Letters to the Editor
Tyler_Mason
Published Letters: 488 Editor's Choice: 41
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incentives
[Read the article: Closing the mortgage barn door]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Well, the article did hit the nail on the head. The incentives were just too tempting. Sell a bunch of crap debt and collect a commission. Buy that same crap debt, collect a commission. OK, lets call 'em "transaction costs".
Sad to say, the solution is lawsuits. Not by the borrowers or the lenders, but by investors who were duped by the fund managers. If the various mutual funds/hedge funds/money market packagers have a duty of diligence, then they can be sued for negligence. So, the companies get hit with settlements.
"So what?" says the retired hedge fund manager reclining in a therapeutic warm caviar bath. It's interesting that a company can be bankrupted by the malfeasance of individuals while those very individuals stand on sidelines debating which super yacht is best.
The point where things get fixed is when the funds turn around and sue the people that caused the mess.
It's a pretty long trail. The investors have to have been actually duped. The fund has to lose a lawsuit and get hit with a juicy settlement. The settlement might motivate the fund to evict the guilty and to sue them for the breach of some kind of duty or for negligence.
It probably won't work. Any break and the scum slips out of the bag.
Criminal charges are more likely to punish the soldiers while the generals simply change uniforms.
Damn. The incentives are huge and there's almost no down side. Enabling this sort of crap is a near perfect investment. Obscene gains with little to no risk.
we're hosed.
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@neilpaul
[Read the article: Closing the mortgage barn door]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Very good point.
I used to keep a picture in my files for showing to folks (usually myself) feeling that life is tough and unfair. The picture was of an African mother holding her 3-4 year old child. She had just walked 30 miles in 2 days carrying her sick child to a doctor. The child died in her arms somewhere along the way.
It put things in perspective.
I guess I should create a new "pity file". Some of those gitmo pictures will do nicely.
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"wouldn't hold up under the constitution"?
[Read the article: Congress hobbled on gag rule]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Only if those funds are an entitlement.
Otherwise, hate to say it, but screaming "unconstitutional" is misinformed. A LAW restricting speech is usually unconstitutional. An agreement to do or not do certain things in order to get government funding is different. The federal government uses its purse strings to recruit the states into all sorts of stuff. Money for law enforcement is often tied to doing the bidding of DHS. Federal highway funds have been leveraged into all sorts of agreements.
The government gets into trouble when the money is for doing something illegal, like spying, or is used to do something that is actually unconstitutional like supporting a church.
The US funds all sorts of things in other countries and attaches all sorts of strings. That is why Hugo Chavez is viewed as a threat. He doesn't like the strings so he refuses the money.
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Wally's true colors
[Read the article: Bill Richardson on the attack]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Wally is just showing what he really is. A courtier to the power elites among establishment democrats. Richardson isn't properly beholden to those elites and must therefor be denigrated.
Meanwhile, Richardson, a mountain states democrat, could win the big one if wally and the other sycophants gave him a modicum of the support they lavish on damn-near-unelectable hilary.
I'm not sure what Joan expects to gain from keeping wally around. Time will tell.
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@stevkar
[Read the article: Bill Richardson on the attack]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Tom Udall is very likely to get Pete's senate seat. Wilson is viewed as carrying too much bush taint. She talks independent, then falls into line. Pierce is even more tainted than wilson. He sticks to the white house talking points and never strays from the party line.
Hopefully, the loathsome martin chavez can be blocked from moving into Udall's congressional seat.
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confused
[Read the article: The K Chronicles]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Best meal was all critter. The thanksgiving strip was about eating tofu whilst saving a turkey. I'm confused.
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cheap shot
[Read the article: The Bhutto test]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]So, according to Joan, the reality is that the US should continue to support Musharraf in the hope that Islamabad suddenly breaks out in democracy. Otherwise, why is Richardson's position "divorced from reality"? He's the guy with more foreign policy experience, and success, than any other candidate. By pettily dismissing his opinion, Joan frames herself as chasing an agenda or, much worse, being a herd animal.
As for Bhutto, yes, sad she was assassinated. I guess we're all supposed to go through a period of public remorse. Do a little research before lamenting too much. Look at what she did, not at what other people hoped she would do in the future. Pakistan deserves better than Musharraf and better than Bhutto.
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same words, different message
[Read the article: The Bhutto test]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Another case of different people getting different messages from the exact same statement.
I interpreted Richardson as saying that the US shouldn't give any more support to Musharraff while he actively impedes the democratic forces that are already at work in Pakistan. The measure would be that those democratic forces start gaining power.
As it stands, Musharraf rigs elections, jiggers the constitution, and subjugates the courts. He really should be cut off until people who have not sworn fealty to him get into positions of power. It is pretty easy to forget that Pakistan has a democratic veneer over a feudal system. At least Musharraf does what other feudal lords have done - thrown elbows at the theocrats (who Bhutto helped put in charge of Afghanistan).
Bhutto's return to Pakistan reminded me more of the Orange revolution than a push toward democracy. Regardless, a ruling plurality that doesn't kill one another is a step toward democracy and something Pakistan currently lacks.