Horrible/Wonderful/Horrible/Wonderful
Horrible: The United States is doing such an unbelievably crappy job of taking care of its own citizens that charities created to deliver medical care to refugees in third-world nations are finding themselves desperately needed at home. That’s right, it’s so bad now that the richest country in the world - which your government assures you doesn’t need to concern itself with the billions-per-week it’s spending in the Middle East - is taking charity to get basic health care to its own working citizens. (The killer? Most of the people in need are insured - the insurance is just so crappy that it isn’t helping anybody. Er, except the insurance companies.)
Wonderful: That this charity exists! It’s called Remote Area Medical, and it’s truly an amazing volunteer effort. They’re my next G.I.F.T. recipient…how about making them yours, too? (Even if you’re not in the U.S., they’re also doing amazing work worldwide, well worth funding with that extra ten bucks you’ve got.)
Horrible: Did you know that no major U.S. corporations are giving funding to RAM? It’s run entirely on small donations. But what are corporations worried about; their stockholders have insurance. ::fumes::
Wonderful: Stan Brock, the leader of RAM, is a mind-bogglingly amazing guy. In stark contrast to the fat parasites in corporate and government circles who give RAM no funding, he’s given it his entire life. He has no family, takes no salary, and owns nothing. When 60 minutes did the interview about RAM, he was living in an abandoned school near the charity site and showering with a hose every morning.
…You gotta have a little faith, if humanity can produce specimens like that, that somebody somewhere can change this mess for the better.
But boy howdy, are we late in the game, coming in with fixes now. Oh, and speaking of band-aids on the titanic, an extra Horrible: goes to General Motors, which actually had the audacity yesterday to explain its latest round of fuckovers - sorry, “cuts” - with phrases like “We need to meet consumer expectations” and “because of high gas prices, it seems that people want smaller, more efficient cars”. OMG DID YOU FIGURE THAT OUT ALL BY YOURSELF JUST NOW?? SOMEBODY BRING THIS CEO A MENSA MEMBERSHIP STAT!
(Bonus topical congratulations to GM for doing its part to increase the size of the throngs of uninsured Americans. Nothing says “support the troops” like firing their parents and canceling the family pension!)
Okay, wow, I need to shut up.
*sigh* I’ll fess…things are worse than this post makes them look. Yeah, I know…I actually started this as a positivity exercise…write about Stan Brock! That’ll help! But it won’t, because everything is tainted by what happened this weekend.
I’ll have to post later with more details, but suffice to say, for now, that we in the foreclosure-prevention biz are calling yesterday “Black Monday”. For some reason that neither I nor the lawyers, brokers, and other professionals I work with can figure out yet, the Federal bailout of several large mortgage lenders on Friday caused every lender we work with to bail on their in-progress agreements and mortgage workouts with families in trouble.
Seriously. We got a wave of phone-calls yesterday from banks whom we thought were already committed to a workout, saying, “Nope, nevermind, no deals. We’re foreclosing.” We’ve had to call family after family and tell them that the solution we thought was a done deal is suddenly gone, and that there are no other options, since the few that there were (state programs and such) have also inexplicably dried up.
Overnight.
Obviously this puts my job in jeopardy and all sorts else, but really I could give a crap … I just can’t believe that all these people that we worked so hard to help, and the ones that are calling today looking for help, appear to simply be screwed. And until we figure out why, exactly, the banks are doing this, there’s nothing we can do, no alternative we can offer them that might sound appealing until we know what the hell they’re thinking.
(Part of me is worried sick that they’re thinking, “Woohoo, bailout! Now we don’t have to make deals with anybody!” Because if they’re thinking that, there’s nothing I or anybody else in this business can do. …On the other hand, why is letting a home go to foreclosure an attractive option?? I don’t get it…foreclosing costs a bank an average of $40,000, which is far less than the workouts we offer will cost (a typical workout might cost them a few grand in the long run). They swear, in public, that they want to avoid foreclosures too…so what the hell is going on?)
Okay. Did I mention that I need to shut up? Because I do.
Oh, wait - I need something else wonderful to close on. Um, um, um, er…Oh, how about this:
Wonderful: Two flamingly stupid rules lately look ripe for getting struck down: The Flint, Michigan pants-are-a-crime law, and the recent pro-industry court decision that seeks to make modifying computer programs in any way (via plugins, writing your own code, etc.) illegal. The ACLU is after Flint (go ACLU!), and the doofuses who passed the copyright law neglected to notice that what they’re trying to make illegal is expressly protected in the original copyright legislation, making it almost certain that the case will be overturned. Whew!
Originally published at *Transcendental *Logic. You can comment here or there.