Middle class help, part 2

In pretending to be a reporter (though not pretending to be unbiased), I've described the way John Edwards has outlined the problems facing the middle class and his proposals for helping improve their (our) job prospects. Should I say that this is the last in a series and hope for a Pulitzer? Sure, when the ice cap melts, uh, when the ice cap refreezes, ok, when hell freezes over.

What does JE say about his other goals after good jobs? Goal number 2 is a secure retirement. For this, he proposes:

1. Portable retirement accounts that supplement Social Security, not the foolish unfunded accounts that Republicans want to use to destroy Social Security.
2. Support through law and "small amounts of aid" to families whose homes are in danger of foreclosure (but no bailout for the financial speculators). Further re-regulation that learns from all the so-called innovative finance that was designed to enrich the finance companies with no thought for responsible lending. It also learns the fundamental lesson of the crash of 1929 (and this is my gloss on the subject): Financial wizardry is usually intended to move great piles of money from the populace into the pockets of the self-styled wizards.
3. Re-regulate abusive credit practices. See item 2!

Most professionals already have portable retirement accounts. Duh, they're called 401(k)s. Yes, there are others. JE's proposal democratizes them and even matches funds at the low end of contributions. Can you imagine a society which really saves, invests, and owns assets all the way down to the hard-working people in the low end of the middle class? That's where I want to live.

Predatory lending has been a concern for JE for a while. Even though he voted for the 2000 bankruptcy reform, he was out of Congress for the 2005 abomination and objected to it, at least by 2006.

The rugged Republicans always whine about consumer protections against predatory lending. The debtors agreed to the terms - why shouldn't they be held to them? They're grown-ups, aren't they? Well, yes, and there is a balance to be struck. Flippers who hold seven mortgages and got caught holding real estate? Sorry, you lose.

But why is it that Republicans' claims of principle suddenly become silent when a hedge fund needs to be bailed out? They would claim it's danger to the economy at large that demands their willing intervention in capital markets and that it's merely coincidental that those interventions make billions for their core constituency on Wall St. And, yeah, they also have a bridge to sell you.

The problem is that ma and pa trying to make payments on one of today's complicated mortgage products to keep a roof over their heads just aren't big enough to rise to the Republicans' attention. They don't make political contributions, either.

Ma and pa still matter, not just to their kids, but also to the larger economy. Even if it wasn't right to show many of them some mercy on moral grounds, it would still be right on the grounds of self-interest. We've spent a lot of our children's inheritance already by sucking equity out of our homes, and there's no getting that back. We Jiminy Crickets are going to have a hell of a hangover that only time and hard work will - or should - cure. But letting the coming recession (did you hear it here first?) deepen, because the hard-hearted (and hard-headed) Republicans want to punish some little people, is monumentally stupid. JE may not use that sort of rhetoric, but he's not rushing down imbecile lane either.

Turns out this won't be the last in the series. I went on waaay too long yesterday, so I'm going to leave the other two Edwards priorities, relieving pressure points and universal health care, for other days. And if I have the stamina, I may even get into Obama and Hillary. I know, no threats!