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Is JPMorgan a farmer?

Wed, 20 Mar 2013 17:02:00 +0000

Imagine you’re a finance lobbyist and want to move deregulation and other industry-friendly policies through Congress. While you might think the House Financial Services Committee would be the logical place to do it -- since it has jurisdiction over financial issues, naturally -- what if there were a sneaky way to maneuver it through a far less scrutinized committee, so most people would have no idea what you were doing?

This is the story of how the world’s largest banks came to love the House Agriculture Committee.

In Washington, we often witness politicians forgetting the lessons of a year or five years or 10 years ago. It takes some special obliviousness to forget the lessons of Friday. Five days ago, Sen. Carl Levin, D-Mich., delivered a critical report and held an explosive hearing detailing the “London Whale” trades, made by a JPMorgan Chase satellite office in London. As you may have read, these trades turned sour and led to a $6.2 billion loss for the bank in a matter of weeks. More important, JPMorgan misled regulators about the nature of the trades, altered its internal processes to take on more risk, and then hid the losses by improperly mismarking the value on its balance sheet, pretending the shortfall was inconsequential to avoid oversight and present a positive financial picture to investors.

Court will hear campaign donation limits appeal

Tue, 19 Feb 2013 16:32:00 +0000

WASHINGTON -- The Supreme Court will hear a challenge to campaign finance laws limiting how much an individual can give to political campaigns.

The justices on Tuesday decided to hear an appeal from Shaun McCutcheon of Alabama and the Republican National Committee. They are arguing that it's unconstitutional to stop a donor from giving more than $46,200 to political candidates and $70,800 to political committees and PACs.

McCutcheon says he accepts that he can only give $2,500 to a single candidate but says he should be able to give that amount to as many GOP candidates as he wants.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia upheld the limits, but the high court decided to review that decision.

Republican dark money group’s corporate sponsors revealed

Thu, 14 Feb 2013 19:51:00 +0000

Some of the nation’s biggest corporations donated more than a million dollars to launch a Republican nonprofit that went on to play a key role in recent political fights.

Like the nonprofit groups that poured money into last year’s elections, the decade-old State Government Leadership Foundation has been able to keep the identities of its funders secret. Until now.

A records request by ProPublica to the IRS turned up a list of the original funders of the group: Exxon, Pfizer, Time Warner, and other corporations put up at least 85 percent of the $1.3 million the foundation raised in the first year and a half of its existence, starting in 2003.

Worker calls cops on Salvation Army for noise complaint

Wed, 21 Nov 2012 16:30:00 +0000

The Salvation Army's annual winter charity drive, in which volunteers ring bells and stand next to kettles calling for cash donations outside of shops, has long-been a marker of the holiday season. But Sarah Hamilton-Parker, who works in downtown Portsmouth, N.H., is fed up with it. Hamilton-Parker called the police to report the volunteers on her street, citing a noise complaint. Seacoast Online reported:

She said the bell ringing starts in the morning, clangs all day long, then continues into the night. According to her calculations, she listens to 40 hours of Salvation Army bell ringing every week, for five weeks a year, or 200 hours a year.

“I don't get a break,” she said. “It makes my blood pressure go sky high.”

Tyler Perry donates van to woman with cerebral palsy

Wed, 03 Oct 2012 13:00:00 +0000

DECATUR, Ga. (AP) -- Filmmaker Tyler Perry is donating a new vehicle to a Georgia woman with cerebral palsy after her specially-equipped van was stolen outside Atlanta.

Perry tells Atlanta station WSB-TV he decided to give Alicia Day a brand new van after he saw a news report about the theft this week.

Authorities say Day's 2000 Chrysler Town and Country van was stolen from her Decatur driveway sometime Sunday night.

Day, who uses a wheelchair, told WSB she prides herself on being independent and works part-time as a greeter at Home Depot. Her mother relied on the van to take Day to work and to doctor appointments.

Day said "my mouth just dropped to the floor" when she learned Perry would give her a new van.

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Information from: WSB-TV