Fed Res Claims "no wrongful foreclosures

Is anyone not ready to consider these mendacious snakes entirely-discredited? WASHINGTON, D.C. -- A months-long internal investigation into abusive mortgage practices by the Federal Reserve found no wrongful foreclosures, members of the Fed's Consumer Advisory Council said Thursday. Kirsten Keefe, a member of the Fed consumer panel and an attorney at the Empire Justice Center in Albany, New York, said the Fed's report defined "wrongful foreclosures" as repossessions of borrowers' homes who were not significantly behind on their payments. Uh huh. So let's see if I get this right - none of the following are "wrongful foreclosures": The institution that forecloses doesn't actually own the paper. They submit a robosigned or otherwise fraudulent set of documents to cover for the fact that they are not actually holders of the debt they claim to have. That is, they foreclosed but legally you don't owe them the money. The institution that forecloses caused the foreclosure through its own wrongful acts. They force-placed insurance on a house that had insurance (or an available policy which they failed to pay from escrow, thereby causing the cancellation) and that began the spiral. They placed a payment off by a couple of cents into a suspense account, refused further payments and foreclosed. They told homeowners to stop paying to qualify for a modification but never intended to actually provide one, or the owner didn't qualify. They were offering a modification but "lost" documents repeatedly and then foreclosed. Or anyone of a number of other wrongful acts - all of their hand, not the homeowners. Yeah. The problem with this alleged "study" is obvious - it has nothing to do with reality.
Freedoms Phoenix

Brits Put Whopping Tax on Bank Bonuses

British bankers are going bonkers today after the UK government announced that it wouldn't stand idly by as they showered themselves with obscene bonuses made possible by last year's massive infusion of government money.

Alistair Darling, the U.K.'s Chancellor of the Exchequer -- sort of like a Treasury Secretary, but with more pluck -- announced today that he will impose an immediate, one-time 50-percent tax on bonuses of more than 25,000 pounds (about $40,800). That's on top of regular income taxes.

The New York Times calls it "the most direct attack on bonuses anywhere in the world."

Across the pond, however -- where the Wall Street titans whose companies were saved from dissolution by an infusion of hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars are about to reward themselves with a good chunk of that money in the form of year-end bonuses -- no such action is in the offing.

Our bankers apparently have nothing to fear from their government -- despite the fact that an unlikely collection of commentators and industry insiders from the left and right has made a compelling case that American taxpayers could and should reclaim some of the industry's profits, by effectively treating them like lottery winnings and subjecting them to a windfall profits tax. - Huffington Post

Crime Without Punishment

My lady friend was a deeply religious Jewess. There was a scandal concerning a local Rabbi and his eleven-year-old daughter. My friend refused to believe the evidence or the Court verdicts.Somewhere in the human psyche lies the ability to complain about our leaders without a corresponding urge to punish them for criminal doings. It's considered bad form.The current Administration has carried this to the logical conclusion. Forgiven of preemptive war, rendition, torture and crimes against humanity, the perpetrators conduct fraudulent bailouts without any attempt at concealment. They are confident neither the public or the Democrats will do anything about the situation.

Citigroup Nears Doom