US Politics Mega-thread - Page 648

On August 26 2018 20:49 Grumbels wrote:
https://mobile.twitter.com/Beschizza/status/1033519881268940806

This is how NBC brought the news, speaking of respect to the dead.

On August 27 2018 07:37 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:


Oh please don't.

On August 27 2018 08:34 DarkPlasmaBall wrote:


Honestly, I'm expecting some people to repeat the old "playing video games causes violent behavior" mantra because of the occasional tragedy like this, not realizing that any sort of consistency in that logic would mean that dancing to club music, praying in church, and going to school must also cause people to get itchy trigger fingers.

On August 27 2018 09:53 Gahlo wrote:

It's also the only NFL based series.

On August 27 2018 18:39 iamthedave wrote:


Except for Blood Bowl.

Student Loan Watchdog Quits, Blames Trump Administration

The federal official in charge of protecting student borrowers from predatory lending practices has stepped down.

In a scathing resignation letter, Seth Frotman, who until now was the student loan ombudsman at the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, says current leadership "has turned its back on young people and their financial futures." The letter was addressed to Mick Mulvaney, the bureau's acting director.

In the letter, obtained by NPR, Frotman accuses Mulvaney and the Trump administration of undermining the CFPB and its ability to protect student borrowers.

"Unfortunately, under your leadership, the Bureau has abandoned the very consumers it is tasked by Congress with protecting," it read. "Instead, you have used the Bureau to serve the wishes of the most powerful financial companies in America."

The letter raises serious questions about the federal government's willingness to oversee the $1.5 trillion student loan industry and to protect student borrowers.

Frotman has served as student loan ombudsman for the past three years. Congress created the position in 2010, in the wake of the financial crisis, as part of the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act. As ombudsman and assistant director, Frotman oversaw the CFPB's Office for Students and Young Consumers and reviewed thousands of complaints from student borrowers about the questionable practices of private lenders, loan servicers and debt collectors.

Since 2011, the CFPB has handled more than 60,000 student loan complaints and, through its investigations and enforcement actions, returned more than $750 million to aggrieved borrowers. Frotman's office was central to those efforts. It also played a role in lawsuits against for-profit giants ITT Tech and Corinthian Colleges and the student loan company Navient.

Over the past year, the Trump administration has increasingly sidelined the CFPB's student loan office. Last August, the U.S. Department of Education announced it would stop sharing information with the bureau about the department's oversight of federal student loans, calling the CFPB "overreaching and unaccountable" and arguing that the bureau's actions were confusing borrowers and loan servicers alike. Of the move, Frotman writes, "the Bureau's current leadership folded to political pressure ... and failed borrowers who depend on independent oversight to halt bad practices."

In May, Mulvaney called for a major shake-up in Frotman's division. The Office for Students and Young Consumers would be folded into the bureau's financial education office, signaling a symbolic shift in mission from investigation to information-sharing. While the CFPB told NPR at the time that the move was "a very modest organizational chart change," consumer advocates reacted with alarm.

Christopher Peterson, director of financial services at the nonprofit Consumer Federation of America, called the move "an appalling step in a longer march toward the elimination of meaningful American consumer protection law."

In his resignation, Frotman also accuses the CFPB's leadership of suppressing a report, prepared by his office, revealing new evidence that some of the nation's largest banks were "saddling [students] with legally dubious account fees."

The Trump administration has also taken steps outside the CFPB to curb oversight of the student loan industry. The Justice and Education departments have argued that debt collectors should be protected from state efforts to regulate them. And, earlier this month, Education Secretary Betsy DeVos moved to scrap a rule meant to punish schools where graduates struggle with poor earnings and deep debt. The department defended its decision, saying it would instead give borrowers school performance data so they can decide for themselves what colleges offer the best value.

Mick Mulvaney was tapped to run the CFPB while also serving as director of the Office of Management and Budget. Before joining the Trump administration, he was a Republican congressman from South Carolina and a fierce critic of the bureau he now manages. He once called the CFPB "a joke ... in a sick, sad kind of way" because, Mulvaney argued, it often acted above the law with no accountability to Congress.

On August 28 2018 02:15 kalikalik wrote:


Ignore us, silence us. Block us. Ban us.

But how will we then communicate?

Explosions at the airport pack a message and a boom.

On August 28 2018 02:15 kalikalik wrote:


Ignore us, silence us. Block us. Ban us.

But how will we then communicate?

Explosions at the airport pack a message and a boom.

On August 28 2018 02:22 Mohdoo wrote:


what in gods name are you saying here?

On August 28 2018 02:23 Ciaus_Dronu wrote:
None of McCain's "principles" or good actions are even a blip on the radar compared to countless Iraqi lives.
Most people who share my or Grumbel's opinion of him wouldn't care to express it were it not for the copious bleaching of the pages of history everyone is doing. Talking up one of the most war-hungry monsters of the last 70 years because he occasionally called for a veneer of decency (while eviscerating it with Palinism) seems like a great way to perpetuate the horrific attitude your country has towards war.

Sure, kalikalik's post is pretty crap, but let's not pretend holding a warhawk who lowered the cultural bar in such esteem, even if only for a day, makes any fucking sense.