AT&T will take $1B non-cash charge for health care

NEW YORK (AP) - AT&T Inc. will take a $1 billion non-cash charge in the first quarter because of the health care overhaul and may cut benefits it offers to current and retired workers.

The charge is the largest disclosed so far. Earlier this week, AK Steel Corp., Caterpillar Inc., Deere & Co. and Valero Energy announced similar accounting charges, saying the health care law that President Barack Obama signed Tuesday will raise their expenses.

All four are smaller than AT&T, and their combined charges are less than a quarter of the $1 billion that AT&T is planning. The $1 billion is a third of AT&T’s most recent quarterly profit. In the fourth quarter of 2009, the company earned $3 billion on revenue of $30.9 billion.

AT&T said Friday that the charge reflects changes to how Medicare subsidies are taxed. Companies say the health care overhaul will require them to start paying taxes next year on a subsidy they receive for retiree drug coverage.

The telecommunications company also said it is looking into changing the health care benefits it offers because of the new law. Analysts say retirees could lose the prescription drug coverage provided by their former employers as a result of the overhaul.

AT&T rival Verizon Communications Inc. was among 10 companies that sent a letter to congressional leaders in December warning that their costs would increase with the health care changes. Verizon did not immediately return a phone call seeking comment.

Shares in AT&T, which is based in Dallas, climbed 7 cents to $26.22 in afternoon trading Friday.

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AT&T will take $1B non-cash charge for health care

The article talks about how retirees could lose the prescription drug coverage provided by their former employers as a result of the overhaul. But Obama, Pelosi, Reid and every moonbat in this nation stands and tries to tell us how GOOD Obamacare really is and how GOOD it’s going to be for ALL Americans!

I know people in the financial business, and they are a bit shocked that the market has continued to gain, especially with the passage of the healthcare debacle.

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — U.S. stock indexes on Friday finished higher for the week, their fourth straight, making it the longest winning stretch for equities since August of 2009. Equities offered a lackluster performance for the day, with the Dow Jones Industrial Average SOURCE

I’ve been told to look for a fairly sharp drop in the market early next week as some of the *big guys* do a bit of profit taking. We’ll see, so far, my sources have never told me wrong.

NEW YORK (MarketWatch) — Commodities, from crude oil to copper and gold — and their related sectors of the stock market — have trailed other assets in the first quarter of 2010. But that’s not necessarily a reason to fret for the market just yet. SOURCE

The key word here is YET! The full ramifications of this ObamaCare bill hasn’t even begun to rear it’s ugly head yet. The Dems that wrote this debacle have NO idea what’s in it, but they forced it off on America, because Obama, Pelosi and Reid said it was GOOD!

SAN FRANCISCO — 3M Co. said Friday that it expects to record a non-cash charge of $85 million to $90 million after tax, or about 12 cents a share, in the first quarter of 2010 as a result of the recently passed health-care bill.

The charge is due to a reduction in the value of the company’s deferred tax asset from a change to the tax treatment of Medicare Part D reimbursements, it said.

In late January, the company had raised its 2010 earnings target to a range of $4.90 a share to $5.10 a share. However, that forecast did not include the impact of the bill. SOURCE

Millions for 3M Corp. Billions for AT&T, and that’s just in the first quarter of 2010, and only 2 major companies announcing so far. And the cost of ObamaCare is a GOOD thing?

Here’s another thing that is killing our market, and I am guessing that it’s completely out of our control. I don’t know that Obama can apologize to North and South Korea and accept enough of the blame on OUR behalf.

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Administration to issue new Wall Street pay curbs

WASHINGTON (AP) — An up-and-coming Wall Street executive might want to hold off on buying that condo in Aspen. The Obama administration is ready to issue broad new guidelines that would rein in pay at financial institutions.

Eager to remove incentives that they say contributed to last year’s financial crisis, President Obama’s economic team plans to unfurl broad executive pay principles, possibly as early as Wednesday, that put a premium on long-term performance over short-term gain.

Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner and Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke want to give the Fed, which regulates banks, and the Securities and Exchange Commission, which oversees the financial markets, greater powers to guide compensation practices on Wall Street and beyond.

In anticipation of the new guidelines, Geithner scheduled a private meeting Wednesday with SEC Chairwoman Mary Schapiro, Federal Reserve Governor Dan Tarullo and executive pay experts to discuss compensation policies.

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Administration to issue new Wall Street pay curbs

Karl Marx is dancing a jig in hell. Lenin is turning somersaults. They finally have exactly what communism and Marxism have always wanted, they have their man in the White House.

I am not a fan of ANY business executive being paid ANY type of bonus for a business that is failing, that is the most ridiculous action I have ever seen or heard of, to reward some idiot for doing a BAD job is unacceptable. But it’s the responsibility of the business, the shareholders, the public itself to regulate the actions of business, it is NOT the job of the federal government!

Paying an executive bonus to an individual that has failed may be totally unscrupulous but to the best of my knowledge, it is NOT illegal, it’s just called BAD BUSINESS. But in a FREE NATION, should business not be entitled to conduct their affairs in any manner the market will sustain, as long as those affairs are conducted legally? Isn’t that what capitalism is all about? Free trade and the ability to make money or fail in trying?

If there is going to be any federal oversight and regulation it doesn’t need to be on businesses in general, but if a business was going bankrupt and was bailed out by federal funds, taxpayer dollars, then, and only then, should the Fed have ANY say in the salary or bonus structure of that particular business.

And as I have said in the past, the bailouts, started by George W. Bush, are the most unbelievable waste of taxpayer dollars imaginable. If a business is going bankrupt because they engaged in bad business practices, let them go bankrupt. That’s what Chapter 11 reorganization is for. They can reorganize and re-emerge, hopefully see the err of their ways and once again become a viable and successful business.

The Federal government has no idea of the damage they have caused by conducting their own BAD BUSINESS. The bailout of Chrysler and GM for example. GM is going to require many more BILLIONS of our tax dollars to even hope to remain solvent. At this time GM appears to be a black hole, sucking up ALL the resources it can and giving nothing in return. And yet we, the taxpayer, are funding GM, by proxy, through our elected officials.

So, wouldn’t the logical conclusion be, we are no longer a FREE nation?

Are we now truly that socialist/Marxist demon that many of us have preached against for a very long time now? I tried to point a lot of this out well before Barack Hussein Obama came on the scene. I tried to point out that we were becoming a socialized nation even before the 1st round of BUSH bailouts occurred. I accused my state Senators, Cornyn and Hutchison, of being nothing more than socialist shills after they BOTH voted FOR the Bush bailouts.

When it comes time for history to define the Socialization of America, Barack Hussein Obama will not be looked upon as the founder of the feast. For many years American presidents and legislatures have steadily moved this nation towards Marxism and One World Government.

Obama merely gets the honor of delivering the coup de grace.

House defeats $700B financial markets bailout

WASHINGTON (AP) - The House on Monday defeated a $700 billion emergency rescue package, ignoring urgent pleas from President Bush and bipartisan congressional leaders to quickly bail out the staggering financial industry.

Stocks plummeted on Wall Street even before the 228-205 vote to reject the bill was announced on the House floor.

When the critical vote was tallied, too few members of the House were willing to support the unpopular measure with elections just five weeks away. Ample no votes came from both the Democratic and Republican sides of the aisle.

Bush and a host of leading congressional figures had implored the lawmakers to pass the legislation despite howls of protest from their constituents back home.

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House defeats $700B financial markets bailout

At the risk of saying “I told ya so�?, well, I told ya so…

The words Bush and confidence are just not compatible, an oxymoron in it’s most exact definition. When Bush projects confidence, BOHICA, Bend Over, Here It Comes Again!

Bush doesn’t give a damn about what the American people want, he does NOT listen to the people that put him in office, it’s ALL about HIM, “I am the decider�?, and that moron, along with the Congresscritters that just love to give YOUR money away, on BOTH sides of the aisle, are going to wreck this nation before they leave office if they can…

The Bush legacy is being set in stone as I write this, ‘Mr. Bush presided over the most destructive phase of U.S. government to date, earning Mr. Bush the title WORST President in U.S. history.’

Bush does have one thing in his favor, our Congress is even worse, their approval numbers are dismal, and the American people are taking the brunt of this BS.

Both sides are pointing fingers, you did this, and you said that, and here’s the bottom line folks, we, the American people, are being seriously penalized for bad business decisions made by Wall Street, and we’re going to pay for those bad decisions, one way or another, with our TAX dollars in a Wall Street bailout, or in a loss of ALL the economy if Wall Street fails.

Any way it goes, WE lose…

Bush confident bailout bill will stabilize economy

WASHINGTON - Buffeted by unusually aggressive pressure from the White House, House members debated hotly-contested Wall Street bailout legislation Monday as a key architect conceded its unpopularity.

“Many of us feel that the national interest requires us to do something which is, in many ways, unpopular,” said Rep. Barney Frank, the Financial Services Committee chairman. “It is hard to get political credit for avoiding something that has not yet happened.”

The House was moving toward an early afternoon vote on the much-maligned legislation, the product of marathon bargaining over the weekend among various House and Senate representatives.

President Bush once again urged the bill’s passage, saying in a White House appearance Monday morning that “every member of Congress and every American should keep in mind that a vote for this bill is a vote to prevent economic damage to you and your community.”

“With this strong and decisive legislation,” he said, “we will help restart the flow of credit so American families can meet their daily needs and American businesses can make purchases, ship goods and meet their payrolls.”

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Bush confident bailout bill will stabilize economy

Here’s the part that causes me GREAT concern: Bush confident bailout bill will stabilize economy.

Any time Bush says that he is confident, I get ready to see massive fallout, simply because Bush and confidence are 2 words that just don’t go together for me, and here are a few reasons why: ABC News: Bush Optimistic About Stimulus Package , obviously that one didn’t work as planned, if it had, we wouldn’t be in this current financial mess, Bush Confident Surveillance Is Legal , Bush Confident Iraq Will Avoid Civil War , Bush Confident Republicans Will Retain White House , OK, so far, he has that one right, Bush Confident Despite Mounting Challenges , Bush confident of finding banned Iraqi weapons, I’m still waiting for that one, some *yellow cake* does NOT constitute WMDs as defined by Bush as justification for going into Iraq, Bush ‘confident’ US Congress will approve bailout, and that is yet to be seen too, they probably will, Congress loves to waste OUR money, Bush ‘confident’ of Mideast peace deal , and I have to ask, which Mideast peace deal? There have been several, and NONE of them amounted to a hill of beans. And the list goes on and on…

Here’s the bottom line, no matter how this turns out, it’s going to hurt the American taxpayer, and the root causes of the problems will remain in place, grinning from ear to ear as they bail out with their Golden Parachutes.