What I find in so many articles about the financial mess we are in is the greatest focus is on Fannie Mae. While no doubt Fannie Mae had much to do with the debacle we are now facing, there are multiple lenders at multiple banks who when freed of such elements as oversight and regulation and the need to maintain certain reserves, lent money to everyone and anyone.
In many real estate scams, the great flipping fiasco, “home buyers” were provided with loans for different properties totaling well in the millions. There was no qualifying or the qualifying financial statements were false. In most cases these were not minority borrowers. In fact, far from it.
But, nevertheless, they were part of giant flipping schemes, misleading their lenders and then borrowers on the actual value of the property by having appraisers who were well paid for their efforts falsify the documents and assess the value of these houses at artificial and specious rates. Sometimes they worked independently and more often they were “straw buyers” front people for the real money, the people who would actually buy the house and then flip them for cooked value and greater profits.
Every bank got into the act and every bank resold their mortgages to the unsuspecting and to foreign investors who had no idea what the true value of the properties were. There is one case in LA alone, relatively small on the bigger picture, where through bribed appraisers, stand-in mortgage brokers and willing banks, they took off over $148 Million. It’s an elaborate scheme, but thanks to the lack of regulation, it has been repeated all over the country. Las Vegas and Phoenix were particualrly notorious for this type of criminal operation.
The arteries that carry blood to the penile organ are similar to the blood acquisition de viagra http://www.molineanimalaid.org/ vessels that supply blood to the heart. The jelly molineanimalaid.org generico cialis on line works faster than the other categories. It is the FDA cialis 5mg cheap approved drug for the cure. They are classified on the basis of herbal teas even self-cultivation, in Yan Yishou effect on its head the. the best viagra
By comparison, the Billions that banks and mortgage brokers raked off by issuing irresponsible and unsubstantiated lines makes the aggregate $48 to $50 million in golden parachutes to to the unworthy members of Fanny Mae pale by comparison. Their severance packages while regrettable and undeserved are a drop in the bucket compared to the grab bag of interests and the hundreds of millions and billions paid out in bonuses and profits for issuing irresponsible loans that were motivated purely by greed.
Like everything else of this nature, Ponzi Schemes, Pyramid Parties, the Savings and Loan debacle some years back, it soon becomes a game of Musical Chairs. It all works fine and everyone is happy dancing in their own delusions until the music stops and there are no more chairs left. Then the panic starts. In this case it proved uncontrollable panic and now we plummet to near financial ruin, much to the surprise of the entire nation.
The bottom line is that regulations are there for a reason. And if they are outmoded or 20th Century regulations, as some contest, then they have to be upgraded and brought current. But the one overriding factor, no matter what century, is that if you reduce the necessary reserves a bank or lending institution must have at the ready, then you invite disaster. It ha happened time and time again, from people who were unqualified buying stocks on margin, which lead partly to the ’29 crash, to the Savings and Loan mess, to this. It is a very simple premise really–have enough capital in reserve to pay for mistakes and avoid catastrophe. It was ignored and then dismissed.
Personally, I believe there is ample blame to go around. From the venal jerks at Fannie Mae to the venal jerks at the banks and mortgage brokers around the country. Just what we have seen so far pretty much defines the general pattern of perhaps criminal behavior. The lenders were given a license to steal and they took advantage of it. Couple all that with a consumer society that doesn’t really produce anything anymore, and consumers who seek instant gratification, taking loans they can never afford to repay, taking loans for their own housing flipping scams, taking home equity loans to buy assorted trinkets and beads, and you have a disaster in the making.
In this case the disaster is already made. We are now living in its aftermath and trying to survive. But pointing fingers at minority groups who bought homes they should have never bought or the people, the simple minded bureaucrats of Fannie Mae and company who were pressued into granting these loans, or even the brokers and corporate criminals alone, or these three fools, no matter how incompetent, seems to miss the point. Blaming the Fannie Mae, is like blaming a single taxi for gridlock. We are all to blame. For being greedy. For being so stupid.
