Special rights?

Great Debates
181

Mr.Z:

I think your argument defending the use of location to deny loans is specious at best. Location is a poor predictor of default rates (far better ones are the past credit history and employment record of the applicant). The possibility of property value decline is only significant in the event the borrower defaults (which, I remind you, only happens in about five percent of first mortgages) and even if it does decline will generally not decline that greatly. So at best this is grounds for tacking on a percentage point or so of additional interest, not grounds to deny the loan entirely. In the unlikely event that the value of the land is totally destroyed, odds are it was destroyed tortiously and the bank will stand to recover the loss in tort against the tortfeasor.

In short, flatly denying a loan because “based on the location of the property, the property value of the collateral might decline” is not sound risk management. The courts understand this (even if you do not) and therefore recognize that when this argument is made, they’re being lied to.

I’ll entertain your question about loaning money when you answer my previous ones about who you’d date and hire.

Every business does not get “hammered with lawsuits claiming discrimination”. I have friends who practice in employment law (on both sides of the fence). The businesses who get sued are the sloppy ones who appear to fire their employees randomly or do not have established procedures and policies that provide clear standards for what amounts to acceptable employee conduct. Businesses that set up clear, effective methods for documenting employee performance and conduct and have well-established policies do not get sued for justified terminations. Lawyers simply don’t take these cases.

If your business is being hammered by lawsuits, I would suggest that it’s because your business is badly managed: either your business actually discriminates unlawfully, or it is careless in communicating to employees what is expected of them and doesn’t make it clear to employees who are at risk to being fired that they are at risk, why they are at risk, and what they need to do to avoid being terminated. Perhaps if you listened to your lawyer’s advice on how to avoid lawsuits in the first place, instead of complaining about how often you get sued, you might get sued less. I find it hard to be sympathetic.

You’ve set off my bullshit detector: my instincts tell me that you’re trying to find excuses to justify what amounts to discrimination in your business practices. If I’m right in this regard, the situations you find yourself dealing with are the just desserts of immoral conduct, and I hope they get worse until you’re either fired or your company goes out of business.

I have no problem at all with increasing the cost of doing business immorally. As far as I’m concerned, this is a good thing.

182

::Note to Self::

Don’t tug on Superman’s cape.
Don’t spit into the wind
Don’t pull the mask of that ole Lone Ranger
And Don’t mess around with KellyM

183
  • agreed in part. Location of property is indeed the best indicator of the probability of the declination or inclination of values. Location, location, location.

depending on the location and condition of the property.

[quote]
So at best this is grounds for tacking on a percentage point or so of additional interest, not grounds to deny the loan entirely.

[quote]
well, kelly, I got “redlined” myself, being a straight white male. It does suck, but I wouldn’t underwrite the risk that I was. [I give on the issue of past credit, etc.]

and you will know who the tortfeasor is how? Subrogation is tenuous at best.

investing in propety of declining value is good risk management? Shit, I better buy some Love Canal property.

[aside] Kelly, I was thinking, deeply, about this over the past four hour because it challenged me. I will try to be candid.] No, I would not date a 400 pound man, bcause I discriminate about who I have sex with on the basis of gender. I would not date a 400lb woman because I find such proportions unappetizing. I would indeed date someone who does drugs as long as it did not interfere with their life. I would hire a gay, black or satanist, if, and this is a big if, they got along with the others in my department and performed well. Shit, I don’t give a shit if you do sacrifice virgins if you are a good employee. But piss off the others, and you are GONE.

I will be caefull about hiring any protected person in the future because it is so damn hard to get rid of them if they fuck up. I am in an “at will fire” state. this applies only to staightwhite christian males. Hiring anyone else requires MASSIVE documentation. If I have the chance, I would prefer to hire the unprotected class.

you are leaving out 3rd party suits.

you don’t have us there. 10 pages of clear direction, and terminations with the advice of inside and outside counsel do not prevent this. I know of none whee we did not follow procedure to the letter.

again, done, done, done and done. The EE get’s pissed off and suit is filed. I would love to talk at length about the one that was embezzling and filed suit ($27,635 in defense to date) or the one that shot another EE ($12,000 to date) but it would get tedious.

witout going into it, I have two single welfare moms that I hired ( yes me, the bigoted bastard). Both guilty of supreme isubordination, lying, and very poor performance. I doubt that I was being as wicked as you insinuate when I hired these protected folks. I did it for altuistic reasons and got hammered. And I also saved a lesbian from being fired because I thought it was bigotry. She almost cost me my job.

Odlly, all of the minorities that we are discussing have thrown their status in my face. They know that they are protected…and they use it. My White male employee has no such weapon.

184

here is requested evidence for discriminatory action by local gov’t:

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2000/10/11/tulia/index.html

also you can read about murders transgendereds at:

http://gender.org/remember/about/index2.html

185

from the links of dixie

which suggests that whites can’t be impartial. Racisim at it finest.

186

**

Easy enough to solve. End the war on drugs and you’ll end this kind of thing. I quote from the article “Only in an atmosphere of drug-war hysteria could so many rules of evidence be so willingly cast aside and institutions that would normally function as watchdogs become swept up in the frenzy.” This has nothing to do with hate crime legislation.

And this second website simply has a list of transgendered people who were murdered. You have no shown that these crimes were not taken seriously or investigated by the local law enforcement agencies. You have not shown that those who assault minorities simply walk free without any fear of prosecution.

Marc

187

end the war on drugs, agreed. but the war on drugs was merely used as a tool to get rid of those that local gov’t wanted to. it was not the war on drugs in a vaccum that did this. twenty years in jail for first-time personal use possession?? and without any evidence outside one man’s testemony that the so-called crime even occured?? a man you commmited perjory on the stand in that very case.

i can’t recite the full story for each dead transgendered listed on that page. here is one story i’m fairly familiar with. tyra banks, who is one of those listed, was in a car accident in wash dc. when the paramedics arrived all went fine, until they removed her pants and found a penis. they then stopped all treatment, and laughed and joked. at the hospital, the staff spent it’s time talking about her rather than giving her life-saving care. she died as a result. this was decided by other medical experts from the data available. her mother won a 2.7 million dollar wrongful death suit. the paramedics?? still working, and in fact promoted.

188

Dix:

In all fairness, you’ll notice that it wasn’t anything other than an honest man (in this case a Redneck farmer) that broke the case and blew the whistle.

189

Mr.Z, why don’t just admit you’re all laid out on a turkey platter with a fork sticking out of your butt, KellyM standing over you with a wicked sharp carving knife?

Giblets, anyone?

190

Lissener, Kel was wrong about property values, and wrong about our use of counsel. Also, she is wrong about me.

But it is nice to see you so gleefull, rather than pissy and whiny, lissener.

191

Mr. Z:

After speaking to my firm’s lawyer, and another landlord, I was told in no uncertain terms that the idea that it is harder to fire or evict a minority with cause is a complete myth.

Your individual business may have internal controls and protocals in effect, that ensure discrimination doesn’t occur, the “hoops” you must jump through before firing a minority. In this particular case, this might be a good thing.

Furthermore, if you as you claim hired welfare moms that you knew were incapable of performing the job you hired them for out of so-called “pity,” than you make me regret sticking up for you earlier.

192

I’d like to apologize to all readers for the convoluted nature of that last sentence.

193

She seems to know a great deal more about you than you’re willing to admit to yourself.

Ever notice how it’s only the SWMs who devote so much creative energy to weaving grasped straws into such elaborate whole-cloth justifications for holding on the biggest piece of the pie? The voices for social equity tend of course to be far more diverse–even to the point of including some thinking SWMs. But the childish whine of “No, Kitty, this is my pot pie!” is monochromatic, monotonic, and monotonous.

Yawn.

194

[QUOTE]
*Originally posted by lissener *
**

Would you wish to reconsider that?

195

Scylla, I hired them because I thought they could do the job. I find it very insulting that you assume that I am, on the one hand a bigot, but on the other hand so stupid that I would hire an employee solely out of pity. In fact, both did pretty well at first. But then they started pulling all kinds of stuff that decreased their performance.

Let me make this clear. I am in an “at will fire” state. I can fire anyone for any reason…unless they are protected. So I can fire a white guy because he wore a blue shirt. A minority on the other hand has legal grounds to sue. And don’t tell me that protected classes don’t sue simply because they were terminated for cause. I have a suit in my drawer from a hispanic that filed a discrimination suit after he killed one of our cooks. Sure we will win, but only after spending $15,000 in defense. You don’t have to lose at trial to lose money.

I jump through the hoops because I am following the advice that Kelly insists I am not following. Including Counsel, HR, consulting the law, looking at past litigation, looking at the legal environment, looking at the law.

So I am a bigot and I am a pudding headed soft-touch. I am both ignoring the law and the advice of counsel and I am overly carefull in following the advice of legal counsel.

Make up your mind folks.

196

Z:

There are two other possibilities

  1. You are getting sued so much because your company is conducting business improperly.

  2. Your diatribe may best be taken well-salted.

197

possibility 3. protected folks are being told “there are a lot of people out to get you. Sue 'em because nothing is your fault. It is those rich white powerful men.”

BTW, I worked as a consultant for years and the policies here are some of the most cautious and best thought out that I have seen. But this does not fit into your paradigm. Those good hearted members of the protected class only sue when they are wronged. This is simply not the case with any class of people. People can be greedy, and can want to shirk responsibility regardless of their color, religion, sex or sexual proclivities. Special rights just give them more ways to be so.

198

lissener, I am 100% for equality. I simply disagree with your method of attaining it. It is tempting to just say “those who disagree with me are idiots” as you have been doing. But that is not the case. I respect what you are trying to do. I just don’t think that your mind is open enough to consider the implications of what you support.

I don’t know if you missed it, but i am for gay marriage and equal health benefit status for gay partners. I am for equal rights. Not equal but different rights.

Buit perhaps Kelly is better suited to tell you what I think. After all, she knows me better than I do :rolleyes:

199

Would you wish to reread it?

200

Lissener:

I’ve reread it several times. Perhaps I’m missing something, but I see no difference between that statement and one like this:

“Do you ever notice how it’s only the gays and other special interests who are always whining about the tiniest imagined slight over how their rights are being violated and how they expect the whole world to bend over backwards to change for their benefit?”

I would see both as being occasionally true, but unfair generalizations likely to come from one who is seeking to justify a bigoted stance.

I truly don’t see how the relative opportunity enjoyed by SWMs versus other groups justifies an unfair statement like that.

I have certainly been wrong before, so please explain the difference, so I can understand.