If you doubt that liberal and conservative have lost all meaning in the health care debate, consult the New York Times' columnists of those persuasions.
On the left, Paul Krugman predicts reform "will be undermined by 'centrist' Democratic senators who either prevent the passage of a bill or insist on watering down key elements...
"What the balking Democrats seem most determined to do is to kill the public option, either by eliminating it or by carrying out a bait-and-switch, replacing a true public option with something meaningless. For the record, neither regional health cooperatives nor state-level public plans, both of which have been proposed as alternatives, would have the financial stability and bargaining power needed to bring down health care costs."
On the right, David Brooks insists: "We’ve built an entire health care system (maybe an entire government) on the illusion of something for nothing. Instead of tackling that basic logic, we’ve got a reform process that is trying to evade it."
Brooks argues for a plan by Democrat Ron Wyden and Republican Robert Bennett to repeal tax exemptions for insurance premiums and provide universal coverage. "The Wyden-Bennett bill has 14 bipartisan co-sponsors and the Congressional Budget Office has found that it would be revenue-neutral," he claims, but Senate Committee leaders of both parties are concentrating instead on "grand rhetoric and superficial cost containment."
The political hot air on Capitol Hill is filled with nonsense from both sides of the aisles, and so far the White House has been unwilling to make them stop the political blather and face reality.
Showing posts with label Congress. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Congress. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 23, 2009
Monday, May 11, 2009
Life-and-Death Games
The health-care finals start in Washington today with the Obama home team hosting the all-stars who have made the American medical system one of the most expensive and least effective in the world.
The name of the game is cooperation as insurers, drug makers, hospitals et al come to the White House reportedly to announce "a voluntary plan to hold costs down, which health care industry officials involved in the effort say could save a family of four $2,500 a year in the fifth year, and a total of $2 trillion for the nation over 10 years. But there is no way of ensuring that the providers keep their promises, beyond publicizing their performance."
As a basketball fan, the President should recognize a fakeout when he sees one but, just in case, Paul Krugman has a head's up for him:
"What’s presumably going on here is that key interest groups have realized that health care reform is going to happen no matter what they do, and that aligning themselves with the Party of No will just deny them a seat at the table. (Republicans, after all, still denounce research into which medical procedures are effective and which are not as a dastardly plot to deprive Americans of their freedom to choose.)"
Behind all the trash talk this week will be the crucial contest over whether Congress will enact health-care reform that includes a government-sponsored option (Medicare-for-all) to give consumers a chance to buy care directly and pressure private insurers to improve what they offer.
Without that, they're just playing the same old games.
The name of the game is cooperation as insurers, drug makers, hospitals et al come to the White House reportedly to announce "a voluntary plan to hold costs down, which health care industry officials involved in the effort say could save a family of four $2,500 a year in the fifth year, and a total of $2 trillion for the nation over 10 years. But there is no way of ensuring that the providers keep their promises, beyond publicizing their performance."
As a basketball fan, the President should recognize a fakeout when he sees one but, just in case, Paul Krugman has a head's up for him:
"What’s presumably going on here is that key interest groups have realized that health care reform is going to happen no matter what they do, and that aligning themselves with the Party of No will just deny them a seat at the table. (Republicans, after all, still denounce research into which medical procedures are effective and which are not as a dastardly plot to deprive Americans of their freedom to choose.)"
Behind all the trash talk this week will be the crucial contest over whether Congress will enact health-care reform that includes a government-sponsored option (Medicare-for-all) to give consumers a chance to buy care directly and pressure private insurers to improve what they offer.
Without that, they're just playing the same old games.
Monday, September 22, 2008
No Blank-Check Bailout
The bill for decades of American greed has just come due, and deadbeats at every level of society are trying to avoid paying their share.
From street-level avaricious buyers of bigger homes than they could afford with zero down and mortgage brokers and banks willing to bilk them to the covetous upper-echelon insurance companies, Wall Street houses and hedge funds that packaged all-but-worthless indebtedness at a markup for free-lunch investors, all eyes are now on Congress to pick up the tab with taxpayer money--to buy all that trash for cash without any safeguards.
Moreover, it has to be done in a super-hurry with no questions asked or the freeloaders in the markets will go into a swoon, as they did today.
Before Congress gives the Bush Administration an economic blank check comparable to the 2002 carte blanche to shoot up the Middle East, saner Senators are asking for more supervision of the Treasury handouts, more equity from the Wall Street casinos that lost their bets and more emphasis on helping responsible home owners who got caught in the squeeze.
Henry Paulson may tell them the sky is falling, but that doesn't mean that our lawmakers have to respond like Henny Pennies in a panic.
From street-level avaricious buyers of bigger homes than they could afford with zero down and mortgage brokers and banks willing to bilk them to the covetous upper-echelon insurance companies, Wall Street houses and hedge funds that packaged all-but-worthless indebtedness at a markup for free-lunch investors, all eyes are now on Congress to pick up the tab with taxpayer money--to buy all that trash for cash without any safeguards.
Moreover, it has to be done in a super-hurry with no questions asked or the freeloaders in the markets will go into a swoon, as they did today.
Before Congress gives the Bush Administration an economic blank check comparable to the 2002 carte blanche to shoot up the Middle East, saner Senators are asking for more supervision of the Treasury handouts, more equity from the Wall Street casinos that lost their bets and more emphasis on helping responsible home owners who got caught in the squeeze.
Henry Paulson may tell them the sky is falling, but that doesn't mean that our lawmakers have to respond like Henny Pennies in a panic.
Monday, September 08, 2008
Congressional Tap Dancing
Oil drilling, yes. Children's health insurance, no. Economic stimulus, by all means. The priorities of the pre-election Congress this week reflect the political verdict on what will turn on voters in November but promise little of substance.
Democrats will bring to the floor an energy plan that would blunt Republican campaign attacks by opening some areas to coastal drilling while providing incentives for alternative energy and reducing subsidies for oil companies.
Meanwhile, they are letting Republicans off the hook on expanding the Children's Health Insurance Program by not forcing the issue and making them vote up or down on overriding another Bush veto.
Instead, Democrats will focus on another economic stimulus bill to follow the earlier one, which seems to have had no effect whatsoever on the lagging economy.
“This situation is yet another stark reminder that we live in difficult economic times and we must do more to help struggling families reach the American dream,” says Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “That is why I urge President Bush, Senator McCain and other Republicans to work with Democrats in the immediate days ahead to enact an economic recovery package.”
All this will translate into campaign rhetoric, but will voters believe that these posturing politicians are doing anything substantive?
Democrats will bring to the floor an energy plan that would blunt Republican campaign attacks by opening some areas to coastal drilling while providing incentives for alternative energy and reducing subsidies for oil companies.
Meanwhile, they are letting Republicans off the hook on expanding the Children's Health Insurance Program by not forcing the issue and making them vote up or down on overriding another Bush veto.
Instead, Democrats will focus on another economic stimulus bill to follow the earlier one, which seems to have had no effect whatsoever on the lagging economy.
“This situation is yet another stark reminder that we live in difficult economic times and we must do more to help struggling families reach the American dream,” says Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. “That is why I urge President Bush, Senator McCain and other Republicans to work with Democrats in the immediate days ahead to enact an economic recovery package.”
All this will translate into campaign rhetoric, but will voters believe that these posturing politicians are doing anything substantive?
Sunday, July 27, 2008
Smoke-Filled Lungs and Empty Stomachs
A 21st century corollary to the idealistic hope, "Suppose they gave a war and nobody came," could be "Suppose everybody stopped smoking and tobacco farmers grew food instead."
The outlandish idea of devoting millions of acres to feeding hungry people rather than shortening their lives is reflected in new stirrings by Big Government and Big Money.
The House of Representatives will vote this week on a breakthrough bill to empower the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco as it now regulates food, drugs and medical devices, an important step toward bringing a death-dealing industry under control.
Meanwhile, two billionaires--New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Microsoft founder Bill Gates--are pledging $375 million to fight what they called a global tobacco epidemic.
As food shortages rise and health care is unavailable to multitudes, inhabitants of a rational world might see crop rotation from tobacco to food as a logical way of filling empty stomachs and cutting down on cancer and heart disease at the same time.
We are living in a rational world, aren't we?
The outlandish idea of devoting millions of acres to feeding hungry people rather than shortening their lives is reflected in new stirrings by Big Government and Big Money.
The House of Representatives will vote this week on a breakthrough bill to empower the Food and Drug Administration to regulate tobacco as it now regulates food, drugs and medical devices, an important step toward bringing a death-dealing industry under control.
Meanwhile, two billionaires--New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg and Microsoft founder Bill Gates--are pledging $375 million to fight what they called a global tobacco epidemic.
As food shortages rise and health care is unavailable to multitudes, inhabitants of a rational world might see crop rotation from tobacco to food as a logical way of filling empty stomachs and cutting down on cancer and heart disease at the same time.
We are living in a rational world, aren't we?
Tuesday, July 08, 2008
Maiming Medicare
Having failed to privatize Social Security, the Bush Administration is trying to wreck Medicare on its way out the door, but MDs are mad as hell, and they're taking it out on Congressional Republicans.
The focus this week is on trying to undo a 10.6 percent cut in payment to care providers for millions of older Americans. Before the Fourth of July recess, the House passed a bill to prevent the Medicare pay cut by a vote of 355 to 59. In the Senate, Republicans blocked efforts to take up the bill, so the cut took effect on July 1st.
Now the AMA and its incensed members are targeting such former friends as Sens. John Sununu, Roger Wicker and Arlen Specter, who all voted against cloture.
As with the SCHIP legislation to expand children's health care coverage, Bush and his allies are favoring the insurance industry over a government program that is working well for those who need it most.
If the new reimbursement rates were to stand, more doctors would be joining the legions of those who refuse to take on Medicare patients as economically unsound for their practices.
Perhaps the next step would be the "Ice Floe HMO" solution favored by one in three British doctors who would deny treatment to the old "if it were unlikely to do them good for long."
Unless Republicans relent, as they almost surely will, members of the AARP are certain to send them a don't-get-well message in November.
The focus this week is on trying to undo a 10.6 percent cut in payment to care providers for millions of older Americans. Before the Fourth of July recess, the House passed a bill to prevent the Medicare pay cut by a vote of 355 to 59. In the Senate, Republicans blocked efforts to take up the bill, so the cut took effect on July 1st.
Now the AMA and its incensed members are targeting such former friends as Sens. John Sununu, Roger Wicker and Arlen Specter, who all voted against cloture.
As with the SCHIP legislation to expand children's health care coverage, Bush and his allies are favoring the insurance industry over a government program that is working well for those who need it most.
If the new reimbursement rates were to stand, more doctors would be joining the legions of those who refuse to take on Medicare patients as economically unsound for their practices.
Perhaps the next step would be the "Ice Floe HMO" solution favored by one in three British doctors who would deny treatment to the old "if it were unlikely to do them good for long."
Unless Republicans relent, as they almost surely will, members of the AARP are certain to send them a don't-get-well message in November.
Thursday, June 19, 2008
Obama's Coattails
The surest sign that primaries are really over is the surfacing of talk about how long and strong Barack Obama's coattails may be in carrying state and local candidates into office in November.
In the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza reports that even Alaska, that frozen tundra of Democratic hopes, is looking good, with polls showing Sen. Ted "Bridge to Nowhere" Stevens behind his challenger, and prospects looking up in deep red hot-weather states such as Louisiana and Mississippi.
"Rarely in politics is a narrow loss as good as a win," says Cillizza, "but if Obama can keep McCain from running up the score in these Republican-friendly states he may well do a world of good for the down-ballot candidates seeking Senate and House posts."
To start undoing the damage of the Bush years will take solid Democratic majorities in Congress to help the new man in the White House with something akin to the "Reagan Revolution" in 1980, which swept a dozen Democrats, including George McGovern, out of the Senate.
This could be a "Change" election in more ways than one.
In the Washington Post, Chris Cillizza reports that even Alaska, that frozen tundra of Democratic hopes, is looking good, with polls showing Sen. Ted "Bridge to Nowhere" Stevens behind his challenger, and prospects looking up in deep red hot-weather states such as Louisiana and Mississippi.
"Rarely in politics is a narrow loss as good as a win," says Cillizza, "but if Obama can keep McCain from running up the score in these Republican-friendly states he may well do a world of good for the down-ballot candidates seeking Senate and House posts."
To start undoing the damage of the Bush years will take solid Democratic majorities in Congress to help the new man in the White House with something akin to the "Reagan Revolution" in 1980, which swept a dozen Democrats, including George McGovern, out of the Senate.
This could be a "Change" election in more ways than one.
Thursday, June 12, 2008
The Politics of Unemployment
Congressional Democrats and Republicans are doing an election-year dance with the White House over extending unemployment benefits. The House yesterday failed to approve a proposal to give jobless workers an extra three months of eligibility, but Democrats are bringing the bill back for another vote today.
Yesterday's bill came up after the May jobless report showed the largest one-month flood of filings in 22 years, the rate up to 5.5 percent from 5 percent, as the number of laid-off workers increased to 8.5 million with more than 1.6 million out of work for 27 weeks or more and no longer eligible for benefits.
Some worried Republicans are supporting the extension, including John McCain, but President Bush keeps threatening to veto it as "not fiscally responsible to extend benefits in states with very low unemployment rates."
The logic of this is mind-boggling, since workers in those states would collect a smaller total of benefits for families that need help as much as those in areas with higher unemployment rates.
Democrats are not unaware of this impasse as an election issue. Rahm Emanuel, chair of the Democratic House caucus, observed that Republicans "are all for spending an additional 10 or 12 years in Iraq, but they're opposed to 13 additional weeks of benefits for unemployed people who, through no fault of their own, are without work."
But election-year rhetoric won't feed hungry children. A veto-proof bill should be on the Congressional menu this week without political applesauce.
Yesterday's bill came up after the May jobless report showed the largest one-month flood of filings in 22 years, the rate up to 5.5 percent from 5 percent, as the number of laid-off workers increased to 8.5 million with more than 1.6 million out of work for 27 weeks or more and no longer eligible for benefits.
Some worried Republicans are supporting the extension, including John McCain, but President Bush keeps threatening to veto it as "not fiscally responsible to extend benefits in states with very low unemployment rates."
The logic of this is mind-boggling, since workers in those states would collect a smaller total of benefits for families that need help as much as those in areas with higher unemployment rates.
Democrats are not unaware of this impasse as an election issue. Rahm Emanuel, chair of the Democratic House caucus, observed that Republicans "are all for spending an additional 10 or 12 years in Iraq, but they're opposed to 13 additional weeks of benefits for unemployed people who, through no fault of their own, are without work."
But election-year rhetoric won't feed hungry children. A veto-proof bill should be on the Congressional menu this week without political applesauce.
Tuesday, June 10, 2008
$4 a Gallon
The pain at the pump is going political this week. The President and his wannabe successors are pushing pie-in-the-sky proposals--more drilling in Alaska (Bush), gas tax holidays (McCain) and new taxes on oil companies (Obama)--but Congress is taking aim at one of the underlying reasons for skyrocketing prices--speculation.
"(A)s gas reaches a national average of $4 a gallon for the first time in the nation’s history," reports The Hill, "some see the makings of a consensus on Capital Hill: making it harder for investors to buy crude on the commodity futures markets.
"Critics say the increased participation of non-commercial investors that don’t intend to use the commodity--as opposed to, say, airlines that also buy crude--has helped raise prices."
The focus of Congressional pressure is the government agency charged with overseeing the gambling on oil. According to a spokesman for the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, “More and more senators are questioning the adequacy of the [Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s (CFTC)] regulatory oversight and...are bothered by the role that speculation and non-commercial, institutional investors are having in preventing energy markets from functioning properly.”
The quickest fix would be new curbs on pension funds, endowments and other institutional investors that pump money into commodities index funds, driving up demand and prices. The Goldman Sachs fund attracted $260 billion last year, compared to $13 billion five years earlier.
According to the McClatchy newspapers, complicating any effort to harness speculation is the 30 percent of trading in crude oil in "dark areas"--markets in London and Dubai--not regulated by the CFTC but could be by the President with "a snap of his fingers."
A former CFTC director of trading is quoted as saying, "Essentially this could be ended this afternoon if the Bush administration had the stomach to do it."
But with an army of oil company lobbyists besieging the White House and Congress, don't bet your gas money that it will happen.
"(A)s gas reaches a national average of $4 a gallon for the first time in the nation’s history," reports The Hill, "some see the makings of a consensus on Capital Hill: making it harder for investors to buy crude on the commodity futures markets.
"Critics say the increased participation of non-commercial investors that don’t intend to use the commodity--as opposed to, say, airlines that also buy crude--has helped raise prices."
The focus of Congressional pressure is the government agency charged with overseeing the gambling on oil. According to a spokesman for the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, “More and more senators are questioning the adequacy of the [Commodity Futures Trading Commission’s (CFTC)] regulatory oversight and...are bothered by the role that speculation and non-commercial, institutional investors are having in preventing energy markets from functioning properly.”
The quickest fix would be new curbs on pension funds, endowments and other institutional investors that pump money into commodities index funds, driving up demand and prices. The Goldman Sachs fund attracted $260 billion last year, compared to $13 billion five years earlier.
According to the McClatchy newspapers, complicating any effort to harness speculation is the 30 percent of trading in crude oil in "dark areas"--markets in London and Dubai--not regulated by the CFTC but could be by the President with "a snap of his fingers."
A former CFTC director of trading is quoted as saying, "Essentially this could be ended this afternoon if the Bush administration had the stomach to do it."
But with an army of oil company lobbyists besieging the White House and Congress, don't bet your gas money that it will happen.
Wednesday, May 14, 2008
The House Is Not a Home for GOP
Congress keeps turning Bluer with the Mississippi victory yesterday of Democrat Travis Childers despite Dick Cheney's stumping for his opponent and the imminent departure of a five-term New York member after starring in a 21st century remake of an Alec Guinness movie, "The Captain's Paradise," about the master of a ship who shuttles between wives in two separate locales.
After a complicated Mother's Day weekend, Rep. Vito Fossella was back in Washington yesterday, but his future was clouded by a DIU arrest after running a red light in Alexandria, Va., which disclosed that he had a second family there.
But it is the Bush presidency rather than scandal that is decimating the party. According to The Hill, "The third straight House special election loss in three conservative districts this year is a clear indication that the GOP brand is turning off voters and the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) is in disarray."
In an effort to market themselves better, House Republicans have come up with a new catch phrase, "Change You Deserve," but some spoilsports are pointing out the slogan was borrowed from an ad campaign for an antidepressant.
The way things are going, that may turn out to be prophetic.
After a complicated Mother's Day weekend, Rep. Vito Fossella was back in Washington yesterday, but his future was clouded by a DIU arrest after running a red light in Alexandria, Va., which disclosed that he had a second family there.
But it is the Bush presidency rather than scandal that is decimating the party. According to The Hill, "The third straight House special election loss in three conservative districts this year is a clear indication that the GOP brand is turning off voters and the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC) is in disarray."
In an effort to market themselves better, House Republicans have come up with a new catch phrase, "Change You Deserve," but some spoilsports are pointing out the slogan was borrowed from an ad campaign for an antidepressant.
The way things are going, that may turn out to be prophetic.
Sunday, May 04, 2008
Health Care: Slow-Motion Katrina
John McCain says free enterprise will make it more efficient, Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama want to tinker with it, but the evidence keeps mounting that American health care is a disaster that keeps overwhelming not only the uninsured but those who have "coverage."
Today the New York Times reports, "Many of the 158 million people covered by employer health insurance are struggling to meet medical expenses that are much higher than they used to be--often because of some combination of higher premiums, less extensive coverage, and bigger out-of-pocket deductibles and co-payments.
"With medical costs soaring, the coverage many people have may not adequately protect them from the financial shock of an emergency room visit or a major surgery. For some, even routine doctor visits might now take a back seat to basic expenses like food and gasoline."
Meanwhile, none of the presidential candidates is willing to acknowledge that the American health care system is broken by massive inefficiency, insurer greed and widespread fraud.
Even before they win the presidency and wider margins in the Senate and House, Democrat leaders are undermining the campaign promises of Obama and Clinton by making it clear that the next Congress won't follow through on even their watered-down proposals.
If voters want health care, they will have to hold their Congressional candidates' feet to the fire by letting them know that they are really hurting and not being treated right by the clients of the health care lobbyists who are blocking reform. Better yet, they should brush aside all the nonsense about "socialized medicine" and get a national conversation going about a single-payer system.
Today the New York Times reports, "Many of the 158 million people covered by employer health insurance are struggling to meet medical expenses that are much higher than they used to be--often because of some combination of higher premiums, less extensive coverage, and bigger out-of-pocket deductibles and co-payments.
"With medical costs soaring, the coverage many people have may not adequately protect them from the financial shock of an emergency room visit or a major surgery. For some, even routine doctor visits might now take a back seat to basic expenses like food and gasoline."
Meanwhile, none of the presidential candidates is willing to acknowledge that the American health care system is broken by massive inefficiency, insurer greed and widespread fraud.
Even before they win the presidency and wider margins in the Senate and House, Democrat leaders are undermining the campaign promises of Obama and Clinton by making it clear that the next Congress won't follow through on even their watered-down proposals.
If voters want health care, they will have to hold their Congressional candidates' feet to the fire by letting them know that they are really hurting and not being treated right by the clients of the health care lobbyists who are blocking reform. Better yet, they should brush aside all the nonsense about "socialized medicine" and get a national conversation going about a single-payer system.
Friday, May 02, 2008
Credit-Card Crackdown
Being held up at gunpoint is a minor problem for most Americans compared to having money stolen from them by credit-card companies. Now, as the economy worsens, regulators are finally bestirring themselves to prevent some of the theft.
The Washington Post reports: "The Federal Reserve and two other banking regulators are set to unveil today one of the most aggressive efforts in decades to crack down on the credit card industry, prohibiting practices such as arbitrarily raising interest rates on outstanding balances.
"The proposed regulations, which could be finalized by year's end, would label as 'unfair or deceptive' practices that consumers have long complained about. That includes charging interest on debt that has been repaid and assessing late fees when consumers are not given a reasonable amount of time to make a payment."
More than a year after hearings on the industry's "unfair or abusive" practices, Congress has done nothing about the loan-shark tactics of large banks that charge as much as 30 percent interest for late payments and cash advances.
After being burned by the sub-prime mortgage scandal, federal regulators are taking some action to head off massive credit-card defaults beyond their efforts to educate consumers on how issuers use fine print to steal from them.
The Washington Post reports: "The Federal Reserve and two other banking regulators are set to unveil today one of the most aggressive efforts in decades to crack down on the credit card industry, prohibiting practices such as arbitrarily raising interest rates on outstanding balances.
"The proposed regulations, which could be finalized by year's end, would label as 'unfair or deceptive' practices that consumers have long complained about. That includes charging interest on debt that has been repaid and assessing late fees when consumers are not given a reasonable amount of time to make a payment."
More than a year after hearings on the industry's "unfair or abusive" practices, Congress has done nothing about the loan-shark tactics of large banks that charge as much as 30 percent interest for late payments and cash advances.
After being burned by the sub-prime mortgage scandal, federal regulators are taking some action to head off massive credit-card defaults beyond their efforts to educate consumers on how issuers use fine print to steal from them.
Wednesday, April 16, 2008
The Home-Foreclosure Picnic
Hearts aching for millions of Americans in danger of losing their homes, the Senate has been working hard on the Foreclosure Prevention Act, which will provide billions of dollars in tax breaks for airlines, automakers, alternative energy producers and home builders.
As they always do, lobbyists have been hijacking the bill that has bipartisan support in an economic crisis to lard it with help for their clients, everybody but homeowners.
“The Senate legislation gave corporations and Wall Street billions in tax breaks,” the president of the Laborers International Union of North America said at a news conference yesterday. “Tax breaks for corporate home builders won’t help stabilize the housing market, won’t create jobs and won’t prevent a single foreclosure.”
In the House, New York's Charles Rangel is pushing a bill to give tax breaks to first-time home buyers, but the realtors lobby would like it to apply to all buyers as would the National Association of Home Builders, the Mortgage Bankers Association, the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association and the Council of Federal Home Loan Banks.
Meanwhile, the only help beleaguered home owners are getting is from some states and cities. "This month alone," the Washington Post reports, "Philadelphia's sheriff delayed foreclosure auctions of 759 homes...Maryland extended the time it takes to complete a foreclosure. State leaders in Ohio recruited more than 1,000 lawyers to aid distressed borrowers."
Nine states have committed more than $450 million to loan funds to refinancing mortgages of at-risk borrowers, according to a study by the Pew Charitable Trusts. Some have brokered deals with lenders to ease terms for troubled loans. A few states have lengthened the time it takes for foreclosure.
When they face the voters this fall, members of Congress may have trouble figuring out why some of them are so...bitter.
As they always do, lobbyists have been hijacking the bill that has bipartisan support in an economic crisis to lard it with help for their clients, everybody but homeowners.
“The Senate legislation gave corporations and Wall Street billions in tax breaks,” the president of the Laborers International Union of North America said at a news conference yesterday. “Tax breaks for corporate home builders won’t help stabilize the housing market, won’t create jobs and won’t prevent a single foreclosure.”
In the House, New York's Charles Rangel is pushing a bill to give tax breaks to first-time home buyers, but the realtors lobby would like it to apply to all buyers as would the National Association of Home Builders, the Mortgage Bankers Association, the Securities Industry and Financial Markets Association and the Council of Federal Home Loan Banks.
Meanwhile, the only help beleaguered home owners are getting is from some states and cities. "This month alone," the Washington Post reports, "Philadelphia's sheriff delayed foreclosure auctions of 759 homes...Maryland extended the time it takes to complete a foreclosure. State leaders in Ohio recruited more than 1,000 lawyers to aid distressed borrowers."
Nine states have committed more than $450 million to loan funds to refinancing mortgages of at-risk borrowers, according to a study by the Pew Charitable Trusts. Some have brokered deals with lenders to ease terms for troubled loans. A few states have lengthened the time it takes for foreclosure.
When they face the voters this fall, members of Congress may have trouble figuring out why some of them are so...bitter.
Tuesday, February 12, 2008
In the Political Trenches
Tall, handsome Jim Himes looks a little like James Stewart in "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington" and, at a meeting with supporters in a Westport living room, sounds like him as he talks earnestly about repairing the damage done to the world and America's place in it during the Bush years.
Behind the hoopla over Presidential primaries and caucuses, the struggle for America's political soul goes on in meeting halls and homes across the country to decide what kind of Congress will set priorities for families and communities next year with a new president in the White House.
Himes, a political newcomer, is trying to unseat Chris Shays who has been entrenched in the House seat of the 4th District in southwestern Connecticut since 1987, the only Republican in New England to survive, barely, the purge of Bush supporters in 2006.
It won't help his cause that, after weaseling about getting troops out of Iraq, Shays planted a kiss on George W. Bush's cheek as the President walked in to deliver his final State of the Union speech last month.
In his campaign, the 40-year-old Himes is being supported by the so-called 30-something Democrats in their tactful revolt against the party's ineffectual elders in the House. Two of them, one from Florida, were in the room last night to cheer him on.
After a year in the trenches, the novice challenger has outdone Shays in fund-raising and is ready to campaign against him, coupling the issue of impending recession with the trillion-plus dollars being wasted in Iraq that could have been providing jobs and repairing our infrastructure back home.
It shouldn't take a Frank Capra ending to get Himes, and others like him, to Washington this November.
Behind the hoopla over Presidential primaries and caucuses, the struggle for America's political soul goes on in meeting halls and homes across the country to decide what kind of Congress will set priorities for families and communities next year with a new president in the White House.
Himes, a political newcomer, is trying to unseat Chris Shays who has been entrenched in the House seat of the 4th District in southwestern Connecticut since 1987, the only Republican in New England to survive, barely, the purge of Bush supporters in 2006.
It won't help his cause that, after weaseling about getting troops out of Iraq, Shays planted a kiss on George W. Bush's cheek as the President walked in to deliver his final State of the Union speech last month.
In his campaign, the 40-year-old Himes is being supported by the so-called 30-something Democrats in their tactful revolt against the party's ineffectual elders in the House. Two of them, one from Florida, were in the room last night to cheer him on.
After a year in the trenches, the novice challenger has outdone Shays in fund-raising and is ready to campaign against him, coupling the issue of impending recession with the trillion-plus dollars being wasted in Iraq that could have been providing jobs and repairing our infrastructure back home.
It shouldn't take a Frank Capra ending to get Himes, and others like him, to Washington this November.
Sunday, December 09, 2007
Torturing Questions
News today that members of Congress, including Nancy Pelosi, failed to protest when they were briefed about waterboarding and other harsh techniques of interrogation five years ago recalls the disturbing Milgram experiments of the 1960s.
A Yale professor wanted to find out how much pain people would inflict on others for what they believed to be a good cause.
"Stark authority was pitted against the subjects' strongest moral imperatives against hurting others," Prof. Stanley Milgram reported, "and, with the subjects' ears ringing with the screams of the victims, authority won more often than not. The extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an authority constitutes the chief finding of the study and the fact most urgently demanding explanation."
We still don't know the answer to that question, which was originally raised in an effort to see behind the Eichmann defense for Nazi atrocities during World War War II, "I was only following orders." But we should keep trying to find out.
Today's revelation about waterboarding further underscores how dicey individual morality can become under social pressure. According to the Washington Post, "officials present during the meetings described the reaction as mostly quiet acquiescence, if not outright support.
"'Among those being briefed, there was a pretty full understanding of what the CIA was doing,' said [Porter] Goss, who chaired the House intelligence committee from 1997 to 2004 and then served as CIA director from 2004 to 2006. 'And the reaction in the room was not just approval, but encouragement.'"
All this is clearly intended to relieve pressure on the Administration for its secrecy, including the destruction of torture tapes, but if involving lawmakers clears the air of some holier-than-thou posturing, it doesn't absolve anyone or lessen the need to move forward in the public debate on what kind of people we are and want to be.
What Stanley Milgram wrote in 1974, looking back on his experiments, might be as good a place as any to start:
"There was a time, perhaps, when people were able to give a fully human response to any situation because they were fully absorbed in it as human beings. But as soon as there was a division of labor things changed. Beyond a certain point, the breaking up of society into people carrying out narrow and very special jobs takes away from the human quality of work and life. A person does not get to see the whole situation but only a small part of it, and is thus unable to act without some kind of overall direction. He yields to authority but in doing so is alienated from his own actions.
"Even Eichmann was sickened when he toured the concentration camps, but he had only to sit at a desk and shuffle papers. At the same time the man in the camp who actually dropped Cyclon-b into the gas chambers was able to justify his behavior on the ground that he was only following orders from above. Thus there is a fragmentation of the total human act; no one is confronted with the consequences of his decision to carry out the evil act. The person who assumes responsibility has evaporated. Perhaps this is the most common characteristic of socially organized evil in modern society."
As today's furor over torture goes on, it might help to think about that.
A Yale professor wanted to find out how much pain people would inflict on others for what they believed to be a good cause.
"Stark authority was pitted against the subjects' strongest moral imperatives against hurting others," Prof. Stanley Milgram reported, "and, with the subjects' ears ringing with the screams of the victims, authority won more often than not. The extreme willingness of adults to go to almost any lengths on the command of an authority constitutes the chief finding of the study and the fact most urgently demanding explanation."
We still don't know the answer to that question, which was originally raised in an effort to see behind the Eichmann defense for Nazi atrocities during World War War II, "I was only following orders." But we should keep trying to find out.
Today's revelation about waterboarding further underscores how dicey individual morality can become under social pressure. According to the Washington Post, "officials present during the meetings described the reaction as mostly quiet acquiescence, if not outright support.
"'Among those being briefed, there was a pretty full understanding of what the CIA was doing,' said [Porter] Goss, who chaired the House intelligence committee from 1997 to 2004 and then served as CIA director from 2004 to 2006. 'And the reaction in the room was not just approval, but encouragement.'"
All this is clearly intended to relieve pressure on the Administration for its secrecy, including the destruction of torture tapes, but if involving lawmakers clears the air of some holier-than-thou posturing, it doesn't absolve anyone or lessen the need to move forward in the public debate on what kind of people we are and want to be.
What Stanley Milgram wrote in 1974, looking back on his experiments, might be as good a place as any to start:
"There was a time, perhaps, when people were able to give a fully human response to any situation because they were fully absorbed in it as human beings. But as soon as there was a division of labor things changed. Beyond a certain point, the breaking up of society into people carrying out narrow and very special jobs takes away from the human quality of work and life. A person does not get to see the whole situation but only a small part of it, and is thus unable to act without some kind of overall direction. He yields to authority but in doing so is alienated from his own actions.
"Even Eichmann was sickened when he toured the concentration camps, but he had only to sit at a desk and shuffle papers. At the same time the man in the camp who actually dropped Cyclon-b into the gas chambers was able to justify his behavior on the ground that he was only following orders from above. Thus there is a fragmentation of the total human act; no one is confronted with the consequences of his decision to carry out the evil act. The person who assumes responsibility has evaporated. Perhaps this is the most common characteristic of socially organized evil in modern society."
As today's furor over torture goes on, it might help to think about that.
Saturday, December 08, 2007
"And That's the Way It Is..."
After the Tet offensive in early 1968, the Most Trusted Man in America announced the war in Vietnam could not be won. "If I've lost Cronkite," the President of the United States said, "I've lost America" and conceded by announcing he wouldn't run for reelection.
Walter Cronkite is 91 now, and George W. Bush is no Lyndon Johnson, but America's news nanny, who tucked us in every evening for two decades by ending the CBS Evening News with "And that's the way it is," has declared "Our Troops Must Leave Iraq."
In a piece co-written and appearing in print, Cronkite's voice is still being heard. In the Japan Times, on the eve of Pearl Harbor day, he concludes:
"Congress must act. Although Congress never declared war, as required by the Constitution, they did give the president the authority to invade Iraq. Congress must now withdraw that authority and cease its funding of the war.
"It is not likely, however, that Congress will act unless the American people make their voices heard with unmistakable clarity. That is the way the Vietnam War was brought to an end. It is the way that the Iraq War will also be brought to an end. The only question is whether it will be now, or whether the war will drag on, with all the suffering that implies, to an even more tragic, costly and degrading defeat. We will be a better, stronger and more decent country to bring the troops home now."
Trust is not what it used to be, and age has diminished the reach of Cronkite's voice, but he is still trying to tell America how it is.
Walter Cronkite is 91 now, and George W. Bush is no Lyndon Johnson, but America's news nanny, who tucked us in every evening for two decades by ending the CBS Evening News with "And that's the way it is," has declared "Our Troops Must Leave Iraq."
In a piece co-written and appearing in print, Cronkite's voice is still being heard. In the Japan Times, on the eve of Pearl Harbor day, he concludes:
"Congress must act. Although Congress never declared war, as required by the Constitution, they did give the president the authority to invade Iraq. Congress must now withdraw that authority and cease its funding of the war.
"It is not likely, however, that Congress will act unless the American people make their voices heard with unmistakable clarity. That is the way the Vietnam War was brought to an end. It is the way that the Iraq War will also be brought to an end. The only question is whether it will be now, or whether the war will drag on, with all the suffering that implies, to an even more tragic, costly and degrading defeat. We will be a better, stronger and more decent country to bring the troops home now."
Trust is not what it used to be, and age has diminished the reach of Cronkite's voice, but he is still trying to tell America how it is.
Monday, October 29, 2007
Listening to the People
The man who gave a voice to unheard Americans is speaking up today against illegal listening in on them.
In a New York Times Op Ed, 95-year-old Studs Terkel recounts the history of illegal wiretapping during the Red Scare day of the 1920s, McCarthyism in the 1950s and now the Bush Administration's dismantling of the protections afforded by the Fourth Amendment.
A Pulitzer Prize winner, Terkel became famous for taping and airing conversations that, in his words, "celebrated the lives of the uncelebrated among us, for lending voice to the face in the crowd."
In a new memoir, the once-blacklisted liberal compares himself jokingly to Richard Nixon, saying both "could be aptly described as neo-Cartesians: I tape, therefore I am," or in his own case, "I tape, therefore they are." Terkel's oral histories brought so-called ordinary Americans into history.
Now he is enraged at an executive branch that listens to them too much against their will and at a Congress "moving in a haphazard fashion to provide a 'get out of jail free card' to the telephone companies that violated the rights of their subscribers.
"Some in Congress argue that this law-breaking is forgivable because it was done to help the government in a time of crisis. But it’s impossible for Congress to know the motivations of these companies or to know how the government will use the private information it received from them."
The man who taught us how to listen to America deserves to be heard on a subject he knows well.
In a New York Times Op Ed, 95-year-old Studs Terkel recounts the history of illegal wiretapping during the Red Scare day of the 1920s, McCarthyism in the 1950s and now the Bush Administration's dismantling of the protections afforded by the Fourth Amendment.
A Pulitzer Prize winner, Terkel became famous for taping and airing conversations that, in his words, "celebrated the lives of the uncelebrated among us, for lending voice to the face in the crowd."
In a new memoir, the once-blacklisted liberal compares himself jokingly to Richard Nixon, saying both "could be aptly described as neo-Cartesians: I tape, therefore I am," or in his own case, "I tape, therefore they are." Terkel's oral histories brought so-called ordinary Americans into history.
Now he is enraged at an executive branch that listens to them too much against their will and at a Congress "moving in a haphazard fashion to provide a 'get out of jail free card' to the telephone companies that violated the rights of their subscribers.
"Some in Congress argue that this law-breaking is forgivable because it was done to help the government in a time of crisis. But it’s impossible for Congress to know the motivations of these companies or to know how the government will use the private information it received from them."
The man who taught us how to listen to America deserves to be heard on a subject he knows well.
Tuesday, October 16, 2007
Spying on Your Circle of Friends
If a suspected terrorist mis-dialed your number any time in the past two years, the FBI is on your case and, if the phone company had had the technology, they might have been investigating everyone you know.
A Congressional committee learned yesterday that Verizon has provided customers' telephone records to federal authorities in emergency cases without court orders hundreds of times since 2005 in addition to the thousands obtained through subpoenas and court orders.
Moreover, the FBI wanted to know not only about the person making a call, but all the people that customer called, as well as the people those people called. The only reason they didn’t get it was that Verizon doesn’t keep data on this "two-generation community of interest."
To conceal the widening net of spying on innocent Americans, the Bush Administration has put up a brick wall of “state secrets” defenses, but as the enormity of surveillance, lawful and otherwise, becomes clearer, Congress is pressing for answers.
Some years ago, I received an apologetic letter from a law enforcement agency about a monitored phone call to my home from a friend of my teen-age son who was being investigated for selling marijuana. Apparently state law back then required notification about every such invasion of privacy.
We’re living in a different country now.
A Congressional committee learned yesterday that Verizon has provided customers' telephone records to federal authorities in emergency cases without court orders hundreds of times since 2005 in addition to the thousands obtained through subpoenas and court orders.
Moreover, the FBI wanted to know not only about the person making a call, but all the people that customer called, as well as the people those people called. The only reason they didn’t get it was that Verizon doesn’t keep data on this "two-generation community of interest."
To conceal the widening net of spying on innocent Americans, the Bush Administration has put up a brick wall of “state secrets” defenses, but as the enormity of surveillance, lawful and otherwise, becomes clearer, Congress is pressing for answers.
Some years ago, I received an apologetic letter from a law enforcement agency about a monitored phone call to my home from a friend of my teen-age son who was being investigated for selling marijuana. Apparently state law back then required notification about every such invasion of privacy.
We’re living in a different country now.
Friday, October 12, 2007
Is This a Great Country or What?
In Washington, our Congress has settled in to business as usual now that the Surge is going so well. Democrats are overjoyed at news of Al Gore’s Nobel Peace Prize, while Republicans are fresh from the triumph of sliming a brain-injured 12-year-old boy to make sure he and others like him don’t rip us off by getting health care insurance.
In Iraq today, other people acting in my name and yours killed six women and nine children during an air and ground attack on senior Al Qaeda leaders. We issued a statement of regret that “civilians are hurt or killed while Coalition forces search to rid Iraq of terrorism."
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, AP reports, “has recently confronted top American commander Gen. David Petraeus about what he sees as overly aggressive U.S. tactics that harm innocent civilians, according to Iraqi officials.”
Last Friday, a pre-dawn U.S. raid on Khalis, a Shiite city north of Baghdad, killed 25 people when troops called in air strikes while hunting suspected smugglers of arms from Iran to Baghdad. Village leaders said the victims included civilians, but the military insisted the 25 killed were militants.
Meanwhile, Shiites and Sunnis are reported to be making no progress toward national reconciliation. But the Surge is working just fine, isn’t it?
We can all go on getting Halloween costumes for the kids and maybe driving somewhere for a little leaf-peeping.
In Iraq today, other people acting in my name and yours killed six women and nine children during an air and ground attack on senior Al Qaeda leaders. We issued a statement of regret that “civilians are hurt or killed while Coalition forces search to rid Iraq of terrorism."
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, AP reports, “has recently confronted top American commander Gen. David Petraeus about what he sees as overly aggressive U.S. tactics that harm innocent civilians, according to Iraqi officials.”
Last Friday, a pre-dawn U.S. raid on Khalis, a Shiite city north of Baghdad, killed 25 people when troops called in air strikes while hunting suspected smugglers of arms from Iran to Baghdad. Village leaders said the victims included civilians, but the military insisted the 25 killed were militants.
Meanwhile, Shiites and Sunnis are reported to be making no progress toward national reconciliation. But the Surge is working just fine, isn’t it?
We can all go on getting Halloween costumes for the kids and maybe driving somewhere for a little leaf-peeping.
Democrats Eating Their Old
The party that prides itself on being a big tent for diversity is showing signs of cannibalism since it took over Congress a year ago and, in a reversal of eating its young, is threatening to devour some of its long-standing stalwarts.
After all the furor about anti-war legislators not being anti-war enough, now we have Rep. Barney Frank, of all people, defending himself from charges of not being pro-gay enough by backing a bill to protect homosexual men and women in the workplace that might leave transsexuals vulnerable.
“There is a tendency in American politics,” he said yesterday, “for the people who feel most passionately about... a single issue to be unrealistic in what a democratic political system can deliver, and that can be self-defeating.”
In an era when George Bush is still blocking almost everything with his veto power and remnants of a monolithic Republican minority, Democratic activists only play into his hands by forgetting that politics is the art of the possible and that the perfect can be the worst enemy of the good enough.
Push for perfection by all means, but don’t trample those who are out front navigating the minefields.
Incremental improvement in energy standards and cutbacks of farm subsidies are not very exciting for generations that want it all now. But politics has never been the best place for instant gratification, except for those who exercise their mouths rather than real power.
From half a century of observation and activism emerges the lesson that inertia, while it slows progress, can also be the best protection against violent, destructive change.
Those who find that old fogeyism can eat me, too.
After all the furor about anti-war legislators not being anti-war enough, now we have Rep. Barney Frank, of all people, defending himself from charges of not being pro-gay enough by backing a bill to protect homosexual men and women in the workplace that might leave transsexuals vulnerable.
“There is a tendency in American politics,” he said yesterday, “for the people who feel most passionately about... a single issue to be unrealistic in what a democratic political system can deliver, and that can be self-defeating.”
In an era when George Bush is still blocking almost everything with his veto power and remnants of a monolithic Republican minority, Democratic activists only play into his hands by forgetting that politics is the art of the possible and that the perfect can be the worst enemy of the good enough.
Push for perfection by all means, but don’t trample those who are out front navigating the minefields.
Incremental improvement in energy standards and cutbacks of farm subsidies are not very exciting for generations that want it all now. But politics has never been the best place for instant gratification, except for those who exercise their mouths rather than real power.
From half a century of observation and activism emerges the lesson that inertia, while it slows progress, can also be the best protection against violent, destructive change.
Those who find that old fogeyism can eat me, too.
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