Helping Homeowners In Michigan
Archive for November 7th, 2010
Uh, The "R" Word Was Just Used
November 7th, 2010 | 
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In a fairly mainstream online publication too.
Speaking of committees and oversight, when Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke testified under oath to Congress in July, he said in no uncertain words, “the Federal Reserve will not monetize the [federal] debt”. [1]. Fast forward to the day after mid-term elections, in which the American people clearly voted for LESS spending/printing, and the Fed announces its plan to monetize $900 billion in treasury bonds. [1]. The Chairman has proven his previous testimony before Congress to be a blatant lie, but instead of condemning the Fed’s recent actions, the federal government has welcomed it with open arms. That’s quite some oversight we have there.
Actually when you commit Perjury before Congress you’re supposed to be cited for contempt and jailed.
The Fed, by it’s own admission, is an independent entity within the government “having both public purposes, and private aspects”. By “private aspects”, they mean the entire operation is wholly-owned by private member banks, who are paid dividends of 6% each year on their stock. Furthermore, the Fed’s decisions “do not have to be ratified by the President or anyone else in the executive or legislative branch of government” and the Fed “does not receive funding appropriated by Congress”. In 1982, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals confirmed this view when it held that “federal reserve banks are not federal instrumentalities… but are independent, privately owned and locally controlled corporations”.
That’s a damn shame, really. At least it is if you’re Bernnake.
Why?
Because of this thing called “Sovereign Immunity.” That is, a government official, so long as he acts within his delegated and official duties, is generally immune from prosecution. He can be removed from office, but not arrested. This doesn’t protect a Congressman from being arrested for taking a bribe (outside of his duties) but it does prevent him from being arrested for passing an unconstitutional law that results in your rights being infringed.
There is no such protection for private actors.
As I said, such a damn shame because………
Speaking of committees and oversight, when Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke testified under oath to Congress in July, he said in no uncertain words, “the Federal Reserve will not monetize the [federal] debt”. [1]. Fast forward to the day after mid-term elections, in which the American people clearly voted for LESS spending/printing, and the Fed announces its plan to monetize $900 billion in treasury bonds. [1]. The Chairman has proven his previous testimony before Congress to be a blatant lie.
More-specifically that’s perjury, and our friend Ben is subject to arrest for it.
Will Congress do it? Probably not. And here’s where we get to the “R” word….
We have all become subject to the misguided and/or malicious whims of a few wealthy individuals operating the levers of economic policy, with no adequate means of challenging their power.
Well that’s not quite true. We still have means available to challenge that power. They’re just not legal.
And while this may be in the back of a lot of people’s minds these days, it’s damn rare to see it written….. like, for instance….. right here.
The reality is that there is only one way back to a true democratic system now, and this path will require nothing less of us than the courage of our forefathers.
Did I just see in print something that looks a lot like “Stop the looting or we will start……“
It may be considerably closer to midnight than I thought.
Posted in Ben Bernanke, Corruption, Economic Crisis, Economy, Federal Reserve, Financial System, Fraud, Perjury, QE-2, quantitative easing | 
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Ben Bernanke Must Be Removed
If We The People do not demand this, our economy will be crushed as commodity price ramps destroy those who are least-able to afford basic goods and services that we all must buy in order to survive – especially food and energy.
STOP THE LOOTING AND START PROSECUTING!
Posted in Banks, Ben Bernanke, Commodities, Corruption, Debt, Economic Crisis, Economy, Federal Reserve, Financial System, Fraud, Government, Money, Price Inflation, US Dollar |
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Bold-Faced Lies of the Day from Geithner, Bernanke
How can anyone take blatant liars seriously? How can anyone not know Bernanke and Geithner are blatant liars?
I have not figured out the answer to those questions but I can point out another round of lies from both Geithner and Bernanke.
Bernanke’s Lie of the Day
MarketWatch reports Fed chairman: Increasing inflation not a goal
Some Fed critics have accused the bank of pursuing an inflationary strategy by adding trillions of dollars of credit into the nation’s financial system. The Fed itself seemed to suggest inflation was too low in a policy statement two months ago.
Yet Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke said Saturday that the central bank’s decision this week to purchase $600 billion in Treasury bonds is solely aimed at keeping U.S. interest rates low so the economy can grow.
“We are not in the business of trying to create inflation,” Bernanke said at a forum in Georgia to discuss the role of the central bank in the U.S. economy.
Bernanke said prior actions indicated monetary policy was “insufficiently stimulative.” He said the possibility of deflation, or falling prices, has posed a bigger threat.
Of course the Fed is in the business of producing inflation. It is their first and foremost goal, just as it is in Japan. Consequences, such as asset bubbles be damned.
Bernanke belongs on the cover of Mad Magazine with his “What me Worry?” attitude about asset bubbles. He could not spot a housing bubble even though it was obvious to practically everyone on the planet except the other members of the Fed, real estate agents, and home builders.
Geithner’s Lie of the Day
Bloomberg reports Geithner Says U.S. Won’t Use Dollar to Gain Economic Advantage
Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said the U.S. won’t use the dollar as a trade weapon and he repeated his support for a “strong dollar” that plays a central role in the global economy.
“We will never use our currency as a tool to gain competitive advantage,” Geithner told reporters today after a meeting of finance ministers from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation group in Kyoto, Japan.
The Treasury chief said he believes the dollar, euro and yen are roughly in alignment with each other, and he said American policy makers understand the “special responsibility” the U.S. has for the world economy. “I’m happy to reaffirm again that a strong dollar’s in our interest as a country,” Geithner said.
If a strong dollar was in the best interest of the country, then Geithners would not be pressuring China to weaken it. Bernanke would not be out to destroy it.
I am delighted that Rand Paul won a senate seat. He will have a chance to stick it to Bernanke during the Fed Chairman’s semi-annual testimony charade before Congress, formally known as the Humphrey Hawkins Testimony and Report.
Mike “Mish” Shedlock
http://globaleconomicanalysis.blogspot.com
Posted in Banks, Ben Bernanke, Corruption, Debt, Economic Crisis, Economy, Federal Reserve, Financial System, Fraud, Government, Lies, Money, Timothy Geithner |
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Fraud Of America
Bill Black nails it again…And again out of the park….
Note also that while we have supported a moratorium on foreclosures, this is only to stop the foreclosure frauds — the illegal seizure of homes by fraudulent means. We do not suppose that financial institutions can afford to maintain toxic assets on their books. The experience of the thrift crisis of the 1980s demonstrates the inherent problems created by forbearance in the case of institutions that are run as control frauds. All of the incentives of a control fraud bank are worsened with forbearance. Our posts on the Prompt Corrective Action (PCA) law (which mandates that the regulators place insolvent banks in receivership) have focused on the banks’ failure to foreclose as a deliberate strategy to avoid recognizing their massive losses in order to escape receivership and to allow their managers to further loot the banks through huge bonuses based on fictional income (which ignores real losses).
Yep.
All these institutions are in fact insolvent. Pretending they aren’t won’t make them solvent again. Home prices won’t go back up either, which is the only way they could get out of this. Therefore, the ultimate outcome has to be resolution – or the looting for the purpose of continuing to steal money and cover the ongoing rot will continue – and economic recovery will be impossible.
The data also support our position that fraudulent lenders are delaying foreclosures and the sales of foreclosed homes primarily in order to delay enormous loss recognition.
And make more money (which they then loot) through the PSAs, which give them an incentive to create defaults that were not already there.
If a deficiency action is available against the mortgagor or any other person, CitiMortgage may proceed for the deficiency. CitiMortgage may retain 25% of the net proceeds received from a mortgagor pursuant to a deficiency action as compensation for proceeding with the deficiency action.
Isn’t that special? Writing the PSA in such a fashion that the more people you can get to default, the more money you make!
The fraud scheme inherently strips homeowners of their life savings and finally their homes. It is inevitable that the homeowners would become delinquent; that was the inherent consequence of inducing those who could not repay their loans to borrow large sums and purchase homes at grossly inflated prices supported by fraudulent inflated appraisals. This was not an accident, but rather the product of those who designed the “exploding rate” mortgages.
Yep. And guess what: By 2006 Citibank was well-aware that the majority of the mortgages they were both making and packaging up were garbage. By 2007 that number was eighty percent. Eight out of ten, or nearly all.
Out of these millions of fraudulent mortgages, Bank of America claims to have modified 700,000; of these, 85,000 are under HAMP. Still, the Treasury says that the bank has another 375,000 mortgages that already meet HAMP terms. In other words, Bank of America has been shockingly negligent in its efforts to modify mortgages.
It’s not negligence, it’s intentional. The PSA cited above is likely similar to most of them. That is, BAC has every incentive to further loot the population using HAMP as a foil, since they make even more money by doing so, and further asset-strip the public.
HAMP’s parallel goal is funneling more money to the banks that induced the fraudulent loans. Data indicate that neither the HAMP modifications nor those undertaken independently by the banks actually benefit homeowners.
Correct. The PSAs for the loan pools are written in such a format that if you can induce someone to default and then deny them a HAMP modification you can make even more money by further asset-stripping the customer.
Most importantly, as we reported, half of all homeowners are already underwater in their mortgages, or nearly so.
That’s a lot of turkey legs that you can turn into bones….
Does Bank of America hold the “wet ink” notes on any of these homes, as required by 45 states? How many of these homeowners were unemployed or otherwise financially distressed when the loans were originally made? How many of the mortgages were fraudulent from the very beginning: low docs, no docs, liar loans, NINJA’s (all specialties of Countrywide)? Without addressing these questions, Bank of America cannot claim to have demonstrated that the foreclosures were appropriate, no matter how many years borrowers might have been delinquent.
The law is immaterial Bill. It’s even immaterial when you commit Hit and Run, provided you’re a banker:
EAGLE, Colorado — A financial manager for wealthy clients will not face felony charges for a hit-and-run because it could jeopardize his job, prosecutors said Thursday.
What did he do?
Martin Joel Erzinger, 52, faces two misdemeanor traffic charges stemming from a July 3 incident when he allegedly hit bicyclist Dr. Steven Milo from behind then sped away, according to court documents.
If you did that you’d be sitting in the dock facing a felony charge. So would I. But if you’re a financial manager for wealthy clients, your job is more important than justice. The prosecutor admits so.
And by the way, this wasn’t a “love tap” either:
Milo suffered spinal cord injuries, bleeding from his brain and damage to his knee and scapula, according to court documents. Over the past six weeks he has suffered “disabling” spinal headaches and faces multiple surgeries for a herniated disc and plastic surgery to fix the scars he suffered in the accident.
“He will have lifetime pain,” Haddon wrote. “His ability to deal with the physical challenges of his profession — liver transplant surgery — has been seriously jeopardized.”
This was a serious incident and the alleged individual responsible sped away instead of stopping after the impact.
Read the bullet points from Bill Black’s article.
Then read the article related to what certainly appears to be felony hit-and-run.
Now answer this question: What options do the citizens of this nation have when we not only cannot get felony prosecution for financial frauds, but we also can’t obtain them when a bankster allegedly runs down a bicyclist and then flees the scene?
I can think of only two, and of the two, “stick in the teeth” is the only legal one.
Then again, if there is no law that applies to banksters, should the rest of us adhere to it?
Posted in Bank of America, Banks, Corruption, Debt, Economic Crisis, Economy, Financial System, Fraud, Government, Money |
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There is only one answer for the world economic situation; monetary reform.
1. No More National Debt
2. No More Fractional Lending
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