| Eligible Homeowners Might Not Receive Rate Freeze
Eligible Homeowners Might Not Receive Rate Freeze Mortgage Holders Complain Of Red Tape Lending Companies Do Not Have To Honor Plan WASHINGTON (CBS) ― Be ready to wait if you want to get information from a toll-free hot line about freezing the interest rate on your subprime mortgage. Minutes after President Bush outlined a plan to help strapped homeowners, callers were told to have patience until a counselor could answer their questions and "devote as much time to you as necessary." But, once they do get through, homeowners may not find the answers they sought. One caller to the hot line (1-888-995-HOPE) was told there would be "lots of hoops to jump through" to obtain the five-year freeze. The rate hold goes to the heart of the relief effort for people with subprime mortgages, which are loans offered to borrowers with tarnished credit or low incomes.
Bush's Afghan report ignores surge in violence
The security is going from bad to worse, especially in the south and the east," said Abdul Kaiyoom, 47, who works for Afghanistan's Education Ministry. Bush said sending an additional 3,200 Marines to Afghanistan - a decision made just this month - would help continue the country's successes. But in reality, it came only after U.S. officials couldn't persuade other NATO countries to send more soldiers to bolster the 28,000 U.S. forces already there. "Thanks to the courage of these military and civilian personnel, a nation that was once a safe haven for al-Qaida is now a young democracy where boys and girls are going to school, new roads and hospitals are being built, and people are looking to the future with new hope," Bush said. USAID, the government's aid arm, has built or refurbished 680 schools in Afghanistan since 2001.
Stratford targeting public pensions
The financial impact on the town is devastating," Mihaley said. "These contracts have to be renegotiated so these flagrant abuses can be eliminated. These guys should go down to the Baldwin Senior Center and see how some people in this town don't even have enough money for a cup of coffee." But Police Union President Shawn Farmer pointed out that the union did made concessions years ago and that the combination of the Sikorsky strike and a major underground construction job over the past two years resulted in a "perfect storm" that required far more overtime than usual. Farmer, president of Local 407, Stratford Police Union, AFSCME, said the union is not insensitive to taxpayers. "There were two major concessions the police union made in the last 10 years to make it a more fair system — the first thing is going from a 66 percent down to a 50 percent pension due to an injury on the job, and because of that we've only had two people retire on a disability pension since then," he said.
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