We plan to release the final film by the end of this calendar year. This is an election year. We can’t afford to wait. Please help me change how this country views the tragedy that is the... (Continue reading)
I didn’t want to do this. I was perfectly content ignoring his idiotic drivel as I’ve been doing pretty successfully for over a year. Or, maybe it’s because he hasn’t said anything in over a year, I’m not... (Continue reading)
I’ll say one thing for Secretary Geithner: He’s great at distraction. He goes, “Lookie over here.” Then he points his finger towards China… and a pigeon flies out of his ass. You really have to watch this... (Continue reading)
You have to understand that while I’m happy to see any and all deceptive sales practices targeting homeowners stopped, I take no pleasure in seeing Philip Kramer prevented from suing Bank of America or any of the other banksters, all... (Continue reading)
While in Phoenix filming a documentary on the foreclosure crisis, I got a call from NBC Channel 12 reporter Melissa Blasius who said she had heard I was in town and wanted to feature what I was doing in one... (Continue reading)
Mark Zandi is not only misleading the American public, but he’s also misleading the American government, because he appears to have become the favorite economist of the Federal Reserve, the Treasury Department and the Senate and House Budget and Finance... (Continue reading)
And call me crazy, but I found the news oddly reassuring… you know… like a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and an ice cold glass of milk. ... (Continue reading)
Guess what… the federal government has ordered 16 of the largest mortgage servicers to reimburse homeowners who they foreclosed on IMPROPERLY. Well, isn’t that nice? What a lovely surprise. ... (Continue reading)
The fact is that the path we’re on can only end badly, and although I quite proud of how this nation has managed to hold it together until this point at least, as the man said, it’s all downhill from... (Continue reading)
Boy, that sure is a relief, wouldn’t you say? Because, see… I had been under the impression that he had actually been trying to do something big and important and was putting his best foot forward, as it were.... (Continue reading)
And the best part of the whole thing is that even if you’re weren’t a DOER this time around… even if until now you’ve just been a “reader,” it doesn’t matter… ANYONE CAN BECOME A DOER AT ANY MOMENT. ... (Continue reading)
And I’ll never be able to prove this, but I’m al most positive that I could have bankrupted Fannie Mae for a lot less than $1.5 trillion, and I don’t know anything about the mortgage business. In fact, I... (Continue reading)
I asked a friend of mine who is a fairly senior executive at a major bank, although not one of those mentioned here, and he said that he can’t imagine the banks losing them. He explains that the truck... (Continue reading)
What the heck is going on around here? We’re now passing around a story about a stupid PR stunt by a lawyer that ended up making Bank of America look REASONABLE? Oh my God, people… listen to me... (Continue reading)
The bankers... yes, the very same bankers who leveraged up on garbage CDOs as if housing prices would never ever go anywhere but up are now supposedly shocked and dismayed that mortgage lending volumes don't seem to be "coming back,"... (Continue reading)
So, there you have it... a veritable cornucopia of bad news... and all of it from CNBC, a cable news channel that normally broadcasts nothing but bull... markets. Bull markets... that's what I meant. But, it's getting impossible... (Continue reading)
So... in “Pillage,” Nomi Prins explains in terms anyone can understand that factoring in the leverage at 11:1, we're looking at a $140 TRILLION economic problem... yes, you read that correctly... that's trillion, with a 'T'... (Continue reading)
Okay, so Mr. Marques is nothing if not persistent, apparently, and God bless him for that, because this time out… his third time at bat… he hits one out of the park! ... (Continue reading)
In 2014, it will be seven years since the meltdown began in the summer of 2007, and something in the neighborhood of 15 million homes will have been lost to foreclosure. And there’s no reason to believe that foreclosures... (Continue reading)
Well, perhaps it’s because Sheila is now a short-timer and will be retiring from her post at the FDIC this July, that she is now feeling a little more comfortable telling the truth, even if that means disagreeing with Walsh... (Continue reading)
Okay, that’s it… I’m convinced… Ben has never actually been to a “troubled community.” Would someone in Washington D.C please take him on a tour of pretty much anywhere Southeast will do… Minnesota Avenue, Lincoln Heights, I’m sure Anacostia... (Continue reading)
They've finally realized it... do you think? They thought other things would have happened by now as a result of pumping trillions into banks and the economy overall... and they haven't. And housing is in a free fall,... (Continue reading)
The overriding theme was that this country missed the opportunity “to rein in (our) largest financial institutions,” and they are now driving our national bus. Even in light of what’s transpired over the last few years, we’ve allowed them... (Continue reading)
Now, we are watching as the media attempts to garner viewership by covering the background of the assassin, and although no one knows the answer to why this happened, hypothesizing as to what could have motivated him to commit the... (Continue reading)
Housing prices may someday be high again, like the way they were a few years ago, but that's a subject for the next generation, or even the one after that. It's not something for me, at 49 years old...... (Continue reading)
And not only are we splitting off in more directions than the London subway, but I’m afraid too many of us have started to like it that way. It’s become a badge of honor for some people. ... (Continue reading)
There is no “market,” right? We really don’t know how low prices have already gone down to, because if the foreclosures were on the market or if banks were actually kicking all the people out that haven’t made payments... (Continue reading)
Oh joy! Foreclosures should be peaking next year! Well there’s something to look forward to, wouldn’t you say? Why will they be peaking next year, you may wonder? Well, I’m forecasting they based on the current... (Continue reading)
I realize that Obama was ready to allow the tax cuts to expire now, but he’s also okay with allowing another 4-5 million homes be lost to foreclosure next year, and the same number the year after that. And... (Continue reading)
The Beige Book, as it’s commonly known, is a report published eight times each year. Each of the 12 Federal Reserve Banks, which are located throughout the country, “gathers anecdotal information on current economic conditions in its District through reports... (Continue reading)
I want to go on record as saying that Bernanke’s QE2 has no chance of working, in the sense that it will do nothing positive in the long run, and won’t even do much in the short run to help... (Continue reading)
It’s worth considering, for example, that in the extreme crisis of the last two years, we might have dutifully followed a president if he would have just read us a bedtime story about a rabbit and a mule a couple... (Continue reading)
Join me now for the stories of three such Americans. May their stories remind you of the power we all posses to serve our country and help it grow and prosper, so that our government of the people, by... (Continue reading)
How many homes could we have saved with $111 MILLION, Wendy? How many people could we have fed… or trained to be able to get a new job one day? We’re talking about $111 MILLION, damn it. ... (Continue reading)
Adjusted down to a rate of 267,000 annual sales was the worst month on record. That "rate," and I do love the way they report monthly numbers as an "annual sales RATE," means that 22,250 new homes were... (Continue reading)
Because, believe it or not, not everyone agrees with our Treasury Secretary, or our President for that matter, when they say that our economy is “on track”. In fact, many think that quite the opposite is the case, and... (Continue reading)
This month in Mandelman's Monthly Museletter: 1. Oregon Woman Accuses Vice President Al Gore of Sexual Misconduct in 2006. 2. Fear Deflation, Pray for Inflation. 3. The latest from Nobel Prize Winning Economist, Paul Krugman. 4. HAMP's UP Program... (Continue reading)
Plus, if I was at all unsure of my position on this program, the clincher was finding out that the cost of both programs is being covered by a tax on large banks and hedge funds contained in the bill.... (Continue reading)
People… we have to stop the foreclosures. They breed more foreclosures. They reduce spending and lower tax receipts. They cause increased unemployment. They cause more bonds to default. They make our banks insolvent. They... (Continue reading)
I’m also fearful that we’ve become a nation of people that doesn’t believe in our democracy anymore. A nation of people who will wait for things to happen to them, rather than trying to change what happens to them.... (Continue reading)
What happened? As the decline in housing prices began to accelerate across the country, this exposed underlying cracks in the financial system. Foreclosures began to rise, loan losses mounted, and housing prices dropped even more, creating a downward spiral not... (Continue reading)
Like the flying monkeys from the Wizard of Oz, they’ve been summoned by the bankers to our nation’s capital; flying in from around the country until they hit the steps of the U.S. Capital building… when they’re transformed into lobbyists... (Continue reading)
1. Wells Fargo - Out of frying pan into fire. 2. Nicholas Cage Looses Home to Foreclosure and No One Bids at Auction. 3.Arizona Homeowners at Meeting on Stopping the Foreclosure. 5. Two Women Sentenced for Scamming... (Continue reading)
They did it again, damn it. The Harvard contingent that’s packed in like sardines in this administration once again demonstrated that they have no idea what they’re doing when it comes to the foreclosure crisis.... (Continue reading)
Okay class... if you've been keeping up with your reading assignments, then the following should be no problem for you to keep up with... but it also may cause motion sickness.... (Continue reading)
Sub-prime borrowers hate moving… especially their refrigerators. They can't afford fancy moving companies who come pack everything up and unpack it at the next homestead. They call friends like me who are stupid enough to always own a truck. The... (Continue reading)
Tweet It has occurred to me over the last several weeks, that there are many people that simply want… and perhaps need… the news to be good, regardless of what the news actually is. When the news is not good,... (Continue reading)
Here we have a senior official who declined to speak on the record because: “the extent of the disclosures were still being debated?” Were they now? By the Obama administration? Now that’s transparency. Change I can Goddamn... (Continue reading)