Philly Saves Homes!

Here's a good article in the NYT about a program in Philly that is saving 80% of foreclosed homes.

Just because this blog is called "Rebecca Rants and Raves ..." (I do way more ranting than raving though don't I?), I'll throw in a rant for good measure:

"Ms. McGrath, a nursing assistant, said she had refinanced her $64,000 loan at 9.75 percent to help pay medical bills. She had expected to pay $1,406 a month, but from the start of the loan she was presented with bills of $1,886, which she could not afford."

Let me just reiterate for the zillionth time - We need Universal Single Payer Healthcare. NOW! (Note that the "single payer" part is key). Think I'm alone? The majority of physicians support universal single payer health care. (Otherwise known as 'Canadian Style' - seriously, when else can you say that outside the realm of bacon?)

Rebecca's Bailout Plan

This might be the only time I will say this: Thank you, thank you House Republicans for voting 'No' to Bush's bullshit "bailout my friends and leave the american people with the debt" plan.

I just got a new issue of the nation with their bailout plan. I haven't read it yet so I'm sure I'll have more to say on this topic later. If you haven't yet, take a glance at Nader on the Bailout and Kucinich's "Main Street Recovery Plan." I, also, saw Paul Krugman on Keith Olberman tonight and he had some good points that found their way here.

First, let's start with what's bad:

1. Buying bank's bad assets. Um, would you buy a house that was ruined by Katrina? No. It's absurd.
2. Giving Bush 700 Billion (or 350 Billion now and 350 Billion later unless you explicitly vote No) to do whatever the fuck he wants. Didn't we already do that in Iraq? Where has that gotten us? Here. That's where.
3. Rewarding people for royaly fucking up the economy ... no, ALL the economies in the whole fucking world. Austrailia's market dropped 15% in the first 5 minutes; Japan dropped 5%. Capitalism is 'sink or swim' but the only businesses that seem to be allowed to sink are small business.
4. Not helping out average americans who are drowning ... BAD. BAD. BAD.

Ok so ... Here's what I think:

1. Yes, we need to help Wall Street. Why? Because they aren't lending to businesses and students and that is the money that makes the world go 'round. Here's what we do: The Treasury buys Preferred Stock in the companies they bail out. Enough stock to have a controlling interest in the company - to prevent ridiculous CEO compensations and ensure that tax payers get their money back ... with interest. This way, if the company is back on it's feet, the tax payers gets payed back by buying low and selling high. If the company goes backrupt, preferred stock holders get paid first.
2. Start with 50 Billion; not 700 Billion
3. In the short term, the Treasury should lend directly to businesses and students alleviating the credit crunch and ensuring, again, that tax payers get their money with interest.
4. Take some of the 700 Billion and create some fucking jobs idiot. Our infrastructure is crumbling and we have an energy and environmental crisis. Let's revive the Tennesee Valley Authority and the Civillian Conservation Corps. Let's build some wind farms all across the country. Let's fund research in energy - I'm sure many of my fellow IT workers at Lehman and other financial institutions would gladly switch over to working in other fields. Gladly. If people have jobs, they have money. They have money, the spend it. Economy better. Seriously, Economics 101 ... and The New Deal 101.
5. Empower bankruptcy judges to renogiate mortgages ... and get rid of any bankruptcy consequences for 6 months to 1 year of the new mortgage. If you still default, then you can ruin your credit.
6. Regulate the fucking economy. Adam Smith is rolling over in his grave guys. This is not capitalism. For example: increase the requirements for buying on margin (buying stock with money you don't have), tax speculation, regulate derivatives; re-instate Glass-Steagall (separate commercial from investment banking).
   

A few things I'd do after the immediate crisis passed:

1. Give stockholders real rights. Stockholders - the owners of a company - should be approving things like executive pay. Let's incentivize companies to do the right thing.
   
2. Expand Medicare and create a universal, single payer health care. NOW. No one should go bankrupt because they can't pay their medical bills. (Currently, half of all bankruptcies are the result of medical bills).
   

There's so many more things we should do - take a look at Kucinich's comprehensive plan - but these are the most obvious and pressing I think.

Some parting thoughts:

- "... there are no libertarians in a financial crisis." Paul Krugman on Real Time with Bill Maher
- Aren't you glad Bush didn't succeed to privatizing Social Security???

Understanding Science ...

I think most competent, intelligent people would agree that our society - mostly fueled by right wing fundamentalist Christians and/or oil execs - is seeing a major assault on science. I would argue that this is more pervasive than even the standard anti-climate change conservatives; it is perpetrated by our poor education system as well as left wing radical animal rights activists, a lazy, profit drive media, and others. My views on that are for another post but the point is that it is clear that there are many misunderstandings about how science works. So here is an incomplete list of things I'd like to see more widely understood about science:

1. Yes, science is based on "theories" but those theories are upheld by consensus among experts in the field. How do you know if a theory, climate change for example, has passed the test? A good rule of thumb is that it is published in a peer reviewed journal. I found a great guide to understanding peer review in the scientific community here. The key points are:

• "Science has a system for assessing the quality of research before it is published. This system is called peer review.
• Peer review means that other scientific experts in the field check research papers for validity, significance and originality – and for clarity.
• Editors of scientific journals draw on a large pool of suitable experts to scrutinise papers before deciding whether to publish them.
• Many of the research claims you read in newspapers and magazines, find on the internet, or hear on television and the radio are not published in a peer-reviewed journal.
• Some of this research may turn out to be good but much of it is flawed or incomplete. Many reported findings, such as claims about “wonder cures” and “new dangers”, never come to anything.
• Unpublished research is no help to anyone. Scientists can’t repeat or use it and as a society we can’t base decisions about our public safety – or our family’s health for example – on work that has a high chance of being flawed.
• So, no matter how exciting or compelling new scientific or medical research is, you must always ask… Is it peer reviewed? If not, why not?"

2. Almost all research is government funded, especially medical and pharmaceutical research. Just in case you buy the argument that if we had universal, single payer health care that medical "innovation" would take a down turn, you're wrong. (Actually, it's possible that it would take an upturn because the government would actually get compensated for successful drug research. Anyway ...) Most drugs are developed by government funded research grants and then handed over, free of charge, to pharmaceutical companies to market and produce ... in a monopoly for the first few years. (Yay for "free" markets! <- sarcasm)

3. Just because a break-through didn't come directly out of previous research doesn't mean that the break through could have happened without that research. Understanding what doesn't work is just as important, and sometimes more important, than understanding what does.