I’ve done a couple posts here on the national debt – the inability of the national debt clock in New York City to handle the rollover to $10,000,000,000,000.00, and the freezing of the Treasury Department’s online national debt clock, now resolved.

The other day, through the WashingtonWatch.com Twitter feed, I discovered a service that will send you the national debt for the day, each and every day. Check out the NationalDebt Twitter feed.

Unfamiliar with Twitter? I wrote some about it while I was deciding whether or not to Tweet WashingtonWatch.com stuff.

The National Debt Twitter feed is hosted by the Peter G. Peterson Foundation, which is dedicated to “increasing public awareness of the nature and urgency of several key challenges threatening America’s future, and to accelerating action on them.” Sounds good to me.

They have an interesting page on the real national debt, which stands at about $53 trillion, not the $10+ trillion we think of. This is the debt calculation that includes what the federal government has committed to pay in Social Security and Medicare benefits beyond expected revenues in those programs.

Your share of the real national debt is about $175,000. You and every other person in the country. The real national debt is a real problem.

Anyway, kudos to the folks at the Peterson Foundation for pressing these issues as we’re doing from time to time here. Now, if we could just get through to you people!

Seriously, pass this post along to someone who you know who might be interested. We can get this national debt situation under control if everyone pays a little attention and takes a little time to get a handle on all that our government is into. We’re here to help you do that. And we’re gonna make it fun! (huh – maybe)

There were a lot of good reactions to yesterday’s post about candidates for federal office with responsibility for at least part of the financial crisis.

We listed House members and Senators who either voted for, or didn’t object to, a law freeing up financial services firms to offer these wagers known as “financial derivatives” without being subject to gambling regulation. The result has been a financial and economic disaster of as yet unknown proportions.

If you reviewed the list carefully, you noted that both Senator John McCain (R-AZ) and Senator Joe Biden (D-DE) stood by and let the law pass in 2000. It went through the Senate on “unanimous consent” and they failed to object. Given their responsibility to know what is on the Senate floor and what it does, it’s fair to find them blameworthy.

In case you’ve been in a coma, McCain is the Republican nominee for president. Biden is the Democrats’ vice presidential nominee. (Neither Barack Obama nor Sarah Palin were serving in the House or Senate when the law passed, so they’re off the hook on this one. Same with independent candidate Ralph Nader.)

But there are some other presidential candidates out there that were around when the table was set for this part of the financial crisis.

Bob Barr and Cynthia McKinney are the Libertarian and Green Party candidates for president respectively. They were both serving in the House of Representatives in 2000 — both representing districts in Georgia, in fact — when the vote happened on the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2001.

Libertarian candidate Bob Barr voted NO. (Here again is the House vote.)

McKinney did not vote; she was one of 80 members who declined to register an opinion. It’s hard to know whether this was some kind of protest or if lots of Members of Congress were prioritizing Christmas shopping, but in this case it looks good for her. Even if all the non-voters had voted No, the bill still would have passed.

Particularly in the case of Barr, this tells you something about outsiders, and I think it tells you something good. The get-along, go-along types who have made it to the top of the heap in U.S. politics both participated in the creation of the country’s current economic woes. The people who don’t play ball both voted against that. There’s something to be said for not getting along.

A third-party vote signals to the major parties that you’re dissatisfied with they way they’re doing things. You’ve got reason to be, considering the role of McCain and Biden in precipitating the financial crisis. There’s another thing to consider when you go to the polls next week.

In 2000, Congress passed a law barring states from regulating credit default swaps under their gambling and “bucket shop” laws. This set the stage for the market in “financial derivatives” that are a big part of what is causing the economic meltdown today.

One hundred fifty-five of the Members of Congress who voted for this law are still serving—and they’re up for reelection next week. You might want to take their votes on credit default swaps into account when you go to your polling place.

The Senate passed the bill on “unanimous consent.” Everyone just agreed to let it go through, including 22 Senators who are up for reelection.

Below is a list of the current Members (all of them up for reelection) who voted to let gambling be treated like a financial service, and the Senators up for reelection who allowed the bill to go through.

Click on your state to see if your representatives helped create today’s economic problems: Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, Wisconsin, or Wyoming. (See all House votes here.)

For some background, give a watch to Sunday night’s very interesting and insightful 60 Minutes piece on credit default swaps and how they played into the financial crisis. Essentially, they’re side bets that allow people to wager on financial outcomes without having to buy assets.

The 60 Minutes story points to a section in H.R. 5660, the Commodity Futures Modernization Act of 2000. That bill was folded into the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2001, a massive spending bill, passed in haste at the end of the 106th Congress.

(Sound familiar? Congress passed a similar huge spending bill a few weeks ago.)

Now, is it unfair to blame House members and Senators for letting this small provision through in such a large bill? Heck No! They collectively let the annual spending process get out of control. This lead to the gigantic bill with the derivatives gambling provision in it, which is now a cause of our economic collapse. They should be held responsible individually for the results, and hiding from their responsibility in collective shirking will not do.

Recapping, the following list includes House Members still serving who supported the Consolidated Appropriations Act and Senators currently up for reelection who allowed it to pass (plus a couple who voted for it in the House). The bill preempted state gambling regulation on financial derivatives. These folks have responsibility for at least some of the economic mess we’re in today.
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With the drama of the election and the recent huge bailout and spending bills flying through Congress, it’s easy to forget the kajillions of little things the federal government is churning out all the time.

So here’s one that caught my eye – the Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) has just announced a meeting “of the General Conference Committee of the National Poultry Improvement Plan.” It’ll be held at the at the Georgia World Congress Center in Atlanta January 28, so book your plane tickets now if you want to go.

The meeting will be open to the public, but I was disappointed to learn that the public is not allowed to participate in the discussions during the meeting. I had thought that I would share my personal poultry improvement plan, which is to cook it in some oil and spices and plop it into folded corn tortillas with a dollop of sour cream.

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The news on Friday and over the weekend was that the Treasury Department will not announce which banks are getting cash infusions in the next portion of its modified bailout program. The standard line is that Treasury announcements about our “investments” in the financial sector are being restricted because those announcements would label winners and losers. And for some reason that’s bad.

(I said “modified”: Recall that the bailout was supposed to be the purchase of troubled assets from financial institutions. Now, it’s about about buying pieces of the financial institutions themselves. And it may be extended soon to insurance companies – and then automakers!?)

But there’s another interest at stake, beyond this “winners and losers” justification. Remember the pressure Treasury is under from the blogosphere for hiding its payments to financial services providers like New York Mellon Bank? Be confident that this is causing Treasury bureaucrats some discomfort.

By keeping its latest list of investments obscure, Treasury reduces by just a little bit the ability of the average taxpayer to figure out what it’s doing. The result? More freedom of action for the Treasury Department.

In the contest between its own power and the “good government” practice of transparency, a government agency will always choose to enhance its own power. What we’re seeing here is nothing sinister – it’s exactly how you’d expect an agency to act. But hidden government doesn’t need to have sinister motives to cause bad results.

Here’s the WashingtonWatch.com email newsletter for the week. Subscribe here.

email newsletter | tell a friend | wiki | about | home | log in On the WashingtonWatch.com Blog Just two weeks after the passage of the bailout bill, and one day after a Treasury Department official declared, “we are committed to transparency and oversight in all aspects of the program,” the Treasury Department began covering up the amount it would pay to New York Mellon Bank for acting as a financial agent in the bailout. Read about it on the WashingtonWatch.com blog. Featured Items Congress has adjourned until January, but leaders may call the membership back to take care of unfinished business later this year. While the lawmaking takes a break, a couple of bills relating to veterans are worth taking a look at. In late September, the Veterans’ Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act became law. It increases veterans’ disability compensation and their survivors’ dependency and indemnity compensation by the same cost-of-living adjustment payable to Social Security recipients. This new veterans benefits law costs just under $375 per U.S. family. Another veterans bill, subject of a new cost estimate last week, is H.R. 1222, the Keep Our Promise to America’s Military Retirees Act. The bill would would allow military retirees, their dependents, and survivors to enroll in the Federal Employees Health Benefits program, giving up their eligibility to use their military health insurance (TRICARE). Total cost to the average U.S. family would be a bit over $70. It’s unclear if H.R. 1222 will pass, but it’s interesting to watch how veterans’ benefits are on the march. P.L. 110-324 The Veterans’ Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act of 2008 Costs $373.90 per family H.R. 1222 The Keep Our Promise to America’s Military Retirees Act Costs $72.47 per family What People Think The Veterans’ Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act of 2008 52% For, 48% Against Vote on this Bill The Keep Our Promise to America’s Military Retirees Act 84% For, 16% Against Vote on this Bill Displayed below are new, updated, and passed items with their cost or savings per family. New Items H.R. 6707 The Taking Responsible Action for Community Safety Act Costs $0.32 per family H.R. 1222 The Keep Our Promise to America’s Military Retirees Act Costs $72.47 per family H.R. 6853 The Nationwide Mortgage Fraud Task Force Act of 2008 Costs $0.00 per family S. 1756 The Republic of the Marshall Islands Supplemental Nuclear Compensation Act of 2007 Costs $0.45 per family S. 2052 The Equal Justice for United States Military Personnel Act of 2007 Costs $0.16 per family S. 3189 The Endangered Fish Recovery Programs Improvement Act of 2008 Costs $0.33 per family S. 1080 The Crow Tribe Land Restoration Act Costs $0.29 per family Updated Items P.L. 110-324 The Veterans’ Compensation Cost-of-Living Adjustment Act of 2008 Costs $373.90 per family Passed Items P.L. 110-437 The Capitol Visitor Center Act of 2008 Costs $1.49 per family P.L. 110-438 The National Guard and Reservists Debt Relief Act of 2008 Costs $0.00 per family email newsletter | tell a friend | wiki | about | home | privacy | contact | log in WashingtonWatch.com P.O. Box 77576 Washington, D.C. 20013

The world was rocked a couple of weeks ago when I reported here that the National Debt Clock was broken.

Not the big sign in New York City – that one’s working, though it needs a new digit. The Treasury Department’s “Debt to the Penny and Who Holds It” feature was stopped. Stopped on Friday, October 10th.

Well, it’s running again. Go on with your lives America!

But keep in mind that the national debt is now $10,524,112,985,802.87.

Your share of that is $34,448.30.

You and every other man, woman, and child in the country.

Back in late August/early September, I did a brief assessment of the presidential candidates’ legislative activity – one window onto how they might behave in the White House. Oh, and one for the V.P. candidate, too.

Here are the posts on Senator McCain’s priorities, Senator Obama’s priorities, and Senator Biden’s priorities. My brief follow-up on the Democratic candidates is here.

I’m not the only one who thought of looking into their legislating, of course. Donny Shaw at OpenCongress has done an assessment of the legislative accomplishments of the two presidential candidates. It’s quite thorough, including the 109th Congress and amendments sponsored by either candidate, which can be significant.

(But my analysis came out first! Whaddya want, quality or . . . speedity . . . ?)

Looking further, the Obsidian Wings blog has a similar analysis. It’s good, too. Quite a bit better than you’d expect from a blog named for something that will never fly.

So there’s more perspective on the candidates’ legislating. No guarantee of what it tells you, but it tells you something.

Just two weeks after the passage of the bailout bill, and one day after a Treasury Department official declared, “we are committed to transparency and oversight in all aspects of the program,” the Treasury Department began covering up the amount it would pay to New York Mellon Bank to act as a financial agent in the bailout.

The amount to be paid the bank in the contract posted to the Web is blacked out.

That’s transparency? That lets us do oversight?

BailoutSleuth also points to a contract with a law firm in which the hourly rates of attorneys and staff are blacked out.

Let’s get something clear here:

Private contracts can be kept private. Public contracts are the public’s business.

When the government goes to spend $700,000,000,000.00 of taxpayer money, the public must be able to review every particular of that spending.

We are under no obligation to “trust” that this will be handled well. We should be able to see that it is being handled well.

The firms that contract with the government to provide services have no claim to privacy or confidentiality if they want to do government business.

Treasury should immediately publish complete versions of these documents.

Here’s a bad rap video about a bad dance that’s so bad – and it’s combined with such a ridiculous hucksterish money-making scheme – that I just had to share it with you.

What really makes it preposterous is that the producer of the video – a nobody named Bob Brown (not Bobby Brown) – is trying to get YOU to sell it to Obama supporters for him.

Friends, I have the right product at the right time, and I could have made a deal with a Distribution company to distribute my DVD and life would still be fine for me. But I’m cutting you in on this deal.

I SINCERELY WANT TO HELP AT LEAST ONE THOUSAND FAMILIES MAKE AN EXTRA $3,000 OF INCOME THIS HOLIDAY SEASON. I am a single father of a 23-month old son. I know what it means to need extra money to provide the best Holiday Season for your family.

I am offering you the opportunity to buy a master copy of my “Can you do THE OBAMA DANCE” DVD with the RESELL RIGHTS!!!!!!!!

It’s $14.95 – an 80% discount from what he ordinarily would charge you. So, that’s, like, almost free! And you can make $3,000!

It’s all part of the circus that is election season. I suppose this guy has a chance of making money off this scheme. After all, people believe what politicians tell them. Why shouldn’t they believe Bob the Rapper? This huckster would be as good as anyone to take care of the investment banking crisis.