Amy:  You made me giggle.  Love ya too.

Susie--I have a big concern with some of the proposals for fixing the mortgage problem--and I'm a tax and spend liberal!  The deregulation of banking created most, if not all, of this problem.  I agree that individuals have to act responsibly, but in all honesty, there are very few people in this country likely to refuse a "zero down" loan when it's offered, particularly since most of the financial institutions led these same people to believe (ridiculously so) that housing prices always go up.  They don't.  

Years ago when I purchased my first house I had to put twenty percent down and had to show that my income was not only steady but also  sufficient to pay my "fixed" thirty year mortage. This formula disappeared during the greed years and I'm a bit reluctant to subsidize the foolishness of some first-time home buyers, and very reluctant to subsidize the greed of mortgage lenders and those who hold their stock. 

However, I am sympathetic to those who are not only losing their homes but find themselves in debt from which they can never recover, so I do support some kind of financial help to these people, but only so long as it comes with the reinstitution of banking regulations and some assurance that the solution will expect those who receive help to return some of their profits to the government should they be lucky enough to sell their homes at a profit at some future date, and so long as the federal government does not reward the greedy lenders with a bailout.  "Greed" is not good, no matter what Gordon Gekko said!

I'm wondering where The Wall Street Journal was during the past ten years when I was asking (and was laughed at for being naive) how real estate prices could double and triple when average salaries were not doubling and tripling and how people could get loans for $300,000 and above with gross incomes of $60,000-$80,0000.  It made no sense to me. 

And since I live on interest earnings, I'm sick of the Federal Reserve, despite increasing inflation, lowering interest rates to bailout people who didn't act responsibly in the first place.

A pox on all their houses.  

I heard Hillary outline her plan for FHA to buy up the loans and directly deal with people. Set fixed interest rates that were affordable.  Probably what the mortgage companies failed to do was to look at net income to see if these people could even qualify to buy the home they purchased. More than likely they were just selling loans to anyone who came through their doors.

Meanwhile, as we talk about this, we do have a congress who should be dealing with this now.  We shouldn't be wondering what our candidates want to do about this in some future time.  Now is the time.  The three of them are in the Senate.  What do they want to do today?

Anne,

I think we all need to share in the shame of our congress.  When was the last time we wrote them to demand action, and attendence?  Congress is coming back March 31, at 2P.M.   They all have websites, it can't be easier for us to get a letter scorching through ewaves.   Their talk is cheap.  We want action.

It's very doubtful I'll get an elected seat.  They overbooked.  For one seat, there are 10 delegates and alternates and it's going to Obama.  I'm a Hillary alternate, 2 times removed.  Thanks anyway, who knows things happen.

Rosemary--I'm always writing to Schumer or Clinton and all I ever get back is the standard, "we received your letter, etc."  However, good idea, I'll write about this as well.  Sorry you won't get to go to the Convention--it would have been fun.

Shirley--buy him his doll and don't pay attention to your friend.  Why not a baby doll?--after all, men change diapers and look after their children.  It's good practice.  I still remember my older brother getting Lincoln Logs and I got a doll one year.  He operated on my doll, cutting off her head and then wouldn't let me play with his logs--which I loved.   

Anne,

I wrote my Senator a couple of years ago, Kay Bailey Hutchinson, she sent me a reply, and half way thru it, I fell asleep...for 2 years.

So if anyone has sleeping problems, I'll send them the letter.   Or I can post it here and we'll all miss the entire election.

We will be out of oil in about 40 years or so.  Definately not enough time for the congress to act on a price.

Hillary's health care.  Below is article from the N.Y. Times on some of Hillary's plans for health care.  One of the statements surprised me. It states that the average family spends between $5,000-$6,000 on premiums a year.  In 2003, my husband and I (no children and no pre-existing conditions) were spending over $10,000 (Guardian), and it would have gone to $12,000.  So were we overpaying?  I thought the figure cited in the article to be low.  (Sorry about embedded code--can't get rid of it!)

ARTICLE: 

Senator Clinton said in an interview on Wednesday that if elected president she would push for a universal health care plan that would limit what Americans pay for health insurance to no more than 10 percent of their income, a significant reduction for some families.

In an extensive interview on health policy, Mrs. Clinton said she would like to cap health insurance premiums at 5 percent to 10 percent of income.

The average cost of a family policy bought by an individual in 2006 and 2007 was $5,799, or 10 percent of the median family income of $58,526, according to America’s Health Insurance Plans, a trade group. Some policies cost up to $9,201, or 16 percent of median income.

The average out-of-pocket cost for workers who buy family policies through their employers is lower, $3,281, or 6 percent of median income, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation, a health research group.

A cap on premiums has been part of Mrs. Clinton’s universal coverage proposal since she announced it in September. Her published plan did not disclose her thinking on where to place the cap. She also said in the interview that she preferred to set the limit at a single level for all Americans rather than varying it by income.

Mrs. Clinton, a New York Democrat, set out a comprehensive approach to her signature issue of health care in three speeches last year, but she has been criticized for not providing details on several crucial components. She largely continued that approach in the interview, saying she would leave particulars like the eligibility criteria for her proposed health insurance tax credits to negotiations with Congress.

But she did discuss her thinking on other questions, including the premium cap, and expressed openness to measures she had not previously embraced.

She said, for instance, that it “might be appropriate” to require insurers to spend a heavy proportion of every premium dollar on health care as opposed to overhead and profit. Several governors, including Arnold Schwarzenegger of California and Edward G. Rendell of Pennsylvania, have proposed requiring that insurers spend 85 percent of premiums on health care.

Without specifying a number, Senator Barack Obama, Mrs. Clinton’s rival for the nomination, has backed that general concept.

Mrs. Clinton also she said if she could not generate the money needed to pay for universal coverage through other means, she would not object to raising the excise tax on tobacco products, which Congress last increased in 1997 to 39 cents a pack.

“I’m a big believer in raising tobacco taxes,” Mrs. Clinton said when asked whether an increase should be on the table. “You know, when we were working on the Children’s Health Insurance Program, that’s the funding stream that the Congress came up with, which was bipartisan, which worked out very well. At some point, there’s going to be diminishing returns. But, sure, why not? I don’t have any objection to that.”

As in her debates with Mr. Obama and other contenders, Mrs. Clinton displayed an easy command of health policy in the 45-minute interview, conducted in a basement meeting room in the Midtown Manhattan tower that houses her Senate office. Her voice hoarse, she conceded some weariness from the lengthy campaign, saying her decision to take off the Easter weekend had only allowed exhaustion to set in. But despite calls by some Democrats for her to abandon the race, she gave no hint that she was viewing her campaign in the past tense.

Mrs. Clinton presented a confident defense of her call for universal coverage, saying it reflected not only a moral imperative, but also the best chance to reduce costs and improve quality.

“I know that there are a lot of experts who may disagree about how to get to universal health care,” she said. “But they agree with me that in the absence of universal health care it’s very difficult to control costs, and it’s extremely hard to incentivize quality improvements at the level you need to really see results.”

Though that view is not shared by Senator John McCain or any of the rivals he vanquished to secure the Republican nomination, Mrs. Clinton said she thought that “the time is right” to build a bipartisan consensus to reorganize the health system.

She pointed to a growing demand for change by businesses, which bear the brunt of rising premiums, and to the support by some Republicans for a Senate bill that, like her proposal, would require individuals to buy policies and toughen regulation of the insurance industry.

• “There is going to be increasing pressure, because left alone, we’re going to have more and more uninsured people and more and more underinsured people and continuing costs and decreasing quality,” she said.

  Asked whether her proposal reflected the will of the entire country or just the leanings of voters in Democratic primaries, Mrs. Clinton said, “Well, I think it’s where the country can be.”

  The proposal to cover all 47 million uninsured people would maintain the private insurance system and mandate coverage for all legal residents. She would require insurers to cover every applicant regardless of age or health status. Government insurance similar to Medicare would be available to all consumers.

  Refundable tax credits would help make the newly mandatory policies affordable for low- and middle-income workers. Small businesses would receive tax credits to encourage them to offer insurance to employees. Large companies would either have to offer health benefits or pay into a pool that would finance subsidized coverage.

  Mrs. Clinton has pegged the cost of her plan at $110 billion. About half would come from savings generated by improvements in prevention, chronic disease management and electronic record keeping. The remainder would be produced by rolling back President Bush’s income tax cuts on people earning more than $250,000 a year.

  Mrs. Clinton’s campaign Web site says she would cover the uninsured “with no overall increase in health spending or taxes.” She said in the interview that rolling back the Bush tax cuts “should not be rightly labeled as a tax increase” because without Congressional action the cuts are to expire on Jan. 1, 2011.

  Mr. Obama, of Illinois, also aspires to provide universal coverage, but he would mandate coverage only for children. He has said consumers should not be required to buy policies until costs can be reduced enough to make premiums affordable. He has suggested that affordability is the sole reason people do not buy health insurance.

  Mrs. Clinton called that argument “just specious.” She maintains, and many health economists agree, that a share of the uninsured are “free riders,” typically young and healthy workers who can afford coverage but choose to spend on other priorities.

  She pointed out that millions of qualified Americans, many of them children, remained unenrolled in government programs that would provide free or heavily subsidized policies. “You can make it affordable, but unless you have some requirement you’re not going to get everybody into the system,” she said.

  As in past interviews and debates, Mrs. Clinton refused to specify how she would enforce her mandate. She has previously said that garnisheeing wages would be one option, but has declined to say whether it would be the preferred one. She did say, however, that the uninsured could be detected by employers and government agencies and then enrolled automatically.

  There would be “a long grace period” to enroll, she said. At some point, it might be necessary to impose penalties to encourage compliance, as is the case in Massachusetts, the lone state with a mandatory coverage plan. “Probably eventually,” she said, “but I don’t want to set a time frame.”

  As with many elements of her plan, Mrs. Clinton’s ability to lower costs so that premiums would not exceed 10 percent of income is speculative. “I think her plan is realistic at close to 10 percent, but I don’t think it’s realistic at 5 percent,” said Jonathan Gruber, a health economist at MIT who generally supports her approach.

  Mr. Gruber also questioned not varying the premium cap according to income.

  Mrs. Clinton said reducing the cost of health care would be crucial to the next president’s ability to keep Medicare solvent. The program’s trustees projected this week that the Medicare Hospital Insurance Trust Fund would be exhausted in 2019.

  She said she would allow Medicare to negotiate lower drug prices and would “rein in” government subsidies for private Medicare Advantage plans. She said she would resist increasing payroll taxes or cutting benefits until trying a broad range of cost controls.

  “We have so much unnecessary cost in our system,” Mrs. Clinton said. “It’s heartbreaking how much we spend on things that don’t produce a doctor at a bedside or a nurse taking care of a patient or any particularly good outcome.

  “So I’m reluctant to put more money into a broken system. And it’s not only Medicare. It’s our entire health care system — without significant reforms. I think that would be an unbelievably bad decision.”

Hi Grace.  I thought you had left us for more fertile ground (or blogs, in this case).  Nice to see you back.  My DH doesn't like being called anything but Uruguayan, and can't figure why he's lumped in with everyone who was born south of Texas.  His country is so south, it's north!

Anne,

It looked like a personal response.  I was talking about a part of the legislation to be voted on and she responded in kind about that part.

I don't see how a health plan can work unless we're all paying into it and we're all covered, 100% participation.  Not just kids.  To stay solvent it will require us all paying in, taking in to consideration our ability to pay, of course.  Anything other then 100% will still leave out a large portion of people.  Those who work for small companies, etc.  

Thanks for link.  Interesting that my two senators from Maine, both women, were at the top of the leader board (been watching Dancing with the Stars), missing zero votes.  And they're actually two women I could see as President,  even though they call themselves Republicans (actually, in the years they've been in the Senate the movement has been so much to the right, that I think of them as Democrats these days). Either one of them would be a great Veep choice for McCain!

Susan Collins and Olympia Snow, both from Maine.  They're officially Republican but are the two most left of center Republicans in the Congress.  They're both very pleasant as well.  I'm stilling waiting for one, or both, to change their party affiliation, but I guess that rarely happens.  If Obama gets the nomination and Hillary isn't in the Veep position, he would be wise to select one of them, and not to tack right.  That would probably help him with the independents and some Democrats--women in particular, and he'd get the State of Maine--all 200,000 of them or whatever the number is.  Did you know that Maine has a higher percentage of voters in the Green Party. 3%, than any other state.  And I think our town has all 3%.

Not a whisper, but an email.  I wrote McCain's campaign suggesting that either Collins or Snowe would be a good VP, but Snowe is probably the best possibility.  She's the senior senator from Maine, wins overwhelming in Maine when she runs. Maine is about half and half, but generally moderate in its views, with a large Green Party presence. Snowe's had a long and distinguished career in government, is very moderate in her views, both pro-choice and pro-gay, very well known as a consensus builder, voted by Time magazine as one of the top ten senators.  She's somewhat hawkish on defense but very moderate on social issues.

If Hillary doesn't get the nomination and those 28% of her voters are looking for a home, they might be inclined to vote for McCain if Snowe were his running mate.  I think he would be very foolish to go for someone to the right of him.  Some of them might stay home but his chances of getting independents and Reagan Republicans with Snowe are good.  I hope he takes the chance.  I looked her up via Google and the first website i looked at said she's on his short list--which I didn't know.  So maybe it will happen.

Good Morning Amy.  I cant think past yesterday lol - so to think about 2012 makes me feel like Im

Nickster

I have nothing against Collins and Snow and I think both McCain and Obama wouyld be wise to consider a qualified woman for their ticket. There's been talk on the republican side of Kay Bailey Hutchinson, but so far she has said she's uninterested. I don't know if Maine would be that important to either candidate since it's not rich in electoral college delegates. I've said all along I want an obama/richardson ticket-- I'd rather Obama not pull from the slim majority in the senate.

Ohh- I am not saying I think she should run, Rosemary mentioned a female running mate for McCain and I mentioned Hutchinson.

I am not changing positions Anne-shirley, just stating why although I respect Snow and Collins, I'm anxious about a)chosing a senator and pulling from the slim majority b) chosing someone from a state with not many electors and in an area where democrats usually have the most votes to begin with (new england).  I realize you don't like me, Anne-shirley and are just trying to trip me up-- hope you find that a productive use of your time and energies.