It is extremely unfortunate that America has reached the point where the lives of millions are disrupted and they are displaced because the elected official’s rhetoric does not fit their agenda. The truth is that the bailout would have worked if the money would have gone directly to the mortgage of the home. The home owners would have either invested the money on other property or investments and contribute to the economy. Unfortunately the money went directly to bail out banks that were deemed “too big to fail” and the banks promised to lend or modify these loans just to turn around and make the bail out into a profit hence Black Rock. Now when home owners go to modify the loans they file endless amounts of paper work simply to receive a letter explaining why they do not qualify for restructuring. I hate to sound like such an extremist but until the people don’t begin to organize and mobilize against this corporate abuse I fear that the situation will simply get worst.

The changes proposed in the article would do some good but the Obama administration is not interested in doing good.

The suggestions would do nothing to increase the profits of the finanacial sector and Wall Street doesn't give a damn about people losing their homes. Obama does whatever Wall Street wants.

Nice ideas but they're DOA for our corrupt leadership.

q

Obama showed his hand by refusing to support the cram-down legislation which would've allowed bankruptcy judges to modify mortgages.

This was THE solution to the problem and Obama was silent because his overlords, the bankers, told him to keep his mouth shut.

The foreclosure crisis is a result of a criminal conspiracy starting from community banks and extending to Wall Street, making your "rent" proposal, Mr. Baker, weakly flavored vanilla tea.

Instead, why not demand that bankers go to jail for illegally steering millions of mostly neophyte minority borrowers into sub-prime death traps? Additionally, why not support giving their trillions of dollars in ill-gotten gains back to the victims?

Every damn decent American would stand up, applaud and carry on their shoulders the politician who could make that happen!

If you can't pay your mortgage because you don't have a job, how can you pay rent? Plus, lots of people have mortgages that are less than the going rate for monthly rent. And how would people feel about a house that used to be theirs but now belongs to the bank that screwed them out of their homeownership?

Bailout monies should have gone into some type of trust fund to be paid out to the banks that created the mess in the first place to keep "owners" in their houses. It is a bad situation all around, but to punish those that accepted the bad mortgages being pushed by the banks is outrageous. Why should bankers get away with the financial downfall of the country and pick up all the chips from the craps table beside?

It would have been better to keep people in their homes to pay down what ever they could on the mortgages, while at the same time paying property taxes, keeping up the houses and neighborhoods. Yes Congress, throw people out on the street, support the decline of cities, and have even more people lose their jobs. That's the right idea.

Terran

You cannot pass a law across the board to solve some problems.

What the government could do was require the firms that got bail out money to make modifications to the mortgages, just keep them the same if they are resetting, that would be fair.

Lets also not deny the truth that everyone losing their homes was due to unfair or "shark" mortgages, some couldn't afford them when they were made.

elainem has the best point, you cannot afford to pay rent if you don'y have a job. Thats where the fault of this government shines. Instead of truing to correct our economic problems, to restart the economy, to provide the basis for new jobs they went off on their own selfish agenda.

Another point, why couldn't there be interest only payments, like unemployment benefits for the foreclosures that wouldn't have happened without the predatory lending....say 6 months worth to give people some time to help themselves out. Sell, refinance, find another job....something rather than just putting them out first chance where everyone loses.

Cygnus-X1-isaHole is right.

"The main argument that has been raised against a right-to-rent law is that it would interfere with the sanctity of contracts by changing the terms of enforcement after the fact."

Sanctity of contracts? WTF is that?

Goldman Sachs (and others) was a securities firm before the government allowed it to convert to a bank - "after the fact", so it could benefit from TARP and other taxpayer funds.

"FASBY 157, which mandates mark-to-market accounting, has has been eviscerated, effectively allowing the banks to misstate their assets values to models, rather than to market prices." This was changed "after the fact".

If you haven't figured it out yet, the sanctity of contracts and laws are only enforced where citizens are involved.

According to the Federal Reserve’s own website, their duties fall into four general areas:

"1. Conducting the nation's monetary policy by influencing the monetary and credit conditions in the economy in pursuit of maximum employment, stable prices, and moderate long-term interest rates.
2. Supervising and regulating banking institutions to ensure the safety and soundness of the nation's banking and financial system and to protect the credit rights of consumers
3. Maintaining the stability of the financial system and containing systemic risk that may arise in financial markets
4. Providing financial services to depository institutions, the U.S. government, and foreign official institutions, including playing a major role in operating the nation's payments system"

It should be pretty obvious that the Federal Reserve has not only broken its contract with the citizens of this country, but has also managed to destroy the economy.

And Obama wants to give Bernanke and the privately-owned Federal Reserve more power. Go figure!??

we cannot be forced to choose between income and homelessness...there has to be a way for a human to live without requiring money...we must stop dividing up and selling each other the planet, leaving those without sufficient funds without country...

Imagine no possessions...

I agree, if people can't afford mortgage payments, they can't afford rent. But in some cases, mortgage payments are leaping to unconscionable levels (ARMs). Many new homeowners were truly lied to by brokers. It is a vicious cycle dragging down the economy, and in 6 months will only be worse. We needed a major public investment but instead it went to the big banks and they are celebrating. Throwing parties, buying luxury jets, and stashing bonus money since they were forbidden for this year (boohoo). You know, it looks tacky when people are losing jobs and homes to have to read about the millions and billions of $$ going to CEOs. Might even start a rebellion. And as Obama said, he's the firewall between the CEOs and the pitchforks. Well, he did his job well protecting them from the pitchforks. Thanks to him they get to have their cake and eat it too. Sorry, no crumbs left for us this time around.

He deserves to go down in 2012 for what he's done to us. It isn't just the lying, it's the harm, sacrificing us for the rich. Like Bush, his real constituency. He talks about shifting the tax burden. Sounds good, but they're safe. It won't happen. If he meant what he said, he'd be using his bully pulpit to inform the people about the right wing of the Democratic Party instead of kicking the left and using the power of his office to push Congress to do the right thing by the public. No, he has "other priorities".

When the people fear their government there is tyranny,
when the government fears the people there is liberty.
~ Thomas Jefferson

DB overlooks a few things:

The average house rental is more expensive than the average mortgage for the same house - if you can't pay the mortgage, then how could you pay rent?

Renters are not responsible for house maintenance. Is BoA or Fannie gonna come out and fix the pipes? Sure, they could subcontract, but then there go the profits...

Renter eviction is more complicated than foreclosure.

Renters do not pay property taxes - more profit loss for banks.

And - if a homeowner in trouble can afford rent, then why not go rent an apartment or a home already for rent? Why the big push to "stay in the same house." It's not like the old days, where families lived 50 years in the same home then passed it down - the average home is sold within 5-7 years.

People already have the "right to rent" properties that are actually for rent. The real way to move towards a real solution is to start jailing banksters and predatory lenders and other liars and thieves en masse - once it's clear there are painful consequences for the nefarious, the entire sector will not only start playing by the rules, but will also do a bit of extra good to prove they're good...

Plugging holes in the dike, but not a global answer.

There is another answer that will not only allow people to stay in their homes, but it will turn the world's economy back on. Once the economy is up and running then we can all work to tweak in in the directions that lead to sustainability.

How do we turn the economy back on? Allow every American, or every American couple, who qualifies, a one time opportunity to purchase a home at 2.75% interest. This will create a situation where the empty homes are sold, it will cause new construction, and will create the jobs that Americans know how to do. We have had a "construction" economy for the past 15 years.

It will give Americans several hundred dollars at the end of the month and I promise, those Americans are going to go out and buy all of the stuff that is made all over the world.

I agree that this would be an interim for the US job market until the green energy stimulus is able to function by itself.

Drastically reducing the interest for a one time purchase would restart the world's economy.

There are about 40 million people over 50 in the work force. - Pay them $1 million apiece severance for early retirement with the following stipulations:

1) They MUST retire. Forty million job openings - Unemployment fixed.
2) They MUST buy a new American CAR. Forty million cars ordered - Auto Industry fixed.
3) They MUST either buy a house or pay off their mortgage - Housing Crisis fixed.

Total cost = $40 million . Not Trillion . Not Billion . Just $40 Million with no big hole in the national debt .
We must get our lives out of the hands of the Flim-Flam gang of Wall Street who control the U.S. Congress . We could start by having individual State control of our health care laws which could be started with the stimulus money .

Let them stay and rent? Fuck that. You know what would be easier? For all the debts of all Americans to be simply FORGIVEN and CANCELLED. You'd think the Right would see how "Christian" and simple that is, but then again, I think their piety is a lie. They aren't moral enough to look outside their oppressive little box either.

Nationalize the banks and all the lenders along with them while you're at it.

It might jumpstart the economy too without all the debt weighing the rank and file down.

unionave-I've heard that suggestion bandied about a bit too. It's not bad, but it still leaves a lot of people behind.

two things. reverse morgagues offered by the gov.
don't banks lose money on a forclousure, unless we are paying for these with money from the fed.

the following relates to it all.

Good Morning Kindred Spirits, (for those of you that are not Kindred Spirits ((if any exist)) and would like to become one, the door is always open.
A Kindred Spirit is Love ,Compassion, Justice.

Those of you that posted a comment to this article should go to this previous article (many of you have been there).
article appears in commondreams.org

Title of article: “When Will The Recovery Begin ? Never.
Author: Robert Reich
dated : Friday July 10 2009

In my opinion Mr. Reich’s article describes the existing economic reality.
Sioux Rose, did you miss this article ?

Citizen Central is no longer inert, the momentum has begun.
Here are some answers to the comments directed to Citizen Central by posters (I am not aware of all of them sorry).
yours truly’s post July 11 2009 to Mr. Reich’s article is the approach Citizen Central is taking.

Is Citizen Central a forum? No Citizen Central is a direction action citizens lobby.

Will Citizen Central be a web creation? That would be great if C.C. manifests through the internet.

Why don’t you just create a web site or have someone do it ?. That’s a great idea , we need a web site, I don’t know how to do it, nor do I have the resources. That has to come from one of you .I can explain what the web site needs to do.

C.C. needs an administrator, who’s going to be the administrator, you? No the site will need an administrator, one of you.

Who will design the site, and choose the topics for consideration, you ? As of today I am the project manager, if someone wants to be project manager,
make your case. I am the current project manager someone had to do it, the way C.C. works, the members choose a project manager. When C.C. is created if a new project manager is desired we get one . There are no ego’s involved here.

What is the objective of c.c. ? Okay, within our current political system the only way to manifest our collective desires is to have the numbers.
Congress, the senate and the administration is elected by us the citizens. What we need is a majority of votes in each congresspersons, and senators district. That’s what c.c. does, bring together all the like-minded citizens ,but instead of electing a person to represent us, we elect a person to create laws and policy that we the citizens want . If they do not want to do the citizens business then we have an immediate recall and replace that person with a person that will.

If the elected official always did what the majority wanted then there would be no civil rights etc. I understand your point . However considering the situation at hand ,our elected officials are not representing our best interests, we have to change that , THE ONLY WAY TO CHANGE THAT WITHIN OUR POLITICAL SYSTEM IS TO HAVE A MAJORITY OF VOTERS IN EACH DISTRICT.

What we need right now is a way for the people interested in c.c.to be able to communicate with each other. I am going to post c.c. activity in the post section of the first article that appears on commondreams each day . Hopefully we can come up with an alternative soon.
Sioux Rose , you had mentioned that the administrator of commondreams might help us out, any way of checking on that.

Later on today :
We need to get a web site operational .Until that’s done we are limited.
We need to get every progressive site on board, as well as the general population.
If this statistic is correct , forty percent of American citizens are functionally illiterate, we need to energize that segment of society, by appealing to individuals that these people might trust for their endorsement i.e. actors, athletes, members of specific ethnic groups, religious leaders etc.
Once the opposition becomes aware of c.c. it will definitely turn into a numbers game. Mainstream media will not be very helpful to our cause, the internet and a field organization is probably the most effective way to go.

See you later today.

Make fewer babies.