Pay attention, liberals:

In the general course of human nature, A power over a man’s subsistence amounts to a power over his will. – Alexander Hamilton

Yikes:

There is a lot of disinformation about health insurance reform out there, spanning from control of personal finances to end of life care. These rumors often travel just below the surface via chain emails or through casual conversation. Since we can’t keep track of all of them here at the White House, we’re asking for your help. If you get an email or see something on the web about health insurance reform that seems fishy, send it to flag@whitehouse.gov.

So, if you see anything anti-Obama out there, be sure to report it to the Cheka….errmmm…I mean to the White House…

Strange days, indeed:

Father regrets encouraging son, 7, to drive family SUV

Next headline:

Son Regrets Dad, Idiot, Asked Him to Drive

Again and again and again we see this:

Dr. Thio Li-ann, professor at the National University of Singapore, was invited to teach at New York University Law School this fall. After it was discovered that the Christian professor, while serving as a Singaporean lawmaker in 2007, opposed a repeal of the law proscribing homosexual acts, NYU students and alumni organized to protest her appointment. She subsequently withdrew her interest in teaching at NYU.

She dared to be different – and in the mindless, rigid world of American higher education, this is not to be tolerated.

And about time this political bully was hit back:

Following reports that White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel has been orchestrating an effort to intimidate members of Congress and Governors who raise legitimate concerns regarding the effectiveness of the stimulus, House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform Ranking Member Darrell Issa (R-CA) sent a letter to Emanuel saying “While this type of scare tactic may work In Chicago, it will not work to intimidate me or other Members of the United States Congress.”

“I and others have dared to bring these facts to the attention of President Obama, the Congress and the American people,” Issa wrote. “You’ve unfortunately reacted by once again resorting to the playbook of the Chicago political machine.”

A coordinated series of letters threatening a loss of federal funding was sent out in a clear attempt to pressure people like Issa in to keeping quiet about the failures of Obamunism. Emanuel is engaging in classic machine politics – using his power to coerce others in to going along with his scheme. This is what we get when we bring Chicago politics in to DC – it was already plenty corrupt and then we put the masters of corruption in charge.

Nothing doing, “Rahmbo”. We won’t be silenced.

The news story:

The government’s $50 billion program to ease the mortgage crisis is helping only a tiny fraction of struggling homeowners, and a list released Tuesday showed which lenders are laggards.

As of July, only 9 percent of eligible borrowers had seen their mortgage payments reduced with modified loans. And the first monthly progress report showed that 10 lenders had not changed a single mortgage.

The report indicated that lenders such as Bank of America Corp. and Wells Fargo and Co. have lagged behind government expectations. Both banks received billions in federal bailout money.

BofA modified just 4 percent of eligible loans, and Wells Fargo 6 percent. Wachovia Corp., which was taken over by Wells Fargo in December, modified only 2 percent.

“We think they could have ramped up better, faster, more consistently and done a better job serving borrowers and bringing stabilization to the broader mortgage markets and economy,” said Michael Barr, the Treasury Department’s assistant secretary for financial institutions. “We expect them to do more.”

This is a complex issue and its not entirely the banks fault. Its mostly their fault, but not entirely.

First off, you have to keep in mind that “servicing bank” and “holder of the note” are only rarely the same entity, especially in the larger banks. “Un-Named Bank A” services my loan, but my note is held by Freddie Mac – having been sold to them by Centex Mortgage, my loan originator. I can talk to “Un-Named Bank A” until I’m blue in the face (and I am talking to them, and I’m nearly blue), but when push comes to shove, “Un-Named Bank A” can only do what the note holder allows – and therein lies the problem.

We have three parties, for most mortgages, and they are all working at cross purposes:

1. Servicing bank just wants to keep making money servicing the loans and I suspect that they get paid at least partially on the amount of loan they’re servicing. I might be wrong on this, but the deliberate obtuseness of Loss Mitigation departments at these servicing banks indicates either massive stupidity or a desire to spin things out and hope that little or nothing will eventually have to be done.

2. Borrower wants to “cram down” the mortgage amount to be in line with current market value. If you owe $400,000 on a house worth $200,000 there is no sense at all – financial, for certain; in morality, it is a bit complex and I’m not qualified to render a final judgment on such things – in shoveling money in to it…even if the mortgage is stretched out to 40 years and the interest rate dropped very low, the fact of the matter remains that you are paying for a house which will never be worth what you paid for it (at least, not in any reasonable time frame – the most optimistic people actually involved are figuring 10-20 years for a price recovery…the more negative are figuring that we’ll never get back to that bubble level in real terms).

3. The note holders seem to be viewing a “short sale” as preferable to “cram down” – in other words, they’d rather have the $400,000 house go on a short sale for $150,000 than re-do the mortgage to $200,000. A 150k bird in the hand seeming to be more desirable than a 200k bird in the bush. A “short sale” also helps the note holder in that, unlike in a foreclosure, they don’t have title and therefor responsibility for the house. This relieves the note holder from all sorts of hassles and liabilities.

In my view, “cram down” is the only logical, moral and financially responsible thing to do – and don’t think that its all the banks losing on such a deal. As a matter of fact, the only people currently losing on the deal are the borrowers…time for the banks to take a bite of the poop sandwich. These borrowers have paid many tens of thousands of dollars since loan origination and that money is gone. They’ve lost that money – now its time for the banks to lose some, too. Now, why doesn’t this happen?

The managers of the banks – service and note-holder – are afraid. Scared spitless at losing job, wealth, position, prestige…for the people who run these financial institutions the raw, stark thought of not having what they have now has made them simply afraid to make a decision…because if you make a decision, you might make the wrong one, and that could cost you. They are standing about, Micawber-like, hoping that something turns up to get them off the hook – to make it so that they don’t have to make a decision. They look to China’s booming stock market, Obama’s spendulus, book keeping which allows them to ignore “one time” losses…something, anything which puts off that terrible day when “yes” or “no” will have to be uttered.

Its going to be interesting to watch – especially as the second wave of foreclosures hits (which won’t show up as foreclosures, per se, but as a vast increase in non-performing loans), commercial lending collapses and China’s stock bubble goes down in flames. A bit scary, too, as it will probably cost me my job – which is bad in the sense of not having income, good in the sense that I will have my very reasonable excuse for disengaging with this aspect of our economy.

A bit of good news for the day:

Former President Bill Clinton has left North Korea with his party, state media reported, after he negotiated for the release of two jailed American journalists.

The official Korean Central News Agency said in a brief dispatch that Clinton and others left early Wednesday by plane. The report did not specify whether the two American journalists pardoned by North Korean leader Kim Jong Il were among those who left Pyongyang on the flight.

Kim issued the “special pardon” for the reporters after Clinton made a surprise visit to the communist nation to negotiate their release Tuesday morning. The release of Laura Ling and Euna Lee was a sign of North Korea’s “humanitarian and peaceloving policy,” the Korean Central News Agency reported.

I doubt it was much of a surprise to the NK government – you don’t just drop in on them unexpectedly. Clearly there is some quid pro quo here, but if the payoff for NK releasing the Americans is a mere visit by Bill Clinton, then its a good job. If there’s something else involved, then it might not be such a good thing – in the larger sense; in the specific of getting these two Americans freed, its all good.

But do note how the MSM reports it:

Consumers opened their wallets and pocketbooks a bit more in June, increasing their spending for the second straight month while saving a bit less, even as incomes fell sharply.

Consumer spending is closely watched because it accounts for about 70 percent of total economic activity. Many economists warned that despite the slight increase in June, falling wages and rising unemployment likely will keep spending sluggish for the rest of this year.

Sounds good, huh? I mean, goodness – here’s a “green shoot” and Obamunism will work! Hurrah! But, hold on a moment: Incomes fell. How, then, did consumer spending rise? I mean, if your income is going down, are you heading to the mall? I know that is key to Obamunism – but does anyone rational (ie, non-liberal) do that sort of thing? Of course not. So, what happened?

Prices rose. For instance, in gasoline – keeping in mind that the rise in consumer spending happened in June:

Those slowly swelling pump prices aren’t done yet, energy analysts said, as crude oil futures jumped back above $70 a barrel today to close near their trading high for the year.

Retail gasoline prices had been on a gradual descent since reaching their 2009 highs on June 22, averaging $3.005 in California and $2.691 nationally for a gallon of regular unleaded.

But they are on the rise again, jumping 6.7 cents to $2.896 a gallon in California over the last week, according to the Energy Department’s weekly survey of filling stations, released today.(emphasis added)

So, gasoline surged to its 2009 high in June and, there ya go!, consumer spending spiked in June. I wonder why? Can any liberal out there tell me? Now, think about this liberals. Here you’ve got people and they’ve got some money. They are making less money than they used to. They are cutting expenses down to the essentials. Gasoline is an essential. The price went up (and, please note, is heading back up after a short period of declining prices). And this means….come on, you can figure it out…this means….that people were just buying the same necessities but they cost more. There was no increase in consumer spending…just an increase in citizen pain.

Now, as to why prices are up in a down economy and a continuing glut of oil on the market – the banks (you know, that we bailed out so they would loan us money to get things moving again) seem to be investing in things dealing with commodities. In a crashed economy with the dollar under pressure and everyone printing fiat money like mad, the money people are moving their cash in to hard assets. Things which will keep their value if there is a large spurt of inflation.

Start thinking, liberals. All of this will come together for you eventually.

Grow a blasted spine, will ya?

Reporter: “But does the administration recognize Ahmadinejad as the legitimate President of Iran?”

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs: “He is the elected leader.”

Look, Gibbs old buddy, when you have an election with that many irregularities and near revolutionary ferment in the streets over the result you don’t legitimize the mullah’s chosen man. Its ok to say something like, “Ahmadinejad will be in office in Iran and we will have to deal with him” but not ok to tell the Iranian protesters that we think their oppressor is legitimately in charge of their country.

For Pete’s sake, will you dimwits in the Obama Administration at least try to think before you speak?

This is getting rather annoying, don’t you think?

The Obama administration is refusing to quickly release government records on its “cash-for-clunkers” rebate program that would substantiate — or undercut — White House claims of the program’s success, even as the president presses the Senate for a quick vote for $2 billion to boost car sales.

The Transportation Department said it will provide the data as soon as possible but did not specify a time frame or promise release of the data before the Senate votes whether to spend $2 billion more on the program.

Which means an almost certainty that the data undercut Obama’s position – if it were otherwise, he’d release the data.

When will you liberals wake up to the fact that you’re backing a very dishonest and cowardly Administration?