Democratic News Chatter 4-10-2009

George Wenschhof Bio

This morning, President Barack Obama will hold a discussion with his economic team at the White House - Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner, Federal Reserve Chair Ben Bernanke, FDIC chair Sheila Bair, along with WH economic advisers Lawrence Summers and Dr. Christina Romer will all be present at the meeting. The President is expected to make some remarks to the press afterwards. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

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The President encourages homeowners to refinance - Yesterday, he spoke of the 7-9 million Americans who would benefit by refinancing their homes with the low interest rates that are currently available. He said they would realize savings of $1,600 to $2,00 per year. the NY Times has more here. The government website to check out for more information on how to save money by refinancing can be read here.

Perhaps, as a result of this presidential sales pitch, the Dow Jones was up almost 250 points yesterday to close above 8,000.

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Obama to request an additional 83 billion for Iraq and Afghanistan - this supplemental spending bill will fund the conflicts through the end of this fiscal year which ends on September 20. It includes 800 million in humanitarian aid for Gaza. CNN.com has more here.

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CIA to close secret prisons - the sites which the former George W. Bush administration was reluctant to disclose, will be closed according to CIA Director Leon Panetta. He also disclosed contractors who had been hired under the Bush administration to guard the prisons and it now also seems they were used to interrogate prisoners, have been fired. MSNBC.com has more here.

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Votes still being counted in New York District 20 special election - at the end of the day yesterday, Democrat Scott Murphy had retaken the lead by 8 votes over Republican Jim Tedisco. Only 1100 of the 6700 absentee ballots had been counted so far. Republican Jim Tedisco had been expected to win a majority of the absentee ballots. There were a little over 155,000 votes cast in the election. TheHill.com has more here.

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