Just how deep does the rabbit hole go?
Posts tagged bankruptcy
Student Loan Racketeering: Congress Critter Introduces a Bill to Make Student Loan Payments a Payroll Tax Deduction
1Source: http://judymorrisreport.blogspot.com
By Judy Morris
Bloomberg had a very interesting article about a congressional bill that was introduced that would force employers to withhold 15% of an employees’ paycheck to pay for student loan debt.
Student-Loan Collection Targeted for Overhaul in Congress
Congress will consider overhauling debt collection in the $100 billion-a-year U.S. student loan program, replacing it with automatic withdrawals from borrowers’ paychecks tied to their income — a system used in the U.K.
Legislation that Wisconsin Republican Representative Tom Petri plans to introduce as soon as this week would require employers to withhold payments from wages in the same way they do taxes. Payments would be capped at 15 percent of borrowers’ income after basic living expenses.
The bill follows growing concern about the burden of $1 trillion in outstanding student loans, which now exceed credit- card debt.
The above proposal comes on the heels of Obama’s 3/10 overhaul of the student loan program that took government guaranteed student lending away from lenders and replaced the Federal government as the direct lender. However, the banksters were still going to collect heavy fees for administering the program, even if they were no longer collecting the interest on student loans.
Obama’s student loan overhaul was modeled after a European styled socialist program and the NYT was wild about Obama’s new student loan program which is a variation of the Marxist doctrine of “from each according to his ability and to each according to his needs”.
The Fiscal Cliff About To Expose Another Medicare Scam
1
Source: http://politicaloutcast.com
By Mark Horne
Why would the fiscal cliff mean that doctors would suddenly take a thirty percent cut in their billing? Nothing was said about that last year when the deal was made. Part of the problem is that deal wasn’t made last year. It was made fifteen years ago and then hidden under fig leaves. Those leaves are going to fall away on January 1.
Inventing Another “Debt Ceiling” to Raise
Back to 1997, the basic bankruptcy of Medicare was too obvious for Congress to deny. They felt they had to do something about it. Basically, seniors were demanding using the program more and more, as is likely to happen when you give away free money. So Congress determined by law that every year that expenses went up above a certain amount, the Medicare reimbursements would go down to compensate. Basically, they tried to impose price controls on medicine in order to counterbalance the inherent price inflation and expansion that such “free money” programs naturally produce.
So, since 1997, every time that the Medicare expenses have expanded too much, Medicare has reduced the amount of money that they would pay for a procedure. This meant doctors became even less happy having to deal with Medicare. Medicare patients found doctors would not take their business or at least didn’t seem happy to do so. Medicare patients vote and make people in Congress want to make them happy in order to gain or stay in office.
We Are on the Road to Bankruptcy
2Source: http://www.realclearpolitics.com
By John Stossel
President Obama said in his State of the Union speech, “We’ve already agreed to more than $2 trillion in cuts and savings.”
That was reassuring.
The new budget he released this week promises $4 trillion in “deficit reduction” — about half in tax increases and half in spending cuts. But like most politicians, Obama misleads.
Cato Institute economist Dan Mitchell cut through the fog to get at the truth of the $2 trillion “cut.”
“We have a budget of, what, almost $4 trillion? So if we’re doing $2 trillion of cuts,” Mitchell said, “we’re cutting government in half. That sounds wonderful.”
But what the president was talking about is not even a cut. The politicians just agreed that over the next 10 years, instead of increasing spending by $9.48 trillion, they’d increase it by “just” $7.3 trillion. Calling that a “cut” is nonsense.
Mitchell gave an analogy: “What if I came to you and said, ‘I’ve been on a diet for the last month, and I’ve gained 10 pounds. Isn’t that great?’ You would say: ‘Wait, what are you talking about? That’s insane.’ And I said: ‘I was going to gain 15 pounds. I’ve only gained 10 pounds, therefore my diet is successful.’”
Democrats use this deceit when they want more social spending. Republicans use it for military spending.
And the press buys it. The Washington Post has been writing about “draconian cuts.”
“The politicians know this game,” Mitchell said. “The special interests know this game. Everyone gets a bigger budget every year. … And we wind up, sooner or later, being Greece.”
We are definitely on the road to bankruptcy.
“We have maybe 10, 15 years’ advanced notice. And what’s frustrating is that we’re not taking advantage of that, even as we see these other countries collapsing into social chaos and disarray.”
The Federal Reserve and Santa Claus [Spoiler Alert]
01 year ago
Source: http://silverunderground.com
Spoiler Alert: If there are any six year olds reading this blog, you can skip today’s post. It’s not written for you. Do the right thing and click the “x” on this tab right now. Santa’s watching.
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I believed in Santa Claus a little longer than most children do. For some reason, as long as I couldn’t definitely prove that my parents were the ones leaving presents under the Christmas tree, I wasn’t ready to completely reject the possibility that it really was jolly old Saint Nick riding a sleigh pulled by reindeer and magically shrinking himself small enough to slip under the front door or through the key hole and into my house (we didn’t have a chimney).
And my parents were incredibly sneaky. I never once caught them. But when I finally told my dad I didn’t believe in Santa any more, he said, with a sly grin, “Santa doesn’t deliver presents to kids who don’t believe in him,” and I promptly responded, “I believe! I believe!” The matter was settled. I got some awesome Legos that year.
The Federal Reserve, fiat money, and inflationary stimulus policies are no different than the Santa Claus of our childhoods. The only problem is that so many adults still believe in them. Let’s examine just how similar the two really are: Santa magically gives you everything you wished for at no cost to you. Free stuff, created magically out of thin air by elves in the North Pole. Purportedly, so can the Fed. Its magical elves are accountants that create wealth out of thin air at the stroke of a pen.
Obama was advised against visiting Solyndra after financial warnings
0Source: http://www.washingtonpost.com
Obama was advised against visiting Solyndra after financial warnings
By Carol D. Leonnig and Joe Stephens, Updated: Monday, October 3, 3:20 PM
“Now there are going to be some failures,” he said in an ABC News/Yahoo online television interview. “Hindsight is always 20/20. It went through the normal review process and people thought this was a good bet.”
Since Solyndra filed for bankruptcy on Aug. 31, leaving taxpayers on the hook for almost half a billion dollars, the White House has said that decisions about supporting the solar-panel manufacturer were made by career employees at the Department of Energy, starting in the Bush administration.
But the e-mails capture the vigorous debate within the Obama White House about whether the solar-panel manufacturer was a smart bet. They also highlight the angst inside the West Wing about whether the president’s initiative to support clean energy was ill-equipped to pick winners, or could, as some hoped, help validate Obama’s use of $80 billion in stimulus to build a clean-energy industry.
Obama’s Energy Department had provided Solyndra with a government-backed loan in 2009. A year later, when the company ran out of money, the agency agreed to refinance Solyndra’s loan and continue paying out federal funds.
What was once a showcase of that Obama clean-energy initiative is now a political crisis for the White House. Despite the federal largesse, Solyndra’s sudden shutdown left 1,100 employees out of work and many of its assets up for auction.
A week later, FBI agents raided the company’s headquarters in a criminal probe looking at potential accounting fraud.
In spring 2010, before Solyndra’s fortunes turned, the White House highlighted the administration’s investment in the company in a “Main Street Tour,” to show taxpayers how their stimulus dollars had been put to work.
This is a work in progess, a self learning tool and fun little project. Please excuse the slow development as it seems the needed proper time is always lacking. It is my hope that the combination of content and links to other sources of information in this simple blog may help awaken a few of the sleeping masses and encourage and inspire others to initiate their own research, ultimately for each person to be a light to help awaken others. Opinions expressed belong to me, myself and I. Also, a big thank you to all that take the time to visit, it is appreciated :)
