Nearly 20 million American households utilize payday lending services to make an emergency car repair, cover a variety of other costs or avoid bounced check fees. Leave it to CBS to attack the legitimate, legal, and useful service. “Evening News” correspondent Armen Keteyian called payday loans “a short-term solution turned long-term trap” in his July 25 hit piece on the lending services, which offer convenient paycheck advances at high interest rates.  “A typical customer takes out about eight payday loans a year, in essence advances on their paychecks with interest rates approaching 400 percent a year,” Keteyian reported.  Keteyian didn’t report how many borrowers actually end up in financial trouble. Instead, he found one woman who ended up in a cycle of payday lending and ended up spending $1,500 to cover interest and fees, according to the report.   “They’re set there for people like me that live payday to payday and then once you get in there you can’t get out,” Mary Bates said. Keteyian filed his report from Pinnacle, a North Carolina town with a population of less than 6,000. The Web site of the industry group Community Financial Services Association of America (CFSA) includes a comment offered by Mary Bates, from the same town, praising payday lending. Phone listings show only one Mary Bates in the town.  “Payday loans are really convenient and they help people get out of a bind,” Bates said on the CFSA site. “It’s less of a hassle. I really liked the people and they provided me a great service.”