Edwards, John

Okay, still looking for answers...not satisfied with the ones I've been getting so far.

I wasn't a huge fan of Bill, especially after his sexcapades knocked the Pope's visit to Cuba off the news.

I'm a Democratic woman who's been ragging on Hillary for years.  I can't stand her, and I was raised not to vote for carpetbaggers.  I've said before, I sometimes wish I lived in NY so I could donate to those who campaign against her.

So,

for the last 12-18 months we've had this steady drumbeat of stories about how Hillary's going to be the Dem nominee and how she's the only one who can beat those nasty Republicans and save the country (and repeal sin and misery in the process).

I didn't buy it then, and I'm not buying it now.  (on all 5 counts.)

Today, 73% of the voters in the Democratic primary in the good state of South Carolina voted for either Barack Obama or John Edwards.  (There may have been a few other votes in there, but cnn.com isn't saying anything about those other guys.)

Given that almost 3 out of 4 Democrats aren't voting for her, much less independents,Greens, Libertarians, Republicans or others, how in the WORLD can this woman win her party's nomination, much less the general election?

When is the national political pundit braintrust going to pick up on this and ask more questions?

Or is the story line going to be about how the strapping young man beat out the old woman, and we'll get a Hillary biography in the future crying about how Obama stole the election from her?

And don't tell me about her "experience"; that's just code for "I've been doing political favors for 35 years and putting up with Bill screwing around on me for even longer, I'm looking to collect now and you better be paying up with interest!"

Explanations, please...   :-/

Did George Will just advocate for Obama, over a Republican?  I'm kinda confused...this throws my entire world out of balance...up is down, down is up, right is left, left is right...

Barack Obama, who might be mercifully closing the Clinton parenthesis in presidential history, is refreshingly cerebral amid this recrudescence of the paranoid style in American politics. He is the un-Edwards and un-Huckabee -- an adult aiming to reform the real world rather than an adolescent fantasizing mock-heroic "fights" against fictitious villains in a left-wing cartoon version of this country.

 

In the earlier paragraphs, Will takes Huckabee and Edwards to task for over-the-top, unfounded claims of a shrinking middle class.  Money quote: 

He and John Edwards, flaunting their histrionic humility in order to promote their curdled populism, hawked strikingly similar messages in Iowa, encouraging self-pity and economic hypochondria. Edwards and Huckabee lament a shrinking middle class. Well.

Economist Stephen Rose, defining the middle class as households with annual incomes between $30,000 and $100,000, says a smaller percentage of Americans are in that category than in 1979 -- because the percentage of Americans earning more than $100,000 has doubled, from 12 to 24, while the percentage earning less than $30,000 is unchanged. "So," Rose says, "the entire 'decline' of the middle class came from people moving up the income ladder." Even as housing values declined in 2007, the net worth of households increased.

 

As a voter, I've never cared for or liked Edwards; his most recent campaign seemed had too much of a "look at me, look at me", shrill tone to it, in my opinion.  I hadn't formed an opinion on Huckabee, until the recent foreign affairs naivety came up; my opinion of him lowered after that, but not irredeemably so.

 interesting times...

HG

From Reuters.com:  President Bush to outline 5-year rate freeze.  Essentially, the sources quoted in the Reuters story claim "the plan envisions covering subprime loans taken out between January 1, 2005, through the end of this past July, with rates that are due to reset over the coming 2-1/2 years."  Later on, more specifics are offered:

Under the plan pitched by the ASF, distressed homeowners would be offered mortgage help according to their ability to pay.

Borrowers with strong credit would be encouraged to drop their existing loan and be shepherded to more affordable mortgages like those offered under the Federal Housing Administration. In August, Bush expanded that government program so that it could reach an additional 240,000 troubled borrowers next year.

A second class of borrowers who simply do not have the resources to make mortgage payments would return to the rental market.

A third group of borrowers who have shown that they are a reasonable credit risk but who could not afford their homes with higher rates would qualify for "fast-tracked" loan modification and a five-year interest rate freeze.

Other existing borrowers who have struggled to keep up their loan payments could still qualify for the freeze, but would face more scrutiny before receiving any loan modification.

I've said this before:  why should the government be involved, at all, with protecting (or otherwise aiding) lenders or borrowers that, through their own willful actions, are in danger of defaulting?  No one held a gun to a borrower's head, and forced them to sign an adjustable rate mortgage; no one held a gun to a lender's head, and forced them to lend money to a high-risk applicant.

The one line that absolutely kills me:  "A second class of borrowers who simply do not have the resources to make mortgage payments would return to the rental market."  Does that mean the plan will force both the lenders and the borrowers to convert the mortgaged property to a rental unit?  Or force people to move out of the mortgaged property to a rental property?  Or wave a magic wand and *poof* the mortgage is gone, no penalties, no worries, here's a listing of local rental units?

Seriously, if that group of borrowers can't afford the mortgages, why are they not renting already? 

To me, this is a gigantic slap in the face of every responsible homeowner; the ones who had the ability and the foresight to plan ahead, to only take out as much money as they needed, to work hard to make their monthly payments.  Now, Bush's plan is to reward irresponsible behavior:  take out too much?  didn't plan properly on ballooning payments?  decided to buy that $2000 hi-def TV instead of putting that money towards your mortgage?  Don't worry, we'll take care of you...

The other thing that galls me is this:  what happens after the 5 years is up?  Do the rates suddenly go up again?  Do we go through another round of this?  Or is it simply a matter of "That's the next guy's/gal's problem"?

One of the sidebars in the Reuter's article links to a "FactBox", a quick-hit of the major candidates stands on this "mortgage crisis".  The talking points speak for themselves...

HG

Obi-Wan: This isn't the bias you're looking for...