suggestion that Bush was behind the economic collapse (“people died!” “Houses burned!” “RAPE!”) doesn’t really

Matt Welch, Reason: There are two main problems with this yawning chasm between Mitt’s flip and Romney’s flop. The first is that a president who continues to insist, despite the mounds of contrary evidence, that Romneycare is working well, is a president who will be likely to continue or exacerbate bad health care policies at the federal level. The second problem, which worries me more, is that a president who

Art Laffer, one of the architects of the plan, explains and expands — and beats back the idea that the plan is regressive. WSJ: Republican presidential candidate Herman Cain’s now famous “9-9-9” plan is his explicit proposal to right the wrongs of our federal tax code. He proposes a 9% flat-rate personal income tax with no deductions except for donations to charity; a 9% flat-rate tax on net business profits;

To borrow a common axiom, if you have to ask… We are so so so so so so so so so so so so screwed.* (h/t Mark Steyn)

OCCUPY GEORGETOWN! Bloomberg: Federal employees whose compensation averages more than $126,000 and the nation’s greatest concentration of lawyers helped Washington edge out San Jose as the wealthiest U.S. metropolitan area, government data show. The U.S. capital has swapped top spots with Silicon Valley, according to recent Census Bureau figures, with the typical household in the Washington metro area earning $84,523 last year. The national median income for 2010 was $50,046.

I blame Bush. And by “I”, I mean Nickolas Kristof, and by “Bush,” I mean heartless Republicans whose draconian cuts to common weal funding may one day lead to a world in which escaped zoo animals can kill with impunity, knowing as they must that the GOP has cut that very money that would otherwise have gone toward a Department of Escaped Exotic Zoo Animals Who Managed to Make Their

The Hill: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) on Wednesday said Congress needs to worry about government jobs more than private-sector jobs, and that this is why Senate Democrats are pushing a bill aimed at shoring up teachers and first-responders. “It’s very clear that private-sector jobs have been doing just fine; it’s the public-sector jobs where we’ve lost huge numbers, and that’s what this legislation is all about,” Reid said

Yes, he did. In an analogy that would make multi-millionnaires who play a kid’s game for a living slaves. Potential for delicious irony: when Obama pushes through his surtax on “the rich,” Gumbel reappears from his big white house to declare the President racist for imposing a punitive tax on, among others, a bunch of slaves already being kept down by The Man. — Which, now that I think about

So as a non-rich Zionist Jew, I’m only half alarmed.