From the Associated Press:

A New York state judge on Wednesday ordered Bank of America Corp. to disclose information about bonuses given to employees at Merrill Lynch & Co. just before the bank bought the brokerage company.
New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo and Bank of America have been sparring over the release of the information for weeks. Cuomo is investigating whether Bank of America and Merrill failed to provide proper disclosures to shareholders about the bonuses.
New York State Supreme Court Justice Bernard Fried ruled that the compensation figures didn’t constitute a trade secret, as Bank of America had claimed.
Bank of America and the attorney general’s office did not immediately comment on the ruling.

An interesting discussion this morning on NPR’s Morning Edition on the aid culture in Africa and the damage it does.

Dambisa Moyo, a Zambian-born economist, has written a book called Dead Aid: Why Aid Is Not Working and How There Is a Better Way for Africa.

Moyo has worked as a consultant for the World Bank and as an economic specialist in sub-Saharan Africa for Goldman Sachs.

“Africa doesn’t need pity,” she said.

She argues that the aid leaves government unaccountable, encourages corruption and discourages entrepreneurs. Africa is far poorer than it was 40 years ago.

“I’m not saying its going to be easy, I’m just saying that there is a real opportunity for policymakers to focus on coming up with more innovative ways of financing economic development. In a way the crisis actually provides the African governments with the situation where they cannot rely on aid budgets coming through from the West,” she told Reuters last month.

But won’t withdrawing aid cause harm. No, she says.

“It actually tends to pool at the top so it’s not like the average African is going to suffer, They don’t see the aid anyway. Essentially it‘s going to really affect the bureaucratic processes at the top and would really impact on corruption,” she told Reuters

Andrew Cuomo issues those subpoenas he threatened:

ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo says American International Group missed a deadline to give him details about employees set to receive millions of dollars in bonuses and he’s issuing subpoenas for the information.
Cuomo says his office will investigate whether the employees were involved in the insurance giant’s near-collapse and whether the $165 million in bonus payments are fraudulent under state law. AIG reported this month that it lost $61.7 billion in the fourth quarter of last year, the largest corporate loss in history.
Cuomo had set a 4 p.m. Monday deadline for the company to provide the employees’ names along with information about their work and contracts.
Cuomo also says his staff were told AIG mailed the bonus checks Friday.

President Obama has told his treasury secretary to “pursue every single legal avenue” to block the bonuses AIG plans to distribute to its executives.

Good thing.

Do the people Wall Street not understand the public’s anger?

We will reach a point where we will no longer care whether it is in our interest to keep these companies afloat.
If they keep abusing the help they are getting from the government—and ultimately all of us—they are toying with their own future. People will be willing to let them fail.

A judge expects to rule next week on whether the names of Merrill Lynch & Co. executives who received the top bonuses last year should remain confidential, Reuters reports.

Attorney General Andrew Cuomo wants the details made public.

They should be.

If taxpayers are footing the bill, they are entitled to the information.

Bank of America, which bought Merrill, insists the information would provide its competitors with too much information.

Here in the U.S. we’re treated to all kinds of Obama paraphernalia. The Germans have taken it a step further.

From Spiegel Online, the German newsmagazine:

“Tender, Juicy Obama Fingers Hit the Shelves”

“A German frozen food company hopes to raise sales with a new product: Obama fingers. The tender, fried chicken bits come with a tasty curry sauce. The company says it was unaware of the possible racist overtones of the product,” writes Charles Hawley.

“It was supposed to be a homage to the American lifestyle and the new U.S. president,” Judith Witting, sales manager for the company, Sprehe, told the magazine.

What would the Colonel think? Can Biden bratwurst be far behind?

At St. Theresa’s Church in Briarcliff Manor, the first Sunday of the month is designated “Beef Stew Sunday.”
A special collection of donated food is taken during the Mass, a tradition that dates to 1991.

“Right in front of the altar are the wicker baskets filled with the donated food,” said Marty Engelhardt, one of the parishioners. “Then in addition are the collection plates if people want to drop in cash or checks. That’s there for them as well.”

“It just makes the Mass so fulfilling,” he said.  “You have this beautiful offering of food.”

The collection at his church is just one of many behind-the-scenes efforts going on throughout Westchester County, he said.

“It’s an example of what just one church can do,” he said.  “There are any number of other churches that are doing the same thing.”

Today I wrote about the Ossining Food Pantry, of which Engelhardt is the president. It operates from the Trinity Episcopal Church Thursday nights and Friday mornings.

Volunteers keep it going. Engelhardt said he called their work “The Three P’s”: coordinating the purchases, picking up the food and packing it for distribution.

“Wednesday night those wonderful people start at 6:30 in the evening and sometimes don’t finish until 10 o’clock at night.”

Did the Harrison police officers and code enforcement officer have a first amendment right to engage in tasteless sexual banter about the town’s supervisor without sanction?
What about the racial remarks some of them made?
The four men have been suspended while the town investigates. I wrote about the case earlier in the week. Here are some additional comments from George Rutherglen, who teaches admiralty, civil procedure, employment discrimination, and professional responsibility at the University of VIrginia School of Law.
“The practical answer is this: There’s limited protection for uniformed police officers, particularly police officers, when they engage in racist and sexist remarks,” he said.
“The thought is that they have to maintain the confidence of the community, and that such remarks would undermine the confidence of the community.”
There is heightened protection for speech on a matter of public concern, he said, as there is for a private conversation. Had the men been exchanging entirely private emails, their protection would have been stronger.
But they were on Facebook, and not all of the settings were on private.
Plus one of the men identified himself as a police officer.
“You just can’t do that,” Rutherglen said.

The headline on the Fox News poll: Obama Believes in Bigger Government.
Buried in the story, this tidbit: “More people lean toward saying the nation’s economy needs the economic policies of Obama (49 percent) right now rather than the economic policies of Ronald Reagan (40 percent).”
The stock market closed at a 12-year low today. The Dow Jones: 6594.44

Last week, Connecticut expanded its bottle law to include water bottles. Earlier this year, the state changed its law to require beverage companies to transfer unclaimed deposits to the state.

Environmentalists in New York continue to lobby Albany to update New York’s law to include water, iced tea, juice, sports drinks and other non-carbonated non-alcoholic beverages.

Governor David Paterson has proposed including the Bigger Better Bottle Bill in the 2009-2010 state budget. The Senate Environmental Conservation Committee has scheduled hearings in Albany today and in Buffalo on Friday.

There is no reason not to include those beverages too. Water bottles litter our landscape just as well as Coke cans.