The Mortgage 'Deal', and OS Once Again Asks: Where Is The Giuliani Of Our Generation?

The news was breathlessly reported in the media, and glowingly announced by Eric Holder:

A multistate settlement with five large U.S. banks over foreclosure practices would include as much as $17 billion in mortgage debt forgiveness and loan modifications and take three years to complete, according to a letter describing the deal.


The draft letter to stakeholders from state attorneys general outlines an agreement among large mortgage servicers, states and the Department of Justice, which are continuing talks to finalize the proposal. 

Servicers, including Bank of America Corp., JPMorgan Chase & Co. (JPM), and Wells Fargo & Co., would also have to provide as much as $3 billion in refinancings, enabling borrowers to secure new loans “at today’s historically low rates,” according to the letter.


Another $1.5 billion would be to about 750,000 borrowers who have lost their homes to foreclosure, according to the letter.

States that sign on to the agreement would get “immediate payments” to fund consumer protection and foreclosure prevention efforts. 

Lissen' up, ya'll. These banksters perpetrated the greatest swindle in the history of the world! They sold shit mortgages on shit houses to people who had no chance of honoring the terms, thus crippling their futures. In the meantime, they bundled and sold these shit mortgages as securities. Most of them were never recorded in the county courthouses of the land, which is what the law requires. 

Then, when the shit mortgages stopped producing, they filed fraudulent, perjured foreclosure documents and kicked the purchasers they had defrauded out of their houses. They used robo-signers to sign the affadavits, often fictitious names, or names of dead people, which is perjury and fraud upon the court. The chain of title has been broken on thousands upon thousands of properties, which will serve to make them unsaleable, or so risky as to gut their market value.

A breathtaking fraud has been perpetrated upon us, and our political leadership are holding the banksters' coats while they stone the culture to death. This makes the corruption of the 1870's look like Amateur Hour, Teapot Dome look like small peanuts, Watergate look like a bad prank.

And now, courtesy of Barry and Eric, they get to sign a civil settlement for pennies on the dollars of wealth they vacuumed away from each and every one of us. And we're supposed to stand up and cheer!

They only have to fork up 4.5 billion in cash, some of it to buy off the state governments, and promise to 'help' by reducing some loan principals--if and when they get around to it. When they fail to honor the agreement, there will be zero enforcement.

Back in the late 1980's, an earlier generation of banksters and politicians collapsed the venerable Savings and Loan industry, which had for decades provided stability in the home sales market by demanding prudence from all parties. At least one of those crooks, Charles Keating, actually was convicted and served four years in the pokey for ruining thousands of lives.  The senators he bought off, including John McCain, were named and shamed.

In our day, the politicians make little effort to hide their ennabling of massive fraud.

It is a culture that has decided that only power matters, and slowly and surely it is grinding...to...a....(halt).

OS sees little to no hope in the Presidential race. He thinks our best bet in that arena is to elect fire-breathing honest conservatives at every level from city council to Congress, and keep after them to hold the crooks' collective feet to the fire.

OS also thinks that anyone who is foolish enough to do business with the banks mentioned above deserves the fleecing that awaits.

Let Us Meditate On The Great First Ladies Of Our Nation, And Wonder If They Would Have Staged A Potato-Sack Race In The White House

Mrs. Washington, who had to watch her husband called into service time and again.

Mrs. Adams, who managed the farm while John labored in Philadelphia with Franklin and Jefferson, creating a Declaration of Independence.

Dolly Madison, who saved what she could of the White House furnishings as the British approached.


Mrs. Lincoln, who made Mr. Lincoln's life a living hell at home as he led the Union through a civil war, and was seated beside him as he was assassinated in Ford's Theater.

Mrs. Wilson, who ran the country in Woodrow's name, after he suffered numerous strokes.

Mrs. Truman, who kept Harry's temper in check as best she could.

Mamie Eisenhower, who graced the White House with such class.

And then there was Jackie. 'Nuff said.

And Lady Bird, who wanted some landscaping on the interstates, at least.

Nancy Reagan, the love of Ronnie's life.

Those are just a few examples.

But we live in a new age now, in which the First Lady stages a flour-sack race with a talk-show host, inside the White House.

What were they thinking? Did it occur this may really be embarrassing and inappropriate? Barry, Michelle and the whole crew demand they be respected because they hold high office, and then turn around and pull stunts like this. It is a bit tougher to stare down monsters like Assad if the LittleWoman is getting these sorts of headlines.

The issue isn't politics left or right--it's the dignity of the office and of the White House itself. Credibility is easy to squander, tough to regain.

Where, Pray Tell, Are The Handcuffs? MF Global Trustee Report

It's an ugly, ugly tale, and OS hopes you take a moment to read it.

OS's premise, and soapbox, is that culture shapes economy. If we live in a culture where firms like MF Global can act with reckless abandon, drive over the cliff, carrying their customers and their customer's customers with them--because the board and management know they have a perpetual 'Get Out Of Jail Free' card from those in charge of the government--then inevitably all trust erodes, and sooner or later things grind....to.......a.......(halt).

Where are the handcuffs? Where's the Giuliani of our generation, who as prosecutor would have perp-walked the whole crew into court long ago?

As You Read This Tale of Woe, Remember Who Has Run San Francisco, And California,For Decades

This was the set of hoops one woman had to traverse,  just to open an ICE CREAM PARLOR in San Francisco!!

The Ice Cream Bar opened Jan. 21 in the Cole Valley neighborhood — an homage to the classic parlors of the 1930s, complete with vintage soda fountain and lunch counter seating. It has become an immediate sensation, packed with both families and the foodie crowd, savoring upscale house-made ice creams and exotic sodas (flavorings include pink peppercorn and tobacco). The shop also employs 14 full- and part-time workers. 

But getting it opened wasn’t easy. 

“Many times it almost didn’t happen,” said Juliet Pries, the owner, with a cheerful laugh.

Ms. Pries said it took two years to open the restaurant, due largely to the city’s morass of permits, procedures and approvals required to start a small business. While waiting for permission to operate, she still had to pay rent and other costs, going deeper into debt each passing month without knowing for sure if she would ever be allowed to open. 

Lissen' up, ya'll! When Miz Nancy, Missah Harry, Missah Obama and allll they furry friends (like Missah Lee, Mayor of San Francisco) yammer on about creatin' jobs--they lying to yew! They wants yoh munney, hunney, to spend on themselves and their friends. If you still make a profit after all that, you become one of 'The Rich', an object of resentment, an example of greed, from whom more money must be extracted.

Ms. Pries said she had to endure months of runaround and pay a lawyer to determine whether her location (a former grocery, vacant for years) was eligible to become a restaurant. There were permit fees of $20,000; a demand that she create a detailed map of all existing area businesses (the city didn’t have one); and an $11,000 charge just to turn on the water. 

11 large to turn on the water? Before one scoop of ice cream can be sold? And she wants to go into business because? And Californians wonder why business is fleeing the state?

Ya'll don't need to take OldSouth's word fer it...this is straight from the Yew Nork Timez! Why their editorial staff continues to cheer-lead for the obviously incompetent and corrupt politicians that spend their waking hours destroying the culture and economy is anyone's guess. 

It makes no sense from here, unless perhaps, these guyz is really the OnePercent, and the rest of us are left to make our way through the cultural and economic hall of mirrors that America has become.

Jes' thinkin' out loud...

Biderman Explains The BLS Job Numbers...

HT Jesse

OS thought he heard a Dixieland band romping away on 'Happy Days Are Here Again' when the BLS numbers were released. Hundreds of thousands of new jobs created! We're on the way back! Thank you, thank you, thank you, Mr. Obama!

It didn't feel right, but OS couldn't articulate exactly why.

Charles Biderman can. A most informative four minutes.

The Security Council Veto By Russia And China: US Delegate Expresses Her 'Disgust'...

...(breaking into the local patois) but did ya'll notice that she didn't say she wuz serpriiiized?

Let's go over this agin, realll slow, so even dem folk at the Yew Nork Times kin understand it:


If'n we're beholden to China from here to Sunday, 'cuz they totin' our note, and buildin' our phones, auto parts, and everthin' else,  and hold a bunch of the world's gold, etc. etc. etc., then we have exactly no say about what may happen about lotsa' stuff, overseas or heah. In case yew haven't noticed, the folk what run RedChina are murderers and thieves, happily running great portions of their country as a slave labor camp. And jes' you try to open yerselves up a Baptist Church down the street....wheweee dey put yore lily-white in jail fer that.  These thugs be in the driver's seat, we be in the back of the bus, ya'll.


If'n Russia is the main natchural gas provider to Western Europe, then them Russkies can do whatever they damn well please, include ship freighters full of armaments to that murderer Assad, soze he can murder his citizen'ry more efficiently. Which is exactly what he be doin'--dem folks dyin' like flies, and tain'nt nuthin' Western Europe can do 'bout it, unless they love living in the dark and the cold.

So, folks in Syria whut don't want to live under that murderer Assad are being shot down wholesale in the streets--no Arab Spring nonsense heah', ya'll. Assad did notice how pitiful things ended for Gadafi, and don't intend to join him anytime soon. And he knows the Russkies and RedChinese have got his back, providing diplomatic cover and an endless supply of toys to kill folks whut displease him.

And, in more standard English...

Here in the States, we've been living like drunken sailors since the mid-1960's, running a welfare state here, and running wars in far-flung places so we can establish welfare states there, too. We won't drill our own oil, dig our own coal, make our own steel/cars/clothes/tv's/washing machines. And we've been charging it to our credit card, held by folks like the Chinese and the Saudis. As for the Russians, they're running their house like a criminal racket, and we've been more interested in cashing in than checking to make sure our pockets haven't been picked.

This cannot end well, and things have no hope of getting better unless we change our behavior.

David Brooks' Grasp Of Our Problems, And Boneheaded Quasi-Mussolini Proposed Solution

The Yew Nork Times features David Brooks as one of its columnists. Guess it gives the editorial staff a warm feeling to think they've even made a place on their pages for a Bushy neo-con.

A great essay, until the last paragraph, in which one understands why OS cannot abide neo-conservatives.

If Romney is elected, clowns like Brooks are back in the driver's seat.  Heaven help us.

Meanwhile, Back In The South Atlantic

The UK is dispatching one of the world's most sophisticated air-defense frigates, just to dissuade the Argentinians from attempting new mischief against the Falkland Islands.

For this, David Cameron has Barry and Hillary to thank, as they have actively encouraged Argentina (along with Chavez, who is cheering them along) to saber-rattle.

The world has enough woes without this. And the world is safer with the sea-lanes of the South Atlantic protected by HM Navy at harbor in the Falklands than, say, any of Chavez's friends.

One would think that this simple sort of stuff would seem obvious to Barry, as brilliant as he claims to be.
Perhaps it does. Perhaps he desires more chaos in the Southern Hemisphere...perhaps his hatred of all things British trumps sober judgment.

Or, perhaps, he is simply that careless and thoughtless. Ya takes yer' choice, in the end.

$52,409 For Every Man, Woman And Child In The US: Rick Santelli Does The Math

But, hey! Who's counting?

Ricky Ricardo Reports On The Latest News From MF Global

LOOOOCY! Dih' Munney! It vaporized itself!

Ai Caramaba, Looocy!  Wha' happun?!?!

Or in more staid English, the opening paragraph of the Wall Street Journal coverage this morning:


Nearly three months after MF Global Holdings Ltd. collapsed, officials hunting for an estimated $1.2 billion in missing customer money increasingly believe that much of it might never be recovered, according to people familiar with the investigation.

As the sprawling probe that includes regulators, criminal and congressional investigators, and court-appointed trustees grinds on, the findings so far suggest that a "significant amount" of the money could have "vaporized" as a result of chaotic trading at MF Global during the week before the company's Oct. 31 bankruptcy filing, said a person close to the investigation.

Many officials now believe certain employees ...
 

At this point, the WSJ invites one to subscribe in order to read it all. But really, why bother?

It's just as informative, and much more entertaining, to bring Desi Arnaz back from the grave and let him do his Ricky routine, in which the more frustrated he became, the more his English deteriorated.

In a society ruled by law, Jon Corzine would have already been placed under arrest, publicly arraigned,  forced to cough up his passport, and detained to one of his Manhattan addresses, always within reach of the prosecutors. He'd be allowed access to enough money to live and pay his lawyers, but otherwise no-touchy-the-assets in all those far-flung places, as the account holders who were robbed of their funds may have need of them in recovery. Ditto for the entire top two tiers of management of the firm. Ain't nobody goin' nowhere 'til we sort this mess out, know-whudd-I-mean?

He'd also not go unchallenged when he tells the world, 'Gollee-Gee, Beaver! I don't have any idea where all that money vaporized to!'

Every so often, OS flips through channels on the way to basketball games, and sees snippets of documentaries on street gangs. They are scary people, covered in tattoos, wielding guns, loyal only to their own tribe, completely disinterested in the fortunes and lives destroyed around them. Fearless. Ruthless. Nihilistic. Many have bought off or scared off any semblance of law enforcement. They rule the street, and aren't shy about letting the world know.

Please inform OS, someone, how these people differ from the upper tiers of our political and banking worlds? Except, perhaps, for the tattoos?

I asked Ricky. He just shrugged his shoulders and slunk back to the 1950's, grateful to be gone, and told me not to call him again. He's got his bridge game scheduled with Fred and Ethel, and doesn't wish to be disturbed.