Wednesday, August 21, 2013

Louisiana GOP Poll

This from Joe.My.God.  --  follow link to original.

This poll tells you how INSANE Republicans are.  It also tell you how STUPID they are. 

If you think about it, it tells you why I'm just sick and tired of "political discourse" in the USA.  We have become a nation of idiots, pretending to know what we are talking about.  Doesn't matter if it's the "left" when it comes to guns, or the "right" about everything else.

Uneducated, insane people, where "faith" trumps facts and truth.
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http://joemygod.blogspot.com/

Louisiana GOP Poll


I'm sure YOU don't need to be reminded that Hurricane Katrina happened in 2005.

Saturday, August 17, 2013

Victims’ Dilemma: 911 Calls Can Bring Eviction

Now you can't even call the cops if you are a victim - or a woman in a bad domestic "situation".  We are reaching a point where the ONLY one who can protect you is YOU.  The Police no longer seem to have any interest in the old "Protect and Serve" thing.  Now it seems to be about protecting the property of rich folks and corporations.  In America today a poor person is a NON-PERSON!

Learn to protect yourself.  If it's legal buy a pistol and learn to use it.  Train with it as much as you can  --  especially if you're a woman.  The cops today don't give a damn about you  --  especially if you are unmarried, a single mother, a woman of color, a lesbian, or not someone they would "hit on".

We have become the same mean spirited country we were back in the 1850's.  We no longer even PRETEND to worry about the poor, women, minorities, or children.   Heck during the last presidential election cycle some Republican candidates suggested we roll back limits on child labor  --  as a "reform".  We are thoughtless, greedy, nasty, mean spirited, uneducated, near illiterate assholes.  Overly entitled, without a clue.

Again, if you are not one of the new chosen few of America  --  please learn how to protect yourself.

This from "The New York Times"  ==  follow link to original
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NORRISTOWN, Pa. — The police had warned Lakisha Briggs: one more altercation at her rented row house here, one more call to 911, and they would force her landlord to evict her

NORRISTOWN, Pa. — The police had warned Lakisha Briggs: one more altercation at her rented row house here, one more call to 911, and they would force her landlord to evict her
They could do so under the town’s “nuisance property” ordinance, a law intended to protect neighborhoods from seriously disruptive households. Officials can invoke the measure and pressure landlords to act if the police have been called to a rental home three times within four months.
So she faced a fearful dilemma, Ms. Briggs recalled, when her volatile boyfriend showed up last summer, fresh out of a jail stint for their previous fight, and demanded to move in.
“I had no choice but to let him stay,” said Ms. Briggs, 34, a certified nursing assistant, even though, she said in an interview, she worried about the safety of her 3-year-old daughter as well as her own.
“If I called the police to get him out of my house, I’d get evicted,” she said. “If I physically tried to remove him, somebody would call 911 and I’d be evicted.”
Over the last 25 years, in a trend still growing, hundreds of cities and towns across the country have adopted nuisance property or “crime-free housing” ordinances. Putting responsibility on landlords to weed out drug dealers and disruptive tenants, the laws aim to save neighborhoods from blight as well as ease burdens on the police.
But the laws are sometimes forcing victims, especially women facing domestic violence, to choose between calling the police and holding on to their homes, according to legal aid groups and experts on housing and the poor.
“These laws threaten citizens’ fundamental right to call on the police for help,” said Matthew Desmond, a sociologist at Harvard.
In a study of citations issued to landlords in Milwaukee, conducted with Nicol Valdez of Columbia University, Mr. Desmond found that domestic violence was involved in nearly one-third of the cases and that rentals in largely black areas were disproportionately singled out.
Legal experts say the laws can give tenants the lasting stain of an eviction record without due process.
In a federal lawsuit being watched by legal aid groups elsewhere, Ms. Briggs has challenged the Norristown ordinance as unconstitutional.
She did so after her fears were realized.
In June 2012, days after her ex-boyfriend, Wilbert Bennett, moved into her house in this struggling town northwest of Philadelphia, he started another drunken, late-night argument. Then came his most violent attack yet: an assault with a broken ashtray that left a gash on her head and a four-inch stab wound in her neck.
Before she passed out, Ms. Briggs begged her neighbor not to call 911 because of the eviction threat, according to the suit, which is being argued by the American Civil Liberties Union.
The neighbor called anyway. Ms. Briggs was taken by helicopter to Philadelphia for emergency treatment. Mr. Bennett is now serving a sentence of one to two years for aggravated assault.
And Norristown officials instructed her landlord to evict her within 10 days or lose his rental license.
“I was afraid I’d lose my house, my job and, what’s next, my daughter?” Ms. Briggs recalled.
A legal aid lawyer put her in touch with the A.C.L.U., and the city backed away from the eviction demand. Ms. Briggs moved anyway, to a location she hopes Mr. Bennett will not discover when he is released.
Responding to the lawsuit, Norristown officials stressed that they had policies to protect victims of domestic abuse. They said Ms. Briggs had failed to comply with an instruction to obtain protection orders against Mr. Bennett and also against her troubled older daughter, then 19, with whom she had repeated arguments. The police had been called to her home 10 times in the first five months of 2012 and said they had seen no evidence of physical injury.
The suit “fails to take into consideration the health, safety and welfare of all neighbors who live in proximity to a disorderly house,” the town said.
This kind of ordinance began to spread in the 1980s as communities sought to banish drug centers. They continued to proliferate as large cities like Phoenix and Dallas, and suburban towns like Norristown also sought to halt the flight of residents from crumbling neighborhoods.
Since rental properties account for a large share of 911 calls, more cities began to license landlords and press them to control disruptive tenants, said Michael Buerger, professor of criminal justice at Bowling Green State University in Ohio.
The impetus was understandable, he said, as cities like Minneapolis, where he did research, saw good people driven out by the uncivil behavior of a few.
“It’s a form of mission creep, I suspect,” Mr. Buerger said, of the negative consequences now gaining attention. “I don’t think anyone believes that landlords should be able to ignore a crack house. But after three visits for disorderly conduct — it’s less clear.”
Evicting disruptive tenants may help one block but shuffles the problem elsewhere, say advocates for the poor.
“I really doubt this policy ends up saving the city money,” said April A. Hartman, a lawyer with Legal Action of Wisconsin. “Milwaukee spends a significant amount of money dealing with the consequences of homelessness and housing instability.”
Potentially unfair consequences are not confined to battered women.
William Zarnoth, 62, a bartender in Milwaukee, said he worked late and was not involved in disputes between his roommates and a downstairs neighbor that led to 911 calls.
“I wasn’t named in any of the police reports,” he said. But he was ejected with the others in June. He is living in an $80-a-week room and has been turned down for apartments because of the eviction record.
“Now I’m trying to get my name cleared so I can rent a place where I can cook,” Mr. Zarnoth said.
More than 100 municipalities in Illinois have adopted nuisance property or crime-free property ordinances, said Emily Werth, a lawyer with the Sargent Shriver National Center on Poverty Law in Chicago and author of a new report on the effects.
Gwen Kaitis, director of the Illinois Domestic Violence Helpline, said her group received several calls a month from women facing a choice between safety and housing. On a recent day, she said, a woman with five children called to say that her boyfriend had choked her and she was trying to end their relationship, but that her landlord had told her that if the police were called one more time, he would evict her.
In Minnesota and, after a recent revision, Milwaukee, laws specify that domestic violence cannot be grounds for eviction. But counselors for battered women warn that, as happened with Ms. Briggs, the police do not always perceive the abusive aspects of conflicts and the victims — often scared, financially vulnerable and in emotional knots — may not speak up.
Many critics of the laws call them “fundamentally flawed,” in the words of Sandra S. Park, a lawyer with the A.C.L.U. who is helping to represent Ms. Briggs.
The critics, including landlords who say they are caught in the middle, argue that the police, not landlords, should deal with criminal activity and severe disorderly behavior.
“The problem with these ordinances is that they turn victims of crime who are pleading for emergency assistance into ‘nuisances’ in the eyes of the city,” Ms. Park said. “They limit people’s ability to seek help from police and punish victims for criminal activity committed against them.”

Friday, August 16, 2013

18


Nicolet National Bank, Green Bay, Wisconsin, Assumes All of the Deposits of Bank of Wausau, Wausau, Wisconsin

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 9, 2013
Media Contact:
Greg Hernandez (202) 898-6984
Cell: (202) 340-4922
Email: ghernandez@fdic.gov


Bank of Wausau, Wausau, Wisconsin, was closed today by the Wisconsin Department of Financial Institutions, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with Nicolet National Bank, Green Bay, Wisconsin, to assume all of the deposits of Bank of Wausau.
The sole branch of Bank of Wausau will reopen on Saturday as a branch of Nicolet National Bank during its normal business hours. Depositors of Bank of Wausau will automatically become depositors of Nicolet National Bank. Deposits will continue to be insured by the FDIC, so there is no need for customers to change their banking relationship in order to retain their deposit insurance coverage up to applicable limits. Customers of Bank of Wausau should continue to use their existing branch until they receive notice from Nicolet National Bank that it has completed systems changes to allow other Nicolet National Bank branches to process their accounts as well.
This evening and over the weekend, depositors of Bank of Wausau can access their money by writing checks or using ATM or debit cards. Checks drawn on the bank will continue to be processed. Loan customers should continue to make their payments as usual.
As of June 30, 2013, Bank of Wausau had approximately $43.6 million in total assets and $40.7 million in total deposits. In addition to assuming all of the deposits of the failed bank, Nicolet National Bank agreed to purchase approximately $29.9 million of the failed bank's assets. The FDIC will retain the remaining assets for later disposition.
Customers with questions about today's transaction should call the FDIC toll-free at 1-800-517-1846. The phone number will be operational this evening until 9:00 p.m., Central Daylight Time (CDT); on Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., CDT; on Sunday from noon to 6:00 p.m., CDT; on Monday from 8 a.m. to 8 p.m., CDT; and thereafter from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., CDT. Interested parties also can visit the FDIC's Web site at http://www.fdic.gov/bank/individual/failed/bankofwausau.html.
The FDIC estimates that the cost to the Deposit Insurance Fund (DIF) will be $13.5 million. Compared to other alternatives, Nicolet National Bank's acquisition was the least costly resolution for the FDIC's DIF. Bank of Wausau is the 18th FDIC-insured institution to fail in the nation this year, and the second in Wisconsin. The last FDIC-insured institution closed in the state was Banks of Wisconsin, Kenosha, on May 31, 2013.
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17

C1 Bank, Saint Petersburg, Florida, Assumes All of the Deposits of First Community Bank of Southwest Florida, Fort Myers, Florida

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
August 2, 2013
Media Contact:
LaJuan Williams-Young (202) 898-3876
Cell: (571) 215-6027
Email: lwilliams-young@fdic.gov


First Community Bank of Southwest Florida, Fort Myers, Florida, also operating as Community Bank of Cape Coral, was closed today by the Florida Office of Financial Regulation, which appointed the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) as receiver. To protect the depositors, the FDIC entered into a purchase and assumption agreement with C1 Bank, Saint Petersburg, Florida, to assume all of the deposits of First Community Bank of Southwest Florida.
The seven former branches of First Community Bank of Southwest Florida will reopen as branches of C1 Bank during their normal business hours. Depositors of First Community Bank of Southwest Florida will automatically become depositors of C1 Bank. Deposits will continue to be insured by the FDIC, so there is no need for customers to change their banking relationship in order to retain their deposit insurance coverage up to applicable limits. Customers of First Community Bank of Southwest Florida should continue to use their current branch until they receive notice from C1 Bank that systems conversions have been completed to allow full-service banking at all branches of C1 Bank.
This evening and over the weekend, depositors of First Community Bank of Southwest Florida can access their money by writing checks or using ATM or debit cards. Checks drawn on the bank will continue to be processed. Loan customers should continue to make their payments as usual.
As of March 31, 2013, First Community Bank of Southwest Florida had approximately $265.7 million in total assets and $254.2 million in total deposits. In addition to assuming all of the deposits of the failed bank, C1 Bank agreed to purchase essentially all of the failed bank's assets.
Customers with questions about today's transaction should call the FDIC toll-free at 1-800-591-2916. The phone number will be operational this evening until 9:00 p.m., Eastern Daylight Time (EDT); on Saturday from 9:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m., EDT; on Sunday from noon to 6:00 p.m., EDT; on Monday from 8:00 a.m. to 8:00 p.m., EDT; and thereafter from 9:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m., EDT. Interested parties also can visit the FDIC's Web site at http://www.fdic.gov/bank/individual/failed/firstcommswb.html.
The FDIC estimates that cost to the Deposit Insurance Fund will be $27.1 million. Compared to other alternatives, C1 Bank's acquisition was the least costly resolution for the FDIC's DIF. First Community Bank of Southwest Florida is the 17th FDIC-insured institution to fail in the nation this year, and the third in Florida. The last FDIC-insured institution closed in the state was Chipola Community Bank, Marianna, on April 19, 2013.

Friday, August 2, 2013

vacation

Am on vacation.  Will return fairly soon.  This time I really need a break from the insanity that grips our nation.