I'm a few days lagging on this one due to the combined impact of a family wedding and a Saturday lifted directly from a 1970s Irwin Allen disaster movie. On the bright side, I finally went to a wedding reception where nobody fought and everyone had fun, no one was a jerk, and I got to dance without insult.
But back to work now...
I may be wrong on the origins of this, but as I understand it, the Credit Card companies, sensing they were close to being targeted for governmental intervention, made appointments with mid-level government offices to come to Washington and assure the hussein camp that all was well in their front yards. No need to get all concerned with the credit card business.
Then, and again, this is as I understand it, the Lucy and Ethel of politics, president hussein and that Gaitner thing, invited themselves to the meeting. If anyone knows the story better than me, please feel free to inform me, but this was the version I heard, but can't recall from where... You WILL be credited.
So this mid-level meeting gets hijacked by a well dressed Somali pirate and what do you think, he's not happy with the credit card companies. He wants to re-shape them. You can read some of the story here.
First and foremost, I am the FIRST person to say how much I loathe credit card companies. They are essentially legalized Yakuza with payment minimums designed to keep you paying until thirty years after you've died. Federal intervention in their case is a good thing. With the type of debt that can be run up on a credit card you can pretty much destroy your ability to live a normal life.
Getting the opportunity to replace my 24.99% Visa loan rate card with a 4% loan from the owner of the company I work for ( a loan with a definite pay-off date...) means that I am now looking at a significant increase in access to my own income in another two and a half years. Compare that to a debt that grows just because you're paying the minimum and you can see the obvious benefits.
But do I necessarily want hussein to be the one to tackle this problem? No.
As much as I want to see Visa rot in hell, I am not really interested in vengeance. I just want to be free of them. And then to tell young couples, ala the House of the Rising Sun, not to do what I have done. I want positive change.
And I don't trust hussein to bring about that positive change... I trust him to ruthlessly usurp these very large companies and strip them of their powers and install puppet CEOs who will be answerable to ... I dunno... a "Credit Card Czar" or something. I nominate Wilma Flintstone for that post (I should offer a prize to whomever is capable of identifying that reference...).
Because we have a common enemy does NOT imply that I support hussein. When my boss began to ask me about my financial situation and I laid out a steady road that put me... about six months from no idea how to make my payments anymore, he asked me why I hadn't come to him before. I was very straightforward in my reply... "You're a millionaire", I said. He got a bit uncomfortable and tried to minimize his wealth. "No, I'm not winding you up, I'm being honest. You're a millionaire." He finally agreed.
"You started a small office in the late 1980s and worked your fingers to the bone building up a very large and successful business, you employ a large number of people at least by my standards, and you probably have people coming up to you all the time with their hand out.".
He didn't confirm or deny, which pretty much told me I was right. I continued, "You earned your money. You can do with it whatever you want. You pay my salary so I can do the job I do, and that's the only realistic interest I have in your money. You don't owe me anything just because you're successful. And after many years of surviving on the generosity of others I feel obligated to cover my debts personally.".
This is in reality a near ver batim of the conversation. This was one man to another espousing a philosophy of conservatism.
He later presented me with an offer and we came to a mutual agreement. I then paid off and cut up my credit card. Best weight-loss program I ever had.
But hussein isn't going to approach this with a conservative's eye. He's going to approach this with vengeance in mind. That's how he's handled everything so far. He's pitted American against American over monetary issues, he's putting banks through "stress tests" he's castrating the auto industry, and he's selling out the Israelis to appease his Muslim brethren.
So in a war between the devil you know and the devil who hides his origins, I trust the credit card companies a whole hell of a lot more. They're in it for the money... I can understand that sentiment, even as I seek to distance myself from it. The deceptive one, however, is in it for dodgier, more disturbing reasons of his own, and as much as there might be a momentary "feel good" quality for a lot of people to push back on the credit card companies, the long-term results will be a disaster. They have no choice. Anytime you remove a free market business from its free market practices and start instilling non-business oriented rules to the code of conduct, you basically ruin that business.
I'm one of the lucky ones, I was given a chance to get out of significant and crushing debt and am now paying off on a fixed and realistic schedule a more manageable debt. In the end, the credit card company got a hell of a lot of money from me, so they were not victimized by my leaving them. That was in the contract too. And me, I'm a good bit more savvy about credit cards than I was before.
So I contributed to the economy for a long time, and now do credit on very short-term deals only, and I set fixed pay-off dates on most of those. I have learned to make double-payments where possible, and to guard against too many small loans.
See what experience can do for you?
I'm Dr. Calamity and I approve this message....
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