Phil Robertson and freedom to have an opinion

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Apr 27, 2012
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AHAHAHAHA! Listen, you conspiracy filled loon...

Until you back up your previous claim, where I've asked for a citation about ten times now, you can't expect to be taken seriously.

You walk around stating bullshit as fact and then refuse to post a shred of evidence backing yourself up.

You are a joke.

I am not providing a citation on private businesses. You don't understand how they operate.

You're full of shit. You blame Wall Street for what happened when the government was responsible for forcing banks to give loans and then the government bailed them out which is crony Capitalism.

If you're going to attack Capitalism like this and make up lies then you can't be taken seriously.

You are a joke.
 

shadow9d9

Diamond Member
Jul 6, 2004
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I am not providing a citation

You just admitting that you make things up and use them as fact. That might work in your echo chambers, but it won't work on anyone with half a brain.

It is especially funny since your made up opinion as facts directly conflict with reality and how the courts have ruled.
 

shadow9d9

Diamond Member
Jul 6, 2004
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LMAO!!! I watch local news as well as read Reuters and AP news articles as I prefer to read news that has as little bias as possible. Being a moderate conservative I see the bias in the liberal leaning stations (CNN, MSNBC/NBC, ABC, & CBS) and the conservative leaning station Fox. If you can't recognize the political leaning of these stations you're biased and/or blind.

If you define "liberal" as anything that isn't Republican talking points, then I could see how you came to that conclusion. That isn't what liberal is though.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
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How full of crap are you? The government was responsible for what happened with the financial crash by forcing banks to give loans to people who couldn't afford them.

Wow, I didn't realize anyone still believed this crock o bullshit.

I am a mortgage banker BTW, and for the record, we blame Wall Street. Even my tea partying fellow mortgage bankers blame Wall Street.
 

compuwiz1

Admin Emeritus Elite Member
Oct 9, 1999
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Is there any reason left for this thread to exist? The Duck dudes are back in business as usual and GLAAD had their little panties in a wad hissy fit side show and didn't get their way. It seems like it's time to move on......nothing to see here anymore. Besides, this thread is now about Wall street bankers.
 
Nov 25, 2013
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I actually contributed to the thread unlike you who came in just to call me out. I pointed out the hypocrisy of liberals.

No you didn't, you simply made a fool of yourself. Again....

I have no idea if you are a troll or what but I think that it's pretty clear that you're simply not worth the effort.

So, go collect some tinfoil or something and have a good life.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
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No.

That's not how it happened.

Bank deregulation allowed some banks to offer any poor dope a mortgage, knowing they could sell off the mortgage and never worry about it. Guess who ended up paying the bill?

Well not this either. Mortgage backed securities have been around for a long time, so this was not some new deregulation. And generally, it is the MBS investors who set lending policies for the loans which they purchase, and not the originating lender (although it may set stricter underwriting policies, called overlays, if they wish). Investors do have chargeback recourse in the event a policy violation is found, so sell it off and never worry isn't really true either.

IMO the housing bubble was a perfect storm. A long period of lowering interest rates and rising home values built up it own momentum in a fashion as old as tulip bulbs.

But I would like to point out that it was Wall Street buying up most of the MBS's back then.
 

werepossum

Elite Member
Jul 10, 2006
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Wow, I didn't realize anyone still believed this crock o bullshit.

I am a mortgage banker BTW, and for the record, we blame Wall Street. Even my tea partying fellow mortgage bankers blame Wall Street.
Wall Street somehow forced you to make loans without verifying income or employment or credit history, using in-house appraisers to establish prices far above actual market value, with faux rebates to eliminate down payments, with payments the buyers could not possibly afford when the variable rates returned to their indices? Color me skeptical. Or did Wall Street assume responsibility when they bought the securities you guys bundled when you had more junk than the GSEs could buy?
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
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Wall Street somehow forced you to make loans without verifying income or employment or credit history, using in-house appraisers to establish prices far above actual market value, with faux rebates to eliminate down payments, with payments the buyers could not possibly afford when the variable rates returned to their indices? Color me skeptical. Or did Wall Street assume responsibility when they bought the securities you guys bundled when you had more junk than the GSEs could buy?

As I recall quite clearly, Wall Street was super eager to buy those MBS's. And like I said, it is the MBS investors who set lending policies.
If you'd like to blame Countrywide and Wamu too though, feel free.
 

Matt1970

Lifer
Mar 19, 2007
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You DO realize that you are using a video from a program that had a Japanese, Russian, and black woman on the bridge of a starship during the cold war, right? It had ghe first interracial kiss on tv and one of, if not the first, lesbian kisses. It was about how the world eventually united, became communist, and was about exploring and accepting the unknown...It is about everything that you are against. The Ferengi are the closest to current day humans and were designed to be so.
.

Oh you are so going to have to back up calling me a racist. It's one thing you having the delusions that there is no Left in the US and the media is controlled by the right, but calling me a racist is something else. Link to one racist thing I have ever said on this forum.
 

QuantumPion

Diamond Member
Jun 27, 2005
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As I recall quite clearly, Wall Street was super eager to buy those MBS's. And like I said, it is the MBS investors who set lending policies.
If you'd like to blame Countrywide and Wamu too though, feel free.

And why were MBS's so popular? Because the government was selling, insuring and guaranteeing them as low risk, fraudulently.
 

cubby1223

Lifer
May 24, 2004
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Oh you are so going to have to back up calling me a racist. It's one thing you having the delusions that there is no Left in the US and the media is controlled by the right, but calling me a racist is something else. Link to one racist thing I have ever said on this forum.

Careful. Racism continues to be redefined by anyone and everyone with an agenda.

more states rights = racist black oppression
less government spending = racist black oppression
lower taxes = racist black oppression
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
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And why were MBS's so popular? Because the government was selling, insuring and guaranteeing them as low risk, fraudulently.

The particular MBS's in question were not government insured. If they had been, then Lehman Brothers would still be around.
 

ElFenix

Elite Member
Super Moderator
Mar 20, 2000
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How full of crap are you? The government was responsible for what happened with the financial crash by forcing banks to give loans to people who couldn't afford them.

nevermind your dubious assertion that the government forced the banks to do anything, it wasn't the loans, it was the collateralized debt instruments built off of them and the leverage ratios those took on that caused the liquidity crunch as everyone realized their money was at much larger risk than they'd thought.
 
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First

Lifer
Jun 3, 2002
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And why were MBS's so popular? Because the government was selling, insuring and guaranteeing them as low risk, fraudulently.

Derp. No they weren't. The Feds guaranteed all sorts of paper in the secondary mortgage market whose default rate was quite well within reasonable default ranges that in normal conditions would never lead to the magnitude of crisis we saw. Far more damaging were the banks that irresponsibly ignored their basic due diligence and their fiduciary duties by failing to confirm income, credit history and ignoring government standards (fraudulently) and common sense LTV ratios, with insurers like AIG spreading that risk through various security tranches all across the globe.

They did it because they were making too much damn money not to, not because the feds put a gun to their head.
 
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Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
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Derp. No they weren't. The Feds guaranteed all sorts of paper in the secondary mortgage market whose default rate was quite well within reasonable default ranges that in normal conditions would never lead to the magnitude of crisis we saw. Far more damaging were the banks that irresponsibly ignored their basic due diligence and their fiduciary duties by failing to confirm income, credit history and ignoring government standards for LTV ratios, with insurers like AIG spreading that risk through various security tranches all across the globe.

They did it because they were making too much damn money. The feds didn't put a gun to their head.

Well, stop and ask yourself: in a lending environment where the values of the secured collateral are always increasing, what actual risk is there if the borrower doesn't perform?
 

LegendKiller

Lifer
Mar 5, 2001
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Well not this either. Mortgage backed securities have been around for a long time, so this was not some new deregulation. And generally, it is the MBS investors who set lending policies for the loans which they purchase, and not the originating lender (although it may set stricter underwriting policies, called overlays, if they wish). Investors do have chargeback recourse in the event a policy violation is found, so sell it off and never worry isn't really true either.

IMO the housing bubble was a perfect storm. A long period of lowering interest rates and rising home values built up it own momentum in a fashion as old as tulip bulbs.

But I would like to point out that it was Wall Street buying up most of the MBS's back then.

This isn't quite correct and you know it. There are all sorts of metrics which RMBS investors do not and can not see. There are also metrics which can be masked and people who do not dig down into the details, such as looking at specific collateral tapes, rep lines, and stratifications, the originator can push off trash.

It's why being comfortable with the issuer and digging down into the details is important.

Blaming this on Wall Street is placing too little blame on mortgage underwriters and originators.
 

First

Lifer
Jun 3, 2002
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Well, stop and ask yourself: in a lending environment where the values of the secured collateral are always increasing, what actual risk is there if the borrower doesn't perform?

Exactly, little risk...if property values increase forever. It's the old Buffet saying; you never know who's swimming naked until the tide goes out.

Having not been intimately involved in the immediate 04-07 runup to the craziness, I honestly wonder how these guys thought it could last. Generally, my sense is 1. they didn't care because they were getting theirs and getting out before it all collapsed on its own footprint and 2. many just didn't know or care to know or were informed enough to know because these instruments are so complicated in a sense.
 

First

Lifer
Jun 3, 2002
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Most blame should go to the politicians who created the problem in the first place. Affordable housing...the best laid plans of mice and men.

http://theaffordablemortgagedepress...bble-the-national-homeownership-strategy.aspx

Boy that was a yawner. The CRA scapegoating died down years ago, because it didn't win over the hearts of minds of non-knuckledraggers. See Federal Reserve study here for further illumination. I'll post an excerpt for you below:

Putting together these facts provides a striking result: Only 6 percent of all the higher-priced loans were extended by CRA-covered lenders to lower-income borrowers or neighborhoods in their CRA assessment areas, the local geographies that are the primary focus for CRA evaluation purposes. This result undermines the assertion by critics of the potential for a substantial role for the CRA in the subprime crisis. In other words, the very small share of all higher-priced loan originations that can reasonably be attributed to the CRA makes it hard to imagine how this law could have contributed in any meaningful way to the current subprime crisis.

Of course, loan originations are only one path that banking institutions can follow to meet their CRA obligations. They can also purchase loans from lenders not covered by the CRA, and in this way encourage more of this type of lending. The data also suggest that these types of transactions have not been a significant factor in the current crisis. Specifically, less than 2 percent of the higher-priced and CRA-credit-eligible mortgage originations sold by independent mortgage companies were purchased by CRA-covered institutions.
 

Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
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Exactly, little risk...if property values increase forever. It's the old Buffet saying; you never know who's swimming naked until the tide goes out.

Having not been intimately involved in the immediate 04-07 runup to the craziness, I honestly wonder how these guys thought it could last. Generally, my sense is 1. they didn't care because they were getting theirs and getting out before it all collapsed on its own footprint and 2. many just didn't know or care to know or were informed enough to know because these instruments are so complicated in a sense.

Nah, they were just making hay while the sun shined, as the saying goes.
If your competitors can lower their lending standards AND still sell them, it forces you to do the same to stay in business.
Remember that the customers demanded these loans they couldn't afford. Lenders who ignored these demands out of principle quickly found themselves without customers.
 
Nov 30, 2006
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Boy that was a yawner. The CRA scapegoating died down years ago, because it didn't win over the hearts of minds of non-knuckledraggers. See Federal Reserve study here for further illumination. I'll post an excerpt for you below:
CRA, keeping derivatives unregulated and many other political factors contributed to the housing bubble. I'm not saying it was entirely their fault...my point is that there's lots of blame to go around.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causes_of_the_United_States_housing_bubble

Edit: Damn I'm way off-topic! Sorry about that!
 
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Vic

Elite Member
Jun 12, 2001
50,415
14,303
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This isn't quite correct and you know it. There are all sorts of metrics which RMBS investors do not and can not see. There are also metrics which can be masked and people who do not dig down into the details, such as looking at specific collateral tapes, rep lines, and stratifications, the originator can push off trash.

It's why being comfortable with the issuer and digging down into the details is important.

Blaming this on Wall Street is placing too little blame on mortgage underwriters and originators.

Not a lot of investor due diligence back in those days, as I recall.
 

LegendKiller

Lifer
Mar 5, 2001
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Not a lot of investor due diligence back in those days, as I recall.

Nor was there a whole lot of originator due diligence, or mortgage broker due diligence, or home owner due diligence. The whole chain was fucked. To blame it on WS is only mortgage brokers/bankers passing the buck on their own shitty practices.