I was shocked, upon reading an article in the
Black Commentator, to discover that my normally excellent Congressman,
Rick Boucher (VA-9), is signed on as a co-sponsor of the evil Bankruptcy Bill. But I checked, and there he is on the
list of cosponsors.
I live in the 9th district of Virginia. This district is down in the pointy end of the state, the far west regions that encompass some of the poorest old coal towns, small villages, and rural hollers. Rick has largely been great at serving this district. He's good at bringing much needed pork (er, funding) to the area, he understands the needs of his poor, rural, underserved constituents, he is excellent in constituent services, and he's a really nice guy -- I've met him a couple of times at our local party events. Despite concerted attacks by Republicans he wins this conservative district 60/40 or better every time because he does his job so well. So I was completely floored that he'd sign onto such a travesty.
Of course, I had to write him a letter:
Rep. Boucher,
I normally am very proud to have you as my representative and I know that you can't be co-sponsoring the awful bankruptcy bill without some kind of rationale. But whatever that might be, I think you should reconsider your co-sponsorship.
Everything I have read about that bill indicates that its main purpose is to make it much tougher for ordinary people to recover from the kinds of financial difficulties that lead to bankruptcy, while making it easier than ever for the rich and for corporations to escape paying their debts. 90% of private bankruptcies result from crippling medical bills or a death in the family, yet the Republicans are arguing for this bill as if people were casually entering bankruptcy on a whim.
It's a handout to the credit card companies that the Republicans have been trying to push through for years. MBNA, one of their biggest supporters, is known for its predatory lending practices -- high fees, sudden rate changes, extending very high-risk credit and charging for it at usurious rates. These practices, of course, victimize the poor and those with unstable employment situations.
People who are hit with crushing medical bills that exceed their insurance are not protected under this proposed law. Servicemen and their families are not protected. Individuals whose credit is destroyed as a result of fraud are not protected. On the other hand, the extremely wealthy can hide their assets in offshore shelters to protect them in the event of a bankruptcy filing.
What kind of rationale is there for a Democrat to support a bill like that? It's buying into the Republican notion that people deserve exactly what they get -- if you're poor and you go bankrupt you deserve to spend the rest of your life paying; if you're rich and you can't pay your bills, you can buy yourself off with opportunities and loopholes that the poor can't access.
Please let me know why you're supporting this. I'm genuinely curious as to how you think it will help your constituents in the ninth, which is none too flush with millionaires.
Thanks,
I'm sure he'll respond like he always does, with a long detailed letter on heavy cream colored paper in a nice weighty envelope. I can't wait to find out what the heck he's thinking.