Blame and real pain

Blame and real pain (Full Version)

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Lucylastic -> Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 6:19:02 AM)
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,433683,00.html Found this story this morning while surfing the news. How come people are so quick to put the blame on the poor and people who just wanted a home they could call their own and ignore what people are doing behind the investment doors. Are there numbers available as to how many people have had their homes foreclosed because they shouldnt have been "allowed to own"?? compared to how many are because of job lossses etc? Im interested because I dont know, but one thing has my blood boiling about the article:- "And he said a compensation system that he estimated paid him about $350 million between 2000 and 2007 even as the company headed for disaster was appropriate. "We had a compensation committee that spent a tremendous amount of time making sure that the interests of the executives and the employees were aligned with shareholders," Fuld said. That wasn't good enough for some lawmakers who decried what they called a culture of entitlement at Lehman even as the company's performance nosedived. The panel unearthed internal documents showing that on Sept. 11, Lehman planned to approve "special payments" worth $18.2 million for two executives who were terminated involuntarily, and another $5 million for one who was leaving on his own." How is this appropriate?? Will heads roll? Lucy

kittinSol -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 6:21:59 AM)
I'm with you. I've been getting increasingly fed up with the tendency to blame tiny mortage borrowers who went in over their heads: after all, they were only trying to make a quick and easy buck, which is precisely what they were told was the good and patriotic capitalistic way. "Make money out of nothing, and you shall be holly."

NorthernGent -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 6:24:10 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Lucylastic How come people are so quick to put the blame on the poor and people who just wanted a home they could call their own and ignore what people are doing behind the investment doors. 'Cause we tend to herd behind ideas, and the media ensure the idea of the day provides for their own.

Lucylastic -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 6:26:50 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: kittinSol you shall be holly." complete hijack here Kitten but is that a prick with small berries? Lucy

kittinSol -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 6:28:57 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Lucylastic quote: ORIGINAL: kittinSol you shall be holly." complete hijack here Kitten but is that a prick with small berries? Lucy Mouahahahaha [8D] .

bipolarber -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 6:35:18 AM)
I seem to reacall a rather famous bit of dialouge from "Henry V", the campfire scene where the soldiers are talking about theri responsibility and those of the King (and by extension, the rest of the upper classes) They rightly say that they have done what was expected of them, and that the real blame or credit for their actions rest with their leaders. Bush & Co thought it would be nice to offer homes to people who couldn't afford it. What they didn't realize was, that meant those people needed jobs to pay for them. But, instead, they just hid the real unemployment figures from sight, not counting all the people who had been unemployed for so long that they no longer qualified for help. What that ammounted to, was a fuse on the powderkeg. Combine this with the "voodoo economic" ideology of the Reagan era, where wealth was supposed to "trickle down" to the lower classes, but didn't, because there was no incentive for it to do so, and the fuse began to burn faster. Eventually, the number of forclosures hit critical mass, and we ended up in the situation we're in today. Thanks, republicans! 25 years of fucked up, "pie in the sky" economic policies of "the way things ought to be" (but aren't reflective of reality) and you've brought the world to it's economic knees.

pahunkboy -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 7:11:30 AM)
LMAO- bushes "cousin" is on the Leaman board of directors. too coincidental!

Aileen1968 -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 7:23:12 AM)
When does it become a matter of personal responsibility? I get all kinds of credit card offers in the mail and second mortgage offers, etc. etc. etc. Common sense says...if I use them then I have to eventually pay for them. So I don't. Live within your means. If you don't like your means then change it. Every single thing I have in my life has been worked for, saved for. These were grown adults that had every opportunity to read the contracts they signed. If they didn't understand what they were signing, then they shouldn't have put their signatures down. Simple as that. But we are a society that feels as if we must coddle those who can't seem to use common sense. We enable and make excuses for them. It would be nice if every one could own their own little home...but that's not realistic. There has always been greed. There always will be. Those who took those mortgages were just as greedy and irresponsible as those who gave them. They are equally as guilty for this mess. It's now us, those who pay our bills on time, who have to pick up the pieces.

kittinSol -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 7:25:07 AM)
Greed is good.

NorthernGent -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 7:39:38 AM)
'Hard to argue with any of that.

mc1234 -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 7:51:13 AM)
You're absolutely right, Aileen. The greed for the best, the hottest, the latest makes me nuts! Instant gratification comes with a price tag, and we're seeing it now, I think.

Lucylastic -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 8:03:00 AM)
Personal responsibility is one thing...what about the guys personal responsibility for this "And he said a compensation system that he estimated paid him about $350 million between 2000 and 2007 even as the company headed for disaster was appropriate." what is his responsibility, thats fifty million a year, yet he will just lose his job....will he suffer the consequences the same way a family who ends up homeless will, just for wanting a home they could call their own? Some dream. Lucy

DarkSteven -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 8:22:34 AM)
Hey, Lucy, will this make you feel better? gawker.com/5059737/lehman-bros-ceo-totally-got-knocked-out

mc1234 -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 8:27:13 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Lucylastic Personal responsibility is one thing...what about the guys personal responsibility for this "And he said a compensation system that he estimated paid him about $350 million between 2000 and 2007 even as the company headed for disaster was appropriate." what is his responsibility, thats fifty million a year, yet he will just lose his job....will he suffer the consequences the same way a family who ends up homeless will, just for wanting a home they could call their own? Some dream. Lucy I agree with you, Lucy - he should pay as well. If he broke laws, he should lose everything. His wrongdoing, though, doesn't make everyone else's choices right. Edited to add: I certainly don't agree with CEO's making that sort of money - it's unfathomable to me.

Lucylastic -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 8:38:52 AM)
LOL I may be a sadistic bitch, I dont condone violence mostly but for him, my heart pumps purple piss. Lucy

hoodie -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 11:28:54 AM)
quote: ORIGINAL: Lucylastic Personal responsibility is one thing...what about the guys personal responsibility for this "And he said a compensation system that he estimated paid him about $350 million between 2000 and 2007 even as the company headed for disaster was appropriate." what is his responsibility, thats fifty million a year, yet he will just lose his job....will he suffer the consequences the same way a family who ends up homeless will, just for wanting a home they could call their own? Some dream. Lucy He has plenty of responsibility, Lucy. He's been castigated on SEVERAL levels for that, and by several people (even on the Fox News Channel this morning) who've said, "look how is your compensation fair, when you're applying for bankruptcy?" The banking lobby is powerful in this country, there's no doubt about it. But who's going to break it? The very people in Congress who's campaign's have benefitted from it over the years? That's the biggest part of the problem right there. Wall Street's inefficiencies are just the tip of the ice berg. Follow the money trail, and it leads right back to Washington.

UncleNasty -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 11:30:58 AM)
The homeowner who over extends his or herself makes a poor choice only once. The lending institutions have made the same poor decision literally millions of times. Brokers have a term for sub-prime type loans that developed in '00 or '01. They call them neutron loans - they wipe out the people but leave the buildings standing. Those familiar with all the layers of fraud involved consider the homeowner to be the least culpable in this debacle. The clearest path to understanding who the most responsible parties are is to simply look at who profits and who looses. Follow the money. Uncle Nasty

bipolarber -> RE: Blame and real pain (10/7/2008 1:42:54 PM)
UN, The thing is, a great many home buyers are advised to get as much house as they can afford. That way, along with inflation and (assumed) increase in income over the years, they are able to afford the payments better as time wears on. Example: if you were just starting out, and buying your first home, you buy a place that takes up about 35% of your income, to make the payments. In a decade, you've supposedly moved up a bit, got more experience, and are making more money. But your home payments remain the same, and (with luck) your home's value has gone up in the market. (Maybe some gay men moved into your neighborhood and rebuilt a lot of the houses there.) Anyway, now you've increased in your pay grade, and your home payments aren't as much of a squeeze. Where this goes wrong is when the economy is in a slump. You job gets frozen, and the ARM (which you used to get into a home, with the intent to refinance once the bubble equity made it worthwhile) has balloon payments which start to kick in. At that point, you're watching your payments spiral up out of reach, while your salary continues to stay the same, or disappear entirely thanks to the layoffs. And since Bush LIED about the unemployment figures, many weren't able to see this coming clearly. Everything was just fine, said Bush... Our fundamentals are strong, said McCain... (talk about drinking the Kool-Aide!) And then the house of cards began to collapse. But, they were making money... so what the hell... they just kept selling the homes to people whom they KNEW would be getting into trouble down the road.

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