HorsesAss.Org

Fascinating and somewhat long article from New York Times economics reporter Edmund L. Andrews about how he and his wife managed to run up tons of mortgage and credit card debt.

While one has to applaud Andrews’ courage in writing the article, certain bits have an almost surreal quality.

Between humongous loan balances and high rates, we had hung ourselves with the rope they gave us. In the previous December alone, we charged $2,845 on the Chase card for Christmas gifts, food, gasoline, clothing and other expenses. The charges included almost $350 for groceries, $700 in clothes from J. Crew, $179 at GapKids and $700 for airplane tickets for two of Patty’s children to visit their father in Los Angeles. Our balance climbed from $14,118 to $17,135, and in January 2006 we maxed out at our $19,000 credit limit. And there were other expenses on other cards: $1,200 in dental work for Patty’s son Ben; $1,600 to rent a beach house the previous year for us and all the children. Granted, the beach house was an embarrassing mistake. But given that Patty had landed a solid job, it seemed like an indulgence we could work off later.

Obviously this man has been coming to terms with stuff, so good for him.

Everyone knows stuff costs money, and lots of circumstances can cause difficulties. Andrews was divorced and paying alimony and child support, but people have difficulties due to illness and all sorts of other life events as well.

But good lord, if you spent $700 at J. Crew while drowning in debt, you had a problem. My kin ate squirrels, catfish and possum during the Great Depression, and while I’ve managed to avoid that particular experience, the wisdom my ancestors passed on about not wasting things and living within one’s means does come to mind. Somehow my kids have been clothed just fine at Fred Meyer and Target.

The key point to take away from the article is that the banksters became societal faith healers, temporarily solving problems with suspect mortgages and HELOCS. Whether it was lust for a woman or lust for material goods, the banksters could rub that out for you.

Tons of people needed to make their self-worth about material things that they couldn’t afford. It’s sad, but it’s true.

Don’t get me wrong, our family has stuff, we like our stuff, and many times I try to impress upon our kids how lucky we are to have stuff. But in the end it’s just stuff. Well, it’s stuff we paid for either with cash or with a credit card that is paid off monthly, excluding the mortgage and one car loan at a time.

If you’re buying tens of thousands of dollars of other stuff on credit, you have a problem. And the banksters will gladly give you a lap dance in hopes of making you feel better about yourself.

The speculative orgy wasn’t, in the end, about capitalism, economics or any other “rational” endeavor, it was about selling the supposed good life to anyone who would fall for it. Never mind that the granite counter tops are too expensive, or that the BMW adds too much to the monthly budget. The banksters were gyrating, the music was loud and tomorrow was for the suckers who play by the rules.

For some reason, many otherwise rational people needed to scratch an itch, and the time period coincided with the reign of George W. Bush. The excessive materialism and condescension towards us were part of the same social malignancy that yielded the invasion of Iraq, the Schiavo madness and the indifference to massive suffering after Hurricane Katrina.

A society doesn’t go mad in one little corner, it goes mad everywhere. The mindset that excuses torture can easily excuse a few little financial excesses, can’t it?

Interestingly, those who were conservative in their personal lives and finances probably didn’t get hit so bad. Funny how that works out.

(Props to Atrios for noticing the article.)

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Hq5ivYUFKA[/youtube]

Personally, I kinda dread the inconvenience of the Seattle’s proposed bag fee, and I’ll certainly mourn the loss of the paper grocery bags I now reuse to collect recycling and food waste… but fuck the astro-turfers at the American Chemistry Council.  I mean, fuck ’em.

You may be surprised to learn that I don’t necessarily disagree with today’s Seattle Times editorial urging voters to “stick with electing council members citywide.” But while there are strong arguments on both sides of the district elections issue, it’s too bad that the Times tends to focus on the weak ones.

The typical pitch for the change is to encourage more candidates who can raise sufficient campaign cash to run for office and let neighborhood voices be heard more clearly.

Election 2009 has more candidates running for council than any time in recent memory. At last count, 14 challengers were seeking two open seats or taking on incumbents. Many are solid candidates.

Define “solid candidate.” Nearly half of the challengers have declared for the same open seat, and most serious political observers would describe only a handful of the candidates as solid. And no disrespect to either Jesse Israel or David Ginsberg, but unless they can crank the fundraising up to eleven, I doubt incumbents Nick Licata and Richard Conlin will ever feel particularly threatened.

At best, this slate represents a triumph of quantity over quality, yet even with that caveat still qualifies as one of the strongest fields in years. For whatever reason, recruiting dynamic council candidates has proven more difficult than pulling teeth, and this cycle’s atypical surge in political lemmings does little to recommend the current citywide system.

The council is neither stagnant nor a place of minimum turnover. In 2007, Bruce Harrell and Tim Burgess joined after running citywide. Both are solid additions.

I forgot Bruce Harrell was even on the council, and while there’s no doubt that Tim Burgess ranks as one of the most competant challengers to run in recent memory, he defeated the polar opposite in the form of David Della. The 2007 cycle did not produce an inspiring field, and likewise does little to recommend citywide elections.

The city needs experts in broader, complicated areas, such as electricity and land use. Members elected by district are programmed to fight for a neighborhood, not a more encompassing citywide interest.

And we’re electing those electricity and land use experts now?  Successful politicians tend to be generalists, which is why they hire experts to advise them and run specific departments. Besides, why exactly would an expert be less likely to come from a neighborhood district?  Our neighborhoods don’t have electricity or land?

“The bedrock of good government is cooperation, not Balkanization,” said George Allen, senior vice president for government relations at the Greater Seattle Chamber of Commerce.

Uh-oh… the business establishment is arguing to maintain the status quo. Now you’re really beginning to lose me.

I voted against district elections the last time it was on the ballot, but after reading this Times editorial I may be leaning the other way. This proposal is less drastic than the last, electing five council members by district, while retaining four at-large seats, so it theoretically balances the best and worst features of both systems. And I’m not so sure that adding a few narrowly focused neighborhood voices would be a bad thing for a council whose culture of polite cooperation has left it incapable of serving as a necessary check and balance on our politically adept mayor and his ruthless henchmen.

Or maybe not. The most dubious claim I’ve heard from district proponents is that it would help take the influence of money out of the election equation. Yeah… right. In fact, just the opposite might be true.  Smaller, lower profile, district elections would provide a juicy target for political consultants and wealthy special interests, creating demographically condensed races in which a large donation or an even larger independent expenditure could have a lot more impact than in a citywide contest.

But regardless of all the arguments pro and con, my instinct tells me that the debate may be moot. The previous measure just barely failed after little if any campaign on its behalf, and in our current, Obama-inspired, reformist political climate, I’m guessing that this new district/at-large hybrid proposal will be damn hard to beat without a well-financed campaign against it… and damn better rhetoric than we saw today in the Seattle Times.

Senators Maria Cantwell and Patty Murray, both Washington state Democrats, make Firedoglake’s list of “Democrats for Loan Sharking” for voting against credit card rate caps.

In the old days charging absurdly high interest rates was called “usury” and it was a crime. Not so much any more. Wouldn’t want to spook the stock market or the bankster lobbyists. The vultures no longer need thugs and guns, they wear Armani suits and stalk elected officials.

Meanwhile, if you find yourself unable to pay off a credit card charging 21% or more interest, well, that’s just too damn bad for you. What are you going to do about it, ordinary American? Vote for someone else? Who would that be? The game is rigged, at least on the economic front.

Our chief product in this country is debt.

Newly confirmed drug czar Gil Kerlikowske sounds ready to start fixing the decades-long disaster known as the drug war:

The Obama administration’s new drug czar says he wants to banish the idea that the U.S. is fighting “a war on drugs,” a move that would underscore a shift favoring treatment over incarceration in trying to reduce illicit drug use.

In his first interview since being confirmed to head the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Gil Kerlikowske said Wednesday the bellicose analogy was a barrier to dealing with the nation’s drug issues.

“Regardless of how you try to explain to people it’s a ‘war on drugs’ or a ‘war on a product,’ people see a war as a war on them,” he said. “We’re not at war with people in this country.”

Mr. Kerlikowske’s comments are a signal that the Obama administration is set to follow a more moderate — and likely more controversial — stance on the nation’s drug problems. Prior administrations talked about pushing treatment and reducing demand while continuing to focus primarily on a tough criminal-justice approach.

The Obama administration is likely to deal with drugs as a matter of public health rather than criminal justice alone, with treatment’s role growing relative to incarceration, Mr. Kerlikowske said.

I think Kerlikowske, the Obama Administration, and the traditional media are going to be surprised at how uncontroversial it is to take this stance. And not just here in Seattle, but across the country. People are sick and tired of this war and all the violence it causes. More and more Americans understand the relationship between the drug war and the unraveling of Mexico and recognize that what we’re dealing with is equivalent to what we dealt with during alcohol prohibition. You can tell how unpopular the drug war is becoming when news outlets have to resort to Stephen Baldwin to provide counterpoints against the reformers.

Seattle Port Commission candidate Rob Holland joins the podcast, prompting Goldy to ask, “What the hell is the Port of Seattle?” Rob offers an overview of the Port and shares his vision for the Port’s future.

The panel then takes on the outrageous, inflammatory, tasteless, over-the-top routine of Wanda Sykes at the White House Correspondents’ dinner. Doesn’t this just prove that Republicans flat-out lack a sense of humor?

What is this world coming to when a lawyer makes charges of libel and defamation against a lowly blogger and demands the removal of an old post? Get the inside story, in which Goldy graciously declines to both remove the post and “out” the offending attorney.

Goldy was joined by Seattle Port Commission candidate Rob Holland, Effin’ Unsound’s & Horsesass’s Carl Ballard, and Horsesass contributor (and brand new dad) Lee.

The show is 45:25, and is available here as an MP3:

[audio:http://www.podcastingliberally.com/podcasts/podcasting_liberally_may_12_2009.mp3]

[Recorded live at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally. Special thanks to Confab creators Gavin and Richard for hosting the Podcasting Liberally site.]

Not sure how I missed this, it’s probably because the ridiculous nature of Republican antics has reached such heights (or depths) that “self-parody” doesn’t even do it justice.

It seems the Republican National Committee is on the verge of passing a resolution “rebranding” the Democratic Party as (ahem) the “Democrat Socialist Party.”

And yippee, there’s a Washington State connection, in the form of Republican National committee member Jeff Kent. From The Democratic Strategist:

Here’s how the sponsor of the resolution, Jeff Kent from Washington State, explained its rationale a few weeks ago:

There is nothing more important for our party than bringing the truth to bear on the Democrats’ march to socialism. Just like Ronald Reagan identifying the U.S.S.R. as the evil empire was the beginning of the end to Soviet domination, we believe the American people will reject socialism when they hear the truth about how the Democrats are bankrupting our country and destroying our freedom and liberties.

I don’t know what’s more offensive: the idea of identifying the Democratic Party, which the American people elected to run Congress and the executive branch just six months ago, with the Soviet Union, or the idea that Ronald Reagan brought about the collapse of the Soviet bloc through a magic spell. All in all, the highly adolescent nature of Kent’s thinking is illustrated not only by this comic-book historical revisionism, but by his insistence on retaining in his version of the “Evil Empire” the little-boy-taunt of dropping the last syllable from the adjective “Democratic.”

What’s awesome, as Atrios points out, is that it’s not even worth getting mad about, and it would be even funnier if the media bites, because the more the GOP implodes like this, the more political space there may be someday for actual progressive reforms to take hold.

Every time you think “surely the Republicans will come to their senses at least a little bit,” it seems they just gin up a whole new level of crazy.

Thanks, Jeff, or should I say “Mr. Poobah?”

My guess is Jim Vesely retired as editorial page editor at The Seattle Times because he couldn’t take the socialism.

Gov. Chris Gregoire has approved a tax break for the state’s troubled newspaper industry.

The new law gives newspaper printers and publishers a 40 percent cut in the state’s main business tax. The discounted rate mirrors breaks given in years past to the Boeing Co. and the timber industry.

I’m sure there was nothing else that could have been done with the money.

It’s going to be entertaining as hell now to watch newspaper editorial boards in this state pump out their usual anti-union, anti-consumer pap now that they’re big-time freeloaders. The cognitive dissonance may put brains in jeopardy all over the state.

Also, kids, your tuition is going up 28%, but it’s okay, you can still get a job throwing dead trees. Our spot as a regressive-taxation, low-services state is very secure. You didn’t need a first rate education for that anyhow.

My crystal ball is digging out the sleeping bags in hopes of some Spring recreation, assuming any parks are still open, but in the past voters have sometimes become quite annoyed when the rich and powerful get special treatment from politicians. Voters tend to overlook it when the economy is humming along, not so much when they’re getting screwed by everyone from their employers to the credit card companies to the state government.

Oh well, we all knew one party rule can’t last forever. It’s a shame we couldn’t accomplish much on the economic front. But that’s what happens when power for its own sake becomes the overriding consideration, the power brokers win. Go figure.

But at least nobody “overreached,” because to do that you have to reach in the first place.

Now scoot your desk over and make room.

Seattle Times editorial page editor Jim Vesely is retiring Friday.

HA regulars might have started to suspect by now that, while I’m an avid reader, I’m not always a 100 percent fan of his editorial page’s opinions or rhetorical tactics. But I’ve never met the man, so I can’t really argue with Times’ publisher Frank Blethen when he describes Vesely as “one of the … most decent people I have had the privilege to work with.”  Enjoy the fly-fishing Jim.

But while I don’t have much to say about Vesely himself, I am intrigued by the closing line in the lengthy editorial heaping praise on the man and his career:

The Times has not yet named a successor for Vesely.

Hey Frank… I think it’s well past time for another mid-life crisis, and I’m exactly the person to lead your editorial page through it. Get in touch.  You know how to reach me.

UPDATE:
Over at Publicola, Sandeep’s got a good summation of the Times’ editorial leanings under Vesely, and where the page might move under his successor.

Former Navy Seal, professional wrestler, and Minnesota Governor Jesse Ventura has some opinions about Bush, Cheney, Powell, and waterboarding:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zoqmH49VBC0[/youtube]

Please join us at the Seattle chapter of Drinking Liberally for an evening of politics under the influence. The festivities take place at the Montlake Ale House, 2307 24th Avenue E. beginning at 8:00 pm. Or stop by earlier for dinner.

Drinking Liberally is now an officially designated place of sanctuary in the Republican’s War on Empathy™.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aZXCK-jQxLo[/youtube]

Not in Seattle? The Drinking Liberally web site has dates and times for 332 chapters of Drinking Liberally sprinkled across the globe.

My ass hurts.

I fell down the stairs last night. Or more exactly, both feet slid out from under me, landing me hard on my ass.

Anybody who has ever bruised their coccyx knows how painful the initial trauma can be, and as I lay at the bottom of the stairs for a few minutes, gasping for air and attempting to assess the true extent of my injury, I couldn’t help but think about how something as pedestrian as a comfy new pair of woolen socks slipping on the carpet could absolutely change a person’s life.

In a nation where access to health care has traditionally been tied to employment, even a relatively minor illness or household injury can set off a cascade of events that leads from a middle class lifestyle to despair.  Be it a tumble down the stairs, a slip in the bathtub or a torn up knee during a beer-belly softball match, everyday injuries can quickly put white and blue collar workers alike out of a job.  And with the loss of employment so too goes the health insurance… assuming you were fortunate enough to have health benefits in the first place.

One minute you’re kissing your daughter goodnight, and the next minute you’re writhing at the bottom of the stairs, having taken the first clumsy step toward toward economic uncertainty.

We hear a lot in the US about the need for individuals to take personal responsibility for their actions.  “Why should I have to pay for your child’s education?” we’re often asked. “Why should I have to pay for your health care, or your buses, or to regulate the safety of products you’re too stupid avoid?”

“I’ve worked hard for my money,” the familiar conservative refrain goes, “so why should I have to pay for the consequences of your bad choices?”

Bad choices. You know, like choosing to fall down the stairs.

As it turns out I’ve likely suffered little more than a couple of nasty contusions, so I guess I was lucky.  I don’t have statistics in front of me, so I don’t know how often a broken wrist or an injured back or a blown out knee ultimately leads to a person losing everything they’ve worked a lifetime to achieve, but you know it happens, and it happens every day.

So honestly, selfishly resent all you want the notion of a social welfare state, but don’t give me any of that personal responsiblity crap.  It’s a bigger pain in my ass than… well… my ass.

So, let’s say, a few years back, Joni Balter refinanced her house. She got a good, 30-year fixed rate, not one of those adjustable, sub-prime, pieces of crap, but today she gets a letter from the bank telling her that, you know, times are tough, profits are down, and they didn’t do so well on that stress test thing, so, sorry… that 6-percent mortgage we agreed on? We’re canceling that, and your new 7-percent mortgage starts next month.  Have a nice a day.

Or imagine you’re Kate Riley, and you just leased yourself a fancy new Cadillac Escalade, but GM, well, they’re struggling just to make it through the end of the month, so they deliver a Chevy Malibu instead.  But the $800/month lease payment? That stays the same. Oops… sorry.

Or let’s say you’re Frank Blethen, and you’ve got $70 million in loans coming due the end of the year… only the bank now says, on second thought, we need that money today. (You know, tough times, stress test, and all that.) And if you can’t afford to pay up right now, that’s okay, we’ll just take your family newspaper and your real estate holdings and we’ll liquidate them at auction.  C’est la vie.

Yeah, just imagine the howls of righteous outrage we’d hear from the Seattle Times editorial board should anybody unilaterally rewrite a legally binding contract on them.  A contract is a contract is a contract, after all.  Unless, of course, it’s signed between an employer and a labor union.

The letter from Superintendent Maria Goodloe-Johnson states the district cannot renew the 182-day contract, but can offer a 181-day contract. Information on how to appeal the proposal is included.

Response by the teachers union, the Seattle Education Association, has been unhelpful and destructive. Union leaders are being purposely obtuse about the letter’s intent, even threatening legal action.

This strategy of killing the message by maligning the messenger shouldn’t work. This issue is less about the superintendent and more about tough state budget cuts.

Indeed, the letter could have been more artfully written…

Could have been more artfully written? Technically, the district just fired all 3,300 Seattle teachers… during Teacher Appreciation Week, no less!  And rather than attempting to renegotiate a contract that was bargained in good faith, the Superintendent chooses to bypass the union entirely, and go directly to the individual teachers, basically telling them to sign the new contract… or else.

And the union’s “ire is uncalled for and misdirected”…?

The issue here is not about tough state budget cuts; it’s about the complete and utter disregard the district (and the Times) has shown for a legally binding contract, and the collective bargaining rights of teachers. Nobody questions the dire financial straits in which the district now finds itself, but the proper and legal way to address this particular shortfall would be to renegotiate the contract with the union, not unilaterally shove a new contract directly down the throats of teachers.

Did the union refuse to give up that 182nd day? No, they weren’t even asked. The union was never given the opportunity to even earn a little public good will by working with the Superintendent… you know, the same way the Times thinks Bank of America should work with the Columbian to renegotiate its contractual obligations:

What makes the Columbian’s plight so sad is that Southwest Washington could lose its dominant news provider because Bank of America is apparently not willing to work with the company.

Get that? When you have a legally binding contract with a struggling newspaper publisher, you have a civic responsibility to work with the company to renegotiate the terms of the deal.  But when you have a legally binding contract with a labor union… well… screw them, those “unhelpful and destructive” DFH‘s.

Had the roles been reversed, had the union sent an unartful letter to Goodloe-Johnson declaring that teachers would no longer work that 182nd day, but would still be paid for it nonetheless, union officials would have been roundly ridiculed for their temerity. The Superintendent would never honor the demand, and no court would uphold such a unilateral violation of a collective bargaining agreement.  And you can rest assured that the Times would never characterize the district’s ire as “misdirected.”

No, the issue here is not the 182nd day, but rather the Superintendent’s blatant disregard for the collective bargaining rights of the teachers, and her absolute failure to view the union as a constructive partner during these tough budgetary times.  And I’m guessing that the Times’ own disregard for the collective bargaining rights of teachers, tells us everything we really need to know about their stance on education “reform.”

Paul Allen is selling off a couple of radio stations in Portland. From The Oregonian:

Paul Allen is selling his two Portland radio stations to a group led by former radio mogul Larry Wilson, who aims to make a fresh start in the business he left eight years ago.

The stations are talk-radio’s KXL (AM 750) and all-sports KXTG (“The Game,” 95.5 FM). They are among Oregon’s best-known broadcasters by virtue of their association with outspoken radio personalities and popular sports teams, including the Portland Trail Blazers. Wilson said Monday that he plans to maintain the format of each, and in conjunction with the sale signed an agreement to carry Blazers games for eight more years.

So just for the record, according to KXL’s web site, their “outspoken radio personalities” include Lars Larson, Glenn Beck and Michael Savage. There’s an ad for a t-shirt on Savage’s site that says “I’d rather be water-boarding.” Cute.

Larson is headlining an event called “Talkfest 5: Censorship,” which is billed as a discussion of “government censorship on the radio airwaves.” According to the KXL site, it’s sponsored by George Morlan Plumbing, IRA Advantage, Office Furniture Direct, Coors Light, Pilsner Urquell, Broadway Cigars, & Americans For Prosperity. That last one is yet another front group in the stink-tank pantheon, big surprise. I suppose they’ll get together and scream about how the Obama administration is going to shut them down, when declining ad revenues and a changing zeitgeist are their real enemy.

So hey, Paul Allen can buy and sell most things on the planet, that’s nothing new, and it’s not clear what his motivation is for selling the stations. Maybe he had a fit of conscience, or maybe it’s just routine business, as Allen’s spokesman David Postman implies in the Oregonian article.

What is clear is that Allen has had ownership of a station that disseminates the worst kind of paranoid right wing balderdash, which is his Constitutional right. But it sure doesn’t make me inclined to buy Blazers tickets, that’s for sure. The always fascinating and aggravating part of hate radio was that eventually some guy in a suit would say something like “It’s just a business,” as if the only possible niche market is conservative wingnuttery, and as if “business concerns” trump all moral and ethical responsibility for the product one puts out.

So thanks, Paul Allen, for all the years of Lars Larson and his brain-damaging stunts about Christmas trees and the “War on Christmas,” and especially thanks for mega-nuts Glenn Beck and Michael Savage. Rich folks don’t have to endure living in the regular world where actual morons believe the things they are told on stations like KXL, but the rest of us do. Instead of making the world a tiny bit better, you’ve made it just a little meaner and uglier.

Nice legacy.