Category: Politics

US sues Wells Fargo over loan defaults

The U.S. government has sued Wells Fargo Bank in New York, blaming the nation's largest originator of home mortgages for thousands of loan defaults over the last decade.

A civil mortgage fraud lawsuit filed in U.S. District Court in Manhattan on Tuesday seeks to recover hundreds of millions of dollars that the Federal Housing Administration, which insured the loans, had to pay out after borrowers defaulted.

The lawsuit charges San Francisco-based Wells Fargo with falsely certifying that its loans met the standards necessary to be eligible for government insurance. U.S. Attorney Preet Bharara says the bank's plan to reward employees for the number of loans they approved "was an accelerant to a fire already burning."

This marks the fifth lawsuit that the government has brought against major lenders over mortgage practices.

Wells Fargo & Co. has denied the allegations and is promising a vigorous defense.

US sues Wells Fargo over loan defaults

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Congressman opens voting rights probe of tea party group

Rep. Elijah E. Cummings

A Maryland congressman has opened an investigation of a group that has tried to remove thousands of voters from registration rolls across the nation in advance of the presidential election.

The inquiry by Rep. Elijah E. Cummings , a Democrat, is being started a week after Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) urged the Justice Department to enforce voting rights laws, citing a Los Angeles Times article detailing attempts by an Ohio offshoot of the group, True the Vote, to strike hundreds of students and others from voting rolls.

“At some point, an effort to challenge voter registrations by the thousands without any legitimate basis may be evidence of illegal voter suppression,” Cummings told True the Vote founder Catherine Engelbrecht in a letter on Thursday. “If these efforts are intentional, politically motivated and widespread across multiple states, they could amount to a criminal conspiracy to deny legitimate voters their constitutional rights.”

Cummings is the ranking minority member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.

Engelbrecht, a Texas tea party leader, has described True the Vote as an effort to prevent election fraud and clean up voter registration rolls. The group recruits volunteers, largely through tea party networks, to scour voter lists, challenge the registration of those they believe are dead or do not live at their listed address, and monitor the polls on election day.

“True The Vote has forwarded Congressman Cummings’ letter to its legal team and is more than happy to avail itself” to the congressional committee, the group’s spokesman, Logan Churchwell, said by email. “In the interim, True The Vote invites Congressman Cummings, or any other interested parties, to participate in any training sessions in the weeks ahead.”

The Times article described efforts by the Ohio Voter Integrity Project, a spinoff of True the Vote, to remove more than 2,100 names from voter rolls. Hundreds of them were college students the group tried to strike from the rolls for failure to specify their dorm room numbers. Local election boards declined to remove any of them.

The Ohio group also challenged the rights of eight members of an African American family to vote from an address it identified as a vacant lot outside Cincinnati. But the address was actually the house where the family had lived for nearly three decades. The family suspected race was the group’s motive. The white tea party activist who challenged the family said she had made a mistake and apologized.

In a statement dated Monday on True the Vote’s website, Engelbrecht said the group’s Ohio volunteers had no intention of challenging properly registered voters and were “completely unprepared for the partisan gamesmanship and media spectacle they were subjected to.”

“They trusted in the system and were betrayed at every turn,” Engelbrecht said. “True the Vote stands by the well-intentioned efforts of these citizens and is disgusted by the attempts of some within government and media to warp what should have been a simple, legal process into a calculated partisan charade.”

In his letter, Cummings expressed concerns about the Ohio voter challenges, as well as others reported in North Carolina, Wisconsin and Maryland. He asked True the Vote to provide information “about the data you have been using to challenge voter registrations, the training you have been providing volunteers to conduct these activities, and the manner in which you have been determining where to deploy your resources in select jurisdictions.”

Congressman opens voting rights probe of tea party group

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U.S. Unadjusted Unemployment Rate at 7.9% in September

U.S. unemployment, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, was 7.9% for the month of September, unchanged from 7.9% measured in mid-September but down slightly from 8.1% for the month of August. Gallup's seasonally adjusted September unemployment rate was 8.1%, unchanged from August.

Gallup Adjusted and Unadjusted Unemployment Rate Trend, January 2011-September 2012

These results are based on Gallup Daily tracking interviews, conducted by landline and cell phone, with approximately 30,000 Americans throughout the month -- 68.2% of whom are active in the workforce. Gallup calculates a seasonally adjusted unemployment rate by applying the adjustment factor the government used for the same month in the previous year. The government made no adjustment to the August numbers last year, but adjusted September's up by 0.2 percentage points, which accounts for the flat seasonally adjusted unemployment rate in September despite the decline in the unadjusted rate.

The 7.9% unadjusted rate is the lowest Gallup has recorded since it began collecting employment data in January 2010. It is also significantly lower than the 8.6% rate measured in September 2011.

Underemployment, as measured without seasonal adjustment, was 16.5% in September -- also the lowest rate Gallup has recorded since it started collecting unemployment data in 2010. The September reading reflects more than a half-point drop since the end of August, and a nearly two-point improvement from the 18.3% measured in September 2011.

Gallup's U.S. underemployment measure combines the percentage who are unemployed with the percentage of those working part time but looking for full-time work. Gallup does not apply a seasonal adjustment to underemployment.

U.S. Unadjusted Unemployment Rate at 7.9% in September

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Voter ID laws take another hit in Mississippi, no appeal coming in Pennsylvania ruling

Voter buttons

Republicans thought they could suppress the vote this year with a variety of new laws, including state requirements that citizens show a photo ID before casting their ballots. Courts in New Hampshire and Georgia approved their laws. But, in Texas, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, the photo ID mandate has fallen to court rulings and other legal action. Mississippi joined those three on Tuesday. That came on the heels of news that Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Corbett won't appeal Tuesday's ruling that eliminates the photo ID requirement in his state for this year's election.

Unlike Pennsylvania, where the nation's strictest photo-ID law ran afoul of state courts, Mississippi falls under the Voting Rights Act of 1965. That law was passed to end various "Jim Crow" laws and regulations that for decades had kept most African Americans in the South from casting ballots. Under the law, 16 states or parts of states must have major changes in their voting laws "pre-cleared" by the U.S. Department of Justice. The DOJ's request for more information in its review of the Mississippi law means it won't be in place for this year's election, according to Attorney Gen. Jim Hood.

"All the DOJ is saying in this response is that they need more details of the state's plan in order to make a determination," said Hood. "What this means is that the voter ID requirement will not be in place before the November election. You will not be required to show ID at the poll until DOJ interposes no objections or pre-clears Mississippi's voter ID bill." [...]

In its letter to the state, the Justice Department asked Hood's office whether the state has determined that voter ID "will not have a retrogressive effect on minority citizens in the effective exercise of their electoral franchise." The DOJ also asks to review a detailed description of any measures the state intends to put in place to "ameliorate this prohibited effect, which Hood said would include the rules and regulations being created by Secretary of State Delbert Hosemann.

Voter ID laws take another hit in Mississippi, no appeal coming in Pennsylvania ruling

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New Zealand PM was aware of illegal Kim Dotcom surveillance

The New Zealand prime minister who authorized the raid the netted Megaupload.com founder Kim Dotcom in January now admits he was briefed on the possible illegality of the case less than a month after it went down.

Only last month, New Zealand Prime Minister John Key publically apologized to Kim Dotcom, explaining that the mistakes carried out by the Government Communications and Security Bureau (GCSB) leading up to and during the January 20 raid on his Coatesville, NZ home was “appalling.”

"Of course I apologize to Mr. Dotcom. I apologize to New Zealand," Mr. Key said. "I am personally very disappointed that the agency failed to fully understand the workings of its own legislation” when conducting surveillance of Dotcom in the period before his arrest.

Now, however, Mr. Key confirms that he sat in on a debriefing meeting with the GCSB on February 29, during which the state’s spy agency discussed details of the mission.

Mr. Key admits to attending the meeting, but blames "brain fade" for forgetting the actual events of the encounter. A Government Communications Security Bureau review now confirms that the prime minister was put in the know only weeks after Dotcom was arrested, and right at the start of a case that the defendant calls “politically motivated” and appears to be weakening by the moment.

“A paper prepared as talking points for the staff member conducting a presentation contained a short reference to the Dotcom arrest a few weeks earlier, as an example of cooperation between the GCSB and the police,” the GCSB investigation appeals.

Mr. Key declines remembering the specifics of the sit-down, saying, “While neither the GCSB Director nor I can recall the reference to the Dotcom matter being made during my visit to the bureau back in February, I accept that it may well have been made.” What he does recall, he says, is seeing an image of Dotcom appear on the screen during a presentation made during the February meeting.

"They just flashed through it, I do vaguely remember the screen so I remember it being put up,” he says.

An investigation into GCSB practices have forced the agency to admit that the legality of three surveillance missions dating all the way back to 2009 may now be called into questions, only expediting the erosion of New Zealand’s case against Dotcom, a German national who has been raising a family at his Coatesville estate since being freed by authorities. His arrest in January was endorsed by the United States’ FBI, who has indicted Dotcom and his associates for allegedly operating a vast copyright conspiracy over the Internet. Dotcom, born Kim Schmitz, maintains his innocence.

New Zealand PM was aware of illegal Kim Dotcom surveillance

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Hackers, Possibly From Middle East, Block U.S. Banks' Websites

The financial and banking industries are on high alert tonight as a massive cyberattack continues, with potentially millions of customers of Bank of America, PNC and Wells Fargo finding themselves blocked from banking online.

"There is an elevated level of threat," said Doug Johnson, a vice president and senior adviser of the American Bankers Association. "The threat level is now high."

"This is twice as large as any flood we have ever seen," said Dick Clarke, an ABC News consultant and former cybersecurity czar.

Sources told ABC News that the so-called denial of service attacks had been caused by hackers from the Middle East who had secretly transmitted signals commandeering thousands of computers worldwide.

Those computers -- or "zombies" -- were then used to overwhelm bank websites with a barrage of electronic traffic.

Different banks have been targeted on different days.

Today was PNC Bank's turn: For three hours, ABC News tried to get on the PNC website to no avail.

PHOTO: Bank of America
Scott Eells/Bloomberg via Getty Images
Pedestrians walk past a Bank of America... View Full Size
Iranian Hackers Attack U.S. BanksWatch Video
Citibank Security Breach Hits America Watch Video
Epsilon Email Breach Exposes Client Data Watch Video

On Facebook, a frustrated customer, Cynthia Schirm, wrote, "Trying to pay bills. This is ridiculous."

"Hopefully it can be up soon," wrote Stacy Briggs-Gerlach. "Never realized how dependent I am on it!!!"

A group of hackers calling themselves Izz ad-Din al-Qassam warned the financial industry that it was going to attack in retaliation for the controversial film "The Innocence of Muslims," which provoked outrage across the Muslim world earlier this month.

The U.S. said it suspected that hackers in Iran were also involved.

"This is the first time that we know about, where a Middle Eastern entity, perhaps a Middle Eastern government, has attacked websites, critical infrastructure, in the United States," Clarke said.

Even though hackers have not been able to steal any money during these attacks, authorities say they fear the next generation of wide-scale cyber assaults could be more devastating.

"If they get inside the banks, they can move money around and cause financial chaos," Clarke said.

ABC News obtained a Sept. 17 FBI alert warning that foreign hackers were targeting bank and credit union workers.

In a number of those cases, the hackers stole employee login credentials and then wired themselves between $400,000 and $900,000.

Sources told ABC News that the U.S. government was actively working to locate and disrupt the massive attacks.

Hackers, Possibly From Middle East, Block U.S. Banks’ Websites

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Here's What the Space Around Earth Sounds Like

One of NASA's newest missions has recorded the radio waves coming from our magnetosphere. Musicians: Sample away.

668519main2_vab-615.jpg

A graphic of Earth's twin rings of plasma known as the Van Allen Radiation Belts in our planet's magnetosphere (NASA)

Surrounding our planet are rings of plasma, part of Earth's magnetosphere, which are pulsing with radio waves. Those waves are not audible to the human ear alone, but radio antennae can pick them up, and that's just what an instrument -- the Electric and Magnetic Field Instrument Suite and Integrated Science (EMFISIS) -- on NASA's recently launched Radiation Belt Storm Probes has done.

The noises, often picked up here on Earth by ham-radio operators, are called Earth's "chorus" as they are reminiscent of a chorus of birds chirping in the early morning. So here's your planet, singing its song into space. Musicians: Sample away.

Here’s What the Space Around Earth Sounds Like

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Romney Wants Former Merrill Lynch CEO Who Helped Crash The Economy As Treasury Secretary



Captain Capitalist and corporation BFF, Mitt Romney, is all about business (except telling you what that business is). His entire campaign is based on good hair and apparent sharp business acumen. Mittie rich can boast all he wants about his keen understanding of the private market; moreover, one in which allowed a patrician son of privilege to lay off thousands of middle-income earners by leveraging relatively solvent companies and footing an enormous profit, which he then stashes in foreign tax shelters for a bainy day. But Romney is ultimately a sneering, soulless vulture capitalist who uses all the lying and cheating skills he learned in business school to bring mixed market capitalism to its very knees. Let’s face it, here: Romney is such a wall street insider that when he gets a rectal exam, wall street feels a chill.

But Romney appears to really be milking this “screw the 47 percent” mentality after suggesting he would strongly consider for Treasury Secretary John Thain, the former CEO of Wall Street investment bank Merrill Lynch who now heads CIT Group. Thain is of course best remembered as the fat cat who notoriously spent $1.22 million to redecorate his office using shareholder money, including a $35,000 commode. Unless one happens to crap gold bricks, an ordinary toilet will suffice.


After the sale of Merill Lynch to Bank of America as part of the bailout during the economic abortion, Thain took over CIT Group Inc, which evidently received $2.3 billion dollars from TARP in December of 2008. At CIT Group INC., he received a pay package of $500,000 in cash, $2.5 million of restricted CIT stock with a holding period of one year, and $3 million in stock restricted for three years. The Peter Principle was huge in 2009 and Thain was its poster boy. But hey, surely Thain can out-prick that.

From Think Progress:

According to a new book by former Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation chairwoman Sheila Bair, when the CEOs of America’s major banks came to Washington to discuss the much-reviled $700 billion bank bailout in 2008, the first question asked by Thain was “if his compensation was going to be cut.” Upon Thain’s departure from Merrill Lynch, the New York Times’ Floyd Norris wrote, “The departure of John Thain from Bank of America provides another reminder of how Wall Streeters have come to see themselves as entitled to pay that would seem excessive even if their companies were not failing.”

And since Romney won’t stand for his poor 1 percenters being forced to buy only 1 Ferrari per household, he’s pledged to repeal the Dodd-Frank financial reform law, which included a provision that imposed placing restraints on executive compensation at financial institutions. I perish to think the amount of corporate welfare that Thain will dole out as Treasury Secretary. Well, at least he wouldn’t need a $35,000 commode since he would now be crapping all over the middle-class and poor.

Michael is a comedian/VO artist/Columnist extraordinaire, who co-wrote an award-nominated comedy, produces a chapter of Laughing Liberally, wrote for NY Times Laugh Lines, guest-blogged for Joe Biden, and writes a column for MSNBC.com affiliated Cagle Media. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook, and like NJ Laughing Liberally Lab if you love political humor from a progressive point-of-view. Seriously, follow him or he’ll send you a photo of Rush Limbaugh bending over in a thong.

Romney Wants Former Merrill Lynch CEO Who Helped Crash The Economy As Treasury Secretary

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