How to Clean a Dirty Bank  —  COMMERCIAL banks in the United States are not subject to the bankruptcy statute — when they become insolvent they are simply acquired by the government.  This is what banks sign on for in return for a charter, deposit insurance and direct access …

From Bubble to Depression?  —  Bubbles have been frequent in economic history, and they occur in the laboratories of experimental economics under conditions which — when first studied in the 1980s — were considered so transparent that bubbles would not be observed.

Bush Bowed Too  —  More than a few people on the right are screaming that Barack Obama should be impeached for bowing to King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia.  —  Those of you who are buying into this hyperventilating nonsense need to see this video.  (Click the image to watch.)

A Rich Education for Summers (After Harvard)  —  Lawrence H. Summers plays down his stint in the hedge fund business as a mere part-time job — but the financial and intellectual rewards that he gained there would make even most full-time workers envious.  —  Mr. Summers, the former Treasury secretary …

Barack Obama really does go on a bit  —  Isn't it time for him to go home yet?  It is good, in theory, that the new President of the United States is taking so much time to tour Europe.  He arrived in London last Tuesday, has been to Strasbourg, Prague yesterday and now he's off to Turkey.

Obamateurism of the Day  —  George Bush's critics rightly roasted him for his tortured syntax and waterboarded grammar, and used it to make the claim that the graduate of both Harvard and Yale was an idiot.  Well, perhaps, but I don't recall him ever claiming that Austrian was a language.

Letting Stupid beget Stupid  —  Newt Gingrich — with all his Boss Hogg gravitas — prattled on FoxNews Sunday about the “recklessness” of Obama's foreign policy, while proclaiming we should attack North Korea with ‘frickin’ lasers.  Meanwhile, Obama was making a speech in front …

Satellite Proposals Gain Traction After North Korea's Launch  —  U.S. intelligence agencies are capitalizing on North Korea's weekend rocket launch to advance proposals to deploy two new spy satellite systems estimated to cost a total of about $10 billion, according to government and industry officials.

Good News: First U.S. Based Pro-al Qaeda Magazine Released  —  It's called Jihad Recollections and is a production of Charlotte, NC al Qaeda supporter Samir Khan's self-styled jihad media company, as-Fursan.  You can download a PDF version at the links provided by Sammy here.

Are Republicans Blackmailing Obama?  —  Amanda Knox Co-Ed Murder Trial: The Convicted Rapist Speaks  —  Blogs and Stories  —  If the president releases the Bush torture memos, Republicans are promising to “go nuclear” and filibuster his legal appointments.  Scott Horton reports on a serious threat to Obama's transparency.

Billionaire Buffett benefits from bailout he promoted  —  Financier Warren Buffett has been lauded for his plain-spoken denunciation of the greed and foolishness behind the economic crisis.  He has pushed the massive federal bailout of imploding banks as the essential response to an “economic Pearl Harbor.”

2006 Israel-Lebanon War Looms Large in Pentagon Debate on Future  —  Leaders Divided on Whether to Focus On Conventional or Irregular Combat  —  A war that ended three years ago and involved not a single U.S. soldier has become the subject of an increasingly heated debate inside the Pentagon …