Life in the Third Layer

Thudfactor is talking about the people who switched to Clinton from Obama in the latest primaries because of a question about Obama’s position on NAFTA.
The NAFTA question is a slim reason to switch, particularly since it isn’t about NAFTA at all but about Obama’s integrity. Certainly this is a serious question if the worst implications of the story are believed, but I think it is a stretch to believe them. I am still seeing Obama as the better campaign manager and the best candidate to face McCain.
In addition to attacking Obama’s integrity, Hillary has used three other non-issue personal attacks against Obama adroitly and sometimes subtly — the “all talk, no substance” attack, the gender bias, and the race card. , MSNBC reports, burried in the last paragraphs of a long story:

How much did race and gender factor in Ohio? The AP: “One-fifth of white Ohio voters said race was an important issue to their vote, and those who did voted three in four for Clinton. That compares with the one in five Democrats in Ohio who said gender was important to their vote, and they voted six in 10 for Clinton.”

The “all talk, no substance” attack is false, as any who know Obama’s record and have compared it to Hillary’s (not Bill’s) already knows. The charge of plagiarism (another attack on integrity) is purely stupid, because all campaigns use speech writers and supporters’ input and suggestions that are given to the candidate. The race and gender issues are not worthy of any Democrat, and I regret that a candidate would stoop to using them. I understand that there are voters who respond to them, but their use by a candidate to manipulate voters is divisive and troublesome.

So it looks like there is a three to the one-two punch of the sub-prime lending — There is a common scam operation behind the reverse mortgage lending as well.
The New York Times in a story “Tapping Into Homes Can Be Pitfall for the Elderly” by Charles Duhigg today looked into this “golden opportunity,” available only to people in their 60’s who own their homes:

But hundreds of people who have sought reverse mortgages ? in lawsuits, surveys and conversations with elder-care advocates ? have complained about high-pressure or unethical sales tactics they say steered them toward loans with very high fees. Some say they were tricked into putting proceeds of their loans into unprofitable investments, while sales agents pocketed rich commissions.
?Every scam artist is getting into this business,? said Prescott Cole, an elder-care advocate who has worked with numerous reverse mortgage borrowers. ?Because reverse mortgages are so complicated and give you money up front, years can pass before a senior realizes they?ve lost everything.?

I guess I have that old person habit of following along with my cusor while I read — sort of like combating the failing vision by keeping my finger on the line — and as I read the “lost everything” I inadvertently double-clicked. That utility that defines words for you popped up and defined “everything” for me. Somehow the definition was not really expressive of working all your life to buy a home and then finding in your retirement years that you will be left with literally nothing.
The article states that “reverse mortgages have grown into a $20-billion-a-year industry, with elderly homeowners taking out more than 132,000 such loans in 2007, an increase of more than 270 percent from two years earlier.”
Apparently in the incident in the story, which is reported not to be one unique circumstance, the bank talked the home owner into a loan and investment package, lending the value of the home and talking the borrower (once the papers were signed, no longer the “owner”) into putting most of the money into investments. The borrower got a small bit of cash and an annuity based on the income from the investments. Of course there was a hefty fee for processing the loan, and another one for setting up the investments and the annuity. Then the investments went downhill, and the borrower was left without income and sucked into debt — something like that. Sort of a sub-sub-prime based on the principle of finding someone who has something and getting them to pay you to take it away from them.

I understand that if you campaign for President and do not win, you don’t take on any responsibilities, so after his campaign Ralph Nader can go back to his regular routine of doing nothing. Meanwhile, he will make a few speeches (no monumental task) and tour around the country a little bit, maybe see the Grand Canyon. He will get money for this from the Republicans, who will give him plenty because they believe he will take votes from the Democrats. When the dust dies down, he will take the leftover money, which is likely to be significant, and go home. He has found a niche in which a person works only one season out of every four years. I think Ron Paul has picked up on that and is hoping the Democrats will kick in a few bucks toward his retirement.

http://update.videoegg.com/flash/proxy.swf?jsver=1.4

My commute to work is just a bit over 52 miles a day, 26 miles each direction. I have just over 13 years with my employer, and while I am not getting rich, I am what people call “making a living.”
Anyway, I just got e-mail from the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee that reminded me that gas was $1.45 a gallon when George Bush took office. The Corolla gets pretty good gas mileage, but with one thing and another, I put around $30.00 worth of gas in the car three times a month. Let’s see, at $3.00 a gallon, that is, hey, 30 gallons a month for $90.00.
At pre-Bush-Halliburton prices, that would be $43.00 a month.
So the gas keeps going up, and with raises below the inflation rate, I will have to work until I am 100 years old — no, wait. That doesn’t figure. If I earn less each year, eventually I will be working for nothing. Then how will Halliburton get money?