GOOD MORNING FLINT!
12/16/08 Terry Bankert,
http://attorneybankert.com/
You are invited to offer suggestions on this topic,”Helping One another.” http://goodmorningflint.blogspot.com/ or http://terrybankert.wordpress.com/
WE HAVE TO HELP ONE ANOTHER!
Some of the country are doing well, some in recession, some depression we are fighting for our lives in Flint. We are all in this together. Its time we begin to work together. We encounter the desperate everyday.
We all need to learn a little social work and be able talk about what help is available in Flint. Be a Flint Hero and help out. Give recognition to those that do.
A community forum to address mental health during tough economic times was held Tuesday at the Genesee County Administration Building in Flint. Some say the citizens of Genesee County and Flint are is in a crisis unlike anything since the Great Depression.
It will take all of us working together to keep people from falling apart in the even tougher economic times ahead. Several FLINT HEROS PRESENTED:Robert Cuthbertson, MD, psychiatrist and vice president of Medical Affairs and Lawrence Reynolds, MD, president and CEO of Mott Children's Health Centers will offered mental health insight for individuals and families who are undergoing difficult economic times. That was the message Tuesday night at a community forum sponsored by the Genesee County Department of Community Mental Health.
The panel discussion was led by state Rep. Brenda Clack and County Commissioner Raynetta Speed, TWO FLINT HEROS, who also serves as chairwoman of the board for Genesee County Community Mental Health. Dr. Robert Cuthbertson, a psychiatrist and vice president of medical affairs for GCCMH, sounded the first call to arms, warning that deepening economic woes coupled with the holidays are making this a particularly troubled time.
But he fears the future could be even worse as unemployment benefits, interim health care insurance and lifelong savings trickle away.
WE ARE ECONOMICALLY GRIEVING
One speaker said ;"People are grieving the losses they're experiencing -- their homes, their livelihood, their savings -- far deeper losses than most of us have ever experienced," Just what does a family do when the health insurance runs out and you have small kids. Another speaker said we are in a “ toxic stew of stress, anxiety and depression in the Flint area.
Ahead we face a “ boiling point with increasing rates of suicide, substance abuse and domestic violence.”
Did you know "Two years ago we were dealing with about 120 foreclosures a year. This year we've had 700 people come to our classes and about 300 seeking individual counseling," said Amanda Crews of Metro Housing Partnership Inc. , which offers counseling services to those at risk of losing their homes. "And that's only what we were able to do at capacity. We couldn't catch up with the demand."
Daniell Brown offered thoughts about Hamilton Health center,"Hamilton had the most encounters we have ever had in November -- more people than we have the capacity to see. We can't grow fast enough to keep up with the rate," Hamilton is county's main free medical clinic.
Another service provider weighed in.Resource Genesee, formerly the Resource Center, fielded about 10,000 calls this year from people needing help finding the right agency for their particular needs, from paying a heating bill to finding temporary shelter.
A growing number of them are first-time callers, said spokesman Dale Weighill. Past Donors now are service consumers."They're telling us in the past they've contributed to the United Way or other social service organizations and now they're relying on social services for the first time in their lives," said Weighill. We need to help the homeless said Frank Woods.
He continued “700 people have come through the doors of the One Stop Shop Housing Resource Center since it opened in August to help the homeless two days a week.”
People need food;"Woods said We gave out 13,000 pounds of food s in an hour and fifteen minutes, Many first time people now are in environment. They're distraught and embarrassed. They say they didn't know this could happen to them this quickly." The conclusion of the workshop was an acknowledgement that “The best thing to do right now: seek help from the dozens of social service agencies poised to offer it.”
Just how can we identify these servcies? Elected officals Clack and Speed are helping "These are middle-class people trying to hold on to their dignity. It's a whole different type of life people are living now. It's a new lifestyle to ask for help when you've never had to ask before," said Clack."That's why we need to let our citizens know there are services here they can connect with," said Speed.
Q: Where is the best on line resource for Flint, Genesee County, Mid Michigan, Michigan people/families in need?
Here are a couple; • Want to learn more about Genesee County Community Mental Health? (810) 257-3705.
• For help in finding the right agency for special human services: Resource Genesee (810) 767-0500.
Are you a Flint hero or do you know one?
See http://www.mlive.com/flintjournal/index.ssf/2008/12/economic_crisis_sparks_overflo.html#more Posted here by Terry Bankert,
http://attorneybankert.com/
You are invited to offer suggestions on this topic,”Helping One another.” http://goodmorningflint.blogspot.com/ or http://terrybankert.wordpress.com/ 109320
Wednesday, December 17, 2008
Flint Hero applications accepted
Tuesday, December 16, 2008
Video: Flint Coney Island pleads to the President to save Flint MI USA
video just in
This is the Message on Tom Z’s electronic outside bulletin board.
Tom Z’s Coney Island Grand Traverse and Court Flint Mi.
The sign reads:
Please Mr. President Approve Bailout for G.M. .
If they can work. We can work.
To keep Michigan Workers alive and open our doors open.
This message approved
by Tom Z’s. Thank You
VIDEO....VIDEO...
Thumbnail photos
http://www.flickr.com/photos/30366181@N05/sets/72157611262564271/
Slide show http://www.flickr.com/photos/30366181@N05/sets/72157611262564271/show/ --- Posted Here By Terry Bankert 12/16/08
Monday, December 15, 2008
More financial regulation needed
GOOD MORNING FLINT!
12/16/08 Terry Bankert
http://goodmorningflint.blogspot.com/
The bad news: Current PONZI Scheme King Bernard L. Madoff, former Nasdaq Stock Market chairman and founder of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities has ripped off trusted clients for $50 billion. Thats $50,000,000,000.00 . Like an unlicensed garage mechanic he ran an unregistered money-management business.
The good news: This $50 billion figure is only what clients were told they had in their accounts at the firm, not the amounts they originally invested. Madoffs advisory business catered to rich people and institutional investors as well as hedge funds, was “all just one big lie.”
Its been broke for years.
Special thanks are in order for Ronald Reagan for de regulation.
What can we learn from the devastation of Madoff on the private wealthy who flocked like lemming to his high rate of return?
These wizards of finance and scions of privilege are months away from a McDonalds grill job or being a Walmart greeter and receive no pity here. What can we learn from this 1% that has been doing it downhill into our lives.
But again we just might pick up some of these lost investments of the rich. Once again we will bail out the greedy rich while auto workers starve. Really greedy rich people should be excluded from the Securities Investor Protection Act, or SIPA.
We should ask what is wrong with the the business model of funds of hedge funds – which run about $685bn in assets. Just where was the the Securities and Exchange Commission's and its oversight of the investment management industry.
I can just hear the whinning at the congressional hearings. Something must have went horribly wrong for a fraud on such a scale. Barney Frank will play the blame game.
The speaker of the house will be distracted with hand-wringing. The bureaucrats will cart in rewritten rules Audit regulators will spout we told you so.
This predators company ,an investment-advisory business ,was in the gun sights of oversight by the SEC in 2006, they blew it. Other traders said nobody can be as good as Madoff the money people just wanted their profits.
Now Predator Mr Madoff was not a hedge fund manager they were his prey. His profits made all the hedge fund look good so they kept shoveling their client money to him and banked their commission based upon non existent gains.
We need change in this industry. Scrape the current fee structure . Create one that affects everybody good and bad times. The manager should lose when the fund goes down as well as gaining when it goes up.
We need more regulation. The regulatory agency typically examines only 10% of the new funds that are registered. That is not good enough. Madoff did not have a world class auditor looking at him. What are the odds that there was not an arms length relationship.
Rumor has it that rivals to Madoff raised concerns about the fund in 1999.
Our country needs hedge fund manager registration rules. Congressman Barney Frank, D-Mass., is on it stating he plans to introduce new hedge fund manager registration legislation. We will need more staffing for the oversight agencies. Government must control the extremes in our society.
Those extremes of human need and here human greed must be controlled by government. We need professionals in government. We must respect them so they will want to work for us.
What has happened to our country by the breakdown in the self policing controls of a not so free market should end forever the howls for smaller government of those greedy parasitical predators in the financial community.
Or at least we should never listen to them again.
Posted here by Terry Bankert
http://attorneybankert.com/
see........
[1] http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/2b38a296-cadc-11dd-87d7-000077b07658,dwp_uuid=e8477cc4-c820-11db-b0dc-000b5df10621.html -
[2] http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/3367a220-cadf-11dd-87d7-000077b07658,dwp_uuid=e8477cc4-c820-11db-b0dc-000b5df10621.html?nclick_check=1
[3] http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story/liquidation-madoff-securities-firm-under/story.aspx?guid=%7B668ADFBC-3F1A-45AD-B77C-77B042700EAB%7D&dist=msr_1
[4] http://www.marketwatch.com/News/Story/madoff-arrest-raises-questions-about/story.aspx?guid=%7BE2002EFA%2DC24D%2D453B%2DBF6C%2DEC67992A0A3C%7D
[5] http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601102&sid=aXWbLI1zC.Oo&refer=uk
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