Posted 10/30/2011 02:55:00 PM by Douglas

Narrow, unenlightened self interest isn't difficult to grasp, so it's not surprising that the occupy Wall Street squatters are tired of paying their bills. But the mentality behind the movement to negate student loans is a bit more troubling.

While economists say there is little chance that such tactics could succeed, the fact that they are even being talked about — including the recent introduction of a congressional resolution calling for student loan forgiveness — shows the depth of the frustration and anger brewing over what is cumulatively a crushing debt load for U.S. students and graduates.

Wow. I've been reading about how the higher education bubble is going to be the next one to pop. Something has to be responsible for a five-fold increas in tuition over the past 10 years, and just like the housing bubble, most of the blame can be levied on too many government dollars telling lenders and borrowers that the money will be spent. So now you've got millions of people that owe hundreds of thousands of dollars with a relatively small probability that they'll have the ability to pay it back? What does that breed:

Robert A_____, a 37-year-old lawyer who graduated from Fordham Law School in New York City in 1998 with about $65,000 in debt, is the creator of ForgiveStudentLoanDebt.com. He said the website grew out of a proposal he first posted on Facebook in 2009 speculating on the economic impact there would be if student loan debtors suddenly had hundreds of dollars a month to spend. Within weeks, the post went viral and he had 300,000 “likes” on Facebook, he said.

Applebaum's idea was born out of painful experience. He said he began championing loan forgiveness after going to work as an assistant district attorney in Brooklyn and realizing he could either pay his rent or make his payments on his student loans. He said he chose to put his loans in “forbearance” — an agreement between the lender and the borrower that prevents a declaration of default but doesn’t prevent the continued accrual of interest — until he left the DA’s office in 2004. After making his loan payments every month since then, his debt today stands at $88,000.

That spells out everything, doesn't it? Not only is the college education a right, not a privledge, but also his house. He doubeled down on the interest payment for a decade so he could live in one of the most expensive real estate market in the country. Then, as the interest is still stacking up, what does he decide to do? Whine about it.

But I think the most disturbing part of all this is that the President is now listening to them, and has a plan to buy their votes with your money.

On Wednesday, President Obama introduced two changes to the federal student loan program that could affect several million borrowers. The broad outlines of his plans to encourage loan consolidation and assist people who are struggling financially are reasonably clear.

People with at least one federal loan that they borrowed directly from the federal government and at least one that originated with a bank or other lender. If you have a bunch of bank-issued federal loans but no loan directly from the government, you can consolidate them under an older federal program, but it won’t save you as much money.

The PLUS loans that some graduate students have taken out in recent years are eligible. Perkins Loans and many federal loans for people entering health professions are not eligible. And again, private student loans are not part of the mix here either.

Also, if you’re in default on the loans, you won’t be eligible.

Don't worry if your student loans haven't been affected by this yet. It's only the beginning.

Posted 10/30/2011 02:22:00 PM by Douglas

Where do we go? Some great songs that started out as jokes. Some of them ended up that way, too.

Posted 10/30/2011 02:20:00 PM by Douglas

Fascinating story on performance enhancing cooling.

RTX promises to enhance human performance in applications ranging from sports to medicine to the military. It is the brainchild of biological sciences professor H. Craig Heller and senior research scientist Dennis Grahn, who have spent nearly two decades studying temperature regulation in mammals. Their lab, once devoted to hibernating ground squirrels and marmots, now attracts San Francisco 49er football players, military representatives from the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, multiple sclerosis patients and sweating Stanford athletes.

Keeping your core cool through your plam. What an idea.

Posted 10/30/2011 02:16:00 PM by Douglas

A whore is someone who will do anything for money, whether that be $20 on a dumpster for $300 million from ESPN. Enter the Longhorn Network.

ESPN remains stymied in its efforts to line up new subscribers for its Longhorn Network, so only a handful of San Antonio-area viewers will be able to watch today's broadcast of the Texas-Kansas game from Austin.

Grande Communications, which has about 16,000 subscribers in the area, remains the only regional cable company of note carrying the Longhorn Network, the 20-year, $300 million partnership between ESPN and the University of Texas that launched in August.

Today's game will be the second UT football game to air on LHN. And, as was the case with the season opener against Rice, the game will be available only to about four million subscribers nationwide and a small percentage in the area.

The Longhorns, who receive over $143 Million a year for its atheletic budget, the largest in the country, decided $300 million for the Longhorn Network was worth more than 100 years of in-state football tradition, playing interesting games, and the Big 12 itself. Way to go, Longhorns. Screwing your alumni and fans that want to watch your games out of the cable fees would be one thing, but your network is so obscure that NO ONE is carrying it, which means Longhorn fans can't even watch your stupid games even if they want to pay for your silly network. Way to go, whores.

Posted 10/23/2011 03:17:00 PM by Douglas

"Can you leave your wrinkled willie glue inside my ocean?" At first, I didn't know what the hell that was, but apparently the "bad lip reading" thing is a thing. This one's pretty funny, too. I wish I had a tin cup for all these nickles. . .

Posted 10/11/2011 06:55:00 PM by Douglas

10/11/11. That's 47 in binary.

Posted 10/11/2011 06:05:00 PM by Douglas

Incredible pictures of a man-made geyser in Nevada. And an even more interesting story about how you'd get your ass shot if you tried to jump the fence and enter someone's private property to take a picture of such wonderment.

Posted 10/09/2011 01:32:00 PM by Douglas

When relying on your clothing to espouse your socio-political positions, it's good to branch out:

When it comes to murdering socialists, really, what was the difference, other than Che didn't have an air force?

Posted 10/09/2011 01:26:00 PM by Douglas

Here's some more pictures of Detroit, rotting from within. Interesting how quickly the buildings decay and the vegetation reclaims the land.

Labels: Detroit Decay

Posted 10/05/2011 05:55:00 PM by Douglas

I suppose I'm a bit burned out on protests and protesters, so I haven't really been paying attention to the who or the why of the recent round of Wall Street sit-ins. It's probably not fair to say that all of the protesters agree with these, but it's probably more than you think.

When I first read that list, I thought it came from The Onion. Then I realized it's too over the top, even for them, to be reasonable.

Posted 10/02/2011 09:00:00 PM by Douglas

What I don't know about political campaigning could fill a warehouse, but I think it's funny to think that your political slogan would look good on a children's picnic table:

One thing's for sure: In 2011, a children's picnic table with an Obama logo on it is really cheap. Also, as long as we're looking at American jobs, where was this table made? Do you even have to ask?