Capitalism
Lets face it. It’s the Kryptonite in a Leftist’s lunch-box. We all know that. The Left hates banks, corporations, Wall Street, small businesses, they just know that these entities never created a job and are vile entities.
Along comes a financial crisis and who do they blame? Why surprise surprise, it’s the banks, the corporations, Wall Street, small businesses... Wow, who could have seen that coming?
Why do these entities come under focus? Is it because they have actually done something wrong, or is it because big government has to find a culprit so that they can look like they are doing something about ‘the causes’ of the calamity, and at the same time move the blame off themselves?
Is there a Securities and exchange commission? Do they regulate? Are banks and the other entities mentioned watched over? Do they have to meet certain standards? Are those standards reviewed the businesses made to conform?
We had a situation that was set up by Senate Banking Chairman Barny Frank, and the whole Leftist community, working tag team with legislatures, judges, community organizers, and the lending industry itself once it couldn’t avoid it, to give out bad loans to unqualified people.
All this took place under the nose of Congress, the courts, the lending industry, the Securities and Exchange Commission, regulators... you name it, the practices put into place were known up front and deemed kosher.
No major investigation took place prior to the melt-down. No banks were taken to task for bad practices. Wall Street firms weren’t under the gun prior the melt-down. And yes, the overseers were doing their job. They weren’t kvetching. The financial industry was humming along smoothly according to these investigators and overseers.
Once the stuff hit the fan, all of a sudden those same financial institutions were evil. The same folks that operated right under the noses of Congress, the Security Excange Commission, the Courts and the rest of the overlords, were suddenly evil incarnate.
Never-mind that Freddy Mack and Fanny Mae went under. Never-mind that banks went under. Never-mind that Wall Street itself had major problems. The overseers couldn’t be seen to be the problem. Congress, the Liberals, the Courts, those who forced the lending industry to play this evil game, were not to blame. No, the entities that had those policies foisted off on them were the evil players.
Barney Frank and the rest of the Leftist manipulators skated. These were the true free lunch crowd. These were the folks who demanded the gifting of loans to people who had no chance whatsoever to pay them back. Judges accepted Leftist claims of racism and the mis-characterization of red-lining to justify their rulings that minorities deserved loans, almost without any reason whatsoever.
Lending institutions who were extremely exposed financially, had to find a way to move this paper off their books. And with the Securities and Exchange Commission and other regulators looking on, they bundled this paper and sold it to Wall Street, who in turn sold it around the planet. This was a fraud, but it was a fraud participated in from the very top of our government right down to the lending institutions themselves.
Then after the fact, the very folks who forced this situation on the lending institutions and Wall Street came marching in to focus on the evil that had taken place. And as if they didn’t already know, they discovered ‘the evils’ that had taken place. (wink wink)
Enter good folks on the right who want to hold folks accountable. They mean well, but here we go blaming the folks who had bad loans forced on them, had to move the paper to survive, and were regulated all the way along as they did what they did.
What we are seeing is in essence equal to a taxpayer complying with existing law, then coming under a tax audit, and deemed cheating for having done what they were assured was correct, and then blamed and prosecuted for being a tax evader.
I’m not going to state that all lending institutions were totally on the up and up, but I’m going to be very leery of blaming exactly who the Leftists want me to.
People can call me a bank bootlicker if they like, but the fact is, there was a lot of licking going on, and it was the Leftists and their constituents that benefited the most out of this deal.
The lending institutions went to court to try to keep this from taking place, and the courts shot them down.
Now they’re trying to shoot them down again, this time for losing to the courts and having to comply with their rulings in the first place.
Sorry, I’m not buying into the Bank and Wall Street bashing quite as eagerly as some others are.
I seldom do side with Leftists, particularly when it’s as transparent as this is what actually took place.
And there are folks here who might just as well work for Barney Frank too.
It runs a bit deeper than this. The Democrats forced sub-prime on the banks and savings and loans, all true. But once these lenders found out how much money they could make writing sub-prime paper, they went crazy with it. I owned a mortgage company from 1990-2004. I saw what certain lenders were doing. They were underwriting toilet paper.
Example: A guy had the following credit report. 11 collection accounts, and one current account, with a high of 500 dollars. He put 100,000 down and got an 800,000 first mortgage. The same company opened up a division in Chatsworth, CA. The sole reason for this office was to write sub-prime mortgages for illegal immigrants. Another major bank did the same. Many other banks were writing sub-primes for 500,000+ with NO down payment. NO income verification.
Loan officers were charging 3 points on a $600,000 loan. Some were making $100,000 a month. I could name companies, their names, and their corporate positions in a dozen of these lenders.(I only wrote “A” paper. Never touched this stuff)
In the summer of 2006, I tried to warn California FReepers that there would be a TRILLION dollar bloodbath, and to quit trying to flip houses, because they would get caught in the crash. I was flamed : )
So are you saying it was fraud but fraud on such a big scale that we should just ignore it? I’m just trying to be clear on what you just posted.
I’m just waiting for the banker bootlickers to chime in and say all the problems are the fault of the CRA... Not a crumb of fraud in Wall Street...
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48 minutes ...
You’ll never learn...
It's an act. The writing of the Communist Manifesto was financed by European bankers. Through the early 20th Century, they were known as the Popular Front. When they were chased out of Germany, guess where they wound up?