Category: Dirty Rotten Scoundrels
What the Indiana law really does
Bill Black on what is so insidious about the Indiana Act:
The Indiana Act does not mention people who are LGBT. It is far broader than that. Any person in Indiana can invent a “religious” “belief.” That “belief” could be that one should not associate with, touch, speak to, see, or serve any characteristic one can imagine – race, color, gender, nationality, age, eye-color, progressives, or the left-handed. The focus on LGBT is because the purpose of the law is to encourage discrimination against LGBT and because Indiana has no law barring discrimination against LGBT.
The law’s ultra-vague standard and the ability of a person in Indiana to sue before any judge they choose seeking a judicial declaration that they have a right to deny service to someone because he or she was LGBT or a Muslim encourages judge shopping. Finding a justice of the peace who is a proud homophobe in rural Indiana should be a piece of cake.
Section 9 of the law provides that the businessman can seek the declaratory judgment and even an injunction without normal “standing,” i.e., demonstrating “injury in fact.”
Sec. 9. A person whose exercise of religion has been substantially burdened, or is likely to be substantially burdened, by a violation of this chapter may assert the violation or impending violation as a claim or defense in a judicial or administrative proceeding, regardless of whether the state or any other governmental entity is a party to the proceeding. If the relevant governmental entity is not a party to the proceeding, the governmental entity has an unconditional right to intervene in order to respond to the person’s invocation of this chapter.
A sympathetic judge could easily find that any homophobic Indiana merchant is “likely” to be faced with requests for goods and services from LGBT customers. The merchant will testify that his or her “religious” precepts would be injured by serving LGBT customers. That will establish in the mind of a sympathetic judge proof that the merchant’s “religion” will “likely” be “substantially burdened” by the prospective customers and provide a basis for a declaratory judgment that the merchant has a right under the Act to deny services to customers he or she thinks may be LGBT.
Student debt strike
This is what it will take to stop these crooked schools. Just refuse to pay them! They’re crooks, they lie to the students and they get rich doing so. Why should they profit from fraud?
A group of students refusing to pay off loans they took out to attend a now-maligned for-profit college has ballooned from 15 to more than 100 over the last several weeks.
The group, initially dubbed the Corinthian 15, sent a letter to the Department of Education last month, saying they would stop paying the federal student loans they took out to pay to attend various outposts of Corinthian Colleges, a chain of for-profit colleges. Under a deal with Department of Education last year, the company agreed to shut down or sell its schools last year amid allegations the company lured students by advertising dubious job prospects and career services.
The CFPB reached an agreement last month to help Corinthian borrowers get rid of their private debt. That deal, with ECMC Group, which now owns many former Corinthian schools, forgives $480 million for students who took out private loans from Corinthian College that the CFPB describes as “high cost.” According to the CFPB, the loans had interest rates that were typically much higher than their federal counterparts and were often for tuition costs that were more expensive than comparable programs.
Those borrowers covered by the deal will see an immediate 40% drop in their outstanding private student loan debt. Politicians and activists are pressuring the Department of Education to wipe away former Corinthian students’ federal loan debt.
The protesters, part of an Occupy-backed movement called the Debt Collective, have chosen a different route, by simply refusing to pay. And they seem to be attracting attention, in addition to bolstering their ranks. The group is meeting with the CFPB and at least one official from the Department of Education this week.
“This is a historic strike,” Ann Larson, a director of the Debt Collective and one of the organizers of the Corinthian Collective, the group’s pilot initiative, said in an interview on a train Sunday en route to Washington for the meetings. “Officials in Washington recognize that.”
Hundreds of students reached out to the Debt Collective after it first announced the Corinthian campaign last month looking to take part, Larson said. Each interested student was vetted by volunteers and told some of the possible consequences of participating, including garnishing tax refunds, wages, Social Security and a ding to their credit score. In the end some chose not to take part, Larson said.
Many of those who expressed interest are already in default, meaning they’re at risk of suffering these consequences. Larson added that the group is still getting in touch with the students who want to be strikers, indicating that the group will likely continue to grow.
In addition to the strikes, the group is launching a legal strategy. Former Corinthian students and activists plan to submit Defense to Repayment claims on the steps of the Education Department on Tuesday. This legal appeal asks the Education Department to discharge on the basis that the school engaged in wrongdoing.
Once again
WASHINGTON (AP) – New Jersey Governor Chris Christie’s move to privatize the state lottery’s management has benefited firms close to the governor while failing to deliver expected income gains.
The Associated Press found the state’s lottery had been one of the most efficient under government control. But since a private manager took over two years ago, the games are heading for a second straight year of missed financial targets.
The deal was shepherded by lobbying and public relations firms close to Christie. They received hundreds of thousands of dollars in fees, while the lottery’s financial shortfalls could spell trouble for social programs that depend on the money.
Exposing the hedge funders
Brilliant idea. (Be sure to go their site at hedgeclippers.org and get on their mailing list.) Now’s the time to start building public support for repealing those hefty tax credits hedge funders make:
Two weeks ago, several busloads of New Yorkers made a pilgrimage to Greenwich, Conn., to visit the waterfront estate of the hedge fund titan Paul Tudor Jones II, where, suffice it to say, they were not invited in to see the china. It was a rainy Saturday afternoon and the protesters, many of them ordinary working people who have felt cheated by the inequities of a tax system that favors the rarefied few, were there to call attention to Mr. Jones’s educational agenda, built on the premise that the extravagantly rich know better how to teach reading, and to his support of Republican candidates and causes in the New York State Legislature that disadvantage the poor and working class.
It is this kind of political spending, a total of $1.6 million over the past 12 years, they maintain, that undermines his philanthropic efforts through the Robin Hood Foundation, the poverty-fighting charity he created. To civilians, of course, Mr. Jones can seem like someone needing remedial work in cause and effect, a billionaire whose industry thrives on extracting economic value rather than producing it, and yet is comfortable speaking on the corrosive impact of inequality.
“When we begin to put justness on par with profits,” Mr. Jones said in a TED Talk recently, “then we get the most valuable thing in the world. We get back our humanity.” Hearing that is like listening to the Real Housewives of Orange County say that once we start prizing restraint over consumer spectacle, we’ll be well on our way to a new chapter in cultural dignity.
Those who made the trip to Connecticut were marching on behalf of a group called the Hedge Clippers, a nascent organization backed by the American Federation of Teachers, prominent labor and community groups, and Zephyr Teachout, the liberal former Democratic candidate for governor. It is aimed at outlining the ways hedge funds bleed the economy through self-interested practice and then extend the damage through the lavish purchase of political influence. According to an analysis by the group, hedge fund managers have made $40 million in political contributions in New York State over the past 15 years, with Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo receiving close to $5 million. Many of those donors are prominent supporters of charter schools, and nearly all would presumably denounce the elimination of tax loopholes that magnify their fortunes.
The Hedge Clippers produce and issue reports at a speed that would make many graduate students envious. This week they released a paper detailing the flow of money from hedge fund managers and high-frequency traders into Rahm Emanuel’s coffers; in Chicago, Mr. Emanuel’s mayoral tenure has been challenged by a bid from the left. Another report offered a list of buyers at One57, the ultraluxury condominium in Manhattan that benefited from considerable tax breaks.
In New York, the Hedge Clippers have been protesting at a very lively pace. One rally was recently held outside 15 Central Park West, a luxury tower that functions as a financial-industry dormitory. That day the focus was on the hedge fund manager Daniel S. Loeb, the chairman of the Success Academy charter school network, who bought an apartment in the building seven years ago. At the rally, the Hedge Clippers offered a tutorial to the public on the complicated ways hedge funds work and accumulate money — the so-called two-and-twenty compensation system, for instance — and the ways in which their tax burdens are kept relatively low.
Put up or shut up
This lobbyist (I forget his name) used to be a big honkin’ deal in Greenpeace before he sold out to the chemical pollution industry:
You don’t expect us to do anything, do you?
This reminds me of when George W. Bush admitted there was such a thing as global warming, but quickly reassured his donors he had no intention of doing anything about it:
Appearing at a candidate forum in late January, three likely Republican presidential contenders — Senators Ted Cruz, Marco Rubio and Rand Paul — all made a striking confession: They considered “the increasing gap between rich and poor” to be a problem.
But on the question of whether the government should intervene to solve it, Mr. Cruz and Mr. Paul rejected that approach, and Mr. Rubio appeared to agree with them.
When “government takes over the economy,” Mr. Cruz said, “it freezes everything in place. And it exacerbates income inequality.” He proposed lowering taxes and loosening regulations instead.
Bankers have a pout over Liz Warren saying mean things
So these bankers (and the media, apparently) really don’t understand how much ordinary people hate them and think they should be in jail. Nor do they get that being a candidate the banks hate is a badge of honor these days. Well then! Let them take their $15,000 (which Elizabeth Warren can raise in about ten minutes) and have a pity party. Via Reuters:
(Reuters) – Big Wall Street banks are so upset with Democratic Senator Elizabeth Warren’s call for them to be broken up that some have discussed withholding campaign donations to Senate Democrats in symbolic protest, sources familiar with the discussions said.
Representatives from Citigroup, JPMorgan, Goldman Sachs and Bank of America, have met to discuss ways to urge Democrats, including Warren and Ohio Senator Sherrod Brown, to soften their party’s tone toward Wall Street, sources familiar with the discussions said this week.
Bank officials said the idea of withholding donations was not discussed at a meeting of the four banks in Washington but it has been raised in one-on-one conversations between representatives of some of them. However, there was no agreement on coordinating any action, and each bank is making its own decision, they said.
The amount of money at stake, a maximum of $15,000 per bank, means the gesture is symbolic rather than material
Moreover, banks’ hostility toward Warren, who is not a presidential candidate, will not have a direct impact on the presumed Democratic front runner in the White House race, Hillary Clinton. That’s because their fund-raising groups focus on congressional races rather than the presidential election
Still, political strategists say Clinton could struggle to raise money among Wall Street financiers who worry that Democrats are becoming less business friendly.
The tensions are a sign that the aftermath of the 2008 financial crisis – the bank bailouts and the fights over financial reforms to rein in Wall Street – are still a factor in the 2016 elections.
Our tax dollars at work!
Meanwhile, kids are going to jail for possessing marijuana. Something is off:
Senior Drug Enforcement Administration agents working overseas allegedly participated in “sex parties” with prostitutes funded by drug cartels, according to a newly-released Department of Justice Inspector General report on the handling of sexual misconduct allegations by law enforcement agencies.
The conduct occurred over a period of years, according to the report. In addition to soliciting prostitutes, the foreign officers interviewed for the report allege three DEA supervisory special agents were “provided money, expensive gifts, and weapons from drug cartel members.”
Some DEA agents who participated in the parties denied knowing about cartel involvement, but the IG report says “information in the case files suggested they should have known the prostitutes in attendance were paid with cartel funds.”
The sex parties occurred in government leased living quarters where “agents’ laptops,BlackBerry devices and other government-issued equipment were present,” posing a security risk and “potentially exposing them to extortion, blackmail, or coercion.”
In another instance, two DEA special agents allegedly solicited prostitutes for a farewell party for a senior DEA official.
That official, an acting assistant regional director, allegedly had “sexual relations with prostitutes” and there were “allegations operational funds were used to pay for the party and the prostitutes,” according to the report.
The report also alleges that one prostitute was assaulted by someone associated with DEA supervisors following a payment dispute. The report was critical of DEA’s treatment of allegations of sexual misconduct, often dealing with incidents as local management issues and not reporting information up the chain of command.
The report also looked at allegations of misconduct against the U.S. Marshals Service, ATF and the FBI.
The heat is on
Time for them all to come clean about their education “reform” agenda:
The National Education Association, the largest U.S. labor union, is pushing to make public schools a front-burner domestic issue throughout the 2016 presidential race, union leaders said Wednesday.
“We have 3 million members who want desperately to know what the candidates have to say to really, seriously improve public education,” NEA President Lily Eskelsen García told reporters. “We intend to activate those 3 million members, the parents, even the students.”
The union, which represents one out of every 100 Americans, has begun its presidential endorsement process, the earliest point it has engaged in a presidential campaign cycle, García said.
Although only one candidate, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Tex.), has declared his intention to run for the White House, the NEA has sent questionnaires to 19 “viable” candidates to begin the vetting process for an endorsement, said Carrie Pugh, the union’s political director.