Friday, February 26, 2010

Do Toxins Cause Autism? By NICHOLAS D. KRISTOF

Autism was first identified in 1943 in an obscure medical journal. Since then it has become a frighteningly common affliction, with the Centers for Disease Control reporting recently that autism disorders now affect almost 1 percent of children.

Over recent decades, other development disorders also appear to have proliferated, along with certain cancers in children and adults. Why? No one knows for certain. And despite their financial and human cost, they presumably won’t be discussed much at Thursday’s White House summit on health care.

Yet they constitute a huge national health burden, and suspicions are growing that one culprit may be chemicals in the environment. An article in a forthcoming issue of a peer-reviewed medical journal, Current Opinion in Pediatrics, just posted online, makes this explicit.

The article cites “historically important, proof-of-concept studies that specifically link autism to environmental exposures experienced prenatally.” It adds that the “likelihood is high” that many chemicals “have potential to cause injury to the developing brain and to produce neurodevelopmental disorders.”

The author is not a granola-munching crank but Dr. Philip J. Landrigan, professor of pediatrics at the Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York and chairman of the school’s department of preventive medicine. While his article is full of cautionary language, Dr. Landrigan told me that he is increasingly confident that autism and other ailments are, in part, the result of the impact of environmental chemicals on the brain as it is being formed.

“The crux of this is brain development,” he said. “If babies are exposed in the womb or shortly after birth to chemicals that interfere with brain development, the consequences last a lifetime.”

Concern about toxins in the environment used to be a fringe view. But alarm has moved into the medical mainstream. Toxicologists, endocrinologists and oncologists seem to be the most concerned.

One uncertainty is to what extent the reported increases in autism simply reflect a more common diagnosis of what might previously have been called mental retardation. There are genetic components to autism (identical twins are more likely to share autism than fraternal twins), but genetics explains only about one-quarter of autism cases.

Suspicions of toxins arise partly because studies have found that disproportionate shares of children develop autism after they are exposed in the womb to medications such as thalidomide (a sedative), misoprostol (ulcer medicine) and valproic acid (anticonvulsant). Of children born to women who took valproic acid early in pregnancy, 11 percent were autistic. In each case, fetuses seem most vulnerable to these drugs in the first trimester of pregnancy, sometimes just a few weeks after conception.

So as we try to improve our health care, it’s also prudent to curb the risks from the chemicals that envelop us. Senator Frank Lautenberg of New Jersey is drafting much-needed legislation that would strengthen the Toxic Substances Control Act. It is moving ahead despite his own recent cancer diagnosis, and it can be considered as an element of health reform. Senator Lautenberg says that under existing law, of 80,000 chemicals registered in the U.S., the Environmental Protection Agency has required safety testing of only 200. “Our children have become test subjects,” he noted.

One peer-reviewed study published this year in Environmental Health Perspectives gave a hint of the risks. Researchers measured the levels of suspect chemicals called phthalates in the urine of pregnant women. Among women with higher levels of certain phthalates (those commonly found in fragrances, shampoos, cosmetics and nail polishes), their children years later were more likely to display disruptive behavior.

Frankly, these are difficult issues for journalists to write about. Evidence is technical, fragmentary and conflicting, and there’s a danger of sensationalizing risks. Publicity about fears that vaccinations cause autism — a theory that has now been discredited — perhaps had the catastrophic consequence of lowering vaccination rates in America.

On the other hand, in the case of great health dangers of modern times — mercury, lead, tobacco, asbestos — journalists were too slow to blow the whistle. In public health, we in the press have more often been lap dogs than watchdogs.

At a time when many Americans still use plastic containers to microwave food, in ways that make toxicologists blanch, we need accelerated research, regulation and consumer protection.

“There are diseases that are increasing in the population that we have no known cause for,” said Alan M. Goldberg, a professor of toxicology at the Bloomberg School of Public Health at Johns Hopkins University. “Breast cancer, prostate cancer, autism are three examples. The potential is for these diseases to be on the rise because of chemicals in the environment.”

The precautionary principle suggests that we should be wary of personal products like fragrances unless they are marked phthalate-free. And it makes sense — particularly for children and pregnant women — to avoid most plastics marked at the bottom as 3, 6 and 7 because they are the ones associated with potentially harmful toxins.


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Copyright 2010 The New York Times Company

Thursday, February 25, 2010

TARRANT COUNTY EARLY VOTING

TARRANT COUNTY EARLY VOTING

(VOTACIÓN ADELANTADA DEL CONDADO DE TARRANT)
MARCH 2, 2010
(2 DE MARZO DE 2010)
REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY ELECTIONS
(ELECCIÓNES PRIMARIAS DE LOS PARTIDOS REPUBLICANO Y DEMOCRATA)
EARLY VOTING BY PERSONAL APPEARANCE DAYS AND HOURS
(DÍAS Y HORAS DE VOTACIÓN ADELANTADA POR APARICION PERSONAL)
February (Febrero) 15 Monday (Lunes) Closed (Holiday) (Cerrado ( Día Festivo))
February (Febrero) 16 – 19 Tuesday – Friday (Martes – Viernes) 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
February (Febrero) 20 Saturday (Sabado) 7:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.
February (Febrero) 21 Sunday (Domingo) 11:00 a.m. – 4:00 p.m.
February (Febrero) 22 – 26 Monday – Friday (Lunes – Viernes) 7:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.
SEE LIST OF LOCATIONS ON BACK
(VER LA LISTA DE CASETAS AL REVERSO)
________________________________________________________________________________________
EARLY VOTING BY MAIL
(VOTACIÓN TEMPRANO POR CORREO)
TO RECEIVE A BALLOT APPLICATION OR FOR MORE INFORMATION CALL
TARRANT COUNTY ELECTIONS ADMINISTRATION: 817-831-8683
(PARA RECIBIR UNA SOLICITUD PARA BOLETA O PARA MAS INFORMACIÓN LLAMAR
AL ADMINISTRADOR DE ELECCIONES DEL CONDADO DE TARRANT: 817-831-8683)
Applications for a ballot by mail may be submitted between January 1, 2010 and February 23,
2010 with one of the following requirements: (Solicitudes para una boleta por correo pueden ser sometidas durante el 1 de
Enero de 2010, y 23 de Febrero de 2010, con uno de los siguientes requisitos :)
1. Age of voter is 65 or over on Election Day. (Edad del votante es 65 o más el Día de Elección.)
2. Voter is disabled. (Votante esta incapacitado.)
For #1 or #2, the ballot must be mailed to the voter registration residence address/mailing address
or to a hospital, nursing home/long-term care facility, retirement center or address of a relative.
The relationship of the relative must be indicated. (Para #1 o #2 la boleta debe ser enviada a la direcciÓn
residencial/dirección de correo de registro de votante o á un hospital, clínica para convalecientes ó ancianos/facilidad de cuidado de término
largo, centro de jubilación o dirección de un pariente. Debe indicar el parentesco del pariente.)
3. Voter is confined in jail - ballot must be mailed to the jail or address of a relative. (Votante esta
encarcelado - boleta debe ser enviada á la cárcel o a la dirección de un pariente.)
4. Voter expects to be out of the county on Election Day and during the regular hours for
conducting early voting - ballot must be mailed to an address outside the county. (Votante espera
estar afuera del condado el Día de Elección y durante las horas regulares de conducir Votación temprano - boleta debe ser enviada
a una dirección afuera del condado.)
Applications must be received by mail at the following address
NO LATER THAN TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 23, 2010.
(Las solicitudes deben ser recibidas por correo a la direcciÓn siguiente NO MAS TARDAR DEL MARTES, 23 DE FEBRERO DE 2010.)
STEVE RABORN, EARLY VOTING CLERK
(Secretario De Votación Adelantada, Steve Raborn
PO BOX 961011
FORT WORTH TX 76161-0011
FOR VOTERS WITH ONSET OF AN ILLNESS ON OR AFTER FEBRUARY 22, 2010, EMERGENCY BALLOT APPLICATIONS MUST BE RETURNED NO LATER THAN 5 PM, ELECTION
DAY, AT THE ELECTIONS CENTER, 2700 PREMIER ST., FORT WORTH, TX 76111 (SEC. 102.001, TEXAS ELECTION CODE.) (PARA VOTANTES CON PRINCIPIOS DE UNA ENFERMEDAD
EN O DESPUES DEL 22 DE FEBRERO DE 2010, SOLICITUDES PARA BOLETA DE EMERGENCIA DEBE SER REGRESADA NO MAS TARDAR DE LAS 5 PM, EL DÍA DE ELECCIóN EN EL CENTRO DE ELECCIONES, 2700
PREMIER ST., FORT WORTH, TX 76111 (SEC. 102.001, CÓDIGO DE ELECCIóN DE TEJAS).
Revised 1/29/2010 11:32:53 AM
Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary UNT – Health Science Center
John Naylor Student Activities Center Building A
1900 West Boyce Avenue 3500 Camp Bowie Boulevard
Fort Worth Texas 76115 Fort Worth, Texas 76107
Tarrant County College Northeast Campus Tarrant County College South Campus
Student Center NSTU Student Center Room SSTU 1112
828 Harwood Road 5301 Campus Drive
Hurst, Texas 76054 Fort Worth, Texas 76119
Tarrant County College Northwest Campus Tarrant County College Southeast Campus
WTLO – Theater NW Lobby North Ballroom
4801 Marine Creek Parkway 2100 Southeast Parkway
Fort Worth, Texas 76179 Arlington, Texas 76018
UTA – University of Texas at Arlington TCU – Texas Christian University
Student Center Brown-Lupton University Union
300 W. 1st Street 2901 Stadium Drive
Arlington, Texas 76019 Fort Worth, Texas 76129
TARRANT COUNTY EARLY VOTING - MARCH 2, 2010
(VOTACIóN ADELANTADA DEL CONDADO DE TARRANT - 2 DE MARZO DE 2010)
REPUBLICAN AND DEMOCRATIC PRIMARY ELECTIONS
(ELECCIONES PRIMARIAS DE LOS PARTIDOS REPUBLICANO Y DEMOCRATA)
1. MAIN EARLY VOTING SITE,
Tarrant County Elections Center
2700 Premier Street
Fort Worth, Texas 76111
*Emergency and Limited ballots available
At this location only
Arlington
2. Bob Duncan Community Center
2800 South Center Street
Arlington, Texas 76014
Arlington
3. Elzie Odom Recreation Center
1601 NE Green Oaks Boulevard
Arlington, Texas 76006
Arlington
4. Fire Training Center
5501 Ron McAndrew Drive
Arlington, Texas 76013
Arlington
5. South Service Center
1100 SW Green Oaks Boulevard
Arlington, Texas 76017
Arlington
6. Tarrant County Sub-Courthouse
in Arlington
700 E Abram Street
Arlington, Texas 76010
Azle
7. B. J. Clark Annex
Room 4
603 Southeast Parkway
Azle, Texas 76020
8. Benbrook Community Center
228 San Angelo Street
Benbrook, Texas 76126
9. Colleyville City Hall
100 Main Street
Colleyville, Texas 76034
10. Crowley Community Center
900 East Glendale Street
Crowley, Texas 76036
11. Euless Public Library
201 North Ector Drive
Euless, Texas 76039
Forest Hill
12. Mahaney Community Center
6800 Forest Hill Drive
Forest Hill, Texas 76140
Fort Worth
13. Diamond Hill/Jarvis Library
1300 Northeast 35th Street
Fort Worth, Texas 76106
Fort Worth
14. Griffin Sub-Courthouse
3212 Miller Avenue
Fort Worth, Texas 76119
Fort Worth
15. Handley-Meadowbrook
Community Center
6201 Beaty Street
Fort Worth, Texas 76112
Fort Worth
16. JPS Health Center Viola M.
Pitts/Como
Lower Level, Auditorium 1
4701 Bryant Irvin Road N.
Fort Worth, Texas 76107
Fort Worth
17. Southside Community Center
959 East Rosedale Street
Fort Worth, Texas 76104
Fort Worth
18. Southwest Communtiy Center
6300 Welch Avenue
Fort Worth, Texas 76133
Fort Worth
19. Southwest Sub-Courthouse
6551 Granbury Road
Fort Worth, Texas 76133
Fort Worth
20. Summerglen Branch Library
4205 Basswood Boulevard
Fort Worth, Texas 76137
Fort Worth
21. Tarrant County Plaza Building
201 Burnett Street
Fort Worth, Texas 76102
Fort Worth
22. Villages of Woodland Springs
Amenity Building
12209 Timberland Boulevard
Fort Worth, Texas 76244
Fort Worth
23. Worth Heights Community Center
3551 New York Avenue
Fort Worth, Texas 76110
Grand Prairie
24. Starrett Elementary School
2675 Fairmont Drive
Grand Prairie, Texas 75052
25. Grapevine Community Activities Center
1175 Municipal Way
Grapevine, Texas 76051
26. Haltom City Recreation Center
4839 Broadway Avenue
Haltom City, Texas 76117
27. Hurst Recreation Center
700 Mary Drive
Hurst, Texas 76053
Hurst
28. Northeast Sub-Courthouse
645 Grapevine Highway
Hurst, Texas 76054
29. Keller Town Hall
1100 Bear Creek Parkway
Keller, Texas 76248
30. Kennedale Community Center
316 West 3rd Street
Kennedale, Texas 76060
Lake Worth
31. Sheriff’s Office North Patrol Division
6651 Lake Worth Boulevard
Lake Worth, Texas 76135
32. Mansfield Sub-Courthouse
1100 East Broad Street
Mansfield, Texas 76063
33. North Richland Hills Recreation
Center
6720 Northeast Loop 820
North Richland Hills, Texas 76180
34. Saginaw Community Center
620 Park Center Boulevard
Saginaw, Texas 76179
35. Southlake Town Hall
1400 Main Street
Southlake, Texas 76092
36. White Settlement Recreation Center
8213 White Settlement Road
White Settlement, Texas 76108
Temporary Branch Early Voting Locations with Special Days and Hours
(Casetas Temporales para Votación Adelantada con Días y Horas Especiales)
February (Febrero) 17 – 19 Wednesday - Friday (Miércoles – Viernes) 8:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.
February (Febrero) 22 – 24 Monday – Wednesday (Lunes – Miércoles) 7:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m.
February (Febrero) 22 – 25 Monday – Thursday (Lunes – Jueves) 7:00 a.m. – 7:00 p.m

EARLY VOTING (Dallas County 2010 Primary)

EARLY VOTING (Votaciðn Adelantada)Dallas County
Dates, Times and Locations for the (Fechas, épocas y localizaciones para)
Democratic and Republican Primary Election (Elecciónes Primarias Democráticas y Republicanas)
March 2, 2010 (2 de marzo, 2010)

February 16, 2010 (Tuesday through Friday) February 19, 2010 8:00 A.M. - 5:00 P.M.
16 de febrero, 2010 (el martes por el viernes) 19 de febrero, 2010 8:00 A.M. – 5:00 P.M.

February 20, 2010 (Saturday) 7:00 A.M. - 7:00 P.M.
20 de febrero, 2010 (sábado) 7:00 A.M. –7:00 P.M.

February 21, 2010 (Sunday) 1:00 P.M. - 6:00 P.M.
21 de febrero, 2010 (domingo) 1:00 P.M. – 6:00 P.M.

February 22, 2010 (Monday through Friday) February 26, 2010 7:00 A.M. - 7:00 P.M.
22 de febrero, 2010 (el lunes por el viernes) 26 de febrero, 2010 7:00 A.M. – 7:00 P.M.

(Ctrl-click here for Google map of all Early Voting locations or Ctrl-click on a location name to see a map to the polling location.)

Audelia Road Library
10045 Audelia Road
Dallas
75238

Crosswinds High School
1100 N. Carrier Pkwy
Grand Prairie
75050

DeSoto Town Hall Library
211 E Pleasant Run
DeSoto
75115

Duncanville Library
201 James Collins Blvd.
Duncanville
75116

Fretz Park Recreation Center
6950 Belt Line Road
Dallas
75254

Garland City Hall
200 N. 5th Street
Garland
75040

Grauwyler Park Rec Center
7780 Harry Hines Blvd
Dallas
75235

Harry Stone Recreation Center
2403 Millmar Dr.
Dallas
75228

Irving City Hall
825 W. Irving Blvd
Irving
75060

Josey Ranch Library
1700 Keller Springs Rd.
Carrollton
75006

Lakeside Activity Center
101 Holley Park Drive
Mesquite
75149

Lancaster Library
1600 Veterans Memorial Pkwy
Lancaster
75134

Martin Luther King Jr Core Bldg.
2922 Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd.
Dallas
75215

Martin Weiss Recreation Center
1111 Martindell Ave
Dallas
75211

Marsh Lane Baptist Church
10716 Marsh Lane
Dallas
75229

Oak Cliff Sub-Courthouse
410 S. Beckley Ave.
Dallas
75203

Our Redeemer Lutheran Church
7611 Park Lane
Dallas
75225

Pleasant Oaks Recreation Center
8701 Greenmound Ave.
Dallas
75227

Records Building
509 Main Street
Dallas
75202

Richardson Library
900 Civic Center Dr
Richardson
75080

Rowlett Library
3900 Main Street
Rowlett
75088

St. Luke Community Life Ctr
6211 East Grand Ave
Dallas
75223

Valley Ranch Library
401 Cimarron Trail
Irving
75063

Veterans Medical Center (Main Lobby)
4500 S Lancaster Rd
Dallas
75216

West Dallas Multipurpose Center
2828 Fish Trap Rd
Dallas
75212


Last day to receive application for ballot by mail is Tuesday, February 23, 2010
Dure día para recibir la aplicación para la Votación por el Correo el martes, el 23 de febrero de 2010

Last day to register to vote for the Primary Election is Monday, February 1, 2010
Dure para registrar para votar para la Elección Primara es el lunes, el 1 de febrero de 2010

Monday, February 22, 2010

Governor -- Democrat:Star Telegram Recommendations

Governor -- Democrat

The best choice for Democrats in the gubernatorial primary becomes more obvious by the day.

Former Houston Mayor Bill White has been the front-runner since the December day he announced he was closing down his U.S. Senate exploratory committee to seek his party's nomination for governor. In a field of seven candidates, White, 55, stands out as bright, serious, and experienced in business and public service.

During six years as mayor of the state's largest city, White worked to make the Houston area the nation's leader in job growth while orchestrating a budget reorganization that reduced the city's unfunded employee pension liabilities. His pragmatic approach to air-quality issues related to natural gas drilling reveals a reasonable balance between public safety and economic development. And his direction of Houston's response to the migration of Hurricane Katrina refugees from New Orleans followed by those fleeing the threats of Hurricanes Rita and Ike highlighted his logistical deftness and humanitarian understanding.

White's appeal to voters -- he was re-elected mayor twice, with 86 percent and 91 percent -- is that he's not a partisan ideologue but someone with an intellect who listens as well as he leads.

Houston hair-care magnate Farouk Shami, 67, may be the challenger whose name is in the news, but not even his millions can save him from himself. His dysfunctional campaign is in free fall, an indicator that success in the private sector doesn't necessarily translate to politics.

The Star-Telegram Editorial Board recommends Bill White in the Democratic gubernatorial primary.

Bill White for Texas

I Endorse Bill White for Governor

Bill White fights for the people he represents, and brings people together to get things done. That's why as Houston's Mayor, he's been re-elected twice with margins of 86% and 91%. During his time as mayor, the Houston area led the nation's cities in job growth, adding more jobs than thirty-four states combined.

Bill White made Houston more efficient by reforming municipal pensions, reducing traffic delays, and cutting energy consumption even as the city grew. During his time as mayor, the government has provided more services -- including parks, libraries, and health clinics -- while consistently cutting the property tax rate and raising exemptions for seniors and disabled citizens.

Bill White made public safety one of his highest priorities and saw Houston's crime rates drop to the lowest levels in more than 25 years. For this leadership and dedication to fighting crime, he received the FBI Director's Community Leadership Award.

In a recent editorial, the Houston Chronicle praised White's management skills and his hit-the-brakes approach to spending, noting, "Mayor White has deftly steered Houston through both fiscal and tropical storms. His successor will have a tough act to follow." Before that, Governing Magazine named White one of its 2007 Public Officials of the Year explaining, "In time of both crisis and calm, White, a former business executive...is a cool pragmatist who wants results rather than excuses."

The results of his strong leadership were noticed nationally in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Bill "mobilized more than 100,000 Houstonians in the public, private business and faith-based communities to help evacuees rebuild their lives with independence and dignity," said the John F. Kennedy Foundation in presenting him the Profiles in Courage Award, "in recognition of his political courage in leading a compassionate and effective government response to the disaster."

Bill was also recently honored by the Houston Military Affairs Council for his work in spearheading a regional Returning Veterans Initiative designed to give returning veterans the welcome they deserve with coordinated social services, reductions in red tape, and employment opportunities. The Department of the Army has recognized this initiative as one of the finest in the country and Houston has been named one of the most military friendly cities to live and work.

Bill has been a nationally recognized energy expert for decades, pushing for practical measures to reduce America's dependence on foreign oil with higher fuel economy standards for cars, aggressive energy efficiency programs, more production of domestic natural gas, and greater reliance on domestic renewable resources. Before serving as mayor, White ran one of the region's most successful businesses. Previously, he served as Deputy Secretary of Energy of the United States, where he helped diversify national energy supplies and saved taxpayers more than a billion dollars with management reforms. As a legislative assistant in Congress in the 1970's, he worked on landmark energy legislation.

Earlier in his career, he helped build and manage one of the nation's most successful law firms. White attended Harvard University on an American Legion scholarship and law school at the University of Texas.

Bill White grew up in San Antonio. Both his parents were public school teachers and his father is a disabled WWII veteran. Bill's civic involvement began when he led voter registration drives in San Antonio's West Side almost forty years ago.

For decades, Bill White and his wife Andrea have helped lead numerous charitable and civic organizations. Together they started the Expectation Graduation to reduce dropout rates, engaging volunteers throughout Texas to bring dropouts back to school. Andrea is an author of books for young readers and helped start a nationally-recognized foundation to improve public schools. The Whites are parents of three children and attend St. Luke's United Methodist Church in Houston, where Bill taught Sunday school for many years.


http://action.billwhitefortexas.com/page/s/future


I support the following candidates who are running in contested races:State & Dallas County

Governor
Bill White
Lieutenant Governor
Ronnie Earle
Land Commissioner
Hector Uribe
Agriculture Commissioner
Hank Gilbert
HD 100
No endorcement
HD 105
no endorcement
68th District Court
Martin Hoffman
134th District Court
Dale Tillery
203rd District Court
No endorcement
254th District Court
David Hanschen
256th District Court
David Lopez
265th District Court
Mark Stoltz
291st District Court
Annie Lesser
363rd District Court
Tracy Holmes
Criminal District Court # 7
No Endorsement
304th District Court
Bill Mazur
County Judge
Larry Duncan
County Court At Law # 5
Mark Greenberg
County Criminal Court # 2
Lennox Bower
County Criminal Court # 5
Etta Mullin
County Criminal Court # 7
Elizabeth Crowder
County Criminal Court # 8
Tina Yoo
County Criminal Court Of Appeals # 1
Cass Callaway
Probate Court # 1
Brenda Hull-Thompson
District Clerk
Gary Fitzsimmons
County Clerk
John Warren
County Commissioner, Precinct 4
Elba Garcia
JP Precinct 1, Place 1
No Endorsement
JP Precinct 3, Place 2
George Freeman
JP Precinct 4, Place 1
Mary Abeyta
JP Precinct 5, Place 1
Luis Sepulveda
Constable, Precinct 1
No Endorsement
Constable, Precinct 2
Jerry Pittman
Constable, Precinct 4
Charles Woertendyke
Constable, Precinct 5
Jaime Cortes

Wednesday, February 17, 2010

The $555,000 Student-Loan Burden

by Mary Pilon
Tuesday, February 16, 2010
Wall Street Journal


When Michelle Bisutti, a 41-year-old family practitioner in Columbus, Ohio, finished medical school in 2003, her student-loan debt amounted to roughly $250,000. Since then, it has ballooned to $555,000.

It is the result of her deferring loan payments while she completed her residency, default charges and relentlessly compounding interest rates. Among the charges: a single $53,870 fee for when her loan was turned over to a collection agency.


"Maybe half of it was my fault because I didn't look at the fine print," Dr. Bisutti says. "But this is just outrageous now."

To be sure, Dr. Bisutti's case is extreme, and lenders say student-loan terms are clear and that they try to work with borrowers who get in trouble.

But as tuitions rise, many people are borrowing heavily to pay their bills. Some no doubt view it as "good debt," because an education can lead to a higher salary. But in practice, student loans are one of the most toxic debts, requiring extreme consumer caution and, as Dr. Bisutti learned, responsibility.

Unlike other kinds of debt, student loans can be particularly hard to wriggle out of. Homeowners who can't make their mortgage payments can hand over the keys to their house to their lender. Credit-card and even gambling debts can be discharged in bankruptcy. But ditching a student loan is virtually impossible, especially once a collection agency gets involved. Although lenders may trim payments, getting fees or principals waived seldom happens.

Yet many former students are trying. There is an estimated $730 billion in outstanding federal and private student-loan debt, says Mark Kantrowitz of FinAid.org, a Web site that tracks financial-aid issues -- and only 40% of that debt is actively being repaid. The rest is in default, or in deferment, which means that payments and interest are halted, or in "forbearance," which means payments are halted while interest accrues.

Although Dr. Bisutti's debt load is unusual, her experience having problems repaying isn't. Emmanuel Tellez's mother is a laid-off factory worker, and $120 from her $300 unemployment checks is garnished to pay the federal PLUS student loan she took out for her son.

By the time Mr. Tellez graduated in 2008, he had $50,000 of his own debt in loans issued by SLM Corp., known as Sallie Mae, the largest private student lender. In December, he was laid off from his $29,000-a-year job in Boston and defaulted. Mr. Tellez says that when he signed up, the loan wasn't explained to him well, though he concedes he missed the fine print.

Loan terms, including interest rates, are disclosed "multiple times and in multiple ways," says Martha Holler, a spokeswoman for Sallie Mae, who says the company can't comment on individual accounts. Repayment tools and account information are accessible on Sallie Mae's Web site as well, she says.

Many borrowers say they are experiencing difficulties working out repayment and modification terms on their loans. Ms. Holler says that Sallie Mae works with borrowers individually to revamp loans. Although the U.S. Department of Education has expanded programs like income-based repayment, which effectively caps repayments for some borrowers, others might not qualify.

Heather Ehmke of Oakland, Calif., renegotiated the terms of her subprime mortgage after her home was foreclosed. But even after filing for bankruptcy, she says she couldn't get Sallie Mae, one of her lenders, to adjust the terms on her student loan. After 14 years with patches of deferment and forbearance, the loan has increased from $28,000 to more than $90,000. Her monthly payments jumped from $230 to $816. Last month, her petition for undue hardship on the loans was dismissed.

Sallie Mae supports reforms that would allow student loans to be dischargeable in bankruptcy for those who have made a good-faith effort to repay them, says Ms. Holler.

Dr. Bisutti says she loves her work, but regrets taking out so many student loans. She admits that she made mistakes in missing payments, deferring her loans and not being completely thorough with some of the paperwork, but was surprised at how quickly the debt spiraled.

She says she knew when she started medical school in 1999 that she would have to borrow heavily. But she reasoned that her future income as a doctor would make paying off the loans easy. While in school, her loans racked up interest with variable rates ranging from 3% to 11%.

She maxed out on federal loans, borrowing $152,000 over four years, and sought private loans from Sallie Mae to help make up the difference. She also took out two loans from Wells Fargo & Co. for $20,000 each. Each had a $2,000 origination fee. The total amount she borrowed at the time: $250,000.

In 2005, the bill for the Wells Fargo loans came due. Representatives from the bank called her father, Michael Bisutti, every day for two months demanding payment. Mr. Bisutti, who had co-signed on the loans, finally decided to cover the $550 monthly payments for a year.

Wells Fargo says it will stop calling consumers if they request it, says senior vice president Glen Herrick, who adds that the bank no longer imposes origination fees on its private loans.

Sallie Mae, meanwhile, called Mr. Bisutti's neighbor. The neighbor told Mr. Bisutti about the call. "Now they know [my dad's] daughter the doctor defaulted on her loans," Dr. Bisutti says.

Ms. Holler, the Sallie Mae spokeswoman, says that the company may contact a neighbor to verify an individual's address. But in those cases, she says, the details of the debt obligation aren't discussed.

Dr. Bisutti declined to authorize Sallie Mae to comment specifically on her case. "The overwhelming majority of medical-school graduates successfully repay their student loans," Ms. Holler says.

After completing her fellowship in 2007, Dr. Bisutti juggled other debts, including her credit-card balance, and was having trouble making her $1,000-a-month student-loan payments. That year, she defaulted on both her federal and private loans. That is when the "collection cost" fee of $53,870 was added on to her private loan.

Meanwhile, the variable interest rates continue to compound on her balance and fees. She recently applied for income-based repayment, but she still isn't sure if she will qualify. She makes $550-a-month payments to Wells Fargo for the two loans she hasn't defaulted on. By the time she is done, she will have paid the bank $128,000 -- over three times the $36,000 she received.

She recently entered a rehabilitation agreement on her defaulted federal loans, which now carry an additional $31,942 collection cost. She makes monthly payments on those loans -- now $209,399 -- for $990 a month, with only $100 of it going toward her original balance. The entire balance of her federal loans will be paid off in 351 months. Dr. Bisutti will be 70 years old.

The debt load keeps her up at night. Her damaged credit has prevented her from buying a home or a new car. She says she and her boyfriend of three years have put off marriage and having children because of the debt.

Dr. Bisutti told her 17-year-old niece the story of her debt as a cautionary tale "so the next generation of kids who want to get a higher education knows what they're getting into," she says. "I will likely have to deal with this debt for the rest of my life."


http://finance.yahoo.com/college-education/article/108846/the-555000-student-loan-burden?mod=edu-continuing_education

Saturday, February 6, 2010

Aggressive Al Franken blasts administration for lack of leadership on health-care, other initiatives

By Manu Raju and Andy Barr -Politico

Sen. Al Franken ripped into White House senior adviser David Axelrod this week during a tense, closed-door session with Senate Democrats.

Five sources who were in the room tell Politico that Franken criticized Axelrod for the administration's failure to provide clarity or direction on health care and the other big bills it wants Congress to enact.

The sources said Franken was the most outspoken senator in the meeting, which followed President Barack Obama's question-and-answer session with Senate Democrats at the Newseum on Wednesday. But they also said the Minnesotan wasn't the only angry Democrat in the room.

"There was a lot of frustration in there," said a Democratic senator who declined to be identified.


"People were hot," another Democratic senator said.

Democratic senators are frustrated that the White House hasn't done more to win over the public on health care reform and other aspects of its ambitious agenda — and angry that, in the wake of Scott Brown's win in the Massachusetts Senate race, the White House hasn't done more to chart a course for getting a health care bill to the president's desk.

In his public session with the senators Wednesday, Obama urged them to "finish the job" on health care but did not lay out a path for doing so. That uncertainty appeared to trigger Franken's anger, and the sources in the room said he laid out his concerns much more directly than any senator did in the earlier public session.

The private session was set up in a panel format, with Axelrod joined at the front of the room by Democratic National Committee Chairman Tim Kaine and Democratic strategist Paul Begala.
A Democratic source said that Franken directed his criticism solely at Axelrod.

"It was all about leadership and health care and what the plan was going to be," the source said.

Franken — a comedian turned liberal talk show host — vowed to keep a relatively low profile when he arrived in the

Senate over the summer after a protracted legal battle with former GOP Sen. Norm Coleman. But he has developed a reputation among his colleagues as one of the more aggressive personalities on the Hill.
Last November, after Tennessee Republican Sens. Bob Corker and Lamar Alexander authored an op-ed in a local paper defending their opposition to a Franken amendment, Franken confronted both men on the floor — and grew particularly irritated with Corker.

He lashed out at Corker and a staff member in a follow-up meeting about the matter, several people said. Franken also clashed with South Dakota Sen. John Thune, No. 4 in GOP leadership, last month in a scathing speech during the health care debate, and staffers have reported other run-ins.

The White House, the Democratic National Committee and Franken's office all declined to speak on the record about Wednesday's session. Begala did not respond to a request for comment.

http://www.twincities.com/ci_14340952?source=most_emailed

Stalled Health Care Bill Leaves Drug Makers in Regulatory Limbo

By DUFF WILSON

With the possible demise of health care legislation, getting back to business as usual may not be the best thing for the nation’s drug makers.

After all, in return for the prospect of tens of millions of newly insured customers and a large degree of regulatory certainty, the pharmaceutical industry had agreed to pay a relatively small price: $8 billion a year in discounts and fees. It was a modest compromise for an industry with $246 billion in prescription drug sales last year.

But now, with the health care overhaul on a back burner in Washington and possibly dead for this year, drug makers are getting a sinking sense of how a piecemeal public policy future might look for them.

President Obama’s proposed budget this week, for example, includes a plan he alluded to in last week’s State of the Union address: a new tax on profits from some patents and other intangible assets parked in overseas tax havens by American companies.For drug makers, which are among those most likely to be affected by such a tax, the president’s proposal “pretty much came out of the blue,” said Martin A. Sullivan, an economist formerly with the Treasury Department and Joint Committee on Taxation.

Another expert agreed. “Pharma’s one that would really get hit,” said Erik Gordon, a professor at the Ross School of Business at the University of Michigan. “That’s a biggie.”

The industry giant Pfizer, for example, which has said that 88 percent of its $56 billion in income from 2004 through 2008 originated overseas, could be subject to the corporate 35 percent tax rate on at least some of its foreign profit in the future if the president’s proposal goes through.

Although the tax idea faced a cool reception from Democratic and Republican leaders of the Senate Finance Committee, it highlighted the risks to the drug industry of unpredictable election-year politics. It is a time when bolt-from-the-blue challenges may await drug makers, compared with the carefully mapped future they had worked out with the White House and the Senate under the health care legislation.

As if to reinforce the continuing business challenges that drug makers face, regardless of carrots and sticks from Washington, Pfizer issued an earnings report and financial forecast this week that disappointed Wall Street. The report, on Wednesday, has helped send its shares down 6.3 percent in the last two days.

Pfizer lowered its 2010 and 2012 forecasts, citing the rising dollar and the sale or spinoff of some assets, including animal health products and an H.I.V. drug. The company also noted the coming patent expirations on some of its blockbuster drugs, including Lipitor, as well as growing competition from lower-priced generics.

Several of the other big American drug companies reported a mixed bag of results last week. Johnson & Johnson posted a rare yearly decline in sales and gave a disappointing 2010 profit forecast. Bristol-Myers Squibb’s earnings per share beat analysts’ estimates, helped by a lower-than-expected tax rate. Eli Lilly profit fell just short of expectations, and its shares declined as investors also showed concern about expirations of its drug patents.

The other big American drug maker, Merck, plans to report on Feb. 16.

None of those drug makers had forecast effects from a health care overhaul by Washington. But all of them had basically endorsed the Senate bill.

Just last month, before the Republican candidate Scott Brown’s victory in a special election in Massachusetts upended the Democrats’ supermajority in the Senate, Pfizer’s chief executive, Jeffrey B. Kindler, told analysts that the Senate health care bill was “largely consistent with the principles” that were important to his industry.

The drug industry had forecast lower revenue in the early years of its cost-savings deal, in which it agreed to pay $80 billion in rebates and fees over a decade. But its revenue and profit were expected to more than make up the difference later in that period as more than 30 million uninsured people began receiving health and drug coverage.

And just as important, the industry had received assurances from the Obama administration and some critical Congressional Democrats that long-feared proposals that might have popular appeal — including government negotiation of Medicare drug prices and allowing the import of cheaper drugs from Canada — would be tabled in return for drug makers’ support of the rest of the health care overhaul. And some industry experts say any notions of an offshore tax had also been taken off the table.

As part of the deal, the drug industry had also pledged and spent more than $100 million on TV advertising in support of the overhaul effort.

It is unlikely that the drug industry will run ads promoting President Obama’s offshore tax proposal. Drug makers are fighting it through a Washington-based business coalition called Promote America’s Competitive Edge, which includes many other multinationals.

The group argues that lower foreign tax rates create a level playing field for American companies and international competitors and, ultimately, save jobs in the United States.

Mr. Sullivan, the former Treasury economist who now writes about tax issues, said that all the big drug makers engage in offshore tax sheltering of one sort or another. And the portion of overseas profit and revenue has been growing in recent years.

“Typically when a pharmaceutical company develops a new drug, it transfers it to a holding company in a tax haven like Bermuda or the Cayman Islands, usually on very favorable terms,” he said. “There’s a tremendous amount of income taken out of the U.S. and put into the tax haven. This proposal seems targeted to just that type of situation.”

Pfizer has reported that 58 percent of its revenue came from overseas in 2008, compared with 39 percent a decade earlier. For other drug markets, overseas revenue in 2008 amounted to 46 percent for Lilly, 44 percent for Merck and 42 percent for Bristol-Myers.

Professor Gordon of the University of Michigan, who studies pharmaceutical companies, said the president’s new plan to tax “excessive” offshore profits had surprised the industry and revealed the risks of a piecemeal health policy.

“The industry thought that it got some uncertainty off the table,” Professor Gordon said. “They’re not thrilled about what happened in Massachusetts. It’s not working to their advantage.”

Some analysts, meanwhile, say parts of the $80 billion, 10-year deal could come back to bite the drug industry — if it is held to some of the cost pledges without receiving the offsetting political protection.

The pact, for instance, committed the industry to support an increase in the rebate the government receives on Medicaid drugs — to 23 percent, up from 15 percent currently.

In the current deficit-cutting environment, that discount may still look attractive to lawmakers. And it could conceivably be enacted by Congress at any time without being part of an industry quid pro quo. “No question that’s alive,” said Seamus Fernandez, pharmaceutical industry analyst for the health care investment bank Leerink Swann.

But the overall health care reform package, he added, is “either dead or severely hobbled.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/05/business/05pharma.html?pagewanted=print

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