Unbelievable...Oh, yeah, it's OT as hell...

Larry L wrote:
and they're not yuppies.




I think we need a new word to be used for people caught up in what is ....
to me.... an obvious cultural surge of consumption, for the sake of
consumption.

Sure, all humans have always liked nice things and comfortable surroundings
but, at least where I live and observe the world, there has been a big
change in the last couple generations.

IMHO, for large numbers of people in our culture, "owning" is replacing (
or an attempt to replace ) traditional spiritual and social aspects of human
life. That is, people are trying to buy things to fill the empty places
inside that real chats ( not cell phone stuck receiver stuck Borg-like to
ear or e-mails ) with other people and with "god" have filled for most
people in the past. It is very easy to find people now that can put no
deeper meaning on their own lives than what they recently bought. The
word "yuppie" never seems quite right for them but we need one as they are a
big and getting bigger part of our world and why that world is going the
current directions.



"Liberal" or "progressive" seems to fit your analysis.

"Cessna 310" wrote


"Liberal" or "progressive" seems to fit your analysis.


Two of the most abused and misused words in America
http://tinyurl.com/26dmwp

Cessna 310 wrote:
Larry L wrote:

....... That is, people are trying to buy
things to fill the empty places inside that real chats (not cell
phone stuck receiver stuck Borg-like to ear or e-mails) with other
people and with "god" have filled for most people in the past. It is
very easy to find people now that can put no deeper meaning on their
own lives than what they recently bought......

"Liberal" or "progressive" seems to fit your analysis.

Interesting reflex. Nicely illustrates the degree to which
today's conservatives, well, aren't.

- JR

On 21 Mar 2007 07:48:12 -0700, "BJ Conner"
wrote:

On Mar 20, 9:50 pm, wrote:
I'm watching "Nightline," and apparently, folks think the "government"
ought to get involved to somehow help folks who overborrowed on
too-large houses at over-inflated prices because the lenders were too
lenient in lending...AFAIAC, let the lenders go under and the yuppie
****s live in boxes eating recalled dogfood....

Doubting this will help much,
R
...and if anyone with any sense wonders about why the US "public" ought
not to be trusted with much at all, here's gonna be Ayer answer...

Along the same lines why are we bailing out those idiots who built
houses where they know sooner or later a hurricane is going to wipe
the thing out. If you build a "McMansion" on the beach in
Mississipppi don't be looking for my money.

Absolutely, except that I disagree that anyone who built on the beach
was an idiot simply because of where they built. If they planned for it
or were otherwise willing to take the risk without forcing or expecting
others to share the risk after the fact, that's fine by me. My family
has had homes in "danger zones" for generations, but they are properly
insured and part of the risk is accepted by us. I personally don't want
to live in such a home because I don't want to lose my home in such a
fashion.

Anyone who builds on the beach (or in a flood zone, be it on the beach
of MS, the Ninth Ward of NO, or anywhere in the country, or builds in an
earthquake, fire, or in any other "danger zone") and doesn't obtain and
pay for insurance or otherwise mitigate their risk, or simply assume
that risk themselves, has no standing to complain or expect a bailout,
IMO.

TC,
R

On Wed, 21 Mar 2007 15:07:09 GMT, Ken Fortenberry
wrote:

wrote:
On Wed, 21 Mar 2007 13:47:48 GMT, Ken Fortenberry
wrote:

Tom Littleton wrote:
wrote :
I'm watching "Nightline," and apparently, folks think the "government"
ought to get involved to somehow help folks who overborrowed on
too-large houses at over-inflated prices because the lenders were too
lenient in lending...AFAIAC, let the lenders go under and the yuppie
****s live in boxes eating recalled dogfood....

Doubting this will help much,
R
...and if anyone with any sense wonders about why the US "public" ought
not to be trusted with much at all, here's gonna be Ayer answer...
agree with the overall sentiment. My suspicion is that
the folks ending up getting bailed-out will be the idiots
who lent out the cash. An equally stupid remedy, IMO.
The ones who lent out the cash at usurious rates have already
cashed out. For the most part they sold those mortgages to
unsuspecting investment houses under misrepresented circumstances
and it's those investment houses who are gonna get stuck holding
the bag. As for the yuppies being kicked out of their houses to
live in Frigidaire boxes and eat Alpo, they're more the victims of
loan sharks than anything else and they're not yuppies.

Uh, OK...and just how does any company, good, bad, or otherwise, force
someone into a mortgage, "usurious" or otherwise, on an overly-large,
over-valued/mortgaged, or otherwise
inappropriate-to-the-borrower's-situation home? Mortgages on "solid"
deals for folks buying appropriately were, and still are, easy to get.
Subprimes are, were, and always have been, well, subprime, and for a
reason. And keep in mind that much of the "in the news" cases are
folks with iffy credit (which in itself should make a point), limited
payback ability, and many were taking out home equity loans to pay off
other "shopping"/"lifestyle" debt.

And yeah, I'm sure that someone knows or read about some poor couple who
had to mortgage the house to pay for junior's heart transplant or
something, but that type of situation would be a _rare_ occurrence. The
great majority of this is, simply, people attempting to live wa-a-a-a-y
beyond their means.

I don't disagree with any of that but loans were made to people with
iffy credit and then those mortgages were sold as if they were loans
to people with good credit. As I understand it this was an aggregate
deal, that is the buyers thought they were buying, just for an example,
75% good credit mortgages and 25% iffy credit mortgages but ended up
with more iffy credit mortgages than good.

And just how does two institutional traders of negotiable paper have the
slightest thing to do with the homeowners/mortgagors? If XYZ Corp.
simply accepted whatever ABC Corp. said about the paper that the face of
which indicated something contrary to what ABC was claiming, they were
negligent. And anyone with just a smattering of walking-around sense
could and can see that if a mortgage created in the last 3-4 years is
above about 6%, something is up with the borrower/mortgagor, at least
insofar as to indicate a little due diligence is in order. And if
someone is selling bundles of 8-10-12% paper, they ain't selling
low-risk/good risk paper and no institutional trader would fall for some
bull**** indicating it was anything but subprime; institutional traders
can easily get a fair (in both senses) idea of what they are buying
simply by the interest rate.

The main reason for this is just like the old oilfield bumpersticker,
"Please God, let there be another oil boom...I promise I won't **** it
all away next time..." or the "dotcom" bust: greedy "yuppies" who don't
have a clue and who think it'll all last forever...or at least until
they make their money...

And this was, and is, all somehow legal.

Why in the hell would or should it be _illegal_? You might want to do a
little research on what "liberal" really means (and no, I don't mean
"libertarian").

I don't believe an S & L type bailout is warranted, like
you say the percentage of the market involved with iffy credit mortgages
is small, but I do think it should be illegal to misrepresent what
you're selling.

TC,
R

On Wed, 21 Mar 2007 16:48:32 GMT, "Larry L"
wrote:


"Cessna 310" wrote


"Liberal" or "progressive" seems to fit your analysis.


Two of the most abused and misused words in America
http://tinyurl.com/26dmwp

I saw nothing to do with the actual definition of "liberal."

TC,
R
....who actually is a liberal...because I know what it means...

Here is is a link an interesting, albeit a bit long, video about money
as debt, and it applies to the current housing situation. It might
change the way you think about our whole monetary system.

For me, it gave proof to a theory/question I had about why we as a
society are must have growth, not sustainability. Why we are bound to
profit and not simple comfrotable provision.

http://video.google.com/videoplay?do...=money+as+debt

On Mar 21, 6:47 am, Ken Fortenberry
wrote:
Tom Littleton wrote:
wrote :
I'm watching "Nightline," and apparently, folks think the "government"
ought to get involved to somehow help folks who overborrowed on
too-large houses at over-inflated prices because the lenders were too
lenient in lending...AFAIAC, let the lenders go under and the yuppie
****s live in boxes eating recalled dogfood....

Doubting this will help much,
R
...and if anyone with any sense wonders about why the US "public" ought
not to be trusted with much at all, here's gonna be Ayer answer...

agree with the overall sentiment. My suspicion is that
the folks ending up getting bailed-out will be the idiots
who lent out the cash. An equally stupid remedy, IMO.

The ones who lent out the cash at usurious rates have already
cashed out. For the most part they sold those mortgages to
unsuspecting investment houses under misrepresented circumstances
and it's those investment houses who are gonna get stuck holding
the bag. As for the yuppies being kicked out of their houses to
live in Frigidaire boxes and eat Alpo, they're more the victims of
loan sharks than anything else and they're not yuppies.

As for what to do, I'd say nothing beyond making it harder to sell
bad mortgages disguised as good ones.

--
Ken Fortenberry- Hide quoted text -

- Show quoted text -

The ones that originated the loans factored them off as soon as they
could. The people that own those big MacMansions are Quiwait, Saudi,
China, Japan and some are in Europe ( not as many as there use to be).
When they come over to collect on the Treasury bonds they hold they
can probably move into one of the hundreds of thousands of houses they
will own.
If you have toured one on the track MacMansions you know the jokes on
them. For the most part they are cheap and built to have square
footage with quality second. I am not sure what the cost ratio is for
material/selling price in a new house is but it's gotta be low. If I
was young and wanted a house these days I think the smart thing to do
would be to take six months off and build one.

wrote


I saw nothing to do with the actual definition of "liberal."


I can't accept that you honestly believe I sat out to "define" liberal,
several years back when I wrote the piece. In case you are not
intentionally being dense G .... it was "about" how and, I believe why,
the word has come to be used in some circles almost as a curse word.
FWIW, the effectiveness of the tactic has diminished the last few years and
it's not as often now that we here people branded "liberal" as an attack and
easy way to dismiss everything they say or think ... regardless


TC,
R
...who actually is a liberal...because I know what it means...




I seldom agree with much you write here, and I'd bet you sometimes don't
either G But both halves of the sentence quoted above ring true to me.


Larry L ( who likes being called liberal by people that have some idea what
it really means, but who knows that doesn't include a great many people that
love to use the word without that benefit of knowledge .... thus my "abused
and misused" statement )

On Wed, 21 Mar 2007 11:51:07 -0600, wrote:



And just how does two institutional traders of negotiable paper have the
slightest thing to do with the homeowners/mortgagors? If XYZ Corp.
simply accepted whatever ABC Corp. said about the paper that the face of
which indicated something contrary to what ABC was claiming, they were
negligent. And anyone with just a smattering of walking-around sense
could and can see that if a mortgage created in the last 3-4 years is
above about 6%, something is up with the borrower/mortgagor, at least
insofar as to indicate a little due diligence is in order. And if
someone is selling bundles of 8-10-12% paper, they ain't selling
low-risk/good risk paper and no institutional trader would fall for some
bull**** indicating it was anything but subprime; institutional traders
can easily get a fair (in both senses) idea of what they are buying
simply by the interest rate.


Indeed. The institutions that bought such paper were not doing due
diligence or thought they could pass it off somewhere else after
getting a year or two of high interest off it and come out clean
themselves, leaving the homeowners (okay, hopeful people who thought
they could be home owners, incorrectly) and the next buyers of the
paper out to dry. They mistimed the boom and they're suffering
instead of being able to pass the suffering on. I feel little to no
sympathy.
--

r.bc: vixen
Minnow goddess, Speaker to squirrels, willow watcher.
Almost entirely harmless. Really.

http://www.visi.com/~cyli