Economy

In other words, they would have to pay you to take what is rapidly becoming Manhattan's quaint little alternative newspaper off their hands.Yesterday, New York Times Company stock closed at $5.72. That is, by far, its lowest close in the 22 years presented in this chart at Yahoo!: Before today's opening bell, the company is worth $822 million,Using conservatively adjusted numbers from a…

Remember the years of media flak President George W. Bush received for his alleged use for political gain of first the terrorist attacks of September 11, 2001 and then the related Afghanistan and Iraq Wars? Will the press be as vociferous now? Incoming Obama Administration Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, speaking on Wednesday on and to the Wall Street Journal Digital Network, stated outright his…

Hypocrisy, meet Ed Schultz ... What's this, you're already well acquainted? The nation's top-rated liberal radio host has spent plenty of time this month pitching in favor of the feds lending $25 billion to the ailing Big Three automakers.Schultz has also been bellicose toward those who disagree with him, singling out Republican Senator Richard Shelby of Alabama for scorn. Here's what Schultz…

Pulitzer-Prize winning author and professor of history at Stanford University David M. Kennedy told Bloomberg radio Nov. 18 that the current financial crisis bears no comparison to the Great Depression. "Well, we're not yet in anything remotely resembling the crisis, the scale of crisis of the Great Depression." When Franklin Roosevelt took office in 1933, 13 million Americans were unemployed…

The media's outrage over AIG's most recent conference at a resort in Phoenix - after being bailed out by the federal government - has led politicians to call for more oversight of the company and its spending. But according to entrepreneur and Business & Media Institute columnist Dan Kennedy, the outrage is misplaced. But the furious news segments glossed over the fact that the company's…

Barney Frank favors bailing out the Detroit automakers over letting them go into bankruptcy.  Chief among his concerns is that bankruptcy might "bust" the unions. You know, those organizations whose contract demands have put Detroit on the brink of extinction.The Massachusetts Dem, chairman of the House Financial Services Committee, was interviewed by Maggie Rodriguez on today's Early Show. He…

Repent, all ye owners of Suburbans, thou drivers of Explorers.  Mend thy ways, ye Escalade-loving louts!  Take heed of the warning the prophet Mika has vouchsafed unto you: greedy thou art; verily, destroyers of the environment be thee!Oy.  Mika Brzezinski was on quite a roll this morning.  On the one hand, free-marketers would find much to agree with in Mika's arguments.  As noted here yesterday…

Joe Scarborough didn't cotton to being called a "socialist," but that's just the label Krystia Freeland laid on him during today's Morning Joe.  The Financial Times editor used the s-word to describe what she mockingly described as Joe's "touching faith" in the wisdom of government bureaucrats when it comes to reorganizing Detroit automakers.The Morning Joe host didn't take the insult lying down.…

In today's "You've Got to be Kidding Me" moment, the San Francisco Chronicle advocated that folks who owe more on their mortgages than their homes are worth should stop making payments so they can qualify for a government bailout.I'm not kidding.Disgustingly titled "Are You an Idiot to Keep Paying Your Mortgage," the article actually instructed readers upside-down in their real estate the ins and…

It appears being bestowed a Nobel Prize for economics doesn't improve one's economic acumen, for in the course of roughly 60 seconds Sunday, Paul Krugman said Franklin D. Roosevelt's decision to raise taxes in 1937 deepened the Depression, but it's okay to raise taxes 70-plus years later when the economy is in trouble.Interesting contradiction, wouldn't you agree?What precipitated this bizarre,…

Earlier today, Christopher Booker at the UK Telegraph noted a "surreal scientific blunder," followed by an attempted cover-up, that should cause everyone to question the source's past and future credibility. The source of the shoddy work is NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), the outfit run by world champion globalarmist James Hansen. Hansen has in the past stated that "heads of…

In the name of gender equality, the Today show plumped this morning for government regulation forcing health care insurers to charge men and women the same for individual policies even though women cost insurers more because of greater use of services.  Hasn't the financial crisis taught the MSM anything about the danger of government meddling in markets? No. Insurers wind up paying out more in…

Well, I guess that settles it. We don't need any political discussion or economist's studies. The auto industry officially needs a bailout. It's just a fact. After all, MSNBC and BusinessWeek have just said it. The auto industry "needs" one or it cannot survive. Oh, yeah, and MSNBC is also informing the world that Republicans have told auto workers to "drop dead." I think this is what the Old…