February 08, 2008

HousingPANIC Stupid Question of the Day


Do you think that our leaders in DC and the State houses, you know, the ones who took the REIC bribe money to look the other way, now understand that the whole financial system, one built on the back of a fraud-fueled credit bubble and housing Ponzi Scheme, is collapsing on their watch?

HP's 2008 Election Guide: Vote for the new guy. Throw the bums out.

24 comments:

Anonymous said...

They know and that's why they're now bribing the voters

Bush, Congress hit bottom in AP poll

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20080208/ap_on_go_ot/bush_congress_ap_poll

Congress Sends Economic Aid Plan to Bush With Tax Rebates for Many; Bush Signals Approval

http://biz.yahoo.com/ap/080208/economy_stimulus.html

Anonymous said...

Choose the next pres based on their home. McCain lives in a Phoenix Condo! I sh1t you not! Ron Paul is left out as usual.

http://www.newsweek.com/id/77081

Anonymous said...

What's wrong with that guy?
Get up, grab a brick, and demolish the fine danish cabinet shelf, already!

Anonymous said...

Keith,

After reading the heading on your banner, I ask myself, how is it that this guy, HOV, became successful and filthy rich. This guy doesnt even understand basic economics.

Raise prices. What a bum.

Danny

Anonymous said...

Oh how i miss the good o'l Clinton days..

Hillary gets my vote.

Anonymous said...

The Democrats will blame the Iraq War, the Republicans will blame terrorists.

Anonymous said...

Got Prozac? Got gold?

“It's All Downhill From Here, Folks”

By Mike Whitney

"I just saw a picture of Bernanke stripped to the waist in the boiler-room shoveling greenbacks into the furnace.” Rob Dawg, Calculated Risk blog-site

http://tinyurl.com/3dhvkn

On January 14, 2008 the FDIC web site began posting the rules for reimbursing depositors in the event of a bank failure. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) is required to “determine the total insured amount for each depositor....as of the day of the failure” and return their money as quickly as possible. The agency is “modernizing its current business processes and procedures for determining deposit insurance coverage in the event of a failure of one of the largest insured depository institutions.”

http://tinyurl.com/2jue46

The implication is clear, the FDIC has begun the “death watch” on the many banks which are currently drowning in their own red ink. The problem for the FDIC is that it has never supervised a bank failure which exceeded 175,000 accounts. So the impending financial tsunami is likely to be a crash-course in crisis management. Today some of the larger banks have more than 50 million depositors, which will make the FDIC's job nearly impossible.......

So, will the price of my house go up?

gregoryw said...

RED ALERT RED ALERT - sent to the president's desk, passed by house and senate

http://tinyurl.com/2g2tus


Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage finance companies, will be allowed to buy loans worth as much as $729,750 between July 31, 2007, and Dec. 31, 2008, an increase over the current $417,000 loan limit. The move may help struggling homeowners refinance large mortgages at a lower interest rate. It will also allow the Federal Housing Administration to insure loans as high as $729,750 in expensive markets.

Anonymous said...

They absolutely do not understand at all, even a little. Not one bit.

Some think that our economic problems are caused by the rich not paying their "fair share" of taxes, and that the rich need to subsidize the poor in order to level the playing field. e.g. bitterrenter.

Others are in total denial that there is an economic crisis because they think this would be an indictment of the tax cuts they are always bragging about; they think that we need only cut taxes further to increase prosperity for all. These people fondly invoke such platitues as "I never got a job from a poor person."

Virtually all of them believe that we could better America's economic standing in the world through additional education, energy, and technology subsidies.

I tell you this. Whichever party acknowledges the following will have a lock on economic issues and will secure power in this country for decades to come:

1.) We are in the beginning stages of economic crisis.

2.) The rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer.

3.) This is not primarily the result of poor tax policy, inadequate minimum wage standards, or educational shortcomings.

4.) It is the result of poor monetary policy and debt subsidies.
4a.) The remedy for monetary policy is to return to a zero-inflation currency whereby the poor and middle class will not have their savings eroded by 5 or 10 or 12% annually. This is especially important for those on fixed incomes. In addition, it will reduce the malinvestment that results in boom/bust cycles tending to wipe out people's investments every ten or so years.
4b.) The remedy for debt subsidies is to eliminate them, thereby decreasing the principal on said debts, encouraging prompt repayment of said debts, and making such repayment possible. (Implicit in this is the reognition that debt subsidies immediately increase the amount of debt required to fincance the subsidized purchases, thereby driving up the overall cost of education, housing, etc. I.e., while making the monthly payments on these debts relatively affordable, subsidies greatly increase the size of loans, and thus extra payments on said loans provide relatively little benefit as compared to extra payments on loans with higher interest rates on smaller principal amounts. Thus, the benefit of debt subsidies inures to benefit of the industries in the form of higher prices for products and services, and inures to detriment of the consumers (f/k/a/ citizens) by mandating enormous levels of debt in order to acquire the products and services).

Sadly, I doubt that politicians generally will ever recognize the above. They will continue either to deny these problems, or to attempt their remedy via more subsidies, price-fixing, forced redistribution of wealth, and other command-and-control type economic distortions. If only the poor and the middle class had a true free market for a true free market money, they would be much better off, and economic tinkering would not be necessary to help them keep their heads above water.

Mammoth said...

Yes indeed the politicians are scared sh!tless.

They all know that California is the trendsetter for the nation, and look at what's happening there - a mass exodus of people, who bought houses with 'Voodoo' loans - walking away from their mortgages.

They are well aware of the huge financial sh!tstorm brewing on the horizon, in which billions and billions of dollars in loans will be defaulted on.

This will definitely have a severe impact on the economy.

Yet the politicians are still behaving like the band on the Titanic, who continued to play music as the ship was sinking.
-Mammoth

Anonymous said...

http://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/orl-condo0708feb07,0,3929812.story

OR

http://tinyurl.com/2mhp27

Orlando condo auction. Can you say mark to market.

Anonymous said...

Mammoth said...

Yes indeed the politicians are scared sh!tless.

They all know that California is the trendsetter for the nation, and look at what's happening there - a mass exodus of people, who bought houses with 'Voodoo' loans - walking away from their mortgages.

They are well aware of the huge financial sh!tstorm brewing on the horizon, in which billions and billions of dollars in loans will be defaulted on.

This will definitely have a severe impact on the economy.

True, but the insolvency of the banks is gargantuan compared to the mortgage walkaways. The worthless off the books derivatives are what will do us in. Voodoo loans weren't just for subprime people. The entire international banking system is sitting on a mountain of voodoo.

When the FDIC posts a new procedure for dealing with bank failures I think it is time to pay attention to cash in the bank for everyone. They wouldn't be posting this particular topic if they weren't themselves preparing for this.

Mike Whitney is right on the mark:

The death watch of the banks has begun.

Anonymous said...

HP's 2008 Election Guide: Vote for the new guy. Throw the bums out

That should be the eternal way to vote, if you're going to vote. Always throw out any incumbent. People can only serve one term in their lifetime. Then it's someone else's chance.

Nothing else will fix the system.

Anonymous said...

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored mortgage finance companies, will be allowed to buy loans worth as much as $729,750 between July 31, 2007, and Dec. 31, 2008, an increase over the current $417,000 loan limit. The move may help struggling homeowners refinance large mortgages at a lower interest rate. It will also allow the Federal Housing Administration to insure loans as high as $729,750 in expensive markets.

I think this is a good thing. It will just hasten the collapse of Freddie and Fannie. Good riddance!

Anonymous said...

I don't want to believe this stuff anymore! Shouldn't we start giving Suzanne or Lereah equal time here?

Anonymous said...


The death watch of the banks has begun.


Maybe half of the banks need to go out of business. Maybe Harvard, Yale and Columbia shouldn't be the prime recruiting grounds for businesses, with their pathetic track record the past few decades.

Anonymous said...

M2 biggest w/w increase since 9/11 - Fed easing may be working.

Anonymous said...

Ron Paul lives in Freeport...I grew up near there. total hellhole of a place, port town obviously...but you have to commend him for staying true to his roots, and staying put!

He's having a party this weekend...I'll be lucky enough to attend.

Yea Ronnie!

Anonymous said...

Americant:

lol, a $4.6 million apartment to boot. wonder if they're allowed to have pets, or if they have noisy neighbors.

Anonymous said...

this is the slowest moving train wreck ever it's like watching water drip or a snail slide. It is beginning to get boring and that is the scary thing. People will begin to put their guards down and do stupid things, they don't believe the government will allow anything bad to happen to their cushy lifestyle, expensive cars and oversized houses and shopping for 130 dollar jeans for their 12 year old daughter. They have effectivly side tracked us with this election so no one is really paying very much attention to other things going on. No one is bothering to put two and two together more stressed out people, more crime based on getting enough money to pay the mortgage, more family members killing everyone in the house and then themselves. Companies announcing that they just can't make the numbers work anymore and then come the layoffs. Sorry you bought that 700,000 dollar house in 2005 and now you have no job. Sometimes I wonder if this whole thing was in some way planned. I have always said these banks thought these people would pimp thier kids to get the money to make the mortgage payment and they have found out it ain't so. What horrors have thou unleased. People need to keep an eye on the election and the other eye on bloomberg because it won't matter who they elect if the USA is in the toilet. No president can make saudi arabia lower gas prices, the farmers lower food prices, or the banks accept lower or no payments regardless of what they promise in speeches. They can't make anyone give you a job, they can't make a bank refinance your house, they can't make people buy your house for what you paid for it, they can't give you a 5000 a month payday on your unemployment check. They can promise you the moon, stars and the sky because they want to get elected but the reality of what is really happening can't be fixed through promises. I wish I had 5 million dollars to donate my own campaign so you know Mrs. Clinton does not have a clue how you live. Mr. Romney has 40 million to loose on an election bid just give me 1 of those wasted 40 mil. Mr Obama has a clue how you live, but, I don't believe all those career politicans would let him do anything with out a fight every step of the way. I think this thing is bigger than he could ever be or would be allowed to be.
People are getting bored with the whole thing and are getting back to the thing that made them happy and what they think is fulfilled. They can't wait for that money to go shopping. This should be an episode of the twilight zone.

Anonymous said...

Would the Powers-That-Be resort to letting the FDIC bail out failed banks what with all the "sky-is-falling" publicity this would generate? Isn't there some way to slip them some cash "under the table"? Isn't that the purpose of hiding those M2/M3 figures?

Anonymous said...

Tangelo,

You said that the rich get richer during inflation. How come their money isn't worth less proportionally? In fact they are getting screwed as well.

The people who make out during inflation are those who first print and spend the money because as it further goes round the economy it dilutes the value of the existing dollars. This does take a little time though, we will be seeing the effects of this inflation for the next 5 years or so. Expect higher interest rates 1 year from now.

So back to your comment the rich who have stockpiles of cash will be hurt as well but will still have enough cash to survive.

-Big Cheese

Anonymous said...

Who pays the taxes (and who doesn't) has everything to do with the current mess. Regressive Social Security taxes, and tax cuts for the wealthy are at the root of of the problem.

The minimum wage in the USA is not even a living wage for a single person.

Anonymous said...

Who pays the taxes (and who doesn't) has everything to do with the current mess.

I agree, The top 5% pay 50% of federal income taxes. The bottom 50% pay 5%. As for SS, I'm middle class, but I'd rather have that money than let the goobermint idiots get a 2% return. Besides, it won't be there when/if I retire.