Remember 2008? That whole subprime mortgage crisis thing? Millions of foreclosures overnight? Billions of dollars in working class savings gobbled up? Collateralized debt obligations? Mass layoffs leading to skyrocketing unemployment, orchestrated by an elite class of millionaires and billionaires who went on to cash in massive bonuses and avoid any jail time whatsoever?
You do? Well get used to that feeling. Because at the going rate it will back very, very soon.
Introducing H.R. 685, the Mortgage Choice Act of 2015. The bill, passed by the House of Representatives on April 14 and awaiting a vote in the Senate, lowers the standards for a Qualified Mortgage (QM) as specified by Dodd-Frank and the Truth in Lending Act. According to D. Sidney Potter at the Huffington Post:
“A QM has a 43% debt to income ratio. The [National Association of Realtors] would like to see that ratio kicked up, possibly to the 50% plus range. The downside of that waiver, is that it results in a high rate of loan default. The subprime ratios in the mid-2000’s were regularly in the 50% to 60% plus range.”
The N.A.R., which Potter mentions, is just one of the dozens of organizations relentlessly lobbying for legislation like H.R. 685. The bill was brought to the floor by Rep. Bill Huizenga, a former real estate agent, and endorsed by real estate finance giants like the Mortgage Bankers Association, the National Association of Federal Credit Unions, and the Mortgage Lenders Association.
Make no mistake, this bill could very easily become law with a newly republican senate. And if not, you can bet a bill just as ludicrous will make its way to the House floor in a year or so, probably with even more funding and support. Sadly legislation like H.R. 685 is just about inevitable in a system where elections serve as nothing more than glorified auctions that go to the highest bidder.
And that’s the true root of the problem. As long as elections are fundraising contests, bankers and billionaires will find ways to buy legislation like H.R. 685 that benefits their quarterly spreadsheet and screws over the masses. For progressives who want to see that change, campaign finance reform should be the single most important issue on your voting docket.
So you probably agree, right? You’re probably thinking, “Screw H.R. 685! Screw those elitist republicans trying to manufacture another housing bubble! I want campaign finance reform and I want it now!”
You’re probably voting for… Hillary Clinton?
Hillary Clinton. The same Hillary Clinton whose net worth is upwards of $20 million. The same Hillary Clinton who charges $300,000 to speak in public. The same Hillary Clinton whose top campaign donors include Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and JPMorgan Chase.
That doesn’t sound like change to me.
Whether or not self-described “progressives” would like to admit it, the candidate with a real solution to campaign finance reform is staring them directly in the face. His name is Bernie Sanders. He publicly supports a progressive tax rate. He denounces and criticizes the new Trans-Pacific Partnership, which is wildly untransparent and a likely threat to thousands of American jobs. He voted against the war in Iraq, champions single-payer healthcare and supports a reasonable raise of the minimum wage.
Oh, and he doesn’t take money from corporations.
Democratic critics of voting for Bernie spew the same tired logic over, and over. He’s too far left, so they say, and because of that he won’t win over the moderates in the south and midwest. Nate Cohn made this point rather convincingly. So did Harry Enten, and Dylan Matthews, and many others. Their numbers are just about inarguable: Hillary is all but guaranteed to win the democratic primary.
But when that happens, I want “progressives” who took part in that result to take a long, hard look in the mirror. Do you loathe the American election process? Do you cringe at the idea of bankers exploiting another financial crisis? Do you want to see real change now, not later?
Well look in the mirror and say “Too bad.” You just voted against it.
jconway says
Sanders has stated time and time again that his candidacy has very little to do with Hillary Clinton. Staking his candidacy on those terms does much to elevate her position and inevitability within the party while shrinking the actual ideological vision and shift Sanders is hoping to affect with his candidacy.
He is not in this to “beat Hillary”, and he decisively rejects the media’s tired ‘who’s up or down?’/’maverick vs frontrunner’ narrative they keep trying to foist on him. This is about asserting a profoundly progressive and populist economic agenda back at the forefront of Democratic politics. It means turning the dirty words of ‘social democracy” into a mainstream value once again.
dsweet says
Newsflash, Hillary Clinton is way past inevitable for Dems in 2016. And re: asserting a progressive shift in the economic agenda–sure, Hillary might pander to progressives when Sanders is in her face, but once the primary is over she will shift back to the center where she feels comfortable.
After all, if she wins she needs to worry about 2020, which means she can’t really do anything to piss of her buddies on Wall Street until the decade is over.
The only way Bernie’s platform will be implemented is if he wins.
johntmay says
..for an independent, white, male voter who pays little interest in politics except for a little water cooler conversation at work and an occasional visit to NBC or Fox News to vote for Hillary Clinton over any predictable and boring Republican who talks about lower taxes, the elimination of “waste fraud and abuse” in government and things like “freedom”.
In other words, take a look at Martha versus Charlie and tell me how Hillary versus anyone is going to win.
jconway says
1) Bernie is no Berwick
I was a Don supporter too, but he basically was a one note, single issue candidate, and an issue that did not gain traction in either the primary or the general election. For better or for worse, Romneycare is as good as we will get for a considerable amount of time. Especially since the VT experiment blew up in Shumlin’s face. A sad reality, but a reality we need to accept.
Bernie by contrast, attracts independents who flocked to McCain in 2000 due to his strict insistence on fair play and clean elections, is a raving populist taking on Wall Street, and is obviously indicting an entire system of inequality rather than one piece of it. He will be significantly stronger at raising money, attracting attention to his issues, and shifting the debate.
2) Hillary is no Coakley
Hillary has wanted to be President for quite a long time, it was never clear what Coakley wanted since she bounced from running for Senate to running for Governor, and she just seemed like a climber who had no rationale for her candidacy beyond platitutudes. Hillary also has real reasons for wanting to be President that Coakley could never articulate for being Governor.
Hillary is basically running as her real self, the woman who chastised Sen. Brooks, who worked on the Watergate Commission, and who has devoted a considerably amount of her career to ending childhood poverty and empowering women. I see her shifts to the left on immigration, on economic inequality, on paid leave, crime, and on healthcare as genuine shifts and reflective of her true beliefs.
I see her shift on gay marriage as more of a calculation of moving to where the base is, but also a realization that while civil unions makes her middle aged Midwestern Methodist side more comfortable than marriage-they ultimately fall short of what her liberal lawyer side recognizes is equality under the law. And frankly, her foreign policy views are genuine. She has been a sincere hawk since the 90s, and strongly beliefs that the US should be a global police force to right international wrongs. I am more confident she can competently manage this foreign policy vision than her husband or George W Bush, and I am confident it is more of a vision than the muddling through lack of a policy Obama has. But, a return to HW Bush realism is desperately needed, and sadly will be avoided by the major contenders in both parties. I hope Sanders or Chaffee can move her to that position with their runs.
3) None of these Republicans are Baker
The clown car that is the GOP primary field is significantly to his right. Let us not underestimate that Baker won over a decent chunk of the suburbanite moderate vote by running as a Weld-Cellucci Republican. He is at 75% approval rating because he has governed as one. All of the Republicans running will govern has hard core social, economic, and foreign policy conservatives. Even Rand Paul has conformed to this and rejected the states rights and realist approach to social and foreign policy issues that once made him slightly different. And with Walker or Rubio excepted, I think Hillary could easily defeat that stale vision in a general election. The more interesting question is if Sanders could.
methuenprogressive says
Voting for Clinton in the primary is showing support for this bill?
What a silly thing for you to believe.
dsweet says
More like voting for Clinton is a vote to sustain the election process that routinely puts bills like HR 685 on the House floor.
methuenprogressive says
– Mark Joseph Stern, Slate
paulsimmons says
…where the right to bear arms (open or concealed) without a permit is enshrined in the State Constitution. One of my major sources of amusement over the years is the fact that both Sanders and Howard Dean were elected largely due to NRA support against (mildly) pro-gun control Republicans.
Information about Vermont’s gun laws can be found here, here, and here.
methuenprogressive says
He didn’t believe his anti-Brady Bill vote was the right thing to do?
—
Anyway, the OP is claiming only insane folks would vote for Clinton, because of a bill introduced by the GOP she has no connection with. That claim is beyond silly.
Yet you claim Sanders’ actual pro-NRA votes, and actual support of pro-NRA bills, aren’t relevant?
paulsimmons says
I simply state that neither Sanders, nor Dean, nor the bulk of the Vermont electorate support gun control beyond the limitations in the Vermont statutes.
jconway says
I’m with MP on this one, I don’t see the direct connection. Particularly if she is going to be forced to govern by her party in Congress, including our senior senator, to make significant reforms to the way Washington works. She is on record supporting an amendment overturning Citizens United, and the reality is, the Democrats would lose if we tied our hands to the public financing system as it exists now. To the extent that it is broken, Obama deserves as much blame as Clinton, and he isn’t supporting this bill either.
I get that the culture should change, and Sanders has the complete freedom to make that argument. But when the general starts, barring someone else getting nominated, I don’t see why Hillary has to neuter her campaign to prove a point.
Christopher says
…and she is saying all the right things on some of these very issues. As to the supposed knocks against her, her donor list is worth scrutinizing (though she was the Senator from NY, home of Wall Street, after all), but you make it sound like her net worth and speech income are per se bad things, a notion with which I strongly disagree. I long ago decided that I was supporting HRC regardless of who else was or was not in the race. She is hands down the best prepared to be President and I do not see evidence that at the end of the day her sign/veto tendencies would not be basically the same as Sanders.
jconway says
Still skeptical of her record on foreign policy and trade. But, that is exactly why we are going to have a robust debate in the primary and not a waltz to the nomination. I will say, I am far less likely to hold my nose for her after this great start to her campaign. Hope she can maintain this posture throughout, and am looking forward to a great debate.
ryepower12 says
that’s true. However, the differences were small.
Her tenure in the Senate wasn’t exactly progressive, but she was no Chuck Schumer either. But neither is Obama a Chuck Schumer, either.
The point is, though, when you elect a bunch of Barack Obamas, Hillary Clintons and Chuck Schumers, you create a body politic in which Wall St. gets 99% of everything it wants, yet complaining bitterly about that last 1%.
If Bernie Sanders were President, he would immediately shut off the Wall St. spigot. He’s a dramatically more progressive candidate, dramatically strong on labor issues, clean elections, and — of course — breaking up the banks (which neither Clintons have ever been for).
I voted for Hillary in the 2008 primary, and would happily vote for her as the democratic nominee.
But our country will be a much better place if Bernie Sanders was President, and there’s no harm in giving him our votes in the 2016 primary.
He is heads and tales above Hillary Clinton on every single progressive policy position out there, at least of any great import, and he doesn’t just say that he supports things, he has a decades-long background as a Mayor, United States Congressperson and Senator actually doing it. That’s going to be the most important difference between them of all.
ryepower12 says
Is everyone can vote for Bernie and if Hillary wins anyway, she’s still the democratic nominee.
If Bernie wins, all the better for progressive politics.