I was just looking at the Tweeter messages from Representative Kevin Brady, a Republican from the 8th District of Texas (Houston area) and it appears that Tweets and Truth rarely collide.
On September 14th, this clown tweets: "back in DC for another week of votes and the administration trying to take over another industry - this week it's student loans"
Student Loans - federally-backed student loans?!? Yeah, there's an industry ripe for government takeover.
On Sept 12th (GOP-sponsored Tea Rally) came this little gem: "Interviewed by Austrian, Canada tv stations. Where's U.S. mainstream media? FOX, as always, front and center. No surprise there..."
And this humdinger from the less-government Congressman at his little Tea Rally: "METRO did not prepare for Tea Party March! More stories. People counldn't get on, missed start of march. I will demand answers from Metro."
Enjoy the comic lunacy here: http://twitter.com/repkevinbrady
In addition to a speaker from Traveler's Aid at Dulles airport to help us develop our thinking on changing the experience of foreigners entering the United States, an officer from USIP (United States Institute of Peace) will attend our meeting on Sunday to talk to us about future collaboration. We will also announce later today a specific joint meeting with USIP in June on the Somali pirate crisis; but Mary Hope Schwoebel, will be with us on Sunday to discuss projects beyond the June effort, Please bring something to drink to the event on Sunday. Feel free to bring food as well. We will have the grill going, so if you want something in particular to be grilled, we will be happy to grill it.
Larry Roeder, Facilitator
www.foreignpolicyforchange.org
This is a reminder to come to the meeting of the foreign policy working group 9now called Foreign policy for Change on May 31. 1pm This will be a bar-b-que. Feel free to bring food for the grill, salds, anything you want. Details are at http://www.foreignpolicyforchange.org/FrgPolicy2009MeetingsAgendamay31.htm. The agenda is as follows. Please do attend. We need you. We are also looking for fresh foreign policy topics to discuss and possible guest speakers. To confirm, send an email to roederaway@yahoo.com or tt his mobile at 703-867-2056. The address is 26128 Talamore Drive, South Riding (Chantilly). Many of you will remember this as the location for Obama operations in the Dulles district of lLudoun County.
Introductions and Agreement to the Agenda. Larry Roeder
2. Pilot Project Involving Dulles Airport. The Working Group has been exploring how to enhance America’s image abroad, including a pilot project at Dulles Airport to improve the experience of entering foreigners.. Larry Roeder and Tim Buchholtz are managing this project and need volunteers for what is expected to be an expanding project. Speaking at the event will be Sally Harvey of Traveler’s Aid, a possible partner agency.
3. Update on the Somalia Project: The Working Group has been discussing a joint project with USIP, the United States Institute for Peace in Washington which will involve two joint-events. Separately, there have also been discussions about doing a Peace Rally in 2009 or next summer. The later idea has political, financial and legal implications which need to be fully understood before we move forward. Mustafa Omar and Larry Roeder will lead this part of the agenda so that the entire Working group is aware of what has been happening explore where the Working Group wants to go in the future.
4. Future Topics: Led by Larry Roeder, Bring recommendations on future foreign policy topics, e.g .Afghanistan, .climate change, human rights, the spread of democracy. All topics are open. As an example, Basant will now focus her attention on opportunities for local civic projects that relate to foreign affairs. This will be an entire new project to be discussed in the June member’s meeting.
5. Update on the Working Group website. Per the request of the working group, we have migrated our website to a dedicated url called www.Foreignpolicyforchange.org. Before coming to the meeting, please study the content. This agenda item will take place indoors. Larry will discuss the history of the website, its content and links to MBO and NING. Before moving forward, we want to determine the Working Group’s views on the existing website to determine which content should remain as part of the existing website and, going forward, the new website" We also want to know what would be in the public area and what in the internal area. It was agreed at the last member’s meeting in April that Aaron Edlow would coordinate a new look and feel for the site and add new functionality. This will be the topic of a separate discussion at the June Members’ meeting. In the mean time, Aaron will announce the creation of a webteam in May and needs volunteers to join. As with all of the teams, Larry will continue to act as overall working group coordinator, in order to make sure the different teams fit together in a strategic way. Some issues will be coordinated with him, others with the working group as a whole.
6. Venue and time of the June Meeting. Let's also discuss possible topics.
My sincere apologies but I did not realize this was a holiday weekend. I am old enough to remember when Memorial Day was May 30th. I am moving this meeting to next weekend May 31st same time and place in the hope that more people can attend. I am sorry for the inconvenience.
Sandy
I received this update from a Senior official in the Seychelles government. Note, there is now worry that the Somani pirates may begin to attack tourists on remote islands.
"The latest is that an Indian warship has arrived in Seychelles to join the French warship and surveillance plane already there in patrolling our waters together with our own coast guard.
The other shoe dropped today. Those who formulated the torture memos might be prosecuted. Clearly that includes Cheney. Good for the President. What the Bush administration did to the rule of law was repugnant.
Lawyers and politicians who violate our constitutional rights need to be investigated. What bothers me is that CNN likes to say this decision was based on pressure from the left. How about pressure from those us who believe in the rule of law? Since when did that make you left of center?
Now is definetly a time for us to stand up for our President, let him know we support him. I recommend we all write letters of support to the President on this issue, congratulate him on showing what happened in the last administration and for allowing investigations to move forward, if Congress and the Attorney General feel the facts deserve it.
If an attorney that works on human rights issues doesn’t know the proper answers to those basic questions, then small wonder West Virginia reservists were confused when aberrant intelligence officers claimed that the rules of war changed after 9/11 and therefore their “high-value” prisoners had no rights. Of course, unknown to both of us was a memo from Justice which contends that the president isn’t bound by laws prohibiting torture and that government agents who might torture prisoners at his direction can’t be prosecuted for doing so."
With a year of publishing that article, I left government service and shortly after was working for Mr. Obama in order to bring justice and honor back to America.
Again, write to the President. Let him know that old ways of politics are over the America we fought for in our revolution is back, a land of ethics and the rule of law.
Larry Winter Roeder, Jr. speaking for myself
Foreign Policy Working Group -- Meeting Number Four
Dear Collegues,
I'd like to explore the you the idea of mounting a pro-Stimulus Package Demonstration as a way of showing support for our President. This would be on the Elipse on saturday the 14th of February. We will need a permit from the Park Service; but first I'd like to know that folks are interested. We could stage a planning committee here at my house in Virginia during the week and then do the demonstration.
Larry Winter Roeder, Jr.
I am troubled by this economic downturn for which I believe is really a slow burning depression. I have been thinking about this issue since January and it seems pretty obvious to me that the only way in which we can right this mortgage titanic is that the banks are going to have to take a loss and all of those mortgages will have to be written down.
THE IDEA
Program Name: The Mortgage Market Stabilization and Toxic Mortgage Asset Rehabilitation Act
My suggestion is the following: The Federal government guarantees banks (through Fannie, Freddie, FHA, FHLB programs, HOPE and others) to refinance homes at current values to a 4.25% loan rate for 25 year amortization ( 4.0% for a 15 year amortization) for all “owner occupied” homes (this would exclude second homes, investment properties and commercial properties), it then, in turn, offers a one-time guarantee for refinance and/or first home purchase for all Americans who either own a home now, or are going to purchase a home in the next 24 months at the same interest rates. In addition, the banks will be incentivized to assist current or recent foreclosed homeowners to rehabilitate their home loans through the same program (at the same interest rates). Depending upon how the program goes, there could be a one-time, two year extension of the program for a total of four years.
Proviso: Lending standards would change and the new law would force Banks to own these mortgages, not just service them. So the banks will have to be incentivized to help refinance homeowners who may be on the brink in terms of their creditworthiness—they will do this based upon (a new yet to be determined formula that would look something like this: (homeowner income from all sources [including gifts] / value of mortgage) – (percentage saved by refinancing – debt to income ratio) = ability to repay loan. If that number is less then or equal to say fifty percent then this loan is a good loan. FICO score can be as low as 500 and still be a qualifying loan up to $850,000. This program can be combined with other incentive programs run by federal, state or local governments including homestead exemption, first-time homebuyer tax credit…
In addition, homeowners should be incentivized to save money: a possible way to do this is to give a one time tax credit of $100 for every $1,000 saved.
This program would include a limited tax-relief program for those individuals who are in the following groups (for Federal Fiscal Years 2007-2010):
1) Renters
2) Are working but don’t make enough income to pay income tax
3) Have either lost their jobs or are underemployed (relative to and/or retroactive to a look back to calendar year 2004)
4) Make under $250,000 annually and are not taking advantage of the refinance/purchase program
5) Make incomes under $1 million dollars and are subject to the AMT
6) Owns their home free and clear, or
7) Doesn’t qualify for the refinance.
***No tax relief for anyone making over $1 million or have assets over $1 million ***
Stabilizing the Market for All
Anyone who had to sell their property during the same 24 month timeframe could assign the same interest rate to the next homeowner (a one-time assignment) if they are 1) owner occupied 2) have never taken advantage of an assignment of property (exception, the program would include those individuals that had to move within the two year time frame for either a job or family emergency such as death, illness or injury).
This process does several things: 1)allows all homeowners to take advantage of lower interest rates, 2) reduces mortgages to a maximum of 25 years, and incentivizes homeowners to take advantage of a 15 year mortgage with a slightly lower interest rate thus rewarding homeowners who did the right thing 3) encourages banks to lend money to the average homeowner through refinance by giving them a one-time face value guarantee of mortgages at a lower interest rate (thus reducing their losses) while allowing them to make limited profits off of a debt that would have been a total loss),4) allows homeowners to tap equity in their properties so they can start spending again and gives the government a grace period to allow their stimulus programs to work.
Trickle Up Market Stabilization
Benefits
Banks Reap What they Sow Without the Public Paying the Price—Banks will not make the same rates of return as they would have under the ballooning mortgage bubble but then again, they won’t go under and we won’t have to bail them out of their toxic mortgages because we made them whole again. Those few mortgages that can’t be reabsorbed into the marketplace will have to be written down by the banks but that is only fair since they were being so irresponsible in their lending practices.
Maintains property values—while there will likely be a lot of foreclosed properties on the market at fire sale prices (as they should be) this program will slow down the property value slides that are currently occurring by rehabilitating peoples loans and either restoring their equity (or in some cases) increasing their equity.
Equity values stabilize or increase—homeowners who did the right thing and took a 30-year fixed-rate loan should come out ahead (even in really difficult markets such as Las Vegas) by either recouping their equity or increasing it. This will allow people to immediately increase their savings rate (equity being the largest amount of savings most people have) which will then allow them to borrow from their equity for student loans, automobiles, and other big-ticket purchases, thus re-stimulating the marketplace.
Time Limited—this program would only last for 48 months from the implementation of the program date which would give a (in most cases) one-time opportunity for existing homeowners and first-time homeowners to reap the benefits and then the program would go away (note one-time extension above). This timeframe provides enough time for the economy to right itself, allow banks to reduce the impact of their toxic assets by rehabilitating them, and encourage homeowners to think frugally about their purchase and stay in that home for the long term.
Rehabilitates toxic mortgage assets without giving banks tons of taxpayer dollars—this program would take a lot of the bad assets off the banks while still holding them accountable for practicing bad lending decisions in the first place. The bank will take a hit financially, but not as large a hit as they would have to take without intervention.
It also allows all of the TARP monies to go to the consumer instead of the bank to rollout the program and fund the guarantee program. Any other loans such as hedge funds buying and borrowing at 70 to 1 against their commercial holdings will now be the only assets on the banks books and they will consequences suffer the consequences by having to write down those loans (as it should be because again that is the risk they took when making those loans). Meanwhile, all of this newly acquired equity will reverberate through the economy thus stimulating the economy and at least in part bringing back much of the real estate market and its beneficiaries without setting up another bubble (because there is such a large inventory of houses new housing starts will continue to decline until the market stabilizes).
Stimulates demand in the market for both real estate and financial services—this program will immediately stimulate the financial services market as a result of the refinancing thus reemploying laid off mortgage brokers, title companies, real estate agents and other housing related industries while simultaneously stimulating the financial services industry not just for banks refinancing but also for investment banks as well.
This program is much more meaningful for middleclass homeowners then a $1,000 tax rebate. As the average homeowner will save approximately $2,400 per year and reduce their total payments by nearly $70,000 over 25 years.
Leaves no taxpayer behind--This program combined with the limited tax incentives will leave no American taxpayer behind.
Other stimulus programs such as infrastructure, green jobs, investment in public transportation, universal health coverage should either be added or remain in the current stimulus bill.
YES WE DID! YES WE MUST:
Þ Protect him from harm both verbal & phyiscal
Þ Stay "FIRED UP" by staying active
Þ Work Bi-Partisan to bring "Change" together
Þ Don't just bitch, get active and stay engaged
Þ Start and join a local "Change" group
Þ Be philanthropic, serve your community, state and nation
Þ Stick by Obama, STOP smears on the Right & the Left!!!! Hold yourself responsible as you hold Barack!
Join the future of this movement!!
http://change.gov/joinus
http://www.communityorganize.com
http://www.ourpresidency.com
http://www.usaservice.org
http://www.whitehouse.gov
Barack's DNC 2004 Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eWynt87PaJ0&feature=PlayList&p=B1939005B8A4D4ED&index=188
Barack's DNC 2008 Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ato7BtisXzE&feature=channel
Barack’s Election Acceptance Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7wJ-2Zu_Iic&feature=channel
Barack’s Inauguration Speech
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VjnygQ02aW4
Dear Friends of Barack Obama,
Please join the AFRICAN IMMIGRANTS MOVEMENT FOR OBAMA at the prestigious NATIONAL PRESS CLUB in Washington DC to celebrate our victory. We all work so hard for the last 22 months to earn the election of Barack H. Obama as the 44th President of the United States of America.
This is an historic moment of our country that we all should be proud of celebrating. January 20, 2009 should a date to remember. Each one of us who strongly beleive on Barack Obama and work hard to make this happen should find a way to keep the Presidential inauguration date alive. The African Immigrants Movement for Obama is therefore inviting you to the "All Africa Inauguration Ball" to celebrate with the African immigrants communities in the united States of America. Our Presidential Inaugural Ball theme is "Renewing the spirit of the Community" which is so fundamental to the African immigrants in the United states, and so dear to President Barack Obama.
The event's location address is: The NATIONAL PRESS CLUB - 52914TH sTREET, NW, 13th floor, Washington DC, 20045. Time: 7:00PM to 1:00 AM
For additional information, please visit our website at: www.aim4obama.org
Contact: Mr. Etienne Takougang - Event Chair - etakougang@hotmail.com, and MS. Fatima Wahab - Coordinating Committee - fatimawahab@yahoo.com
Thanks
Etienne Takougang
Coordinator of African Immigrants Movement for Obama
Obama for America
The indictment of the first female mayor of Baltimore City in Maryland has unfortunately exposes the inimical and detrimental aspect of the law that constitute nothing short of using the same law and the power to be to aggressively and diabolically pursue an egocentric agenda that is only self serving and does not in any way constitute any kind of veritable opportunity to help move the city forward.
While it may not be in my position to exonerate the mayor, I am however appalled and at the same time disappointed by the outcome of the so called investigation and the indictment that was handled to her only as a result of the fear that the days of the state prosecutors were to expire a day after. In order words, it may be wise to say did the prosecutors indict the mayor because their days were to expire the following day or as a result of concrete evidence beyond reasonable doubts?
It is also important to point out that in recent times the state prosecutors have ransacked the house of the mayor and as of today nothing has been said and no credit has been given to her in that regard; that a mayor of a major city like Baltimore City was humiliated by the power that be and we are all watching with helplessly like sheep without Sheppard.
Wednesday, January 14, 2009 at 05:05pm
BY Amy Hamblin
Whistle Stop Tour Event Details Announced
We just released more details about the events along President-elect Obama’s Whistle Stop Tour from Philadelphia to Washington, D.C. on January 17th. Tickets already have been distributed for the first event in Philadelphia, while the other events in Wilmington and Baltimore will be open to the public.
The train tour marks the final leg of the President-elect’s incredible journey that began on the steps of the Old State Capitol in Illinois and will end on the steps of the United States Capitol. The President-elect and the Vice President-elect – who will be joining him in Wilmington – will travel alongside a group of everyday Americans with extraordinary stories. Read about Rosa Mendoza and Mark Dowell, whom we’ve profiled on the blog.
Here’s all the event details…
Philadelphia, PA Event Begins: 10:05 AM Tickets: Tickets are required and have been distributed to the public.
Wilmington, DE Where: Back of Wilmington Train Station, 100 South French Street, Wilmington, DE Doors Open: 9:30 AM Event Begins: 1:00 PM Tickets: Event is open to the public
Baltimore, MD Where: War Memorial Plaza, 101 N. Gay St., Baltimore, MD Doors Open: 1:00 PM Event Begins: 4:15 PM Tickets: Event is open to the public
President-elect Obama and Vice President-elect Biden announced that former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright and former Republican Congressman Jim Leach would be available to meet with delegations at the G-20 summit on their behalf. Congressman Leach and Secretary Albright are holding these unofficial meetings to seek input from visiting delegations on behalf of the President-elect and Vice President-elect.
The Obama-Biden Transition Team today announced a broad list of Agency Review Team leads that will complete a thorough review of key departments, agencies and commissions of the United States government, as well as the White House, to provide the President-elect, Vice President-elect, and key advisors with information needed to make strategic policy, budgetary, and personnel decisions prior to the inauguration.
Obama-Biden transition spokesperson Stephanie Cutter released a statement on a planned meeting between President-elect Obama and Senator McCain Monday.
In the Washing Post yesterday there was piece about a $15.5 billion plan that would subsidize insurance for low-income residents and those who do not get coverage through their employer. The revnue would come from increased payroll taxes and an increase in ciagarette and alcohol taxes. We need to help the Maryland Citizens Health Initiative and Del. james W. Hubbard(D-Prince George's) in building support for a bill. We also need to contact Del. Peter A Hammen(D-Baltimore), chairman fo the House health committee that we know times are tough but continuing to have people uninsured is not going to stimulate the economy either.
Please join me in contacting our MD represntatives. I did not spend the past two yrs supporting President-elect Obama to end at inaugration. I got involved becasue I thought we all wanted to improve our state, our country for everyone. We can make change happen.
Thanks,
Michelle Cerny
Barack Obama's sister has not emerged in public since the death of their grandmother two days before her brother's historic presidential election but in a post-election email to close friends Maya Soetoro-Ng said "I wept tears of joy for all of us on Tuesday. He may not be a perfect man. Certainly, he has often said that he'll likely be an imperfect president, but he is a good man, a smart man, a disciplined soul who balances temperance with determination and courage. We've made a great choice, I assure you."
Their maternal grandmother, Madelyn Dunham, died on the Sunday before the Tuesday Nov. 4 presidential election in the two-bedroom, 10-story apartment where Dunham raised Obama. The email was shared with this reporter (and with his newspaper, the daily Honolulu Advertiser).
In the final run-up to Election Day, Obama had abruptly changed his campaign schedule to fly back home and visit Dunham, who was dying of cancer at the age of 86. After her death was announced, on Election Day eve, he spoke movingly of her at a final campaign appearance, tears streaming down his face. Services for Dunham have not been announced and the Honolulu mortuary handling the arrangements, Borthwick Mortuary, has not returned phone calls. Obama's campaign, however, says he will return home to Honolulu sometime in December, prior to his Jan. 20 inauguration 5,100 miles away in the nation's capitol.
During a family vacation in August, then Sen. Obama brought his family to the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific, which overlooks the apartment where he grew up. Obama and his children left two leis at niche No. 440, where the ashes of his grandfather Stanley Dunham are in an urn behind a bronze plaque. Stanley Dunham was an Army sergeant in World War II and died of prostate cancer in 1992. Officials at the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific have since been contacted by Borthwick Mortuary about holding a service for Madelyn Dunham, says Gene Castagnetti, the cemetery's director. Stanley Dunham's niche is large enough to hold another urn. If the family decides on that arrangement, Sgt. Dunham's bronze plaque covering the niche would be removed and replaced with another that would include his wife's name, birthday and date of death.
As it turned out, Dunham's koa wood urn arrived on Election Day, Soetoro-Ng wrote in her email. Soetoro-Ng surrounded the urn with pictures of Dunham's late daughter, Stanley Ann Dunham (the mother of Soetoro-Ng and the President-elect), Dunham's grandchildren and her great grandchildren, "all of us who benefited so much from her steady voice and hand," she wrote.
Soetoro-Ng could have accepted her brother's invitation to be by his side on Election Night in Chicago. But, as she had for much of the past eight years, she chose to stay in the apartment on Beretania Street where Dunham raised Obama as a boy and where Soetoro-Ng had later cared for her. In the post-election email, Soetoro-Ng writes of the sometimes-conflicting emotions surrounding both her grandmother's death and her brother's success — and of the need to then unplug for a while with her husband, Konrad, and their 4-year-old daughter, Suhaila, on Oahu's rural North Shore. She writes that she had been flooded with email messages "of both congratulation and condolence.... There's a wide swatch of emotion cutting through me, sometimes swirling, never simple... a briny mixture of elation, sadness, determination, regret, pride, hope, fatigue. You can imagine..."
Dunham, whom Obama called "Toot" after the Hawaiian word for grandparent, tutu, never showed self-pity or fear as she faced the end of her life, Soetoro-Ng writes. But Dunham could be wickedly funny. "When she saw the number of flowers that had been sent to her," Soetoro-Ng writes, 'she said, 'Oh my...with all of this hullabaloo, it's going to be embarrassing if I DON'T die.' I gave her a chuckle and of course told her that I wouldn't at all mind such an embarrassment, and then I invited her to stay and dance with me into the new year. She couldn't stay, but she certainly tried, and defied expectations again and again."
Click here for pictures of Obama's campaign.
I don't know what the plan is for the future of the Obama-Biden Web Site....I think it should be kept going, just as I think the huge grassroots movement Barack built should be kept going. After all, four years is a short time and its not too early to be thinking about reelection!
Tim & Joyce Wheeler
I spent election night with my siblings at my parents' house. We watched the returns. At 11pm when I heard President Elect Obama and Vice President Elect Biden pronounced the winners, I just cried tears of joy and thanked God. Finally our country is moving in a new direction. We are one big family. This entire nation needs to heal as one.
