Michael Moore Wants to 'Save Our CEOs'

Chrysler ad a political football

(NEWSER) - God bless America ... and the Chrysler bailout ... seemed to be the message that left football fans misty-eyed after Clint Eastwood's Super Bowl Chrysler ad. It's "halftime" in America, and we're all pulling together for a brighter economic future, says the gravelly-voiced star. But Eastwood was opposed to the bailout that made the Chrysler turnaround possible, and now the ad has become a political football as Dems score points with it and the GOP tackles it, notes ABC News . “Saving the American Auto Industry: Something Eminem and Clint Eastwood can agree on," crowed White House spokesman Dan Pfeiffer on Twitter, referring to Eminem’s Chrysler ad during last year's Super Bowl. "Powerful spot," chimed in Obama re-election strategist David Axelrod. But George Bush's political maven Karl Rove snapped that he was "offended" by the ad, which he argued was orchestrated by the administration to paint a rosy future. More»

Environmentalist not happy with president's handling of oil spill

(NEWSER) - Another Cannes ruckus: Peter Fonda called President Obama a “f***ing traitor” at the launch of a documentary about the BP oil spill, the AFP reports. At yesterday’s premiere of The Big Fix, Fonda recalled his reaction to the feeling that Washington was trying to silence reporting on the Deepwater Horizon disaster. "I sent an email to President Obama saying, 'You are a f***ing traitor,' using those words ... 'You're a traitor, you allowed foreign boots on our soil telling our military—in this case the Coast Guard—what they can and could not do, and telling us, the citizens of the United States, what we could or could not do.'" Click for another buzzy incident from Cannes . More»

Morgan Spurlock helms documentary on advertising

(NEWSER) - Morgan Spurlock, the guy behind Super Size Me, calls his latest documentary—an exploration of our ad-obsessed culture—The Greatest Movie Ever Sold. And critics seem to agree:

• Spurlock “has this habit of making documentaries that come hidden in the Trojan horse of silly and then stab at your conscience,” writes Peter Travers in Rolling Stone . “As ever, he makes you laugh till it hurts.”

After Lloyd Blankfein's compensation almost doubles to $19M

(NEWSER) - Lloyd Blankfein’s salary nearly doubled in 2010 to a total of around $19 million—and the Catholic church isn’t happy about it. Four orders of nuns that invest with Goldman Sachs have all signed on to a proposal demanding the bank review its compensation policy, the Guardian reports. The nuns are pushing the board to review and report on whether compensation is “excessive,” and on how it relates to “sizable layoffs and the level of pay of our lowest paid workers.” More»

'Notably improved' market means $15B-$20B profit for taxpayers

(NEWSER) - The Treasury Department will start selling the $142 billion portfolio of mortgage-backed securities, the "toxic" assets it bought up during the financial crisis , the Wall Street Journal reports. The securities are mostly 30-year, fixed-rate mortgage-backed securities guaranteed by either Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac. And having bought the securities dirt-cheap, the Treasury expects to make between $15 billion and $20 billion for taxpayers in the next year. More»