Cnbc on The Huffington Post

CNBC's Mark Haines Mocks Automakers: "Please Give Us Money, We Screwed It Up"

2008-11-19T11:51:38Z

CNBC Squawk On The Street anchor Mark Haines has spent a lot of time in the last week berating American automakers as they have been lobbying for a $25 billion bailout from Congress. As a vote likely nears, Haines has had more guests on his show to talk about the automakers and it seems to be making him more irritable.

While watching for what seems like an inevitable meltdown fight with auto reporter Phil LeBeau, we caught this moment of Haines employing a little voice to mock the automakers.

WATCH:

We're just minutes away from the big three on Capitol Hill. Today they're in the House wearing out their knees, making the case for a bailout: "Please give us money, we screwed it up really royally."

Co-anchor Erin Burnett can be heard being frustrated with Haines at the end of the clip.

Mark Haines Thinks Auto Promises Are Baloney

2008-11-14T12:47:42Z

CNBC Squawk On The Street anchor and reliable curmudgeon Mark Haines doesn't trust the Big Three automakers -- Ford, GM and Chrysler -- to behave with government aid. He predicts that the automakers will promise to make environmentally-friendly cars and won't ever actually do it.

Then CNBC auto reporter Phil LeBeau comes in, trying to defend the long lead time the auto industry would need to create "green cars," and Haines railroads him, too. Erin Burnett tries, as she often does, to keep the peace.

WATCH:

HAINES: Never. They will never make good on those promises. They will do what the banks have done and what everyone else has done -- they'll tell us one thing to get the money and once they get the money, forget it.

LEBEAU: Mark, it's a long-lead business. I mean you can say you're gonna make green cars, who's gonna be able to check for another two or three years?

HAINES: You know what, Phil? I mean, I'm sorry. But the American auto industry drove itself off a cliff, OK? It drove itself off a cliff.

Read more: Cnbc, Chrysler, Video, Gm, Mark Haines, Ford, Cars, Green Cars, Business News

Mark Haines Thinks Treasury Treats US Like Mushrooms: Kept In Dark, Fed BS

2008-11-12T13:35:33Z

CNBC's Squawk On The Street anchor Mark Haines had a unique analogy for the way he thinks the Treasury Department has been handling the economic rescue plan. He's pretty steamed about a perceived lack of transparency and consistency in Treasury's communications.

When discussing the economy with CNBC's Steve Liesman and co-anchor Erin Burnett, Haines said he said he no longer wanted to be treated like a "mushroom."

WATCH:

HAINES: "I'd like somebody to tell me -- not to treat me like a mushroom. You know how they grow mushrooms. They keep them in the dark and they feed them bovine fecal matter. OK? And That's what they've been doing with us."

Dr. Tian Dayton: An Integrated National Psyche

2008-11-05T09:05:47Z

Integration is a word often used by psychologists to describe a psychological state in which we are consciously consolidating the various parts of our inner world into a coherent whole. The thought behind "psychological integration" is that a lack of it is weakening to the self. That if parts of our larger "self" are banished from consciousness; we suffer an essential lack of inner wholeness. When we disown parts of ourselves we undermine our own ability to see and own the full picture, to make intelligent choices that take all of our various sides into account. We make it harder for ourselves to follow through on our own decisions because we aren't working with and mobilizing all of our parts. Valuable psychic energy that could be used in service of our own forward movement gets held in an unconscious, psychic frozenness. Certainly this same theory can apply to a country.

Last night, through the election of an African-American president, we are, as a country, allowing parts of our national psyche to become integrated into a coherent whole, into a working model of our national self. It is a stunning moment in our history as a country no matter what our political leanings. The idea behind psychic integration is that it makes the individual healthier and more whole, that it allows for previously tied up emotional, psychic and hence physical energy to become mobilized in service of the self, in service of moving forward into more of life. It seems no great stretch to apply these same principles to our national psyche. While parts of our population are disowned, don't we drain our own potential energy and intelligence as a national being? What ever our political leanings and preferences, we are a society of many races, this is who we are. Following this line of thinking, last night we became more of who we are, we allowed the hidden and banished parts of national psyche to be integrated into a coherent whole in service of a more fully integrated self.

Two very meaningful and historic speeches were given last night. John McCain's speech was a powerful and moving call for psychic integration. Whatever the campaign was or wasn't, last night he did not foster or encourage the fracturing of our psychic energies, he did not allow us to boo or hate parts of who we are, rather he called for a kind of acceptance and integration of our national psyche in service of our self as a nation. His words, "we are Americans, we don't give up" took on a new meaning, especially coming from someone who did not give up under circumstances that most of us can never even allow ourselves to imagine.

Last night Barack Obama's very presence on stage along with Joe Biden's family was a speech in itself, it said what words cannot touch and what history has not known how to manage. It allowed us to become whole, to consciously integrate who we already are, to bring split off parts of ourselves under our conscious control and to take responsibility for them so that we can mobilize heretofore tied up psychic energy toward the task of moving forward. Obama's words "yes we can," echoed toward a future that we are daring to imagine that we can co-create. Whatever our political leanings, last night we became a more integrated, coherent and whole national psyche.

Read more reaction from HuffPost bloggers to Barack Obama's victory in the 2008 presidential election

CNBC Anchors Have Bizarre Argument Over "Whaddya Got?"

2008-11-04T23:26:47Z

We missed it, but apparently Dylan Radigan and Charlie Gasparino almost broke into their famous "What Do You Got" routine (see here for the first time). Here's how a tipster explained the exchange:

FYI - Gasparino just flipped again on his 'don't say what'dya got to me' thing. Ratigan let is slip again and immediately apologized but it was too late. Even Maria asked 'what is with you guys and this thing?'

Steve Parker: October car/truck sales reports - Fuel for Obama campaign

2008-11-01T23:52:23Z

This Monday, the new car and truck sales reports for the month of October will be announced, and are expected to be the worst in 25-or-more years.

Those numbers should be used to bring more voters to the polls the next day, solid members of the Democratic Party and those who might vote that way for the first time. Democratic candidates and volunteers working phone banks in some key states should use these numbers to convince those still (somehow) undecided or too depressed by their own economic situation to vote to do something positive and vote for Barack Obama and other Democrats running for office, locally, statewide and nationally.

Friday on CNBC, an auto industry analyst said that if General Motors were to go bankrupt, more than two million Americans would lose their jobs, including those working directly for GM, at their hundreds of supplier companies, all of their dealership personnel - the list goes on and on.

And several analysts agree that GM is burning through $1 billion a month - in cash they don't have.

GM's cash condition is so bad that one of their most important new high-mileage vehicles, the Chevrolet Cruze, could be delayed in the US until 2011 or longer, while the car is now being built and sold in South Korea and plans call for building and selling it in Europe in March, 2009. And GM's much-vaunted Volt plug-in hybrid may also be delayed for the same reason - no cash for production start-up.

(Chevy's Cruze, top, was introduced at the Paris Car Show in October, but the US version of the high-mileage car may be delayed until 2011; GM VP Robert Lutz, 76, introduces the Volt plug-in hybrid at last year's Detroit Auto Show, and Volt may also be delayed because the company doesn't have the amount of cash necessary for starting its production).

Candidates and volunteers in car- and parts-making states like Michigan, Alabama, Texas, California, Ohio, Tennessee, Mississippi, Indiana, Iowa, New Jersey, New York and more should use these numbers when talking to voters.

At this point, merger talks between GM and Chrysler have ended; those two told Washington that another $10 billion, in addition to the $25 billion already going to Detroit, was going to be needed to finance any merger.

Discussions between Chrysler and Nissan/Renault have also stopped.

As recently as August, John McCain vigorously opposed a bailout for Detroit. According to
www.MotorAuthority.com, "His (McCain's) stance thus far is that it's not the role of the government to be a crutch to these businesses, a view also shared by current president George W. Bush."

(Barack Obama has consistently told Americans about the importance of the auto industry to the country, and that creating a new, green car-making industry will help the nation and the world; French car-maker Renault, which also controls Nissan, has advanced technology thanks to their involvement in Formula 1 racing, but their talks with Chrysler about a merger have ended).

Also in August, the Detroit News reported that, "Barack Obama has previously vocalized his support for loan programs for domestic manufacturers, including 'loans and tax credits to retool the nation's auto plants and build the next generation of American cars'. Obama has also previously spoken about his desire to see the American auto industry at the forefront of technology for next-generation cars, rather than lagging behind as it is now."

Many of this Blog's visitors have said, essentially, that when it comes to the Detroit Three, "Let them go out of business - They did it to themselves, anyway."

And I couldn't agree more - but only with the second half of that statement.

Realistically, with the specter of two million unemployed Americans looming on the horizon if just one of the Detroit Three goes bankrupt in the US, can our economy afford to support, re-train and create new jobs for those workers? And should Washington step into this situation at all with tax payers' money?

I say, again, that the Detroit Three should merge into one single large car-maker, and I think most Americans would be thrilled to support this new company - But only if they engineer, design and sell the right cars and trucks for this marketplace. And one company will assure there are no "winners" and "losers" among the Detroit Three. I think that's important to the companies and the country.

And the money, time and effort necessary to help those laid-off by this merger can be factored into any plan to "re-do" Detroit.

Help with home mortgages, extending unemployment payments, help with car/truck loans and leases, aid to families with students in college, re-training - and the establishment of hundreds of thousands of new jobs for America's new green economy - can all be planned for before any merger occurs.

The economies of scale and being able to take advantage of all of the $25 or $50 billion bailout and sheer patriotism will help this new company succeed.

Remember that Washington is not just throwing money at this problem and hoping it will go away; the new company is expected to make and sell the best cars and trucks in the world, and payback Washington (and us), at the lowest possible interest rates (about 4.5%, or about a third of what they're paying for money now), and do it within 25 years; Washington can defer payback for five years.

All this information, coupled with Monday's bad news about car/truck October sales should be used to sway America and its workers to help Barack Obama become President-elect of the United States of America - the very next day.

Visitor Bonus! For those interested in the new clean diesel engines being offered by Volkswagen, Audi and Mercedes-Benz this year, and from the Detroit Three next year, Mercedes-Benz has created a fun, easy-to-navigate and informative Website to explain the new technology. Click anywhere on this line to visit ... And enjoy (but only after voting!).

Summer Rayne Oakes: Journey to the Center of a Windmill

2008-10-31T15:38:00Z

In between doing some Planet Green events I've been filming for G Word, one of Discovery's new shows. Here's a recap on one of my favorite episodes. Stay tuned for some clips, bloopers, and the stuff Discovery doesn't want you to see!

About Me and "G"
I guess they know I'm comfortable in the grit and the glamour because that is exactly what I'll be covering for G Word-a show about all the oddities and goodies of "green." You can watch me tackle ocean trash, dance on top of windmills, sniff out garbage, and plod through cow poo. Unfortunately I'm still waiting for the glamorous part of my job to kick in...

"I imagine putting up a windmill is quite a big undertaking," I said to Ned Hall, President of AES Wind Energy. "Yes, very much so," he responded. "So when one is going up, do you notify the community that you are having a big erection?" Oh yes I did, I said it. Bam, Bam, Bam. (joke I got compliments of W. LaDuke)

A windmill kisses the wind.

Journey to the Center of a Windmill
Where: Abilene, TX--the "Friendly Frontier" of wind energy and the U.S. city with the most churches per square mile (as told to me by a Wiccan cab driver who picked us up from the airport).

What: Explore wind energy and what it means to us

Why: Because gas isn't cheap or green and wind seems like a cool, viable alternative

"It's kinetic art," Ned Hall, President of AES Wind Energy said to me as we looked out over the miles and miles of magnificent white wind turbines. The rotating blades were hypnotizing, leisurely spinning their 120ft arms in the wind. The blades may only turn 20 revolutions per minute, but the 20 mph winds were enough to whip our hard hats off as we craned our necks David-&-Goliath-style to ogle at the impressive structures that easily rival the Statue of Liberty in height.

The producers told me I'll be climbing to the top of the windmills. Ha! Good thing I didn't tell them I am terrified of heights until we were in the safety training. They seemed pretty pissed that I didn't let them in on that important tidbit of information beforehand. Hell, I didn't even know you could climb up the belly of a windmill. What's in there anyway? How does it convert wind to electricity? And what does it look like from the top of a turbine? I guess my curiosity totally outweighed my acrophobia, because I had a blast climbing to the top to salute the breeze.

What can you do?

Call your energy supplier to find out if you can purchase environmentally-friendly energy alternatives like wind;

Like to play the stock market? Invest in wind energy companies;

Offset your travel emissions with accredited companies like Native Energy, which re-invests the money into wind energy projects

Get involved in the alternative energy revolution. Support or get involved in organizations like Energy Action, Green for All, 1 Sky, and others.

Sign up for Power Vote, whose goal is to get 1,000,000 young citizens supporting clean energy solutions, which will be unveiled at the next Powershift Feb 27-Mar 2 in Washington, D.C.

"I stand erected"
These are the scenes Planet Green didn't want you to see...Coming soon...Coming soon. Coming soon.

At a windmill construction site in Abilene, TX

This is how big they are!

Free, clean energy: Wind and Solar!

Line 'em up!

Energy Action, pin-up style

Yes, your eyes are not deceiving you. That is a Campus Climate Challenge pin.

Filming at the wind turbine erection site.

Shafted! Yah, I'm not just showing you this for posterity's sake. I actually climbed up this monster! 250 ft into the air on the belly of a windmill. How about that!?!

That's me in the top of the wind turbine, standing on the gears.

And this is my view from the top...Prepare yourself...

My view from the top! Windmills as far as the eye can see.

The answer is a resounding "YES!" I did get to hang over the edge of the windmill's nose.

Lovely view. Lovely view.

Ari Melber: Would Obama's Victory Hurt Obama?

2008-10-30T00:55:25Z

If Sen. Barack Obama wins the presidential election, will that victory undermine his political future?

What a stupid question, you might be thinking. I can't believe I even clicked on the headline. This kind of bizarro logic, however, is percolating in the political media. The cable shows have been talking about how a Democratic sweep could ultimately hurt the Democratic Party. "Democrats See Risk and Reward if Party Sweeps" blared a recent New York Times headline. OpenLeft Blogger Chris Bowers slices through this madness in a post Wednesday:

Look, the raison d'etre of electorally focused political party is to win as many elections as possible. To argue that winning more seats is somehow a negative for any political party is exactly as stupid as arguing that it is bad for a sports team to win a championship. To even attempt an argument that winning an election is bad for a party is to enter the final level of concern troll mastery...

Speculative punditry is riddled with concern troll ticks, of course. Some editors and producers also like the "man-bites-dog" quality of these stories.

On a personal note, I'll never forget when I was invited on CNBC to debate whether Obama would be weakened by winning another primary. I am not exaggerating -- the segment was titled "Mississippi: Will Win Weaken Obama?" I pointed out that winning primaries was the point of these campaigns.

Yet, as everyone prematurely obsesses over a massive Democratic sweep -- which has not happened yet and may not happen -- we'll hear even more contrarian craziness. But, for the record, here's one safe prediction: The winner of this election will not be hurt by his victory.

--
Ari Melber is covering the Obama campaign for The Washington Independent, blogging from the road here and Twittering here.

Jim Cramer: "It Is Harder To Get It Right Than Any Time I Have Seen In My Career"

2008-10-20T07:28:21Z

On "Mad Money" he now makes fewer recommendations and is hitting the button marked "House of Pain" a lot more often than the one marked "House of Pleasure," but tearing the horns off a bull does not make it any more relevant to an economy rendered in fragile china.

Mr. Cramer will never be Suze Orman, telling you how to carefully handle the money you have left. He is a blue sky kind of guy, a creature of a fast-fading era. The viewers still shout "Booyah," when they call in, but nobody, including Mr. Cramer, is feeling it.

"We are still going to try and find things, but it's harder to have a good batting average. It is harder to get it right than any time I have seen in my career," he said.

Read more: Television, Cnbc, Tv, Jim Cramer, Media News

CNBC Banking On Jim Cramer

2008-10-20T07:28:15Z

CNBC HOST Jim Cramer is back in the news. For most TV personalities, that would be a good thing. But since it's Cramer we're talking about, PR can get a little dicey. Especially at such a critical time for his employer.

As you may have heard, the legendarily excitable Cramer has been telling viewers, on NBC's "Today" and elsewhere, to bail out of stocks and grab any cash they'll need over the next five years. Some critics are now accusing the former money manager of helping to spur a selling panic amid one of the worst financial crises the country has ever seen.

"How about this?" Cramer proposed when we discussed his controversial role in the crisis last week. "How about I said, 'Yeah, I did it.'? You know what kind of hubris that is?" On the word "hubris," his voice suddenly rose to a near-whistle, the way it often does when dispatching callers on his dizzying, buzzer-laden, stock-picking extravaganza "Mad Money."

"I'm not Warren Buffett!" he added.

That last part is indisputably true. Yet Cramer is now the standard-bearer of a network that, because of the Wall Street meltdown, is back in the spotlight once again.

It's been nearly a decade since CNBC's glory years, back in the heady era of day traders and the Internet boom. Now ratings are soaring as nervous investors mop up any info they can get about the market malaise.

Network executives say they're on track for a second straight year of record profits. This despite early reports that heavy advertisers such as credit-card and mortgage companies are pulling back on spending as quickly as they can. But the brass insists that the panic of '08 will be a good thing for the NBC Universal-owned network, which aims to deliver business news to affluent investors.

Business Press Sees Record Numbers

2008-10-14T08:49:35Z

The financial crisis means more Americans are interested in business news, which is helping business media across various mediums.

In TV, TVNewser reports that CNBC just saw its best week ever and is on pace for its best month ever:

For Business Day programming (5am-7pmET), CNBC averaged 570,000 Total Viewers the week of Oct. 6. That's up 5% from the previous high set the week before. CNBC also had its best week in 7 1/2 years in the A25-54 demo averaging 153,000 viewers.

With two weeks of October data, CNBC is having its best month ever averaging 555,000 Total Viewers; more than doubling last October's viewership.

Although magazines can't follow the market's every move in the print edition, Women's Wear Daily reports that financial magazines' websites are booming:

Figures from Nielsen Online show that for the month of September -- even before the real market meltdown began -- unique visitors to Cnnmoney.com, the Web home of Fortune, Money, and Fortune Small Business, jumped 30 percent to 10 million, and page views surged 142 percent, to 257 million, compared with September 2007. Businessweek.com saw a 25 percent surge in visitors, to four million, while page views jumped 84 percent to 20 million. Forbes.com reported a 4 percent growth in unique visitors, to eight million, and a 17 percent growth in page views, to 126 million. Portfolio.com's unique visitors totaled one million and page views two million in September, but the site's traffic was too small to be tracked by Nielsen Online last September.

Finally, even newspapers are getting in on the action, as Reuters reports that the Financial Times is boasting about four key successes:

Newsstand sales rose 30 percent in the United States in September, and about 20 percent in Europe and Asia. That's compared to August 2008, i.e., it's a "sequential" gain rather than year-over-year growth. In the United Kingdom, Ridding said, "We basically couldn't print enough copies and retailers were running out."

The number of registered users of FT.com rose to 750,000 now, compared with 30,000 a year ago. Some of this growth of course, came from pulling back the curtain last November. But Ridding said a couple hundred thousand of those showed up in the past few months, as the mortgage and housing crisis in the United States deepened and then metastasized into full-blown world-market-crisis mode. (Here's how registration and subscription works at FT.com)

During one week, Ridding noted, page views hit 25 million, more than double the normal amount. Ridding's conclusion: "What [the crisis] is doing for our readership and audience is pretty remarkable. I think it really underlines this idea that at a time of turmoil, people really do need trusted guides, and are prepared to pay." (The Journal, if anyone's wondering, logged 21.7 million visitors at its website, up 110 percent from last year. It's hard to tell whether the figure is comparable.)

During the week of Sept. 22, online page views were up 300 percent, and monthly unique visitors were up 250 percent compared with last year. The United States is pitching in so far, producing the largest number of unique users.

During Frantic Trading, Rick Santelli Finds Toupee On Trading Floor (VIDEO)

2008-10-10T15:00:01Z

CNBC reporter Rick Santelli found(?) a toupee on the floor of the Chicago Board of Trade during one of the most eye-popping days of trading in history. As stock prices plummeted and volatility soared, Santelli said that people were losing not only their shirts, but also their hair.

Adding insult to injury for the owner of the apparently denuded head, Erin Burnett adds, "Wow, it has a bad part-line, too."

WATCH:

Yvette Kantrow: The Washington Post's Howie Kurtz Blame Financial Press for Economic Crisis

2008-10-10T14:45:14Z

So big cheese media critic Howard Kurtz has spoken: The business media is partly to blame for our economic crisis.

"As in the savings-and-loan scandal of the late 1980s, the press was a day late and several dollars short," Kurtz declared in his Washington Post column last week. While he allows that some of the financial system's woes "were conveyed in incremental stories--and a few whistle-¬blowing columns--the business press never conveyed a real sense of alarm until institutions began to collapse."

Kurtz, who hosts a weekly CNN gabfest, is not the only media critic chastising the press for failing to warn people that financial Armageddon was near. (See the Columbia Journalism Review's The Audit.) But he is the most mainstream of the bunch, and his piece, accordingly, was filled with various éminences grises of financial journalism admitting that, yes, we all failed to see disaster coming.

"What we didn't understand was that this was building up," CNBC's Charles Gasparino tells Kurtz. "We all bear responsibility to a certain extent."

That's true. Only a fool would argue that the media could not have done a better job at sounding the alarm in the years leading up to the credit crisis--though what other part of the media is expected to make long-term predictions? We all know that the media, like the market itself, is a bullish creature. But columns like Kurtz's are also wrongheaded on two fronts: First, they make you want to ask, "Well, Howie, what were you doing while the rest of us were busy missing the big story?" (Well, gabbing on CNN.) And second, they fail to tell us exactly what kind of stories would have prevented us from ending up in the predicament we're in now.

Kurtz admits some stories were indeed done--there were dozens of housing bubble pieces, and there were prescient warnings from The New York Times' Gretchen Morgenson about credit default swaps--though you do wonder how deep Kurtz's reading goes. But, he argues, the media didn't put all the pieces together and warn us that the banking system was about to fall off a cliff.

In short, the media failed to fully predict the future, an easy observation to make with the benefit of hindsight.

Kurtz offers several stereotypical reasons for this failure: the difficulty in taking on "masters of the financial universe," especially when times are good; a tendency to lionize CEOs; the ghettoization of business news; pushback from corrupt companies. And while all those things may play a role, they don't address a more disturbing problem: Could anybody--on Wall Street, in Washington, in the newsroom--really foresee the path of this disaster? Or have our markets and our financial institutions gotten so large and complex that no amount of journalistic derring-do could have resulted in stories foreseeing the fall, in quick succession, of three Wall Street titans, a couple of big banks and an insurance giant?

And just imagine if a doomsday piece predicting such widespread destruction had appeared. Who would have believed it? Who would have run it? As the managing editor of Fortune, Andy Serwer, told Kurtz, "If we had written stories in late 2000 saying this whole thing's going to collapse, people would have said, 'Ha ha, maybe,' and gone about their business."

Serwer is right. Media Maneuvers summarily dismissed a Portfolio cover story by Jesse Eisinger last year that predicted Bear Stearns Cos. and Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. would lose their independence and "takeover speculation" surrounding Morgan Stanley and Merrill Lynch & Co. would reheat. Oops. Our bad. But ignoring such prophecies of doom and gloom isn't unusual. For one thing, such pieces are highly speculative by nature--where's the smoking gun--and if they come out too early in the cycle, they disappear into the bubble-filled ether. As a journalist, if you make a dire prediction, you'd better be correct soon. Otherwise, everyone just moves on.

But getting into the game too late doesn't work, either. Witness the blame heaped on the media (not to mention the shorts) for "bringing down" Bear and Lehman by speculating on their survival. When it comes to the prediction game, the window of opportunity is very small.

Betsy Perry: Is There A 12-Step Program For CNBC Addicts? Nowhere To Hide

2008-10-10T13:58:49Z

Tearing myself away from my OCD with CNBC I ran to lunch at Michael's the other day fearing I'm isolated now that my consulting work is vanishing faster than the puffy smoke at the Vatican that signals a new pope — or is it a dead one? Poof and there goes my monthly retainer while I sit glued to watching my equity sink, lip-synching to every whisper of hope from Erin Burnett and Mark Haines.

My hope had been to leave the city after lunch and head to my pink and green pad-let in South Beach where I would take advantage of a Jewish holiday and Chris Columbus's first step on our soil — way pre FOMC days when Isabella and Ferdinand used gold coins. Wonder what the price of gold was then??

Michael's was beyond frenetic with table hopping I'd not witnessed before and I felt as if I was dining on the Titanic before the ship went down. Only thing missing was playing of "Nearer my God to Thee"; Joy Behar was being applauded for her view against Elizabeth Hasselbeck and Star Jones was seated at the front table — like who cares about her anymore? There was too much celebration and even with Cobb Salads going for $35 a half portion, it had the feeling of the Last Supper if in fact that supper was fun.

I made a quick stop with my financial advisor who is a wizard and maybe the only one I know relishing a down market. The only sign of nervousness was the smell of cigarette smoke in her office which you never notice anymore..

While my usual plan is to hit the vintage shops in SB, you know I'm feeling the lack of a paycheck when I obviously am as fearful of buying Walgreen's $9 flip flops as I am of buying a $450 Dior leopard print bag in mint condition. Instead of buying my customary street fair $20 orchid plant and fresh flowers at Wild Oats I buy devilled eggs and sliced turkey.

And don't tell anyone that I filched some extra Q-tips at the gym while recycling my water bottle.

I have always put myself on a budget down here except for the vintage shopping excursions (lusting after that bag and it is a bargain). I drive a pink bike, share a ride from the airport and swim at the public pool. I use my co-existing ubiquitous gym membership and gave up my favorite trainer, Kellie, for classes that are way too hard for me.

In fact, other than sunshine and palm trees, I'm still watching CNBC from either my bed or my gym and my treat today — one mojito for $13.

Maybe I'll save up enough not buying flip flops and flowers to rationalize the Dior bag? Iffy.

Charles Warner: CNBC Served the Public

2008-10-06T16:51:14Z

On Thursday morning, after the Senate passed the bailout/rescue/recovery legislation, I got up and began watching CNBC. Then, in an act of self-flagellation, I turned to the Fox Business Network. In a previous blog entry I had referred to Fox Business as "Fox Bimbo News," and I wanted to see if it had miraculously improved its coverage of the biggest business story in the history of America.

I should have known better, because I don't believe in astrology or miracles. Fox Business was still bimbo news in spite of the outrageously misleading advertising and promotion that you would expect from a news network under the leadership of Fox's Roger Ailes, the Karl Rove of the media. It was under Ailes that Fox News promoted itself with the Brave-New-World, Huxlian, totally untrue slogans "fair and balanced" and "we report, you decide."

One of the reasons I had decided to watch Fox Business's coverage of the financial crisis was because the day before I watched CNBC as it covered the markets and the Senate consideration and passage of the originally called bailout bill, which by Wednesday was being called a rescue bill. By Friday when the House passed it, the bill was called the recovery bill. But on Wednesday, while I was watching CNBC, I was upset by a Fox Business commercial that ran in a local break that claimed, falsely that "we own the story." Fox Business also claimed in the commercial that it had more live shots and was covering the story while CNBC was airing infomercials. All of these claims, I later learned from a story in The New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/03/business/media/03fox.html?scp=1&sq=fox%20business&st=cse , were based on the previous weekend - totally out of context, and a completely unfair, deceptive claim.

But what should anyone expect from a Fox property lead by Ailes, formerly a political consultant for Richard Nixon and the Republicans. Who do you think Karl Rove learned his dirty tricks from? I asked myself, should time Warner cable have accepted the ad to run while viewers were watching CNBC? Was that fair? I decided that while it probably was not fair, Time Warner didn't have a strong enough reason to turn it down during tough economic times when it wanted all of the ad revenue it could get. Nevertheless, the Fox Business ad turned me off with its false, misleading, nasty claims. It was clearly gorilla marketing and attack advertising down in the gutter with current Republican attack advertising.

The rule in advertising is that when you are way behind and have no chance of catching up by talking about your own brand's benefits, you go negative and attack your competitors. Ad guru David Ogilvy warned about this tactic and recommended never even mentioning a competitor in an ad because he knew that up to 33 percent of the people who see that ad think it's for the wrong brand. The one thing you know when a brand mentions a competitor in an ad is that that brand is not number one - it's usually way behind, as Fox Business is. Ever see an ad for a Rolex that claims it's "better than a Timex?" Of course not.

According to The New York Times http://www.nytimes.com/2008/10/03/business/media/03fox.html?scp=1&sq=fox%20business&st=cse Fox Business has "...never drawn an audience large enough to be considered statistically reliable by Nielsen for an extended time period." But according to that same article, Fox Business had its best day ever, with an average of 81,000 homes between 1 p.m. and 10 p.m. watching on Monday when the House turned down the then-called bailout bill. CNBC's audience was over 900,000 for the same time period of time.

So I was one viewer of a miniscule Fox Business audience on that Thursday, but I stuck it out as long as I could bear - through Degan McDowell and Brian Sullivan, who co-anchor between 10 a.m. and 12 noon. Brian didn't really understand what was going on and Degan was the most obnoxious lock-jaw anchor I've ever seen on national or local television.

During that painful time that was like hearing fingernails scratched on a chalkboard for me, I did see several promotion spots for Fox Business that were virtually the same as the commercials I had seen the day before on the local break within CNBC programming. I suppose they were making the same claims on the theory that if you tell a lie often enough some people will believe it. But with the teeny weensy Fox Business audience, even if the lies stick, it won't make any difference. Fox Business was running promos because it couldn't sell enough ads to fill the empty slots. Any smart advertiser would be on CNBC, which had the biggest audience in its history, and deservedly so.

During those agonizing hours, I noticed the lead story on Fox Business was about GE and how two days before Warren Buffett had invested $3 billion in GE. A surprisingly bright reporter did a fairly thorough job of explaining what a difficult position GE was in because over 40 percent of its profits came from GE Capital, which because of the crisis was in deep, deep financial doo doo.

When I had watched CNBC earlier, from around 9 to 10:30 a.m., its lead story had been how the Senate had loaded the now-called rescue bill with pork. Knowledgeable CNBC anchors and reporters detailed the pork earmarks and explained the political reasons for them. I felt strongly that the pork story was clearly the lead. So why had Fox Business lead with GE and try to make GE look bad?

I'm shocked, shocked that Fox Business would corrupt its business journalism judgment and bury the obvious lead in order to try to put a bad light on GE, the owner of their avowed enemy, CNBC. That's Ailes for you.

I called my good friend Neil Derrough, who is the former V.P. and general manager of WBBM-TV when Bill Kurtis was the highest-rated anchor in Chicago, of WCBS-TV when Jim Jensen was a top-rated anchor, was president of the CBS-owned television stations division, and President of highly rated KNSD-TV in San Diego. I mention these gigs because Neil is one of the most astute television executives I know and is a keen and knowledgeable critic of television news. He's also fairly conservative and a sometimes (though not often) fan of Fox News on cable. I thought he'd give me an objective opinion of how CNBC did covering the bailout/rescue/recovery story of last week.

Neil said that he thought the CNBC's coverage was "insightful and evenhanded - much better than any other cable news network such as CNN, Fox, or MSNBC." He praised CNBC's production values, and we discussed how much we both liked the way CNBC did split screens during Paulson and Bernanke's testimony showing them testifying on one screen and the second-by-second effect it was having on the stock markets and the dollar versus other currencies.

I asked Neil if he liked the multi-guest screens - six of them at once some times - and he said, "yes, I like a cross-section of views, especially when the guests are as good as CNBC's are." Finally, Neil said that in the time of financial crisis that CNBC stepped up to the plate and provided an important and much needed public service in the best journalistic tradition.
The jazz great Jack Teagarden and the incomparable Louis Armstrong sang a duet in a song in which Armstrong sings, "I like what you like," and Teagarden responds with, "and that's what I like about you." Neil Derrough and I could sing the same duet. CNBC did a magnificent public service last week. Thanks, CNBC.

Read more: Cnbc, Wall Street Crisis, Bailout, Media News

Jim Cramer Admits: "I Screwed Up" In Recommending Wachovia Stock Two Weeks Ago Because I Liked The CEO

2008-09-30T13:49:32Z

Jim Cramer apologized Monday on "Mad Money" for recommending that his viewers buy Wachovia stock just two weeks ago, a recommendation he acknowledged was spurred by the appearance of his longtime friend and former boss, Wachovia CEO Bob Steel, on his program.

WATCH: Cramer And Steel Talk About Financial Crises

On September 15, Cramer had Steel on the show and later advised viewers to buy Wachovia stock. Watch:

Monday, Cramer said he "screwed up" because he "wasn't skeptical enough," admitting, "I let my judgment of Steel cloud my thinking about Wachovia." Watch (full comments below):

I let you down, cause I wasn't skeptical enough. I have to presume when it comes to banking right now there is no objective truth, just negative, just terrible things. I let my judgment of Steel cloud my thinking about Wachovia. Is he to blame? Did he take advantage of me? Perhaps yes. But ultimately I must be a firewall for you and this time I let the firewall down.

Here's the bottom line: if we had a plan, Wachovia might've been able to split into a good bank and a bad bank and be saved. Wachovia was overtaken by events. Still, I have no choice: I gotta put my friend Bob Steel on the Wall of Shame. You know what? I should put myself in the annex. I didn't protect you good, I didn't protect you better. I screwed up, I apologize.

Andrew Ross Sorkin referenceed Cramer's recommendation in a New York Times article Tuesday morning headlined, "What Goes Before A Fall? On Wall Street, Reassurance." Here's an excerpt:

It didn't help that Mr. Cramer later told his TV audience to buy Wachovia, calling it one of only a few potential "winners" in the $700 billion bailout being proposed, and said that Mr. Steel's background as the former Treasury under secretary meant he had "a better handle on how this process works than anyone else."

On Mr. Cramer's show Monday night, he spent an entire segment apologizing to his viewers about having Mr. Steel on the program and for his own bullish call on Wachovia's stock. "I screwed up," he said, referring at one point to Mr. Steel as a friend for 25 years. "I believed in the guy. Did he take advantage of me? Perhaps yes."

A spokeswoman for Mr. Steel defended his appearance, saying, "The environment we were operating in dramatically changed" between then and now. She added, "If you look at his comments, he tempered them by saying 'We always do what's right for shareholders.' "In fairness, she's right about that. Mr. Steel said on the same program that, "We're a public company. So we're going to do what's right for shareholders, I can promise you that." And at times, he seemed to show some self-restraint, resisting talking directly about Wachovia, instead spending much of the program talking in generalities about the troubles in the market.

WATCH: Cramer And Steel Talk About Financial Crises

Maria Bartiromo, Erin Burnett: "There Is Not A Rivalry," "It's A Male Fantasy Thing"

2008-09-29T11:29:31Z

As for their rivalry ... The rumors, both women say, have been a little creepy. "There was a point," says Burnett, "when they were running this stuff semi-regularly, and Maria and I, one of us would pick up the phone and call the other and just be like, 'Hey, that's really nasty.' You can't deny that makes you feel awkward. Both people are like, 'Oh my God, oh my God'--you know it's not true, but you don't know where it's coming from." To be sure, there has been competition between them. "If there weren't, people would say we weren't working hard enough," says Bartiromo. It was Erin, she says, who first called attention to the importance of covering the Middle East and India, during trips to Dubai, and then Mumbai. In April, Bartiromo went on her own tour, to Abu Dhabi, Dubai, and Qatar, where she interviewed Sheikh Hamad bin Khalifa al-Thani, the prime minister and head of the country's $60 billion sovereign-wealth fund. There have been some major interview "gets"--including Christopher Ailman, the chief investment officer of the $160 billion California State Teachers' Retirement System--who say that they have gone on Erin's shows, only to be told that if they want to be interviewed by Maria on Closing Bell they could not appear on any competing shows. "Exclusivity is important to Maria," says Ailman, who says he now "only does Maria when I go on TV. She's No. 1."

"There is not a rivalry," insists Bartiromo. "Erin and I are friends." For Bartiromo the competition goes well beyond Burnett, and the pressure to stay one step ahead never lets up. "I'm always worrying," she says. "I mean, if I'm not worried about something, I worry." Last year she trademarked the name "Money Honey," and set up a company by that name to produce animated shows to teach children about money--although the company's name may change because she got "a lot of pushback" from people who thought "it was too sexy for children." She has a book to finish, on success, which is due in 2009, along with her BusinessWeek column and her television work. And, as she puts it, battles to fight. She says she is constantly struggling with her producers to get more airtime on her interviews, and her dream is to host a show with a format closer to that of Charlie Rose, which will no doubt be a demand she makes on CNBC--or anyone who outbids the network--as she negotiates her new contract. And she wants to maintain her hammerlock on the big interviews. If all those things are in place, says Dylan Ratigan, her co-anchor on Closing Bell, Maria isn't much interested in having Erin, or anyone else, as a rival. "As long as Maria is in a place where she feels comfortable, when she is doing what she wants to do, she doesn't much care what anyone else does. She's fine."

As for Erin, there may be a bit of a struggle getting out of Maria's enormous shadow. "No one wants to be compared," she says. "I have a great deal of admiration for Maria, but you don't want to be known as someone's '2.0.' Maria is amazing, but I want to be Erin 1.0."

Both of them, though, think the idea of a rivalry between them is particularly absurd, considering the on-air bitchfest among their male colleagues. Viewers at CNBC are regularly treated to screaming matches. Charlie Gasparino dressing down fellow correspondent Dennis Kneale during the Eliot Spitzer scandal: "You're not Client No. 1, right?" Kneale, voice shaking, shouts back: "I'd like an on-air apology. Show some class." Viewers have yet to see Maria and Erin hack at each other like that. "Oh my God, that is so true," says Maria, bursting into laughter.

There are some who believe that the rumors of a feud between Bartiromo and Burnett were started either by a disgruntled former CNBC employee or someone at Fox Business Network, or perhaps someone who falls into both categories, mainly because so many items about their rivalry have appeared in the New York Post, which, like FBN, is owned by Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. Bartiromo and Burnett, however, have their own suspicions about who may have started the rumors. "Erin and I have spoken about this," says Bartiromo, "and I just think that we both feel like, well, maybe at the end of the day someone is doing this, planting this, because it puts more attention on the network." Asked if she means executives at CNBC, she smiles and says nothing. CNBC roundly denies this, but it sort of makes sense. After all, a fight between two smart, successful, beautiful women does not make for a bad marketing tactic in a business that still caters largely to men. "I think that when people see strong, successful women, they love to imagine that there is a rivalry," says Burnett. "Maybe it's because there are not as many women. And maybe, I don't know," she says, rolling her eyes, "it's a male-fantasy thing."

Americans Turn To CNBC To Explain Financial Crisis

2008-09-29T08:02:31Z

The week of Sept. 14 was the highest-rated one in CNBC's 19-year history, with 502,000 viewers during the business day (counted as the 5 a.m. to 7 p.m. hours by CNBC). Last week the ratings remained high, with an average 441,000 viewers through Thursday.

Mark Hoffman, the president of CNBC, said the network had focused for years on "the delicate balance in business between fear and greed.

"When there's an aggressive move to one extreme or the other CNBC engagement surges," he said. "Through much of this crisis fear has beat greed silly."

As Tom Brakke, an investment firm consultant, put it in a blog post last week, the viewer impulse was perhaps "the same basic instinct that attracts onlookers to a car crash."

The ratings have also soared for the Fox News Channel, CNN and MSNBC in recent weeks. (Presumably they have also increased for the business channels Fox Business Network and Bloomberg, but their ratings are not publicly reported by Nielsen.

Business pundits are suddenly in demand: CNBC reporters have contributed daily to the "NBC Nightly News," and Fox Business Network hosts have appeared on "20/20" and "The View."

Raymond J. Learsy: Bailout Ballet: New York Times Reports on Hank Paulson/Pimco's Bill Gross Pas de Deux

2008-09-26T00:43:40Z

Talk about setting the fox in the hen house, the New York Times outdid itself today ("For Hire: Bailout Advisor," 09.25.08) in puffing Bill Gross's frightening offer to become the bailout adviser to the Treasury. "And I'd even be willing to say if the Treasury wanted to use our help, it would come, you know, free and clear." And why not -- the last time the Treasury took his advice, which was endlessly proffered on CNBC, Mr. Gross and his Pacific Investment Management Company (Pimco), the country's largest bond mutual fund, hit the jackpot with a $1.7 billion payday piggybacking the Treasury's and taxpayer's bailout of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac last month.

According to Gross he was not out of line in recommending and pushing for a bailout from which Pimco would benefit outrageously because "Pimco had no official role in formulating the plan...we want safe agency guaranteed mortgages. We don't want to take a lot of risk in subprime space." Huh?? Since when in recent memory, and until the bailout, was Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac paper not "subprime space." What's going on here?

Well, later in the Times' article it was reported that Mr. Gross regularly talks to Mr. Paulson. Could one conjecture that Mr. Gross's persuasiveness goes beyond appearances on CNBC and as far as Mr. Paulson's ear? Certainly the redemption of all classes of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bonds at full value is highly peculiar given that some $110 Billion in Lehman Bonds are now trading at 18 cents on the dollar according to the Financial Times (Sept. 23).

As reported in the Times, Mr. Gross further argues against measures that would restrict executive compensation, a position that Mr. Paulson shared with Mr. Gross until Mr. Paulson was made to understand it was a non-starter in Congress. Of course there was no mention of Mr.Gross' relationships with all those executives whose compensation might be restricted.

The article goes on to state that Mr. Gross, in his beneficence, argues that
"foreign banks should be allowed to take part in the program." The initial outlines of the bailout program specifically excluded foreign banks and their American affiliates. The ink was barely dry on the initial bailout outline when pressure was brought to bear to amend it, striking that exemption (please see "The Bailout: The Bond Billionaires Piggybacking The American Taxpayer For Another Gilded Ride," 09.24.08). Perhaps one could imagine that there might have been another one of those Gross-Paulson telephone calls wherein Mr. Paulson was reminded that Pimco is an affiliate of Allianz, the large German insurer headquartered in Munich.

On January 28 of this year I posted "Citicorp's Self Immolation and the Beginning of the Eclipse of American Style Capitalism" that it was long past time that crony capitalism in this country be ended. That "Foreclosures, lost jobs and lost futures, for the middle class and the underpowered can no longer be tolerated while the corporate bigwigs dance off richer then ever before. It is a sign that American capitalism has grown rotten at the core. The capitalist impulse, the kind that made a Bill Gates possible, that nurtured his exemplary vision, making him rich and all of us as a society richer, is under attack by vested and influential interests that have stacked the game to such one sided advantage, that it is on the verge of losing all credibility and crushing our confidence in a system that was a meritocracy and a beacon unto others. It is obscene, and a healthy society cannot permit it to continue."

Paul Abrams: No, Erin Burnett, We Are Not "All Responsible" for this Mess

2008-09-25T21:38:34Z

CNBC's Erin Burnett has spent most of the day interviewing the players in Congress and the financial markets, feeding them the gibberish that we are "all responsible" for this economic meltdown.

No, Erin, we are not.

The reason we are not is not that the new, "marginal homeowners" (to coin a term) are too unsophisticated to understand what obligations they were undertaking, although they are as a group certainly far less sophisticated that the mortgage lenders earning their commissions, who in turn are far less sophisticated than those who aggregated and then sold the mortgage-related assets (MRAs).

The reason we are not all responsible is the same reason teenagers are not responsible for becoming addicted to cigarettes. They were attacked by the tobacco industry with scenes of success and/or serenity, and it did not take many months of smoking before the addictive power of nicotine set in. Marlboro Country. You've Come a Long Way Baby. Take a Puff and It's Springtime.

Similarly, the American people have been literally bombarded for decades on the benefits of home ownership. Anyone reading this who has not had a friend or relative suggest that they are"wasting money" renting, not building equity? Brokers have been advising prospective buyers that stretching themselves now to meet monthly payments is good financial planning -- the interest is tax-deductible, the house will rise in value, and with a little increase in salary over time, the payments will seem less and less burdensome. And, this does not even include the unscrupulous who acted shamefully.

That is not only how a middle-class family was to build a nest-egg for retirement and a source of loans for college tuition, but they were living in it and thus experiencing practical value at the same time.

And, then, of course home ownership was the paradigm, the symbol, of the American dream. So, if one did not stretch to grab a home, one was not only stupid, but un-American.

Finally, one's friends had done precisely this 5 years ago. While you were wasting money renting, friends had seen value appreciation of 40, 50, 60%. While the renters struggled, the homeowners could take out second mortgages for pre-school, and some great vacations.

None of this is to suggest these people, any more than teenagers who start smoking, bear no responsibility. But, it is not as if they awakened one morning, with no prior urgings, no prior visions pounded into them, and decided on their own to stretch their finances to own a home.

By sheer, utter, and complete contrast, the "sellers" in all of this -- the mortgage companies, the banks, the mortgage-related asset concocters, the investment banks that bought and sold those instruments, the lobbyists who successfully removed oversight, the Republican Congress that overturned Glass-Steagall -- all of them awakened on various mornings and contemplated what schemes they could employ to enhance their revenues.

Moreover, unlike the marginal homeowner whose purchase decision was binary, either they bought a home or rented, the sellers were all making money, it was a continuum, just a question of how much. Thus, they did not face the same type of decision as the marginal homeowner.

The sellers, of course, were lobbying and supported by the Republican Congress, the Bush Administration and John McCain. The marginal homeowners did not have a lobby.

Greed is very different from need, even if need turns out to be a bit of stretch.

So no, Erin, we are not all equally responsible.

Charles Warner: CNBC vs. Fox Bimbo News

2008-09-24T17:04:15Z

On Tuesday and Wednesday I watched CNBC and Fox Business News (FBN) cover the biggest financial crisis in the country's history and the appearance of Henry Paulson and Ben Bernanke before the Senate and Congressional Banking Committees. It was the Super Bowl of television business news coverage - like the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal's coverage of 9/11. CNBC won hands down over Fox Bimbo News.

Not that CNBC's coverage was flawless, it fumbled the ball at least once while I was watching, but overall what I saw and heard on CNBC was far more intelligent, more knowledgeable, and graphically more relevant than the coverage on FBN.

CBNC's anchors and reporters were far more knowledgeable about the complexities of the financial crisis than those on FBN. I got the distinct impression that, in general, CNBC chose its on-air people based on their knowledge and expertise and FBN chose its on-air people based on their looks and personality. No big surprise here. Although, there was at least one anchor (in the morning) on FBN who was both attractive and seemed to know what she was talking about, but a couple of the male guests and FNB reporters on her segment were clueless.

How do I know who is clueless and who isn't about this unbelievably complex situation? Because I usually know when I listen to people if they are smarter than I am (which is usually the case). If someone knows about as much as I do about a subject, then I figure he or she is not that smart, so I go somewhere else to learn what I don't know. So for two days I kept coming back to CNBC and leaving FBN.

CNBC fumbled the ball on Tuesday when chief economic reporter, Steve Liesman (unnecessarily accusative and obnoxious) got into a extended, nasty on-air fight with "Squawk on the Street" anchor Mark Haines (defensively outraged), which "Squawk on the Street" co-anchor Erin Burnett handled nicely and professionally -- she came out if looking a lot better than either of the males, and I don't mean "looking" having to do with looks.

On Tuesday CBNC had a highly visible and readable graphic on a split screen when Paulson and Bernanke were testifying that showed second-by-second stock market movement (Dow Jones and other averages) and the US dollar value vs. other currencies. This graphic was cool because you could see what effect Paulson and Bernanke's testimony and the Senators' reactions had on the markets and on the dollar -- smart. FBN had confusing bouillabaisse of graphics on the bottom third of the screen - dumb because it was hard to read and hard to make sense of. On the second day (Wednesday), FBN didn't learn much from CNBC's better coverage and graphics and didn't change its graphics approach. I suppose it didn't want to give CNBC the sincerest form of flattery -- not in FOX's DNA.

Also, CNBC had a good, readable graphic on a ticker that was a summary of Paulson and Bernanke's testimony -- smart and helpful.

What did we learn about the players in the hearings -- Paulson, Bernanke, the senators, and congressmen on the Senate and House committees? We learned that Paulson, who played tackle on the Dartmouth football team, looked and talked like an offensive lineman - big, tough, pushy, and aggressive, barely masked by an outward deference to the committee members. Bernanke surprised me. We learned that as a former university professor (almost my favorite kind of person), Bernanke had the ability to explain complex issues and make them understandable. He was a quite, calm intelligent star. He was the cool, smart quarterback who had a big tough tackle blocking for him -- a good combination.

The majority of the senators and congressmen performed as you would expect. Most of them weren't asking questions of Paulson and Bernanke (appointed by a Republican president); they were grandstanding to their constituencies and to the public. It was typically boring, embarrassing, and dumb browbeating. The two exceptions were the chairs of the committees: Senator Chris Dodd and Congressman Barney Frank (both Democrats). They got it and moved things along.

America is fortunate to have Dodd and Frank represent us, Paulson and Bernanke blocking and tackling for us, and CNBC informing us about the crisis. What about FBN? About as deep in knowledge and expertise and about as qualified to do the job as its favorite vice-presidential candidate.

Raymond J. Learsy: CNBC Giving Airtime to Bailout Winners

2008-09-24T10:46:27Z

CNBC, the broadcaster that so graciously gave Bill Gross near endless airtime to propagandize for an unfettered bailout of all debt holders of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, permitting his company PIMCO, the nation's largest bond trader to clear between 1.7 and 1.8 billions in profits on the backs of American taxpayers, is at it again. This afternoon at around 2pm (please see "CNBC's Fawning Coverage Helping Bond Billionaires Fleece Main Street," 09.15.08) Gross has been invited back on CNBC to give his insights on the current bailout plan.

Question: will he be asked to reveal his book and will he be asked exactly how the bailout will impact his fund's bond holdings, and to what degree of profit? Or will he simply be given free rein to lecture us about the stormy seas ahead and what needs be done for PIMCO's sake -- oops, sorry, I mean for our sake.

By the way, for those who were listening, Warren Buffet was on earlier this morning on CNBC. Now there is someone worth listening to and who plays with an open deck.

Raymond J. Learsy: The Bailout: The Bond Billionaires Piggybacking The American Taxpayer For Another Gilded Ride

2008-09-21T09:58:58Z

As the outlines of the "bailout" package come into focus, initially limiting the bailout to redeeming assets from American institutions, the fine hand of the influence peddlers are already all over the program. Hardly out the door, as the New York Times reported as of this writing (9/21/08):

"Even as talks got under way, there were signs of how very much in flux the plan remained. The administration suggested that it might adjust its proposal, initially restricted to purchasing assets from financial institutions based in the United States, to enable foreign firms with United States affiliates to make use of it as well." ($700 Billion Is Sought For Wall Street Vast Bailout" NYT 09.21.08)

Now who might they be referring to when signaling out "foreign firms with United States affiliates," and who would likely benefit most? Could it be an organization that has already enriched itself on the backs of the Freddie Mac-Fannie Mae bailout and the American taxpayer to the tune of $1.7 to $1.8 billion? While others were sinking, they saw fit to crow about their bonanza in the press (FT.com) and on CNBC (Please see: CNBC's Fawning Coverage Helping Bond Billionaires Fleece Main Street 09.15.08, referring in part to the Wall Street Journal's insightful editorial "Bailout for Billionaires" -- WSJ.com). Could it be the all powerful bond trader, PIMCO, with deep contacts throughout Washington and to the press?? Who just happen to be an affiliate of a foreign firm, Allianz, the German Insurance giant?

Wouldn't it be refreshing if someone in our Congress asked a few hard questions?

Tina Fey As Sarah Palin NBC's Most Watched Web Video Ever

2008-09-18T17:44:56Z

The Peacock felt gale-force winds beneath its wings this week on the Internet.

A trio of unrelated events conspired to give NBC Universal record traffic at three Web locations: CNBC.com, NBC.com and iTunes.

Instability on Wall Street this week made CNBC.com a prime destination, delivered the site's largest audience ever, according to internal data provided by Omniture.

It was Tina Fey's "Saturday Night Live" spoof of vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin on Saturday that gave NBC.com its most-watched viral video ever. The video not only topped past favorites like "D--- in a Box" and "Lazy Sunday," but managed to outdo copies uploaded to YouTube.

Users of Apple's popular digital storefront had no problem relocating NBC Uni's TV shows now that a new deal between the companies on Sept. 9 restored episodes. More than 1 million downloads for NBC Uni TV properties have been tallied since then, according to Apple.

Simran Sethi: Congress Weans Us Off the Teat of Foreign Oil with Concessions to Offshore Drilling

2008-09-15T12:52:25Z

The Republican mandate to "drill, baby, drill" is shortsighted and unsustainable, yet even the most rational of Dems is now kowtowing to this call. On September 16, the House of Representatives debated a bill House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) unveiled last week. In addition to conservation measures and the higher fuel efficiency standards addressed in my last post, the bill permits oil drilling 100 miles off the Atlantic and Pacific coasts and empowers coastal states to decide whether to allow drilling as close as 50 miles off their shores. A variation of this bill developed in the Senate plays with the boundaries of who can drill where, in a water-logged version of NIMBY.

Weaning America off the teat of foreign oil is something that every citizen can agree is a good thing. But most of that foreign oil comes from just north and south of us in Canada and Mexico, presumably not countries that John McCain says "don't like us very much." Suck on that, Senator.

Let's be clear, this legislation will not take away your hurt at the pump, regardless of your political affiliation. What it will do is finally start to put some funding into the renewable energy infrastructure that we so desperately need. Royalties from the minuscule amounts of oil that we extract offshore will be pooled with increased tax revenue from big oil to fund domestic renewable energy resources: the sources that keep on giving. I'll explore more of these over the next few weeks. Let's start with the energy source that is getting the most attention at the moment: wind.

Oil tycoon and Swiftboat funder T. Boone Pickens has sunk billions into what he hopes will be the largest wind farm in the world, bolstered by U.S. Department of Energy research indicating wind could generate 20% of our energy by 2030. Pickens is not an altruist. He's a shrewd businessman who looks after his own interests and wants to continue to grow his wealth. Right now wind is just 1% of our total domestic energy mix. The huge growth potential of wind coupled with dwindling fossil fuels makes the energy source a darling of environmentalists and Wall Street. Last year, nearly half of the $54.5 billion spent on clean energy generation went to wind. And for the last three years, the U.S. has been the largest market in the world for new wind turbine sales, reflecting the growth in wind farms across the country.

But with all the fanfare, we still have a long way to go. The windiest spots tend to be situated in the middle of nowhere, making heavy-wind areas inaccessible to consumers and transmission lines that could move the electricity to where it's needed. Some locations closer to civilization are suffering a logjam of entrenched political interests, like the scenario playing out in full color in Kansas, a state with the 3rd largest wind capacity in the country that currently gets only 1% of its energy from wind and almost 90% from coal. Other locales are reluctant to get windy for cosmetic reasons (yes, even Democrats are vain).

If we want to harness our earthly elements for power and energy, it's time to re-define beauty and reinvigorate our economy. Turbines eliminate the invisible, ugly impacts of coal like mercury contamination and air pollution, and the market volatility of dwindling resources such as coal and petroleum.

Don't get me wrong. We still have major primping to do in the form of improved tax credits and rapid investment in infrastructure. Maintenance costs are low, but wind is more expensive to build. The Pelosi bill is a significant step in recognizing the long-term benefits of clean, abundant, homegrown energy and reduced greenhouse gas emissions.

This post was written by Simran Sethi. Thanks to Heather Mueller for research assistance and Kris Kros for the image. For more information on energy challenges and opportunities, subscribe to Simran's "Powering the Planet" podcasts.