US Century Bank: depositors can't say now, they haven't been warned ... by gimleteye

This blog is the only place that readers curious how Miami operates can see the connections to the insider piggy bank, to be known only a little while longer as US Century Bank. The board of directors of US Century, led by founder Sergio Pino and Ramon Rasco, were the local power brokers who substantially helped transform local government from serving the needs of taxpayers to serving zoning and permitting to convert farmland and wetlands into crappy platted subdivisions in south and west Dade. The politics in South Florida, underlying the housing boom and bust, were etched into the landscape by the power brokers, gamblers, and land speculators who used US Century Bank as their crown and scepter. By industry metrics-- including loans to insiders as a percentage of total loans-- the bank should have been seized by regulators long ago. If the Tea Partiers want to find places to attach accountability to the economic and fiscal crisis, then they might start with the local bankers and they might find that politicians they support-- like Marco Rubio-- have stood by US Century Bank for many, many years.

Today, we have a hint that the theatrics at US Century are all tumbling down: yesterday the FDIC slapped a consent order on the bank, which is preliminary to removing the bank board and closing the operation down. If I were an "outside investor", I wouldn't invest a cent in its toxic legacy or assets. Check out the EOM archive to read how we have been tracking the US Century debacle: it is a more accurate "economic time machine" than you will find in the "60 metrics" glued together by The Miami Herald.

Seen on the Street. By Geniusofdespair

This was very depressing. I think I am going back to bed. Actually, I have a fever so it probably isn't a bad idea.

Check out the Haggman story on Mayor Gimenez's generous salaries to his top aides in the Miami Herald.

When did Mike Collins start taking checks from Big Sugar? ... by gimleteye

During Jeb Bush's terms as governor, Mike Collins was his enforcer on the governing board of the South Florida Water Management District. Recently, Collins wrote in a letter to the Palm Beach Post: "Rick Scott is putting politics aside and using his office to streamline Everglades restoration." As a younger fishing guide in the Florida Keys, Collins was described to me by one of the long-time guides as a "bantam rooster". His temper and combativeness served him well on the governing board of the district. He became one of the trusted Florida Bush loyalists after spending a few days on Florida Bay with the first President Bush and George Hommel and, later hunting with Dick Cheney. (As in, what is said in the hunting circle, stays in the hunting circle.) But it was on the governing board where Collins achieved his niche: dishing out vitriol against environmentalists as a stand-in for what Jeb! felt but would not publicly express. In more important forums, Jeb was busy setting his (the state's) lawyers about the business of destroying the Everglades to accommodate Big Sugar: ie. changing the law that was the foundation for the state's relationship with the federal government on water supply and water quality in the Everglades. That is not opinion: it is memorialized in a 2008 federal court decision still being fought by the Scott administration. So long as the facts didn't fit the policy, Bush needed loyalists who would go out and lie for him. That is what his Secretary of the Department of Environmental Protection David Struhs did, with the 2003 changes to the Everglades Forever Act. Mike Collins took the Big Sugar line then, as he is apparently now being paid to do. Read Mary Barley's recent letter to the editor to the Palm Beach Post in response. So when did Mike Collins begin being paid by Big Sugar?

Mike Grunwald on the Idiocracy ... by gimleteye

Miami-based, Time Magazine senior national correspondent Michael Grunwald has a refreshing viewpoint on the fiscal crisis engulfing American politics. "One of the major parties has abandoned its grip on reality."

Viewpoint
Still True Today: Frequently Forgotten Facts of the Debt Debate
By MICHAEL GRUNWALD Wednesday, July 27, 2011

If the debt-limit debate had anything to do with reality, every story about it would include a few basic facts. Starting with: President Obama inherited a $1.2 trillion budget deficit. And: Republican leaders supported the tax cuts and wars that (along with the recession, another pre-Obama phenomenon) created that deficit. Also: Republicans engineered this crisis by attaching unprecedented ideological demands to a routine measure allowing the U.S. to pay its bills. Finally, Obama and the Democrats keep meeting those demands—for spending cuts, then for more spending cuts, and even for nothing but spending cuts—but Republicans keep holding out for more.

FEC Slip in Bicentennial Park is a Historical Site With a WW II History. By Geniusofdespair

County Commissioner Dennis Moss wants to fill in the FEC slip in Bicentennial Park. I don't think he or any of the other County Commissioners know the slip has a historical component. This was the location of the Submarine Chaser Training Center (SCTC) during World War II. The Chaser Magazine Cover from 1943, seen above, shows three slips depicted with a soldier with a hammer putting up a sign on the pier bordering the only remaining slip. The two slips on the left have since been filled in. Also see photo below of the three slips. The SCTC was downtown Miami's international graduate school of anti-submarine warfare during the World War II.

Are we going to throw away our history just so we have a place to put dredge fill? I hope this idea gets what it deserves, no traction.

(Click on photos and magazine cover to enlarge them)

As an ever-increasing number of students poured into the SCTC, McDaniel told the local press that its rapid expansion necessitated the procurement of more housing and additional space for the training center’s operations. The City of Miami permitted the Navy to build temporary dressing rooms and shower facilities for its personnel in Bayfront Park at N.E. First Street.

And:

The subchaser center continued its expansion in the port as well. There had been damage to the engines of subchasers attributed to adulterated fuel and lubricants, so the Bureau of Ships required the SCTC to construct a fireproof laboratory on its pier with the appropriate testing and treatment apparatuses and personnel experienced in petroleum chemistry to analyze fuel and oil. That complex building had to be specially equipped with exhaust blowers to eliminate toxic fumes.

- Charles Rice

LBA Paying Homage to the New Mayor? By Geniusofdespair

From a Press Release: "On Friday, July 22nd, Mayor Gimenez was the keynote speaker at the Latin Builders Association Luncheon, where he discussed his budget plans and legislative priorities for the year ahead."

In office for a few weeks and already over to the LBA? I hope this isn't a harbinger of things to come. Must have been plenty of developers there with their tail between their legs groveling at Gimenez. The LBA endorsed Julio Robaina for Mayor, I hope Gimenez never forgets that.

The Skinny on the Boehner Budget: from the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities ... by gimleteye

I trust The Center On Budget And Policy Priorities to whittle down the blather, rhetoric and demagoguing on the budget. Here is what Robert Greenstein had to say, yesterday:

CBPP Statement: Updated July 26, 2011
For Immediate Release
Statement: Robert Greenstein, President, on House Speaker Boehner’s New Budget Proposal
Robert Greenstein
The Center On Budget And Policy Priorities

House Speaker John Boehner’s new budget proposal would essentially require, as the price of raising the debt ceiling again early next year, a choice between deep cuts in the years immediately ahead in Social Security and Medicare benefits for current retirees, repeal of health reform’s coverage expansions, or wholesale evisceration of basic assistance programs for vulnerable Americans.

The plan is, thus, tantamount to a form of “class warfare.” If enacted, it could well produce the greatest increase in poverty and hardship produced by any law in modern U.S. history.
This may sound hyperbolic, but it is not. Both the mathematics and the politics are clear.
The Boehner plan calls for large cuts in discretionary programs of $1.2 trillion over the next ten years, and it then requires additional cuts that are large enough to produce another $1.8 trillion in savings to be enacted by the end of the year as a condition for raising the debt ceiling again at that time.

The Boehner plan envisions no tax increases, with its entire $1.8 trillion in additional deficit reduction coming from budget cuts. Speaker Boehner gave documents to House Republican caucus members stating that the $1.8 trillion would come from “entitlement reforms and savings” and that the plan “includes no tax hikes.” In addition, Speaker Boehner told radio talk show host Rush Limbaugh that Republicans appointed to the special committee that will craft the $1.8 trillion in savings won’t support tax increases and, in the unlikely event that that committee proposed a plan with tax increases, House Republicans would vote it down anyway.[1] A House GOP aide toldNational Review more bluntly: “We appoint members to the committee, and we’re not appointing any Republicans who will vote for tax hikes.” [2]

Failing to Protect Florida: the Unfolding Rick Scott Governorship ... by gimleteye

The Orlando Sentinel published a spot-on editorial the other day on a subject we are sickeningly familiar with:  the determination by the state Republican leaders and the hang-dog legislature that treads in their footpath: we can't afford to clean up the mess we have made of Florida's waters. It is a pathetic disgrace. Knowing the actors as we do, it is apparent to us that so much of what is going on in Washington today -- the frenzy over the budget and debt ceiling -- is about billionaire polluters using smokescreens to attack the true source of their anger: the EPA.

That's right, the EPA whose expenditures are .3 percent of the monthly federal budget. The Sentinel names, names. We are glad for example that the Sentinel calls out Barney Bishop, of Associated Industries, for his reckless leadership. We call Bishop, the lobbying organization's "Jack-Ass-In-Chief". And he is. But the biggest omission in the Sentinel editorial is Gov. Rick Scott. Scott is a sycophant of Barney Bishop -- not the other way, around -- because when no other Republicans would come to Scott's side during the Governor's Race, Bishop (who laughingly calls himself a Democrat) did. Today, Governor Rick Scott has directed the state's legal muscle against the EPA's effort to clean up Florida's waters, because Florida won't. It is Scott who is helping blow the doors off protections due ordinary Floridians. He is the intransigent one, and he has to go.

Protect Florida's water
New federal regulations aren't the enemy; the state's intransigence is.
Orlando Sentinel - July 26, 2011

Last year's hysterical reaction from opponents of tougher federal clean-water rules was, unfortunately, only the beginning.

Since the Associated Industries of Florida's Barney Bishop hammered "radical left-wingers" for daring to impose new regulations that would strap businesses, we've seen a lawsuit from Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi and Agriculture Commissioner Adam Putnam.

The pair sued those awful left-wingers running the Environmental Protection Agency for imposing what will be new limits on how much phosphorus and nitrogen can get into waterways from sewage plants, industry and other sources.

Central Florida's John Mica got into the act, too, introducing legislation in Congress that would blunt the EPA's ability to toughen Florida's ineffective water-pollution limits. The EPA's "almost unprecedented power grab" would create a "regulatory nightmare," Mica gasped on the floor of the U.S. House.

Central Florida's Sandy Adams injected her trademark hyperbole. The congresswoman tied the EPA's coming rules to clean Florida's waterways to an imagined plot by President Obama to undermine anti-pollution efforts. And her office said the new EPA rules "would effectively kill job creation throughout Florida."

Fortunately, Mica's bill won't make it to a vote in the Senate, which appreciates that the EPA should have the ability to draft and enforce rules making states comply with the federal Clean Water Act.

Julio Robaina Talks About Absentee Ballot Fraud on LIsten305. by Geniusofdespair

Albert Harum-Alvarez's Show Listen305 hosted former State Rep. Julio Robaina. He spoke about Absentee Ballot fraud, here is a 3 minutes audio clip of the show. I urge you to listen to it. Julio was in enough elections to know how it works. Most politicians will not talk about this publicly. Thank you Julio (TGO) for your candor. He nails Rundle.



Remember the one thing you can do now is ask your County Commissioner to put a penalty on County Code, Section 12-14. That ordinance prohibits the practice of picking up more than one ballot from a non-relative but there is no penalty attached to it. Without a penalty the practice is unenforceable as a criminal offense.

Link to video.

The Limits of Privatization ... by gimleteye

Florida Gov. Rick Scott is dead set on proving privatization is the answer to taxpayer problems with government. The 18-county region in South Florida is about to see its government-run prisons, privatized.

In the Miami Herald, "Corrections Secretary Edwin Buss said ... “This is going to be some of the most competitive bidding the country has ever seen for private prisons."

But for such a massive transfer of public responsibility, there are only two likely bidders. That's not the "free market" at work: that is a group of insiders who have corralled the resources to underbid, at a cost savings of at least 7 percent, a government service.

Rick Scott did the same and made a fortune; underbidding government reimbursable medical costs to patients through his Hospital Corporation of America. It is a clear parallel and begs the question: who would you trust to deliver the best medical services to the underserved-- who include the middle class? Do you trust a businessman, who shaves a hair off the inefficient government service, or, do you empower public health care experts to devise the best plan to serve the most people? And if you have no expectations of the political system-- namely, Congress-- to do the right thing, is it then automatically right to default to the profit motive of a few savvy investors?

It would be interesting, of course, to know whether either of the two eligible corporations to privatize South Florida prisons have made political contributions to Scott or to Scott- related activities. If that were proven to be the case, it would no doubt be defended as the rights of corporations to free speech. It is as ridiculous as entrusting the execution of our foreign policy to mercenaries and private support armies.

The question arises: what is government good for? Why stop at privatizing prisons? Why not privatize schools or armies, why not privatize water supply and the judiciary? I'm not serious about this, of course, because the sum total of America has to be more than making a nation safe for business.

Businesses are inherently selfish: they represent, first and foremost, the needs of shareholders as expressed through management. It makes no sense to believe that just because government has failed, that privatizing government services is the answer. If half as much private energy were put to making government work instead of tearing it down-- as it is today, from the GOP--, ours would be a much nation much closer to the hopes and aspirations of our Founding Fathers. That, sadly, is not to be in Florida.

U.S. Rep. Allen West: Sleeper Agent? By Geniusofdespair

Remember the movie the Manchurian Candidate, if not here is part of the plot from Wikipedia:

Communists have been using Shaw as a sleeper agent, a guiltless assassin subconsciously activated by seeing the “Queen of Diamonds” playing card while playing solitaire. Provoked by the appearance of the card, he obeys orders which he then forgets.

I think Allen West fits the plot except instead of being a sleeper agent for the Communists he is a sleeper agent for the Tea Party, and instead of being an assassin he becomes a hate monger, and instead of being activated by the appearance of the queen of diamonds he is actually activated by the appearance of his Congresswoman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz.

The Bow Tie Face-Off. By Geniusofdespair

Inquiring minds want to know...well at least I was interested. There are two prominent lawyers I know of in our town that sport bow ties, Ben Kuehne and Bruce Rogow. I thought, one of them must have been first wearing the bow tie so I asked Bruce Rogow. He assured me he was the first. As I am not the trusting type, I also contacted Kuehne to see what he would say. If I was lucky enough, I thought I could start a feud between them (like my Kuehne-Coffey clash) over the bow tie and have a big story to report. Maybe they would even duke it out and I could take a video. Awesome. But knowing lawyers, they would just argue about it. Yawn. Anyway, Ben Kuehne had a lot to say on the subject:

Truth be told, Bruce is the Dean of the Bow Tie, while I am just Ben the Bow Tie Boy. In my formative years as an appellate lawyer, I marveled at Bruce’s scholarly approach and style. While I have long favored bow ties, I was judicious in my haberdashery splendor in those early years, donning the bow often enough to be comfortable, but always working toward the day when, like Bruce (Professor Rogow in those days), I could discard the cloak of the four-in-hand and reveal my true lawyer self, with the Bow. Thus, I evolved over time, developed a reputation worthy of the Bow, and always saw Bruce (and Florida Justice Major Harding, with a nod to U.S. Supreme Court Justice Stevens) as my champions of the appellate persona.

But I do have a different, but nonetheless significant, claim to fame: I have eschewed any pre-tied tie (bow or traditional) since I was a young tyke, having learned at an early age to tie a “real tie”, and preferring to demonstrate my prowess when the other boys were clipping on their faux-ties!

Not content to let Kuehne have the last word on the issue, Bruce Rogow said:

I thank Ben for his comments and am pleased to be associated with his bow tie wearing. Of course he is right, real men tie their own bow ties, and both Major Harding and Justice Stevens share that skill with us. One day in the U.S. Supreme Court I was arguing a case and Justices Stevens, Souter and Blackmun were all wearing a bow tie and I thought "I have a good chance just on the bow tie identification." I lost 9 to 0.

Are these two polite or what? They didn't argue one point. I have to find some attorneys that hate each other or at least coax a few in that direction. "Hey Ben, Bruce also said your shoes look like you buy them at Walmart. And Bruce, Ben said he will swear he saw you use a clip-on."

GOP trapped in Norquist Vomitorium ... by gimleteye

Make no mistake: the brinkmanship by the GOP in Congress over resolving the fiscal crisis ties back to one individual whose place in modern American politics is secure: Grover Norquist of American Tax Watch. Norquist is the organizing principal of the Republican Party, twisted in a knot over any efforts by Democrats and President Obama to raise revenues from the wealthy. Not bad for a political operative/lobbyist. His "anti-tax pledge" has boxed in members of Congress petrified of being on the receiving end of right-wing punishment at the polls. The Norquist radicals threaten default of US obligations as an acceptable price for straying from his orthodoxy. On network television this weekend, Norquist waved his wand, saying that the expiration of the Bush tax cuts in 2012 would not constitute a tax increase; but that is ploy: when the 2012 election comes around, just wait and see how accommodating Norquists' minions will be to candidates who advocate letting the tax cuts lapse. Why am I sure of this? Because Norquist argued the other side, in the not-so-distant-past. But who remembers history, these days, when it comes to economics? The man is drunk with his own power, the Republican party is reaping his whirlwind, and the price the American economy will pay is yet to be seen though it can be predicted. Today, it only feels like we are covered in slime.

Government Officials Retiring with Unused Sick & Vacation Days. By Geniusofdespair

Regarding the Miami Herald front page report today: If government officials are retiring with between $50 to $300 thousand worth of unused sick and vacation days, doesn't it occur to anyone in charge that the policy on sick and vacation days for these officials is too liberal?

My advice: Slash the number of days for both since they are obviously not needed. Better yet, dole out sick days as needed. Does anyone know how many sick and vacation days these city and county officials get a year? How many of each is Chip Iglesia getting? We have to start with new policies for new hires, don't you agree?

I like the City of Miami's new "use it or lose it policy" but why get a set amount of days to begin with on sick days? And, what about 'personal days' how do they work? Are people just substituting personal days for sick and vacation time? I welcome any comments that enlighten me and our readers.

The Fox News "Bovine Excreta" Machine Owned by Rupert Murdoch ... by gimleteye

There is no question that the smartest news writers in the business work for Jon Stewart's "Daily Show" on the Comedy Channel. There, they get to do excellent work like sift the database of Fox News, unfair and unbalanced by any yardstick, wash it through their finely calibrated bullshit detectors and hang it in the public square to dry. That Fox has steadily downplayed the Rupert Murdoch scandal unfolding in the British Empire is no surprise. Nor is its value as comedy. The Right Wing Spin Machine has simply become a parody of itself.

For example, listen to conservative bloviator Cal Thomas fume at the "piling on": well, it is great comedy. The Daily Show writers remind us: "But perhaps, (Murdoch Critics) don't have Fox's finely tuned sense of proportionality. They don't have the ability to spot stories of real criminality and import, like the crimes of, let's say, NPR.

SEAN HANNITY (3/8/2011): A National Public Radio executive caught on tape in a bigoted hate-filled rant.

BILL O'REILLY (10/21/2010): Juan Williams fired by NPR, for saying he gets nervous when flying with Muslims.

BRET BAIER (3/9/2011): The upheaval at NPR reached its zenith today.

GRETCHEN CARLSON (3/10/2011): President Obama still supports giving NPR your tax dollar money.

BILL O'REILLY (3/14/2011): On the NPR scandal, is the left-wing media playing that down?

SEAN HANNITY (10/21/2010): Liberals are intolerant.

BILL O'REILLY (10/22/2010): We've linked in NPR to Soros, we know what they're doing over there.

SEAN HANNITY (4/22/2011): The corruption is now so widespread, it has succeeded in permeating every area of the mainstream media.

ANDREW NAPOLITANO (3/9/2011): ... these crackpots at NPR ...

LAURA INGRAHAM (10/22/2010): ... the totalitarian tactics of the left ...

PETER JOHNSON, JR. (10/24/2010): Is NPR an agent, somehow, of a jihadist inquisition?

Just watch the Right Wing Spin Machine aka Fox News sputter and spit its cogs and gears. Daily Kos provides a written transcript of the recent Jon Steward segment on Murdoch and Fox News, here. It is great Sunday entertainment if you haven't seen it already.

Miami-Dade Mayor Gimenez is Holding LOCAL Budget Town Hall Meetings. By Geniusofdespair

No excuse to say the meeting is too far away except if you are in deep south Dade. How about one in the South Dade Government Center or at the Ag. Center? Pick a budget town hall meeting near you and go (you might also consider an additional meeting in another neighborhood):

Date: Thursday, July 28, 2011
Location: Kendall Village Civic Pavilion, 8625 SW 124th Avenue
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm

Date: Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Location: Little Haiti Cultural Center, 212-260 NE 59th Terrace
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm

Date: Wednesday, August 3, 2011
Location: Hialeah Senior High School, 251 East 47th Street, Hialeah
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm

Date: Thursday, August 4, 2011
Location: Aventura Government Center, 19200 West Country Club Drive
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm

Date: Tuesday, August 9, 2011
Location: Palmetto Bay Village Hall, 9705 East Hibiscus Street
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm

Date: Thursday, August 11, 2011
Location: Miami Gardens City Hall, 1515 NW 167 Street
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm

Date: Tuesday, August 16, 2011
Location: Miami Art Museum, 101 West Flagler Street
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm

Date: Thursday, August 18, 2011
Location: Coral Gables Country Club, 997 North Greenway Drive
Time: 7:00pm – 8:00pm