A well-written tribute to the cops of Chicago.

(I'd probably disagree with his "only in Chicago" line, though--I'm sure there are just as great and singular cops everywhere in the world.)

BSG related tidbit from Watch with Kristin:

BATTLESTAR GALACTICA: The ragtag fleet reassembles! According to Grace Park (love her!) at the EW party, several Battlestar Galactica castmembers—including Park herself, her real-life husband and her onscreen BSG husband, Tahmoh Penikett—are living at Jamie Bamber's house in Studio City while Family Bamber is in London for Bamber's gig on Law & Order: UK. And over at the Los Angeles

Some stuff on this bailout thing:

Yet a critical - and radical - component of this bailout package has thus far failed to garner the serious attention of anyone in the press. Section 8 (which ironically reminds one of the popular name of the portion of the 1937 Housing Act that paved the way for subsidized affordable housing ) of this legislation is just a single sentence of thirty-two words, but it represents a significant consolidation of power and an abdication of oversight authority that's so flat-out astounding that it ought to set one's hair on fire. It reads, in its entirety:

Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

In short, the so-called "mother of all bailouts," which will transfer $700 billion taxpayer dollars to purchase the distressed assets of several failed financial institutions, will be conducted in a manner unchallengeable by courts and ungovernable by the People's duly sworn representatives. All decision-making power will be consolidated into the Executive Branch - who, we remind you, will have the incentive to act upon this privilege as quickly as possible, before they leave office. The measure will run up the budget deficit by a significant amount, with no guarantee of recouping the outlay, and no fundamental means of holding those who fail to do so accountable.

Is this starting to sound familiar? Robert Kuttner cuts through much of the gloss in an article in today's American Prospect:

The deal proposed by Paulson is nothing short of outrageous. It includes no oversight of his own closed-door operations. It merely gives congressional blessing and funding to what he has already been doing, ad hoc. He plans to retain Wall Street firms as advisors to decide just how to cut deals to value and mop up Wall Street's dubious paper. There are to be no limits on executive compensation for the firms that get relief, and no equity share for the government in exchange for this massive infusion of capital....

The differences between this proposed bailout and the three closest historical equivalents are immense. When the Reconstruction Finance Corporation of the 1930s pumped a total of $35 billion into U.S. corporations and financial institutions, there was close government supervision and quid pro quos at every step of the way. Much of the time, the RFC became a preferred shareholder, and often appointed board members. The Home Owners Loan Corporation, which eventually refinanced one in five mortgage loans, did not operate to bail out banks but to save homeowners. And the Resolution Trust Corporation of the 1980s, created to mop up the damage of the first speculative mortgage meltdown, the S&L collapse, did not pump in money to rescue bad investments; it sorted out good assets from bad after the fact, and made sure to purge bad executives as well as bad loans. And all three of these historic cases of public recapitalization were done without suspending judicial review.

So basically, we're giving this guy $700,000,000,000 to play with, with no oversight.

Dirty Secret Of The Bailout: Thirty-Two Words That None Dare Utter

How did I not know that Grace Park and Tahmoh Penikett are married? I'm really out of the geekTV gossip loop!

git!!!!

BRILLIANT!

How did I not know that Grace Park and Tahmoh Penikett are married? I'm really out of the geekTV gossip loop!

My kingdom for a serial comma!

Section 8 (which ironically reminds one of the popular name of the portion of the 1937 Housing Act that paved the way for subsidized affordable housing ) of this legislation is just a single sentence of thirty-two words, but it represents a significant consolidation of power and an abdication of oversight authority that's so flat-out astounding that it ought to set one's hair on fire. It reads, in its entirety:

Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

Yeah, that's not the Section 8 I'm reminded of.

Happy to be of help.

I was wracking my brain all morning trying to come up with that word, and then I flashed on an episode of Python (which is also what made me click on twit). I checked wikipedia to see if it was also something inappropriate, but I can't find anything except that it's supposed to be a stronger insult than "twit".

Decisions by the Secretary pursuant to the authority of this Act are non-reviewable and committed to agency discretion, and may not be reviewed by any court of law or any administrative agency.

Would that passage even get by the Supreme Court when this little bit of legislation is reviewed for constitutionality? I would think that any laws passed to grant broad executive branch powers free of legislative and judicial oversight would have to be made via amendment to the Constitution.

That's pre-9/11 thinking, Matt.

(Also, to the best of my knowledge the SC doesn't review anything for constitutionality - they step in if and when a suit is filed and makes it's way to that level. Say around 2014. I don't know if that's an absolute, if they could step in in extraordinary circumstances. But I sure doubt this bunch is likely to even if they have that power.)

Rick Sanchez just quoted my tweet on the air on CNN. Nothing stranger than hearing "Cashmere says" on teevee.