washingtonpost.com — The Troubled Assets Relief Program, which was widely reviled as a $700 billion bailout for Wall Street titans, is now expected to cost the federal government a mere $25 billion - the equivalent of less than six months of emergency jobless benefits.
A new report released Monday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office found that the cost of TARP has plummeted since its passage in October 2008, when policymakers thought that the world stood on the brink of an economic meltdown.
washingtonpost.com — I'm cautious about the conventional wisdom that the Democratic Party is about to get flattened by a Republican steamroller. Pollsters are less certain than they'd like you to believe about who's a "likely voter" and who isn't. It's easy to imagine how Democrats, facing near-unanimous predictions of a wipeout, could bestir themselves to narrow the enthusiasm gap by just enough to turn a potential "wave" election into a regular midterm setback for the party in power.
online.wsj.com — Bank of America Corp. reopened more than 100,000 foreclosure actions, declaring that it had found no significant problems in its procedures for seizing homes. GMAC Mortgage, a lender and loan servicer, said that it also is pushing ahead with an unspecified number of foreclosures that came under intense pressure.
bloomberg.com — The dollar has dropped more than 7 percent since Aug. 27, when Chairman Ben S. Bernanke signaled the Federal Reserve is prepared to ease monetary policy. Where once such a decline may have been met with resistance from the U.S., Geithner may now be tolerating it as a way of bolstering the recovery.
pbs.org — The Tea Party has captured the imagination and spirit of many Americans and may very well turn that into a powerful voting bloc come November. But, that bloc may not have a leg or girder to stand on as our nation’s infrastructure continues to crumble. I am very concerned, from what I have read so far, and what has been ignored to date, that the Tea Party movement will throw our public works overboard with the tea.
thehill.com — The Obama administration has “assured” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) that $3.5 billion in renewable energy loan guarantees diverted for other policy priorities will be restored this year.
“The Speaker has been assured by the Obama administration that it will work to restore these funds so that loans planned for later this year can move forward,” according to a statement from Pelosi spokesman Drew Hammill.
nytimes.com — Early last year, while still a rising G.O.P. star, Gov. Mark Sanford of South Carolina led a chorus of Republican governors criticizing the federal stimulus package and vowing to reject at least some of the money being directed to their states.
dyn.politico.com — Included is $10 billion to preserve teaching jobs in the new school year, and $16.1 billion to help states cover their Medicaid payments for the first six months of 2011. More than past stimulus efforts, the bill pays for itself through a combination of tax reforms and often painful spending cuts, and the choices represent a new “common sense” message which Democrats hope will help them with voters in November.
latimes.com — Congress on Tuesday gave final approval to a $26.1-billion aid package for cash-strapped states that will keep 161,000 teachers and thousands of police, fire and other local government workers from being laid off. The legislation was quickly signed by President Obama.
thehill.com — House Democrats are set to approve $26 billion in emergency state aid, fight off a lame-duck lockout and pass a border-security bill before they wrap up their work period Tuesday and repack their bags for home.
The unusual August work session was prompted by the Senate’s surprise passage last week — after the House had recessed until mid-September — of a $26 billion package of teacher and Medicaid funding for states.
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