It appears that Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner simply will not bite the bullet. NYTimes:

[T]he Treasury Department announced on Friday that it would vastly increase its ownership of the struggling company. After two multibillion-dollar lifelines failed to shore up Citigroup, the government will increase its stake to 36 percent from 8 percent.

Under the deal, the Treasury Department has agreed to convert up to $25 billion of its preferred stock investment in Citigroup into common stock, giving taxpayers more risk, but more potential for profit if the company recovers. The Treasury will convert its stake to the extent that Citigroup can persuade private investors, including several foreign government investment funds, to go along. . . . The Obama administration deliberately stopped short of securing a majority or controlling interest in Citigroup . . . Taxpayers, after pumping more than $45 billion into the bank, have become Citigroup’s single largest shareholder. The government will not put in any additional money for now, but some analysts believe Citigroup may require more down the road.

This is simply ludicrous. Bite the bullet now Geithner. "Temporary takeover" of Citi is inescapable. Start fixing the problems now.

Speaking for me only

NYTimes:

President Obama heads to one of the nation’s most storied military bases Friday morning to unveil plans to pull most troops out of Iraq by August 2010. . . .“The combat, current combat mission in Iraq will end on August 31, 2010,” a senior administration official told reporters . . . At that point, the U.S. forces remaining in Iraq will undertake a new mission, a more limited mission.”

. . . After August 2010, the Obama plan will leave behind 35,000 to 50,000 of the 142,000 American troops now in Iraq to advise and train Iraqi security forces, conduct discrete counterterrorism missions and protect American civilian and military personnel working in the country, including State Department reconstruction teams.

Unlike some on the progressive side, who railed vehemently against the concept of residual troops (Bill Richardson became their favored candidate during the primaries because he said he was against leaving residual troops), I always thought this approach was reasonable. I support President Obama's policy. For an intelligent opposing view, here is Robert Stein. I've added a poll question below on whether you support or do not support President Obama's Iraq policy.

Speaking for me only

The Obama Administration will charge Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri with criminal terrorism charges. The NYTimes claims Al-Marri is "the only enemy combatant to be held on American soil." On Rachel Maddow's show, the invaluable Jane Mayer seemed to contradict this claim, but perhaps she is referring to persons held overseas, such as in the American base at Bagram, Afghanistan.

Mayer made an another important point - the theory upheld by the Fourth Circuit, that a President can unilaterally declare a person an unlawful combatant and thus hold them indefinitely will remain untested.

It seems unlikely that President Obama will attempt to exercise such raw power, but the theory remains. What would be better would be if the Obama Administration expressly renounced the Bush Administration position on this issue.

President Obama's 2010 budget was released today. It amounts to $3.55 trillion and, according to the Washington Post, will push the deficit to $1.75 trillion.

Included is a $634 billion health care fund. How will it be paid for? In large part, by increasing taxes on those earning more than $250,000. [More...]

Say hello to Accountability Now. It launches tomorrow, and is a political action committee which will seek out liberal candidates to move the Democratic party to the left.

Soliciting donations from their readers, the bloggers said they were planning to recruit liberal candidates to challenge more centrist Democrats currently in Congress.

The formation of the group is another step in the evolution of the blogosphere, which has proven effective at motivating party activists to give money and time to political campaigns, especially in local races.

Who's behind it? On the blogger end, Jane Hamsher of Firedoglake, Glenn Greenwald and Daily Kos, to name a few. They've already bankrolled $500k. On the labor side, SEUI. Also involved: Move-On.org.

Fundraising starts for real next month.

For the past 38 years, I've read the Rocky Mountain News daily. Tomorrow will be the last day. The paper will cease publishing Friday.

Maybe I shouldn't have stopped my subscription and read it solely online the past five years. Or maybe Denver doesn't need two dailies. [More...]

It's a motions day for me. My issue: Is a single instance of weaving within a lane on the interstate without crossing a line a valid reason for a traffic stop under the theory that the driver might be tired and fall asleep and therefore a welfare check is called for?

Here's an open thread for you, all topics welcome.

Here is the video of Attorney General Eric Holder's press conference yesterday. At 25 minutes in, he is asked whether DOJ will continue raids on medical marijuana dispensaries (in states that have legalized medical marijuana.)

Holder says "what the president said during the campaign, you'll be surprised to know, will be consistent with what we'll be doing here in law enforcement." He says Obama is "formally and technically and by law my boss now, and so what he said during campaign is now American policy." [More...]

Some highlights:

-increasing taxes on the wealthiest Americans and using revenues from a new program: selling carbon credits to manufacturers as part of a cap-and-trade plan meant to slow climate change.

-a proposal to phase out government payments to crop producers making more than $500,000. Additional revenues are posited from a tightening of tax-code enforcement.

-use revenues from the centerpiece of his environmental policy — a plan under which companies must buy permits to exceed pollution emission caps — to pay for an extensionof a two-year tax credit that benefits low-wage and middle-income people.

[More . . .]

Attorney General Eric Holder today said the Obama administration will seek to reinstate the assault weapons ban and a ban on "cop killer" bullets.

"As President Obama indicated during the campaign, there are just a few gun-related changes that we would like to make, and among them would be to reinstitute the ban on the sale of assault weapons," Holder told reporters."

Just a few?

Attorney General Eric Holder today announced the arrest of 52 people in a continuation of a Bush Administration drug investigation of the Mexican cartels. The operation began 21 months ago. The total number of arrests (a number of whom are low level traffickers) is 750.

The military may get involved in the effort:

The Homeland Security Department has developed a plan to send more agents and other resources, and possibly U.S. military support, to the U.S. side of the border if the drug violence continues to spill over and overwhelm the agents stationed there, a DHS official confirmed.

The Pentagon is looking into a larger role in bolstering counter-narcotics efforts. Adm. Dennis C. Blair, the director of national intelligence, told Congress Wednesday that the corruptive influence and increasing violence of the cartels has undermined Mexico City's ability to govern parts of its own country.

Another Holder plan that should be no surprise: He wants to bring back the assault weapons ban.

I think we forgot to put one of these up today. Your turn, all topics welcome.