Baltimore You can’t find this piece in the Journal, Times, or Post. Soon it will show up in more conservative blogs with appropriate conspiratorial references and asides. Count on the misquotes and false attributions being numerous, but reading the decision by U.S. Federal Judge Nina Gershon, one cannot miss the decision’s clarity or thinly veiled anger. Gershon permanently enjoined the federal government from banning ACORN from funding and expressly directed a list of officials from Secretary of HUD Donovan to Secretary of the Treasury Geithner to OMB head Orzag to stop blocking the path and in Orzag’s case to step up and make this injustice right. Well, I guess “righter” since this is a textbook case of the damage to ACORN being irreparable as the organization seems on its last legs and fighting to survive in any form or fashion.
I would think our conservative friends who often try to claim they are big defenders of the U.S. Constitution, would be twisting in front of their computer screens a bit on this situation. The bar on “bills of attainder” in the Constitution is clear that any single entity or organization could not be politically singled out and punished without rhyme or reason without investigation or trial or particulars, but just in the herd reaction of a crowd in a theater hearing the shout, “fire!” This is an obvious and critical protection of the rights of speech and association in the Constitution where the bright line tests and protections against political whim and vengeance are as fundamental as one can imagine. Yet, to their shame we saw scores of Democrats and Republicans lined up to tar and feather ACORN without trial or charge or usually a clue. It is hard to forget that in pure political expediency the President, a former constitutional law teacher for crying out loud, joined the lynching mob in giving cover to these scurrilous attacks, which continue even as the Justice Department tries – unsuccessfully – to overturn Judge Gerson’s ruling.
Continue Reading Judge Orders Permanent Injunction to Block ACORN Defunding
Takoma Park Financial reform for consumers has been in deep water and drowning ever since Rep. Barney Frank nixed the White House inserted CRA protection from the bill, but in the “something is better than nothing” world we’re forced to live in these days, at the least we have to draw the line at giving a “bye” to predatory payday lenders. Seems though that lame duck, Wall Street bound Senator Chris Dodd (D-CT) is bending over for Senator Bob Corker (R-TN) to pray at the false god of bipartisanship while Corker plays footsie with his many friends in the payday rip-off world to create a loophole in the proposed legislation to let them escape regulation. Stop this now!
We know from the many successful provincial level fights led by ACORN Canada over the last several years in Ontario and British Columbia that in fact the whole premise of the industry is wrong. In the USA they are arguing that they would go under with a 36% cap on loans, yet Dollar Financial (which is owned by USA interests) and others operate under the new laws in Canada just fine, in fact, we believe too fine, which is why we are still hammering away every chance we get. Their cry for loopholes to Corker and Dodd is masked in a twofold strategy: (1) blame the banks for the financial meltdown and (2) claim they would be forced out of business by regulation.
Continue Reading Payday Lending Loopholes
Silver Spring I couldn’t believe this when I read it, but somehow Congress and the Bush Administration managed to figure out a way to garnishee social security and disability payments for seniors by eliminating the 10 year statute of limitations on collecting certain debts owed to the federal government. Did you know this? Amazing that while we should be committed to building citizen wealth, instead we are trying to play gotcha with the elderly to attach their small social security checks for federal government debt claims in many cases for an indefinite period. Thanks to Ellen Shultz in an article in the Wall Street Journal called “Seniors Lose Shield on Debts.”
Here’s the horror:
◦ Before you count on social security payments for your senior years, realize that the government can demand payback on veterans payments for health care, defaulted farm and small business loans, student loans (!), income taxes, and almost any other debt, though I’m not sure about housing loans. I would bet it could include hurricane recovery loans.
Continue Reading Garnishing Social Security to Impoverish Elderly
Washington It’s not spring here, but finally there is a briskness in peoples’ step. Tomorrow there is a major rally for heath care reform called by Health Care for America Now (HCAN), and on Sunday, March 21st, the forces in favor of comprehensive immigration reform are rallying, praying, and marching on the Mall, hopefully with significant numbers. There are front page stories wondering how the Obama administration got so off message, and there’s a real race in Arkansas with Senator Blanche Lincoln dying in the middle of the road. Something good is bound to come of the reemergence of progressives from the lassitude of mindless hope and passivity. Hooray!
But…increasingly there seems to be blood in the water as the Administration becomes the gang that can’t shot straight. Evidence is piling up:
◦ Weatherization strategy for creating jobs and helping working families seems to be nowhere after more than a year. Energy Secretary frustrated, but how hard could this have been?
◦ Teachers all fired in Rhode Island to take the blame for god knows what, probably just to take the blame and the President of the United States weighs in with a gut punch. Why in the world is Obama in this picture?
◦ Big talk about increasing school hours to better education the kids, but school districts strapped for money are cutting down to 4 days per week. Mr. President?
◦ A year after a new administration, don’t ask me about post-Katrina recovery.
Why pile on? The list could go on and on. Maybe if people get their legs moving and voices louder it won’t breakthrough the Congressional logjam, but at least people will start remembering that we only win, when we fight.
Baltimore You can’t find this piece in the Journal, Times, or Post. Soon it will show up in more conservative blogs with appropriate conspiratorial references and asides. Count on the misquotes and false attributions being numerous, but reading the decision by U.S. Federal Judge Nina Gershon, one cannot miss the decision’s clarity or thinly veiled anger. Gershon permanently enjoined the federal government from banning ACORN from funding and expressly directed a list of officials from Secretary of HUD Donovan to Secretary of the Treasury Geithner to OMB head Orzag to stop blocking the path and in Orzag’s case to step up and make this injustice right. Well, I guess “righter” since this is a textbook case of the damage to ACORN being irreparable as the organization seems on its last legs and fighting to survive in any form or fashion.
