"Warren waits for her own Senate suite" by Noah Bierman | Globe Staff, March 14, 2013
WASHINGTON — After shaking hands and snapping photos with visiting constituents, Massachusetts Senator Elizabeth Warren offers them a sheepish apology.
“You’re welcome to come by my office,” she tells them. “It’s just not much to see.”
This is not a politician’s false modesty. Warren’s prize for winning one of the toughest and highest profile Senate battles in the country: An office in a prefabricated building known around the Senate as “the trailer.’’
I sure hope they didn't get them from FEMA.
************************
There is no way to disguise the modest nature of the space, in a small cluster of temporary structures erected in the courtyard of a grand office building — the US Senate’s version of a mobile-home park.
WTF?
Warren cracks good-natured jokes about it and insists she has far greater frustrations to confront, including complex filibuster rules that can be used by the minority to kill legislation.
Then she's a better man than I.
But her extended stay in modular housing, expected to last until June, is a freshman’s first and most tangible lesson in the plodding and idiosyncratic ways of the Senate.
That's the excuse?
In November, Warren learned from her chief of staff, Mindy Myers, that she would be confined to the equivalent of a double-wide trailer. She thought it was a joke.
So did I at first, but I'm not laughing now.
But Myers, a veteran of the Senate, explained that as a freshman, Warren would have to wait for a permanent office until more senior senators decided whether they wanted an upgrade. That process, it turns out, takes months. In the meantime, freshman senators have no choice but to bide their time in temporary quarters....
Even among this year’s crop of 12 freshmen, Warren is rated low in seniority, because she has no previous experience in the House, in certain executive branch positions, or in governors’ mansions. That system places Warren 97th in seniority among 100 senators, her only boost coming because Massachusetts has a larger population than Nebraska and North Dakota, the home states of number 98 (Republican Deb Fischer) and number 99 (Democrat Heidi Heitkamp).
Paradoxically, number 100 on the list, Massachusetts Democrat William “Mo’’ Cowan — the interim senator appointed to fill the seat vacated by Secretary of State John F. Kerry — currently occupies a nicely appointed suite that previously belonged to Republican Scott Brown, whom Warren defeated.
Related: Meet the Next Senator From Massachusetts
He must be loving his stay. It really is an old boys club no matter what your color.
What's the lame-ass excuse they are giving the ladies?
Cowan benefits from a rule that permits replacement appointees to squat in a vacant office before taking over the departed senator’s old space. In his case, he will get Kerry’s office, which is even nicer than Brown’s, once it is emptied of Kerry’s collection of art and memorabilia and repainted.
Ladies, you are forgiven for asking WTF?
Cowan declined to let a reporter visit his current space for a fresh comparison with Warren’s.
“I don’t make the rules around here,” Cowan said, adding, with a collegial touch of diplomacy, that Warren’s worth is not measured by the size of her office.
Yeah, it appears Republicans do even in the minority.
Whoever wins the special election in June to replace Kerry will get to keep Kerry’s office until 2014, a rarely mentioned perk of winning a special election. (Brown, when he came into the Senate, spent less than two months in the “trailer’’ before moving into the late Edward M. Kennedy’s suite — a premium office with fireplace, balcony, and sweeping view across Constitution Avenue to the Capitol. The coveted space has since been claimed by Republican minority leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky.)
You think Kennedy is haunting it?
Meanwhile, Warren will not choose an office until April 22. Then, after another senator clears out, it will be cleaned. But the budget battle that mandated cuts across government has set this process back about a month, because there may not be money to pay overtime to cleaning and moving crews who normally expedite the process.
So it might not be until July when she gets an office? Does that trailer have global-warming causing air conditioning?
“The first lesson around here that I learned is that the Senate works on Senate standard time,” Warren said.
Warren said she is now deeply familiar with the customs of seniority, the same rules that govern where senators sit in the chamber and their power within committees. With no plans to challenge this particular tradition, she strikes a philosophical tone about her situation.
“Come on, it could be a broom closet,” she said. “This is fun.”
Man, what a woman!
--more--"
Hey, it's no different than a house:
"In a tiny house, large lessons about life" by James Sullivan | Globe Correspondent, March 11, 2013
AMHERST — As a child, Hampshire College senior Nara Williams hated being told to pick up after herself. This semester, she’s learning to keep things tidy — very tidy.
Related: A College Like No Other
Yeah, they divested from Israel and took heat.
For her senior project, she is living in a 130-square-foot house to explore the realities and benefits of living small.
Drives you stir crazy, doesn't it?
And then there is the prospect of living large.
A few weeks ago, Williams took delivery on a model home used as a showcase for the Tumbleweed Tiny House Co., a leader in the burgeoning “small house” movement. Williams, a 21-year-old native of Oak Park, Ill., has become a bit of a student celebrity, with her experiment in efficient living situated prominently on the Amherst campus.
First they have you thinking your fat so you will eat less and they can have more, and now this.
The cedar clapboard cabin has a sleeping loft, a kitchenette, and a bathroom....
The housing project, Williams said, is her inquiry into “viable alternatives” to the American dream. Blogging about the experience, she is raising questions about property ownership, material goods, consumption, sustainable living, and other issues in an era marked by housing and environmental concerns.
Small homes are well established in some places, such as Japan, that are grappling with population growth.
The movement is also gaining attention in New York and Boston, where a developer last year began building micro-unit apartments in the Seaport District.
Besides the appeal of lower rent or mortgage payments, small houses leave a smaller energy footprint....
I'm going to leave a smaller print now by recycling this Globe and turning off this computer.
--more--"
Heck, you don't even need that much space:
"Housing-starved cities seek relief in micro-apartments" by Casey Ross | Globe Staff, March 26, 2013
SAN FRANCISCO — A space capsule....
Or a prison cell.
Related: Sunday Globe Special: Senior Citizen Cell
Why not just stick 'em in a home?
“The size of the place is actually perfect.”
In an era of skyrocketing housing prices, micro-apartments are triggering a housing debate that is ricocheting around the country....
Development of such small apartments is being promoted as part of the solution to the housing shortage in Boston and other cities. But there is unease among public officials about allowing real estate developers to flood the market with such units, out of fear they will become the modern equivalent of 19th century tenements.
And yet here they are being promoted as a solution in my agenda-pu$hing pos.
And with rents of $1,600 or more, many question their affordability and the willingness of people to pay big to live so small [with] concerns the city is skewing housing policy to help young professionals at the expense of families....
No doubt they are discriminating here. I just hope there aren't any fires.
--more--"
"Growth of micro-units will be slow in Boston; Planner worried about standards" by Casey Ross | Globe Staff, March 27, 2013
Tamara Roy, an architect with the firm ADD Inc., which has become a chief advocate of micro-apartments, said that the city is already facing a critical shortage of housing for young professionals as well as middle-class families. She believes that the city’s prescribed units sizes should be reduced in all categories....
She is saying make them even smaller?
During Tuesday’s forum, an executive with Vertex Pharmaceuticals Inc. said construction of more compact, lower-cost housing will help the company attract and retain skilled young scientists near its new headquarters on the waterfront.
“The talent war that we all talk about is a very real thing,” said Michael Glass, head of learning and organizational development at Vertex. He said the company risks losing young scientists if they cannot find affordable housing nearby. “We think [micro] housing is a big part of the solution for us.”
So pharmaceuticals are the new slumlords, 'eh?
--more--"
I gue$$ Liz should have watched what she said:
"Warren rips deals with big banks; In 1st spotlight turn, scolds US regulators for settling civil cases" by David Uberti | Globe Correspondent, February 15, 2013
WASHINGTON — After campaigning last year as an outspoken consumer advocate and Wall Street critic, Senator Elizabeth Warren was surprisingly quiet during her first month on Capitol Hill. But that changed on Thursday at the Massachusetts senior senator’s first hearing, when she rebuked federal regulators for settling civil cases with big banks instead of taking them to trial.
Looking at the seven regulators arrayed before the Senate Banking Committee, and noting that she had often sat at the same witness table before becoming a senator, she used her new power to question why the federal government has not been more aggressive.
“The question I really want to ask is about how tough you are — about how much leverage you really have,” Warren said. “Tell me a little bit about the last few times you’ve taken the biggest financial institutions on Wall Street all the way to trial.”
A handful of supporters in the packed hearing room applauded. But none of the witnesses — representing the Securities and Exchange Commission, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and others — offered a response.
“Anybody?” Warren asked, pursing her lips and raising her eyebrows above her glasses.
I'm so happy she is my senator.
The hearing was the committee’s semiannual meeting on the Dodd-Frank financial reform act, implemented in 2010 as a response to the financial crisis. The legislation tightened laws regulating big banks and provided safeguards intended to shield consumers from abusive financial practices.
They say it has done that, but no rules have yet been written for that hollow shell. It was nothing but a propagandistic pos to make it look like the bought-off bastards were doing something.
Republicans had been expected to use the hearing to attack the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the government agency whose creation that Warren had championed, especially since one of the witnesses was the agency’s director, Richard Cordray.
I'm so happy she is my senator.
The hearing was the committee’s semiannual meeting on the Dodd-Frank financial reform act, implemented in 2010 as a response to the financial crisis. The legislation tightened laws regulating big banks and provided safeguards intended to shield consumers from abusive financial practices.
They say it has done that, but no rules have yet been written for that hollow shell. It was nothing but a propagandistic pos to make it look like the bought-off bastards were doing something.
Republicans had been expected to use the hearing to attack the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, the government agency whose creation that Warren had championed, especially since one of the witnesses was the agency’s director, Richard Cordray.
But the Republicans, without explanation, held back, in effect clearing the path for Warren to take the limelight. The GOP members stuck to broad lines of questioning and did not specifically assail the consumer agency....
Oh, I LIKE THAT kind of BIPARTISANSHIP!
Oh, I LIKE THAT kind of BIPARTISANSHIP!
Warren seized the hearing to chide regulators for not taking legal stands against Wall Street, saying that the threat of trial is an important tool in keeping big banks in line, despite the vast resources required to do so.
Yeah, JAIL seems to do something to the greedy ba$tards.
And did she really pull a Hamas at the hearing by "seizing" it?
“If a party is unwilling to go to trial — either because they’re too timid or they lack resources — the consequence is they have a lot less leverage,” Warren said. “If [banks] can break the law and drag in billions in profits and then turn around and settle paying out of those profits, they don’t have that much incentive to follow the law.”
Yeah, JAIL seems to do something to the greedy ba$tards.
And did she really pull a Hamas at the hearing by "seizing" it?
“If a party is unwilling to go to trial — either because they’re too timid or they lack resources — the consequence is they have a lot less leverage,” Warren said. “If [banks] can break the law and drag in billions in profits and then turn around and settle paying out of those profits, they don’t have that much incentive to follow the law.”
The regulators often sought to avoid directly answering Warren’s questions....
I'll bet they are intimidated by the woman.
I'll bet they are intimidated by the woman.
As for taking on banks, she added, “I’m really concerned ‘too big to fail’ has become ‘too big for trial.’ That just seems wrong to me.”
Warren’s performance drew the praise of some fellow Democrats, including Jon Tester of Montana.
“She obviously understands the issues,” Tester said after the hearing. “She has always been somebody that, from my perspective, is looking out for the little guy. That’s exactly what she was doing.”
"Bernanke firm in Fed’s commitment to stimulus; Some worry about inflation, strategy change" by Ylan Q. Mui | Washington Post, February 27, 2013
WASHINGTON — Senator Elizabeth Warren, Democrat of Massachusetts, and Senator David Vitter, Republican of Louisiana, pointed out that the cost of funds for big banks is lower than for small ones because investors believe the government will bail them out.
More bipartisanship!
More bipartisanship!
Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke agreed that too-big-to-fail should end but said the Fed’s rule-making process is “moving in the right direction.”
Warren countered: “Any idea about when we’re gonna arrive in the right direction?”
Like I said, they haven't written any rules or regulations yet. It's back to business as usual on Wall Street.
Like I said, they haven't written any rules or regulations yet. It's back to business as usual on Wall Street.
--more--"
"Warren pushes for tighter banking regulations" March 08, 2013
WASHINGTON — Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts continued pressuring banking regulators Thursday, criticizing them during a Senate hearing for failing to enforce tougher penalties on the nation’s largest banks.
Warren joined other members of the Senate Banking Committee in grilling regulators on corporate wrongdoing, focusing on the punishment faced by British bank HSBC after it was caught laundering Mexican drug money.
Federal regulators fined the company nearly $2 billion in December. But Warren chided them for neither forcing the bank to shut down its US operations nor prosecuting individual employees.
“If you’re caught with an ounce of cocaine, the chances are good you go to jail,” Warren said. “But evidently, if you launder nearly a $1 billion for drug cartels and violate our international sanctions, your company pays a fine and you go home and sleep in your own bed at night. . . . I think that’s fundamentally wrong.”
We all do, Liz.
Representatives from the Treasury Department, Federal Reserve, and Office of the Comptroller were unclear as to if and when they would stiffen penalties for such malfeasance. They agreed, however, that regulators must follow the Justice Department’s lead when it comes to prosecutions.
We all do, Liz.
Representatives from the Treasury Department, Federal Reserve, and Office of the Comptroller were unclear as to if and when they would stiffen penalties for such malfeasance. They agreed, however, that regulators must follow the Justice Department’s lead when it comes to prosecutions.
The response puts the Obama administration in a tight spot regarding financial regulation, as it came a day after
"Attorney General Eric Holder told the Senate Judiciary Committee that the nation’s banks had become too big to jail. “The size of some of these institutions becomes so large that it does become difficult for us to prosecute them,” Holder said at a hearing Wednesday. “If we do prosecute — if we do bring a criminal charges — it will have a negative impact on the national economy, perhaps even the world economy.”
I separated and italicized that because that has be to be one of the top quotes of the century if not in history. Now you know why we are in such trouble. Some criminals are allowed to remain free to commit crimes.
--more--"
Let's keep rolling on with the absurd:
"Democrats battle for consumer protection nominee" March 13, 2013
WASHINGTON — Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts accused her GOP counterparts at a Senate Banking Committee hearing of attempting to weaken a fledgling consumer protection bureau Tuesday, as Republican senators continued to oppose the nominee to head the agency.
So much for bipartisanship.
Republicans object to the structure and what they call a lack of oversight for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which was established by the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial services regulatory overhaul. In turn, they have stiffly resisted the confirmation of Richard Cordray as its director.
Warren, who before running for the Senate helped conceive of the agency and its mission to help consumers avoid predatory lending practices, remains among its ardent supporters.
“The delay for getting him confirmed is bad for consumers,” the Bay State lawmaker said. “It’s bad for small banks. It’s bad for credit unions. It’s bad for anyone trying to offer an honest product in an honest market.”
Which means it's good for big banks and Wall Street.
The bureau was formed in 2011 to safeguard consumers in transactions related to anything from credit cards to home mortgages. President Obama got around Republican opposition to Cordray’s first nomination by naming him to head the bureau last year in a recess appointment. Obama renominated Cordray and confirmation proceedings are under way.
“Everybody in this room and everybody who’s paying attention knows people in their extended family and friends who struggle with consumer financial issues, who need help and support in navigating complex financial markets,” Cordray said Tuesday, citing $425 million his agency has already refunded to consumers.
Republicans insisted on waiting to approve his nomination until the White House agrees to changes in the bureau’s structure. Senator Mike Crapo of Idaho, ranking Republican on the committee, said the consumer bureau should be directed by a commission, not an individual, and that the agency’s budget should be overseen by Congress. Its purse is currently controlled by the Federal Reserve Bank.
Have another drink, Mike. And I'd rather the private central bank pay for it rather than taxpayers, although we are paying anyway by continuing to put up with a private central bank Ponzi scheme.
Cordray’s nomination requires 60 senators’ approval to advance to the floor. But 43 Republicans have signed a pledge to block the nomination. Senator Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican, expressed optimism that the Senate could find a middle ground “that makes everyone on both sides of the aisle feel comfortable,” he said.
The committee’s Democratic majority contended Tuesday that the Republicans were merely trying to dismantle Dodd-Frank reforms to curry favor with Wall Street.
Both parties do it.
Related: Senate Sends Along Financial Fraud Bill
Capping a career with a flopping failure?
Warren’s advocacy for and eventual organization of the agency catapulted her into the national spotlight. Though expected to be Obama’s choice to head the bureau, Warren was passed over for fear of Republican backlash in Congress.
Nearly two years later, Warren is making her same case to lawmakers from a Senate seat.
“The American people,” she said, “deserve a Congress that worries less about helping big banks and more about helping regular people who have been cheated on mortgages, on credit cards, on student loans, and on credit reports.”
Can't argue with that.
--more--"
Let's keep rolling on with the absurd:
"Democrats battle for consumer protection nominee" March 13, 2013
WASHINGTON — Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts accused her GOP counterparts at a Senate Banking Committee hearing of attempting to weaken a fledgling consumer protection bureau Tuesday, as Republican senators continued to oppose the nominee to head the agency.
So much for bipartisanship.
Republicans object to the structure and what they call a lack of oversight for the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, which was established by the 2010 Dodd-Frank financial services regulatory overhaul. In turn, they have stiffly resisted the confirmation of Richard Cordray as its director.
Warren, who before running for the Senate helped conceive of the agency and its mission to help consumers avoid predatory lending practices, remains among its ardent supporters.
“The delay for getting him confirmed is bad for consumers,” the Bay State lawmaker said. “It’s bad for small banks. It’s bad for credit unions. It’s bad for anyone trying to offer an honest product in an honest market.”
Which means it's good for big banks and Wall Street.
The bureau was formed in 2011 to safeguard consumers in transactions related to anything from credit cards to home mortgages. President Obama got around Republican opposition to Cordray’s first nomination by naming him to head the bureau last year in a recess appointment. Obama renominated Cordray and confirmation proceedings are under way.
“Everybody in this room and everybody who’s paying attention knows people in their extended family and friends who struggle with consumer financial issues, who need help and support in navigating complex financial markets,” Cordray said Tuesday, citing $425 million his agency has already refunded to consumers.
Republicans insisted on waiting to approve his nomination until the White House agrees to changes in the bureau’s structure. Senator Mike Crapo of Idaho, ranking Republican on the committee, said the consumer bureau should be directed by a commission, not an individual, and that the agency’s budget should be overseen by Congress. Its purse is currently controlled by the Federal Reserve Bank.
Have another drink, Mike. And I'd rather the private central bank pay for it rather than taxpayers, although we are paying anyway by continuing to put up with a private central bank Ponzi scheme.
Cordray’s nomination requires 60 senators’ approval to advance to the floor. But 43 Republicans have signed a pledge to block the nomination. Senator Bob Corker, a Tennessee Republican, expressed optimism that the Senate could find a middle ground “that makes everyone on both sides of the aisle feel comfortable,” he said.
The committee’s Democratic majority contended Tuesday that the Republicans were merely trying to dismantle Dodd-Frank reforms to curry favor with Wall Street.
Both parties do it.
Related: Senate Sends Along Financial Fraud Bill
Capping a career with a flopping failure?
Warren’s advocacy for and eventual organization of the agency catapulted her into the national spotlight. Though expected to be Obama’s choice to head the bureau, Warren was passed over for fear of Republican backlash in Congress.
Nearly two years later, Warren is making her same case to lawmakers from a Senate seat.
“The American people,” she said, “deserve a Congress that worries less about helping big banks and more about helping regular people who have been cheated on mortgages, on credit cards, on student loans, and on credit reports.”
Can't argue with that.
--more--"
Sometimes it funny:
"Democrats celebrate St. Patrick as they ever have" by Michael Levenson | Globe Staff, March 17, 2013
Senator Elizabeth Warren, making her second appearance at the breakfast, cracked jokes mostly at the expense of Republicans.
State Representative Daniel B. Winslow, one of the three Republicans running for US Senate, came in for some ribbing for his opposition to an assault weapons ban and his support for marijuana legalization.
“He wants us armed, and stoned,” Warren said.
Related: Senate Election Special: Another Slow Saturday For Winslow
That must be why he went.
Gabriel E. Gomez, the former US Navy SEAL who is running for the GOP Senate nomination, was zinged for writing a letter to Patrick in January asking the governor to appoint him to the interim Senate seat. In the letter, Gomez pledged to support President Obama’s agenda on gun control and immigration.
“I’m sorry I don’t have any advice for Gabriel Gomez,” Warren said, “because I always support my fellow Democrats.”
Related: Senate Election Special: Going With Gomez?
*******************************
This year’s breakfast was notable for some major figures who were not in attendance, including Governor Deval Patrick, interim Senator William “Mo” Cowan, much of the US House delegation, and two of the three Republicans running for US Senate.
My printed Globe said all three and then later told me Winslow showed.
Former governor William F. Weld and his wife, Leslie, made a surprise appearance that immediately began stirring speculation about Weld’s interest in running for office again in Massachusetts. Attendees were asking themselves: Why else would the former governor show up?
Weld was famous for bending the elbow early.
************************
Winslow was the only Republican candidate to make an appearance at the roast.
Patrick, who would not say why he skipped the roast, sent in a video that depicted him holding a press conference in the Massachusetts Emergency Management Agency gear he usually trots out during blizzards. “I’m wearing the MEMA vest because this breakfast is so often a disaster,” he said.
--more--"
I see Lynch and Markey made it.
Related: Slow Saturday Special: St. Patrick's Day Breakfast
Also see:
US Senator Elizabeth Warren files fishery assistance amendment
Mass. senators propose disaster aid for fishing industry
Elizabeth Warren to write book on middle-class
Yeah, she's just looking to make a buck like the rest of those parasitic $cum that reside in the chamber.
And sometimes it's not funny:
GOP revels in Scituate breakfast that is all their own
"Mass. sheriff defends Obama assassination joke
A Republican sheriff in Massachusetts is defending a joke he told at a St. Patrick’s Day breakfast in which President Abraham Lincoln visits President Obama in a dream and suggests he go to the theater. Lincoln was assassinated in a theater, and Democratic critics say that even a joke suggesting the current president might get shot was inappropriate, especially from a public safety official. Plymouth Sheriff Joseph D. McDonald Jr. made the joke Sunday at the heavily Republican breakfast in Scituate. He told the Patriot Ledger of Quincy Tuesday that the uproar over an old joke is ‘‘absurd.’’
Oh, for the love of Lincoln!
Related: McDonald’s bad joke: Apologize and move on
Not before I state for the record that any attempt or success at doing that will immediately call into question an operation of a false flag nature, etc. So if any intelligence agency or special interest is out there thinking along those lines, forget it. We aren't falling for it, and even as much as I oppose this president's policies, we have his back on this one (for what it's worth; I think the whole at odds with Bibi thing is a bluff).
