Today, President Biden hits the road to Madison, WI to announce his Administration's new plans to cancel student loan debt for tens of millions of Americans. https://t.co/1vtFk0Si77
— Rachel Thomas (@Rachel_Thomas46) April 8, 2024
Not the fanatics’ forced-birth edicts, but the lives of millions of individuals.
Biden promotes 'life-changing' student loan relief in Wisconsin as he rallies younger voters https://t.co/8CWRqJCnrd
— The Associated Press (@AP) April 9, 2024
Per the Associated Press, “Biden promotes ‘life-changing’ student loan relief in Wisconsin as he rallies younger voters”:
President Joe Biden said Monday that more than 30 million borrowers would see “life-changing” relief from his new plan to ease their student loan debt burdens, a fresh attempt by the Democratic president to follow through on a campaign pledge that could buoy his standing with younger voters.
He detailed the initiative, which has been in the works for months, during a trip to Wisconsin, one of a handful of battleground states that could decide the outcome of Biden’s likely November rematch with Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee.
Biden said he wanted to “give everybody a fair shot” and the “freedom to chase their dreams” as he lamented the rising cost of higher education…
Some young voters have been impatient with Biden’s attempts to wipe away student loan debt. The Supreme Court last year foiled his first attempt to forgive hundreds of billions of dollars in loans, a decision that Biden called a “mistake.”
Since then, the White House has pursued debt relief through other targeted initiatives, including those for public service workers and low-income borrowers. Administration officials said they have canceled $144 billion in student loans for almost 4 million Americans…
Biden’s new plan would expand federal student loan relief to five new categories of borrowers through the Higher Education Act, which administration officials believe puts it on a stronger legal footing than the sweeping proposal that was killed by a 6-3 court majority last year…
The plan’s widest-reaching benefit would cancel up to $20,000 in interest for borrowers who have seen their balance grow beyond its original amount due to what Biden described as “runaway” interest. That part of the plan would forgive at least some unpaid interest for an estimated 25 million borrowers, with 23 million getting all their interest erased, according to the White House.
An additional 2 million borrowers would automatically have their loans canceled because they’re eligible but have not applied for other forgiveness programs, such as Public Service Loan Forgiveness.
Borrowers who have been repaying their undergraduate student loans for at least 20 years would be eligible to have any remaining debt canceled, along with those repaying graduate school loans for 25 years or more.
The plan would forgive debt for those who were in college programs deemed to have “low financial value.” It’s meant to help those who were in programs that ended up becoming ineligible to receive federal student aid or programs found to have cheated students.
A final category would cancel debt for borrowers facing financial hardship.
Speaking of the SC(R)OTUS: This won’t happen before the election, but if Biden gets our hoped-for majority in the House as well as the Senate… we can dream:
If the Supreme Court can be increased to 9 justices in 1869, because there were 9 circuit courts – it can be increased to 13 justices, because there are 13 circuits.
So instead of 78yo Richard Blumenthal suggesting 69yo Sonia Sotomayor retire – let's focus on rebalancing SCOTUS. pic.twitter.com/krcXe7mv2S
— anyone_want_chips (@anyonewantchips) April 5, 2024
Meanwhile:
https://t.co/llS2Wd3QAK pic.twitter.com/BKxASv8N4J
— James Medlock (@jdcmedlock) April 8, 2024
Billions for corporations, not one cent for hungry children — the GOP mantra. Bloomberg:
Senate Republicans are poised to sink a $78 billion tax-cut package, gambling that they’ll win the majority in November and can push then for bigger breaks for business.
They also don’t want to hand President Joe Biden an election-year victory on the legislation, which includes both child and business tax breaks, lawmakers and aides have said.
The package, the top business lobbying objective this year, easily passed the Republican-controlled House in January on a bipartisan 357 to 70 vote. It also has White House support.
But Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell supports efforts to block the package, as does his No. 2, John Thune.
Both senators were once considered possible supporters of the bill, a GOP aide said, but are now bending to strong opposition to the child tax credits from Mike Crapo of Idaho, the top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee…
On The Road – ema – 2024 NYC St. Patrick’s Day Parade
Baud
I miss the darkness.
Baud
Usually it’s the House Republicans that are the bigger bastards.
Let’s win a trifecta and pass the child tax credits without the business tax breaks.
narya
@Baud: Oh, I’d love to see that.
I’d also like to see the people getting on the “Sotomayor should retire” train to drink alllll of a STFU milkshake.
lollipopguild
Two Bauds for the price of one! Nice!
different-church-lady
“Fine, but WHY WON’T HE DO ANYTHING ABOUT STUDENT DEBT?!?”
H.E.Wolf
Yes!
And let’s remember that there are a lot of us working toward the goal.
Four Directions has our help (see the two thermometers for AZ and NV in the front-page sidebar) – and also the help of a person unknown to us, who is matching the donations we make this month.
Baud
@different-church-lady:
It really is frustrating.
rikyrah
Good Morning Everyone 😊 😊 😊
rikyrah
@different-church-lady:
They have stopped whining about that. They have Palestine and Gaza to yell about now.
rikyrah
@Baud:
Tell that truth 👏🏾
Fake Irishman
@narya:
Why? She’s a great justice, but we could replace her with a great justice 20 years younger. Control of the White House and Senate at the same time is not a given for the next 10 years.
(Souter quietly stepped down when he was 68)
Fake Irishman
@Baud:
🙏
Baud
@rikyrah:
Good morning.
Baud
@Fake Irishman:
I wouldn’t trust Manchin or Sinema to confirm.
Melancholy Jaques
@Fake Irishman:
I get the argument for Sotomayor to retire now, but the idea that people should publicly pressure her to do so is not helpful at all.
bbleh
Increasingly optimistic about the WH and House — TIFG sitting in court 4 days a week while a porn actress delivers lurid details about his penis and his cheating on his third wife to a media that spread it far and wide Jerry-Springer style while he has to sit there with his mouth shut just ain’t gonna help him, I don’t care what anybody says — but the Senate, man, that’s a tough lift. Even if the Rs win it, though, there’s one or two like Murkowski and mmmaybe Susan, She Of Great Concern, Collins who won’t necessarily toe the Crazy line. We didn’t lose the ACA, after all
And OMG could they PLEASE STFU about Sotomayor? Unless there’s some open secret about galloping cancer or something that I haven’t heard, WTF?!? We need to deliberately give up a CERTAIN seat now, which might well NOT be filled by someone nominated by Biden, or even at all, because of the RISK we might lose it later? Have any of these people done the math? It ain’t that complicated …
different-church-lady
Would this be an appropriate time to note that I hate everything?
Anne Laurie
There is no way in the GOP Hell that the Repubs would ‘permit’ President Biden to appoint a Sotomayor replacement before November — probably not even if he nominated Leonard Leo.
Also, the loudest voices demanding Sotomayor quit right now, if not yesterday, are hardcore Republicans and their ‘Leftist’ comrades at the other leg of the horseshoe. I’d distrust anything proposed by those dudes, up to & including free unicorns that poop ice cream.
I say we wait till Joe Biden wins his second term — there’s always the hope that Alito will stroke out and/or Clarence will have to flee for the Canadian border when Ginni gets indicted for her various crimes.
OzarkHillbilly
Heh: Yes, total eclipses are very nice. But have you ever smelled bacon? Zoe Williams
Having just returned from Arkansas on my own eclipse chasing sojourn, I can’t help agreeing with Zoe. The previous eclipse passed over my house and we had an eclipse viewing party with some friends in attendance. I can’t say that this eclipse was any more or less than the previous one but tbh that’s not why we went.
The real reason we went was to enjoy the company of some of our long time Arkie caver friends and to once again revel in that oh so “cooked and steep” topology. We hit paydirt on both of those scores.
Although I am now too old and decrepit to experience the crooked and steep to the fullness of it’s beauty.
JPL
@Baud: I lost power earlier for over a hour and it was dark. Since it’s raining, that added to the eeriness.
bbleh
@Anne Laurie: this also, too. We must give up the Very Good because we can imagine something perfect!
Matt McIrvin
@different-church-lady: I mostly hear people criticizing him for doing too much about student debt (including the argument that it’s a “giveaway to the rich”) and it frustrates me to hear all of this at the same time, but that’s politics.
JML
The GOP “plan” of “tank something that we and everyone else supports so we can get more when we win in November” was the exact strategy the MN GOP tried in 2022. refused to deal, backed out of deals they had already made, the lot. They failed to take back the state House, lost the state Senate, and Tim Walz was re-elected easily.
Brilliant plan. I suspect it will work just as well at the federal level.
Jeffro
as always, it takes a non-U.S. media source to do any sort of deep dive on trumpov’s constant incoherence and rage: Trump’s Bizarre, Vindictive Incoherence Has to be Heard In Full To Be Believed
(then again, maybe the U.S. media is trying to be kind? by subjecting us to as little of the Orange Madman as possible?)
So true. I remember talking with a cousin of mine back in early 2016, who said, “I don’t want someone who acts and talks like that as president…what kind of example is that for my kids?”
Maybe we need to remind folks about that once in a while. trump’s always been horrifying; some folks have just gotten used to it.
Or, another way to put it: just because the GOP lowered its standards doesn’t mean the rest of us have to.
Matt McIrvin
@Anne Laurie: Various posters at LGM are really into this, because they argue that Ruth Bader Ginsburg bears blame for the erosion of abortion rights by not retiring when she had the chance, and it feeds into Paul Campos’s general sense that liberals are always making a terrible strategic mistake that will cause our doom.
Michael Bersin
Yeah, we were on the road yesterday, too.
After much planning and practice I found myself under a tent cover next to a greenhouse at a plant nursery on the west side of Russellville, Arkansas. We arrived around 7:00 a.m. after driving Arkansas’ scenic Highway 7 in pitch darkness. I’ll have to try driving it in the daylight some time.
So, there was this total solar eclipse on Monday
After the big show we pulled out to get on the road around 3:00 p.m. directly into one of the 21st Century’s epic traffic jams. Most drivers involved were intent on proving The Accordian Theory of Traffic. They were quite successful.
We didn’t get back home until a little after 11:00 p.m.
I’m still processing images.
Fake Irishman
@Anne Laurie:
I’d entertain Baud’s reasons of Manchin or Sinema both being jerks, but since Sotomayor doesn’t alter the balance of the court, I could see at least one relenting, especially since I think Murkowski and Collins would vote to confirm anyone reasonable (again, doesn’t alter balance of power on court)
As far as Republicans not permitting Biden to do so? They’ve got the minority caucus. What they want doesn’t matter. They can delay confirmation a bit, but not stop it (remember McConnell blew up the filibuster for SC appointments in 2017)
Finally, Sotomayor, doesn’t have to step down; she can only do so “upon replacement” like Breyer did. No replacement, no change.
satby
In 2009 I took out a Parent’s Plus loan for my son’s tuition at one of the Corinthian Colleges, Wyotech. My son badly wanted to go, and it was the first time since he was 10 that he was really excited about attending a school. So of course I would have moved the earth to help him. Everyone in the automotive industry that we knew vouched for the place. It was nationally accredited by real accrediting agencies. Less than a year there cost more than a year at a good university. I took out one loan, he took out a smaller one, and then while he was there he took out a second loan that the school advised him to take. A year after he graduated, he went back to his old job, their job placement was a joke, despite their stated 95% rate.
Everyone knows what happened. The Dept. of Ed went after Corinthian and its subsidiaries for fraud, 21 States attorneys also sued them, and they went out of business in 2015. Between us, my kid and I had over $38k in loans to repay and the buyer defense to repayment was not available to private loans, and not moved forward at all during the DeVos years at Ed. My kid completely paid off the smaller loan and was in a payment plan that would extend for years due to periods of deferral while looking for a job; it had ballooned to more than the original loan even after years of repayment. I had paid my loan down by almost half in only a few years when I lost my corporate job, and while on a hardship deferral it zoomed past my initial loan amount to 50% more than the original. When I started taking SS, they garnished it to pay the loan. I assumed I would pay it till I died, for a place that defrauded all its students.
Last month my son got a letter saying his loan was forgiven. Last week, I got one too.
different-church-lady
@Jeffro:
People want a president they can identify with.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
I don’t get that. Dobbs was 6-3. Her vote would have made it 5-4.
Baud
@satby:
👍
beckya57
@narya: Sotomayer does need to retire. The Senate is highly likely to flip in 2024, and the GOP will never confirm a Dem nominee, they’ll just hold the seat open for the next GOP president. She’s been a great justice, but so was RBG, and the latter’s refusal to retire when the Dems had the Senate gave McConnell the opportunity to ram ACB through. That lead directly to Dobbs (among other bad things). I don’t like it either, but we need to keep that seat.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
If you want to be a Dem, you need to be prepared to be abused.
different-church-lady
@Matt McIrvin:
Remains true: when LGM gets a chew toy in its mouth, it does… not… let… go.
bbleh
@Matt McIrvin: I like LGM, but occasionally the tenured-ivory-tower perspective takes over, and it’s like ???
Baud
@Fake Irishman:
And does she unretire if Trump wins if Biden can’t get anyone confirmed. Do you think the GOP would respect that?
OzarkHillbilly
Let me guess. You hit the same FUBAR clusterfuck in Harrison that we did. Haysoos chrispo, are there any Harrison cops who can do something other than give tickets to folks with out of state plates???
We were down hwy 21 about 20 miles north of Clarksville. As for seeing 7 in the daylight, yes you should. Better yet, take a float trip on the Buffalo. You won’t be sorry.
Manyakitty
@different-church-lady: come sit by me.
Geminid
@bbleh: I thought that Cheryl Rofer was a good addition to LG&M’s writers because she has actually done stuff.
Jeffro
@different-church-lady: LOL
In a similar vein, here’s the start of Jamelle Bouie’s aptly-titled “The man who snuffed out abortion rights is here to tell you he is a moderate” (today’s NYT):
(it actually gets even better from there =)
Ejoiner
@satby: I’m paying off a Parents Plus loan for my son as well, but I was told it didn’t qualify for any of the loan forgiveness programs. Any idea why your loan was? And congratulations, of course!
eclare
@satby:
Oh I’m so happy for you and your son!
Another Scott
@satby: A horrible story with a good ending. :-)
Thanks for the post.
I always try to remember Balzac – Behind every great fortune lies a great crime. And Dan Davies – Good ideas don’t need to have lies told about them. And TANSTAAFL. But even with all that, the systems need to protect people from scammers and for far too long they haven’t done that.
Hang in there, everyone. Things will get better if we keep pushing forward.
Cheers,
Scott.
narya
@satby: Holy crap–that is AWESOME. And your story is one I’m going to tuck away for use when someone is going on about how terrible it is that Biden is forgiving student loans. I don’t think a lot of people know that full story.
Fake Irishman
@Matt McIrvin:
But I think on this one the LGM doom-mongers are correct. When Kennedy was replaced with Kavanaugh, Roe was doomed over the long term; but when Ginsburg was replaced with Coney Barret, it was doomed by the first major case that came up the pike. A lot of LGBT rights (at least in cases without a direct religious component) went from reasonably solid ground to a thin majority (relying on Gorsuch and Robert’s, instead of two of Gorsuch,Roberts and Kennedy.
And strategic mistakes on the court don’t last for 2, 4 or six years; they last for decades.
Manyakitty
@satby: woohoo 🎉 🎇
OzarkHillbilly
@satby: Your loans were forgiven? I blame Biden.
bbleh
@Fake Irishman: @beckya57: I do not understand the assumption — sometimes stated but often simply blithely elided — that, were Sotomayor to retire, even conditionally upon replacement, a “better” Justice would be confirmed. Counting on Manchin AND Sinema, or one of them plus Murkowski or maybe Collins, to confirm not just *A* Justice but a “better” (eg equally or more progressive AND considerably younger) one? Once all the yelling and pressure starts? During an election year? Really? And all this because of the risk — by no means a certainty — that when she passes away (itself highly uncertain unless there’s something I don’t know), the situation will be worse?
I don’t get it. At most it seems like “the (imagined) best is the enemy of the (present) good,” and in some ways it seems more like “Trump appointed 3 Justices and now we must panic.”
rikyrah
I have an issue with those taking about Sotomayor resigning. It doesn’t feel right. Never will feel right to me.
Baud
@narya:
People don’t know because they don’t want to know. It blunts their resentment.
Fake Irishman
@Baud:
She just announces she’s changed her mind and stays on the court. Judges have done that several times.
rikyrah
@satby:
YESSSSS!!!
That’s President Biden and his competent Administration working for the American people.
Baud
@Fake Irishman:
When?
bbleh
@Geminid: and generally I agree with the politics and the legal stuff — eg
CamposLoomis is good on labor — and I think Farley tends to stick a little closer to his areas of expertise — but sometimes it’s really frustrating.different-church-lady
@Fake Irishman:
A reasonable take is that a 6-3 majority gave them the cover they needed to really go for it that a 5-4 majority wouldn’t have.
JML
@satby: I’m so happy that loan forgiveness came through for you. It must be a huge relief.
(I despise for-profit “colleges”)
rikyrah
@narya:
Clap clap clap
different-church-lady
@bbleh: You mean Loomis on labor. Campos is good at… whining?
different-church-lady
@bbleh: “ACME LIBERAL SCOTUS JUSTICE REPLACEMENT KIT”
bbleh
@different-church-lady: right whoops fixed
rikyrah
@bbleh:
A lot of this whining comes from whom?
Where were these people in 2016?
Can we look and see what their defense of Hillary was in 2016?
Were any of these muthaphuckas the ‘ you can’t scare me with the Court’ crowd?
Were they part of the ‘ I just can’t find myself being able to vote for Hillary’ crowd?
Baud
Liberals love to think strategy rather than face up to their inherent feebleness as a polity.
Baud
@rikyrah:
👍
narya
@Baud: And I think a lot of people my age had a VERY different experience: I had loans for undergrad and grad school, all of which had federal guarantees of some kind and all of which had reasonable (or downright low) interest rates. Paying off the grad school loans was more of a challenge given my underemployment during the early repayment years, but I was able to manage it. And then things changed such that it all became predatory rather than a way to help educate the next generation.
Miss Bianca
@beckya57: why the fuck is it always the liberal, female Justices who “have to” retire? Hmm? Why is that? A mystery, to be sure.
TBone
I have a foreboding sense of discomfort about the Supremacist Court’s upcoming machinations in the immunity case. I’m trying to shake it off. But if the Alvin Bragg case occurs at the same time, they could smoke bomb us just like their overlord Pooty fantsizes about. “Just for this one time, this one guy, and no precedent shall be set for future presidents.” I really hope my gut is wrong about this.
Baud
@narya:
I’m all in favor of forgiveness, but the people affected have to support the people pushing for it and oppose the people fighting it.
different-church-lady
@narya:
Baud
@Miss Bianca:
Well, we don’t have any male liberal justices at the moment.
different-church-lady
@Baud:
Wait, you’re saying if we want something we have to make effort?!?
UncleEbeneezer
@bbleh: That kind of thinking has never hurt us before (cough, cough…Nader, Jill Stein…)
different-church-lady
@Baud:
Funny that.
narya
@different-church-lady: ding!ding!ding!
Baud
@different-church-lady:
Not even much of an effort. Voting is one of the easiest things to do to effect political change. The MAGA style resentment is too seductive for a lot of people who can’t afford it. Hopefully there will be enough who can resist it this November.
gvg
narya
@Baud: Agreed. I’m glad Biden is continuing to talk about it, too; it needs attention because there are some fiddly details that aren’t immediately apparent.
kindness
Were do so many of you get that the Senate will flip Republican? Have you seen any of the elections that have happened since the Supreme Court burned Roe at the stake like a common witch? Even (most) Republican women want the right to get an abortion if they need one and almost all Republican women do not want to see their access to birth control be tossed in the bonfire with Roe.
Abortion and birth control have won us all the races since 2022. Senate races aren’t gerrymandered. Democrats will gain seats in this election. Stop being a common beltway talking head
And don’t get me started at the LGM ‘Sotomayer Must Retire’ idiots. They are idiots.
Fake Irishman
@bbleh:
I, and others who are open to the argument Sotomayor should retire, are not arguing a “better” justice would be confirmed. Sotomayor is amazing. I’d love having her on the court for 20 more years.
I’m saying we could get one who is roughly on the same level (Elizabeth Perloger?, Florence Pan? Myrna Perez?) in good health and 10-20 years younger.
It’s also not like she’s new to the court: She’s been on the court for 15 years.
Look, perhaps the biggest fumble both the left and the right have had have been messed up court appointments: failing to replace Warren in 1968 instead of 1969 opened the door to conservative courts by giving Nixon four appointments instead of two. Reagan nominating and failing to get Bork through (1986 senate elections in which Dems won back control of the chamber mattered a lot) let Roe stand for another 30 years, made possible a lot of advances in gay rights, and had huge implications for fighting global warming and upholding the ACA.
Thinking strategically about lifetime appointments is not a bad thing.
I’d also note there were a lot of folks after Breyer to retire a 50-50 Senate in 2022. They were right. I think the folks who want Sotomayor to retire at least have an argument.
different-church-lady
@narya:
Especially when your whole political position depends on not seeing them.
Almost Retired
@satby: OMG, I had no idea Social Security could be garnished for undischargeable student loans to scam schools. Beyond appalling. I’m happy for the relief you got, even if it’s too little too late.Let’s not forget that Republicans didn’t just recently discover the joys of being evil.
In the 1980’s, I worked at the Legal Aid Foundation of Los Angeles (LAFLA) while I was in law school. Way back then, LAFLA brought a class action on behalf of students in scammy private colleges (which flourished in California at the time). I worked on that. As well as a class action against the Social Security Administration (Lopez v. Heckler) at a time when the Reagan Administration was making it impossible to qualify for SS disability without jumping through more hoops than a circus clown.
Both class action were successful.And then the Reagan Administration passed a bunch of regulations that prohibited the Legal Services Corporation from suing the Government, and (the details are hazy in my mind) limited LSC class actions – not quite eliminated them at the time – such that LAFLA couldn’t bring any other scam private school claims.
So so so so many of our modern ills can be traced back to the Reagan Administration.
Fake Irishman
@Fake Irishman:
when it becomes clear Biden can’t confirm some one new, or some one she likes. A district judge in New York did it last year.
H.E.Wolf
Liberal, female, Justice OF COLOR. Hmmm.
And in relatively recent US history, Jews (such as Ruth Bader Ginsberg) were not considered all-the-way-white.
UncleEbeneezer
@rikyrah: They were likely the same ones telling us it was “Blackmail!!1!” to say we should all vote for Hillary, if only for the sake of SCOTUS. Probably a large overlap with the people currently signal-boosting calls to refuse to vote for Biden because of Gaza. They spend a lot of their time defending voter suppression attempts from our side and seem to view the airing of grievances against Dems as the most important free speech to protect, especially in election years. They are predictable AF, just ask Putin.
Baud
@Fake Irishman:
A district judge is not the same as a Supreme Court Justice.
different-church-lady
To call things out a bit stronger: the argument for a strategic Sotomayor retirement hinges entirely on the idea that it’s conditional — no replacement confirmation, no retirement. Most people making the argument will include that point somewhere along the way, but they’ll bury it like an afterthought because pointing it out ruins the click-baity qualities.
Fake Irishman
@Miss Bianca:
Normally, I would be quite sympathetic to this argument, but it this case it’s simply wrong. Stephen Breyer basically had everyone left of center begging, cajoling and loudly demanding he retire in 2021 and 2022.
(and this is not meant to be disrespectful of you, I’ve got a ton of respect for the comments you make and the fact you grind out there as a journalist making the world a better place, I just disagree with you in this case.)
Fake Irishman
@Baud:
that is fair. But what are they going to do, impeach her?
Baud
I want Sotomayor to retire so I can complain that Biden nominated the wrong replacement.
Baud
@Fake Irishman:
They can ignore her take back and confirm her replacement.
Timill
@Miss Bianca: Stephen Breyer is female? News to me…
Fake Irishman
Since I seem to have turned this thread into a pie fight about the judicial system, I’ll use this space to note that the Senate is on track to confirm three more district judges this week, including one in Utah and one in Nebraska. There has been a steady uptick in confirmations in states with two GOP senators. Most of these appointees aren’t going to be the liberal lions we love, but they in general have solid backgrounds, take the rule of law seriously and are not hacks. That will be just fine in places like Florida and Indiana and Texas.
different-church-lady
@Baud: You can go ahead and do that now. Nothing needs to make sense anymore.
Miss Bianca
@Fake Irishman: get back to me when people on the right start demanding that Alito and Thomas retire. Get back to me when you have a guarantee that the bad actors in the Senate aren’t going to pull a McConnell and simply refuse to consider another SCOTUS appointment.
Or, rather, don’t. I’m getting beyond sick of this argument that we’re supposed to be putting our best justices out to pasture when there is no current mandatory retirement age because Reasons. There is no One Trick, weird or otherwise, that is going to fix the mess we are currently in with SCOTUS. Except possibly expanding the Court to 13 Justices with Biden appointing all four. But that is going to take a lot of actual work, not wishcasting.
Sure Lurkalot
@Jeffro:
I don’t usually watch vids on Twitter, especially 10 minute ones, but this, “we have to take Trump literally and seriously” hits the mark:
nitter.poast.org/JoJoFromJerz/status/1776676255145857401#m
OzarkHillbilly
@Baud: Don’t worry, the GOP takes care of that.
mrmoshpotato
@narya:
And be allergic to milk.
Scout211
Did you hear about Ken Buck’s new name for MTG? Link
I like her new name but not a profile in courage, Just Ken. Speaking up now is all well and good but you could have made a difference . . .
rikyrah
@Baud:
THANK YOU.
Pay attention to those who don’t want to you do get any help.
They are the same muthaphuckas.
OVER AND OVER AND OVER.
rikyrah
@Almost Retired:
Say it again.
Baud
@rikyrah:
Last week
Kay
I rthink the retirement talk is generally healthy and good for the country. SCOTUS justices have been treated as high priests long enough (I mostly blame lawyers for this – it’s ridiculous) they really do need to be taken down a peg.
There are a lot of smart accomplished lawyers. Everyone is replaceable.
I don’t think it will have any effect – she’s not going to retire because people tell her to – but we need to move the parameters of acceptable discussion on the SCOTUS to make it much broader.
This is how you get to expansion – you stop treating these people as if no one in the public can have practical discussions on their role and service. Open it up.
Another Scott
I didn’t stay at a Holiday Inn Express, but I remember the commercials.
USCourts.gov:
Justice is too slow in the USA, not least because the courts are too slow.
The 9th Circuit is too big:
The 9th Circuit is WA, OR, CA, ID, MT, NV, AZ, AK, and HI.
The 9th Circuit needs to be split up. Maybe WA, OR, AK, HI + ID, MT, NV, AZ + CA.
Maybe Kay can talk about the need for more Bankruptcy courts.
There’s more than enough work for 15 Justices, and it makes sense.
Fight for 15!!
Cheers,
Scott.
Matt McIrvin
@bbleh: At least they’re no longer just asking questions about whether Biden’s age implies that he needs to replace Kamala Harris.
(Which seemed to be predicated on the idea that you could just abstractly swap out one vice-presidential candidate for another with no transaction cost, as if you were magically jumping between parallel timelines.)
Baud
@Kay:
I don’t have faith in our side’s ability to prevent talk from turning into resentment. YMMV.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Yes, that is worse.
Jeffro
@Sure Lurkalot: it does.
we – and the media, and ALL voters – should be able to take a political candidate or elected leader at their word. if they say they’re going to do X, assume they’re going to do X.
trump shouldn’t get a pass just because he’s an insane clown of a human being.
OzarkHillbilly
Vatican calls gender fluidity and surrogacy threats to human dignity
No comment beyond I feel the same way about the Church.
Kay
Student loan forgiveness is my least favorite Biden initiative (except for the fraudulent for profit colleges, which should have been forgiven long ago) but I think this might help him politically with college students so you go, Joe. I personally would reform bankruptcy laws to allow student loans to be discharged, which I think would also act as a control on colleges ripping students off.
The thing about college students is not that they’re better or more desirable than other voters – it’s location. They’re a majority D voter pool in swing states. One big state school in MI can provide a lot of D votes in a close race and they’re efficient to reach because they’re all in one place.
Matt McIrvin
@Miss Bianca: To be fair, the LGM people *did* say it about Breyer.
OzarkHillbilly
@Kay: Thank you.
bbleh
@Matt McIrvin: yeah that SOTU made them STFU.
different-church-lady
@Matt McIrvin: Last time we swapped out a VP, Nixon won re-election.
Kay
@Baud:
Look at student loan forgiveness. Ten years ago it was laughed at – never happen. Now we’ve had this whole great discussion on college costs and generational debt and how to fix it.
JPL
@satby: phew! I’m so pleased that you are out of that trap.
Baud
@Kay:
As you know, bankruptcy reform requires Congress and is subject to the filibuster.
bbleh
Oh and OT PSA: this is one of his best yet
twitter.com/traecrowder/status/1777466250853257582
Baud
@Kay:
We’ll see what happens in November, but so far I see more resentment from both ends than credit to Biden, so my point stands for now.
Kay
I love Joe Biden, best Prez of my lifetime- but the FAFSA is all fucked up. I know they were trying to simplify it but IMO they hired a bad contractor.
We have 4 kids and 3 of them went to college so I have filled out many, many FAFSA forms. Many.
I have no idea what happened with this one. I think it was submitted? The process sort of…stopped in a way that LOOKED like it might have been submitted :)
You can’t check until X amount of time has passed. It doesn’t matter that much for my kid – the money he gets is from his school – but I hope they fix it.
VFX Lurker
@satby: Great news!!! Thank you for sharing it.
sdhays
@Baud: Apparently, Souter did that. His resignation was contingent upon a replacement being confirmed. According to the LGM folks, it’s not unusual at all.
I’d like to gently push back on the people taking offense. These Supreme Court seats are OUR seats – the American People – and thinking of each Justice, no matter how amazing, is frankly, kind of toxic.
Baud
@sdhays:
Yes, that’s not unusual. What would be unusual is if a justice unresigned because she expected the president of one party to name her replacement and it ended up being the other party that got the chance to replace her.
Kay
@Baud:
Oh, I know. I just think it’s a great solution – it also solves the problem of people who paid their loans back and are resentful – I think that’s a real issue. Forgiveness isn’t fair and fair is important.
I don’t resent it – I went to college when states and the federal government still supported colleges. I finished undergrad with 1500 in loans. It wasn’t even a blip in my life.
The Kropenhagen Interpretation
But why let that get in the way of people punching left?
I thought it would be safe this year because no primary, but I see the horseshoe conspiracy theorists revving up their engines and I think I need to just get off here for my mental health.
UncleEbeneezer
David Corn has a good primer for Trump’s NY Hush Money/Falsifying Business Records/Election Interference Trial:
beckya57
@Baud: Sotomayer just needs to do the same thing Kennedy did: make her retirement contingent on a new justice being confirmed. If Machin/Sinema refuse (which is certainly a possibility), this would have the effect of raising the visibility of the issue for Dems, which could help with turnout. IMHO the Obama/Clinton people failed to make nearly enough fuss about the Garland blockade in 2016. I’m confident the Biden campaign has learned from that mistake. The Dems have to get more strategic about SCOTUS, as the GOP has been for decades.
schrodingers_cat
@OzarkHillbilly:What are your thoughts about lead holders. Buy or pass? Have you used them and do you have any favorite?
beckya57
@Kay: totally agree.
UncleEbeneezer
@sdhays: I certainly don’t think of them as “our seats” when Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema have the power to veto or effectively choose who fills them.
Miss Bianca
@sdhays: I’d like to gently point out that currently it’s only Democrats who talk about retiring Justices. And until there’s some actual legislation about a mandatory retirement age for ALL SCOTUS justices, I am a little sick of hearing “I know, let’s retire all the liberal Justices, when there’s absolutely no guarantee that any new one is going to be able to get confirmed if the Republicans take the Senate majority again!”
dirge
Sure, though largely because the more fair plans have been sabotaged by bad faith actors. But there’s a problem with allowing the argument that “we can’t help these people with this problem, because that’s unfair to people we’re not helping with different problems.” It works just as well against any policy aimed at helping anybody with any problem, so you wind up helping nobody. To the extent you’re arguing that broader solutions would be better, I’m generally with you, but that shouldn’t stop us from helping when and where we can.
schrodingers_cat
@rikyrah: The mostly white cosplay activists are going out of their way to get anyone who MAGAs could mistake as remotely Muslim or Arab in trouble by their Death to American Slogans.
They can just get rid of their scarves the rest of us are not so lucky. I remember I was asked whether I was a Muslim and whether Obama was a Muslim when I was canvassing for Obama in 2012 by a retired vet. Good times
A lot of the Gaza related protests smell like an op or may be the storied young people who are supposed to save us are really that naive.
Brachiator
@Matt McIrvin:
I mostly hear about the “unfairness” of this debt relief from people who paid their student loans, or from people who didn’t go to college and don’t understand why college students should get special treatment.
Some people just believe that life is hard and the government has no special obligation to help you, especially if you agreed to college loans.
But I also note some heavy duty right wing hypocrisy. I hear older conservatives blast student debt relief while they applaud red state efforts to give credits and subsidies for private and religious elementary schools, charter schools and home schooling.
I applaud the Biden administration for student debt relief and think that overall it is good politically. But it does also generate a good deal of pushback.
Soprano2
@different-church-lady: What that really means is “why hasn’t my debt been forgiven yet”?, which is especially dumb from the people who got private loans.
Another Scott
@UncleEbeneezer:
Haven’t the Senate Democrats been united in approving Biden’s court appointments? Haven’t the issues with Sinemanchin been over policy (voting rights, tax bills, Build Back Better, etc.), not judges? That’s my recollection – corrections welcome.
Moscow Mitch held up Obama’s appointment of Scalia’s replacement because it would have changed the “balance” of the court (among other things). Biden replacing Sotomayor or Kagan wouldn’t do that. Predictions are hard, especially about the future, but I don’t think there would be much difficulty in replacing them if/when the time came. Sure, there would be grousing from the RWNJs, but that’s what they do.
All that said, this Sotomayor talk is a distraction, IMHO.
Eyes on the prizes.
Cheers,
Scott.
Baud
@Another Scott:
Manchin has said he won’t confirm a new justice in an election year. Who knows if he’d stick to that now that he’s going to be gone?
ETA: In fairness, he did vote against Barrett.
OzarkHillbilly
@schrodingers_cat: I used to use them all the time when I was still drafting cave maps and drawing up plans for additions, etc.. As to my favorite, the cheapest would do for me. I suspect you are a little more demanding than I ever was.
Oclarkiclarki
@Baud: Justice Sotomayor resigns contingent upon replacement by the start of the October 2024 SC term. Because the Dems control the Senate, a new Justice is confirmed by the Senate Democrats (+ Sinema and Manchin) by the start of the new term. If there are problems in the confirmation, J. Sotomayor shows up in her current office in October. What exactly is the risk here?
TBone
In another shining example of exemplary jurisprudence, Rudy (rhymes with Pooty) gets to keep his Florida residence despite bankruptcy AND has been sinking far more money into it than stated on the document given to the Court. Shocker🙄
apnews.com/article/rudy-giuliani-bankruptcy-georgia-a63f6da1287e244d3e83be4a2b7c6769
Baud
@Oclarkiclarki:
The GOP takes control and says justices can’t unresign and confirms been replacement. What do you do?
sdhays
@Miss Bianca: That’s because Democrats haven’t been practical about the Supreme Court for decades and are only now freaking out because of the 6-3 Radical Conservative majority. People are justifiably concerned about sane Justice representation going to 2 of 8 or 9 if Republicans retake control of the Senate (which could happen next year!) and Sotomayor unexpectedly kicks it.
That’s not an unreasonable concern. I want to see a sane majority on the Supreme Court in my lifetime, and part of that is being ruthless about how we defend our current seats.
Soprano2
@satby: I’m glad you both got forgiven; it’s too bad you can’t get the rest of the money back.
Kay
@dirge:
I agree and I always argue for “universal” programs for that reason – but student loan forgiveness is just insanely unfair. It’s unfair as between groups of students.
How does one justify forgiving one cohort’s debt and not the nexts? The class of 2005 goes free but not the class of 2004? It’s terrible policy. I read widely so I know the Left think forgiveness will force changes to the system and to a certain extent I agree with that – I think they already have forced changes to the system. Making a lot of noise about student loans was GOOD, but this policy sucks.
But Biden should promote it because he needs every single voter. There is no D voting group he can walk away from. It’s at least 40k votes in MI – I don’t know how many in WI.
But I wish someon e would write a good forgiveness plan, or just make it eligible for discharge in bankruptcy – we have a whole specialized (and expert) court system for debtors. It works and no one has to invent anything.
schrodingers_cat
@OzarkHillbilly: I am thinking of Staedtler with 2mm lead (HB) for starters. Both the leads plus the holder are < $15 at Amazon
I recently attended a Zoom lecture by a botanical illustrator for Smithsonian. She uses these lead holders for the sketch and then finishes them with pen and ink.
BTW I am getting some vintage crow quills and hawk quills that I won in an eBay auction.
sdhays
@UncleEbeneezer: My point is that it’s not this Justice’s or that Justice’s property. It’s already bad enough that these powerful people get to choose when they go. Supreme Court Justice isn’t just any other job, it’s a Super Legislature with almost no checks. Liberals need to be more ruthless about not ceding power there.
bbleh
@Oclarkiclarki: in no particular order, (1) the whole thing becomes a huge political football, people scream at Biden from all sides leaving him stuck with doing nothing (looks weak) or nominating someone “centrist” (ie considerably less progressive than Sotomayor), meanwhile dividing Democrats and giving Republicans an issue to rally around, (2) as noted above, things become further complicated by Sinemanchin grandstanding, leading to further pressure to nominate a “centrist” lest the nominee be defeated (looks weak), (3) also as noted above, Republicans do their damndest to monkeywrench the proceedings (a certainty not a risk) leading to deligitimization of both Sotomayor and any nominee and possibly even a vacant seat. And those are just off the top of my head.
Soprano2
@OzarkHillbilly: I’ve only seen the part of 7 that goes from Little Rock to Hot Springs. That said, I’ve driven from Springfield to Hot Springs and Springfield to Little Rock, those are some great views.
I still so wish I could have gone to Poplar Bluff, but no way hubby could spend that much time in the car now. Would have been a nightmare. If I had planned it a year ago, we could have gone over on Sunday and come back today. That probably would have been doable. Oh well….
Baud
If I hadn’t long ago made a commitment to myself to not let the world burn because of my frustration with people, I would let the world burn because of my frustration with people.
Oclarkiclarki
@Baud: If the R’s have the nerve and power to replace J. Sotomayor in January, then they might as well expand the court or something similar that locks in R dominance for generations.
sdhays
@Baud: That’s not the scenario that’s being argued on LGM. The scenario is: Sotomayor tells Biden she wants to resign, Biden appoints a replacement, replacement is confirmed, Sotomayor resigns, replacement shows up for work. If replacement isn’t confirmed, Sotomayor decides not to retire.
rikyrah
@Kay:
You have been pointing out the bankruptcy issue for years. And, I’ve been agreeing with you for years.
Between bankruptcy, and getting a handle on the interest.
Those two things would STRUCTURALLY change the game.
And, being allowed to take out federal loans for Graduate School.
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Indeed these cosplay socialists/communists really set my teeth on the edge. I keep calm by creating art. That gives me Zen.
Most MAGAs and bhakts are beyond redemption so I don’t let them bother me. I just freeze them out.
Kay
@sdhays:
If Trump wins they’ll pressure or bribe Thomas to step down immediately and he’ll be replaced by one of Thomases cult member clerks, per direction from Justice Thomas.
different-church-lady
Look, why don’t we have all three of them retire and replace them with twenty-somethings?
Another Scott
@Kay:
No, it’s not.
What’s “insanely unfair” is impoverishing young people starting out in life for decades to shovel money to the banksters, and those young people having no recourse. Waiting for Congress to somehow fix it through bankruptcy is waiting for Godot. And we all know that bankruptcy has all kinds of other bad consequences for people.
My father’s generation was able to go to college and grad school without having decades of debt hanging over his head. Students today should be in the same boat.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
UncleEbeneezer
@Baud: I know, I know: BLAME DEMOCRATS!
TBone
Life is unfair (mama made sure that lesson was learned very early). Begrudging others on our team is a sign of poor gamesmanship. Period. Full stop.
Baud
@sdhays:
Gotcha. I’m pleased the GOP will respect our scenarios.
Melancholy Jaques
@different-church-lady:
Would it be okay if I joined you?
rikyrah
@UncleEbeneezer:
it is an Election Interference trial. Period.
Brachiator
@Baud:
Why? The business tax breaks make some economic sense. And you would need some GOP support to get any bill passed.
Mitch McConnell is up to his old obstructionist bullshit again, but is so concentrated on hurting Democrats that he has overlooked how this move hurts Republicans.
The Senate should have passed this bill weeks ago, right after the House approved it, because provisions were intended to go into effect for 2023. The Republicans could have taken more credit than they deserved and won some conservative voter approval going into November.
Instead, there is just confusion. And when the Democrats win big in November, the Republicans will have to be more accommodating.
satby
@Ejoiner: I don’t know, because I was told the same thing. I wrote many letters to many officials about the basic injustice of paying for deliberate fraud, especially since the SS garnishment probably only covered the interest and the balance was still growing. Wyotech was sold to the company that also owned the PLUS loan, originally taken out at a bank, and it was that organization that sent the forgiveness letter.
Kay
@rikyrah:
Interest. You’re absolutely right. I always forget that and it’s huge.
You could get rid of 75% of the problems with just a guaranteed, ultra low (or no!) interest fix.
Soprano2
@TBone: I think it would be impossible for them to do a “just this one time for this one guy” ruling about presidential immunity. I don’t put it past Thomas and Alito to vote that presidents have immunity from everything forever just to help TFG, but I don’t think the rest of them would go that far.
Baud
@Oclarkiclarki:
They might do that too. But I think that would be a harder life than telling an unresigning justice to suck it.
sdhays
@Baud: I don’t understand this. The whole point of this scenario is avoiding Republican involvement – doing this while Democrats hold the White House and the Senate.
Baud
@sdhays:
I don’t know how to explain it better. If we can’t get a replacement, then I think there’s a real possibility that the GOP, if they win, simply says a justice can’t make her resignation contingent or temporary. And there’s no resignation police that can stop them if they hold power.
Kay
@Another Scott:
Well, is it permanent then? All loans forgiven, forever? Or do we do the past forgiveness and everyone racking up debt now is just stuck with it?
Cheryl from Maryland
Donated $100 (plus a tip) to Four Directions, NV.
satby
@narya: There were so many people caught out who, like me, did do due diligence before taking them out. Had my kid gotten a job in the industry soon after graduation, none of those loans should have been a problem. It all fell apart because they lied about how easily their “well-qualified” students found jobs after finishing. My kid was really bitter about it, but eventually he worked his way up to where he should have been soon after graduation.
Melancholy Jaques
@Baud:
It seems like every election cycle, at least two constituent parts of the Democratic coalition are threatening to stay home because their demands were not met. And in every case, their demands are on an issue where the Republicans would be much worse.
I have to admit I am exhausted from it.
Kay
Has anyone used the free file on the IRS site? The new public program that is only available in some states? I’m wondering if it works – we don’t have it in Ohio.
Brachiator
@Anne Laurie:
What problems do “Leftists” have with Sotomayor?
Totally agree. I get tired of people trying to play political chess and obsessing over replacing Supreme Court justices.
Melancholy Jaques
@Kay:
The loans being forgiven are generally people who are not college students, but middle class aspiring adults. Some of the loans being forgiven are for people in their 40s.
Baud
@Melancholy Jaques:
I’m thankful I’m old. It’s easy for me to walk away if things go south.
gvg
@Kay: It was passed in 2020 with Trump and a republican Senate. It was supposed to have a max of requesting 36 questions instead of 108 and most of the tax info coming directly from the IRS so preverified. The problem 1 is that simplification is not simple. This is the second big simplification of the FAFSA I have worked through. The other was during Clintons time. Both were IMO a waste of time. But in this instance it wasn’t Biden, it was Congress and a little Trump but he probably didn’t even notice this. It also wasn’t supposed to take effect right aways but was put off beyond the original plan because of the problems.
The other issue is its not that easy to program the computers. There are a whole bunch of conditional answers that determine if you need to provide certain info or not instead of just asking all the questions of everyone, and that is harder to program correctly. They also have to pull down data from other agencies like the IRS and immigration. The old form had worked out all these issues since the last update, now they have to start over, not tweak. It’s a mess. I haven’t heard any particular contractor is at fault, just that it’s such a huge change. Thats what was said at the beginning too. We have all been dreading this for years. Sometimes Congress should stay out of things……they could have just increased the amounts.
Shalimar
@Fake Irishman: They may be correct that it would be strategically best for Democrats if Sotomayor retired now, but that is not their call to make. They accused Ginsburg of being narcissistic and selfish for believing she was irreplaceable. It’s even more insane for random professors on a political blog to decide for someone else when they should retire.
It’s a lifetime appointment and only she gets to decide when it’s over. If they want to push for limited terms for Justices, that crusade I am all in on.
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: We had to do the financial-aid application process multiple times because several colleges decided they couldn’t get useful information out of the FAFSA and reverted to their own system, or used the College Board’s far more invasive CSS Profile.
Kay
@gvg:
Thanks so much. I wondered. There were a couple of “golden years” where it all worked so smoothly! That makes sense though, with your explanation- how it gets better and better and then they yank it and you have to start from scratch. We were at the end of the “mature cycle” :)
rikyrah
@Kay:
We will agree to disagree.
What was wrong, is changing from free college to paid college, once those who were not White started to go to school in sizeable numbers.
What is wrong, is the deliberate underfunding of State Schools.
What is wrong, is the change to the predatory nature of school loans.
What is wrong, is people paying for years, having paid off the original amount of their loans, and still owing.
We will just have to agree to disagree.
Kay
@gvg:
That’s probably why there’s zero media coverage, right?
It was a Trump initiative. If it had been Biden there would be videos of people crying and screaming.
Oclarkiclarki
@bbleh: Your points are reasonable, particularly any wobble in Sinema and Manchin. On the other hand, none of these points would (and didn’t) stop the R’s. If the Democratic-leaning electorate can’t be convinced to come out and vote in November with the importance of the SC composition in mind, after Dobbs, etc., we are well and truly screwed.
Matt McIrvin
@The Kropenhagen Interpretation: Horseshoe-ism is real but is mostly a Very Online phenomenon. NPR-liberal centrism with Republican-curious tendencies is what I see more of in real life.
rikyrah
@Shalimar:
The only Justice I wished had actually died at their desk at the Supreme Court is Thurgood Marshall. His actual retirement was as harmful as RBG’s death.
Jeffro
@rikyrah:
have to agree here, 100%
satby
@narya: Agree! When I went to college I had one Pell grant and a tuition at community college that was so reasonable I could pay as I went. My kid did go to a couple of CC classes too, but it didn’t offer the comprehensive program in automotive he wanted.
Stepping into the for-profit world was something I wouldn’t have done, except for how totally focussed and motivated my school hating kid was. I hadn’t seen that kid since first grade, where a bad teacher slowly strangled that desire out of hm.
In the end, knowing what I do now, I might still have made the same decision just to support that motivation and drive.
Brachiator
@Kay:
I don’t know anyone who has used it and have not had a chance to see how it has done. I recommended it to people in Texas who I knew might qualify.
It is best for people with very simple returns. If people have more than just W2 income and maybe Social Security, and use the standard deduction, they probably wouldn’t qualify.
I know that the IRS planned a slow rollout, but I have not heard of any problems.
I’m in California and got an email that said that I might be able to use Direct File because I get Social Security.
Note that there are some other free file services sponsored by the IRS provided by private companies. You can check the IRS website for more information. This is Free File. The IRS program is Direct File.
Soprano2
@Fake Irishman: Anyone Biden can appoint to those seats will be much better than anyone TFG and his Federalist Society handlers will appoint.
rikyrah
@Kay:
I thought that people could efile for years with the IRS?
I send mine through the mail.
But, what makes this different from the efiling that I’ve seen offered for years?
gvg
@Kay: I don’t think Biden is inventing anything. All the plans I have heard so far sound like what was always supposed to happen but wasn’t because Republican Presidents appointed Department of Ed leaders who didn’t want to give anything. I remember when a lot of these things were routine and they were in my original paperwork when I was in College or when relatives were. The biggest is the service forgiveness. That was in the Promissory notes way back. What changed was the lenders and the department of Ed were not approving them as much. It became rare and schools stopped advertising that you could get your loans forgiven if you taught at a school, because they found out it was like false advertising and cause bad feelings. The 20 years of payment max was also in the paperwork going way back.
I have also read of people getting refunds now of loans they paid (in error under the “new” rules)
Biden is not lawless. He would not invent something. He will have his people read every group of contracts and find groups of former students who were denied things their contracts say they were entitled too. However it takes time to identify them which is why this seems piecemeal.
Kay
@Brachiator:
Thanks. I use the free file with the contractors – I just did my youngest sons return which is how I found out Direct File is not available in Ohio. I was thrilled to see they were rolling out a public program. I hope they expand it.
Scout211
TBone
@Soprano2: I remember when: George. W. Bush. fercrissakes was appointed. Hanging chads. Brooks Brothers “riot.” UGH I put nothing past these Pooty puppets.
Kay
@rikyrah:
The free file is a site where you choose among private contractors. The new program – direct file- is public (the IRS).
Matt McIrvin
@Kay: Every program that helps people is unfair to somebody who didn’t make the cutoff to be helped by it, and there will probably also be somebody who didn’t really need or deserve help who gets it. You can craft these things cleverly so the unfairness is minimized. You can expand coverage to as many people as possible, but then that also maximizes “why are my tax dollars going to help this un-needy person?” I think it’s impossible to eliminate the unfairness completely.
It seems as if for the past 50 years or so, our response to these little unfairnesses has been crabs in a bucket–if I didn’t get that help, nobody should. And it pulls everything down to zero. There’s this death spiral where means testing gets put in to prevent what seems like waste or giveaways to the undeserving, and then Republicans use the means-testing cutoff as a wedge to make people just on the wrong side of it resent recipients.
gvg
@rikyrah: You can already take out federal loans for graduate school. Always have been able to.
The problem as I see it is they changed the rules about 10 years ago so it was only unsub loans instead of part sub (no interest while in school) and part unsub. That was a step back about 15 years. They also allow grad plus loans which mean payments and interest while still in grad school……which I really hate. I’d rather increase the unsub limit.
Soprano2
@Miss Bianca: If Thomas and Alito dropped dead next week, that would solve a lot of problems. If only it could become so….
Baud
@Scout211:
Pretty sure you left out a word.
Baud
@Matt McIrvin:
Less than zero. Makes people Republican.
TBone
@rikyrah: it’s actually free (with no hidden fees and pop-up charges during calculating) from what I understand.
TBone
@Matt McIrvin: perzackly.
Soprano2
@Kay: I’m happy that he has mostly fixed the public service forgiveness part of the student loan program, because those people took jobs based on getting their loans forgiven, and then it didn’t happen. That was wrong, to promise that and then not follow through. ETA – I agree about the bankruptcy thing, although I would put conditions on it like having to have paid on them for “x” so many years. No taking out a loan and then immediately filing bankruptcy after graduation.
rikyrah
@Scout211:
1.25 million
schrodingers_cat
@Baud: Blame Biden and Sotomayor.
Another Scott
@Kay: Every change affects somebody, somehow. We don’t live in the best of all possible worlds. That doesn’t mean we don’t try for important incremental progress.
It took around 6 months after the start of the FY24 fiscal year to pass a FY24 budget. You want to stop any substantial student loan relief to wait for them to fix the bankruptcy code??
Systems are complicated. There are constraints at every turn.
Biden is doing what he can, now, with the powers that he has, now.
His actions are “insanely unfair” here.
My $0.02.
Cheers,
Scott.
UncleEbeneezer
None. They are just looking for another way to frame our difficult and scary situation as a result of Dems Suck™. For some strange reason this shit always seems to go into overdrive every four years, as a major election approaches.
Kathleen
@satby: I’m so happy that you and your son had that huge weight lifted from your shoulders. That had to have been a nightmare.
gvg
@Kay: Well to be fair, it was mostly Congresses, multiple, it finally happened right around the transition and I think they also had to vote a Bill to delay some of it because they couldn’t do it fast enough. It’s also possible some of the funding for it were in an Omnibus spending bill that Biden era people had to finesse through republican obstruction. When that happens, you can’t pick and choose, you have to insist that all of it go through, or the voting block starts to come apart. I had to google and there is conflicting info out there. But it started way before Trump left office, the first versions.
satby
@rikyrah: ALL OF WHAT YOU SAID HERE. By the time my and both of my kid’s loans were forgiven, we had very likely paid the entire initial loan amounts. I was several years ahead on a loan that could not be prepaid, but I did it anyway, until I was laid off at 59 1/2 and never landed another comparable job.
Loan sharks have better ethics.
Kathleen
@different-church-lady: I had to stop reading that site several years ago, even though there could be some hilarious threads that had me LOL.
rikyrah
@Soprano2:
From 7,000 TOTAL before Biden’s Administration
to over 700,000 DURING BIDEN’S ADMINISTRATION
Wrap your mind around that. This is what I mean when I say that the competency of the Biden Administration upsets a lot of people.
Kay
@Matt McIrvin:
Well, I did get the help as I said so I’m not saying “I didn’t get help so no one should”. I’m saying forgiveness doesn’t fix any of the problems with student loans in any kind of reasonable or predictable or consistent way.
I think it’s great the Left pushed for it – I think it’s vastly widened the parameters of what we can or will do for students – but I also think it’s lousy policy – it’s a nutty way to approach an ongoing problem.
They have to fix the college funding system. This doesn’t do that.
Scout211
LOL. That’s what I get for copying and pasting without proofreading. The article has now been corrected.
TBone
@satby: it’s like Don Hankey was in charge 😔 of servicing.
JaySinWA
@rikyrah: Free file isn’t just e-file. It is a Government provided tax filing system like a TurboTax lite after TurboTax and other vendors promised a free teer and then made it nearly impossible to find an use.
rikyrah
@JaySinWA:
I thought all those sites were like the one I used.
Sure, my Federal Tax Forms are free.
But, I have to pay almost $20 for the state one.
Kay
@JaySinWA:
They did fix that though. Now if you click thru from the IRS site to one of the contractors the page that comes up is the free return. They must have added regulations – you don’t have to search for it anymore.
TBone
@JaySinWA: I had to stop in the middle of filing because of hidden fees and pop-up charges during e-filing. I put pen to paper instead.
dirge
Yeah , the arbitrary patchwork aspect is a bit much, even for me. I’m still supportive, given the context of seeing the broader plan shot down, and responding with attempts to use whatever loopholes to help who can be helped. We’ll all wind up in different places on the “get it right” vs “get it now” scale.
Yeah, that’s a huge part of the solution. I think you also have to look at how guarantees work, and who takes the loss on discharged debt. It should be the institutions making the admission and underwriting decisions, so that they’re incentivized to pass on student loans with low odds of repayment. You probably need some kind of backstop, to prevent educational redlining, but you can’t continue with the institutions having no skin in the game.
bbleh
@Oclarkiclarki: if the Dem electorate don’t come out to defeat TIFG, the SC will be the least of our problems. And I fear that throwing an SC resignation into the mix would, among other things, make things worse for the Dems, although I agree that having the issue in the mix could well help the Dems.
Winning the election is the whole ball of wax right now. I’d strongly prefer to minimize distractions and complications.
UncleEbeneezer
@Matt McIrvin: Also, some of the most morally righteous policies like Reparations, Affirmative-Action, DEI, Family Leave for Pregnancy, Transgender Sports Inclusion, a sane approach to Immigration/citizenship etc., are all severely hindered (or completely killed) because of how they are perceived as being “unfair.” Almost any policy aimed at Equity can be framed as “unfair.” So many good progressive policies die at the hands of “unfair.”
Another Scott
@Matt McIrvin: +1 Well said.
I agree with Kay (and Atrios) that programs should be universal (Atrios – “just increase the taxes on the wealthy to pay for it”) – it cuts down on administrative costs, etc. But Congress writes the laws and controls the purse. Biden has to work within the constraints he has.
WhiteHouse.gov:
That’s not “insanely unfair”. That’s the US keeping its promise.
Cheers,
Scott.
gvg
@rikyrah: That was with contractors not the government and they always had narrow rules about who could do it with each company. They would do certain states or certain incomes, but not everybody. This meant that even if nothing changed, I often had to use different companies from one year to another. Figuring out who could do mine was harder than the actual takes. I assume they got paid by the government too.
In addition, I just was never comfortable with a private party having my tax info. I’d rather it was JUST the IRS.
rikyrah
Biden-Harris HQ (@BidenHQ) posted at 9:34 AM on Tue, Apr 09, 2024:
.@MollyJongFast: The really dangerous thing that Trump does, that he’s done previously, is that he’ll say a lie like ‘we’re going to kick this back to the states’ and then get that lie repeated as a headline. A reader will then say oh, he’s going to kick it back to the states… t.co/5SUuA4Jz3y
(https://x.com/BidenHQ/status/1777706759668248851?t=LONHaLNrwtUJkcvLaqs_Kg&s=03)
Another Scott
@Another Scott: Ack!
NOT “insanely unfair” here.
Cheers,
Scott.
bbleh
@Matt McIrvin: @Another Scott: yeah another +1. The perfect is the enemy of the good.
Kay
@dirge:
I think so too. I also suspect the management at colleges and universities really, really don’t want skin in the game, which is one reason we have such an insane, inconsistent “system” – they don’t really want to discuss “skin in the game” :)
I think one also has to add that there is a TON of free community college now. My youngest did a full year of college free when he was in high school.
Citizen Alan
@Baud: I had thought that too. While the opinion was 6-3, Roberts did not join the majority opinion overturning Roe, so it could be argued that Roe would have been preserved if she’d been replaced earlier with a liberal justice. Which is all entirely speculative. The tragedy of it is that she held out almost long enough. Three more months and Biden would have replaced her.
TBone
@dirge: that specialized court system for debtors is not working out so well for Shaye Moss and Ruby Freeman, et al.
apnews.com/article/rudy-giuliani-bankruptcy-georgia-a63f6da1287e244d3e83be4a2b7c6769
rikyrah
@Another Scott:
This makes me so happy. All those people helped. Because, of good government.
satby
Thanks for the well-wishes from everyone. It is a relief, though I had already told my kids that if that loan company tried to get them to pay when I kicked off that debt dies with me. 😆
Another thing to remember, who were the students that resorted to for-profit colleges? Poor kids, minority kids, kids who had GEDs, not SATs. As rikyrah points out, when they started attending college in larger numbers, the availability of grants and rules on student loans changed. For the worse.
SoupCatcher
@rikyrah:
Thank you.
The status quo is unfair and privileges some.
The Biden administration consistently make changes that push the status quo towards more fairness towards more people.
Moreso than any other administration in my lifetime, and I’m middle aged.
Citizen Alan
@Shalimar:
Honestly, my impression of the few statements she made cause me to think that (a) she was afraid Obama would replace her with someone more moderate who would not fully support the issues that mattered to her as forcefully as she wanted and (b) she had a powerful desire to be replaced by the first female SCOTUS and, like most of the world, though Hillary would win in 2016.
Citizen Alan
@rikyrah: I was just thinking that. My belief was that he looked at GHWB’s meteoric approval ratings in the immediate aftermath of the Gulf War, thought he was a shoo-in for reelection, and didn’t want to try to maintain the rigorous schedule of a SCOTUS Justice while in serious and obvious decline.
Kay
@TBone:
Guiliani is a horrible ghoul but he’s also essentially uncollectable. He doesn’t have 148 million dollars and never will. His residences are mortgaged to the hilt and the first people who will get paid are his ex wives – he owes them a ton.
Judgments are nice but to get paid you have to sue someone who has some money.
Melancholy Jaques
@schrodingers_cat:
When did we stop blaming Obama?
stacib
@Matt McIrvin: THIS! It’s unfair that oil companies get subsidies while taking in huge profits; it’s unfair that big ag gets even more subsidies while also taking in huge profits. For the folks who didn’t go to college and are collecting welfare – that can be considered unfair to all the folks who have worked their entire lives. We’re adults and whoever suggested life would be fair is a liar and whoever believed that is a fool. Sometimes it’s your turn, and other times it’s not. Get over it.
TBone
Occupy went on to do great work. I’m proud that I marched with them. They got the powers that be to listen a bit more, instead of writing us off (pun intended).
arcade.stanford.edu/occasion/when-theory-meets-heart-rolling-jubilee-and-lessons-occupying-debt
Brachiator
@satby:
Very happy to hear about your good news. Must be a tremendous relief.
wjca
Appeal, obviously. To the (current) Supreme Court. What could go wrong with that?
/s
Sure Lurkalot
@rikyrah: Agreed on all your points.
To name a few–the tax code is not fair. The justice system is not fair. Income from stock options you can borrow against and not pay income or social security/medicare tax is not fair. Tax payer dollars ciphoned off to private schools is not fair.
If the aforementioned policies were made more fair, both the unaffected and affected would benefit. Starting out with mortgage-sized college debt is a net negative for more than those burdened by said debt.
Paul in KY
@Kay: I didn’t have alot of loan debt and my great parents paid them off.
Brachiator
@rikyrah:
I see that Kay has answered your questions about the IRS Free File and Direct File programs.
I would add that these days I suggest that people efile their tax returns rather than mail them in. During the pandemic, the IRS got into a huge backlog of paper filed returns, which they are still working through. And they need more funding to improve operations.
Efile is more efficient and less prone to incur little processing issues that sometimes affect paper filed returns and might delay refunds.
Suzanne
@Another Scott:
Thank you.
What is “insanely unfair” is that state schools used to be funded roughly 75% by taxpayers (each state is a bit different, so this is approximation). And now that’s more like 10-15%. That’s “insanely unfair”.
schrodingers_cat
@Melancholy Jaques: You are right. The tankie ex-prof who spoke to our DTC a few weeks ago was blaming Obama for the DRONEZ. So irritating. I am seriously wondering whether his operation is funded by the Russians or the Chinese. He was praising them.
wjca
I looked into it. Turns out that, because of where some of my retirement income comes from (I get 1099s), I’m not eligible. Long story short: it needs to allow more kinds of income before it’s really ready for prime time.
rikyrah
Gary Chambers (@GaryChambersJr) posted at 6:25 PM on Mon, Apr 08, 2024:
People talk a lot in the comments about why they don’t vote. My neighborhood is all Black, and we don’t have high crime nor do we get ignored by city leaders. We are a voting and engaged neighborhood.
All politics is local and I think that’s lost on a lot of us. I started doing Civics for the People because I realized most of us don’t know how to make the government work for us. When people won’t do the things you want done in your community, change the people leading in your community. Simple.
The things that impact your life the most are controlled by local and state politics. Skipping elections hurts you, not your enemy.
#AlwaysRising #MakingImpacthttps://t.co/IPCqd8M7mg
Link
rikyrah
Anna Liz Nichols (@annaliznichols) posted at 11:39 AM on Tue, Apr 09, 2024:
An Oakland County judge sentenced Jennifer and James Crumbley, parents of the Oxford High School shooter, to 10 to 15 years in prison, the maximum sentence allowed t.co/49bCd6YWWL
(https://x.com/annaliznichols/status/1777738183645557057?t=b8klMDbPW48J0-dpV4SZQQ&s=03)
Kay
@Paul in KY:
I paid for a year of law school because I lost my free ride when I got a C.
One C!? Yup. It’s fair because if I lose it it goes to some other person and I knew the rules. I cried in the bathroom. I never cried over law school – just that money :)
We were lucky enough to be able to pay for our kids. Just undergrad- they have to pay for their own grad. My middle son took an apprenticeship instead of college – he’s an electrician now- so we helped with his house to even things up as far as he and his brothers and sister. He still may go back. The IBEW has “free” tuition programs for union members. They pay for it of course but it’s free to him.
rikyrah
Adam Klasfeld (@KlasfeldReports) posted at 11:27 AM on Tue, Apr 09, 2024:
Breaking:
An appellate judge has REFUSED to pause proceedings as Trump fights his gag order in his New York criminal case.
(The appeals court denied a separate stay request yesterday.)
(https://x.com/KlasfeldReports/status/1777735021534601534?t=Btbr5NCRzgCitWjAFahicg&s=03)
Kay
@rikyrah:
My husband thought this judge had had it with Trump. You really have to do what they say! That’s really how it works!
rikyrah
Jasper Scherer (@jaspscherer) posted at 11:33 AM on Tue, Apr 09, 2024:
New: @KenPaxtonTX’s office has sued Harris County over its guaranteed income program, alleging that it violates the Texas Constitution.
Court filing here: t.co/SbVgcdEUm1 #txlege t.co/cPyTQiGrq4
(https://x.com/jaspscherer/status/1777736701152251963?t=8M07eSt-mTrDF_Rg7ImQOA&s=03)
rikyrah
Robert Reich (@RBReich) posted at 11:45 AM on Tue, Apr 09, 2024:
Ever notice how forgiving loans is suddenly a big problem when students get much-needed relief, but nobody blinks an eye when billionaires get their PPP loans forgiven? Or when corporations are handed billions in subsidies?
(https://x.com/RBReich/status/1777739540985225377?t=qSC_ZVEHNYcA6t1gI9xzdg&s=03)
rikyrah
UH HUH
The Hill (@thehill) posted at 10:21 AM on Tue, Apr 09, 2024:
Protesters demonstrating against the war in Gaza repeatedly interrupted a Senate hearing attended by Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin and Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Charles Brown. t.co/HQl9I2RcHA
(https://x.com/thehill/status/1777718370688729479?t=6z9fmnuvmzXN6uqcdxIYOw&s=03)
StringOnAStick
@Kathleen: I stopped reading LGM a few years ago for the same reason, plus the hipster cynicism was really bad for my mental health.
Miss Bianca
@rikyrah: there seem to be a lot of bad-faith actors out there in ProtestorVille these days. Which makes me start to wonder if it’s always been like that, or if this is some new trend.
Brachiator
@Jeffro:
Trump’s base hear his rants in full and eat it up.
People can read his Truth Social posts and get a full sense of his infantile rage.
Many in the press consider Trump’s antics as little more than politics as usual. There are a couple of political bloggers I no longer follow who have never commented on Trump’s childishness or desire for retribution.
But I think that the average voter understands who Trump is. I think that most people are disgusted by him. But a sizeable group love it or don’t care.
Kathleen
@StringOnAStick: Oh yeah. I used to read a lot of OG blogs and just had to stop.
Brachiator
A few notes about the IRS Direct File program.
The IRS Direct File pilot states include Arizona, California, Florida, Massachusetts, Nevada, New Hampshire, New York, South Dakota, Tennessee, Texas, Washington and Wyoming.
The pilot will only accept Form W-2 wages, Social Security retirement income, unemployment earnings and interest of $1,500 or less. This excludes filers with contract income reported via Form 1099-NEC, gig economy workers or self-employed filers.
To qualify, you must claim the standard deduction, which is $13,850 for single filers and $27,700 for married couples filing jointly for 2023.
Direct File only accepts a few credits: the earned income tax credit, child tax credit and credit for other dependents. The software also accepts deductions for student loan interest and educator expenses.
In March, the Treasury Department estimated that one-third of federal income tax returns could use Direct File this season and 19 million taxpayers may currently be eligible.
The agency hopes to see 100,000 filings this season, a senior administrative official said in March. That works out to roughly 0.5% of those eligible filers. Roughly 60,000 taxpayers have used Direct File so far and the agency expects volume to increase ahead of the deadline, according to a Treasury official.
Direct File will remain open for rejected returns until April 20.
Kathleen
@Miss Bianca: Biting my keyboard. I have opinions but I will refrain.
cain
@Kay: We had that initially – back in 2007 or something. IT was like 1-2% or some such. My ex-wife had her dental student loans – she managed that for 3 years, on the 4th year it student loans turned to high interest rates.
One of things that happened is that students use the loans to also buy cars, and things to live on – cuz why not? It’s a 1-2% interest loan – I can’t say I wouldn’t be tempted myself given that I’m just starting off in life. You still gotta pay it back. :)
Bupalos
@Miss Bianca: The last justice to strategically retire (under a lot of pressure) was an old white dude, replaced by a black woman. The overwhelming pressure was in response to the jewish woman who refused to retire.
Not only does it not “always happen,” that the liberal woman is forced to retire, it has never happened. Though quite obviously it should have.
Matt McIrvin
@UncleEbeneezer: I know liberals who agree with the right’s current fixation on ending birthright citizenship for people born on US soil because they heard stories about birth tourism and it seems like an unfair consequence.
Miss Bianca
@Bupalos: Concern troll bleats “quite obviously?” I’ve noticed that I almost never actually agree with any of your opinions about anything, and this one doesn’t appear to warrant an exception.
Chief Oshkosh
@H.E.Wolf: Not to be contrary, but I recall that people pissed and moaned for Breyer to step down as soon as Biden sworn in and we had a slim Senate majority (2021). Breyer stepped down in 2022, even though he said he felt he was still fully engaged.
JaySinWA
@rikyrah:
@TBone:
Sorry, late to correction, I had business to attend to. Direct file (as others have pointed out) is the correct term. Free file is the hit you with hidden charges private company site.
The Free file stuff was what was proposed to keep congress from having the IRS just providing free tax filing services. Direct file is a 12 state pilot program.
wjca
It’s certainly not a novelty. I was at Berkeley in the late 60s. There were lots of protests, prominently featuring guys with long hair, which was a sign of serious rebellion then. (And there were riots, too.) Not exactly spontaneous: I made a habit, as I walked onto campus, to pick up a handout saying where that day’s “spontaneous demonstration” would be — so I didn’t inadvertently walk into it.
As it happened, I made the passing acquaintance of a couple of the guys organizing the demonstrations. And organizing riots when they could. They had hair as short as mine (and I was in ROTC). And their actual interest the the cause of the day was minimal; they were trying for revolution, nothing else. Naturally they never went near the actual excitements themselves. Not what I would call good faith actors.
Captain C
@Anne Laurie:
Clarence after Ginni gets busted: “Can we please overthrow Loving right now so I don’t have to deal with getting a divorce, please?!?”
(edited for grammar)
artem1s
@Miss Bianca:
Exactly. If they are so committed to fixing the SC why not spend all that energy going after the obvious target – Thomas – because of the corruption but also, he’s the oldest. Oh and if age is really the issue for these people – here’s the order they should use when demanding any of them retire.
Justice Thomas, 75.
Justice Alito, 73.
Justice Sotomayor, 69.
Chief Justice Roberts, 69.
Justice Kagan, 63.
Justice Kavanaugh, 58.
Justice Gorsuch, 56.
Justice Jackson, 53.
It’s all clearly misogynistic bullshit. When Roberts, Alito, and Thomas are all gone, then the assholes at LGM can whinge about anyone they like.
Captain C
@artem1s: If it were up to me, the five youngest of the Shitty Six would leave the court, whether by resignation, conveniently timed death, or however. This is because I think it would be hilarious to see Bitter Old Thomas as the 1 conservative on a court which consistently rules 8-1 against him. I suspect his dissents would very quickly reduce to “Because Fuck Everyone!, that’s why! Gimme another RV!”
sab
@artem1s: I just turned 70, and much as I love Sotomayor I would love for her to be able to retire if she wants to. We need to win the WH and Senate this year.
I disagree with Bupalos on RBG because I thought Sandra Day OConnor was vile for voting as she did on Bush v Gore just so that she could retire.
Well reasoned dissents can lead to well reasoned majority opinions later. RBG was useful. Sandra Day O’Connor not so much.
Kristine
@satby: Very happy for you and your son. What a weight lifted.
sab
@satby: Yikes!!! We could have done that too with my oldest stepson, moving heaven and earth when the kid finally gets focused.
Sally
@Matt McIrvin: I so agree with this comment. It is universally true, whether about education, health care, or any other social assistance. Also, many of the people complaining the loudest paid a few thousand dollars to attend excellent in state universities – like me. They finished their degrees with little or no student debt
Should everything never improve?
Paul in KY
@Kay: It is good (and a bit lucky) to have good parents who can help you out. I’m sure your kids really appreciate your help!
Kayla Rudbek
@rikyrah: I was one of those people who finally got loan forgiveness in the Biden administration. And in terms of the post title, maybe we Gen Xers and the generations after mine would have been able to afford having kids if we didn’t have the student loan debt.