Edwards Criticizes Returns on Bank Loans (for students)

[Nambe]

By LIZ SIDOTI, Associated Press Writer

ST. CHARLES, Mo. - Democratic vice presidential candidate John Edwards on Friday promoted John Kerry's initiative to help students afford to go to college and criticized a government-set guarantee that banks earn a 9.5 percent return on some college loans.

Banks that provide college loans are guaranteed a risk-free return on their investment, set by Congress, because some students inevitably default on their loans.

Kerry's campaign contends that banks make almost $1 billion a year from the 9.5 percent guarantee on loans that are financed by tax-exempt bonds issued before 1993, all because of a loophole in a 1993 law that had been meant to rein in such high rates.

The campaign says President Bush and the Education Department could close the loophole at anytime but have not acted, and it issued a memo accusing Bush of using "federal college aid to pad corporate profits and block access to college." ..

Edwards said the Kerry-Edwards plan would use that money to pay for a program in which the government would give a person four years' worth of college tuition in exchange for two years of public service. And, he said, the plan would give a tax credit of up to $4,000 for college students.

Ride Don’t Drive * * It’s Global Cool

1. a related tangent

to
accusing Bush of using "federal college aid to pad corporate profits and block access to college." ..

Explaining Bush is a Full-Time Job

http://www.commondreams.org/views02/0720-04.htm

Mr. Thompson is a deputy attorney general and the head of a new multi-agency corporate-crime task force. He won unanimous confirmation to that post on May 10, 2001. On May 9, 2001, he was the chairman of the audit and compliance committee of Providian Financial Corp. He held that post from June 1997 until his confirmation.

Providian is a company that sells credit in the "subprime market." People in that market are those who can't get credit cards from the major companies. They are people with low incomes and bad credit histories. Providian is doing them an enormous favor by permitting them to get credit that they can't afford to have at interest rates they can't afford to pay. The APR rates charged by Providian can be as high as 29.9 percent.

In a March 1999 memorandum obtained by the San Francisco Chronicle, the then president of the company, Andrew Kahr, asked company executives about its customers: "Is any bit of food too small to grab when you're starving and when there is nothing else in sight? The trick is charging a lot, repeatedly, for small doses of instrumental credit." Although the extended credit makes the borrower poorer than before the credit was extended, it had the opposite effect on officers and directors of the company. It made them conspicuously wealthier. David Alvarez, former president of the integrated-card unit made a $12.2 million profit selling his stock before the company disclosed that it was in deep trouble. Mr. Thompson sold all his stock having a value of approximately $4.7 million following his confirmation hearing and a short time before Providian's financial problems became public information and the stock price plummeted.

[wildflower]

2. I think this is great, I really do. But I think it's time they pare down..

to a unified message.

There is so much fertile ground to work with, when it comes to the administration's failures, the mind boggles. (And used in list form, it can be effective.)

But day after day I hear people call up Air America and say "Well, I'm on the fence. I don't really know what Kerry stands for. Why would he be better?" I am always incredulous! But that's because I listen to Air America, read DU, and watched the convention.

The Rs repeat repeat repeat the same thing over and over until it's in the voter's minds (whether it's true or not); such as the "flip-flopper" meme.

I think a scattershot approach of criticizing different things each day, which I often see K/E doing, doesn't work as well.

I'm not saying Kerry and Edwards don't repeat their message and their plan often enough. But I think what would work better is to settle on just two or three things, and have a simple slogan for each, a la the oft-quoted "It's the economy, stupid."

I think they need to simplify (a) the number of messages, and, once they've done that, (b) the message itself (and not just to something like "job growth," a term which is repeated so often that people often tune it out, but to something new, specific, and memorable).
In my opinion :)

What would be some good ideas for 2 or 3 memorable slogans that arise directly from their plan for America? (Aside from "Stronger at Home, Respected Around the World.")


-wildflower

3. I've got a unified message they could use!

... "The war in Iraq is wrong"
Bet that one would have worked.
Before I get flamed, the point I'm trying to make is we got this far, let Kerry run his campaign.

[wildflower]

6. I know, it's always easy for someone else to criticize...

But I just can't help being an armchair marketer, having worked in marketing.

I'm sure they've got all kinds of marketers, strategists, etc. and I realize that the campaign knows what it's doing. The campaign does continually surprise me.

But...as I said, I just can't help it, when so many people calling up AAR, etc. really don't know what Kerry stands for at this point in the game.

While I'm being the campaign critic: they really should take seriously Lakoff says about language and framing. He knows of what he speaks.

/critic off

:)

-wildflower

7. Uh-oh you mentioned Lakoff

I'll be quiet now.

(slinks away)

[wildflower]

8. I hope I didn't say something to offend you

Is Lakoff mentioned a lot here? (I've seen only a couple of references but may have missed some.) I was just trying to offer my perspective as someone who has worked in marketing and with language. I strongly agree with Lakoff's linguistic analyses in this campaign.
But I know it's easy for me to sit back and say what they should be doing; they're doing the hard work and have inside knowledge.

Anyway, as I said, I hope I didn't offend you.

-wildflower

9. Not at all

I just decided I got trumped and you were thinking about the subject deeply, so no need for me to comment further.

[AP]

5. The unified message: the middle class are underwriting the success of the

wealthiest and getting very little in return for the risk and effort they make to better themselves and society.

[AP]

4. Another gov't assist to bnks: can't get rid of student loans in bankruptcy

That's another way that the student loan program in the US is guaranteed profit for banks even when an education doesn't guarantee returns for the student.

It's BS.

It's just another way gov't sets up society to make the rich richer and force everyone else to fight it out in a survival of those who are born rich and connected.

[JDPriestly]

10. My version of the unified message:

Follow the money.

Bush is transferring the hard-earned wealth of the Americanpeople to his elite, wealthy friends. It's the corruption, stupid.

[JDPriestly]

11. Correction: It's the corruption, stupid.

Short, sweet and says it all.

[JDPriestly]

12. It's the corruption, stupid!

Edwards' remarks fit about student loans fits that theme perfectly.