Daily Political Wire 6-20-2010

George Wenschhof

Yesterday, President Obama and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner announced China had agreed to greater exchange flexibility for the yuan - the Obama administration had been pushing for this for some time as the Chinese currency had been kept artificially low for quite some time in the global market. the announcement comes prior to meetings with the G-20 next week. TheHill.com has more here.

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Senator Claire McCaskill (D-Mo.) hopeful for vote to end secret holds in Senate - a senate rule which evolved over the years allowing a member to block a nomination by the president from coming to a vote. McCaskill sent a letter to Senate Majority Leaders Harry Reid with 67 signatures of Senators requesting a vote on the rules to end the practice. Republicans have used this procedure to block dozens of President Obama's nominees. The NY Times has more here.

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Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac continue to lose billions - the mortgage companies were taken over when the economy tanked. Originally created to help spur home lending, the mortgage giants would buy mortgages from banks and lending institutions allowing them to to then offer more loans.

The defaults continue to be staggering and over the first three months of this year there was a foreclosure action every 90 seconds, leading to an astounding 163, 828 homes the government owned by the end of March. The Congressional Budget Office estimates the total cost to government will be 389 billion. MSNBC.com has more here.

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Success in Afghanistan remains elusive for U.S. - appearing on CNN "State of the Union", U.S. Senators Dianne Feinstein (D-Calf.) and Richard Lugar (R-Ind.) remain committed to U.S. troops remaining in Afghanistan.

Feinstein sounding somewhat like the Nixon administration and the Pentagon during the Viet Nam war, said we can't afford to allow the Taliban to take over Afghanistan for Pakistan would be next. CNN.com has more here.

Lugar said it would hard to define success as there has been no benchmark established. However, he remained committed to the U.S. training of Afghanistan military. CNN.com has more here.

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