Miscellaneous And Off Topic Subjects

[froot loops]

Dan Gilbert plans on building an huge new headquarters at the old Hudsons site.

[UMStan White]

Hack, glad to read some of your stuff. Great article, You have wonderful style. Very impressive to say the least.

[Ghengis Jon]

Excellent prose. On your way to a Pulitizer.

[hack]

Thanks gents. Much appreciated!

[Da Geezer]

Great article Hack. Let this be a lesson to some of you guys, keeping track of this thread is a good idea. Hack and I had an ongoing debate about 2 months ago, but not about microloans.

Our church has been giving microloans in Honduras for 20 years or so. But we never charge interest. It amazes me that these loans by philanthropies are charging consumers 100%. Are they charging businesses the same? So what is happening is that first world citizens donate money to an organization, write it off their taxes at over 40% in most cases, and then charge the borrower 100% per annum? No wonder foundations like the Clinton Global Initiative (not trying to be political, just the first that came to mind) have so much money. Might I suggest taking away the tax exempt status of philanthropies that charge unreasonable interest.

I am glad to know about this. I have always thought microloans were interest free, or at least charged interest at a rate to cover unrepaid loans which are less than 1% of the loans. These borrowers have honor.

A friend of mine from New Era, owns a dairy that sells milk under the name Country Dairy. Using his own money, he replicated his dairy in Uganda. Folks from our church go to work in Uganda as mission trips, and the Ugandans come to New Era to train and mix with the folks in town. The Uganda dairy is breaking even, and giving a lot of Ugandans both clean milk and good jobs. I guess now he has a 501(c)(3), but initially it was his baby. There is a good story there.

[hack]

Another scam is clothes donations. We donate stuff thinking it goes to Africans for free, but it ends up in the hands of middlemen who sell it on.

Thanks for reading, Geezer. Agreed that Christian charities are out there doing some good work. But I guess the lesson here is that it's profitable, so you have those competing rationales. Agreed that non-profits should be in there competing with lower-interest loans, driving down rates in the process.

[Da Geezer]

I'm not even wild about large, organized Christian charities. But when a local church of 250 or so takes the bull by the horns, and members of the local congregation travel to where the money is loaned or the work is being done, then it is efficient and uplifting for the giver and recipient.

Of course, I happen to believe there should be no 501(C)(3) organizations at all, which doesn't sit too well with the three ministers in my immediate family

[Mike]

I'm sure glad Missouri wasn't able to weasel their way into the Big Ten. Holy hell that place is a total shitshow.

[entropy]

They are coming out of this looking pretty good...

[THE_WIZARD_]

...the old tail wagging the dog...heh...

[Da Geezer]

Entropy:

Looking good? They look like damn fools, and the paper today says that the administration is encouraging students to report hurtful speech to the police.

http://www.mediaite.com/online/university-of-missouri-police-ask-students-to-report-hurtful-speech/

No chance that the protesters will be satisfied with the President's scalp. And can you imagine what the police think when they get a call. Next step is the Black Lives Matter folks show up because the police are not arriving within 6 minutes about a complaint of hurtful speech.

I was in Grant Park outside the Conrad Hilton Hotel during the 1968 Democratic Convention when the "police riot" occurred. Google it and watch the film. I'm all in favor of peaceful protest. But we were protesting a draft which sent guys to Vietnam to be shot in the jungle for no discernable national defense reason. A bit different than being called names!

I wonder if protest itself is hateful speech.

[Mike]

What's happening at Yale is also very disturbing.

Geezer, I was thinking the same thing. There's a bit of a difference between protesting against Jim Crow and the Vietnam draft versus hurt feelings because a redneck yelled a racial slur from his pickup truck. The pussification of our society can be quite depressing.

[Ghengis Jon]

Mike, for fame and fortune, you need to jump on that Professional Victim Bandwagon.

You f*ckin' cracker white bread honky

[lineygoblue]

lmao

Jon: Who you callin' white?

:-)

[Mike]

Jon, I demand you apologize for your white privelege. I assume everything you've "accomplished" in life was handed to you. And that goes double for you, Liney!!