From Chicago Tribune:
Promising to continue to make the investigation of mortgage fraud a priority, federal authorities in Chicago announced charges in five schemes on Tuesday that involved properties ranging from dilapidated houses on the South Side to pricey condominiums in a River North high-rise.
The cases included charges against 37 people and four companies, and some $48 million in mortgages that allegedly were fraudulently obtained.
I’m reminded of a case from my home town back in Kansas that finally saw some measure of justice late last year. From Kansas City Business Journal in Dec. of 2008:
Kansas City builder F. Jeffrey Miller and two business associates were convicted on federal charges of conspiracy, bank fraud and money laundering in a $5 million mortgage fraud scheme, acting U.S. Attorney Marietta Parker said Friday.
In May 2006 , the U.S. Department of Justice charged Miller, 47, of Stanley, with organizing a $25 million scheme to boost his business through conspiracy, bank fraud and money laundering.
One of the last times I visited my childhood home, before my folks moved further south in search of better fishing, I saw that Miller had built a huge mansion across the street, where there used to be a field and a pond. My guess is his current quarters are considerably smaller, say on the order of 80 square feet.
Obviously, it’s not true that all real estate agents, title companies and builders are crooks. Our real estate agent and loan broker have both been stand up folks here in Washington state. They’re quality folks who live in the community and don’t rip people off. The guy who built our house here did a pretty good job overall. And while some folks may lean Republican, the sensible ones are a little more sanguine about their ideology and are willing to grant that maybe sometimes rules have to be enforced for the greater good.
The criminality in the industry has affected the entire economy, and while it’s fashionable in some right wing quarters to throw hissy fits about a Democratic administration, the bitter truth is that this economic calamity was caused by a lack of sensible regulation and the unbridled greed of people who are no better than street criminals. Frankly they have done an amount of harm greater than all the street criminals ever could, at least in dollar amounts.
What remains to be seen is how many more of these white collar lawbreakers are brought to justice, and if the building and banking industries will ever come to their senses and realize that tolerating criminality works against the long term interests of legitimate business people.
two words……….BARNEY FRANK
A very intelligent argument. Well reasoned, supported by facts, and not at all vague or unclear, and fortunately, it steers clear of any name calling.
A typical GOP response.
manoftruth apparently thinks that there was no failure of regulation, and lawbreakers as mentioned in this article don’t deserve to go to jail, and everytime, anytime, anyone says something in favor of a Democratic point of view it must be immediately rejected with a tit for tat knee jerk response.
This is in truth the George Bush level of thinking, and argument, and we see the results for our economy. Complex issues have two-word answers: Hussein/bad; axis/evil; war/terror; barney/frank.
One wonders if this is truly the sign of a low form of intelligence, as they do appear to believe this childish, oversimplified comic-book level views.
The rest of us generally leave them back in the third grade. You could add to that list cowboys/robbers, but at some time we realize it’s not so simple.
Or at least 57% of us.
Unless Greenspan, Summers and folks of that ilk are arrested and real regulations with teeth are passed why would arresting a few folks on the bottom rungs change anything?
Nice Allen Stanford frog march this morning. The orange jumpsuit was a nice touch.
When Mr. Klynical fails to post the Daily Wingnut Tracking Poll you just know that the news sucks for him. Today’s Wingnut Poll shows our nation’s beloved president to be at 56% approval, just a single point lower than he stood back on February 21st. The Wingnut Poll Presidential Approval Index is four points higher than it was just a few days ago.
There are enough regulations in-place: they just weren’t enforced.
This mess was the result of a chain of events that ran over a period of thirty or forty years. It came to a head when the frenzy started as lenders made loans and sold them. They didn’t care of the loans were any good – they just sold them to municipalities (like Torvik, Norway), insurance companies, and pension funds. The rating agencies (Standard & Poor, Fich, Moody’s) went along with the game, putting “AAA” ratings on crap so the CDOs, CMOs, and the rest of the shit was made to look like vanilla ice cream so the unsuspecting buyers would buy it.
Lenders made loans to people who couldn’t pay them back. People took-out loans they knew they couldn’t repay.
Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae were asleep at the switch. AIG sold credit default swaps without a clue as to what it was doing. Merrill Lynch was into the same crap as the banks and got what it deserved.
Unfortunately, the resulting credit crunch meant the death of the US auto industry, which cascades into so many different things, all of them bad.
All in all, it’s a mess. It will take some time to clean-up the garbage, but it will eventually get done. More regulation isn’t going to stop greed.
Remember Allen Stanford was thought to be a Republican because he was from Texas… Now which HA libtardo commentator thought that and wrote a blog thread? You can contact that libtardo here: devore.jon@gmail.com
Remember the WA Post was thought to be a conservative newspaper because they had six or seven conservative commentators. Yet the vast majority of them voted libtardo in the last presidential election… Now which HA libtardo commentator thought that and wrote a blog thread? You can contact that libtardo here: devore.jon@gmail.com
Now there is a new banking thread here and the mortgage fraud commentary is lukewarm towards libtardos, Puddy thinks first of Senator Christopher CountryWide Dodd and second of the 2004 Congressional Hearings where these PRICELESS Dummocraptic words were uttered:
If the HA libtardos remember Franklin Raines would barely avoid fraud prosecution.
But the strange thing was the Dummocraptics attacking the regulator which found the Franklin Raines fraud and the earnings had to be restated all the way back to 2001. Kind of like what’s happening right now with the Inspector General for AmeriCorp being sacked for finding fraud of Kevin Johnson, disciple of “the messiah”, Sacramento Mayor and the return of $400 Large because it was a “witch hunt”.
Not much in the press about this….
SEATTLE, June 17 /PRNewswire/ — Two California homeowners filed a class-action lawsuit against KB Home (NYSE: KBH), Countrywide Financial and LandSafe Appraisal Services, expanding cases previously filed in Arizona and Nevada claiming the companies conspired to systematically, artificially and illegally rig home appraisals and sale values in KB developments throughout the state.
According to the 75-page complaint, Countrywide funneled all its KB customers’ home appraisals to one person at LandSafe, an appraisal subsidiary of Countrywide who, in turn, would deliver an appraisal value at whatever KB and Countrywide ordered. These individuals were under direct instruction to value homes at or above the contract price, even if it meant violating regulatory guidelines and requirements.
http://news.prnewswire.com/Vie.....#038;EDATE
Yeah, and Greenspan is a liberal. Whatever.
Actually, Frank, a FHS classmate, was always kind of conservative, even as a kid. During very trying times for blacks*, here and elsewhere, he managed to prep himself to take advantage of life’s opportunities. He done good, Puddy. If you met him, I’m sure you’d like him.
*Things got so bad at Frank’s school and neighborhood in the late sixties there were occasions when over thirty cop cars were parked at Sick’s Stadium waiting to pounce on our school. Alas, they never showed up and things degenerated to the point that classes were no longer held. Kids and teachers mingled outside listening to the sound of the school being trashed. Some extremely badass motherfuckers, not even kids who attended the school, were roaming the halls. One teacher bravely tried to hold class in the cafeteria but he was attacked and then pummeled with a stool. Bandages around his head, he showed up the next day and tried again. Some students, caught isolated, were attacked and severly beaten, ending up in the hospital. Those were the times and the school that produced Frank Raines, who then as now, is a decent, capable, resourceful, and highly intelligent man.
But feel free to slime him, Puddy. Because I seriously doubt that a man like Frank gives a flying fuck what you think or say about him.
5 Politically Incorrect
Not really, the financial regulations were loosened by Clinton and the Republicans and they refused to regulate derivatives among other things.
Here’s a good summary:
http://www.alternet.org/workpl.....zzy_plans/
@9: It was almost a good summary except the article chose on purpose to skip over 2003-2005 when GWB tried to create some new regulations and the YouTube video provided above was the congressional outcome. Puddy wonders why?
Steve, steve, steve:
The YouTube video provides the visual and audio context for Puddy’s response. It wasn’t Puddy who looked into his shady dealings Steve. Too bad you can’t get that through the granite encased hat-rack.
From the Seattle Slimes: “Franklin Raines to pay $24.7 million to settle Fannie Mae lawsuit”
“Raines, former Fannie chief financial officer Timothy Howard and former controller Leanne Spencer were accused in a civil lawsuit in December 2006 with manipulating earnings over a six-year period at the company, the largest U.S. financer and guarantor of home mortgages.”
Now how did Franklin cum up with all dat Large Large?
So it wasn’t a lynching after all huh Steve?
The Prosecution Rests.
@9
I think you are referring to the Gramm-Leach-Bliley Act. See the section titled Criticism which has links to other critiques of the act for more information.
@9 & 10,
We can put the blame on everyone. That’s the whole point.
@1 Four words: You’re full of shit.
@2 MOT and his fellow wingnuts are defenders of warmongers, torturers, liars, thieves, and criminals. Which tells you everything you need to know about their own (lack of) character.
@5 “This mess was the result of a chain of events that ran over a period of thirty or forty years.”
Yes, I’ve noticed the timeline rather neatly coincides with the conservative takeover of government that began with Nixon in 1968 and continued more or less unabated until this January. See, e.g., the S & L scandal of the 1980s, the deregulation of the 90s, and the massive corporate frauds of this decade.
@6 See #14.
@13 No, we’re not gonna put the blame on “everyone.” The fault for this mess lies with a specific ideology and group of people, and we’re not gonna let the guilty (and their enablers and defenders) get away with pointing fingers at the innocent. That is the point.
You actually READ posts by MOT???
You DO have too much time on your hands, Roger
@18,
Sorry, rodent, you’re wrong. Everyone has a little bit of blame on this one. It wasn’t a Democratic thing or a Republican thing because people were making loans to other people who couldn’t re-pay those loans. They were on both sides of the political spectrum, from unbridled capitalism advocates to total-wealth-redistribution advocates.
What part of sub-prime loans is hard to understand? They’re below investment grade and risky as hell. One hiccup and the borrower is in default, the entity holding the loan is a loser. It’s like buying a stock on margin: as long as prices keep rising, everyone is happy. When prices fall, the shit hits the fan. Leverage can magnify profits or losses. That’s the lesson we all should get out of this.
12 “More information” is rather a foreign concept to right-wig idealogues.
7 There was a news item carried by NPR (cue the expected wingfuck response) this morning about a lot of banks and real estate folks screaming about how badly they’re being hurt because of new rules that require mortgage appraisers to (horrors!) determine the property’s actual current market value, instead of what it was a year and a half ago–or whatever the parties driving the sale want it to be.
1 Huh? Does this mean the trollsphere is no longer parroting the mantra that the collapse started last year because investors were so scared that Obama might win the election?
Pardon me for asking….I just want to make sure what’s the “official” winger Bullshit Du Jour.
18 RR well said.
20 Politically Incorrect….you are wrong. What part of sub prime loans aren’t the problem don’t you understand? For one thing they were often made to people who could have qualified for a better loan, for another poor folks tend to pay their bills more than rich corporations. Also rich corporations can get bailed out by the government, which is unwilling to help those at the bottom.
Finally sub-prime loans are only the tiny fraction of the paper trading that was created by the ‘government is the problem’ ‘let the free market run wild’ mindset of the last 30 years, (and of the years before the last Great Depression also).
‘We’ aren’t all guilty Greenspan, Summers, and all those who drink at the Milton Friedman/Ayn Rand trough are guilty.
For a business to rip off its customers and then claim “it was their fault” is pretty much like a rapist saying, “The bitch was asking for it”.
For a business to fail and then whine that it wasn’t allowed to rip off its customers badly enough is perhaps like the rapist, having said the above, then asking, “Now, why doesn’t she LOVE me?”
For a business to fail and then go asking the government (remember, the one it previously wanted “off its back”) for help is like the above-mentioned rapist looking for consolation from the victim’s family.
Not to change the subject but Micheal Jackson just passed away heard it bout 1 and 1/2 ago Just saying very sad, he was only 50.
27 Maybe he’s been reunited with the rest of his nose.
@27 You’re right, he just died.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/31.....ent-music/
Liquid Fart@28:
Poor taste dude. Pun intended.
This is what happens when government spends our money on anything other than essential services, defense and infrastructure.