putative.com

Poor WaMu employees

From the Puget Sound Business Journal:

Employees held about 31 million stock options at the end of 2007, according to WaMu’s annual report. Not all of the options were fully vested.

“It’s an unbelievable amount of money that got evaporated,” said the former WaMu executive, who declined to be named. “I think the only difference between this and Enron is the majority of WaMu employees will end up having jobs where everyone at Enron lost their job.”

...

The amount of company stock owned by WaMu employees through their 401(k) retirement plans, isn’t known. But “it’s significant,” the former executive said.

Historically, there were no limits to how much employees could invest of their 401(k) in company stock.

At the end of August, WaMu sent a notice to 401(k) plan holders informing them that contributions to the Washington Mutual Stock Fund would be capped at 20 percent. The notice was obtained by the Puget Sound Business Journal.

WaMu’s letter of explanation warned employees that it’s “important to mix investments among different asset classes” and “investing large amounts in a single holding or stock — like the Washington Mutual Stock Fund — can leave a portfolio under-diversified.”

The new cap would have gone into effect on Wednesday.

The problem with our neighborhood

And I guess the other problem with the retarded Pioneer Square business ecosystem is all the places that have the opposite hours, open only for club nights and games.

Why I love Girl Talk

From Wired, a graphic breakdown of one of their songs:

(Thanks, Rob!)

Worst. President. Ever.

The guy is still president, as it turns out. That is some real leadership, after the GOP hamstrings his own bailout deal:

At the White House, Bush beseeched lawmakers to join him in announcing progress toward a deal. According to one report, the president asked, "Can't we just all go out and say things are OK?"

Yes, let's just say that everything is okay. Whew, I feel much better now.

Bill Maher on race

Funny, funny stuff, about 1:50 in:

Found via one of my new favorite blogs. (Thanks to Rob for the tip!)

"GOP" vs. "Republican" in WA

I had heard about—and seen, on campaign signs—that Rossi was conspicuously calling himself "GOP" and not "Republican."

I didn't really think it was a big deal until I read this.

This is the kind of thing that makes me want to repeatedly close my laptop on my head. Rossi does six points better when he's listed as GOP and not Republican? 25% of voters don't know that GOP means Republican?

WHAT? I want to be charitable and respectful of opposing views. And, for example, I realize that many of today's "conservatives" and "Christians" are arguably not conservative nor Christians respectively. But this sort of thing drives me insane. Are they *trying* to make me hate Palin's "vote-stealing retard baby"?

The worst Palin excerpt

As I was saying last night, I had seen one or two answers from the Couric interview that I thought were just really inexcusable and terrible—and then I saw this one. ZOMFG:

My idea is that if McCain is elected, I want to set up a volunteer Secret Service, sort of like the Minutemen are a volunteer border patrol. We would work together to surround McCain with a solid phalanx of bodyguards—hundreds of people deep, around the clock—to make sure that please, please, please, god, nothing ever happens to him.

McCain and the Keating 5 scandal

Explained in 97 seconds (found via Andrew Sullivan). It's a testament to how much McCain has flooded the zone with inanity that this doesn't even get talked about. Maybe tonight at the debate!

"Picking Apart the Plan"

Good post on The Big Picture, with some really substantive video. It's almost ten minutes long, but it's information-rich.

What is McCain suspending?

His campaign offices are hard at work. His ads are still running. And weirdly, he hasn't even had time to read the current *three-page proposal*. (Yes, it's only three pages long.) And, of course, there was the time for the interview that Letterman ranted about.