From the left: Predatory Green Lending
The decade-old Property Assessed Clean Energy “program was meant to make it easier for homeowners to install clean-energy technology, such as solar panels,” but has often “forced homeowners to default on their property taxes, or even left them facing foreclosure,” reports The American Prospect’s Lee Harris. A new Consumer Financial Protection Bureau report finds that “over a two-year span, taking out a PACE loan increased the risk of mortgage delinquency by about 35 percent.” Oh, and: “Borrowers were more likely to live in Black and Hispanic neighborhoods,” while “PACE loans charged ‘substantially higher’ interest rates than most home equity loans.” Now the CFPB wants a “rule that would require PACE lenders to assess a borrower’s ability to repay.”
Woke wars: Canada’s Race-Based Sentencing
“It’s taken for granted among Canadian criminal defense attorneys, prosecutors, judges, and law professors that” Impact of Race and Culture Assessments — “a presentencing report in which ‘Black and racialized Canadians’ can demonstrate how systemic racism led them to commit their crime” — are a “a necessary tool for curbing the ‘overrepresentation’ of black and indigenous prisoners,” observes The Free Press’ Rupa Subramanya. For example, “a driver in Ottawa” got only 100 hours of community service “because he was black” despite killing a pedestrian and then hiding in “an airport hotel, hoping to evade the cops.” Watch out, America: “Liberals, who spent decades trying to deracialize society, are now re-racializing it.”
Reaganite: A Lame ‘Morning in America’ Ripoff
President Biden’s “ad team is so enamored of [President Ronald] Reagan’s ‘Morning in America’ commercial they produced a copycat,” “with images of smiling children and folks flying the American flag,” observes Kenneth L. Khachigian (who helped produce Reagan’s ads) at The Wall Street Journal. Worse, “Biden’s video is an amateurish pastiche of quick cutaways and amped-up music,” apparently meant to distract from his “obvious lack of vitality.” The video echoes Reagan’s “we have more to do” line with Biden’s “let’s finish the job,” yet the current prez could never match “Reagan’s gift of communicating optimism”; instead, his ad is filled with “anger” — including “images of riots” and warnings about democracy and Social Security. Clearly “the 46th president hopes to ride a wave of fear to a second term.” “To mimic Ronald Reagan’s 1984 campaign,” the best the Bidenites can do “is fly him to Delaware, hand him a pair of Ray-Bans, and film him sitting in his Corvette.”
Conservative: Everyone Fears the Prez Is Too Old
“Most Americans” — 63% of registered voters — “don’t believe the president is fit to serve. Now what”? asks the Washington Examiner’s Byron York. “Those are huge, decisive numbers. And they reflect a broad agreement among people of all ages and circumstances” as well as “people of all educational levels.” “The same is true with race and ethnicity.” Crucially, “among independents, 69% said Biden does not have the mental sharpness, and 65% said he does not have the physical health to serve.” It’s “a wide and deep agreement” that our “80-year-old president, who is now running for reelection” isn’t “up to the job.” “To state the obvious, that has to have a profound effect on the presidential campaign.”
Libertarian: Joe’s Next Pricey Student-Loan Plan
With the Supreme Court set to slap done one student-loan-forgiveness plan, President Biden’s pushing a new repayment plan that will “be significantly costlier than the Department of Education originally projected,” sneers Reason’s Eric Boehm. A Congressional Budget Office analysis shows that Biden’s plan “will cost at least $230 billion over 10 years,” plus another $45 billion if the Supremes nix his first one, for about twice what DOE claims. It’d also cause “more students to take out loans — including loans that they would be unable to pay off in full.” In short, it “will result in more students taking on more college debt — and passing the excess costs onto taxpayers”
Compiled by The Post Editorial Board