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Banned
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Here are two "moderates" in the senate....Olympia is the most progressive Senate republican, and Joe Biden, everybody loves democrat Joe Biden.....he says all the right things. He's no angry, on the fringe reactionary like,,,,,,host on the TFP politics forum.
Tge only problem is, they allowed themselves to be owned by a constituency of one.....MBNA and the big money center banks that issur credit cards...
Quote:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...010401525.html
White House Postponing Loss of Iraq, Biden Says
By Glenn Kessler
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, January 5, 2007; Page A06
Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.), chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, said yesterday that he believes top officials in the Bush administration have privately concluded they have lost Iraq and are simply trying to postpone disaster so the next president will "be the guy landing helicopters inside the Green Zone, taking people off the roof," in a chaotic withdrawal reminiscent of Vietnam.
"I have reached the tentative conclusion that a significant portion of this administration, maybe even including the vice president, believes Iraq is lost," Biden said. "They have no answer to deal with how badly they have screwed it up. I am not being facetious now. Therefore, the best thing to do is keep it from totally collapsing on your watch and hand it off to the next guy -- literally, not figuratively."....
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Quote:
http://www.davidsirota.com/2005/06/l...joe-biden.html
....All good Democrats and progressives should make a deal with Biden: he can continue stabbing his own party in the back with impunity for his own self-promotion, and say his party doesn't speak for him. In exchange, Biden should agree to never, ever claim to speak for Democrats. Remember, this is a Senator who (among other things) led the fight to pass the bankruptcy bill, voted against limiting the interest credit card companies can gouge consumers with, voted against limiting predatory lending, voted against protecting consumers when their identity is stolen, voted for the Iraq War and voted to confirm Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. This says nothing about him perpetually floating his name for President, even though the last time he ran, he got caught pathetically trying to plagiarize people's speeches........
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Quote:
http://www.rra.org/story.html
Bart Jansen of the Portland Press Herald won the 2002 Goldstein Award for Regional Reporting from the National Press Club. This was one story from his entry.
MBNA Big Donor Behind Debtor Bill
By Bart Jansen (Portland Press Herald)
.....<b>MBNA, which is a major employer in Maine, also was Sen. Olympia Snowe's largest contributor in her re-election campaign, giving the Maine Republican $164,750 last year.</b>
Snowe said she has supported the bankruptcy reform legislation on its merits for consumers and businesses, not in exchange for financial support.
"There has never been a quid pro quo. Never. Ever," Snowe said.
Bush and Snowe ranked first and third as recipients of campaign contributions from the finance and credit industry, sandwiching former GOP Sen. William Roth, who represented MBNA's home state of Delaware.
The industry gave $9.3 million for the last election, doubling the previous election cycle and dwarfing the $600,000 spent in 1990, according to the Center for Responsive Politics.
Behind the scenes, MBNA spent nearly $2 million lobbying Congress last year, with significantly more in the second half of the year as the bankruptcy bill was debated, according to congressional disclosure forms.
That amount followed a steady increase in the company's lobbying since 1997, when it spent $1.26 million.
Other charge-card companies also lobbied heavily in 2000.
Visa USA Inc. spent $3.5 million; Mastercard International Inc., $1.38 million; American Express Co., $1.76 million; Citigroup, $1.4 million; and Capital One Financial Group, $720,000.
Personal bankruptcies have exploded in the last decade, with no real reforms to the laws that allow individuals to erase their debts after selling off some of their assets. Credit-card companies stand to benefit greatly from current legislation before Congress because it would make it more difficult for consumers to seek bankruptcy protection.
The bill could yield 5 percent more earnings for credit-card companies, according to an estimate from Kenneth Posner, an analyst at Morgan Stanley Dean Witter.
For MBNA alone, that would translate into $65 million more each year in profit, based on the company's 2000 net income. MBNA officials declined to be interviewed.
The bankruptcy bill has passed both chambers, and was sent along to a conference committee to work out the details. The legislation, in essence, would place many consumers filing for bankruptcy on a repayment plan instead of erasing their debts.
The argument by consumer advocates against the legislation is that it would send millions of dollars more flowing to corporations at the expense of
lower- and middle-class consumers drowning in debt, often after suffering a medical problem, divorce or job loss.
"It looks like the banks have purchased from Congress, by funding the campaigns, the right to collect their debts through bankruptcy," said Barry Schklair, a Portland bankruptcy lawyer for 22 years. "I think it's not balanced."
But the call for bankruptcy reform is reaching a crescendo because the number of cases doubled nationally during the 1990s and tripled in Maine.
Lenders argue that unscrupulous debtors must be thwarted from driving up the costs of borrowing for everyone.
For the fourth year, competing versions of the legislation have won supermajorities in the House and Senate, and lawmakers are debating how to finally forge a compromise. The talks are key because, after former President Bill Clinton vetoed a similar bill last year, President Bush has indicated he will sign it.
CONTRIBUTIONS
MBNA spreads the wealth. For example, Alfred Lerner, MBNA's chairman, and his wife, Norma, each gave $250,000 to the Republican National Committee last year. Charles Cawley, MBNA's president, hosted a fund-raiser at his Camden home overlooking Penobscot Bay in 1999 for candidate Bush.
<b>
"There is no doubt that money talks," said Travis Plunkett, legislative director of the Consumer Federation of America. "The firepower and campaign contributions have made a huge difference."
Sen. Paul Wellstone, D-Minn., argued that the legislation unfairly benefits lenders who bought the ear of Congress.
"It's outrageous that we don't confront them," he said. "I think these families just do not have these million-dollar lobbyists representing them."</b>
The $164,750 that Snowe got from MBNA represented a significant share of the $2.2 million raised for her re-election campaign last year.......
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The folks "in the middle" and the politicians who they support, are still part of the great white right in America.....they control themselves, and they sell the best interests of the majority of us, to the highest bidder. I won't settle for that, and I'll object to them and what they do, because they know better, but they act just like the Bushes, Cheney, Tom Delay, and Denny Hastert....
Last edited by host; 01-05-2007 at 02:41 PM..
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