(Michael Farr) - Last Sunday, the House passed a historic $938 billion health care bill and on Tuesday, President Obama signed the bill into law. The Senate will try to pass a second measure passed by the House on Sunday amending portions of the bill through a process called reconciliation. This massive health care overhaul is expected to guarantee insurance coverage for 32 million uninsured Americans. The cost of covering these currently uninsured citizens is expected to be covered by a combination of taxes on wealthy individuals and companies and through Medicare cost cuts.

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(Michael Farr) - On Monday, President Obama submitted his 2011 budget proposal to Congress. The long-range budget projections, included within the administration's proposal, sent shivers down the spines of deficit hawks. By all accounts, our current course is unsustainable, and something must be done. Put bluntly, Americans simply require more out of their government than they are willing to pay in taxes. Absent drastic action to reverse the deteriorating outlook, we should all expect lower living standards for ourselves, our children and our children's children. But alas, election years are not known for the implementation of painful decisions. We fully expect another year of unheeded warnings, deferral of tough decisions, and unchecked spending. All the while, however, the voices at Tea Party rallies grow steadily louder. Are we nearing the day of reckoning, or can we afford to defer fundamental reform indefinitely. Only time will tell.

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(Michael Farr) - Most of the larger banks have reported fourth quarter earnings already, and we must admit the results were better than we had anticipated. In general, the growth in problem loans declined, capital and reserve ratios strengthened, low-cost deposits continued to grow at a robust pace, and earnings largely surpassed estimates. Absent the bucket of cold water that President Obama threw on the sector when he announced new regulatory initiatives late last week, the 4Q results may have actually strengthened the resolve of those that believe we are nearing a peak in credit losses for this painful cycle. So while we at Farr, Miller & Washington remain non-believers for now (which we will explain further below), let’s examine some of the factors that have many people believing that the days of outsized loan write-offs at the banks are nearly over.

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(Lee Siler) - This may not sound like much, but it doesn't take much to change market sentiment, especially when much of Wall Street is expecting a pullback.

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(Lee Siler) - Stock futures jump pre-market as President Obama re-nominates Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke to a second four-year term. Of course, Bernanke's appointment will have to be confirmed by congress, which is a likely scenario. I think it would be disastrous to change the head of the Federal Reserve in the midst of and economic recovery as complicated as this one.

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(Lee Siler) - A surprisingly strong jobs report helped stocks jump more than 1% on Friday and more than 2% on the week. The unemployment rate unexpectedly dropped from 9.5% to 9.4% for the month of July. This news was clearly welcomed by investors, as well as President Obama, who said, "The worst may be behind us." Jobs were the one element in this bottoming process we hadn't seen until now.

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