Prediction: If this doesn't die down by Monday, the Secretary of the Treasury will "resigna stating the rukus over him is too much of a distraction in these difficult times and that for the sake of the country he is moving aside. Obama will "reluctantly" accept the resignation, and appoint Larry Summers as acting Secretary pending his confirmation. He will avoid the problems he would have previously faced with Congress who won't have the stomach for a fight.

Until we stop providing billions of dollars in no-bid contracts to corporations, billions to bankers who made poor investments, trillions on unnecessary wars, I see the pittance we spend on the poor as a non-issue.

When I had my daughter we were just barely getting by. The Col. wasn't making much back then. We tried to get food stamps but they said we made to much. They told us if we had another baby and sell the juck car we had we would qualify. I got so pissed off I told that lady I'm not gonna have another baby just to get your damn food stamps left and slammed the door.

Excellent points SB

While I do see and understand the sincerity in Mignon's concerns, and share the outrage that she feels at those who are taking advantage and manipulating the system, at the same time I also know that we have to look at the big picture and realize that we cannot just arbitrarily punish the majority of people who legitimately depend on these federal programs to feed their families and their children.

Do we need to tweak and fix the welfare / federal subsidary systems that we have? Absolutely! But it has to be done the right way in order not to hurt the vast majority of people who's lives depend on these public assistance programs.

So did you get a job?

Mig, I'll bet it didn't happen quite that way. You were probably informed of eligibility criteria and the person who provided you with that info simply informed you further that if you had an additonal family member that would satisfy the income eligibility criteria, right?

There's so much anecdotal and incorrect information flowing around out there about welfare. I echo other posters comments aboutit. In Texas, a family of 4 will receive about $400 in food stamps based on $1,000 monthly gross income, no vehicle or other household revenue, and assets under $1,000. The monthly cash benefit would be about $225 One can only be on welfare for up to 60 months, must be registered for work, and even a mother of small children must accept work after 24 months. I guess emoting over these things is to be expected. But having correct information may mitigate that emotion.

Yes I did and I hated it.

I'm not heartless. I don't want innocent children to go hungry. I know that there are people who need help and assistance. I just hope something can be done that people won't be able to take advantage and manipulate the system one day. But that will probably never happen.

I don't believe that I said or implied, anywhere in my post, that you were heartless! As a matter of fact Mig, I specifically said that I understood that you were being sincere with your concerns AND I even went on to say that I share your outrage at those who are taking advantage of the system!






So are you saying that you would have taken the public assistance instead of taking a job had they deemed you elidgable for the public assistance?

I tried to get some kind of health coverage through the state a few years ago and they told my then fiancee and I that if she was pregnant I might qualify.

I know you didn't DC.



We didn't want welfare all we wanted was a few food stamps to help us get by. Everything worked out.

And would you have gone to apply for them if you were going to be drug-tested on a weekly basis? Because, as you said, the process is a difficult one as it is. To add one more indignity to it is just one too many, IMO.

But as SaladBar stated, drug-testing welfare recipients is the least of our worries. When our government spends billions bailing out the private sector and trillions on a war that was based on false intelligence, giving food stamps to someone who likes their beer is not making it to the top of my list of problems.

On the other hand, the Dow was down, but only slightly, and the DJIA is still up almost 1,000 points since it's low of 6469. It's something, anyway.

Here's another way the economy situation is screwing the average, hard-working homeowner like me. Two years ago I moved to South Jersey from a NYC suburb (goodbye SB). I bought a bigger house than I needed, but it cost less than the house I sold, so I made a little money. We all know how the real estate business went. My timing has never been good. So now my mortgage company-Wells Fargo- sends me an offer to refinance for free. Well I don't qualify. They appraised my house at 15% less than what I bought it for. I have a big mortgage, so my loan to value is 92.5% and it has to be 80%. I don't qualify for a conventional refinance either. All I want to do is lower my monthly payments, so I have more money to pump back into the economy.

Then I thought about my Homerowners Insurance. If the value of my house went down, how about the value of my insurance. No such luck. It's gone up 5% each of the past two years and I quote, "Coverage for your home has been increased by 5% to more adequately reflect the cost to rebuild your home."

Dear MC, please bend over so we can screw you more easily. Thank you for tipping your ass upward in the submissive posture.

That's what you get for leaving me without having dinner and drinks first.

15 AIG employees have agreed to give back their bonuses totally 50 million (out of 165 million). I saw yesterday that there was bus tours to some of these peoples' homes protesting. Anyway, it's a start. Market soared today too I hear.


TIS


Link

TIS, the Dow closed up just shy of 500 points!! WOO HOO!!!

I don't understand what's makes it fluctuate up and down like that.

I just heard on Rachel Maddow that Bernard Madoff is responsible for one of the e-mail scams from another country. Know what I mean? The ones that has some rich guy or lady, from Nigeria (or another foreign country) wants to transfer funds to your bank account. Anybody else heart this? She even had a copy of the e-mail I think I probably received one too. I get at least 12 a day it seems.


TIS

Buying and selling.

Don't get too excited. It will probably be down 300 tomorrow.

And it's that kind of negative attitude that has ruined the economy. C'mon, JL. Enjoy the moment, whether it's short-lived or the start of a trend (I prefer the latter).

Shall we takes bets on whether the Dow finishes over/under -300 today?

I'm in. In some respects I'm an eternal optimist, so I'll say at least another day of "over". Wait, we're not betting a million dollars or house deeds or anything like that right?

Do I have to say how much over? I don't really know nuttin' about nuttin' when it comes to such preciseness.



TIS

Well, it's down almost 70!! Thanks for the jinx, JL!

Don't blame me. ...And it's bouncing back right now.

California raised local sales tax to 9 per cent.

Okay, a few cents doesn't seem like much, but in this economy, many will feel the crunch. Supposedly this is temporary and due to end in 2011 or 12. We'll see.


"Starting Wednesday, California's sales tax will rise to six percent, bringing the average local sales tax rate to almost nine percent -- one of the highest in the nation."


Tax Increase


TIS

I heard on the radio this morning that the acting CEO of Freddie Mac was found dead in his VA home, probably a suicide.

In Baltimore, a man rented out a hotel room, then shot his family and killed himself. He was supposedly almost $500,000 in debt.

Although there have been glimmers of improvement in the economy, I think we will see more and more of this in the months to come.

You will also see more and more people breaking into other people's homes.

Somewhere, there are piles of cash waiting to buy out everything once deflation hits. I don't see anything getting better right now.

While the economy seems to be turning around a bit, and the forecast is not all gloom and doom like it was last fall, I think the stories like the Freddie Mac CEO and private citizens in massive debt will continue. The stress of being in massive debt is terrible, but not worth killing oneself or loved ones over. But it's obvious that crimes related to the economic crisis will continue for some time. Very sad.