Debt Relief
Warning: if we aren’t careful this concept of debt relief may become a thing of the past.
Before I go to far I want to talk about two old ideas: republics and democracies. Basically, a republic is a form of government where it’s officials are voted into office by the people and that are governed by the rule of law. Laws are set up to protect the people from abuse by each other and the officials they vote into office. That is where the Constitution and the Bill of Rights came from. Our founding fathers understood the need to build a system that would insure our protection from a constantly fluctuating and changing system where one day you were protected from abuse and then suddenly things could change where you could find yourself in jeopardy from the very system you sought protection through. This country was founded as a REPUBLIC and not democracy. We even have a Pledge of Allegiance to the flag and to the United States of America and to the Republic for which it stands... How many of us know the difference between a republic and a democracy?
A democracy is a form of government where supreme power rests in the majority of the people. On the surface of things this seems to be the same as a Republic. The difference being that there are no safe guards in a democracy. Laws can change quickly and catastrophically at the whims of the people. One day there is a constitutional law protecting you from abuse and the next day it’s gone because the mob (majority) decided it was outdated. What does this have to do with debt relief?
Let me ask you a question: how many of us entered into contracts with banks and credit card companies to borrow money and then to pay it back at a certain rate of interest? All of this is fine; we sign the contract that is regulated under the rule of law. The law says that when you enter a contract you have to follow the terms of that contract as long as those terms don’t violate some higher law that exists at the time the contract is signed. Most of us don’t enter into a loan intending to go bankrupt the next day. However, we knew at the time many of us entered our contracts there were a set of bankruptcy laws to protect us against ruin and slavery should something happen such as a loss of a job or the loss of business. Those same banks and credit card companies knew this when they entered into those contracts. But, and here’s the but, those same banks and credit card companies ignored sound business practices and granted loans to people who shouldn’t have received those loans. Then they turn around and complain that they’ve been cheated and that they want the law to change. Ok, that’s fair to change a law that will apply to future borrowers but, it’s not fair to change the law after the fact. If the banks and credit card companies could change the law retroactive to the time we signed contracts then there can be no such thing as protection under the law.
Why hasn’t there been a cry of foul play to this? This issue should go all the way to the Supreme Court of the land. We should be able to file bankruptcy under the law as it existed at the time we signed the contract. We wouldn’t be asking for something that we hadn’t already been guaranteed by our law.
This issue isn’t just about debt relief, it’s about our very freedom and liberty. Those banks and credit card companies have vast resources available to them to sway and influence our law makers. If we aren’t careful we’ll find ourselves without a voice and without a voice we’ll find ourselves prey to those people with all of those vast resources. There is only one way little people like myself can maintain a voice and that’s collectively with enough other small voices.
Let us return the system back to it’s original function and intent. Let’s restore the bankruptcy laws to what they were, not just for us but for future generations.
We should expect that businesses exercise sound business practices. That’s their greatest guarantee under the law. Don’t loan money to people who are poor risks. Loaning money is the same thing as investing and everyone should be aware that there aren’t any guarantees when it comes to investing. There is an element of risk in any kind of investing. That’s the nature of business. There are no floors, except the bankruptcy laws that apply to business as well as individuals and there are no ceilings either. You are free to succeed to any level you can achieve.
And while we’re on the subject of debt relief let’s force our government to live by the same rules everyone else lives by. Our government is the only entity that we have no debt protection from. It has shown itself to be able to evict people from their homes and businesses when they find themselves unable to pay the government rents in the form of taxes or they find themselves saddled with a debt that can never be paid off that only continues to grow until the debt is relieved by death. If we’re not careful the government may find a way to force our children to pay a debt we can’t pay.
A man should pay his debts and that includes little men like me. I desire to pay all of my debts and I’m sure you do also. But, I want the same freedoms that my forefathers had. They could fail then they could fail and then they could succeed. The protection of the law was there for them and for their businesses. I don’t want to look back and think that those freedoms are forever gone. Our country grew rich and strong under those laws. I’ll even bet that there were many of our captains of industry that failed and used those same freedoms and laws to eventually succeed. Try to think of it this way: if Thomas Edison had been forced to quit trying to make an incandescent light bulb because he failed once or twice we may not have many of the things we have today including the light bulb. Failure is a part of life and a part of learning. We would never think of making a baby stay seated the rest of it’s life because it fell down a lot; now would we? No. We encourage the baby to get up and try again. Some of us are like those little babies; it may take us a few times to learn how to succeed but, we need good teachers to show us how to succeed not harsh cruel taskmasters that probably were failures at one time of their life also.
Our government is turning out to be cruel when it’s able to change laws arbitrarily and at the whim of the mob. Let’s band together, become a mob ourselves and force the government to return to sound law; the same laws that lead us to freedom and prosperity as individuals and as a nation. I’d rather live in the Republic we started out with than the mob rule of democracy that we are turning into.
Katrael
