Proposed legislation in response to Katrina

[Sindawe]

I came across the following a bit ago, its off a liberal blogsite, but the intent makes sense to me.

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Bankruptcy


Every Dem had better line up to support this, include the Senators from MBNA.


Rep. John Conyers, Jr., Rep. Mel Watt, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee announced today that when Congress returns next Tuesday, they will introduce legislation to protect the thousands of families and small businesses financially devastated by Hurricane Katrina from being penalized by anti-debtor provisions contained in the Bankruptcy Abuse Prevention and Consumer Protection Act of 2005, scheduled to take effect on October 17, 2005. Reps. Conyers, Nadler, and Jackson Lee released the following joint statement:

"We are concerned that just as survivors of Hurricane Katrina are beginning to rebuild their lives, the new bankruptcy law will result in a further and unintended financial whammy. Unfortunately, the new law is likely to have the consequence of preventing devestated families from being able to obtain relief from massive and unexpected new financial obligations they are incurring and by forcing them to repay their debt with income they no longer have, but which is counted by the law.

When the Judiciary Committee considered the Bankruptcy Abuse and Consumer Protection Act earlier this year, Ms. Jackson Lee offered an amendment to protect the victims of natural disaster like those now devastated by Hurricane Katrina. While the amendment was defeated on a party line vote without any debate, we hope that in light of recent events our colleagues will recognize the importance of protecting our most financially vulnerable Americans.

The legislation we plan to introduce will prevent new bankruptcy provisions from having adverse and unintended consequences for the hundreds of thousands now facing financial catastrophe by providing needed flexibility for victims of natural disasters in bankruptcy proceedings.

Our common sense bill will insure that we do not compound a natural disaster with a man made financial disaster. We hope to obtain bipartisan support for expedited consideration of this critical legislation."

##109-JUD-9/1/05##


Source: http://atrios.blogspot.com/2005_08_28_atrios_archive.
html#112560030552421807
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[Greg L]

I wouldn't mind seeing the entire bankruptcy law that is to go into effect scrapped. The shock waves from this disaster are going to spread across the entire country in one way or another (if you are a consultant in Chicago for example but most of your clients were in the oil industry in Louisiana, or an independent trucker who would lose money by delivering his load, etc). Go back to what it was a year ago & reevaluate in a few months/years.

 

[Standing Wolf]

Rep. John Conyers, Jr., Rep. Mel Watt, Rep. Jerrold Nadler, and Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee announced today that when Congress returns next Tuesday, they will introduce legislation to protect...

I'm supposed to believe anything that bunch says?

 

[M-Rex]

Our common sense bill...

I shudder every time I hear this phrase. I suppose time will tell.

 

[beerslurpy]

But I thought the bill was never supposed to hurt people who really need bankruptcy protection. Oh right, that was a lie. Who could have imagined that a handout to the financial services industry might hurt the people at whose expense it was given?

 

[Refirignis]

October 17? That must be the one that will make every single person's minimum credit card payments henceforth be doubled. Bankruptcy? Indeed.

 

[Rabid Rabbit]

You might have forgotten who pays for the bankruptcies. We all do, through higher prices for everything, less of a return on the stocks your retirement plan owns in financial companies, jobs because the company can't collect etc....

I don't mind people declaring bankruptcy for real reasons, sometimes major changes happen unexpectedly but I personally know too many people that knew they were spending beyond their means and had a "oh well" attitude about the whole process. Legal theft is what I call it in those situations. Those are the people that should not be allowed to declare bankruptcy.

Don't blame the financial companies for making it too easy to get credit. They get sued if they don't make it easy, they get sued or take losses if they make it too easy. No matter what they do somebody isn't happy.

 

[Art Eatman]

IF, IF, IF: This is truly limited to major disasters, I don't have a problem. As usual, it's the legalese equivalent of the "fine print" that is worrisome.

The funny thing about the blaw as it's now written is that it helps the financial industry for the short run, but hurts it over the long run. There will be more difficulty for people to run up the amounts of debt--and interest--that have led to the problem which the law was intended to "fix".

Art

 

[R.H. Lee]

Great. More dependency. Don't get me wrong, it's not the relief provision that is the problem. It's the blind, stubborn, self centered pig headed refusal on the part of these politicians to acknowledge that the environment of multi generational dependence they created caused the problem in the first place.

 

[Can'thavenuthingood]

Who pays in the end?
Pretty much a sure bet for passage since its a vote getter for wealth redistribution type potlickers. Also it is just what is needed to quell the screamers we see every night on the news videos.

I think the potential for unrelated laws to pass on this bill is tremendous.

Vick