Say Anything Blog

I’ll look forward to the follow up post a year from now when the trials are held.  I would have to guess that it would be difficult to prove that not only was something false on the forms, but that the underwriter knew it and deliberately ignored it.  My bet is they simple take the most obvious cases, put a few heads up on a pike, and pretend to satisfy voters that way.

heads on a pike! you guys love that. who doesn’t? admit it. its just too Christian not to love it.

Yun Chu said, “You must strictly not express in words what is very significant. Both dragon and snake are killed in one blow.”

bike bubba
Maybe, instead, they’ll do like the compassionate Christian missionaries who entirely wiped out the Tasmanian aborigines did… cut off the heads of the men and make their wives wear them around their necks. And they can make purses out of their skin too.

Ah, Christianity’s good old days, no?

Yun Chu said, “You must strictly not express in words what is very significant. Both dragon and snake are killed in one blow.”

??? Your source says nothing of the sort, but rather points out that most deaths were due to European diseases inadvertently brought there.

Judging by your reading comprehension, it appears that your research into hemp oil is going full bong, and you might be helped by taking a break to go through Hooked on Phonics.

bike bubba
I have read the details elsewhere. The source does say this:

the removal of the skull and scrotum — for a tobacco pouch — of William Lanne, known as King Billy, on his death in 1869.

High fashion!

Yun Chu said, “You must strictly not express in words what is very significant. Both dragon and snake are killed in one blow.”

at any rate, you can join the ranks of the Tasmanian genocide deniers! congrats.

Yun Chu said, “You must strictly not express in words what is very significant. Both dragon and snake are killed in one blow.”

Well, in that case I’d at least be with the majority of sane researchers who realize that the tragedy that befell the Tasmanian natives was mostly one of disease, not intentional actions.

Put the reefer down, Sparkie, pick up the phonics book.  It’s for your own good.

This pure scapegoating, and like BB, I predict that, if there ever is a trial, almost all of them will be found not guilty.  Well after the election, of course.  The real cause was the govt mandating loans on the basis of quotas for skin color, economic status, and neighborhood of residence, all in the name of “fairness”.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

I saw the indictment against the two from Bear Stearns. Read it. And the email excerpts. Those guys were liars.

About these other 400. I think a bunch of petty fraud cases won’t be hard to make stick. Especially if they are rounding up people in Miami. Fraud city.

Yun Chu said, “You must strictly not express in words what is very significant. Both dragon and snake are killed in one blow.”

Yup, Sparkie, with your reading comprehension of your own source about the Tasmanian tragedy, I’m sure to trust you when you say that petty fraud isn’t hard to prove, and that somehow the indictment of two other people for a mostly unrelated case proves that these 400, and that a couple of emails make it an open and shut case....

....wait a second, that makes absolutely no sense.  Put down the reefer, Sparkie, pick up the phonics book.  It’s for your own good.

The Feds convict about 90+% of the time.
Rrr108 wrote:

I predict that, if there ever is a trial, almost all of them will be found not guilty.

Look how well they did with the Haditha Marines, even with the MSM aiding and abetting them.  In the Plame case, they failed to get any of their targets, and had to settle for a bullshit charge against a minor official just to save face.  How many millions were spent in that effort?
They failed to convict any oil company execs, either.
Not even any indictments.

I’m standing by my prediction.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

Woof, even you might be able to figure out that an overall conviction rate in federal prosecutions might not equate to a conviction rate for fraud cases, right?

I say this not to provoke the ire of my colleagues, but a broker-friend of mine clued me into mortgage-based fraudulent activity some years ago.  Since you can only hope to recoup payment at the end of any litigation, it is one avenue I have not pursued until recently.

That is all about to change.

I get more and more potential clients seeking assistance in avoiding foreclosure and the problems are not as cut-and-dried as one might think.

First off, real estate financing is a heavily-regulated activity: federal, state and administrative regulations govern their conduct.

One recent case revealed that the brokers in question were guilty of something called an ’equity skimming‘ or ’equity stripping‘ scam, which is usually done in conjunction with yet another mortgage or foreclosure rescue scam. 

They prey on laypeople, retirees and others not sophisticated and very trusting.  In this particular instance, they held instigate the failure of the first mortgage by exploiting late payments by refusing catch-up payments and threatening foreclosure instead (which is not permitted)

They offered, as an alternative to foreclosure, refinancing.  But as happens so often, the refinancing involved deeding the property over to the unscrupulous brokers and couching the transaction as a sale and thereafter the victim would be renting the property at an alleged lower rate than the earlier mortgage payments.

In order to accomplish this, the brokers make certain representations to the banks that will be paying off the old, distressed, mortgage, and instead of paying those off, pocketing the difference (or, they pay off the old mortgage, pocket the equity, assume ownership and fail to make payments on the refinanced mortgage)

The victim gets no notice of any late payments on the new, renegotiated mortgage since the property is no longer in the victim’s name. 

The equity that the victim normally receives in the course of refinancing is pocketed by the scamsters.

After not making payments on the new mortgage, the property is allowed to go into foreclosure.  Getting a legal remedy for their emergency is very difficult for the original owners because, of course, they have no money to pay an attorney with, which is why they are in trouble in the first place.

Recent changes in some state laws have made this even more difficult, mandating that any payments made in a rescue happen only after the emergency is past—pretty much guaranteeing that any lawyers who might have taken the case on, even at a reduced rate, will shy away from these work-intensive cases.

A cursory look at the laws broken include Federal banking and fraud (giving FBI jurisdiction in these cases) state criminal and civil laws, as well as a raft of state licensing rules.

Many of those rules revolve around the duty of brokers to inform the client as to what the implications of signing any documents may be, record keeping, provision of documents upon demand to the clients, their fiduciary duty to the client, intermeddling and absconding with the equity that rightfully belongs to the client, and so forth.

If there is a pattern of behavior and collusion, there are actions for conspiracy in addition to fraud as well as RICO violations and breaches of the Unfair and Deceptive Practices Act.

These dirtbags in the mortgage financing business are truly hyenas and deserve nothing less than being fed feet-first into tree chippers. 

The great shame of it all is that you can only torture them to death once.

In some localities, the police fraud units are so overwhelmed with Suspicious Mortgage-Related Activity that they are no longer opening new cases—that’s how bad it has gotten, at least in some areas.

...for great justice

Move_Zig:  What you describe here is truly awful! 

And it is scumbags like these who pave the way for further regulation by the SEC and FTC.

"Here lies, in honored glory, an American soldier, known but to God.”

The times, they are a-changin’...
Bob Dylan

Unfortunately, since the heavy regulation is what caused the problem in the first place(complex regulations being an opportunity for unscrupulous operators to deceive the public), more regulation will only make the problem worse.
The real solution, like always, is transparent market forces.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

I have to paraphrase an old quote from, I believe, one of the Constitution’s Founders:

If men were angels there would be no need for laws.

Or something to that effect.

At bottom, you can have all the rules you want, but if you have a total loss of control of the guidance of the inner moral compass you end up with widespread lawlessness and the corruption feeds on itself with ever-growing numbers of laws to contain the contagion and ever-widening circles of those ignoring the laws.

Among my older clients, I often see the look of shock and disbelief of the egregiousness of the lies and fraud that have robbed them of their homes and fortune, as they grew up in an era when a man’s word was his bond and agreements were concluded on a handshake and those agreements would run for years without a hitch.

Somewhere along the line, the sheer number of those who lie and cheat and steal have grown larger, more bold, aggressive and in-your-face.

Perhaps it’s arisen with the advent of the values-free school education.  Perhaps it’s arisen in part due to the change in American culture where angered mobs don’t tar and feather bad actors any more, or invite them out in the middle of the night for a string-tie party.

For whatever the reason, it has gotten worse, and the worst part of it all, many seem to be getting away with repeated scams, living the high-life off the life’s work of others.

Each family devastated by the scam is cut to the quick and it leaves long-lasting damage in them.

Some of the more hopeless and less resilient have committed suicide.

Like I said, it’s not as clearly-defined as one might think, particularly if you have never been in the position to be scammed.

[Side-note: any vets here ever got lied to be their recruiter or career-jammer?]

...for great justice

Here’s where a lot of it started:

The Fair Housing Act, 42 U.S.C. 3601 et seq., prohibits discrimination by direct providers of housing, such as landlords and real estate companies as well as other entities, such as municipalities, banks or other lending institutions and homeowners insurance companies whose discriminatory practices make housing unavailable to persons because of:

* race or color
* religion
* sex
* national origin
* familial status, or
* disability.

In cases involving discrimination in mortgage loans or home improvement loans, the Department may file suit under both the Fair Housing Act and the Equal Credit Opportunity Act.

It requires an ever-growing maze of paperwork to satisfy this one aspect of govt interference in the housing and home loan market.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

robert108,

The real solution, like always, is transparent market forces.

The real solution? How about you back this up with some facts and example of a country that has been completely free of interference and distortions of market forces.

...completely free…

Only Marxism requires perfection to work. The more freedom from oppressive regulation this market becomes, the better it will work.
If you read the comment right above yours, you will see an example of regulatory interference that was a big part of the mortgage market meltdown.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

Part of the problem is that the market is NOT transparent…

Mortgage fraud

Book cooking

CEO sweetheart deals

VIP treatment for some

Insider info

stock fraud

The market is not - and never has been - transparent, but it SHOULD BE!  Hence, the need for regulation.

Move_Zig:  Madison, Federalist #54, “If men were angles....”

"Here lies, in honored glory, an American soldier, known but to God.”

The times, they are a-changin’...
Bob Dylan

The market is not - and never has been - transparent, but it SHOULD BE! Hence, the need for regulation.

As I explained before, it’s not about “perfect” transparency; that’s a strawman argument.  It’s about relatively more transparent, like through clearing out the tangle of regulations, the ones that require unGodly amounts of paperwork, all of which makes the process far less transparent.  I even gave an example of same, the so-called Fair Housing Act, which was part of the Civil Rights legislation passed in 1968.  In the way that govt regulations metastasize, it has grown from a well-intentioned protection of “oppressed” or “disadvantaged” groups to a device to manipulate the market, with predictable consequences.  We have a mortgage “crisis”, which is being hyped as a call for even more legislation, which will make the market even less transparent.
You can’t make a market transparent by increasing regulation, only by weeding out redundant, unnecessary and obstructive regulation.
Overregulation is the cause of lack of transparency, not the solution to it.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

Overregulation is the cause

No doubt in the same way that safety ‘overregulation’ of the automobile industry in the 70’s and 80’s - requiring seatbelts and airbags from a highly reluctant industry - reduced crash-fatalities by some 65%.

"Here lies, in honored glory, an American soldier, known but to God.”

The times, they are a-changin’...
Bob Dylan

No doubt in the same way that safety ‘overregulation’ of the automobile industry in the 70’s and 80’s - requiring seatbelts and airbags from a highly reluctant industry - reduced crash-fatalities by some 65%.

Not a valid comparison.  While those measures may or may not have increased physical safety, the overregulation in the housing and finance industry were designed to prevent an assumption of dishonesty and discrimination throughout the industry, with predictable results.
Whatever happened to your “the perfect is the enemy of the good” line?
You can’t make the housing and finance industries perfectly “fair”, no matter how many regulations you impose on it.  In the same way, some people are killed by seatbelts and airbags every year; it’s really a cost/benefit calculation designed to relieve the auto industry of exposure to lawsuits.
I always suspect self-serving statistics, btw.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

r108: 

You can’t make the housing and finance industries perfectly “fair”, no matter how many many regulations you impose on it.

Well, of course not, because - for example - outlawing (regulating) murder has not prevented homicides. But, it has given us the means to punish those who do it, when we catch them.

Regulation is the result of wrongdoing, not the cause of it. It was the horrific abuses of laissez-faire capitalism in the 19th century which led to government watch-dog legislation in the first place.

And the newly uncovered spate of abuses by those entrusted with money-management - including the most recent revelations involving sitting members of the senate! - will result in further regulation, as it should.

We may not be able to guarantee fairness, but we should be able to throw crooks like Angelo Mozilo behind bars for a long, long time when we catch them.

BTW: You have me confused with someone else on the, “The perfect is the enemy of the good”, line. Never said it… not even sure what it was supposed to mean in the context of market discussions.

"Here lies, in honored glory, an American soldier, known but to God.”

The times, they are a-changin’...
Bob Dylan

Well, of course not, because - for example - outlawing (regulating) murder has not prevented homicides. But, it has given us the means to punish those who do it, when we catch them. Not a valid comparison at all. The laws against murder are a constant in all societies, and are not a result of trying to produce “fairness”, unlike this regulation, which is designed to do just that.

Regulation is the result of wrongdoing, not the cause of it. Wrong.  The wrongdoing in this case is totally enabled by the inability of the general population to understand and navigate the maze of legislation.  If regulation worked, this problem wouldn’t exist, or it would be a minor problem.It was the horrific abuses of laissez-faire capitalism in the 19th century Another leftie myth; I should write a Reader Blog about it. which led to government watch-dog legislation in the first place.
Wrong again.  The govt was quickly becoming unnecessary, due to the overwhelming success of the free enterprise system.  The yellow journalists at the time produced a phony “crisis"(in the midst of economic growth and an increase in overall persoal wealth) as an excuse to interfere and exert control. One of the major ways they did that was through the Sherman Anti-Trust Act(unions were exempted, curiously enough) which assured the primacy of govt over business.

Before you try it, the economic conditions in the 19th Century weren’t “perfect”, and abuses certainly existed, but the regulatory overreaction was similar to the one in the housing and finance markets today: A crisis and abuses produced by the obscuration of market forces.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

The regulation of money is also a constant in all societies, stretching as far back as ancient Egypt and the Jews of the Old Testament.

You can paint this pig all you want, but money laundering, VIP ‘deals’, sweet-heart severance packages, insider trading, stock manipulation, purposefully complex and confusing loan-contracts and a host of other market ‘activities’ - going on behind closed, corporate doors and right under our noses today! - deserve and require federal scrutiny.

"Here lies, in honored glory, an American soldier, known but to God.”

The times, they are a-changin’...
Bob Dylan

pp: This has nothing whatsoever to do with “the regulation of money”.  However, I will trust market forces over govt agendized interference every time.
You’re not getting the fact that it is the maze of almost indecipherable govt regulations that has furnished the cover for dishonest operators.
It’s no longer “sink or swim” for those businesses, and as long as they fill out the paperwork properly, they don’t suffer the consequences of their perfidy.  Cockroaches hate the bright light; it’s time to strip away the maze of regulations, and expose these system-gaming cockroaches to the light of market forces.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

robert108,

While [seat belts and airbags] measures may or may not have increased physical safety…

That’s comical. I was one of those people that disliked seat belts and used to argue the counter-example, if the car caught on fire then you would be trapped. My ignorance caused me not to have my seat belt on in a crash which I flew out of the car onto the middle lane of Interstate 75.

You can find a counter-example for most things, but it doesn’t make the premise false.

You can find a counter-example for most things, but it doesn’t make the premise false.

Your example certainly proves that.  You lived, didn’t you?
I have a friend who is alive today because he wasn’t wearing a seatbelt in a headon.  On the other hand, one of my sisters is alive today(and was relatively unharmed) due to airbags.  I say let the consumers decide on the basis of facts, and buy what they want.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

robert108,

Your example certainly proves that.  You lived, didn’t you?

You’re begging the question, simply assuming that airbags and seat belts are only to save a life and not reduce injuries. Instead of having no injuries, I broke my clavicle when hitting the cement. If I would have been in the car, I wouldn’t even had a scratch.

Nunez:  The REAL issue here is that the auto industry FOUGHT the feds on this tooth-and-nail and did everything they could to avoid complying with auto-safety regulations.

"Here lies, in honored glory, an American soldier, known but to God.”

The times, they are a-changin’...
Bob Dylan

Nunez: The REAL issue here is that the auto industry FOUGHT the feds on this tooth-and-nail and did everything they could to avoid complying with
auto-safety regulations.

No, it’s only one side of the story; you make the typical mistake of thinking there’s no other side.
I don’t want the govt mandating how I can run my business, either.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

You’re begging the question, simply assuming that airbags and seat belts are only to save a life and not reduce injuries.

Wrong again.  The original subject was prevention of fatalities.  Your stupidity at not wearing your belt and getting into a collision somehow becomes an attack on me.  Real nice.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.

Correction; the auto industry did NOT fight the feds tooth and nail on seat belts in the 1970s.  They were advertising them in the 1960s, and I’ve got the ads in National Geographic to prove it.  The leaders on road safety in this period were the insurance company actuaries and road-builders like Caterpillar, not the feds.

In the same way, absent market interference in credit markets (read “The Fed"), you would have banks advertising their reserve ratios, strict credit policies, and so on.  Why not?

Federal Reserve rules.

Correction; the auto industry did NOT fight the feds tooth and nail on seat belts in the 1970s. They were advertising them in the 1960s, and I’ve got
the ads in National Geographic to prove it.

Good catch, BB!  It’s always good to refute leftie propaganda with facts.

"Give the lefties a pile of money, and they’ll spend it buying votes.” - Rush Limbaugh on the “bailout”.