The Wonk Room

In response to Congress extending and expanding the unnecessary and expensive homebuyer’s tax credit, the Tax Policy Center snarkily suggests a few “new tax credits.”

A paper by three International Monetary Fund economists shows that “mortgage lenders who lobbied Congress more intensively earlier this decade made riskier loans, were more prominent in communities that ended up with higher delinquency rates and had stock prices that fared worse than others in the industry.”

A bill in Congress that would impose new IRS reporting requirements on foreign financial institutions has drawn the ire of the New Democrats and the banking industry.

Congressional Hispanic Caucus (CHC) Chairwoman Nydia Velázquez (D-NY) met with President Obama yesterday and warned that CHC members are prepared to vote against the Democrats’ health care bill if undocumented immigrants are not allowed to participate in the exchange and buy insurance at full price.

18-year-old Nicholas Hausch pleaded guilty to his role in the hate-motivated murder of Ecuadorian immigrant Marcelo Lucero and agreed to testify in the upcoming trials against his six other friends.

Neo-Nazi members are staging a protest against immigration this Saturday and will be marching down Washington Street toward the capital buildings in Phoenix, Arizona.

The United Nations said it is “temporarily removing more than half of its foreign staff from Afghanistan in response to the killing of five workers at a guesthouse in Kabul last week.”

VOA reports that “an aide to ousted Honduran President Manuel Zelaya says a deal designed to end the country’s political crisis has failed, after interim leader Roberto Micheletti announced the formation of a new cabinet.”

The Palestinian president, Mahmoud Abbas, “warned on Thursday that he would not seek re-election, the latest sign that the Obama administration’s drive to broker a Middle East peace accord, one of President Obama’s key foreign policy goals, has fallen into disarray.”

House Democratic leaders worked furiously on Thursday to “secure the final votes for weekend approval of a sweeping health care overhaul.” While they don’t have 218 votes yet, Democrats are confident they will pass the measure sometime this weekend.

The Washington Post observes that “the legislation’s prospects got a boost with key endorsements Thursday from AARP, the American Medical Association and the American Cancer Society.”

“Hawaii would be allowed to opt out of key requirements of national health care reform legislation, the only state given such a privilege because it already has its own comprehensive health insurance law,” the AP observes.

“It is time to be totally blunt about the agenda of the climate change skeptics in all their colors,” Australia prime minister Kevin Rudd said today. “It is to destroy agreed global action on climate change abroad, and our children’s fate – our grandchildren’s fate – will lie entirely with them. It is time to remove any polite veneer from this debate.”

“The balance” in the Senate on climate action “is among people who, like myself, are people who come from coal states and manufacturing states, who can’t just meet the Copenhagen deadline,” Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV) said, calling for further delay.

“More than 23 million people are facing a major food crisis with significant threat to lives and livelihoods” because of drought in Africa, and typhoons have killed over a thousand people in Vietnam and the Philippines.

The Washington Post reports that despite a GOP boycott of the markup process, the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee is prepared to pass a climate bill without amendments when the committee convenes today.

Yesterday, legislators in California passed a series of bills that “would vastly overhaul the state’s troubled water system.” The historic water package, which Gov. Schwarzenegger pledged to sign, was “prompted by a protracted drought — which has reduced water supply, harmed the fishing industry and contributed to crop loss.”

Following more than 70 public hearings, South Korea, “the OECD’s fastest-growing carbon polluter,” announced that it would set its “carbon emission reduction targets for 2020 on November 17 at between unchanged from and 4 percent below 2005 levels.”

“House Democratic leaders struggled Wednesday to strike a deal that would restrict the use of federal money to pay for abortions under sweeping health care legislation headed for debate on the House floor this week,” the New York Times reports. “But the proposed compromise satisfied neither supporters nor opponents of abortion rights.”

Blue Dog Democrats face a dilemma this Saturday as the House prepares to vote for the health bill: “Should they oppose legislation they believe is flawed, or move the bill out of the House in the hopes of it changing in conference?”

The Congressional Budget Office estimates that the House plan to prevent cuts to doctors’ Medicare reimbursement rates would cost $210 billion over 10 years.

After weathering weeks of Republican objections, the Senate finally passed a bill extending unemployment benefits yesterday, by a 98-0 vote. “The measure will increase to 99 weeks, or nearly two years, the maximum length of time that a jobless worker can get benefits in some states,” the New York Times notes.

“After spending more than a year in suspended animation, the commercial real estate industry is expected to hit bottom in 2010 with a wrenching thud,” which is going to spell trouble for a lot of small lenders and community banks.

Brad Delong writes that, while it wasn’t pretty, government intervention saved the country from a depression.

The Wall Street Journal points out that “Democrats may have to press ahead with a broad overhaul of immigration laws next year” if they want Latino voters to turn out and vote for them in 2010.

Republican candidate for Texas governor, Debra Medina, is the first candidate in the 2010 race with Spanish-language TV ads in which she claims she is “alguien como ustedes” — “someone like you.”

Two Guatemalan parents of US citizens with no criminal history who have lived and worked in the US since 1992 are about to be deported after spending $30,000 on legal proceedings in the absence of much-needed immigration reform.

Iran’s Arabic-language television network Al Alam said on Wednesday that “it had been taken off the air by Arab satellite operators based in Egypt and Saudi Arabia without explanation.”

In a profile of Secretary of State Clinton, Joe Klein reports that “the Palestinians are weak and divided. The Israelis have been difficult, as always: whenever Mitchell raises East Jerusalem in talks with the Israeli Foreign Minister, the Israeli stands up and walks out of the room.”

The New York Times reports that Abdullah Abdullah, “the erstwhile rival to President Hamid Karzai in the presidential election’s second round, held a news conference on Wednesday in which he denounced Mr. Karzai’s newly anointed administration as illegal and said that the government would be unable to cope with the problems facing Afghanistan, including security and corruption.”

Republicans refused to applaud German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s call to “tear down walls of today” and “work in common in order to stem the potential catastrophe that can result if we continue to see global warming continue unabated.”

A survey of the “289 economists who had published climate-related studies in the top 25 economics journals in the past 15 years” finds “94% believe the U.S. should join climate agreements to limit global warming.”

Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) rebuked the Republican boycott of the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power Act markup, saying, “we are very close to a completely accurate estimate. People might say, ‘Why not wait?’ Because as soon as you amend it, you change it again. What are they going to do, wait five weeks to analyze each amendment?”

Democrats filed their Manager’s Amendment to the House health care bill last night, suggesting that vote “will not be held until Friday evening at the earliest.”

The Washington Post reports that “moderate lawmakers are exerting their outsize influence in the divided Senate to secure changes to health-care reform legislation, potentially adding more delays to a bill that has already missed several announced deadlines.”

“Sen. Tom Harkin (D-IA) said Tuesday he was launching an investigation into health insurance pricing, asking four major insurers to justify their pricing practices.” “Harkin sent detailed requests to the four private companies — Aetna, Humana, Wellpoint and UnitedHealth Group — asking them to explain how they set premium rates and to explain the factors used in determining such charges.”

Buried in the unemployment insurance extension that both the House and Senate will likely pass this week is a tax change that, according to the National Bureau of Economic Research, will “prove to be a $34 billion financial windfall for corporate America.”

Rep. George Miller (D-CA) introduced legislation yesterday “directing employers to pay for up to five days’ sick leave for workers they send home because they have contracted the H1N1 virus.”

The House Financial Services Committee, “under pressure from the White House, voted Tuesday to exempt small public companies from part of a federal law designed to prevent financial fraud, despite objections from regulators and key Democratic leaders.”

BBC reports that “US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, on a visit to Cairo, has reiterated Washington’s call for an end to Israeli settlement activity in the West Bank.”

VOA reports that “senior U.S. diplomats are meeting with detained Burmese opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi Wednesday, as the Obama administration pursues a new diplomatic approach towards the military-ruled nation.”

Reuters reports that “police clashed with supporters of Iran’s opposition leader Mirhossein Mousavi in Tehran on Wednesday when a rally marking the 30th anniversary of the storming of the U.S. embassy turned violent.”

Latino leaders have started a campaign to make sure legal immigrants don’t get cut out of the health care bill by eliminating proposed waiting periods and canceling the existing five-year wait for Medicare and Medicaid programs.

A South Carolina poultry plant raided by immigration agents last year has avoided trial by agreeing to pay $1.5 million, change its hiring practices, and adopt E-verify — a controversial web-based employment verification system.

Immigration and Customs Enforcement appears to be sticking to its promise of focusing more on dangerous immigrants: 45% of immigrants arrested in 2009 had criminal convictions, up from 23% last year.

According to The Hill, Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) “has reached a private understanding with Majority Leader Harry Reid that he will not block a final vote on health care reform, according to two sources briefed on the matter.”

Congressional Daily reports that Democrats are close to finalizing an abortion compromise that would strengthen the segregation of private and public funds without writing into law the Hyde Amendment’s prohibition on using federal funds for abortion.

A new Senate analysis suggests that for-profit insurance companies spend as little as 66 cents of each dollar on health care, “while the rest covers administrative expenses, marketing and company profits, according to the analysis.”

According to a new report, “nearly half of all U.S. children and 90 percent of black youngsters will be on food stamps at some point during childhood, and fallout from the current recession could push those numbers even higher.”

The British government announced yesterday that “it will break up parts of major financial institutions bailed out by taxpayers, highlighting a growing divide across the Atlantic over how to deal with the massive banks that were partially nationalized during the height of the financial crisis.”

Ryan Avent asks “what if for one year — just one year — we allocated as much money for infrastructure as we did for defense?”

Despite attacking the scientific criticism of SuperFreakonomics as being motivated by their “interests in non-carbon energy sources,” author Stephen J. Dubner joins the “doomsayers” his book mocks, saying “We’re heading towards cataclysm.”

Climate change will wholly eliminate the snows of Kilimanjaro “within a decade or two,” a new scientific report has found. “The climatological conditions currently driving the loss of Kilimanjaro’s ice fields are clearly unique within an 11,700-year perspective.”

On the day of the introduction of “Our Choice,” Al Gore’s new book about how we can build a green economy, the New York Times runs a front page story promoting right-wing attacks on his investments in clean energy — picked up by the Drudge Report.

Analyzing the Obama administration’s troubled efforts at Middle East peacemaking, Tony Karon writes “Having made resolving the Middle East’s most intractable conflict a top foreign policy priority, the Administration now needs the symbolic resumption of talks simply to signal progress.”

Sam Stein reports that the National Iranian American Council and J Street, “two relatively new organizations — each covering distinctly opposite ends on the spectrum of Middle Eastern affairs — have been the target of withering public relations attacks in recent weeks and months.”

Reuters reports that Afghan election officials declared Hamid Karzai president after “intense behind-the-scenes diplomatic activity to prevent a one-man contest on November 7.”

Members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Hispanic Caucus and the Congressional Asian Pacific Islander Caucus are pushing House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to allow undocumented immigrants to participate in the health insurance exchange and purchase insurance at full cost.

The U.S. Supreme Court asked the Solicitor General to comment on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s challenge to an Arizona immigration law which imposed penalties on businesses that hire undocumented immigrants and requires all employers to use an online verification system.

Ben Reed was a conservative shock jock, but changed his philosophy after falling in love with a Mexican immigrant who was deported on their wedding day.

CIT Group filed for bankruptcy yesterday afternoon, making it “the first firm to fail after being bailed out by the government.” The bankruptcy process “almost certainly will wipe out the federal government’s $2.3 billion investment in the company.”

The AP’s latest Economic Stress Index shows that “the economic recovery is proceeding unevenly in its early stages, with areas hurt most by the housing slump still lagging behind other regions.”

According to a new report by the Tax Justice Network, Delaware is the most secretive financial jurisdiction on Earth, surpassing Switzerland. “While the U.S. has been jumping up and down and saying ‘Aha, bad, wicked Swiss banks,’ the U.S. is doing exactly the same things,” said Sarah Lewis, executive director of the UK-based group.

Nick Baumann looks at recent neocon smears of Trita Parsi and the National Iranian American Council, which charge without evidence that Parsi and NIAC have been working on behalf of the Iranian government.

The London Times reports “Hamid Karzai was handed a second term as President of Afghanistan today when the election run-off was cancelled after his main rival withdrew from the race. Dr Abdullah Abdullah quit yesterday in protest at the Government’s failure to combat election fraud.”

The Washington Post reports that “Palestinian officials criticized the United States for what one called “backpedaling” on demands that Israel stop settlement construction in the occupied West Bank, saying the Obama administration’s change of approach on the issue damaged the likelihood of a peace agreement.”

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) “are set to meet Wednesday with Energy Secretary Steven Chu, as well as with Obama’s top climate adviser, Carol M. Browner, and Interior Secretary Ken Salazar to discuss a possible compromise” on comprehensive climate and clean energy legislation.

Exxon Mobil spent $7.2 million lobbying Congress this summer, more than the the $6.6 million total of the entire alternative energy sector, and more than every environmental group combined, who spent $6.1 million, according to an E&E News analysis.

“Nepal’s Cabinet will hold a meeting on Mount Everest” ahead of the international climate change conference next month in Copenhagen, Denmark “to highlight the threat from global warming, which is causing glaciers to melt in the Himalayas.”

The top 13 health insurers and their industry association, America’s Health Insurance Plans (AHIP), “spent nearly $8.2 million in the third quarter of 2009 to influence Congress on upcoming health care legislation, according to analysis released today by the nonpartisan campaign finance watchdog Public Campaign Action Fund (PCAF).”

Roll Call reports that Senate Republicans are planning to derail the health bill. They “plan to use targeted amendments to attack the legislation issue by issue, offering detailed GOP alternatives in a concerted bid to turn the public against the measure and to try to set the table for electoral gains in 2010.”

POLITICO details the White House’ strategy for passing health care reform. “Obama has worked behind the scenes to move the process along, keep abreast of policy disputes and monitor House and Senate vote count.”

Despite the fact that police have not ruled out the possibility that the bullet which hit Lou Dobbs’ house belonged to a hunter, Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio is now considering tightening his own security.

The New York City Bar Association is “calling for all immigrant detainees to be provided with counsel” and are citing the Varick Street Detention Facility as an example of the “fundamental unfairness” of the US immigration detention system.

Brad Botwin, the Jewish founder of Help Save Maryland, resents his group being labeled a “nativist extremist group” and says he views the listing as an “anti-Semitic act against me.”

“I don’t think you’ll ever have offshore drilling for oil and gas until you marry it up with emissions controls,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) told reporters. “They don’t have 60 votes for environmental policy in the House and the Senate because it’s bad for business. All of these bills, I couldn’t support because they’re cap and trade legislation that really does put us at a competitive disadvantage.”

“The nation is using less water now than it did in 1975 and 1980,” according to new data just released by the US Geological Survey (USGS) shows that total water use in the United States dropped “while the nation’s population and economy grew.”

During testimony on his opposition to the Clean Energy Jobs Act, American Farm Bureau chief Bob Stallman contested the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, saying “Congress should at least hold hearings to consider the scientists and climatologists who disagree with the IPCC data and analysis.”

Reuters reports that “U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton signaled on Friday that the United States will allow talks with Iran over its nuclear programme to play out before considering fresh sanctions against Tehran.”

The Washington Post reports “Russia and the United States are scrambling to address disagreements over a new nuclear arms reduction treaty with a little more than a month left until the existing agreement between the Cold War adversaries expires.”

Reporting from Iraq, Nir Rosen writes “Sectarianism rules, if less explicitly violently than it once did. The new government is among the most corrupt in the world. It is beginning to resemble its Baa’thist predecessor in its authoritarianism and brutality. But it faces no immediate threats, and its strength gives it some form of legitimacy, even among Sunnis. An ugly peace may indeed hold” in Iraq.

The “most extensive direct count” to date finds that the economic stimulus package has created or saved 650,000 jobs. This data “doesn’t include the thousands of jobs created or saved indirectly, through tax cuts, unemployment benefits, Pell Grants and other payments.”

A new Department of Education study finds that “nearly a third of the states lowered their academic proficiency standards in recent years, a step that helps schools stay ahead of sanctions under the No Child Left Behind law.”

According to a new Bloomberg poll, most bank executives “expect their bonuses to match or exceed last year’s, with 1 in 10 predicting their best-ever payout.” A majority of executives “also turn thumbs down on government attempts to limit compensation, with 51 percent saying restrictions will stifle useful innovation.”

More than 100 Democrats in the House of Representatives signed a letter to President Obama urging him to tackle comprehensive immigration reform in early 2010.

Following an almost 15 year battle, the Obama administration has recommended political asylum for Rody Alvarado Peña, “a Guatemalan woman fleeing horrific abuse by her husband, the strongest signal yet that the administration is open to a variety of asylum claims from foreign women facing domestic abuse.”

“Arizona lawmakers are renewing a push to grant local police the ability to detain and question suspected undocumented immigrants.” The legislation would make it a crime to “trespass on the territory of the state” and allow local police to arrest anyone who cannot provide documentation of their citizenship.

Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) in a new Web video posted Thursday, “makes the case for a public health insurance option and appeals to voters across the country to contact Washington to “push hard” for its inclusion in the final bill.”

TPMDC’s Brian Buetler is reporting that Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND) says “he will vote to bring the bill with a public option and an opt-out to the floor — getting the bill past a key procedural vote — and suggested his colleagues should do the same.”

The Wall Street Journal observes that the “House health-care bill presents more problems for drug makers than legislation in the Senate, but it gives the medical-device industry better breaks.”

The House unveils its health care reform legislation today. Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) “wants to have the legislation on the floor next week, with a final vote before Veterans Day, Nov. 11.”

In an effort to satisfy moderate Democrats, the House bill includes a public option that uses negotiated reimbursement rates. But asked whether more members of the Blue Dog Coalition will vote for the plan now that leaders will include negotiated rates, “Utah Rep. Jim Matheson, a spokesman for the group, said, “I don’t know. … It’s an important issue. But it’s not the only issue. It has never been the only issue.”

Meanwhile, the GOP is trying to generate business opposition to health care reform.

A group of New Mexico Latinos who were fired by the widely publicized hotel owner who wanted them to Anglicize their names may take their case to court.

Ten New Haven residents fighting deportation are suing their supervisors and senior immigration officials, alleging that their civil rights were violated when ICE agents stormed into their homes without cause, consent or search warrants.

San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom has vetoed a measure that supervisors passed Tuesday that would prevent local police from turning over minors to immigration officials until they are found guilty of the alleged crime.

The U.S. gross domestic product (GDP) grew at a 3.5 percent pace in the third quarter, “the best showing in two years” and the first increase since the spring of 2008.

According to a new report by Pew Charitable Trusts, “none of the credit cards offered online by the 12 largest U.S. banks would meet requirements of new federal curbs on the industry’s rates and fees.” All of the companies employed practices considered “unfair or deceptive” by the Federal Reserve.

Bloomberg reports that “U.S. carriers including Delta Air Lines Inc. will have a harder time blocking union organizing campaigns under a change planned by a federal labor board.”

“Iran will seek major revisions to a U.N.-draft nuclear fuel deal, including shipping abroad its low-enriched uranium (LEU) in stages rather than all at once,” a pro-government newspaper reported on Thursday.

BBC reports that Iraqi authorities have “arrested more than 60 security force members, including 11 senior officers over Sunday’s twin suicide bombing in the capital Baghdad.”

AP reports that “Afghanistan will open more voting centers in next week’s presidential runoff than in the fraud-tainted first-round vote…rejecting U.N. recommendations that they cut sites to prevent cheating.”

“Jack Bonner, head of controversial political consulting firm Bonner and Associates, and Steve Miller, the CEO of American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity, have a lot of explaining to do” in a hearing today on the fraudulent letters they sent to Congress opposing clean energy legislation.

Western Republicans claim Interior Secretary Ken Salazar is “trying to skirt congressional authority by issuing an administrative order on climate change.”

“An international team of environmental scientists has shown that sea-level rise, at least in North Carolina, is accelerating. Researchers found 20th-century sea-level rise to be three times higher than the rate of sea-level rise during the last 500 years.”

A USA TODAY review of reports from 33 states and Puerto Rico shows that economic stimulus package is having a “significant impact on the economy,” creating or saving 388,000 jobs this year in those states.

JP Morgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon yesterday endorsed efforts to create a resolution authority for unwinding complex financial firms. “We think everyone should be able to fail — being able to fail is a good thing — but you don’t want a failure that ruins America,” Dimon said.

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York said yesterday “that it had no choice but to instruct [AIG] last November to reimburse the full amount of what it owed to big banks on derivatives contracts,” which Bloomberg News estimates cost taxpayers $13 billion.

Reuters reports that “a car bomb ripped through a crowded market killing 90 people in Pakistan’s city of Peshawar on Wednesday, just hours after Washington’s top diplomat arrived pledging a fresh start in sometimes strained relations.”

Iran analyst Meir Javedanfar wishes Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad a happy 53rd birthday, warning him “the people of Iran are the country’s most powerful asset. Ignoring and abusing them has been perilous before, and could be again.”

AFP reports that “the Hamas-run interior ministry in the Gaza Strip said that it will ban the organization of elections called for by Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in the coastal territory.”

CNN’s documentary feature “Latinos in America” attracted far fewer viewers than “Black in America” and MediaBistro’s Kevin Allocca reports that “the bigger story” ended up being the hypocrisy of CNN reaching out to Latinos while keeping on Lou Dobbs.

Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) told NPR’s Jennifer Ludden that immigration reform can not wait and has a “window of February and March.”

Arizona’s Sheriff Joe Arpaio has a 61% job-approval rating and 60% of Maricopa County residents disagreed with the government actions aimed at limiting his immigration enforcement power.

In light of Sen. Joe Lieberman’s (I-CT) refusal to vote for a national opt-out public option, Sen. Tom Carper (D-DE) “is floating an alternative that would make a national public insurance option available initially only in states where private insurance is deemed unaffordable. Other states would eventually be able to opt into the public option under the Carper proposal.”

In the House, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) “has less than 200 votes for a public option pegged to Medicare, even though it would save an estimated $85 billion from the final cost of the health care bill.”

Has the American Medical Association lost its power and influence?

“Noah never would have survived the EPA“: Rep. Mike Simpson (R-ID) and Rep. David Obey (D-WI) joined forces to block the EPA from regulating greenhouse pollution from agribusiness and Great Lakes diesel ships, respectively.

In the first day of hearings on the Kerry-Boxer Clean Energy Jobs Act, Sen. Max Baucus (D-MT) argued Montana “cannot afford the unmitigated affects of climate change legislation,” but Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-OR) said “you could argue that this bill is not moving fast enough.”

Scientists have found that “relatively minor increases in ocean acidity brought about by high levels of carbon dioxide have significant detrimental effects on the growth, development, and survival of hard clams, bay scallops, and Eastern oysters,” and that coral reefs, also under threat from ocean acidification, provide “annual services to humans valued at US $130,000 on average, rising to as much as $1.2 million” per hectare

After a Mexican immigrant told the media that Dallas police had cited her for being a “non-English-speaking driver,” it turned out that 39 drivers have been wrongfully ticketed in Dallas for not speaking English.

Labor groups are calling on the Obama administration to establish an agreement between the Labor Department and immigration authorities with rules for cooperation and an understanding that labor law enforcement would not be trumped by immigration enforcement.

Dennis Burke, U.S. attorney for Arizona, has been named the chairman of the Border and Immigration Law Enforcement Subcommittee and will advise U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder.

“Only two Democrats, Sens. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Ben Nelson (D-NE), would not yet commit to moving ahead with a bill that includes a public option with opt-out.”

House Republicans are “questioning AARP’s support of the Democrats’ health care overhaul efforts, saying the reform plan could prove costly to seniors enrolled in the Medicare Advantage program.” Washington Post also has a critical piece on the organization.

“Democratic leaders were forced to include a national public health insurance option as part of health care reform by progressive Democratic senators who refused to support anything less, Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) said on Monday.”

Spurred by the Drudge Report, right-wing bloggers are enflamed that Sir Nicholas Stern praised “a vegetarian diet,” crying about the “millennial cult” of global warming and warning vegetarianism will lead to a “world government.”

The American Energy Alliance, part of the GOP-oil Institute for Energy Research, is running a Halloween-themed ad attacking Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) for his “scary” “support for a new national energy tax called cap and trade.”

“Activities such as home weatherization, routine vehicle maintenance and opting for the clothesline instead of the dryer could cut total U.S. carbon emissions by 5 percent over just five years and 7.4 percent in 10 years.”

Yesterday, Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) proposed freezing all credit card rates until new credit card regulations take effect in February. Dodd “said his bill was necessary because banks were raising rates ‘to squeeze customers‘.”

In a letter to the Securities and Exchange Commission, Goldman Sachs defended “dark pools, short-selling, high-frequency trading and other market practices that have been criticized by lawmakers,” saying that they reduce consumer cost and increase competition.

The New York Times examines how the recession is driving a surge in youth runaways: “Teenagers living on their own in eight states told of a harrowing existence…after fleeing or being kicked out by families in financial crisis.”

Iran’s foreign minister, Manouchehr Mottaki said Monday “that Iran could endorse a United Nations deal for it to send uranium abroad for processing for peaceful uses, the first official indication that Tehran could respond positively to the agreement.”

The Washington Times reports that “Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan began a high-level visit to Iran on Monday with criticism of Western pressure on Iran over its nuclear program and promises to double trade with the Islamic republic by 2011.”

According to the Voice of America, “an al-Qaida-linked group in Iraq has claimed responsibility for Sunday’s devastating car bombings in Baghdad that killed at least 155 people and wounded more than 500 others. The militant group named the Islamic State in Iraq announced it was behind the twin suicide bombings in a statement posted on a militant Web site.”

CNN is reporting that Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) will decide today if the merged Senate bill will include a public health insurance option. “Reid is likely to make the move without having firm commitments of support from 60 senators.”

Senate leaders may submit the merged health bill “to the Congressional Budget Office for a cost estimate as soon as Monday, and make the legislation public as soon as Tuesday, according to a person familiar with the negotiations.” The legislation is likely to include a ‘free-rider’ requirement and an opt-out public option.

Sens. Debbie Stabenow (D-MI) and Chris Dodd (D-CT) “are pushing Senate leaders and the White House to speed up key benefits in the health reform bill to 2010.”

The New York Times points out that rather than drawing in Latino viewers with CNN’s “Latino in America” special, the segment turned into a “rallying cry for activist groups who are calling on the cable news channel to fire Lou Dobbs.”

The Associated Press reports that US immigration agents have “blundered badly in their dealings with [drug cartel] informants and other sources, covering up crimes and even interfering in a police investigation into whether one informant killed another.”

An Iranian woman who was abandoned by her Muslim family for converting to Christianity went missing and the law students who won her asylum case are desperately trying to locate her and let her know that she will be able to stay in the US.

Tomorrow, Senate hearings on the Kerry-Boxer Clean Energy Jobs Act begin with testimony from administration officials, and President Obama will make a “smart grid” announcement “that will be the largest stimulus investment so far in clean energy.”

Steven Lawitts, New York City’s top environmental official, “called the risk that drilling for natural gas in the upstate region that supplies most of the city’s drinking water” “especially alarming,” and “suggested the state or the energy companies should foot the bill if they pollute the city’s water supply.”

The LA Times reports on the “10 million people worldwide who have been driven out of their homes by rising seas, failing rain, desertification or other climate-driven factors,” such as California’s wildfires and the Filipino floods.

Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) said that he does not think a bill consolidating all of the banking regulators into one super-regulator, which is being crafted by Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) in the Senate, will pass. “There is no remote chance of it happening,” he said.

U.S. bank regulators have closed more than 100 banks this year, “signaling the financial crisis hasn’t abated for lenders struggling with mounting losses tied to commercial real estate.” This is the first time since 1992 that 100 banks have failed in a single year.

Bank of America’s push to repay its TARP funds “has been snagged by a disagreement over how much additional capital the bank must raise to satisfy regulators,” according to the Wall Street Journal.

BBC reports “Afghan presidential candidate Abdullah Abdullah has demanded the chief of the country’s election commission be sacked ahead of a run-off poll next month. In a news conference Mr Abdullah said that Azizullah Lodin, the chairman of the Independent Election Commission (IEC), had ‘no credibility’. The IEC commissioners were appointed by incumbent President Hamid Karzai.”

Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki said today “that his country may agree to ship just part of its stockpile of low enriched uranium abroad for further enrichment, as per the Vienna talks…The comments by Mottaki were the first official indication that Teheran may at least partially agree to a UN-drafted plan to ship much of Iran’s uranium to Russia, where it would be further enriched into metal fuel rods.”

VOA reports “the war crimes trial of Bosnian Serb wartime leader Radovan Karadzic began Monday before the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia in the Hague, but without the defendant. Karadzic refused to attend the opening session, insisting he needs more time to prepare his defense.”

Controversial Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio “won’t close the door on a possible run for governor” and is confident he would win if he did.

A group of minority lawmakers from the Congressional Black Caucus, the Congressional Asian Pacific American Caucus, and the Congressional Hispanic Caucus adamantly opposed Sen. David Vitter’s (R-LA) amendment that would require the US Census to add a question about citizenship to its 2010 survey.

CNN reports that that about 50% of the approximately 7,211 unaccompanied undocumented children lack legal representation when arguing their case in immigration court.

Wellpoint, the nation’s largest health insurer by members, has issued a new study that purports to show “how proposed changes to the nation’s health-care system would drive up premiums for some individuals and small businesses.”

Yesterday, Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) said that “a measure banning insurers from engaging in price fixing, bid-rigging and market allocation will be added to broader legislation overhauling the health-care system.” The House Judiciary Committee approved the measure on Wednesday.

The Center for American Progress has issued a new report explaining how secret claims denial rates could tell consumers a lot about their insurance company

VOA reports that “the top United Nations envoy for Afghanistan says more foreign troops are needed to help secure the country, and to train its army and police forces.”

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov said on Friday that “Russia has agreed to proposals by the U.N. nuclear watchdog to help reduce Iran’s stockpile of low-enriched uranium.” “We agree with these proposals and we are counting on not only Iran, but all the other participants of the negotiations, to confirm their readiness to implement the proposed scheme,” Lavrov told reporters.

Commenting on the ubiquity of neocon nut Frank Gaffney on television, Steve Benen asks “is there nothing conservatives can say that would force them from polite company? Just how nutty must a far-right activist be before he/she is no longer invited to share their ridiculous ideas?”

Citigroup, in which the government has a 34 percent stake, “has more lobbyists than any other company who registered to try to shape legislation regulating the financial industry, U.S. Senate records show.”

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) “endorsed reducing banks’ power in nominating Federal Reserve regional bank presidents, vowing to include it in a planned overhaul of financial regulation.” Dodd’s move aligns him with Sen. Richard Shelby (R-AL) “who said last week he was pushing for the move to eliminate ‘obvious conflicts.’”

The research firm CreditSights believes that “600 to 1,100 of America’s 8,200 banks may need help from, or winding down by, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, compared with the 118 that have failed since the beginning of 2008.”

“President Obama will appear at MIT this morning to talk about climate change and energy,” as thousands of activists worldwide prepare to call for “faster action, deeper GHG emissions cuts and stronger enforcement than either US climate legislation proposals or Copenhagen treaty conference preparations are currently contemplating,” in the 350 Day of Action tomorrow.

The Government Accountability Office told Congress that “federal agencies, working with Congress, state and local governments, should develop a national strategic plan that will guide the nation’s efforts to adapt to a changing climate,” including “flooding and other natural disasters brought by global warming.”

The Obama administration “proposed protecting critical habitat for the polar bear” — but “Interior officials insisted that the protections would not significantly alter” gas and oil drilling operations in the Arctic, including those in the critical habitat.

According to a new UN report, “Afghan opium is unleashing a ‘devastating’ impact across the world…funding the Taliban and other terror groups and killing thousands in consumer countries.”

U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice “told Israelis on Wednesday that it was not enough to pay ‘lip service’ to peace and urged the government to restart negotiations immediately, without preconditions, aimed at creating an independent Palestinian state.”

The Iraqi Parliament announced yesterday “that it had reached a stalemate over drafting an election law. That could well delay the election, scheduled for Jan. 16, and might even slow down the withdrawal of American troops from Iraq.”

Kenneth Feinberg, the Obama administration’s special paymaster, “will cut in half the average compensation for 175 employees at firms receiving large sums of government aid.” The Wall Street Journal reports that “the biggest cut will be to salaries, which will drop by 90% on average.”

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) said yesterday that “he would place a hold on the confirmation of union lawyer Craig Becker to join the National Labor Relations Board, saying Becker might try to make labor laws more union friendly without congressional approval.”

Goldman Sachs CFO David Viniar told reporters that Goldman “enjoys no government guarantee. Not even an implicit one.” Bloomberg’s Jonathan Weil responds “are you laughing yet?”

“President Obama will try to push the Senate climate bill” — the Kerry-Boxer Clean Energy Jobs Act — “forward Friday with an energy-themed speech at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, just days before the start of a marathon series of hearings featuring testimony from top administration officials.”

Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX) and Kit Bond (R-MO), working with the American Trucking Association and the American Farm Bureau, claimed clean energy legislation is a “giant new gas tax,” based on the National Black Chamber of Commerce’s 40-year estimate of a “$3.6 trillion surtax on gasoline, diesel and jet fuel.”

According to a new report from the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy (ACEEE), “states are backing big energy-efficiency programs, spurred by the belief that they could hold down heating and electricity bills, as well as cut greenhouse-gas emissions.”

The Hill is predicting that health insurance reform will be a winner for D.C. lobbyists and keep their business booming for the foreseeable future. “Good God, think about the business that would be generated by this thing,” said one lobbyist.

Congressional Democrats moved yesterday to repeal the anti-trust exemptions for health insurers. “It’s a different universe today than it was in 1945, and this exemption is antiquated, out-of-date, and doesn’t belong,” said Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY).

According to a joint report by the World Health Organization, United Nations and World Bank, while “global efforts to immunize children against life-threatening diseases set a record high last year” they still “failed to protect millions of youngsters in the world’s poorest countries.”

Arizona state Sen. Russell Pearce (R) has introduced the “Support Our Law Enforcement and Safe Neighborhoods Act” which “targets the undocumented immigrants themselves, the cities where they live and the companies and businesses that employ them” in support of Sheriff Arpaio’s controversial immigration enforcement.

US News & World Report claims that there is “growing common ground” between liberals and religious conservatives on the issue of immigration.

An immigrant who believes a US company kept him in forced servitude and an American who is angry the company hired foreign workers are “surprising allies” in a lawsuit that claims that the H2-B nonagricultural guest worker program hurts immigrant and US workers alike.

Mike Lillis at the Washington Independent reports that “Republicans are hoping to attach a number of amendments related to ACORN and immigration” to a bill extending unemployment benefits, and that these provisions “have delayed floor action on the UI bill indefinitely.”

In the last five months, the 22 biggest TARP recipients have cut their small business lending by $8 billion, and “as unemployment nears 10%, lawmakers are worried about the ripple effects of the credit clampdown.”

Felix Salmon on a report that former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson held a secret “social event” with the Goldman Sachs board of directors in Moscow: “This is sleazy in the extreme, and will only serve to heighten suspicions that Paulson’s Treasury was rigging the game in favor of Goldman all along.”

San Francisco supervisors voted to overturn an existing ordinance and require local police to turn over juvenile undocumented immigrants to immigration authorities only after they are convicted of a felony crime, instead of at the time of their arrest.

Latino activists are “proud that CNN talks about issues important to them” in its “Latino in America” documentary, but “disappointed the network isn’t addressing Dobbs’ [immigration] position head-on.”

The Washington Independent points out that after an Arizona judge ordered Sheriff Joe Arpaio to stop charging prisoners for transport associated with obtaining abortion services, Arpaio’s lawyer erroneously claimed that there is a “federal law that prevents us from extending credit to an illegal alien.”

President Obama “spoke by phone with his Chinese counterpart Hu Jintao on Wednesday with the leaders voicing hope for progress at December climate change talks, China’s state media reported.”

“With the clock running out and deep differences unresolved, it now appears that there is little chance that international climate change negotiations in Copenhagen in December will produce a comprehensive and binding new treaty on global warming,” the New York Times reports.

A study released yesterday “suggested that the forests of the Pacific Northwest could see a substantial gain in productivity” from climate change. “The bulk of the gains from climate change will be seen at higher elevations — above 3,000 feet — and in forests east of the Cascade Mountains.” “Lower-elevation forests, where most of the commercial timber is harvested, could see reduced growth as a result of drier conditions.”

AP reports “President Hamid Karzai’s chief political rival agreed Wednesday to take part in the Nov. 7 runoff election, setting the stage for a high-stakes showdown in the face of Taliban threats and approaching winter snows. However, ex-Foreign Minister Abdullah Abdullah said he would not accept an election organized on the same terms as the August presidential vote and was preparing a list of conditions for election organizers. ”

The New York Times reports “Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr. moved to repair a rift with Eastern Europe on Wednesday by announcing an agreement to station interceptors from President Obama’s reformulated missile defense system on the territory of this NATO ally.”

Al Jazeera reports “The UN’s atomic watchdog says Iran has agreed to consider a deal on its nuclear program, which could see it ship out most of its enriched uranium to Russia.”

President Obama has gone silent on health care. “After spending much of the summer and most of September banging his presidential drum in favor of a health care overhaul, Mr. Obama, entering what one senior White House official called ‘a quiet period,‘ is intentionally lowering his public profile on the issue, for the moment.”

Senate Democrats have “backed down from their effort to increase Medicare payments to doctors without offsetting any of the cost over the next 10 years.”

“House Democrats have cut the cost of their health care bill from more than $1 trillion over 10 years to $871 billion over a decade.”

“Burning fossil fuels costs the United States about $120 billion a year in health costs” — $62 billion a year from coal — as “20,000 people die prematurely each year,” according to a new report by the National Academy of Sciences.

CQ reports that Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT) is the “de facto amendment gatekeeper” for the Kerry-Boxer Clean Energy Jobs Act, while Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) are “expected to announce the formation of a Natural Gas Caucus” and Lindsey Graham (R-SC) is looking to form a “nuclear power caucus.”

Across the nation, “an antigarbage strategy” known as “zero waste” is “moving from the fringes to the mainstream, taking hold in school cafeterias, national parks, restaurants, stadiums and corporations.”

Southern California pastors representing 1,200 Latino Protestant congregations plan on working together to urge full Latino participation in the 2010 census and counter a boycott being pushed by a Latino evangelical clergy group in protest of the lack of immigration reform.

The Houston Chronicle reports that “one in five suspected illegal immigrants who went through an Immigration and Customs Enforcement intensive monitoring program absconded while under supervision during the past five years.”

A Mexican human rights official who admits he fears for his life after claiming that he has evidence of at least 170 cases of Mexican army human rights violations is being detained by U.S. immigration authorities as an asylum-seeker, even though he doesn’t want American protection.

Sen. Chris Dodd (D-CT) and five other Democratic Senators have introduced a bill to curtail bank overdraft fees. Reuters reports that, under the bill, “banks could not slap overdraft fees on cash-machine and debit-card transactions unless customers have specifically opted in to an overdraft protection program.”

Even as they received $350 billion in government funds, large banks “were boosting the perks and benefits they pay their chief executives” last year. Firms increased benefits — which included use of corporate jets, chauffeur services and personal security — by 4 percent.

Barry Ritholz points to a study finding that “securitized mortgages were five times as likely to be delinquent as mortgages that were not resold to securitizers.”

VOA reports “the Vienna talks on Iran’s nuclear program were delayed for two hours Tuesday after an Iranian official said France was not needed at the talks.”

JTA reports “U.S. authorities arrested a Defense Department official who allegedly agreed to spy for Israel. Stewart David Nozette, 52, of Maryland, allegedly told an FBI agent claiming to be an Israeli agent that he had access to U.S. satellite information and had once held top security clearances.”

CNN reports “two back-to-back suicide bombings killed at least two and wounded 13 others at a university in Islamabad Tuesday…The explosion occurred at the International Islamic University in the Pakistani capital, said police official Bin Yamin.”

“The basic Medicare premium will shoot up next year by 15 percent, to $110.50 a month, federal officials said Monday.” “About 12 million people, or 27 percent of Medicare beneficiaries, will have to pay higher premiums or have the additional amounts paid on their behalf.”

Poll Watch: “The number of Americans worried about losing their current health care coverage keeps rising,” while the number of Americans who support a public option is growing.

Live Pulse points out that “patient, consumer and labor groups are crafting a proposal they plan to shop to key senators to make health coverage more affordable than it would be under legislation approved by the Senate Finance Committee, hoping to influence a final Senate version of healthcare overhaul.”

Just three years ago, “foreclosure was rarely a factor in how people became homeless,” but according to a new survey by the National Coalition for the Homeless and six other advocacy groups, an average of 10 percent of the homeless people that social service agencies have helped over the last year lost their homes to foreclosure.

A report examining recent bankruptcy filings by small U.S. businesses reveals that “50 percent were current with one or more of their lenders when they threw in the towel,” which Reuters calls “a trend that could complicate lenders’ efforts to identify at-risk borrowers.”

A McClatchy investigation lays out how the credit rating agency Moody’s Investors Service “sold its ratings — and sold out investors.”

Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio conducted another one of his controversial immigration sweeps this weekend, despite the fact that federal immigration authorities recently stripped him of his authority to do so.

Immigrant advocates have asked US retailers that are selling an offensive “illegal alien” Halloween costume — which includes an orange jumpsuit, space alien mask, and fake green card — to stop selling the outfits, which are described as an “ignorant attempt to poke fun at a small community.”

Police are offering a reward for any information provided in connection to the brutal beating of an undocumented Mexican immigrant living in Brooklyn, NY, that left him so brain-damaged that he can’t recognize his own family.

The Washington Post explains that the Congressional Budget Office is not God. “Much of what the CBO does is akin to trying to forecast your grocery bill in 10 years.”

“The president of one of America’s largest labor unions, Gerry McEntee, has emerged as a major obstacle to the White House’s efforts to maintain a unified front in the health care debate.”

Al Hunt lays out “A Roadmap to Health-Care Overhaul by Christmas.” “Over the next couple of months, a sausage factory will seem tidier than the U.S. Congress. The disposition of the huge health-care overhaul will be a messy dance of legislation,” he concludes.

“Iranian officials claimed Monday that they had evidence of American and British involvement in the country’s worst suicide bombing attacks in years, raising tensions as Iran meets with Western nations for another round of delicate talks on its nuclear program,” The New York Times reports.

BBC reports that “a panel probing fraud claims in the Afghan election has found Hamid Karzai did not gain enough valid votes for an outright win…Karzai’s vote share had fallen below half after a number of votes were ruled invalid.”

Bloomberg reports that “Pakistan’s army said it was targeting the hometown of the architect of the Taliban’s suicide bombing campaign as it presses an offensive against up to 10,000 militants.”

“The Maldivian president and ministers held the world’s first underwater cabinet meeting on Saturday, in a symbolic cry for help over rising sea levels that threaten the tropical archipelago’s existence.”

Jairam Ramesh, India’s environment minister, “has urged the prime minister” to abandon the Kyoto Protocol structure and “take on carbon emission reductions under a new global deal without insisting on finance and technology from rich nations,” saying India “should try to curb emissions in its own interest” and instead push for diplomatic gains like “a permanent seat on the Security Council.”

Sen. Lisa Murkowski (R-AK) is “one of those who will keep my mind open as we move forward” in supporting climate legislation “if it also contains a vigorous expansion of nuclear energy and domestic oil drilling,” although a spokesman said “she will oppose any move by Democratic leaders if they try to debate the legislation on the floor before a major round of U.N. climate negotiations this December in Copenhagen.”

The Obama administration “scored its first financial regulation reform victory in months” yesterday, as a bill spearheaded by Rep. Barney Frank (D-MA) to regulate the over-the-counter derivatives market passed the House Financial Services committee by a 43-26 vote.

Administration “pay czar” Kenneth Feinberg “pushed outgoing Bank of America Corp. Chief Executive Kenneth D. Lewis into giving back about $1 million he received so far this year and forgoing the rest of his $1.5 million salary for 2009,” reports the Wall Street Journal.

Federal prosecutors yesterday announced charges “against 41 lenders, lawyers and others in the real estate industry who they said used fraud to obtain more than $64 million in loans connected to more than 100 residential properties in New York State.”

It’s expected that DHS will report this morning that a few local police agencies have dropped their controversial 287(g) agreements with immigration authorities that allows them to enforce immigration law, but that won’t outweigh the addition of 13 police and sheriff’s departments.

CNN has refused to an air an ad paid for by immigrant advocates and Media Matters during its presentation of its special, “Latinos in America,” which slams CNN’s Lou Dobbs’ anti-immigrant coverage.

The Harvard Undergraduate Legal Committee has canceled Minuteman leader Jim Gilchrist’s invitation to speak at its forum on immigration, citing that his participation is “not compatible with providing an environment for civil, educational, and productive discourse on immigration.”

“Congressional budget analysts have given House leaders cost estimates for two competing versions of their plan to overhaul the health-care system, concluding that one comes within striking distance of the $900 billion limit set by President Obama and the other falls below it,” the Washington Post reports. The report from the Congressional Budget Office “puts the cost of one plan at $859 billion over the next decade and the other at $905 billion.”

The Wall Street Journal reports that “Senate Democrats may widen insurance coverage in sweeping health legislation, Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus said Thursday, but they face a struggle to come up with ways to pay for the extra spending.”

How wellness initiatives allow employers to “drive some workers out of their health plans.”

The Wall Street Journal reports “U.S. spy agencies are considering whether to rewrite a controversial 2007 intelligence report that asserted Tehran halted its efforts to build nuclear weapons in 2003.”

AFP reports that President Barack Obama’s national security advisor Jim Jones has made a new call to revive talks on setting up a Palestinian state alongside Israel. “The time has come to relaunch negotiations without preconditions to reach a final status agreement on two states,” he said.

Haaretz reports “despite commitments Israel made to President Barack Obama’s administration last month, widespread building activity commenced three weeks ago in at least 12 settlements” in the West Bank. “This work is not part of the projects that Israel and the United States had reached an understanding on.”

Steven Pearlstein discusses “three embarrassing truths” about the U.S. Chamber of Commerce exposed by corporate defections because of its “continued opposition to doing anything about global warming.”

California’s “top water official said Thursday night that he is bracing for another year of drought and for even bigger challenges from climate change in the years ahead,” threatening the future of the nation’s top agricultural state.

Steve Colbert praised Bonner & Associates for “representing a oft-ignored constituency, non-existent Americans” by forging letters on behalf of the coal industry.

Among the thousands of bloggers participating in Blog Action Day by writing about climate change is UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who writes, “Climate change is the biggest threat to all our futures.”

The House Global Warming Committee is holding a hearing to investigate forged letters from Bonner & Associates as part of a $10 million Astroturf campaign to oppose climate and clean energy legislation by the American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity.

“Ecologists estimate that Arctic lands and oceans are responsible for up to 25 percent of the global net sink of atmospheric carbon dioxide,” but the “rapid rate of climate change in the Arctic” could spur a catastrophic release of methane, making the region a net source of greenhouse gases.

According to the the National Assessment of Educational Progress, “fewer than four of 10 fourth- and eighth-graders are proficient in mathematics…adding to recent evidence that the U.S. drive to become more economically competitive by overhauling public education may be falling short.”

The administration yesterday “attempted to preempt the announcement that Social Security recipients will not get an increase in their benefit checks for the first time in three decades” by advocating a one-time payment of $250 to seniors.

Simon Johnson writes that the Chamber of Commerce’s small business membership “should wake up to the current reality and press the Chamber hard to change its position [opposing the creation of a Consumer Financial Protection Agency] before it is too late.”

The insurance industry has released another study saying they will increase costs after health reform passes.

The Senate Finance Committee’s health-care plan bill is being hit from the left and the right. Yesterday, labor groups criticized the bill “deeply flawed” for its “lack of a government-run option and its tax on expensive health-insurance plans.”

The Washington Post explores the “hidden costs” of Medicare Advantage plans: “[T]he extra benefits are not exactly free; they are subsidized by the government. And some of the plans pass their costs on to seniors, who pay higher co-pays and additional fees to get care.”

Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) agreed to modify his amendment and only require the US Census to ask participants about their citizenship status, not their immigration status.

Some local and state police agencies are having “second thoughts” about their 287(g) agreements which allow them to work with immigration authorities to enforce immigration law, indicating that the new rules cost too much time and money and damage their relationship with immigrants.

An undocumented Mexican immigrant was severely beaten in Brooklyn by men who chased him down yelling “Mojado!” “Hey, wetback!”.

The Washington Times reports “a key al Qaeda military planner thought dead by the United States and Pakistan gave an interview this week to a Pakistani reporter, illustrating the uncertainties of a military strategy based on air strikes by unmanned drones.”

BBC reports “Israel has come under pressure from its allies to investigate UN allegations of possible war crimes by its army during its Gaza offensive last winter. Britain’s UN envoy urged Israel to hold “full, credible and impartial” investigations, echoing similar calls from his US and French counterparts.”

The Washington Post reports “the Pakistani cultural capital of Lahore came under assault this morning, as bands of militants and suicide bombers stormed three security installations in attacks that appeared to be coordinated. Around the same time, a suicide bomber blew up part of a police station in the northwestern city of Kohat. The death toll from the four attacks was 37, wire services said.”

The New York Times reports that “thousands of immigrants came to Capitol Hill” yesterday calling for comprehensive immigration reform” as Rep. Luis V. Gutierrez (D-IL) “unveiled” the principles which will guide the bill he plans to introduce.

Republican strategist and former RNC chairman Ed Gillespie admits that “the Republican Party was harmed with Hispanic voters” and advises the GOP to talk less about stopping illegal immigration and more about its support of legal immigration.

The US Supreme Court decided yesterday that criminal lawyers are not obligated to provide immigrant defendants immigration advice, but if they do, it cannot be “misadvice.”

Kenneth Feinberg, the Obama administration’s “pay czar,” “has advised American International Group to scale back $198 million in bonuses due next March to employees at its troubled Financial Products unit.”

After successfully lobbying the Obama administration to shelve its corporate tax reform plan, multinational corporations are now “urging Senate leaders to sideline a bill by Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., that aims to crack down on offshore tax dodgers, arguing that there could be unintended collateral damage.”

The LA Times’ David Lazarus asks “if the feds can come to the assistance of beleaguered banks and homeowners, why can’t they offer a helping hand in the form of lower [interest] rates for students?”

The Environmental Protection Agency “released a long-suppressed report by George W. Bush administration officials who had concluded — based on science — that the government should begin regulating greenhouse gas emissions because global warming posed serious risks to the country.”

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-CA) announced hearings on the Clean Energy Jobs Act will begin October 27 with testimony by Obama administration officials. Politico reports that “Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus, however, also plans to draft legislation dealing with the pollution allowances.”

In reporting on the die-off of “hundreds of thousands of acres” of aspen trees across the West, the Wall Street Journal fails to mention that scientists have conducted research that “links ailing aspen to global climate change.”

The White House is suggesting that health insurers have positioned themselves as the enemies of reform. “The insurance industry has decided to lead the charge against health reform, and everyone recognizes their motives: profits,” said White House deputy communications director Dan Pfeiffer. “They made themselves a very good foil,” he said.

The New York Times reports that “insurance companies, unions, medical device makers and others in the health care industry are furiously lobbying lawmakers to shift burdens onto someone else — anyone else — before they find themselves saddled with billions of dollars in taxes under new health care legislation.”

Jonathan Cohn has ten ways we can improve the Senate Finance bill.

Amid the economic recession the U.S. military announced that for the first time in 35 years they had met all of their annual recruiting goals. The Pentagon said that rising joblessness as well as more aggressive recruiting efforts “led more qualified youths to enlist.”

The Wall Street Journal reports that in the wake of growing Palestinian-Israeli conflict and no apparent signs of progress toward a separate Palestinian state, support for U.S. trained, Palestinian security forces has waned dramatically.”

The Russian government continues to resist increased sanctions on the Iranian regime. “At the current stage, all forces should be thrown at supporting the negotiating process,” Russia’s foreign minister announced yesterday. “Threats, sanctions and threats of pressure in the current situation, we are convinced, would be counterproductive.”

The Senate Finance Committee is expected to pass its health care reform bill at 2 p.m. today. The Senate Finance Committee reports that “few, if any, Republicans expected to support the bill,” and “Democrats have already begun their own internal negotiations aimed at reconciling the various measures passed by House and Senate committees.”

“After releasing a bruising analysis of the Senate Finance bill,” AHIP President and CEO “Karen Ignagni dodged a question about whether the industry supports the bill in its current form. “The challenges … can be addressed,” Ignagni said in a conference call with reporters.

Sen. Mike Enzi (R-WY) is accusing “the Democratic HELP staff of substantially altering the HELP bill as the plan was translated into its final legislative text, which was sent to the Senate floor last month.”

As the Miami Herald is reporting, leading members of the tourism industry are among those who have joined the “powerful campaign to allow all Americans to travel to Cuba.”

Advocates of immigration reform from ten cities across the U.S. are converging on Washington today. Rep. Luis Gutierrez (D-IL) argued for the urgency of reform, saying, “The longer we wait, the more every single piece of legislation we debate will be obstructed by our failure to pass comprehensive reform.”

Notorious Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio continued his media tour yesterday on FOXNews, declaring his intention to continue enforcing immigration law even though he was stripped of his federal enforcement powers. “Nothing will change,” Arpaio said. “I’m not going to be deterred by any bully.”

An op-ed by Sen. John Kerry (D-MA) and Sen. Lindsey Graham saying climate legislation will revitalize the economy has “jump-started the languishing proposal” and given Obama’s “climate-change hopes” a boost.

“As the West warms, a drier Colorado River system could see as much as a 1-in-2 chance of fully depleting all of its reservoir storage by mid-century,” but developers are beginning to change their profligate water-use practices.

“Much power plant waste once went into the sky, but because of toughened air pollution laws, it now often goes into lakes and rivers, or into landfills that have leaked into nearby groundwater,” the New York Times reports.

Two former Bear Stearns hedge fund managers go to court today “in the first, and so far only, prominent criminal trial stemming from the mortgage meltdown.” CNN Money dubs the trial a “test case for Wall Street justice.”

USA Today reports that “public school teachers are expected to be the big winners when states around the U.S. reveal for the first time how many jobs were created or saved during the first months of President Obama’s $787 billion stimulus plan.”

Michael Hiltzik writes that the myth of the overburdened rich “[has] the power to distort almost everything we see when we turn our attention to state spending and taxation.”

The Washington Post reports that the White House has authorized at least 13,000 more troops for Afghanistan, “primarily support forces, including engineers, medical personnel, intelligence experts and military police. Their deployment has received little mention by officials at the Pentagon and the White House, who have spoken more publicly about the combat troops who have been sent to Afghanistan.”

Reuters reports “Pakistani aircraft bombed militants in the South Waziristan region on the Afghan border as government forces prepare for a ground offensive against the militant hub.”

Ynet reports Israeli opposition Chairwoman Tzipi Livni “accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of being responsible for the uproar created by the United Nations report into the Israeli operation in Gaza. She hinted that Israel was the one who revealed that the Palestinians had deferred a Human Rights Council vote on the report, because the prime minister ‘had to boast of his performance.’”

Secretary of Energy Steven Chu cut the ribbon for the Solar Decathlon on the National Mall, with twenty prototype solar homes built by university teams from California, Minnesota, Virginia, and other states and countries competing in sustainability, efficiency, and design challenges.

In an emergency meeting with reporters yesterday, U.S. Chamber of Commerce Tom Donohue, rocked by the exodus of companies from his organization over climate policy, “did not directly answer a question about whether he believes that humans are causing climate change” and repeated his call for the EPA to “open the debate on the science.”

“You would have to go back at least 15 million years to find carbon dioxide levels on Earth as high as they are today,” a UCLA scientist and colleagues report in the online edition of the journal Science.

The New York Times reports “Myanmar’s military government allowed Daw Aung San Suu Kyi, the leader of the country’s beleaguered democracy movement, to hold a rare meeting with foreign diplomats on Friday as part of what appears to be early but tentative signs of a détente between the junta and Western governments.”

Reuters reports that “Pakistan’s foreign minister urged parliament to look with an open mind at a U.S. aid bill which the powerful military has voiced concern about.”

AP reports that “U.S. forces have withdrawn from an isolated base in eastern Afghanistan that insurgents attacked last week in one of the deadliest battles of the war for U.S. troops, the NATO-led coalition said Friday. The pullout from the Kamdesh outpost near the Pakistani border is likely to embolden insurgent fighters in the region.”

Bloomberg notes that the derivatives lobby may have found a friend in the New Democrats.

The New York Times reports that “problems at the Federal Housing Administration, which guarantees mortgages with low down payments, are becoming so acute that some experts warn the agency might need a federal bailout.” However, the FHA’s chief disagrees.

A coalition of business groups is reportedly “worried that Senate Democratic leaders will not hold a confirmation hearing on President Barack Obama’s nominee for a key post at the Labor Department,” and instead bring David Michaels’ nomination to head the Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) straight to the floor.

The East Valley Tribune says that “prideful” Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio “shouldn’t stand stuck in the mud” and continue refusing to adapt to ICE’s new agreement which limits his immigration enforcement powers, but “would shore up his own budget and would be far more likely to make a difference.”

Yesterday, the National Association of Evangelicals urged Congress to approve a resolution passed unanimously by the group’s board of directors recommending that immigration laws provide a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.

New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg presented a plan to “maximize economic contributions of immigrants, help immigrant children achieve, integrate immigrants into neighborhoods and civic life, and protect immigrants from exploitation.”

The stocks of large health insurers sunk yesterday after the Congressional Budget Office released their analysis of the Senate Finance Committee’s health plan. “The fear is that the bill will actually get through, and that increases the risk to the insurers,” said Avik Roy, an health care analyst with a private equity research firm.

According to a new report by the Commonwealth Fund released yesterday, “the quality of health care Americans receive depends largely on where they live, with insurance coverage, access to preventive medicine and disease treatment varying widely from state to state.”

This week the Consumer Union, the nonpartisan, nonprofit organization which publishes Consumer Reports unveiled the first television advertisement in their 72-year history: the historic 30-second spot features Consumers Union President and Chief Executive Officer James A. Guest arguing in favor of health insurance reform.