Boortz? Just another conservative liar.

No private company should have become so large that it's failure threatens the infrastructure of the nation and wrecks the global economy.

Who lobbied for deregulation? The political class? Mr. Boortz has a problem.

Yes, more deregulation is what we need...

Like how letting foxes into the hen house is the best way to stop your chickens from getting eaten.

Bukharin: No private company should have become so large that it's failure threatens the infrastructure of the nation and wrecks the global economy.

DNRTFA yet, but this bears repeating.

So much fail in so few words.

Um, no. There was a market failure. Brokers sold to banks and only got paid for loans that closed. Since they were passing them on to banks, had no incentive to determine whether the borrower could actually repay.

Banks resold them to investment banks, taking a commission. Since they only got paid for loans they sold, they had no incentive to see if the borrower could actually repay.

I-banks packaged them up and sold bonds secured by the mortgages. The more bonds they sold, the more they made. The more mortgages they bought, the more bonds they could sell. The business model assumed some borrowers would default, but since the purchasers of the bonds only owned a tiny fraction of each loan, the defaults were supposed to be immaterial.

No one expected widescale fraud, despite the fact that every incentive was to commit fraud.

And don't get me started on the shenanigans that allowed ratings agencies to rate as AAA bonds backed by crap subprime and Alt-A mortgages.

Lax regulations allowed Lehman Brothers to leverage itself at 60 to 1.

When the music stopped, the banks and I banks got stuck holding all the crap mortgages that they hadn't been able to pass on.

There's a balance - more regulation means fewer loans will be made. But quite clearly everyone in the chain (from borrower to I-bank) went overboard and needs to be reined in.

I listen to both right wing talk radio (including boortz) and air america. I've been greatly amused at the dancing the Limbaughs and Boortz's are doing to explain how this meltdown is all the democrats fault.

Green? Oh Christ.

Not Available has broken it down folks. There's really not much more to be said.

Having now read TFA, I will agree that the CRA did create an incentive to make loans to people in "underserved" areas who could not afford them. But trying to pin the entire meltdown in the credit markets on the sliver of loans made by banks to comply with their CRA requirements is asinine. It's not like regulators had to twist the banks' arms to get them to loan money - credit was flowing like water and the only way for banks to make money was to be doing deals and making loans. These loans would have been made regardless of whether or not the CRA existed. Bad loans were made up and down the income spectrum.

Banks got lazy. They started pushing their record keeping requirements and due diligence requirements onto mortgage brokers, throwing the whole safety and soundness of the banking system down the toilet. This is why they are regulated.

Success has a thousand fathers. Failure is an orphan.

There's alot of shared accountability here, no pun intended.

Two words: De Regulation.

Not Available: Having now read TFA, I will agree that the CRA did create an incentive to make loans to people in "underserved" areas who could not afford them. But trying to pin the entire meltdown in the credit markets on the sliver of loans made by banks to comply with their CRA requirements is asinine. It's not like regulators had to twist the banks' arms to get them to loan money - credit was flowing like water and the only way for banks to make money was to be doing deals and making loans. These loans would have been made regardless of whether or not the CRA existed. Bad loans were made up and down the income spectrum.

Banks got lazy. They started pushing their record keeping requirements and due diligence requirements onto mortgage brokers, throwing the whole safety and soundness of the banking system down the toilet. This is why they are regulated.

If I were a lender and the government told me I had to allow greater access to higher-risk borrowers, I think I'd be taking the extra measures to protect myself and counter-balance the higher risk. The fact they didn't have the capital in reserve says to me the lenders were asleep at the switch.

But greed IS a factor also. In order to hold that extra capital in reserve you might take a hit in shareholder value. And Wall Street has been unyielding in its unrealistic demands for higher profit.

That's when creative accounting starts. I used to develop and support systems for AT&T's financial services (AP, Payroll, Purchasing, General Ledger, etc.). Computer systems don't lend themselves well to creative accounting. And I can't tell you how many times I was instructed to fudge data or tweek the systems in complete contradiction to the regs.

So far I see alot of finger pointing and an appalling lack of big picture thinking. We're going to end up plugging the hole and never correcting the inherent weakness of the dike.

Ahhh. I'm so glad that we've found a way to blame someone else for greed and lack of foresight. Phew.

For a moment there, it was almost looking like we might have to face the sad fact that we'd pooped in our own dog dish. Lucky for us it was the gub'ment that FORCED people to make loans--banks didn't want to. They didn't want to get into a frenzy of packaging off loans they were certain were bad, and banks didn't REALLY want to buy them up to pass onto someone else...

You know what would be refreshing, just once? A bank director or CEO/CFO who stepped up and said, "I am so sorry, I REALLY farked the pooch on this." You know, as opposed to casting around to blame anyone else around them, or the invisible boogeyman of the gub'ment when they make poor decisions.

Don't get me wrong, there's plenty of blame to go around here, but I do wish I could see someone stepping up to own their mistakes.

Download. Listen. Learn.

Deregulation is fine provided you don't bail anyone out when/if they fail. As soon as you do that, you reward bad decision-making and s***ty business practices.

What deregulation is supposed to do is make it easier yet more risky for these firms. So if they wanted to mitigate the risks they faced, then it was on them to do it, not the gov't.

*sigh*

Sure, our companies failed spectacularly.. but it wasn't our fault! It's those damned politicians that made us engage in shady business practices that eventually caught up to us.

Ugh.

Wow. I can't believe douche-bags like this guy are still writing trash like this, and that people haven't literally drug them through the streets for it.

It's this crap that makes me seriously wonder if we don't need a few bread lines to finally prove the cult of rationalized selfishness conservatism to be a failed faith based initiative.

Bring back tar-and-feathering, and start will reality-denying cheap-political-point-scoring asshats like this author. They are hurting America.

NittLion78: Deregulation is fine provided you don't bail anyone out when/if they fail. As soon as you do that, you reward bad decision-making and s***ty business practices.

What deregulation is supposed to do is make it easier yet more risky for these firms. So if they wanted to mitigate the risks they faced, then it was on them to do it, not the gov't.

*sigh*

Yes, but since the consequences of the failures of these institutions means dragging the entire global economy into the shiatter, tight regulation is likely required to balance man's natural greed.

You know people have been completely farking duped by those in power when the few things we have to protect the little guy from the big and powerful become bogeymen to them.

regulation
anti-trust laws
trial lawyers
unions
ACLU
etc...

So very consistent. Crouch and lick.

I wonder how long it will take to find out that this was all the Democrats fault for not pushing hard enough against the Republicans when they were de-regulating everything. The Demos should have known better than to let the Repubs pass that kind of legislation!

/sigh

Congress set up processes (Research the Community Redevelopment Act) whereby community activist groups and organizers could effectively stop a bank's efforts to grow if that bank didn't make loans to unqualified borrowers.


HAHA!!

ZING!

Just read this article.

It all becomes very clear that the Bush administration allowed 5 large-capitalized firms to ignore debit ratios. 3 of them have gone under, two are wobbly.

The article is from the NY Sun.

"Pay my expenses and bills but stay out of my life !!"

... who knew the mortgage companies were run by 16 year olds?

And Draconix is in just under the wire!

I blame greed. If people were content to live off the land, they wouldn't need mortgages.

I think this sums it up:

Republican policies of irresponsible government deregulation in critical sectors allowed us to rapidly develop an energy crisis, a housing crisis, a credit crisis and a financial market crisis, all at once, and accompanied (and partly caused) by impressive levels of corruption and speculation. Meanwhile, those of your political leaders charged with oversight were either napping or in bed with corporate lobbyists.

Take John McCain, your Republican presidential nominee, whose senior staff includes half a dozen prominent former lobbyists. As he recently put it, "I was chairman of the [Senate] Commerce Committee that oversights every part of the economy." No question about it: Your leaders' failure to notice the damage done by irresponsible deregulation was indeed an oversight of epic proportions.

At least Obama has an idea of what can be done with existing executive powers to steer this economy off the rocks. All McCain has left are lies and unpresidential bluster. (new window)

Where does McCain get off blaming Obama for this mess when it was the deregulatory policies that he himself supported that caused this?

someone needs to shop a pic of Bush Gramm and MCain tending bar at the Wall St bar and casino

thenateman: If people were content to live off the land, they wouldn't need mortgages.

What magical world do you live where land is free?

there is only person to blame and we all know it because he dont care about black people.

He forced them to take out home loans they couldn't afford and made them stay behind during katrina.


Obama will save us he will make all our dreams come true.

More libtard lies. Dont believe them.

Goddamn biased reality. It always sides with the libs. This is clearly the turning point for reality... if it keeps up this bias, it's ratings will plummet.

Whomever wrote this liberal smear hate speech is just relying on reality... which is biased %95 of the time to the libs, according to the latest Limbaugh-KoolAid Poll.

lexslamman:

That article sums up how I've felt about McCain for about 8 months.

Gas-tax holiday, more tax breaks for the rich, drill here drill now, 'we will come back in honor and victory', I know how to capture Bin Laden, and on, and on, and on...

Mavericky Conservativeness gimmickry

This article is adorable. As if these tiny amounts of hard to obtain loans were apart of any problem this large. The parrots over in the business section here are Fark have been crowing with this one all morning.

Talking points. Get them out fast, get them out early.

Darconix: Great. Just farking great. You farking libs and your "politically correct" snobbery just cost the American taxpayer trillions of dollars because you forced these companies to extend bad loans to minorities who couldn't afford to repay them.

Fark you,libs. EABOD and DIAF.

+$.50

Poor, ignorant farkers. It's not degregulation causing this. It's feel good farkers telling banks who they have to lend to instead of banks being free to lend based on proven risk modeling techniques.

Work in the industry. Learn something. The liberal Fark brigade simply can't bring themselves to believe that the almighty democratic party can do harm with their arguably good intentions.

You can't have your world of rainbows and sunshine for everyone without risk and without a price.

Boortz? I saw that douche nozzle on Bill Moyer's show the other night. He looks like someone that would try and find the wooden pews in church so he could grind his butt plug into something hard while he speaks in tongues. Praise Jeeesuess!!!!! lam lab ltyu rhf oooooooooooh amen.

Darconix: Great. Just farking great. You farking libs and your "politically correct" snobbery just cost the American taxpayer trillions of dollars because you forced these companies to extend bad loans to minorities who couldn't afford to repay them.

Fark you, libs. EABOD and DIAF.

That's the second utterly epic fail I've seen in an hour.

Strange days, these.

purple helmet: Poor, ignorant farkers. It's not degregulation causing this. It's feel good farkers telling banks who they have to lend to instead of banks being free to lend based on proven risk modeling techniques.

Work in the industry. Learn something. The liberal Fark brigade simply can't bring themselves to believe that the almighty democratic party can do harm with their arguably good intentions.

You can't have your world of rainbows and sunshine for everyone without risk and without a price.

Wharrgarbl?

Darconix: minorities

How do you keep your sheets so white, by the way?

Darconix: Great. Just farking great. You farking libs and your "politically correct" snobbery just cost the American taxpayer trillions of dollars because you forced these companies to extend bad loans to minorities who couldn't afford to repay them.

Fark you, libs. EABOD and DIAF.

I know. Those goddamn muslim anti-american libtards forced the 5 large investment houses to ask the SEC to allow them to increase their debt loads to astronomically high levels. And after that... they forced the SEC to allow it.

libtards

purple helmet: Work in the industry. Learn something. The liberal Fark brigade simply can't bring themselves to believe that the almighty democratic party can do harm with their arguably good intentions.

Download. Listen. Learn.

To put the last 8 years of Republican leadership into apartment up-keep terms...



No security deposit back for you.

1980's = S&L Bailout which we are still paying for.
Causes:
Deregulation
Imprudent real estate lending
Neil Bush

2000's = Current bailout our grand kids will be paying for.
Causes:
Lack of regulation
Imprudent real estate lending
George W. Bush

How does the Bush family avoid getting lynched by a mob at this point? Ok, they were only involved and not really direct causes, but still.

Americans really don't bother to learn from history do we?

BTW, the S&L scandal lead to the Keating Five. Who was in that?
John McCain

Can we really afford 4 more years of this type of crap?

Those of you saying that the banks were forced to make bad loans, where are you getting that idea? My understanding is that banks were encouraged to make loans to people with poor credit, and that the risk would be mitigated by government assistance.

TFerWannaBe: Those of you saying that the banks were forced to make bad loans, where are you getting that idea? My understanding is that banks were encouraged to make loans to people with poor credit, and that the risk would be mitigated by government assistance.

Yeah... the libs would have you believe that they made the loans because of greed, and ignorance. But in reality they were made to the poor people because of super-secret legislation that forced the noble companies to make bad loans to the mexican illegal immigrants and muslim terrorists so it would later fail and they could say your wife and your small town mayor is a pig!!

libtards. their hatred has no bounds

TFerWannaBe: Those of you saying that the banks were forced to make bad loans, where are you getting that idea? My understanding is that banks were encouraged to make loans to people with poor credit, and that the risk would be mitigated by government assistance.

New talking point. It's nice to know we can always count on a few disseminators of propaganda to come in here and tell the "libs" how it really is. They're like little Johnny Talkingpointseeds.