Jonah Raskin : Class of '09 Speaks Out on New Media

VFor four months, from 6 p.m. to 9:30 p.m. every Wednesday, freedom of speech seemed to be alive and well in an old fashioned classroom where students asked questions, talked in small groups and wrote with pens and pencils on lined-paper...LINK

Medea Benjamin Calls on Obama to Visit Gaza

During His Trip to Egypt, Obama Should Visit Gaza
By Medea Benjamin / May 29, 2009

Obama will give a major policy talk at Cairo University on June 4, intended to start mending the rift between the United States and the Arab world. During the Bush years, many Arabs turned against the United States because of the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, as well as the abuses at Guantanamo and Abu Graib. But the issue that is really at the crux of the tensions with the United States is the intractable conflict between Israel and Palestine, and what many perceive as a one-sided U.S. policy in support of Israel...LINK

Obama, the Anti-War Movement and the Neo-Cons: Turning the Ship Around

Obama's agenda of 'turning the battleship' is not our agenda of disarming it altogether: ending U.S. interventionism and bullying of all sorts, initiating an era of peaceful global cooperation to tackle poverty, disease, global warming and other threats to all humanity....LINK

Chavez: 'When the Working Class Roars, the Capitalists Tremble'

Venezuela: ‘When the working class roars, capitalists tremble’
By Federico Fuentes / May 30, 2009

Addressing the 400-strong May 21 workshop with workers from the industrial heartland of Guayana, dedicated to the “socialist transformation of basic industry”, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez noted with satisfaction the outcomes of discussions: “I can see, sense and feel the roar of the working class.”

“When the working class roars, the capitalists tremble”, he said.

[+/-] Read More...

Texas mayor resigns for gay partner

The mayor of San Angelo, Texas, has resigned just ten days after a landslide re-election victory to pursue his relationship with his gay partner, an illegal immigrant.

J W Lown was elected in 2003 as the city's youngest ever mayor at the age of 32. He has been re-elected three times, gaining 89 per cent of the latest vote, held ten days ago.

He told the San Angelo Standard-Times he fell in love with his partner in March, after he announced he would be standing for re-election.

It is thought the unnamed Mexican man had a student visa which has now expired.

Lown said he had chosen not to take the oath of office while “aiding and assisting” a person who was illegally in the country.

“I made the final decision when I knew it was the right decision to make for me and my partner and our future – and for the community,” he said.

He added he planned to stay in Mexico to try to obtain a visa so that his partner can return with him if “the people of San Angelo will welcome me back.”

Lown officially tendered his resignation via a letter delivered to city manager Harold Dominguez this week.

“While I know that the timing of this announcement is less than ideal, I have my own compelling reasons for making this decision,” he wrote. “I have made thousands of decisions on behalf of our community, and I weighed this decision in the same manner that I approached other decisions.”

Even if Lown married his partner by proxy in a state that allows gay marriage, the federal government does not recognise same-sex marriages for immigration purposes...LINK

GreenNote Introduces P2P Student Loan Hybrid: Virgin Money Meets Facebook with a Dash of Prosper

This week two Finovate Startup alums launched the
services they demo'd a month ago at our conference:

• June 2: CheckingFinder from FirstROI/BancVue
• June 4: Friends & family student loan facilitator,GreenNote

We'll start with GreenNote and look at CheckingFinder tomorrow. Although I'd seen the GreenNote demo, since it was in closed beta, I hadn't had a chance to use it until earlier this week.

My first impressions are favorable. The site helps students reach out to family and friends to put together a "personal loan consortium" to finance educational expenses (also called a "pledge drive"). While GreenNote does not currently provide access to funds from outside the student's own network of friends and family, the service does offer tools to solicit loan pledges via email. It also collects the resulting loan pledges from interested parties, then sets up and services the resulting loan.

The process:

• Students solicit loan pledges from their network, and hopefully the networks of their network
• Interested friends, family, or anyone else who's received a loan request from the student (either directly, or through forwarding) create a GreenNote account and make loan pledges (minimum $100)
• Once the loan is funded (minimum $1,000, no maximum), GreenNote verifies enrollment, collects the money, and packages it into a single loan agreement with the student
• When it comes time to repay the loan, lenders can choose to forego the principal and/or interest and gift it to the student; lenders will also be able to lower the rate

The terms:

• Loans are deferred for up to five years while the borrower is in school, then initiate a six-month grace period before repayment begins
• Interest accrues during the deferment period
• Repayment is over a 10-year period, meaning that lenders must commit their money for 15 years
• The rate is currently 6.8% fixed, but GreenNote takes 100 basis points of that, so lenders receive a 5.8% return (which they can elect to lower at repayment time)
• GreenNote charges a 2% loan fee at funding, with a minimum of $49

Coming soon:

• Allow third parties to browse loans they might want to fund (e.g., alumni)
• Facebook integration

Analysis
At first glance, it looks like an expensive way to put a nice wrapper around funds that have already been made available by the student's family. And certainly, if moms and dads are providing the bulk of the cash, it's not necessary to pay 2% for a promissory note. For most loans, you can do that for less at online paperwork specialists such asVirgin Money or LoanBack.

However, the power of GreenNote's model is tapping into the friends of friends, and the friends of those friends, and so on. As a student puts together an email pledge drive, recipients are encouraged to pass the request on to appropriate parties who might be willing to participate. For example, Pat who is headed to Michigan State, knows Jon whose uncle is a successful alum of the school. Jon's uncle, who'd be highly unlikely to simply write Pat a check, might be very interested in putting a few thousand dollars into a long-term 5.8% deposit that earns him a fair rate of return and helps someone go to Michigan State.

GreenNote is well thought out and well implemented. The main problem though, is finding enough deep pockets willing to put thousands of dollars on deposit for up to 15 years with no guarantee of repayment.

Financial institution opportunities
Lenders have taken some heat recently as they've cut back on student lending during the credit market turmoil. A bank or credit union could gain some positive PR by facilitating this type of lending among their own customer base and community. It could be built from scratch or potentially in partnership with GreenNote.

Background
GreenNote is backed by Menlo Ventures, among others, and has an impressive board and advisors including prolific blogger and partner at Glenbrook Partners, Scott Loftesness. Bill Harris of Intuit, X.com (now PayPal), and Passmark (now RSA) fame is on the board. The launch was covered this week by TechCrunch, VentureBeat, and C|Netamong others.link...

GreenNote homepage (5 June 2008)