Becky Burke Mundt

The government says they are supporting short sales and loan modifications for homeowners - yet less than 3 percent of all loan modifcations at this time include any reduction in principle on mortgages as housing values continue to fall.

Meantime short sales falter as banks add new “home owner contribution” requirements, strip agent commissions and demand “out side of escrow pay offs” which exceed the Fannie and Freddie Guidelines for junior liens… “We’ll kill your short sale over $5,000.00 in additional payment that we know must not appear on the HUD or in the escrow records (where it would violate the law and force the superior lien holder to cancel the contract”).

Arguing ideals is pointless - political ideals and reality are vastly different things. In our country right now there are banks and there are the government agencies which are run by the banks- the idea that republican and democrat mean anything at all beyond two sides of the same power monopoly is ignorance. There is no free system here anymore - there is so much corruption on so many levels that it is impossible to call any of it by any real politically correct name other than corrupted.

The man who warned us about all of this coming into being was Eisenhower but we didn’t listen. Now the powers that be can pit the people against each other as republican, democrats, gays, straights, religious, non religious and so on into the vast forever of stupid people ignorant of the controlling systems where all monetary and political decisions are made behind closed doors to benefit those making the decisions.

So long as the people are willing to squabble over the crumbs and remain ignorant of the power brokers moves there is no future other than the one where the entire nation is brought to its collective knees at the mercy of the “lenders” and the governments who fail to regulate them. Case in point: the easy money lending practices of the past decade were put in place purposefully by the Fed in order to shift the collapsing tech bubble into a new consumer bubble - sustaining the unsustainable consumption which powered the machinery of the profits the lenders and money printers needed while they ensnared the entire nation in unsupportable debt.

Now as the money supply is stripped from the people and given directly to those same “lenders” who front loaded and made billions in the past decade on fees and points the small businesses and people of the country are left with no credit and no cash flow. These are not accidental occurrences.

These are not simply “symptoms” of something not working. This is the direct result of a flawed money system which gives power to those in control and strips it from the people. How else in the world could a corrupt institution like the “now defunct” Countrywide Home Mortgage be able to demand “contributions” from sellers who are jobless and homeless when a buyer presents to purchase the property at a short sale?

How else can a lender like B of A demand a cash or promissory note contribution from a seller on a short sale and state clearly that the offer price is perfectly acceptable but the offer is denied unless and until the homeowner provides this additional contribution? And this on purchase money mortgages in the State of California where (like most sane states) the lender is forbade from pursuing the collection of their debt BEYOND THE PROPERTY?

Yet this is now happening all over the country in record numbers - where documented hard ships of the homeowners make absolutely no difference in the eyes of the “lender” who has been given billions in taxpayer bailout funds and is still not satisfied - even when it is a proven fact that a short sale will provide the lender with the highest possible return on their investment when compared to a foreclosure and subsequent REO sale?

It is amazing how much ignorance parades as knowledge in these times - where people are willing to defend irrational and long proven unsound money policy (print print print) rather than do the ONE thing that can and must be done:

Make the banks suffer the losses they incurred. Make the investors and derivative funds take the losses they incurred. Let the lenders and investors who played this insane gamble of leveraging the average American household up to its eyes take the hit and take the fall.

Right now the lenders and bankers are the ONLY ones NOT taking the hit - the homeowners are taking the hit - the local governments are taking the hit - the local businesses are taking the hit - but the banks are sitting on trillions of newly created dollars, cooking the books to the point that the OTS has SAID they were cooking the books and STILL NO ONE is being prosecuted and no one is calling the bluff.

The FDIC is now offering ReFi and loan mods with 125 percent Loan to Value in a market where the values are still falling! This is LUNACY. If you want to solve the problem for the PEOPLE of this nation then do the ONE thing no one is willing to do: make the banks take the same write down everyone else is being force fed and let them fail.

It is much easier to have a healthy financial institution (there are a few left, you know, who did NOT get into this insane derivatives game) take over the failed banks and RUN THEM CORRECTLY than it is to keep feeding FRNs to the incompetent banks and expecting things to get better!

Why is this so hard to understand? Because the vast majority of Americans have not taken the time to even research or understand their own country’s monetary system. We are a private money system run by a private money institution.

The FED which has, I notice in recent years been named a “quasi government organization” - really ? What the HELL is THAT? Is it something like the Halliburton corporation being owned by the VP and being allowed to over charge and strip resources directly out of the defense budget at the detriment of our own soldiers overseas?

Is it something like the vast federal prison system run by nested corporations owned at the highest levels by members of elite families like BUSH and others who can hire out labor of American prisoners to great profit while ignoring crowded conditions, vast and systemic corruption by prison guards, and even death of inmates in a country where some 60 percent of short term prison inmates are doing time for TRAFFIC OFFENSES?

Americans think that the problems they face are caused by their ignorant neighbors getting a loan they could not afford. That is not the problem. The problem is that the vast networks of power and corruption are so broad and so deep and so entrenched that when a financial collapse threatens, these same corrupt power brokers determine that the solution is to give the people and institutions that CAUSED the near collapse all the future earnings of the American people and the people are so ignorant that they don’t even understand what just happened to them.

This idea that the markets of this country are “free” is the biggest joke ever foisted on the American people - and they keep falling for it. Your money is all tied up in 401Ks the Government tells you is the only place you can put your retirement funds so you do it - then the banksters start playing in the derivatives markets and crash the markets and poof all your money is gone - but no one is bailing YOU out - how gullible are you?

But hell, I am just another crazy radical with sideways ideas - go back to blaming the farm workers who were easily conned into signing on contracts they couldn’t read, or the greed of consumers who ended up indebted to credit cards charging 29 percent interest when the market rates are something like 3 percent - But don’t you yourself make any consumer loans to anyone at such interest rates or you will go to jail for violating the usury laws - hmmmm.

Now let’s get back to arguing over the democrats and republicans, progressives and socialists, gays and lesbians, marriage or living togethers, anything to keep our eye off the ball that is in motion and about to swing so hard that the vast majority of Americans will be so caught of guard as to find themselves losing so much so fast (look around at the “minority” of Americans this has already happened to) that they will not know what hit them.

There is a power object in my living room.

t is unassuming enough -

Soft patterned muted muted color tones

Folded neatly. Set upon the upper left arm
of the couch.

It eminates

People and animals are
drawn to it…

They nuzzle it - draw it up
around them-

Yet, for all this interaction
from people to pets and back again
it retains

It’s own particular scent
which never changes

It’s own particular feel
which never alters

It’s own particular specific
essence of soothing well being

It landed in my hands
when my brother tossed it to me
and said “then thee take this one”

In the midst of our unraveling
of a lifetime’s inheritance
of physical objects, books,
belongings

It is the same smell and rough
woolen fibre it has always been

From the days when my mother rested
beneath it on the wicker couch
in her study…

To the days before that -
Which I’ve come to believe
were the days it belonged to my
Father’s father -

Originally I had thought
It came from my mother’s side
of the family

But lately it speaks to me

and denies this inheritance.

There’s no one left to tell me,
or prove the origins of its existance.

But if feels to me like Papa
and mom -

and home.

it seems to have
that effect
on most everyone.

There is nothing for me to say beyond this…

<a href=”http://americannewsproject.com/videos/market-based-mindset”>Market ‘Mindset’ - Market Based Two Party System MindSet the Ultimate Colonization?</a>

Take this in with all cells firing.

In this quite revealing (on both sides) ‘confrontation’ between Kucinich and Lewis it becomes obvious that not only is Lewis the latest scapegoat but that the Fed and Treasury are using Kucinich to look clean while still no one is reining in the lending ’servicers’ ‘institutions’ or whatever their latest name is…

Those institutions who:

send money wires

hold depositors funds

run debit cards

loan funds

make mortgages

sell mortgages

service mortgages

borrow from the Fed

Loan to the ‘People’

Are transformed from lenders to ’servicers’, collectors, and others
on behalf of mortgages they wrote…

After They Sold Them

It hardly matters about the 20 Billion Lewis admists to here,..

These ’servicers’ are so awash in ‘money’ now …

That 20 Billion is a drop in the bucket

Compared to what has ‘flowed out’

The only question is…

To Where?

Government and Banks Blame Each Other - Victim or Perpetrator, Who’s Who?
And the answer is - us - how surprising.

Now Dennis, if you have the nads, take on Citi and the Fed.

That’s a bit much to ask. I know.

In this stunning article Martin Weiss outlines the bottom line truth in America Today:

Washington says “We’ll bail out Banks, Bankers, AIG and Our Insider Buddies  - But Not Our States” -
Killing California is a bigger risk to the whole of this country than any bank ever was…

After all, California is one of the last PRODUCING States - but don’t listen to me..

Where is the “Yes We Can” When we need it? It’s pretending California doesn’t exist - and playing poker with the bankers and the people of the world (who don’t yet know they are at the table, but they will, oh yes, they will…

Read Martin’s article On the Collapse of California Now.

As we round the corner from the 2nd quarter of 2009 and into the 3rd; it is worthwhile to take a look at the signal changes of more than a few stellar thinkers.  Harry Dent is certainly one of these - and so we are willing to give our attention to what he has to say..

It is worth noting that there is enough white noise in the financial “news”/”entertainment”/media - that pretty much anything meaningful can be completely drowned out by meaningless rhetoric in very short order on the ‘networks’.  So we don’t much pay attention to them…

But we do have a few independent thinkers we have found worth listening to, and interestingly enough, all of them seem to agree with a basic principle we have come to observe: Market corrections are best swift and painful and over than long and arduous and “eased” by government intervention.

Unfortunately, what it takes to get that kind of response is an immense political will; and right now there doesn’t seem to be anyone capable in the theater to take the part.

With that in mind, remember that what Mr. Dent is telling us is not as terrible as we may imagine it to be: if we know what is going on and therefore how to behave, rather than simply acting as the mass sheeple that most financial markets are full of.

Click here to see video

It has come to me tonight
That the fundamental question - was not whether -

Or not it really happened
If or if not it was based upon truth
Or personal experience -

But whether - as in whether or not

It mattered.

Does it Matter That

Dupont wiped out the hemp industry in America in favor of petrochemical innovations like nylon, polyester and others -

Somehow for the last at least Century and a half we have been at war somewhere killing our own -

That mothers do not have the right to work with their children for their own best wishes for personal health care if the State decides they know better - to the point of hunting down said mothers and children to forcibly submit them to what the State deems to be the proper medical doctrine and practice -which they then enact upon the child -

That nearly ever portion of every sector and corner of our State, Local, Regional, and Federal Governments are so corrupt as to be unapproachable.

That we have become a nation of petty tyrants ruling over one another through meaningless State ordained Positions in such a way as to thwart cooperative success and mutual gain but have become, instead, adversaries in a struggle for power of control over what is and is not possible, allowable, “permissible” and ultimately - achievable given the limitations imposed by the “system” -

That local police authorities are being given ever greater powers while local citizenry are being given ever less

That “market conditions” including the demand from such institutions as CitiGroup and BearStearns were pressuring brokers and loan agencies for “paper” which led to the irresponsible and criminal loan writing practices of the 2000’s wherein loan officers were making 20 and 40,000.00 profits on single contracts - on unsupportable terms and conditions to people without the slightest ability to perform on contracts with limiting features like early prepayment penalties which made them impossible to refinance before their penalty rate resets kicked in - (and by which time the market had tanked) Selling fixed rates to homeowners and delivering ARM anything but -

That 75% of the young unwed mothers in my classes on parenting were raising the children of their step fathers; those same persons having been the ones who had abandoned them to the streets

That sometimes when you look out at all the world around you you want to scream and slap something hard - to say - I SEE you.

But that doesn’t make polite company - or elegant hosts -

It makes you ornery and testy - as they used to say -
Belligerent - and un pretty
Never mind less than graceful.

But you know what -

Sometimes, that is where the world IS

and it’s OK not to pretend otherwise -

Does it matter?

I guess that’s up to who
is asking the question.

I guess that depends why
they’re asking the question.

I guess that depends.

Looks like there may still be a few sane people out there even yet… but none of them are in Congress, apparently…

As the stupidity mounts and the A.I.G. bonuses are held firmly front and center in the worlds view the larger issues of the entire fiasco conintue to get barely any press at all.

Thanks to Joe Nocera of the New York Times for bringing some much needed perspective to the issues. In his article The Problem with Flogging A.I.G. Mr. Nocera addresses the underlying problems of the current public frenzy over bonuses and the failure of Congress (and almost everyone else) to comprehend or even acknowledge the real issues and needed solutions to the current financial meltdown.

I have to say I agree with Mr. Nocera pretty much across the board. The question is, will Congress come out of its rabble rousing stupor and take on the serious issues of this financial crisis; or will they simply continue slogging away through ever rising tides of useless and pointless rhetoric until there is nothing left to salvage?

As a taxpayer who is now a majority share holder in A.I.G. my hope is for the former but my observations tell me that the latter is still the rule of the day.

Where is the examination and rational inquiry into the A.I.G. payoffs to   foreign banks and other financial institutions who have already received generous bailouts?  Where is the discussion or questioning of why those A.I.G. payoffs were made at 100 cents on the dollar? Why is A.I.G. paying out at such a huge rate to institutions whose policies and practices have been major contributors to the problems we are now facing?

Finally, where is the rational in depth examination of the real issues which underlie this entire collapse? We cannot afford to continue down the path of popular outrage if we have any desire to curb this financial meltdown rather than simply run it into its most extreme possible result: the destruction of the remaining healthy institutions and market sectors, not only those healthy sectors of A.I.G. but across all markets.

Don’t say we ddin’t say so…
U.S. Plan Seeking Expanded Power in Seizing Firms

so now the goverrnment is giving itself powers - but it would be better to give the people the power -

auction the banks -
keep the houses -

Remember - in a fiat currency world
only real assets matter - right now the banks are stripping
real assets in “default” on fiat paper - as if paper could be in default…

Keep the real assets and let the paper fall..
would be a good premise.

not likely this time around…

read Buckminster Fuller’s GRUNCH. Find it at BFI on line - Buckminster
Fuller Institute..

(Otherwise known as) Get a Clue.

My niece is so brilliant - like the sun she is clear and bright and cogent.

Listening to her tonight I felt as if I had found  somthing akin something - real. Something tuned in, tapped in and turned on - and ready to take on anything.

It is an immense and amazing revelation to be confronted with one so clear, concise and precise in a world so full of subterfuge and superfluousness.

What a blessing!

If the world asks you “what?” answer it - and mean what you answer - there is no better game in all the universe than being true to what you can intuit and know within yourself. Those who lose it lose their own connection to self and source. Those who have it shine like beacons on the landscape. Go ahead. Shine like a beacon.