The real problem is the economy. The fights over projected deficits for 5 and 10 years out are a distraction.

Jim Himes is on the House Financial Services Committee, and has been active trying to tackle the problem of executive compensation. While the AIGFP bonuses were certainly a flash point for public anger, the problem of executive compensation is a serious flaw in our financial system. William Black, in his paper “Surreal Fiddling While Rome Burns,” highlights this passage from a report by the National Commission on Financial Sintitution

Nearly a year and a half ago, Fred Thompson was called to task on his blatant abuse of the ‘testing the waters’ exemption of campaign finance law. That complaint was a compilation of research and writing by progressive bloggers. It was also a result of wide coverage in the mainstream media about Thompson’s lack of compliance with the law.

The WaPo has a front page article blaring about Obama’s horrible record on state secrets.

I agree with the article that Obama’s record on state secrets has been worse than disappointing. But I’m really tired of reporting that misses key facts about the case.

By a margin of 58% to 42%, Gainesville voters rejected Charter Amendment 1, the anti-equality amendment. Written by a far right conservative group in Michigan, the amendment would have overthrown the city’s anti-discrimination ordinance.

Watch Timothy Geithner’s face as he’s grilled here by Bachmann. Priceless.

I was on Rachel Maddow last night talking about the efforts of Campaign for America’s Future, USAction, blogs and others to push back against Evan Bayh and his coalition of self-described “centrists.” Bayh and his buddies have announced they will join with the Republicans and undermine Obama’s ability to use the reconciliation process to pass the budget and healthcare.

“The AIG bailout, in effect,” writes Matt Taibbi at Rolling Stone, “was Goldman bailing out Goldman…rich bankers bailing out rich bankers, using the taxpayers’ credit card.” The bailout is as much about power as it is money.

Today on GRITtv MATT TAIBBI, JANE HAMSHER, and ROBERT JOHNSON discuss what can be done to take that power back from the financial institutions that have wrecked the economy and, along the way, our democracy.

After suffering through what seemed like an eternity of elevator music kitsch, I was on an OMB media conference call this morning with Peter Orszag.

These calls are always a bit frustrating in that I never seem to get through for a question. And often have to sit through big media asking the same old, same old from the list of usual talking points.

Today’s, however, was happy departure from that with a few requests for specifics.

photo by cweed

You know Goldman and Barclays: bailed out to the tune of $12B and $9B, respectively, via AIG. And, as I wrote yesterday, Barclays has been making a nice chunk of change peddling what some would call “dodgy tax avoidance schemes,” too.

During Monday’s chat with Dean Baker, commenter “reader” mentioned CNN’s Rick Sanchez’s comments on the Geithner plan.