Joe Biden: No True Friend of
Working Men and Women
Posted August 23, 2008 | 02:21 AM (EST)
Last August, the Democrats held a presidential debate in Chicago. Seven
Democrats participated, with former sportscaster Keith Olbermann
moderating the televised event on MSNBC. It was sponsored by the AFL-
CIO and took place before 15,000 union activists at Soldier Field.
You'd
think the candidates at a Democratic debate dealing with issues relevant to
working men and women would be asked about the infamous bankruptcy
bill signed two years earlier by President George W. Bush. Oddly, you'd be
wrong. Olbermann never mentioned it.
This wasn't the first time
Congress had passed this shameful act. Bill Clinton vetoed it twice in the
90's, so we know where he stands. The credit industry, ever relentless, kept
coming back, confidant they had the number of elected officials necessary
to do their bidding. They did, and Joe Biden was always one of them.
The final version of the bill was cleverly titled the "Bankruptcy Abuse
Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005," but it wasn't aimed at
preventing abuse or protecting consumers, and everyone knew it.
Arianna Huffington wrote on salon.com in March 2005 that this
legislation was "so hostile to ordinary American families that it could only
have come about in a place as corrupt, cynical and unmoored from reality
as Washington, D.C." She concluded: "The bankruptcy bill is morally
bankrupt. And so is any senator who votes for it." She defined the
problem:
"So what does the bill do? It makes it harder for average people to file for
bankruptcy protection; it makes it easier for landlords to evict a bankrupt
tenant; it endangers child-support payments by giving a wider array of
creditors a shot at post-bankruptcy income; it allows millionaires to shield
an unlimited amount of equity in homes and asset-protection trusts; it
makes it more difficult for small businesses to reorganize while opening
new loopholes for the Enrons of the world; it allows creditors to provide
misleading information; and it does nothing to rein in lending abuses...."
It turns out the average annual income of Americans who file bankruptcy is
less than $30K, not the loose affiliation of millionaires and billionaires
gigging the system that we all heard about when this bill was debated. Also,
the vast majority of people who file bankruptcy don't do so to strategically
hang on to their mansion on the hill, but because of medical bills, a job
layoff, or both. Real people, real lives.
I've never filed bankruptcy, but like Bill Clinton I'm moved by those
demographics. Not so our Joe. Of all the presidential contenders lined up
on the stage in Chicago, he was the only one who had voted for the bill. Not
senators Dodd, Clinton and Obama (Edwards was no longer in the senate
in '05), and not House member Dennis Kucinich. Only Joe Biden.
And he didn't just vote for it, he helped carry the water on it. Some
Democrats tried to soften the bill with a series of amendments; for
example, exempting military personnel at war in Iraq. Biden joined the
majority of his colleagues -- all the Republicans and too many Democrats --
in knocking down every possible change that was offered.
For the record, Biden's home state famously holds the incorporation
papers of large credit card and financial services companies. He obviously
knows how his bread is buttered in Delaware, which means a "profile in
courage" by 'ol Joe on the bankruptcy bill was out of the question.
Sure, Biden has a certain rogue charisma combined with what he's
developed over the years as serious experience on the senate foreign
relations committee. He's no idiot. But if part of the calculation in picking
him is that he'll help sell economic populism in the heartland, from
Perkiomen to Peoria, that's a cynical joke whether it succeeds or not.
(By the way, this is an issue Republicans probably won't hit Biden on
because they're as much in the same industry's pocket as he is, and McCain
always loved the bankruptcy bill, too.)
Still, anyone who cares about progressive politics, or the salt of the earth,
knows that the bankruptcy bill is a disaster for average folks. Joe Biden is a
big reason why this is so. He supported it and voted for it, many times over
many years.
That speaks volumes about how he views the rest of the country.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/jackson-williams/joe-biden-true-friend-
of_b_120776.html