Allan Sloan and Foreclosures

Sloan has an article in today’s (10/26) Washington Post about the BIG trouble with the foreclosure crisis. But before he tells us the biggest threat, he tells us what it’s not: communists, community activists or left-wing academics. By saying they’re not the BIGGEST threat, this gasbag makes it clear that in his mind they are a threat.

In other words, when big business creates horrendous problems for nearly ever person in the country, the threat is from commies and liberals. It’s a great head fake. Remember, though, the problems we are dealing with were created by a decades long near total lack of systemic oversight. Let me be even clearer: holding people accountable for their mistakes and making changes to prevent them from recurring DOES NOT make you a commie or a liberal, much as one of the high priests of the business press would want you to think.

Anyway, Sloan goes on to say that the real disaster in this mess is that people will become even more cynical about big business once big government bails out the big banks. If a normal person makes a mistake when dealing with a bank, he has to pay up. When a big bank fucks up, it goes to the government and gets off the hook, and still gets to put the screws to you.

He’s right, of course, that this is exactly what’s going to happen. He’s also right that the banks will go to the Obama administration and/or Congress and get off. (More on that later.) And he’s also right that if any normal person doesn’t sign his closing documents right, he gets the shaft.

The two major problems with this nonsense article are:

1. Big banks are going to let themselves off the hook. The government is going to do nothing, and in so doing, the government is going to let them off the hook. The commie, liberal Obama administration is going to actively facilitate the ass rape of the common mortgage holder.

2. If what he describes really is a problem, and it is, then what do we do about it? In Hungary recently when a massive pollution spill wreaked havoc on the Danube and surrounding areas, the CEO of the company did time. Yes, TIME. As Sloan correctly states, the CEOs of big banks are going to do a show trial before a Congress they’ve bought and paid for and get off scott-free.

So Allan, how about jail time for these people? And not just the robo-signers. How about Jamie Dimon and Ken Burns doing some time? They’re not violent, so a low security facility would be fine.

My guess: Allan thinks that’s going too far.

How about regulating banks so this can’t happen again?

My guess: Allan thinks that’s going too far.

What you need to remember is simple: To call for tight regulation of lending is not a commie plot, it’s a good idea.