Why Warren is calling out Biden [View all]

[crazytown]

Last edited Sat Apr 27, 2019, 09:51 PM - Edit history (1)

In evaluating VP Biden as a candidate we should consider how much Biden will be diminished by Elizabeth Warren’s critique of his Bankruptcy Act. She will not go softly, and no one should expect her to. As Professor, it was her speciality and a large part of her life’s work. She argues then and now that women were hardest hit by the 2005 legislation.

President Clinton vetoed the 1999 version of the Bill with Hillary leading the opposition

In 2005 only 12 Democratic Senators voted for it.

Amongst other things the Act locked students to their debt regardless of their economic circumstances, threw sick, unemployed and divorced women out of their homes, and, on the Fed’s analysis, contributed to the financial crisis. A real vote winner don’t you think?

Washington Post, 26 April 2019
https://www.washingtonpost.com/amphtml/opinions/2019/04/26/why-warren-is-calling-biden-out/

Why Warren is calling Biden out

It didn’t take long for Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass) to go on the offensive against newly declared presidential contender Joe Biden reminding everyone that before the former vice president was everyone’s beloved Uncle Joe, he was a senator who did the bidding of big finance at the expense of the American people. “Our disagreement is a matter of public record,” Warren said Thursday. “I got in that fight because [families] just didn’t have anyone, and Joe Biden is on the side of the credit card companies.”

(Snip)Warren began studying families in bankruptcy in the 1980s, while teaching law at several universities. Expecting to find a bunch of loose-living people taking advantage of the system (a belief many Americans shared), she instead discovered Americans beset by stagnant incomes and increasing medical bills. The experience didn’t just change her mind about why Americans seek protection from creditors in the courts; it led her to ultimately change her party registration from Republican to Democrat.

Warren took Biden on both in the New York Times and in a book she co-authored, “The Two-Income Trap.” She repeatedly pointed out that standing up for women’s interests didn’t simply mean supporting the right to choose an abortion, or backing legislation to protect women from domestic violence, but it also meant looking out for their economic rights, too. And women were more likely to turn to bankruptcy than men — hit hard by what she described as a combination of “unemployment, medical bills and divorce.”

Warren eventually lost the battle in 2005, when more than a dozen Democratic senators joined Biden in voting for the change, which, among other things, all but eliminated the right for student loan debtors to offload privately issued student loans in court, substantially raised the cost of filing for protection from creditors and made it harder to discharge unsecured debt such as credit card bills. The change, according to the New York Federal Reserve, contributed to the subprime mortgage crisis.The reason? It made it both harder for people to afford their mortgage bills, while reducing their incentive to prioritize their housing payment over other monies owed. That’s as much a part of Biden’s legacy as his time as vice president.