HOW TO BREAK UNHEALTHY ATTACHMENTS TO PEOPLE

OESTERHOUDT ON RELATIONSHIPS

People often approach me for relationship advice. I don't like to flatter myself, but I'm good at it. I know a thing or two about human beings and their capacity to live with each other. I have credentials. I have been in a committed relationship for eleven years and I have endured every emotional, physical and sanity-damaging challenge you can possibly imagine. Along the way, I have coped with jealousy, envy, longing, lust, passion, disappointment, infidelity, vanity, heartache, reconciliation, misunderstanding, rage, sleeplessness, abuse, frustration, ecstasy, contentment, simple joy, tension and anxiety. I have even weathered trying health troubles at my partner's side, like unforeseeable life-changing accidents and mental illness.

When it comes to living with another person, I've been around the block. I'm not a boy anymore. I'm a man. That's not a boast. That's a fact.

In many cases, people ask me whether they should transform pleasant acquaintances into lasting relationships. Others ask me how to overcome consumptive attachments they develop to people, then the terrible disappointment that flows when their love interests do not reciprocate their devotion.

These are related situations. They arise frequently. When a person tries to force a relationship onto another level, a power struggle ensues. One person wants something the other might not. This leads to a disparity in desire, as well as wishful thinking and blind faith that the other person is acting in accordance with your fantasies. In short, it is emotionally dangerous. When you start expecting another person to act the way you imagine they will, you are setting yourself up for heartbreak or worse.

I did this in my first love. I became very close friends with someone when I was just a teenager. I loved our time together. We had a very special friendship and I felt respected whenever we met. Eventually, my feelings grew stronger. I wanted a romantic relationship. I started believing that he did, too. He really didn't. I wanted him to love me the same way I loved him. I turned it over in my mind all the time; it kept me up at night. I wanted to talk to him all the time, but I didn't want it to seem that I was the only one making the phone calls. So I would wait around for days at a time wishing that he would call me; and of course he didn't. When he finally did call, my heart would race and I would stumble on my words. I felt that I was speaking to my savior; he had all the power over me. It was just pathetic. I was slavishly dedicated to him even though he never gave me the reciprocation I craved.

It took me several years to break my attachment to this person. I wasted so much psychic energy on an illusion. I will never do it again.

Now I see clearly what I did wrong. I created a whole mental patchwork of fantasies about my friend. Those fantasies overwhelmed my mind. I expected my friend to act in accordance with them. It was unrealistic, of course, but when you're craving a person's love, you do not think reasonably. My mistake was this: I fell in love with a subjective fantasy image, not a real person. And when the real person did not act according to the fantasy script in my mind, I felt crushed. I expected too much; and I learned that people are basically inscrutable: They rarely act the way you really want them to.

My youthful attachment to my friend was unhealthy for another reason: It led me into slavishness. I hung on his every word. I followed his every action with total devotion. I delivered my fate into his hands. Whatever he did, I followed. I gave him all the power because I wanted him to give me what I wanted. I wanted him to love me so much that I sacrificed my own dignity and spirit to win his affections. I stumbled on my words when I was around him because he was my mental master. I wanted too much. That made me slavish.

I did not break my attachment to this person until I stopped wanting what he had to offer. And that is the lesson: If you have an unhealthy attachment to a person and they are not showing you the love you want, you must convince yourself that they have nothing you want. Once you do that, you will stop obsessing about them. You will regain your peace of mind and dignity. You will reorder your desires and think clearly again. True, it is hard to do. But you will thank yourself if you can pull it off.

Let us try to understand how this works. We develop unhealthy attachments to people when we WANT something they have. "Want" is the most important word in our mental lives. It expresses our truest desires. It honestly discloses who we are. No one controls what we want; our personality dictates it. We are never so happy as when we get what we want because it satisfies our deepest, most personal yearnings.

Problems arise when we want something that only another person can give. In this case, we cannot easily address our wants because we cannot directly slake them. And because the other person has what we want, we make concessions in order to entice him to give us what we crave. We indulge him far more than we should. We bow, scrape, flatter and stumble on our words. We make our love interest our master; he has power over us because he has the discretion whether to grant us what we want. That is unhealthy. It leads us into despair because we willingly enslave ourselves to his will. Disappointment and frustration become our dominant emotions. We never get what we want. And we are crestfallen every time our love interest does not act the way we expect--which is much more often than we'd like.

But there is a way to overcome this cycle. To break the attachment, you must engage your reason. You must take control over your own desire again. You must convince yourself that the other person has nothing you want. If you can do that, the other person loses his authority over you. He becomes indifferent to you. You get to say what you want, not him. You can pursue your own desire again without a fickle middleman. That is freedom in the purest sense.

I know it is difficult to do this when you are caught in an unhealthy attachment. It is hard to engage your reason when you are contorted with unrequited desire. But it is worth the effort. It helps to have a distraction that breaks your incessant attention to your love interest. In my case, I met someone else who took my mind off my obsession. It helped me turn my mind away from its destructive focus on unattainable affection. Within a few weeks, I felt free again. It was wonderful.

If you ever find yourself with an unhealthy attachment to another person, think about why you feel the way you do: You want what the other person has. You put your happiness in his hands. You heap unrealistic expectations on the other person and you disappoint yourself every time he acts some other way. You give him total power over the way you feel. Conceptually, it is easy to understand. To break the attachment, you must simply stop wanting what he has to offer. Once you control your own wants again, no one will ever tyrannize you with frustration and disappointment. And life feels much better when you're not frustrated.

FAIR LABOR CONTRACTS? WHAT ARE THOSE?

THE MYTH OF EMPLOYMENT IN AMERICA

PART 3 - CONTRACTS

Commerce would not work without contracts. Contracts provide legal assurance that people will adhere to their commitments. Both commerce and the law presume that men do not naturally hold to their word. But no one would take financial risks if they knew their fellow man would not fulfill his promises. So the law supports commerce by forcing men to do what they say. If they don't, they must face dire economic consequences. Men don't like dire economic consequences, so they adjust their behavior to avoid them.

In theory, contracts reflect a perfectly equal bargain between two perfectly equal commercial parties. One party wants something the other has. Each parts with something in order to gain something from the other. It is not gratuitous; it is methodical. One party suffers detriment in the precise proportion that the other obtains benefit. And there are no flaws in the bargaining process: The law presumes that both parties are rational, shrewd, cynical businessmen who know all the risks before committing to do something. Thus, neither can complain when something goes awry: After all, when two rational, equal adults bargain for something, they have a right to delineate who bears the risk if it does not work out.

But does this sound like commercial reality? Certainly not. In most commercial exchanges, parties are not equal. One party inevitably has more money and power than the other. As a result, the stronger party can leverage his strength to foist more risk and burden on the weaker party. After all, the weaker party needs what the stronger party has. So what authority does the weak party have to influence the bargain? He can take it or leave it. If he leaves it, he does not get what he needs. That is commercial reality: A perennial Hobson's choice. The legal myth of "equal exchange between equal bargainers" is a tiny exception to the rule: Unequal, unfair exchange between parties with gross disparities in power.

I always marvel at inconsistencies between legal myths and practical realities. They always reveal a tension between theoretical aspirations and cruel commerce. After all, theory and reality follow different paths. Just because something exists in theory--as it may in legal doctrine--does not mean that it exists in reality. Theory is just an overlay. Theory concerns objective abstractions; as long as a situation exhibits a few technical requirements, it is "so." But practice is more fluid. It does not restrict itself to formulae or aspirations. In practice, the only inquiry is: "Does it work?" If it works in accordance with principle, fine. If not, no big deal.

In most cases, people just want things to work. That is certainly true in commerce. It is one thing to strike a technically enforceable contract. It is quite another to strike a just one. After all, practical realities reflect existing power structures. Things "work" when they please those who have power. Contracts are usually unfair because they work best when they are unfair. The strong offer terms to the weak in a manner that satisfies legal requirements. As a practical matter, they maintain the unequal relationship. The law has nothing to say about that. And that suits the strong just fine.

On some level, everyone knows this. Everyone suspects that contracts somehow "screw them over." They do not exactly know how. They just know that if the other guy does not deliver, they will have no recourse against him. But if you do something wrong--or if something unforeseeable happens--he will have recourse against you. This is why everyone fears "fine print." It is as if everyone who signs a contract resigns himself to the idea that the bargain is one-sided. They know the "fine print" will work against them when push comes to shove. They just hope it doesn't come to that.

So much for equality in bargaining: Everyone who signs a contract knows that he is subjecting himself to the other's unlimited authority. He doesn't even know how much power he's giving the other guy. He just knows the "fine print" gives the other guy license to do almost anything to him.

I see support for my analysis everywhere. Just yesterday, for instance, I watched a clip from the 1998 movie "Player's Club." In it, Bernie Mac plays a sleazy strip club owner named Dollar Bill. In one scene, his DJ (Jamie Foxx) enters his office to complain about how much money he has to forfeit from his paycheck every week. Bernie Mac looks him straight in the eye and says: "I got a contract between me and you that says you do what I tell you to do. Therefore, shut the fuck up. Don't say nothing, don't speak to me, don't look at me."

That concludes the negotiation. Bernie Mac is the employer with power. Jamie Foxx is the employee without it. The contract symbolizes their unequal relationship. It embodies a fundamental disparity in power. By law, it allows the strong party to tyrannize the weak one; it even allows him to silence the weak one when he complains about the terms. True, the weak party can walk away from the deal. But what if he has mouths to feed? Another Hobson's choice.

These are the practical realities. There is no "equal exchange" between "equal partners" in most commercial relationships. Rather, in most cases, the result is more like the exchange in "Player's Club": One party needs a job and a paycheck; another offers a job and paycheck in return for the power to dictate all the terms and control the employee's conduct. As a practical matter, contracts grant power to one party while subjecting the other to the same power. They generally operate in one direction. And if the weak party complains, the strong party just has to whip out the contract and explain why he has the legal authority to do what he is doing. If there's a dispute, the strong party wins. That's practical reality.

I mention all this because it coincides with my weekly motif concerning employment in the United States. Contracts perpetuate the "Myth of Employment in America" by granting legal authority to strong parties to dominate weak ones. Employment "terms" in America are rarely equal. And they certainly do not reflect full and fair bargaining between two evenly-matched commercial entities. Rather, a weak party needs a paycheck. A strong party offers one; and that gives him the right to dominate the weak party's life in exchange for almost nothing.

According to the law, contracts reflect equality. But practical realities paint a vastly different picture. When it comes to contracts, there is a disparity between law and reality. The real questions are: Who wants what; who's giving it; and who gets to say who does what in exchange for it. Those questions are invitations to tyranny. And when private employers operate under the "profit principle," do you really think they will treat employees in a way that threatens their bottom lines? Certainly not: And that is exactly why contract law allows them to function as they do.

So to all the employees out there who are disgruntled with their lot: "Shut the fuck up, don't say nothing. Don't speak to me, don't look at me."

You signed it. You wanted it (kind of). So live with it.

Go ahead and leave. Think you'll be able to pay your rent if you do? It's your choice.

That's not just practical reality. That's commercial reality, too. It's not a fair game.

JOIN THE TEA PARTY : BE PATRIOTIC--AND IT'S MORE FUN THAN YOU THINK

LET FREEDOM RING

By : Mr. H. Henry Patrick, Esq., Former State Legislator (Virginia); Real Estate Owner (1400 Acres in several Virginia counties); Former Chair, Citizens for the Abolition of the Income Tax (1982-1997); Outdoorsman; Contributing Editor, Breathe Free Magazine (2004-present); Author, Government, Get Your Goddamn Stinking Hands off my Hard-Earned Keep, And Stop Poisoning My Children : I'll Spend my Money Any Way I Please, Thank You Very Much (a Pamphlet published by Freedom Press)(forthcoming 2010); Winner, West Virginia Sport Shooters Remington versus Doe Contest (1999); Volunteer Fireman.

In 2008, Barack Obama took the White House promising "change we can believe in." But in the months that followed, Obama did something terrifying: He expanded the government. He began policing banks, stealing private property, handing out cash to unemployed luggards and awarding free health care.

Now, government threatens everything we hold dear. It threatens to seize our property, tax our children and kill our grandparents by condemning them to wait in grimy clinics for necessary care. Government threatens to spy on our wives, monitor our whereabouts and punish us for defending liberty. Put simply, government is suppressing freedom in a way never before seen in the United States. And we're all paying for it.

Barack Obama may have thought government could solve our problems. But to quote Ronald Reagan, government is the problem. And if we don't act soon, we will live in a gulag in which our daughters will be forced to wear red bandanas and sing workers' hymns.

Smart Americans recognized Obama's shtick for what it was: Socialist snake oil. That is why they banded together to form the Tea Party. We are committed to resisting Obama at every turn. We are committed to protecting our children from government propaganda. We are committed to the ideal that every American deserves to own his own property without governmental interference. We are committed to keeping every penny in our paychecks.

Obama believes exactly the opposite. He believes that government has a right to take away property and give it to people without property. That is why we resist him. We refuse to surrender our property so that some black beggar in New York can get a free heart transplant. We refuse to give up our rifles to government agents. We refuse to pay a single nickel so that lazy unemployed people can get a free meal. After all, free meals are un-American.

In the Tea Party we believe in a simple virtue: Responsibility. Sadly, that virtue does not carry much weight in Obama's America. Yet responsibility made America great. Our forebears did not wait around for government checks. They cut down trees, built homes and warded off Indian raids. They did not whine about being poor. They started wholesale companies, sold wheat and made their own fortunes. Or they died trying. That is the American way: Make money, ask no one for help, or go down like a man. In this country, you need to fight hard to survive. We aren't softies. We're toughies. We pass by dying people in the street without a second thought.

Government used to know its place in America. Our forebears established government in this country not to feed the poor, but to protect their property. They did not establish government to handicap their economic affairs. Rather, they established government to keep order so that they could attend to business in a responsible way. Furthermore, our forebears hated taxes. They revolted from England because they did not like paying taxes on their hard-earned labor. After all, who would want to work knowing the government could just come in and take away all his profit? That is why our forebears broke from England.

And that is also why we began the Tea Party: To resist tyrannical government and to protect private property from government seizure.

We believe that every American should join the Tea Party. If you are sick and tired of paying away your honest paycheck to the government, you should join us. If you don't like the idea that you slave away at a horrible office job so a toothless homeless man can get a free hospital stay, you should join us. If you don't like the idea that your children read propaganda praising the Kennedys in public schools, you should join us. And if you can't stand the idea that government can steal your land, you should definitely join the Tea Party.

Americans are all about freedom. So are we.

In the Tea Party, freedom is not just an abstract principle. It is an impetus for action. We have work to do before we achieve freedom. We will not be truly free in this country until we cast off the terrible burden that government has thrown upon us. We will not achieve freedom until government removes its filthy tentacles from our bank accounts, mutual funds, paychecks and corporate treasuries. We will not be free until we drive government tax collectors off our property and drive our automobiles without government licenses. Nor will we achieve freedom until we remove our children from pernicious public schools. In a word, we have a battle to fight. And words alone will not win it.

To realize the dream of freedom through the Tea Party in America, we must rise up against tyranny. We must declare that We are the People. We made this government; and that means we can un-make it, too. When government disrespects our property, then turns around to give free meals and diabetes treatment to black people, it must be abolished. We have a right to overthrow tyrannical regimes. Obama is a tyrant. He disrespects private property. Unless we act against his government today, he will plunge our country into a new dark age in which every American can obtain low-cost health care and unemployment insurance. What's more, unless we act against him today, we will drown in taxes. And our children will not be safe from schools that observe Black History Month and Gay Awareness Week.

Do not hesitate to do the right thing. Do not hesitate to be a patriot. But joining the Tea Party is not as grave as you think. It is also very fun. It is fun to angrily carry torches through the streets and chant slogans like: "Down with the income tax!" It is fun to break windows and smash down doors. It is fun to participate in anti-tax riots. It is fun to tar-and-feather IRS officials. It is fun to throw half-clad judges from third-floor chambers. And it is very fun to burn down courthouses. What's more, it is simply exhilarating to exchange smalls arms fire with Federal officers. And it is even more thrilling to blow up police cars. In this light, Tea Party membership is not just about boring policy speeches. It is also about having a great time actively rebelling against the government: And that means fighting, shooting, burning, breaking, smashing and blowing things up. Everyone loves that.

There's a place for everyone in the Tea Party. You don't need to own land to join us. We need everyone. We need young people to storm State houses and string up legislators. We need sociopaths to set fire to government buildings and kill tax collectors. We need children to stop going to school. We need hardened gun owners to give us muscle to match our spirit. And we need educated people--like Sarah Palin--to direct our loyal followers. In a word, we need everyone--and we need you now.

It is time to send government a message it will never forget. It is time for freedom. It is time to stop paying taxes. It is time to own your own property again. It is time to pay your laborers whatever you want, not what the government tells you to pay them. It is time to spend your money as you please, not to pay for unfair entitlement programs and free medical care for lazy people. You want to hold on to your own money, don't you? If you make $10 an hour, you don't want $241.97 for working 40 hours, do you? Well, if you want a fair-and-square $400 for 40 hours at $10 an hour, the Tea Party is the party for you.

Americans want freedom. They want a life without government interference. They are sick and tired of tax returns, excises, duties, imposts and liens. They are sick and tired of Martin Luther King, Jr. Day and affirmative action. They are sick and tired of public schools and government propaganda. They are sick and tired of jury duty and ineffective courts. They don't want their sons and daughters learning about cultural perversions. And they want the liberty to hire whomever they please. Put simply, Americans have this to say: "Government, hands off my goddamn money and kids!"

So be patriotic. Stand up for freedom. Tell Obama that he'll get your money and kids--in hell. And have fun doing it. Open your drawer and take out that pistol. Take the shotgun off the mantle. Grab a rock. Light up a torch. Then take to the streets. Start shouting about liberty. Prowl for fire stations and police outposts. Hunt down crossing guards and public school teachers. Get together with your friends, fill up a few Molotov cocktails and toss them into your nearest courthouse. Vandalize police vans. Tear things down. Spit on a town councilman. If the police try to arrest you, fight back against government tyranny until your last breath. Yell out to them: "You may take my life. But you'll never take my freedom!"

Join the fun. Join the Tea Party. Stand up for a full paycheck. And tell Obama that you refuse to allow America to sink into the new dark age of free health care and financial industry regulation.

Over our dead bodies. And Mr. Taxman, you'd better run, because the Tea Party is about to begin.

So to all you aggrieved Americans out there, we have just one thing to say: Lock and load. We're taking this mother down.

NAUGHTY BAILED-OUT BANKERS ARE ENEMIES OF THE PEOPLE

Советские Решения Современных Экономических Проблем в Америке Обамы

(SOVIET SOLUTIONS TO CONTEMPORARY ECONOMIC PROBLEMS IN OBAMA'S AMERICA)

By : Mr. Lavrenty Pavlovich Beria, Member, Communist Party of the Soviet Union; Commissioner, National Office of Internal Affairs (NKVD)(1938-1945); Senior Investigator, People's Commissariat to Eradicate Spies, Traitors and Unpatriotic Defeatists Uncommitted to the Public Good (1934-1948); Close Confidant to Joseph Stalin (1926-1953); Orchestrator of Soviet Wartime Production (1941-1945); Manager of Undesirable Population Relocation Program to Central Asia (1941-1951); People's Prosecutor against Lithuanian, Polish, Latvian, Estonian, Ukrainian, German, Hungarian, Czech, Romanian, Slovak and Yugoslavian Traitors and Capitalist Counter-Revolutionary Troublemakers (1938-1953); Pistol Enthusiast and Marksman; Executed 1953; Resurrected 2010.

I am here in America at the request of the Chairman of the Federal Reserve System, Mr. Ben Shalom Bernanke. This Mr. Bernanke--Jewish capitalist intellectual counterrevolutionary though he may be--is a capable man. He understands that your country is in grave danger. He knows that the American economy is teetering on the brink. Most importantly, he understands that traditional "American" methods will not return your country to prosperity. That is why he called me.

Let me briefly summarize my conversation with Mr. Bernanke. He said that the United States is now suffering from a "persistent recession" that has resulted in massive unemployment. He attributed this "recession" to unregulated banking practices and large-scale greed among large financial firms. He also informed me that government has begun playing a much larger role in private financial affairs. He even said that government has paid billions to private banks in order to prevent them from failing. I believe I say this correctly: Your government "bailed out" the wealthiest capitalist pigs in order to allow them to continue loaning money to everyone else.

I applaud America's new commitment to government intervention in the economy. Although it does not come close to the Soviet example, it nonetheless represents a step in the right direction. In Stalin's Russia, we regulate everything. There is no private property. The State owns the banks. If a miserable little banker gets out of line, we shoot him and bury him in an unmarked grave. We even shoot his children and wife. That's how we regulate bankers in Russia. True, this frightens bankers. But it also prevents them from defrauding the people. Sometimes pistols are more effective than laws.

I understand that your country is not the Soviet Union. Mr. Bernanke informed me, however, that these ungrateful bankers have actually taken government money and used it to pay their own bonuses. Additionally, they have thumbed their noses at the very government that saved them from ruin. Mr. Bernanke told me that "something must be done" about these devious, greedy bankers. He asked my advice on the subject.

I am happy to lend my expertise in dealing with your banking problem. First off, let us understand the situation. Your government has taken an unprecedented step to rescue private banks from their own capitalist follies. It has actually given State money in order to prevent them from failing. In return, government can expect allegiance from the banks. In essence, "bailed-out" banks are no longer private. By taking government money, they have subjected themselves to government regulation. They have ceded their private nature. As such, they must listen to your orders. If they don't, they must suffer serious consequences.

Yet now the bankers act as if they never took your money. Worse, they have used your money to invest in the evil New York stock market, where they earned spectacular profits. Rather than return the money to you, they have insolently awarded themselves monstrous bonuses and sent their children on European vacations. They have renovated their villas and hired high-priced prostitutes for week-long champagne orgies at sultry Caribbean hideaways. They have purchased long yachts, "cigarette boats" and Bentley automobiles. They have gallivanted on million-dollar ski trips. All the while, they have refused to hire more workers or act in the public good. To the contrary, they have done little but enrich themselves. They are having the time of their lives--all thanks to government funds.

I share your disgust with these ungrateful outlaws. I am pleased to offer my assistance in "regulating" them. They are Enemies of the People.

We must increase our regulation efforts. Your country must cease relying on "laws" and "procedures" to tame wayward bankers. You will only stop naughty bankers by adopting Soviet-style banking regulations. Bankers are ruthless pirates by nature. Ruthless pirates only understand one language: Brutality. If America wishes to rein in these pirates, it must start regulating with pistols.

Let me explain what I mean by "pistol regulation." As Commissioner of the Secret State Police in the Soviet Union, I became an expert in the craft. Here’s how it works: Once I identify an enemy of the People, I quickly dispatch agents to his home at about 4:30 AM. Generally, most people are either asleep or just waking up at that time--even ambitious capitalist pigs like your wayward bankers. They are in no position to resist ten armed police agents. Most surrender without a fight. In fact, very few ever know we're coming. We investigate in secret.

Once taken into custody, my agents bring the enemy to a secret building with no windows. There, a State security agent informs the enemy why he is an enemy, then tells him to explain himself. This is just a formality: Nothing he says will save him. Basically, it just gives us an opportunity to have a good laugh while the man pisses himself, falls on his knees and begs for mercy. After we've laughed enough, we bring in an officer who says he has judicial power to pronounce sentence. He gravely tells the enemy that he has been found guilty of treason, at which time several armed guards take him into another dimly-lit room. They push the enemy face first against the wall, then shoot him in the back of the head with a pistol like this one:

After that, the guards clean the blood, skull fragments and brains off the floor, remove the body and send it off for cremation. Then I release a press statement describing the enemy's crimes against the people. I close the statement by noting that the "dangerous enemy" has "faced justice for high treason."

Now, once your naughty bankers know that they may face "pistol regulation" for squandering State funds, they will think twice about buying new homes and throwing lavish dinner parties. In fact, some might even invest their money in public projects or--God forbid--hire some people. As you can see, "pistol regulation" carries two benefits. First, it eliminates bad behavior, like embezzling public money. Second, it encourages good behavior, like reducing unemployment. After all, no one wants to get that knock on the door at 4:30 AM. Bankers start behaving much better once they notice that their greedy colleagues aren't in their offices anymore.

You have made a wise decision to enlist my help in regulating your financial industry. You understand that your traditional "American" methods will not impress these rapacious profit-hounds. To the contrary, your entire constitutional system--with its burdensome right to counsel, "independent judiciary" and "proof beyond a reasonable doubt" procedure--favors the accused. Worse, when the accused has money--as these bankers do--it is even more difficult to convict them. Even then, it takes years for appeals to pass. Plus there's a chance that banker-friendly judges will free their pals. Under your laws, you can't even execute these piratical bankers for their offenses.

This is simply unacceptable: You need Soviet "pistol regulation" or these dogs will walk all over you with "procedures."

Still, you can do it. You have already made an unprecedented step by allowing the government to intervene in the economy. Now, you must take the next step by holding bailed-out bankers to their bargains. If a banker takes government money, he must do as the government says. No more can you tolerate their ingratitude. It is not just embarrassing. It is bad for the country.

To that end, I will do my part to hunt down these criminals. Their lawyers and cash bribes will not stop my agents from putting bullets in their brains. I have wide experience sniffing out wrongdoing; nothing escapes my notice. We will work together to send a simple message: "If you take government money, you had better not use it to pay your own bonus."

I will find every banker who scoffs at government regulation. Believe me, they won't be scoffing after my agents show up at their swanky penthouses at 4:30 in the morning. In fact, they'll be crying, begging, moaning, wailing, pissing and shitting themselves. A few will get angry and shout. But my men will pistol-whip them until they behave.

Enough talking. Let's get to work. We have an industry to regulate. And we have Enemies of the People to eliminate.

NEW YORK RENTS & THE FREE MARKET : A LITTLE PROFIT IS NOT ENOUGH

OESTERHOUDT STRIKES

Most people know that it is expensive to live in New York City. But most people do not realize just how expensive. Rent in Manhattan is truly exorbitant when you consider how little your money buys. While it has always been relatively more expensive to live in New York as compared to any other city in the country (exception: San Francisco), prices have accelerated especially quickly over the past 15 years. One-room studios in Greenwich Village used to cost $900 a month in the mid-1990s. Now they can cost up to $2900. That is acceleration, baby.

What caused this? Do landlords suddenly deliver more value in 2009 than they used to deliver in 1994? Do you get free champagne service and a complimentary shoeshine with your apartment now? No—you get the same thing you got in 1994: a semi-trashy walkup with old fixtures. Your landlord is just making a much bigger profit than he used to. Real estate markets in other States took a beating in recent years. But not New York. Things just kept on marching skyward here. And now virtually no one can afford it except wealthy publishing heirs, Japanese industrial magnates, Hollywood celebrities and various prematurely gray, professional workaholics with no lives who hire nannies (weekends included, because they work then, too).

I often write about profit and the “ugliness” of commercial enterprise in general. Rent in New York City encapsulates my views on the subject like no other. Why are rent prices in New York so high? If landlords are not delivering more value now than they did in the past, what entitles them to keep charging more? According to free market principles, price is a function of “supply and demand.” Applying those principles, it is easy to see why New York rent prices increased so much since 1994. There is a very limited supply of apartments in Manhattan (it is a pretty small, narrow island, after all), and demand for them has steadily increased since “Giuliani time” (ie, the era during which many Americans began to feel that hoodlums, bandits and various “minority thugs” no longer ruled the streets).

Not many apartments. A lot of people want them. They’re going to cost a ton. That’s the free market for you. The same thing happens with umbrellas when it rains: Not many umbrellas. A lot of people want them. The hawkers can charge anything they want to exploit the sudden demand. An umbrella that costs a dollar on a sunny day costs $40 in a downpour. People call this “price gouging” when a street hawker does it. But when a Manhattan landlord or industrial baron does it, it’s called “prudently reacting to progressive market trends.” No matter what you call it, it adheres to the same principle: Make as much profit as you possibly can in the circumstances.

I find this all atrociously ugly. In the free market, those with “goods in demand” suddenly obtain the power to screw everyone else simply because they can. I have written about this power in other circumstances. Banks, for instance, charge fees for ATM use—up to $4.00 for taking out $20.00—because they can. They don’t need to charge that much to cover their cost and make a modest profit. In the free market, modest profits are not enough. Those with the power to make a profit want gratuitous, gluttonous, bountiful, excessive, disgusting, fattening, overflowing, sumptuous, fat-dripping profits. They don’t want to make $1 per unit; they want $100 per unit. This is just the way the free market works. When someone has the unique power to provide goods or services in demand, he or she can throttle the public for far more than the goods or services are worth. Modest profits are no good. In the free market mind, only luscious profits are appetizing. After all, why go into business if you can’t really cash in?

At this point, someone will naturally object: “Prices reflect operating costs and factor in some margin for profit, but nothing excessive.” This might be true in markets in which goods are not in special demand. But it is not true in the New York rental market. Consider this example: My friend’s father co-owned an apartment building in Manhattan starting in 1959. In 2001, he said that he could make a decent profit on a one-room studio (450 square feet) by charging no more than $715 per month. He sold the building the same year. The company that bought it began charging new tenants $2900 for the same apartment in 2002.

Overhead cannot possibly have increased that much in one year. The landlord did not increase the rent by over 300% in order to defray new costs. He increased the rent because he could; and demand was so high he could actually get away with it. He was not satisfied with the “modest profit” he could net from $715 per month. He wanted the bulging, luscious profit he could wring by charging four times as much. This is the free market at work: Take demand and drain it for all it’s worth, no matter how shameless the “gouging.”

I do not write all this in order to abolish the free market. I know the Soviet Union failed, so spare me that standardized objection. I mention it only to point out there is nothing at all dignified about free market forces. Some have the good fortune to own goods or offer services at a time and place in which they are in special demand. Everyone else needs the goods and services. This arms those who possess the goods or services with unusually disparate economic power. The party with power has discretion whether to exploit it by overcharging and making a huge profit or acting “fairly” and making only a modest profit. When it comes between big profits and small profits, which one do you think the true free marketeer will choose? This is not just natural human avarice at work; institutional factors come into play, too. Corporations, after all, are fictional entities established for one reason: To maximize shareholder wealth. “Maximize” means “get the most you can in the circumstances.” As such, corporations have a legal duty to “gouge” as much as possible for the goods or services they sell (subject always to laws that would cost more to violate than ignore).

I do not like tilted playing fields like this. That is why my blood boils when I read about New York rents. Landlords essentially charge thousands of dollars for something that is really worth hundreds. I know for a fact that they do not need to charge as much as they do. They do it only because they want to gorge themselves on profit. At the profit table, New York landlords are not content to nibble or even eat their fill. They need to stuff themselves with profit with orgiastic relish. And even then they are not satisfied. The same apartment that cost $4200 a month last year will go up to $4500 a month next year, and on and on until you have to flee, making room for the next fully-bankrolled trust fund heiress. In my view, this is just disgusting.

I do not lightly use the word “disgust.” Generally, I criticize the concept because people use it to underscore perverse moral judgments on many subjects. But I honestly feel disgust when I learn about people who make excessive profits on goods or services that should not yield so much profit. After all, there are so many people who struggle in this country for next to nothing. Millions worry in desperate fear whether they will lose their home or go bankrupt because they can’t pay for an unexpected medical expense. Yet there are those who sit in offices and rake in billions simply because they had the good fortune to own choice property. Their hunger for profit drives everyone else to despair. The irony is that they really don’t need to charge as much as they do, not even close. But they charge $5000 for a $1000 apartment because they can. I find that disgusting.

I have no solution to this. Perhaps it is humanity’s fate to endlessly seek maximal profit at others’ expense. Perhaps there is nothing we can do to temper the human urge to maximize profit when opportunity permits. Perhaps this is just the way we are. Commerce, after all, is warlike. By nature, man is a violent creature. He seeks to dominate his fellows. But in civilization, he can’t assert his dominance with brute force, so he uses “civilized” means, such as economic tyranny and legal oppression.

Commercial struggles replace the struggle for survival in the wild. And just as survival in the wild requires total victory over natural foes, so too does commercial dominance require total victory over every conceivable foe. The urge to maximize profits reflects that desire for “total commercial victory.” Modest profits simply do not cut it.

What would the world come to if landlords only charged “what they needed to survive plus a little extra?” Sadly, people only take risks in our society if they know they’ll get a chance to gorge themselves at the profit buffet. No one would risk all for a mere chance to nibble or snack. Although this hunger for excess might lead to “progress” and “prosperity,” it sure makes life bitter for everyone else who has to tribute food to the buffet.

TAZERS : LEGAL, BUT WRONG

AN ESSAY

Two weeks ago, a Texas highway officer stopped a 72-year-old great-grandmother for driving 60 miles per hour in a 45 speed limit zone. See video at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cdDdwxJyZZI. The officer asked the woman to sign a ticket promising that she would appear in court to answer the charge. She refused. The officer ordered her out of her car and violently shoved her onto the roadside. Naturally, she became upset. He raised his voice and threatened to “taze” her unless she complied with his orders. She continued to refuse. Finally, after trying to return to her car, the officer fired his tazer into her body, causing her to shriek and collapse to the ground. As she writhed in pain beneath his feet, the officer shouted: “Get down! Get down! Or you’re going to get tazed again!”

Thanks to the officer’s decisive action, the dangerous suspect surrendered. Well, she really did not have a choice because her muscles were unresponsive. The officer cuffed her and took her into custody. She was charged with speeding and resisting arrest. She suffered no physical injury. When the officer’s dashcam footage made the news, however, the Sheriff’s Office quickly rallied to his defense. A police captain said he acted “properly at all times” and that “no one suffered injury.”

Tazers have generated debate for as long as they have existed. Law enforcement hails them as a revolutionary means to subdue violent, resisting offenders. Liberals call them inhumane, degrading weapons intended to humiliate and subjugate citizens. Law enforcement stresses that tazers “do not cause permanent injury” and are thus “safer than nightsticks” or other bygone restraint methods. Liberals point to the grotesque spectacle that ensues when 50,000 volts of electricity flood through a human body, rendering it instantly limp and motionless. For the liberals, the question is not efficacy. It is dignity and humanity. For law enforcement, the question is crime control and “officer safety.”

I fall on the liberal side in this debate. Nobody likes crime, but no one can suggest that law enforcement should have a free hand in adopting any methods necessary to control it. After all, our Constitution would mean nothing if, as a society, we decided that we wanted to control crime “by any means necessary.” Our Bill of Rights proceeds on the assumption that unchecked government power represents a threat to individual liberty. Government power is most dangerous in the hands of the Executive branch, and that includes the police forces. Without constitutional guarantees securing our bodies, property and dignity, the police could freely detain, question, torture, humiliate, degrade and coerce us at will, all in the name of some nebulous “crime prevention.” We tolerate Executive power only on the understanding that we retain rights against it as individuals. Among those rights is the right to reasonable, dignified treatment by executive officers.

Tazers represent a “means” to enforce the law. For Machiavellians, “means” mean nothing as long as they effectively achieve the desired “ends.” When it comes to crime, the “ends” are compelling: Stopping criminals and enforcing the law. But what means are permissible to effectuate these goals? Machiavelli would have praised Hitler for his commitment to crime control. His police forces knew no boundaries in their efforts to suppress crime. They were highly successful because they had every “means” at their disposal to investigate and prosecute “offenders.” But this example exposes the deep moral flaws in Machiavellian thinking. Means do matter, at least in a constitutional democracy with claimed commitments to lasting principles such as dignity, equality and justice. In America, we have always defined ourselves against tyrants with unrestrained power over citizens. Tyrants employ every means necessary to maintain dominance and control over their subjects. In this sense, Americans have always been deeply suspicious of Machiavellian thinking in government because tyrants read Machiavelli. In our constitutional order, means matter as much—if not more—than the ends.

Tazers bring these age-old issues into focus. Many States now authorize the police to use tazers in order to suppress dangerous or resistant crime suspects. Proponents cite medical evidence that the tazer’s electric charge—while substantial and fearsome to behold—only temporarily shuts down muscle function, leaving the subject uninjured. The subject experiences massive pain for an instant, then it vanishes. Many States embrace tazers because they do not cause “permanent injury.” Many States even reference reports that “old” restraint methods are actually more dangerous because they can potentially cause “permanent injury.” For these States, tazers offer a way to completely subdue suspects without causing injury or placing officers in harm’s way. These States focus on the objective benefits that flow from tazers. They focus on the “ends” that tazers achieve. On paper, it looks good. Tazers are “legal.” They are “modern.” They are “effective.”

But what about reality? Tazers do more than merely “subdue suspects.” They represent a massive, overwhelming intrusion of governmental power onto the body of the individual citizen. Consider the power dynamic in a typical citizen-police confrontation involving a tazer. In most cases, the citizen is unarmed and upset about being accused of a crime. The officer, by contrast, has a gun, wears an official uniform and threatens to employ a futuristic-looking electrical device to render the suspect totally powerless in an instant. Even if the suspect has not committed a serious infraction, the officer holds all the authority. Furthermore, he has the raw, technological means to enforce his will over the suspect. When he says: “Step back,” he has the power to enforce compliance and punish defiance by sending a 50,000-volt shock through anyone petulant enough to question him. Thus, the officer has all the cards. If the suspect does or says something he does not like, he can employ his technological advantage to utterly break the suspect’s physical and emotional capacity to defy him. All the tazer videos show this dynamic at work. The officer seems to relish his ability to reduce his antagonist to utter subjection. Even when the suspect goes down and begins wailing like an injured pig, he continues shouting and even threatens to “taze him again” unless he complies with his every command.

Is this rational law enforcement? Or mere power play?

Tazers are frightening devices. They do more than merely “allow” police to “control” unruly crime suspects. They arm executive officers with a devastating weapon that breaks individual citizens’ will and reduces them to compliant, screaming children. In my view, this is too much. I do not like government action that impinges deeply upon the dignity of the individual, whether or not they are crime suspects. When a police officer shoots an unarmed suspect with a tazer solely to punish him for willfulness or resistance to orders, I see tyranny, not legitimate “crime control.” No matter what benefits the State claims from tazer use, I cannot bear the spectacle of citizens reduced in an instant to a shrieking quarry. It bothers me to know that government can do this to its own citizens in a constitutional democracy. “But it does not injure them,” say the tazer defenders. Perhaps not. But tazers certainly inflict pain, indignity and humiliation on them for daring to question a police officer’s authority, even if it is misplaced. In my eyes, that is too much power for an executive officer to possess. It is not about crime control. It is about governmental conduct. And dignity matters to me.

Sadly, most people disagree with me. They wonder why I have sympathy for crime suspects. They also wonder why I care about some worthless criminal’s dignity. Even the Supreme Court disagrees with me. In case after case, they reject constitutional challenges alleging “arbitrary” police conduct. The Court says that you have a “liberty interest” to be free of “arbitrary police action” that “shocks the conscience” because such action “offends the decencies of civilized conduct.” See, e.g., Sacramento v. Lewis, 523 U.S. 833 (1998). But the Court whittles away that hopeful language by requiring challengers to show that the police “intended to cause harm unrelated to the legitimate object of arrest.” In tazer cases, the police will never admit that they intended to cause you harm; in fact, they will simply say they did not cause you “harm” at all, because tazers “do not cause permanent injury.” Your writhing agony after being hit by 50,000 volts does not qualify as “harm,” because it was not “permanent.” This is the mischief to which hypertechnical legal argument can lead.

For me, dignity means more than the legal abstractions our Supreme Court is willing to define in law. I defend everyone’s dignity against governmental intrusion because I believe in the principles that animate our constitutional order. In my view, that order reflects the primacy of the individual against government action. And in police-citizen confrontations, government action grossly overpowers individual autonomy. In unfair fights, I favor the underdog. I think anyone who believes in the individual over the government should think the same thing. In my eyes, zapping people with tazers because they refuse to comply with intimidating police orders is wrong and unfair, whether it is “legal” or not. Tazers allow government to physically and emotionally break individual citizens into abject submission with a single trigger pull. I do not like that idea.

There are so many things in our society that are “legal but wrong.” I place tazers in that category. What do I mean by this? To understand what I mean, I return to the tension between “ends” and “means.” Legislatures—and the citizens who elect them—can choose to make certain things “legal.” In so doing, they democratically enshrine certain value judgments concerning what “ends” must be achieved. Many State legislatures have decided that tazers admirably advance the governmental interest in “crime control.” They made tazers “legal” without really reflecting on the “means” they chose to accomplish their purpose. Yet there is a different source for “right” and “wrong;” it does not flow from the legislature, or even the Constitution. Legislatures make things legal or illegal; they do not make things “right” or “wrong.” In many cases, legislatures make things legal that are also good. But they also make things legal that are wrong. Tazing people is wrong but legal. It is wrong for government officers to zap citizens into utter submission, whether or not they suffer “permanent injury.” It is wrong to inflict scorching pain on citizens, even if it is “temporary.” It is wrong to inflict pain on citizens merely for being willful or for questioning the basis of governmental action. It is wrong for government officers to use tazers to childishly assert dominance over citizens. No matter what legitimate goals tazers serve, I think they are the wrong means to achieve them.

I am fully aware that law enforcement proponents will heatedly disagree with my views on this subject. They are welcome to disagree with me. I understand that some people value crime control more than others, and that some people believe that criminal suspects do not deserve dignity or respect from government. I know there are people who do not really care whether government violates a person’s dignity as long as that person is “a criminal” or somehow “blameworthy.” I believe the contrary. In my view, dignity and respect are absolute governmental obligations in our constitutional order. They are principles that go beyond mere expediency. They apply whether the subject is a murderer or a saint. And they should prevent government from adopting certain methods to effectuate otherwise legitimate goals.

My response to the law enforcement apologists is this: Once we allow increased government intrusion onto the bodies of individual citizens, what’s next? We allow tazers. They allow officers to inflict pain and degradation on people who have not been convicted of any crime. Why? “Because we want to control crime,” they say. Yet that is a broad mandate. What fearsome methods might we also permit to effectuate that goal, as long as we move “incrementally?” What about a tazer that stops the heart “temporarily?” What about a tazer that causes “temporary memory loss?” These are significant deprivations, no matter whether they are “permanent” or “temporary.” A suspect could claim: “Government stopped my heart,” and no one would care. That is profoundly troubling.

If we do not take a stand for individual dignity at some point, there is no logical end to potential governmental intrusion upon us. If we do not make dignity a meaningful principle, we all degenerate into lawyers arguing about whether something is “legal,” even when we know it’s wrong.

A PRIMER ON COLLECTION LAW, AND A WORD ON CIVIL PROCEDURE

Today I wrote a little self-help guide for a friend who faces a debt quandary. I post it below.

I often write about debt and the unfair relationship it represents. I wanted to share this overview to reinforce my thoughts about creditors, debtors, debt and the legal processes that operate in this area. In short, debt collection in America reveals the essential conflict between JUSTICE and LAW in our legal system. By examining the legal processes and power disparities that operate in these small debt cases, we see clearly that our system cares far more about vested contract rights than it cares about fair procedure. Civil litigation itself favors the powerful. Even in cases in which the weaker party has legal merit, litigation imposes such expense, confusion, technical intimidation and inconvenience that the weaker party rarely gets a chance to assert his arguments in a fair forum. Even if he does, he may not know the "proper form" in which to submit his arguments. And that can lose him the case on "formal" grounds, no matter how substantial his arguments.

We can bicker over who's to blame for the credit mess in this country. We can blame consumers for being improvident. We can blame creditors for putting too much faith in financially weak borrowers. We can blame mass media for implanting insidious impulses to buy things in weak minds, leading to mass economic stupidity. We can even blame the health care system and crushing education costs for creating a nation of perennial, powerless debtors. Depending on your political views, you will either blame the strong party or the weak party. No matter where you stand, however, these issues are real and pervasive. Debt is a fact of life in America. In my view, it is not a good fact. But we must live with it and consider its social impact on powerless people.

Our Framers said that debt was the cousin of slavery. The more I live with debt and witness its emasculating effects on people, the more I see the truth in that dictum.

Thanks for reading.

Oesterhoudt.

I would be glad to give you a few options, but since I do not know all the facts, please use your discretion in applying them. You said first that you "might owe this debt." That is extremely significant. If there is no valid debt, your original creditor cannot transfer it to a third-party (ie, a collection house). You said that the collection house sent you a letter and you didn't recognize the person who says you owe money. That is very common; debt is a "business." It is rare that original creditors ever bother to pursue older debts. Instead, they sell the RIGHT TO SEEK YOUR DEBT to a third-party collection house for, say, half the debt value. Then the collection house "steps into the creditor's shoes" and tries to throttle you for the full debt amount. In this way, the creditor wins because he gets "something" from what appeared to him an "uncollectible" debt, while the collection house stands a chance to make a profit by paying $400 for something from which he might get $1000. It's very nasty. And you're the "target" for the collection house's potential profit. If they don't wring you for more than they paid for your debt, you are a "loss" for them. Corporations don't like "losses."

Having said this, collection houses masquerade as law firms. In fact, they are little more than sweatshops where nonlawyers line up in cubicles, get on phones and harass people for money. You will never talk to a lawyer if you call a collection house. Instead, you will get an unreasonable clerk who will browbeat you into making admissions. Don't do it. The law can do nothing against you until the collection house PROVES you owe a valid, legal debt. They can only do this with genuine evidence. Obviously they have filed a lawsuit. They must have some evidence to substantiate their claims. DO NOT make their job easier by suggesting you "might owe" the debt or by answering other questions, such as "how much you make" "where you work," "whether you have any savings," etc. They are just trying to make you seal your own coffin, no matter how nice they might try to make it sound. In short, do not give them ANY information. If you ever do call them, get information FROM THEM, not the other way around. I would advise against an "informational" or "explanatory" letter. I think it's great that you care about honor and decency. Sadly, the law cares not for these things, nor do collection houses. In most cases, collection houses USE people's sense of honor against them by making them confess they owe far more than they do, or they owe it to someone (like the collection house) who does not have a right to it. This may seem hard to grasp, but being a "good person" will never help you in a legal matter. You will get trampled. That's why I don't practice anymore!

Still, the collection house has the burden here. They have to show that you: (1) owe a VALID debt; and (2) they properly obtained your debt from your original creditor. Additionally, you are right to be scared of defaults. Defaults represent a collection house's most significant legal weapon. This is perverse, because defaults mean that the opposing side in a legal dispute simply did not answer, allowing the claimant to win even if he is wrong. In our system, we think that fairness should prevail. Fairness in a legal case implies that BOTH SIDES have a full opportunity to explain themselves without regard to wealth, status or situation. Collection houses do not want to give you such a "fair opportunity." After all, fairness reduces their chances for a quick win, and time is money. They just file the lawsuit in some distant court, hope to scare you with legal-looking papers, then rely on your ignorance. They trust--and expect--that you will not answer the complaint. If you default, you LOSE your fair opportunity to contest their evidence. That totally undermines our justice system. But again, our system has less to do with justice than power, and collection houses are more powerful than working individuals like you.

Even against this unfair background, you have options. But you must understand that a lawsuit has been filed. Informal answers will not suffice to protect your rights. To legally answer a complaint, you must APPEAR IN THE COURT WHERE THE COMPLAINT WAS FILED. That is the only way to stop the default clock. In routine collection actions like this, debtors almost never appear. Nonetheless, look to see WHERE they filed the lawsuit. Before you are liable for any debt, a State court must have JURISDICTION over your person. If the collection house filed against you in Maryland, but you live in Massachusetts, a default judgment in Maryland will not affect you at all. And under the Constitution, Massachusetts courts would not be bound to enforce it by garnishment. Of course, if you had some contact with Maryland (ie, you did business there or something) you might be liable. But in most cases--especially collection cases--collection houses file lawsuits in the most obscure places, often in States that have no jurisdiction over the debtor. They simply trust the debtor's ignorance to win by default or "fright." They also minimize the chance that the debtor will appear in court against them because it is well-nigh impossible for a wage-earner in California to appear in a Maine court. This increases their chances for a default win.

So my first option is: Check the court in which the suit has been filed. If it is in Hawaii or something, you can be assured that you will never be garnished in Massachusetts. They can get all the defaults they want against you in Hawaii, but you can block them by showing up in a Massachusetts court and saying: "I have no contact to Hawaii." In this sense, the law favors you.

If the court is local, you must either: (1) Appear in court to answer the complaint; or (2) Settle out of court by private contract with the collection house. Now, I doubt you have the time or energy to litigate this case. But if you truly believe that the amount is wrong or that you do not owe the money at all, it might be worth submitting an answer with all the legal formalities. If you do, the collection house might just give up. They do not like wasting time on individual cases because that would hurt their margins. Before you do this, however, I encourage you to call the collection house to ask for some very basic information. Ask them FROM WHOM they bought the debt. Also ask them for any documents they have that provide evidence that you owe a debt. With that information, you can intelligently answer them in court with facts relevant to the legal standard.

If all this fails, and it appears that you do owe money, you can only avoid default and garnishment by bargaining with the collection house. This is unappetizing, but remember that the collection house has THOUSANDS of files like yours. They are trying to squeeze SOMETHING out of each, even if not the full amount they have a right to demand. If the face value of all their files is $15,000,000, but they only paid $5,000,000 for them, they still win if they squeeze just $6,000,000 from everyone. They want to resolve cases fast, and if it looks like you don't have the resources to pay the amount, they will settle for far less than the amount to which they are entitled. This is not "kindness" or "generosity." It is merely an acknowledgment that you do not have the financial capacity to give them all they want. That said, do not volunteer any specific information about your bank accounts, your identification numbers, your savings, any sources of income or your employer. Do not even mention your wife or any other person who lives with you. Just say you are broke and there is simply no way you could pay the full amount. Offer them something. If they take it, the original debt EVAPORATES (it's called "Discharge" in legal jingo). Just make sure you get it IN WRITING that your new payment arrangement discharges the old debt and fully resolves the matter.

This is probably the most practical option if you actually DO owe money. It keeps you out of court, and it saves you paying the full amount. You might even convince them to take pennies on each dollar owed. Plus it gets rid of the case for good. Again, you must insist on a WRITING that says your compromise payment "discharges" the old debt, and that the collection house promises to dismiss the lawsuit. If they don't provide these things, you could pay the compromise AND STILL face full liability for the debt! You definitely don't want that.

Well, sorry to have gone on for so long, but I wanted to give you a full overview. This whole area of law bothers me on a fundamental level. I have dealt with creditors myself over the years, and I can't tell you how weak and insignificant it made me feel. Debt really represents a form of tyranny in this country. Creditors enjoy so many advantages over debtors that it really mocks the "fairness principle" that people naively ascribe to the law. Yet that is the central irony I discovered in all this. If the law FAVORS the creditor, what does that say about the law? It really doesn't care about "little people" at all.

I wish it were not naive to think that the law stands for justice, honor and good. But the longer you live, the more you find that it is naive to believe it does.

CREDIT CARD DEBT CONSOLIDATION IS THEFT : STAND UP FOR FREEDOM

CONSIDERED OPINION

By : Mr. Paul J. MacGrabbin, Jr., Chairman and Chief Advocate, Americans for Free & Fair Financial Services, Inc., a For-Profit Advocacy Group Specializing in Lending Issues from the Banker’s Perspective

Credit cards make Americans’ lives easier. They allow people to pay bills when cash runs short. They allow people to buy that special gift for a loved one when there is not quite enough money in the bank to cover the cost. In a word, they allow Americans to make essential purchases responsibly, from education to health care and beyond. Credit cards build upon trust. We trust Americans to be responsible and to pay us back—fair and square. We trust the American people. We believe that Americans are responsible people who deserve respect. Trust is good. Credit cards help Americans keep money moving through the economy. And when money moves freely through the economy, everyone wins.

Credit cards make money available to everyone. Our economy falters when people do not make credit purchases. Stocks plunge when Americans live within their means. Yet not every bank is willing to loan money to every American. We here at Americans for Free & Fair Financial Services, however, believe in the American people. We believe in one important word: Freedom. We believe there is value in credit purchases, and we believe that Americans should be free to buy what they want. In that spirit, we believe that every American should have a credit card to buy things when and where they want them, provided they can make minimum monthly payments subject to the maximum applicable interest rate under State or Federal law. Unlike banks, we trust in the American people’s ability to make payments. If you have a monthly income stream, we will give you credit—guaranteed. We do not need to see assets. We do not need to see real estate ownership. All we need to see is an income and some payment history. If you have an income, you can buy that television today. You can buy those sandals today. You can buy those sunglasses today. And you can finally pay that overdue child support installment today. Isn’t it time to stop letting bank balances rule your life? Worry about the bill later. Enjoy your life. We trust you. Just remember the magic letters:
J-C-I: Just Charge It™.

Credit cards help Americans get what they want. They embody the spirit of independence and freedom that makes America great. Despite this, there are individuals out there who do not trust the American people. They say that “unscrupulous” credit card companies prey on innocent Americans, enticing them to “get into debt over their heads.” They say that credit cards lure Americans into making bad financial decisions, ruining their financial lives. They say that our companies draft unfair contracts and charge unconscionable interest rates, then harass debtors with vicious telephone calls and legal action if they default. Put simply, these party poopers say that credit card companies exploit Americans’ naïveté, gullibility and hunger for quick material gain. And they call on government to “regulate” credit card companies to protect “innocent Americans” from credit card “scammers.”

We reject these criticisms. We are not scammers. We are bankers. We believe in the American people to make wise, informed and prudent financial decisions. We reject the contention that Americans are stupid, naïve or gullible. On the contrary, we believe that Americans make financial decisions only after due and reasonable deliberation. Americans do not use credit cards unless they fully read our rules and disclosures. Nor do they use credit cards unless they know they have the financial resources to pay their bills when they are due. Americans do not charge purchases if they know they do not have the money to pay for the items. Americans are responsible. They are grown-ups. They know what they are doing. They need freedom, not regulation. When government starts telling adult Americans how to spend their money, what’s next? Telling them what color socks to wear? When they should wash their underwear or use the toilet? If we allow government to intrude on freedom, there is no endpoint. Once government intrudes on one freedom, all freedom is worthless. We refuse to allow government to wage war on freedom. We believe in liberty. We trust in the American people; we do not believe they are stupid, naïve or gullible. Nor do we believe they are so weak that they require “special protection” from credit card companies. Far from it: We believe Americans should have more access to credit cards, not less. After all, Americans should have the freedom to make whatever economic decisions they wish without interference. That is American freedom.

Government is hostile to freedom. In recent years, government has forced us to make disclosures to the American people about our financial products. We have to tell them about the interest rate, the default rules, the assignment process and our collection practices. We have to tell them which banks participate in our funding pool, and which State’s law governs disputes. They even tell us that we must print these “facts” and make them “conspicuous,” so that even the dumbest customer could understand what we say. We find these regulations oppressive. We believe that two private parties should be free to bargain however they wish; we find it oppressive that the government forces us to tell our customers certain things that might turn them away or give them the wrong impression about our products. Freedom means saying what you want and selling what you want. These government regulations take our freedom away. And when our freedom suffers, so does the American people’s. When banks lend with fear, everyone loses. When banks are not free to bargain on terms they deem fit, costs increase for everyone. This is the price of government meddling in private contracts. In short, we believe in deregulation because we believe in freedom.

We generally reject government meddling in credit card affairs. Nonetheless, we call upon government to take action against dangerous private actors who undermine freedom and damage contract rights. In recent years, certain private businesses have sought to make a profit on debts owed to us. These so-called “credit card debt consolidators” offer to assume credit card debt from us at a reduced rate, then charge a higher rate to the debtor for a profit. These merciless profiteers seek to capitalize on the idea that credit companies tyrannize hard-working Americans and exploit their stupidity. At the same time, they blackmail us into thinking that our outstanding accounts are worth less than their face value, sell us short, then reserve the profits for themselves. Meanwhile, these ruthless bottom feeders advertise endlessly in print and on the airwaves, telling Americans that they “can overcome credit card debt” and “restore freedom to their lives.”

We find these developments perverse and abominable. For one, we resent the implication that “credit card companies” tyrannize Americans. The opposite is true: We believe in freedom, fairness and economic choice, not compulsion and tyranny. We also resent the assertion that these so-called “consolidators” represent “freedom” against us, the “big, bad credit card companies.” If anyone represents freedom, we do. We stand for free economic choice and unfettered credit opportunities. It is perverse for these Johnny-come-latelys to claim that they stand for freedom, when in fact we have defended freedom since day one. Third, consolidators wage a deliberate war on our contract rights. When we lend money to consumers, we have a right to receive repayment plus interest. It is in the rules. It is perfectly legal. Our consumers read the rules and respect the law; they knew what they signed. To that extent, we have a legally enforceable claim against our consumers for every dollar we lent to them, plus all accrued interest, penalties, fees, costs and collection expenses pursuant to applicable contract provisions under the State law of our choice. Now, consolidators come along and try to buy out our rights for a fraction of their value. What good is freedom if we cannot reap all the legal rewards from our hard work? If a consumer owes us $45,612.19 for purchases made (and accrued interest thereon) between 2005 and 2008, we want that amount, not something less. Yet if payment proves difficult to collect, these consolidators step in and offer us $10,000 for the account and all the rights. We resent this pressure. We want more money, not less. If we sell, we get the $10,000, but the rapacious consolidators run off with our legal right to demand $45,612.19 from the consumer. We would rather have our rights than a measly $10,000. And we believe in the law. Contract rights are sacred. We resent any attempt to steal what we earned through hard work and toil.

Credit card consolidators are dishonorable, profit-hungry thieves. They promise “relief” to “downtrodden consumers” from “vicious credit card companies.” In fact, they are avaricious charlatans who want to pilfer our investments. We created these accounts, not them. Just because we occasionally have some trouble strongarming payments from a few bad apples does not mean we should just roll over and surrender our rights to these carrion-crows. Put simply, we chased the quarry and killed the game; now we want the meat. We will not just fork it over to a bunch of cash-crazed vultures circling overhead. In this country, we reward hard work. Yet consolidators make a living stealing what belongs to others under the pretense of “contract assignment.” We find this contrary to freedom and contrary to everything America stands for. We call on Congress to take action against these nefarious bandits. No longer will we tolerate theft and plunder. No longer will we tolerate slanderous attacks against our good names. Banks provide freedom to millions. We do not unfairly exploit “weak Americans.” To the contrary, we believe in the American people with all our hearts. We believe in freedom for all. And we stand opposed to any effort to label our business “tyrannical.” There is nothing tyrannical about two sane adults bargaining out a fair credit arrangement, no matter what the interest rate may be. Sane adults freely and fairly agree to contract terms. That is all that matters, because that is real freedom.

Take a stand against credit card debt consolidators. They assume that you are weak, gullible and naïve. They say they want to help you, when in fact they merely want to plunder our bounty and make a dollar on your back. In so doing, they raise the costs for everyone, making it more and more difficult for everyday people like you to get credit. You want to buy that new computer, don’t you? Well, unless you tell your Congressman to put an end to the consolidators’ reign of terror against private contract rights, we will not be able to help you. In that sense, it is in your interest to help credit card companies. When you make it easier for us to lend to you, you make it easier to get the things you want, even if you do not have quite enough in the bank to buy them on your own. And you want the computer now, don’t you?

What are you waiting for? Get on the phone right away. Let’s make government work for us. Put consolidators out of business once and for all—and let’s make freedom mean something again.

TO REGULATE OR NOT TO REGULATE : GOVERNMENT IN COMMERCE

AN ESSAY

Yesterday I ran across an interesting passage in the introduction to Germany’s Civil Code (Bürgerliches Gesetzbuch). Unlike England and America, Germany applies civil law, a legal system in which virtually every legal rule finds expression in statutes passed by the legislature. That differs substantially from the Anglo-American tradition, in which many basic legal rules filter down from the supposed wisdom of unelected “common law judges” who make decisions on unique factual issues, which in turn provide binding guidance for similar factual issues in the future. This “judge-made” law dominates private legal ordering, especially in the economic field. The whole notion of “contract” in England and America derives largely from judicial rumination on private transactions. Judges say what “prudent commercial men” should do in particular circumstances, and judges lay down rules that provide legal recourse against naughty bargainers. In theory, these rules are supposed to allow an “equal exchange” between two willing private parties through fair bargaining. But parties to economic exchanges are rarely equal. One party always has something the other does not. This creates a fundamental power disparity that allows the stronger party to force unfair terms on the weaker party. With the industrial revolution and postmodern distribution systems, the disparity in power grew even more. If common law rules provided the only guidance for economic exchanges in this environment, weak parties would not stand a chance. Stronger parties could tyrannize them—legally.

Legislatures in America recognized the dangers inherent in private commercial common law late in the 19th Century. During the so-called “Progressive Age,” they attempted to impose regulations on private dealings between economic actors. They mandated lower work hours, better working conditions, fair prices, mandatory overtime pay, product quality controls and other measures intended to level the playing field between stronger economic actors (industrialists, manufacturers, wholesalers, etc.) and weaker ones (employees, consumers, etc.). Legislatures did this because existing commercial common law actually permitted stronger economic actors to pay workers 5 cents a day under horrific working conditions. In fact, the common law prescribed no standards for pay, working conditions or “fairness;” as long as two parties bargained for something, the law would not question its substance. Of course, this “liberty to contract” existed only in fantasy. Workers take jobs “freely,” but they must work to feed their families and pay their rent. To that extent, workers are not really “free” to choose work terms. They act under economic compulsion: Work or starve. Is that a “free choice?” In the late 19th Century and early 20th Century, employers could dictate any terms they wished. The common law courts called this “freedom to contract.” In practice, it led to blatant unfairness and tyranny. After all, how could a poor worker negotiate with the massive company that paid his wages? If he complained that the contract was “unfair,” a court would merely say: “Well, you bargained for it. So you must adhere to it,” even if the employer reaped all the benefits from the employee’s work.

Fairness does not matter in the commercial common law. The only question is whether two parties voluntarily agree to do or not to do something in return for a promise or performance. If they do, there is no further discussion concerning the fairness of the relationship or the terms it imposes. Nonetheless, legislatures saw that this system led to unfairness. Perhaps they acted from conscience when they began to meddle in commercial affairs. Perhaps their Christian impulses could not countenance weak parties suffering under unfair contracts while strong parties got away with anything they wanted. Whatever their motivation, they took action and laid the foundations for the modern “regulatory State.”

They did not have an easy time, either. In 1905, the United States Supreme Court invalidated New York State’s attempt to limit bakers’ working hours as an “encroachment on the fundamental liberty of master and servant to bargain with one another.” Lochner v. New York, 198 U.S. 45 (1905). In other words, the Court protected employers’ rights to tyrannize their employees because they had a “fundamental liberty” to bargain for contracts as they saw fit. In essence, the Court used constitutional liberty guarantees to advance commercial common law. According to the Court, strong parties in commerce have the “liberty” to bargain any way they damn well please, even if that means forcing workers to labor for 12 hours a day with no overtime. To avoid slavery problems, they must merely say: “If you don’t like it, you can quit.” But can a worker really quit if he has mouths to feed? Therein lies the illusion of freedom in commercial life. Only the strong party has real freedom. The weak party must adhere to the strong party’s terms or he does not get wages or products he needs to survive. This is what happens in unregulated commerce. And the law actually facilitates it.

During the 1930s, the Supreme Court overruled Lochner. See, e.g., Nebbia v. New York, 291 U.S. 502 (1934). By that time, the public could no longer tolerate unchecked commercial power. After all, unregulated business led to the Crash in 1929. That convinced even the moderates that commercial common law could no longer persist; government had to intervene in relationships between private economic actors. With the legal way now clear, Roosevelt’s New Deal ushered in a whole new era of government intervention in commerce. No longer could strong parties force terms on weaker parties. They had to comply with basic norms and standards prescribed by the government. Although this seems “only fair” to us today, it was revolutionary at the time. In commerce, fairness was never the goal—and it still isn’t. Yet legislatures and the People believe that it should be. This fundamental tension stokes the perennial debate between private enterprise (deregulation) and government activists (regulation). Private enterprise wants to do business without interference, while government activists want to stop private enterprise from exploiting its power to tyrannize the weak.

In the decades since the New Deal, private enterprise has adapted its approach. Aided by well-paid lawyers, it complies with regulatory requirements in letter. But in spirit it has slowly reasserted the commercial common law. For example, companies comply with the Food and Drug Administration and Securities & Exchange Commission because if they do not they face fines or prosecutions. When there is an external obligation, they conform. Yet in every case in which regulations do not apply, private enterprise will exploit its power. When private enterprise can tyrannize, it will tyrannize. If private enterprise does not have to provide health insurance to workers, it will not. If a landlord can charge $10,000 per month for a small apartment, he will. In essence, private enterprise follows a simple rule: “I will charge as much as I want because I can.” If someone complains: “Why are you charging me so much? That is unfair,” private enterprise responds: “Because I can.” As long as private enterprise does not violate an external legal obligation, the commercial common law applies. And the commercial common law gives private enterprise a free hand in private dealings.

Unfairness and commerce go hand in hand. In fact, companies “earn the right” to be unfair because unfairness guarantees success. In other words, success entitles the winner to unfairness. Fairness implies that everyone has an equal chance to win in a particular enterprise. Unfairness implies that one party holds superior advantages that reduce or eliminate the other party’s chances to win. If a person has a choice, don’t you think he would prefer to be unfair? After all, you can’t lose if you act unfairly, and who likes losing? This may sound simplistic, but commerce is simple. It is a game, and money is the prize. If an economic actor can maximize his chances to win through unfairness, he will.

Yet unfairness offends our sensibilities. When we fall victim to unfairness, we feel embittered and hurt. When we hear about unfairness that affects others, we feel the same way, even if to a lesser extent. We also feel resentful that strong parties continue winning a “rigged game.” This bitterness and resentment propels us to use the government to curtail unfairness in commerce. When a business practice really rankles us, we employ the regulatory State to crush it. To that extent, the regulatory State provides us a means to correct unfairness in commerce. On the other hand, politicians control the regulatory State. If their constituents benefit from unfair business practices, they will not use the regulatory State to correct those practices. In that sense, commercial unfairness exists as a matter of political grace. If “business hostile” politicians control the government, they will make it harder for private enterprise to tyrannize weak parties. But if “business friendly” politicians control the government, they will refrain from regulation and give private enterprise a free hand. Thus, while government regulation in commerce looks good in theory, it actually does not work without the political will to intervene in private dealings.

So it goes, at least in the United States. But perhaps not in Germany. As mentioned, Germany applies a Civil Code to provide a framework for private economic dealings. Like the United States, Germany is a free market economy. It also has enormous regulatory mechanisms to rein in the unfairness that inheres in private economic dealings. But unlike the United States, Germany has different reasons for regulating private enterprise. While the American government seems to apply regulations only when there is public outcry about particularly atrocious business excesses, Germany appears to regulate on principle. Consider this passage (I translate):

“According to our current understanding, the government’s ordering task cannot limit itself to establishing formal rules of conduct and responsibility in commercial intercourse. Rather, the government must intervene much more, if and to the extent that serious dangers to social justice arise from the exercise of private autonomy. For that reason, the task increasingly falls to the law to protect those who are economically weak…In the field of private law, the main problem for legislation and jurisprudence is—and remains—to fairly deal with and overcome the tense relationship between economic freedom and social justice.” Dr. Helmut Köhler, Einführung in das Bürgerliche Gesetzbuch, München : Deutscher Taschenbuch Verlag (61st Edition 2008).

Here, we see a slightly different approach to “the fairness problem” than we saw in American legislative responses to the issue. As was the case in American law, the Germans appreciate that “private law” (i.e., “commercial common law” in America) is not enough to protect the public. As Dr. Köhler says, “the government cannot limit itself” to prescribing general rules for conduct and responsibility in private commerce. After all, we saw that unregulated commercial common law leads to unfairness, exploitation and—as Dr. Köhler calls them—“serious dangers to social justice.” In the German view, the government has an essential “task” to combat “dangers to social justice.” In the American view, regulation arose to allay public outcry about unfair business practices. It was not concerned—as a matter of principle—with “social justice.” In that sense, the German impulse to regulation has a more principled rationale: It is the government’s “ordering task” to defend social justice as much as it is to provide formal rules for commercial intercourse. The German view also supports the notion that these “serious dangers to social justice” arise from “the exercise of private autonomy.”

This directness is refreshing. In German law, legislators and judges understand that “private autonomy” goes hand in hand with “dangers to social justice.” In the commercial common law, American courts fabricated an artificial reality in which “fairness” flowed from the theoretical “liberty of master and servant” to freely bargain with each other, even though—as a practical matter—the master always had superior power. In the German view, however, the law takes a more realistic approach: It knows that private autonomy grants all power to the superior party. After all, that is what creates “serious dangers to social justice.” In that light, government intervention in commerce is mandatory. In German law, fairness is a governmental concern, because unfairness damages “social justice.” And because the government has a duty to protect “social justice,” it also has a duty to constrain unbridled “private autonomy.”

This interests me because I care about fairness. I think that fairness should be a governmental concern. Yet in American commerce, I am reminded every day that fairness is not the goal. In fact, commercial interests detest fairness. They say it is too difficult and too costly to worry about. They say that courts must never label contracts “unfair” or “unconscionable” because that will merely force them to increase costs on everyone else. That may be true. But that does not excuse the theoretical difficulty in defending unfairness as a business practice. Unfairness pays. And businesses know how to get away with it.

Regulations can only go so far in the United States. Until we make “social justice” an actual “ordering task” for government, we can be sure to get raw deals for as long as we live. It is not enough to wage small wars on especially egregious business practices, such as the Enron fraud or Bernie Madoff's ponzi scheme. These are merely symptoms of a much more entrenched ailment: Institutionalized unfairness in commercial exchange.

Or we can strive to be successful, in which case we win the right to force raw deals on everyone else.