Obscanity: You'll know it when you see it

ABC News: Going-Out-of-Business Sales Not Such a Bargain.

Fascinating. I mean, I figured liquidation sales were probably not such a great deal because this is their last big shot at actually selling their merch – but I didn’t realize that the stuff was actually being sold by third party liquidators. An interesting read!

Attention, Barnes & Noble members! From now until November 30, you can use coupon code V7E3F7F to take an additional 40% off a single book item, on top of your regular member discount, when you use your Mastercard to make the purchase. If you click on the coupon code number, you can read more information about the deal. Note that you can use it once in stores AND once on the website. Awesome!

Now, the trick with these coupons is to go for the MAXIMUM discount. Of course you can get a little paperback for a few bucks and be happy that you didn’t pay a few bucks more… but the real savings comes when you buy the bigger-ticket items.

Unfortunately, this discount code doesn’t work on textbooks – but apparently it DOES seem to work on box-sets. For example, want to replace your old, battered Harry Potter volumes for a shiny new collection? Check it out:

Harry Potter Hardcover Boxed Set @ BarnesandNoble.com:

List price: $195.00
Online price: $136.50
Member price: $122.85
Price with coupon code: $85.19

HOLY MOLY! Now that’s a deal! BN members, start shopping at Barnes & Noble now, and don’t forget to copy the coupon code – V7E3F7F – and use your Mastercard to get the discount! Expires November 30.

So… back in April I remember seeing a charge on my credit card for like, $4 and change. It was from Paypal, from a company called “SWAGVAULT.” I vaguely remember calling the company to figure out what the hell the charge was for, but I never got through to them. This was right around the time that I was dealing with some medical problems, and I was totally disoriented and not really wanting to deal with chasing around a $5 bill – so I wound up just assuming that it was from one of the comic book vendors on eBay, as I had recently bought a bunch of Buffy comics, all for around $4-$8.

Well, today I tried to add my credit card to PayPal, and it told me that my card number was already linked to another Paypal account! I figured, ah, maybe I linked it to my wife’s account when we were paying bills for the wedding… so I checked her account. No card. Then I thought, hm, maybe it’s on that other PayPal account I set up a long time ago. So I checked there too. I did find $90 I forgot I had on that account (SWEET! Hey, I ain’t complainin’!), but NO CARD.

So I called PayPal and got on the phone with some random person in a call center, and she told me that the account was linked to another email address. She couldn’t tell me which one, though.

Great. That helps! Blegh.

So she transferred me to somebody in the dispute resolution department, and he refused to tell me what email address the card was linked to.

GREAT! More help!

He was able to tell me the domain name of the account’s email address, at least, at which point I was just like, “Oh FUCK.” I don’t USE that mail service.

So I convinced him to at least tell me if there had been any charges, and if so, when, so I could look them up in my credit card statement. He was very, um, reticent about it. Don’t get me wrong; the guy was perfectly nice, and was really helpful and apologetic about not being able to give me more information – but these agents can be kind of coy when it comes to getting information out of them in the first place.

Luckily he was willing to suggest to me that I “might want to look” around March or April of this year. So I looked at March and April… nothing. Aha – but April’s charges are on the May statement. So I looked at May, and tada! There it was. That damned $4.xx charge from PAYPAL – SWAGVAULT.COM. FINALLY, the dam of information was broken – once I was able to identify the date and amount, he was able to give me the full name linked to the account.

That was the one and only charge made to my credit card, thankfully, but that didn’t stop me from calling and requesting a new credit card. Ironically, what started me off with all my credit card debt was a $250 fraudulent charge when I was 18 years old and making no money. (That seemed like a hell of a lot back then). They never did reverse that $250 charge, despite many attempts to report the fraud – but fortunately this time around they were more than happy to refund me my $4 and change and send me a new card.

The moral of the story… even if you do lots of online shopping, make sure you recognize each and every charge on your bill, because fraudulent charges can show up in any amount, and one scammed charge is one scam too many.

From Yahoo News:

US elected officials scored abysmally on a test measuring their civic knowledge, with an average grade of just 44 percent, the group that organized the exam said Thursday.

Ordinary citizens did not fare much better, scoring just 49 percent correct on the 33 exam questions compiled by the Intercollegiate Studies Institute (ISI).

How did you score on the ISI’s Civics Quiz?

I’m ashamed to admit I missed 2 questions, #27 and #33, giving me a score of 93.94%. Sad, considering that I’m IN an economics right now… ah well. It’s microeconomics anyway. Not sure if we get to take macroeconomics in my program.

To be fair, I missed #33 because of a semantic misunderstanding; I was reading debt and thinking deficit spending. But in retrospect, the real answer makes more sense.

In any event, I think it’s particularly sad that most Americans would fail this quiz. Sad that new citizens probably know more about American civics than lifelong ones, eh?

AmEx becomes bank to stabilize funding – Nov. 10, 2008.

The move will give AmEx the ability to grow its deposits — a more stable form of funding — and provide it greater access to Fed funding and government rescue programs.

Hey, I’m not doing so well economically these days. Maybe I should become a bank too. Obscanity Savings & … Savings. Get me some corporate welfare, and all that…

The No on 8 campaign received a letter from the Yes on 8 campaign requesting that they engage in a debate over whether Prop 8’s failure would lead to kids being “indoctrinated in schools.” In other words, the Yes on 8 campaign asked for No on 8 to show up for a debate in order to legitimize their lies by making them sound like something actually up for debate. They might as well have asked No on 8 to come to a debate about whether gay people are child-molesters – we all know that’s what they are really thinking.

The No on 8 people refused to take the bait:

SENT VIA EMAIL AND COURIER
October 28, 2008
Frank Schubert
Campaign Manager, protectmarriage.com – Yes on 8
1415 L Street, Suite C-259
Sacramento, CA 95814

Dear Frank:

Thank you for your letter. It would be a disservice to the people of California to debate an issue
that is completely unrelated to Proposition 8.

As you know:

Jack O’Connell, the state’s top educator and the nonpartisan-elected Superintendent of Public
Instruction says Prop. 8 has nothing to do with schools and that your campaign’s use of children
to make this false claim is “shameful.”

Delaine Eastin, his predecessor, says Prop. 8 has nothing to do with schools.

Dr. Ted Mitchell, the President of the State Board of Education, says Prop. 8 has nothing to do
with schools.

His predecessor, Reed Hastings, says Prop. 8 has nothing to do with schools.

The California Teachers Association says Prop. 8 has nothing to do with schools.

And leading newspapers have concluded Prop. 8 has nothing to do with schools.

The only debate worth having in California is why you have pursued such a deceptive campaign
strategy.

That debate is one you can conduct alone – with your conscience.

Cordially,
Steve Smith
Campaign Manager
NO on Prop 8

Don’t leave until you read this whole post! You won’t regret it!

Restaurant.com has an AMAZING deal right now – they are offering 80% off their already-reduced dining gift certificates when you enter code EIGHTY at checkout – DON’T FORGET to enter the promo code or else you won’t get the discount. This deal expires October 15, 2008 – that’s tomorrow – so if you want in, you’d better hurry up!

My guess is that this is meant to encourage people to keep going out to eat in this ridiculous economy, especially since most of the restaurants listed are smaller restaurants that tend not to be huge chains. That said, there are some chains on there, and we found a handful of our favorite restaurants there. I can’t wait to start eating!

There are minimum purchase amounts (usually $35 to use a $25 coupon) but that usually isn’t hard to reach unless you’re eating at a fast-food restaurant – and if you have a few people, you know you’ll reach the minimum. Let me tell you, this is an amazing deal. Their prices are already pretty good – $25 certificates are normally $10. Right now, they are $2. $10 gift cards are even less; they’re $0.60! I got about $80 worth of gift cards – for $16!

Can you do better than that?

Well, actually, you can! As it turns out, eBates, a rewards program that gives you cash back four times a year, offers 15% cash back on Restaurant.com – that’s a way generous rebate. So of my $16, I’ll get 15%, or $2.40, deposited into my eBates account. (I’ve gotten checks from them before, so I know it’s legit!) That’s just too awesome.

BUT WAIT! It gets EVEN better. If you sign up for eBates through this link before October 31, 2008 you’ll get a $10 welcome deposit into your eBates account, instead of the usual $5. So not only can you get 80% off your Restaurant.com dining gift certificates, but they will practically pay for themselves (ha, depending on how much you spend) if you sign up for eBates and make your Restaurant.com purchase through their link.

Now how awesome is that?

U.S. ready to debut plan – Oct. 13, 2008.

Do you ever wonder if this isn’t just the greatest heist of all time? Do you wake up in the middle of the night sometimes wondering how much of that $700 billion of our money is going to wind up in the offshore bank accounts of the top .05% of America’s wealthiest Republican puppeteers? Do you ever wonder if King Georgie is going to help himself to a share of it before he heads out of office? How many of Wall Street’s CEOs are REALLY not going to see massive financial perks from this bailout?

How much of this money is going to bail out the economy, and how much of it is going to leak out of the economy into the wealthiest Americans’ personal vaults?

I have no answers – only lots and LOTS of questions.

Congress unveils rescue bill (CNN).

I still think it’s just amazing how it’s become the accepted convention to use the $700 billion as the baseline for this bailout. Where did this number come from? Why are we even accepting that Congress and the taxpayers somehow owe Wall Street any kind of bailout? And I know the snarky comment is going to be that “owe” is exactly the operative word here, since so much of this is based on mortgages, or so we’re told. But again, these banks were greedy and took a risk based on that greed. Why do the rest of us have to pay for their hunger for money and their willingness to push people to borrow beyond their ability to repay?

Why isn’t this money going towards the establishment of a universal healthcare system? Aren’t skyrocketing healthcare costs another HUGE reason why people are declaring bankruptcy and walking away from their homes? Even if they’re not, nobody can possibly claim that healthcare costs are not damaging the economy. Shouldn’t this be our number one priority, considering that people are dying?

Of course, they could just give this money back to the taxpayers, in a real economic stimulus package… but that would never fly. They’re only interested in giving us chump change, not real change.

From Michael Moore‘s website:

Friends,

Let me cut to the chase. The biggest robbery in the history of this country is taking place as you read this. Though no guns are being used, 300 million hostages are being taken. Make no mistake about it: After stealing a half trillion dollars to line the pockets of their war-profiteering backers for the past five years, after lining the pockets of their fellow oilmen to the tune of over a hundred billion dollars in just the last two years, Bush and his cronies — who must soon vacate the White House — are looting the U.S. Treasury of every dollar they can grab. They are swiping as much of the silverware as they can on their way out the door.

No matter what they say, no matter how many scare words they use, they are up to their old tricks of creating fear and confusion in order to make and keep themselves and the upper one percent filthy rich. Just read the first four paragraphs of the lead story in last Monday’s New York Times and you can see what the real deal is:

“Even as policy makers worked on details of a $700 billion bailout of the financial industry, Wall Street began looking for ways to profit from it.

“Financial firms were lobbying to have all manner of troubled investments covered, not just those related to mortgages.

“At the same time, investment firms were jockeying to oversee all the assets that Treasury plans to take off the books of financial institutions, a role that could earn them hundreds of millions of dollars a year in fees.

“Nobody wants to be left out of Treasury’s proposal to buy up bad assets of financial institutions.”

Unbelievable. Wall Street and its backers created this mess and now they are going to clean up like bandits. Even Rudy Giuliani is lobbying for his firm to be hired (and paid) to “consult” in the bailout.

The problem is, nobody truly knows what this “collapse” is all about. Even Treasury Secretary Paulson admitted he doesn’t know the exact amount that is needed (he just picked the $700 billion number out of his head!). The head of the congressional budget office said he can’t figure it out nor can he explain it to anyone.

And yet, they are screeching about how the end is near! Panic! Recession! The Great Depression! Y2K! Bird flu! Killer bees! We must pass the bailout bill today!! The sky is falling! The sky is falling!

Falling for whom? NOTHING in this “bailout” package will lower the price of the gas you have to put in your car to get to work. NOTHING in this bill will protect you from losing your home. NOTHING in this bill will give you health insurance.

Health insurance? Mike, why are you bringing this up? What’s this got to do with the Wall Street collapse?

It has everything to do with it. This so-called “collapse” was triggered by the massive defaulting and foreclosures going on with people’s home mortgages. Do you know why so many Americans are losing their homes? To hear the Republicans describe it, it’s because too many working class idiots were given mortgages that they really couldn’t afford. Here’s the truth: The number one cause of people declaring bankruptcy is because of medical bills. Let me state this simply: If we had had universal health coverage, this mortgage “crisis” may never have happened.

This bailout’s mission is to protect the obscene amount of wealth that has been accumulated in the last eight years. It’s to protect the top shareholders who own and control corporate America. It’s to make sure their yachts and mansions and “way of life” go uninterrupted while the rest of America suffers and struggles to pay the bills. Let the rich suffer for once. Let them pay for the bailout. We are spending 400 million dollars a day on the war in Iraq. Let them end the war immediately and save us all another half-trillion dollars!

I have to stop writing this and you have to stop reading it. They are staging a financial coup this morning in our country. They are hoping Congress will act fast before they stop to think, before we have a chance to stop them ourselves. So stop reading this and do something — NOW! Here’s what you can do immediately:

1. Call or e-mail Senator Obama. Tell him he does not need to be sitting there trying to help prop up Bush and Cheney and the mess they’ve made. Tell him we know he has the smarts to slow this thing down and figure out what’s the best route to take. Tell him the rich have to pay for whatever help is offered. Use the leverage we have now to insist on a moratorium on home foreclosures, to insist on a move to universal health coverage, and tell him that we the people need to be in charge of the economic decisions that affect our lives, not the barons of Wall Street.

2. Take to the streets. Participate in one of the hundreds of quickly-called demonstrations that are taking place all over the country (especially those near Wall Street and DC).

3. Call your Representative in Congress and your Senators. (click here to find their phone numbers). Tell them what you told Senator Obama.

When you screw up in life, there is hell to pay. Each and every one of you reading this knows that basic lesson and has paid the consequences of your actions at some point. In this great democracy, we cannot let there be one set of rules for the vast majority of hard-working citizens, and another set of rules for the elite, who, when they screw up, are handed one more gift on a silver platter. No more! Not again!

Yours,
Michael Moore
MMFlint@aol.com
MichaelMoore.com

P.S. Having read further the details of this bailout bill, you need to know you are being lied to. They talk about how they will prevent golden parachutes. It says NOTHING about what these executives and fat cats will make in SALARY. According to Rep. Brad Sherman of California, these top managers will continue to receive million-dollar-a-month paychecks under this new bill. There is no direct ownership given to the American people for the money being handed over. Foreign banks and investors will be allowed to receive billion-dollar handouts. A large chunk of this $700 billion is going to be given directly to Chinese and Middle Eastern banks. There is NO guarantee of ever seeing that money again.

P.P.S. From talking to people I know in DC, they say the reason so many Dems are behind this is because Wall Street this weekend put a gun to their heads and said either turn over the $700 billion or the first thing we’ll start blowing up are the pension funds and 401(k)s of your middle class constituents. The Dems are scared they may make good on their threat. But this is not the time to back down or act like the typical Democrat we have witnessed for the last eight years. The Dems handed a stolen election over to Bush. The Dems gave Bush the votes he needed to invade a sovereign country. Once they took over Congress in 2007, they refused to pull the plug on the war. And now they have been cowered into being accomplices in the crime of the century. You have to call them now and say “NO!” If we let them do this, just imagine how hard it will be to get anything good done when President Obama is in the White House. THESE DEMOCRATS ARE ONLY AS STRONG AS THE BACKBONE WE GIVE THEM. CALL CONGRESS NOW.

YouTube – Jack Cafferty slams Sarah Palin!. Visit Cafferty’s blog entry for a transcript. Spend a couple of minutes reading people’s comments on this entry – thankfully most of them are intelligent comments, but there are a few that are just completely off the wall.

But bear in mind… she may just be working hard to lower expectations before the debate, so that if she just gets through without fucking up, people will say she won.

I’d bet a whole lot of dollars (or donuts) that the Republicans are cooperating with McCain to give him an excuse to postpone the debate. I think everybody realizes a debate is not good for the Republicans right now.

Of course they may just be coming face to face with the reality that many of the people who support Republicans actually expect their elected officials to practice the fiscally conservative beliefs they espouse during their campaigns… oops. Funny how real fiscal conservatives don’t support this bailout.

The Subprime Mortgage Primer.

Everything you wanted to know about the sub-prime mortgage crisis (or, okay, like, some of the stuff you wanted to know). In stick figures.

Make no mistake: John McCain is NOT suspending his campaign simply because the economy is about to go bust. If his only concern was about the economy, he would be out there, telling the country what he plans to do to fix it. He would be chomping at the bit to get the airtime provided by the presidential debate. He would say the debate is especially necessary now that one of these two men is going to inherit this economic crisis. Time is running out, and the American public NEEDS to hear from the presidential and vice presidential candidates.

But of course, none of that is happening. Why? The real reason he is suspending his campaign – and trying to postpone the debate – is because he sounds better with his mouth shut. He has nothing to say, and has no good way to say it. His campaign has been injured enough by stupid, bigoted, ignorant, completely ridiculous statements coming from him and from his staff. At this point, the very best (and most safe) thing for him to do is smile and look pretty until all the polls are closed. The more he talks, the more we hear him and understand who and what he truly is – and that’s not good for his numbers.

I can only hope that America is not gullible enough to fall for this ploy. After all, what does it mean that he’s suspending his campaign? Does it mean the endless barrage of deceitful commercials about Obama will stop? No. It just means he saves money because he can let his supporters do all the advertising for him – which probably means more lies, not less. Does it mean that his army of lackeys will stop trying to smear the Democratic candidates at every opportunity they get? Of course not.

All it really means is that now he will have an excuse to stay out of the public eye.

Of course, it may also be that he’s trying to push things as far as he can in order to prevent Palin from ever having to debate Biden. I could see him claiming that the presidential debate is more important than the VP debate, and trying to cancel the VP debate altogether.

All this goes without even getting into the very serious question about whether we’re facing another Reagan in the White House, and if elected, whether he will even survive the presidency.

And what of David Letterman’s suggestion that the right thing to do is for McCain to go back to Washington but let his campaign continue on with his running mate, the vice presidential candidate, at its helm?

Well, I think we see the problem there. She’s busy campaigning for the title of Miss America and arranging staged, scripted photo-op meetings that bear a remarkable resemblance to speed-dating.

This political ploy by McCain will be a true test of what America has learned during the past 8 years. Let’s hope we don’t fail by falling for it again.

Until August 31, if you spend $59 on selected items from Amazon Grocery, you’ll get a $25 instant rebate! I got a whole bunch of Clif Luna Bar products and 100-Calorie Packs from Nabisco. Yay for cheap snackage! Read more about this offer!

By the way, if you have any problems redeeming this rebate, you can email Customer Service and they should be able to apply the refund manually from their end. There should not be any problems, though!

From the NY Times:

SAN FRANCISCO — To the ever-expanding résumé of Gavin Newsom — San Francisco mayor, California hopeful for governor, Montana-bound groom — one may now add this: code-breaker.

In a story that seems equal parts spy novel and potential municipal fiasco, Mr. Newsom was enlisted on Monday to coax a secret code out of a city engineer who prosecutors say had effectively hijacked a large part of the city’s computer systems. [Read more.]

Next stop, starring in the next Mission: Impossible sequel? *g* Could just picture it.

Some free shipping and other deals from Target.com. The free shipping is where the real discount is; Target’s shipping fees are so high that sometimes the cost of shipping cancels out the economic benefit of shopping at Target’s website. Take advantage of the free shipping offers whenever you see them!

• Spend $125, save 15% on Furniture. Exp. 7/26
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Summer savings at Kmart.com:

• Save 20% off Outdoor Grills and Grill Accessories. Valid 7/20 – 7/26
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A great sale at Kohls.com:

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Some other great deals:

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Last month, CNN revealed that the Federal Emergency Management Agency had stored $85 million worth of household items in warehouses for two years. Instead of giving the supplies to victims of the 2005 hurricane, FEMA declared them surplus and gave them all away to federal agencies and 16 states in February.

FEMA fucks it up again: A recent CNN investigation revealed that for two years FEMA was paying $1 million to store millions of dollars’ worth of supplies that were intended to go to Louisiana and Missouri residents displaced by Hurricane Katrina. Eventually it declared the items “surplus” and gave away the supplies to prisons, colleges, fire departments, and even government agencies – everybody but the intended Katrina victims.

Nobody can really say why this happened, except that everybody (except those actually on the ground) claims that there wasn’t a “need” for the supplies. The folks living in tents in New Orleans more than two years post-hurricane are saying otherwise.

Now FEMA is downplaying the error, claiming that it made a HUGE accounting error and it was only $18.5 million worth of supplies “given away” to non-Katrina victims, not the originally-estimated $85 million. (So let’s get this straight – when they were bragging about how much they were planning to Katrina victims, it was $85 million, but now that they’re caught with their pants down, it’s suddenly “only” $18.5 million? Either way, there are thousands of people who could still use these supplies and aren’t getting them.)

They’re also blaming Louisiana for not taking all of the items in the first place (no clear explanation on exactly why or how that happened), and even claiming that the items weren’t really JUST meant for SPECIFICALLY Katrina victims, PER SE.

Louisiana is demanding answers from FEMA, but I’d certainly like to know why Louisiana turned down the items in the first place. That said, how utterly out of touch does an agency have to be to not know that there is still a need for disaster relief over there?

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Found this great and useful article on Hubpages, entitled “How to Make Money WRITING Online.” The nice thing is that it’s actually a pretty honest and accurate assessment of making online writing your career; it’s not a “set up a single page loaded with keywords and watch the money tumble into your Adsense account” deal like many of the articles I come across – ’cause I think for the most part, those are bogus. This is not. Check it out!

From Newsweek: “For months, economic Pollyannas have looked beyond the dismal headlines and promised a quick recovery in the second half. They’re dead wrong.” (Read more)

Depressing, but an interesting read, nonetheless.

From CNN: “In a nod to consumer advocates, regulators require lenders to evaluate subprime borrowers’ ability to pay while banning most prepayment penalties.” Read more.

What I want to know is this: What is being done about the equally shady practice of some property owners who collect rent money while their property goes into foreclosure? A lot of people are losing the roof over their heads because their landlords have decided not to pay their mortgages, instead pocketing the rent money as long as they can before the house goes into foreclosure and the tenants are evicted by the bank, through no fault of their own. Frequently, the tenants have no idea that they are in any danger until the eviction notice is served. In the meantime, they continue to pay rent, while the landlords don’t bother to maintain or repair the property, since they’re going to lose it anyway. Shouldn’t renter’s rights be protected as well? Homeowners are not the only victims of the subprime mortgage fiasco.

First it was Charles Black’s remark about how McCain’s campaign would benefit from a “fresh terrorist attack” on US soil. Now, another top McCain advisor, Phil Gramm, has called America a “nation of whiners,” and claims that the recession is all in our heads. He disparages “mental depression,” and then claims we’re in a “mental recession.” That’s really easy to say when you’re a rich white man. Of course you’re not experiencing the pain of recession – the money we don’t have is somehow finding its way into YOUR pockets!

Great guy, that Phil Gramm.

These are the men that McCain keeps close to him – at least, until the public finds out what they talk about behind closed doors. What does that say about McCain himself?

Cross-posted from my Hubpages article, though I’ve posted the text below for preservation’s sake:

If you’re graduating with a mountain of student loans some time in the near future (or recent past), you should be aware of a new federal student loan forgiveness program (a part of the new “College Cost Reduction and Access Act“) designed to ease the burden of education debt and encourage new graduates to pursue work in the public sector.

What Kind of Debt Is Eligible For Forgiveness?

The loan forgiveness program applies to Stafford, PLUS and federal consolidation loans made through the U.S. Education Department’s Direct Loan program. In case your federal loans were borrowed through another lender, you should be happy to learn that as of Tuesday, July 1, 2008, any federally guaranteed student loan can be converted into a Direct Loan consolidation loan so the borrower can qualify for the debt forgiveness program [PDF].

Federal loans have the added benefit of allowing graduated payments so that your monthly payment amount is commensurate with your income. Since public sector jobs tend not to pay as much as those in the private sector, you’ll pay less over those ten years than you would have if you made more money, and a greater portion of the principal balance will be forgiven at the end of the ten-year period.

Who Can Qualify For This Program?

According to a recent article in the LA Times, the new loan forgiveness program is open to “anyone who works full-time for a state, federal or local government — including police officers, firefighters, the military and public school teachers. It also applies to some people outside of government, including employees of tax-exempt, nonprofit organizations and those working in emergency services, public interest law or public child care, healthcare or social work.”

The Bottom Line

If you’re graduating with minimal student loan debt, this program may not be the optimal solution for you, although the public can always use more talented professionals.

However, college education costs are growing by the minute, especially if you are working toward an advanced degree (since you’ve still got your undergraduate loans to deal with, too!). If you will be graduating with a seemingly insurmountable amount of federal student loan debt, this program might be the answer for you, as long as you are willing to devote the first ten years of your career to working for the public good.