Ibanez wrote:CID1990 wrote:
I want somebody to point out to me one of those **** on Wall Street.
Everybody says "those Wall Street people"... so I assume they are referring to "people" like Goldman Sachs?
I want a flesh and blood person to vilify- and one that did not contribute to Barack Obama through Goldman Sachs steered PACs.
The people are those that laxed the regulations, engaged in predatory and unethical lending, etc....
So in terms of predatory lending, you mean doing that which they were allowed to do? In some cases ENCOURAGED to do?
I went to buy a new house up in Summerville back in 2006. The lender gave me a bunch of options (it was GMAC I think)... they offered me everything but the kitchen sink... interest only mortgages, ARMs, the whole lot. Not once did the lender offer me a 30 year fixed. After going through the whole rigamarole, I told the agent I wasnt interested in interest only or ARMs. I am not a real estate guy, nor am I a finance person. I am actually quite stupid in those fields. But that said,
simple common sense told me that those gimmicky mortgages were risky. Particularly the ARMs. My payment staying the same over the course of the loan was dependent on interest rates doing something they have NEVER done: stay the same.
Seriously... maybe we DO need big, huge government to protect us from ourselves. Were enough American homebuyers actually fooled into these mortgages on a scale that caused the housing bubble to burst? Are we really that lacking in common sense across the entire middle class?
My guess is that no, the middle class is not that stupid. Certainly there were SOME people who fell victim to these lending practices, but by and large I would say that it was greed.... people purchasing homes that they would NEVER be able to afford outright, and knowing this ahead of time. But we are not conditioned to live within our means. From the teenager in need of the latest smartphone all the way up to a government that has no compunction about borrowing more and more money to pay for things we DONT NEED... we are not a frugal culture.
And now, we have combined this cultural fiscal suicidal tendency with a victim culture.... one that says no, it isn't your fault for taking on that ARM that you should have KNOWN you wouldnt be able to make the payments on once the interest rates jump... it is those big, bad mortgage companies (abstract... they have no face, of course) that FOOLED YOU into taking that loan that you were just too simple minded and lacking on common sense to avoid.
IN law enforcment there is a concept called victim facilitation. That's when a 19 year old girl decides to take a midnight stroll down to Line and Nassau Street on the East Side. She gets jacked up, but everybody knows that had she used a little common sense, she would not have been there in the first place and would not have been victimized. We are becoming an entire country of dependent children with zero common sense.
So I'm not averse to government regulation in the financial markets. There WAS a crash and it did have its causes. But at the same time I have a problem vilifying people who make a buck within the law. I could care less how big that buck is. But when we have a big wig on the Senate finance committee telling us how solid Fannie Mae is (take a look at all the people who got low rate loans from the aforementioned Anthony Mozilo) I think our government is as stupid as the people who took those ARMs and probably is never going to have the capacity to regulate markets in ways that are less damaging than just letting them run wild.
