In some cases, BAD regulation, not LACK of regulation is causing bankruptcies.

The sub prime lenders gave out NINJA loans (no income no job no assets). Now really, is there any wonder why we are in this mess? Who’s fault is it? “Everyone’s” the government, the lenders, the greedy speculators, and yes some of the people that took the loans knowing it was more than they could afford. People that took second mortgages on their homes to buy cars and go on vacations.

It pisses me off that now, the rest of us are expected to bail them out or risk our own savings or even a depression.

NW, you said that we have 73 million homes at an average of $230K per. That comes out to $16.8 trillion. With ‘only’ $10 Trillion in mortgage debt, that implies a lot more equity than a mere $850 billion, or at least, the existence of other factors not mentioned in the excerpt above.

Obviously a percentage of the 73 million homes don’t have a mortgage, so their entire value would not show up in an accounting of the equity in the homes with mortgages, but is it really as high as 40% of the 73 million homes? Another factor is the the percentage of new 1st-time home buyers, and the fact that so many of these mortgages were done with little or no real money down, and the percentage of long-time mortgages that have been ‘reset to zero’ by refinancing.

But your question above doesn’t quite make sense. How is it bad that we have a lot of people buying homes. It isn’t, in itself.

IF the buyers can afford what they buy. IF they are signing up for something they understand (people used to ALWAYS take a lawyer to a mortgage signing). IF we have the banking system to handle it… and that turns out to be a big one. In 2004, the SEC began permitting the biggest 5 banks in NY to go from 12:1 leveraging to as high as 30:1 and 40:1. Three of these 5 banks have already bit the dust, in a manner of speaking. Were these rules changed primarily to facilitate the concept that ‘everyone should own their own home’? Another big IF is the question of to what degree did government encourage loaning to those not really able or ready to pay back a mortgage for social engineering purposes, all the while promising to take care of the bankers if anything bad happened?

In some cases, BAD regulation, not LACK of regulation is causing bankruptcies. There are some accounting rules that are forcing some solvent financial firms to go into bankruptcy. That needs to be changed immediately. But don’t hold your breath waiting for Chris Dodd to do anything about it unless and until Obama wins.

True leadership on this would go a long way to compensating for the many other difference I have with him.

I’d LOVE to be there to watch them craft it…

I think there’s a little turmoil in Obamaland today!

I remember his famous words when talking to a group of workers, “some of you may think I raised your taxes to much, and I agree”. The media had a field day over those words but Bill Clinton balanced the budget and life was pretty good at that time.

However, I will admit the internet boom helped Bill at the time and at the end of his term, the boom was over and Bush was looking for a new way to stimulate the economy, so they started lowering the interest rate.

IMHO, Bush’s administration probably lowered the rate to much and with the Dems pushing to relax the qualifications for low income people to obtain loans, the market created a huge bubble.

The administration should have raised the rates as soon as they saw speculators flooding the housing markets causing low income people to have to pay more for a house than it was worth and more than they could afford.

I often wonder if this administration supported the economy artificially with the low rates in order to maintain support for the war.

McCain, is different from Bush and think he will do what’s best for all of us if he is elected president, but first he has to “get elected”.

Obama, frightens me with all his giveaways. I fear another Carter type administration. Carter years, for me were terrible with his exorbitant interest rates, freeze on wages, gas shortages, weak military ect.

IMHO, if Obama wins we are on our way to socialism and the more government is in your business the more freedom you lose. Freedom is something that Americans have valued more than life it’s self.

I pray that we don’t get so caught up in the desire to be “liked” by Europeans & other countries, that we are willing to give up our way of life, lose our identity as Americans and become European-ized.

WTF, Perry?

I hate both parties, but I have to vote McCain.

The fault lies in so many, many places. I just remember thinking clear back during the presidency of O’s hero Ronnie Reagan that he seemed to let the floodgates of greed open–It will trickle down, etc.

It just never seemed to me from that time on that anyone really had respect for balancing budgets. Yes, I know all about Bubba Clinton, and I like him for it. But I’m talking about Americans in general. Look at their average credit card debts, etc.

I know people who are furious because of their investments, etc. I guess I am fairly lucky, having no debt and no real stock market investments. My stuff if pretty safe at this point. I’ve never wanted much or spent much anyway.

I remember my poor parents, grandparents, and relatives. When I was in high school, we were asked to interview people about the Depression and what it was like living through it. All my poor relatives said, “We really didn’t notice the difference. We were always poor, pretty self sustaining (small farmers), etc. It was life as it always had been for us.”

He has put the ball in The Messiah’s court…

Break of serve!

It was just announced on Fox. No other statement. Good move by him, better move to make no comment as a way of demonstrating this is not a campaign issue but an issue affecting the US taxpayer.

He has given notice the Friday debate may be cancelled for the same reason. I hope he does. Obama trotted Biden out today to try and put attention on Obama on Foreign Policy. It would eliminate that move by Obama.

McCain is taking CNN, MSNBC and Fox. Making political sacrifice to go back to Washington which isn’t popular right now. Challenges Obama… does Obama cave and follow or does he show he will do anything to win.