What Do Freddie & Fannie Have that Sallie Doesn’t?
Posted by Joshua Sharf in ACORN, Finance, National Politics on September 18th, 2009
The same thing that a public option in health insurance would have: the ability to run off the competition.
Yesterday, you may have heard, the House voted to cut off funding for Acorn, with all of the opposition coming from 75 Democrats. Typically, the minority – the Republicans, for the moment – will try to tack something truly poisonous to the majority on a bill that the majority – for the moment, the Democrats – just can’t refuse.
In this case, it was the final gasp knee on the ventilator tube of the independent student loan market. The story combines the worst elements of the government part of the mortgage mess with the scariest elements of the proposed insurance mess. Way back, bankers and independent lenders didn’t see students as such good credit risks. (They still don’t, which is why they tend to loan to them at 18% interest on credit cards.) So the government decided to step in and offer subsidized loans for education. Over time, the banks who made the federal money available were subject to more and more restrictions, until they became, to all intents and purposes, a utility of the federal government when it came to student loans. So much so that they could be portrayed – sadly, with some justification – as rent-seekers offering no value added:
“This bill will end the billions upon billions of dollars in unwarranted subsidies that we hand out to banks and financial institutions, and will use that money to guarantee access to low-cost loans,” Obama said in a statement.
The unwarranted subsidies to bad credit risks and liberal universities naturally go unmentioned, those being virtuous in nature.
Now, in a student-loan version of the Community Reinvestment Act, the government will spread that virtue around:
The Obama administration would use anticipated savings from the measure to increase grants for low-income students, boost funding for minority student groups, provide money for school construction, with a small portion left over to pay down the deficit.
The news has driven Sallie Mae’s credit rating down to a BBB-, and its stock price down accordingly. This is exactly the path that a public option in health insurance would take. The public (heh) has roundly rejected that idea as pretty terrible. It was terrible with mortgages (85% of which are now backed by the government), it would be terrible in health insurance. Why is it any better with student loan debt, which is also some of the worst debt in the world to owe?
I understand the Republicans’ desire to get the Democrats to vote on ACORN. With any bills likely to be bottled up in committee forever, a floor amendment to one of the few bills the Democrats were permitted amendment to was the logical path to take. Ironically, it may also focus attention on just how bad a bill that is.
House Votes to Defund ACORN; DeGette, Polis Dissent
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Colorado Politics on September 17th, 2009
Despite the opposition of Representatives DeGette and Polis, the US House has just voted to defund ACORN, on an amendment to a student aid bill. The amendment passed, and the bill has now passed out of the House, as amended. The bill doesn’t seem to have been introduced yet in the Senate, so including the defunding there would seem to be an easy matter, if the Democrats choose to do so.
UPDATE: Reader Patrick Gibbs reports that Representative DeGette’s office claims that, ”
her response for voting “no” was because she “regularly votes no when a tactic like this is used to slip in unrelated rules into a particular bill”. In other words, since it was part of the “Sudent Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act”, it was a procedural tactic and on principal she is “… Read Moreagainst” doing that (not necissarly on the merits of the bill). This, even though she said she is in favor of the SAaFR Act and in favor of holding ACORN accountable.
If this were he true motive, one would expect to see her signed on as a co-sponsor on HR 3571, the Republican bill to defund ACORN. Needless to say, she has not.
Maaser vs. Zakat
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Jewish on September 16th, 2009
Both Jews and Muslims are required to give an annual tithe. In Judaism, it’s called “maaser,” and in Islam, it’s referred to as “Zakat.” Somehow, I ended up on the Zakat list for some Muslim charity last year, and apparently they share their lists (or more likely, sell them) just as Jewish organizations do. Which means that this year, I’m on four lists.
Both amuont are 10%, but they’re 10% of very different totals. In Judaism, Maaser is a 10% after-tax line-item deduction on income. In Islam, Zakat is a 10% assessment on net assets (with a personal exemption, to boot). So for Judaism, it’s an Income Statement problem, and for Islam, it’s a Balance Sheet question.
I don’t know enough about how Islam view wealth or Zakat for that matter to come to any conclusions (although if I keep reading these solicitations, I may) but I’d like to throw out there as a working hypothesis that they represent different views of money. A tax on income would seem to reflect a more dynamic view of wealth. Someone may have a lot of assets, but either be unable to dispose of them, or may simply have a bad year. Where a tax on assets – a property tax, if you will – may reflect a more static view of wealth, that it’s unlikely to evaporate (or sublimate) over the course of a year.
As I said, I’m not sure about this, and I’m open to proofs that I have it exactly backwards. But I do think it’s an interesting difference.
Another Candidate, Another Poll
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Colorado Politics, Senate 2010 on September 16th, 2009
With Jane Norton’s entry into the Colorado Senate Race, Rasmussen has test-polled her against both Sen. Ben. and Romanoff. (No word on whether or not the controversies over Obama’s czars is hurting Andrew). It turns out she polls better than either Frazier or Buck against the Senator Select, leading 45-36, and beating Romanoff 42-34. Norton does well, 52-21, among unaffiliated voters, but that’s a very fluid voter bloc, given the high number of undecideds there.
Some of this, however, may be a result of polling sample. Last week, Rasmussen had Bennet’s very favorable-to-very unfavorable levels at 14-18, but this poll has them at 8-19. It’s hard to believe that Bennet has really suffered that much deterioration in one week – especially in numbers that are so low in absolute terms to begin with. The new sample also has Romanoff down 8 points, 12-20, in the very-favorable-to-very-unfavorable rating, which is just hard to believe given his general popularity when he left office earlier this year. Do people remember his active campaigning for his doomed baby, Amendment 59?
Norton certainly has higher name recognition than Frazier or Buck. All three are right at break-even in the Veries, but Buck is at 9-7 (16 total) and Frazier at 6-6 (12 total), while Norton polls 13-12. There’s no question that Bennet’s negatives are higher than his positives, but a sitting Senator with any sort of a record should have generated stronger feelings, especially in this political environment. As with Ritter, the election should be a referendum on the incumbent, but count on the SEIU and CODA to try to define all three Republicans simultaneously as right wing-nuts. Given that the public hasn’t really formed impressions of them yet, there’s plenty of room for them to prey on the uninformed.
Yet to be included in any Rasmussen poll is Tom Wiens. I spoke with Tom before the show on Sunday night, and he seemed very confident that he could compete with Norton in fundraising. The question is, can he compete with Bennet in the general for votes, or is he simply not electable outside of his base in the Springs?
UPDATE: A friend of mine from elsewhere in the state reminds me of another part of my conversation with Tom Wiens before the show Sunday evening. Tom stressed that he has extraordinarily good relationships with delegates from across the state, and that he expects to do very well at the state convention. While unlikely to win 70% there, an extremely strong showing could be enough to propel him through the primary in August. One caveat to this strategy is that, between higher caucus participation and the as-yet-unpredictable straw poll, it maybe harder for the traditional party caucus-goers to dominate the proceedings.
While it’s the official position of the Republican Party that all candidates are welcome, and that primaries make for stronger candidates, I do happen to believe those things. It’s a long road, people, and the raw poll numbers right now don’t mean much.
McInnis v. Penry v. Ritter
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Governor 2010 on September 11th, 2009
On the heels of its Colorado Senate poll showing good news for Ryan Frazier, Rasmussen has published a poll on the governor’s race that Scott McInnis supporters are touting, and that can’t make Gov. Ritter very happy. While McInnis leads Ritter 44-39, Penry polls in a dead heat with the next former governor, trailing 41-40. McInnis will spin this as showing he’s stronger against Ritter, although much of the strength vs. Penry is still a result of statewide name recognition. Penry will claim that despite still struggling to make himself known outside the party, almost half the state is ready to vote for him in the general.
Of greater interest, according to Rasmussen, is the very favorable-very unfavorable ratings for the Republican challengers. McInnis leads here with a +10 (18-8), while Penry trails at a -3 (8-11). Some of this may be that McInnis has been out of office for a while, and Penry is having to lead a party in office. I doubt that it’s due to Mike “The Headless Chicken” Huttner’s attempts to portray the financial crisis as the “Bush-Penry recession.”
The election should, of course, be a referendum on Ritter’s performance, and in this regard he’s in some serious trouble. Among those likely voters with strong opinions about his performance, Ritter has an abysmal -14 rating, with 29% strongly disapproving, and 15% strongly approving. He’s not getting points for not deferring to Big Labor on important issues, and one presumes that the Car Tax is beginning to take its toll.
However, the fact that only 20-25% of voters have strong opinions about the Republicans leaves room for the CODA spin machine and the MSM (but I repeat myself) to help define the Republicans, and at this point, McInnis is only slightly less vulnerable to that than Penry is. However, the legislative session is likely to be contentious, with the Democrats threatening to ram through a state-wide health care takeover of their own, and likely to pick fights on issues designed to paint Penry into a corner. How he manages that will go a long way to determining his viability in the primaries.
“When Will You Make An End Of It?”
Posted by Joshua Sharf in The Great Repainting on September 10th, 2009
And so, the Great Repainting stretches out to the end of its fifth week. Today was supposed to see the crown molding mounted. Elden had a friend who supposedly knew how to do this, had a mitre box, and would be able to hang the molding that Elden had already painted.
Instead, I got a call, explaining that Elden had figured out that his friend didn’t really know what he was doing, and that he had hired someone from an agency to come by and do the job properly. Of course, this sets the whole thing back another day. And when I got home, I saw what he was talking about. His friend had indeed mounted one of the pieces – vertically. not at an angle, and coming to an end about 1″ from the corner. Now, I’ve done crown molding before. The secret here is that you really don’t even need a mitre for the internal corners. You can just cope out the pattern, and slide a full end piece right underneath the one you’ve coped out. Our pattern is simple enough that I could do it myself, except that I’m paying them to do it.
Elden’s reaction wasn’t particularly encouraging, either. Apparently he was so disgusted by the whole matter that he packed up and left at 10:00, with plenty of work left that he could have done.
So because the agency needs to be paid in cash when the work is done, I need to come home tomorrow during lunch, inspect the molding, and then pay (or not). Which means that not only is the project taking more time than the Sistine Chapel, it’s not starting to devour my own time in the process.
I can’t begin to tell you how ready I am to take an evening and put books on shelves.
So Much For That Whole Listening Thing
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Health Care on September 10th, 2009
Back when the Town Hells started, I predicted that the President would give a health care speech in an effort to salvage an overhaul this year. I thought that he would try to sell the same unpopular bill of goods, repackaged as a result of his having, “listened” to the anger and discontent that’s obviously out there.
I didn’t give him enough credit. Instead, the President tried to repackage the same discredited speech.
Remarkably, the President managed to be defensive, dismissive, and deceptive all at the same time. Which leads me to think that this speech was aimed not at the American public, but at Congressional Democrats.
Two Wheels Good, Four Wheels Bad
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Denver on September 9th, 2009
The number of parking tickets written in Denver is on pace to hit near-record levels for Mayor John Hickenlooper’s administration, with particular hot spots in neighborhood enclaves scattered throughout the city.
Denver officials said the increase is not an attempt to plug the city’s sizable budget gap.
Uh-huh. Ah, it seems like only yesterday…
I’d Settle For a Chalk Outline
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Uncategorized on September 9th, 2009
A nonprofit group is seeking permission to write every word of the healthcare bill on the Capitol steps.
Wadhams Staying Put, It Seems
Posted by Joshua Sharf in Colorado Politics on September 8th, 2009
Amid rumors that State Party Chairman Dick Wadhams’s trip to Nevada might portend another full-time effort to unseat a Democrat Senate Majority Leader, comes a memo from Dick himself. The relevant parts are quoted below:
I just want to let you know that nothing can keep me from being a part of unseating a Democratic governor for the first time in 48 years, and the accidental senator he appointed.
…
My friend Sue Lowden, who recently resigned as Nevada Republican state chairman, asked me to make the presentation to a group of her supporters as she decides whether to challenge Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
As fun as that quick trip to Las Vegas was, my full time political agenda is here in my home state of Colorado, as state chairman of Colorado Republicans.
While stopping short of an outright, “I will not be going to Nevada to run Sue Lowden’s campaign, period,” it’s clearly intended as a reassurance to the party that it won’t be left leaderless, just as it appears to be regaining its footing here in Colorado.
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