Sleazy Mortgage Lenders Almost Destroy the Economy, Steal Billions and Stay Out of Prison

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Last updated on July 17th, 2023 at 06:04 pm

According to the NY Times, giant bank JPMorgan Chase is in negotiations to keep its top honchos away from potential cellies Lefty, Killer and Bubba in exchange for at least $9 billion in fines and an additional $4 billion to make things better for the trusting suckers who stumbled into Morgan’s mortgage lending departments and signed up for loans that were way higher than they could afford but were made possible by JP personnel who committed innumerable crimes in lying, forging, cheating and God knows what else to qualify the loans and exacerbate the housing bubble to the point where an entire sector of the American economy came within a whisker of collapsing.

The bank had been stubbornly holding at a total of an $11 billion fine until the Justice Department told them they were bringing criminal investigations to the fore. Oops! Is it any wonder that these slime balls want a president with scruples and his like-minded posse out of Washington?

My question would be, where’s Darrell Issa? Isn’t his ridiculous Committee on Oversight and Government Reform supposed to look into such matters? Or are Issa and his administration-hating groupie, Trey Gowdy, too busy ginning up anti-Obama BS and holding a perfectly innocent Attorney General in “Contempt of Congress?” The answer is obvious to anyone with a pulse.

In an April 2011 story, respected and often cheeky financial website, Motley Fool gave their explanation as to why so few high-level mortgage financing execs (ONE so far) end up in Graybar U. It’s supposedly because the big boys (and a few girls) were ignorant of what their underlings were doing. For the sophistication level of the ‘Fool’, it’s a rather specious argument. A flood of financial reports recording questionable billions in sudden profits cross bank president and CEO desks for months and the lawyer/business school grads from the finest universities in the land have no clue as to what’s happening in their mortgage sectors? ROTFLMAO!!!

The Motley Fool piece also touches on the Florida real estate market but misses the real crux of the story by concentrating solely on mortgage-brokers. In fact, Florida is populated by a cast of worldwide drug and financial charlatans who are buying hugely expensive luxury units in newly erected giant condos and other fancy properties purchased with ill-gotten billions under assumed LLCs to hide profits from their nefarious activities.

The real story can be found in the October 21 edition of “The Nation” magazine. Starting on page 12, there begins an 11-page tale of an extraordinarily comprehensive, well-researched updated investigative piece by Ken Silverstein on the subject of Florida real estate and those squalid amoral mongrels from the U.S. and around the globe who put filthy money in the hands of filthy enablers. It should surprise no one that ‘The Donald’ is a happy and willing recipient of probably billions of this untraceable LLC drug-money and other criminally originated fare by putting up one building of multi-million dollar units after another where the running dogs (thanks Mao and others) of capitalism and crime can hide their currency.

And you wonder why Trump is trying to deflect the kind of legal attention he deserves with his absurd “birther” BS. He knows damn well the president is legit. He just wants to fend off those who might be able to prove ‘The Donald’ is not. Let’s see your deeds Mr. Trump. “Tear down that wall of secrecy!”

Huge kudos to Silverstein. I’m always bitching about the alarming lack of investigative reporters. I’ve just discovered an A-lister. “The Nation” is another source of stories others won’t print. That’s why writing for PoliticusUSA is so enjoyable. No censorship.

This latest front-page rape of taxpayer dollars got me thinking of other members of assorted seedy covens of corruption. Banks seem to be front and center in many instances. Switzerland’s largest bank, UBS comes immediately to mind. That’s because from 2002-2007 UBS was at the epicenter in aiding millionaires and billionaires to hide billions thereby avoiding roughly $300 million a year in taxes. The UBS fine of $780 million at the time was for an action that added $380 million to the bank’s bottom line for serving as a tax-evasion haven and other mischief. UBS is not a particularly quick study. A couple of months ago, the Wall Street Journal reported the bank is liable for another fine in the neighborhood of $200 million for the same kind of sleaze with German clients that got it into trouble with the Americans.

Is it pure coincidence that the Romney’s thought UBS would be a perfectly appropriate place to park some of their millions after the fact of an international banking scandal and that giant $780 million fine? Did I mention that one-time Republican presidential candidate, Mitt, failed to disclose interest income on that account? ABC News reported that a campaign official called it a “minor discrepancy” and that might be pretty accurate as the profit was pegged at a mere $1,700; lunch money in the Romney household. Or was it JUST $1,700. The Romney account was closed in 2010, just as Swiss secrecy was forced into more transparency and UBS claimed it would be closing its offshore accounts to Americans. UBS appears to be keeping their word as they started closing off tiny accounts in 2008. Maybe they got around to Romney in 2010. The final total would be around 19,000 U.S. accounts, although I wouldn’t trust any info that came from the bank or the Mitt Romney camp any further than I could throw his Ann’s two Cadillacs.

The Swiss are still hiding around $2.2 trillion in money that pays for services denied honest taxpayers from around the world. I would suspect there are still thousands of American tax cheats who simply funnel their money in from another country.

I’ve got a file stuffed with clippings of financial and multi-national cheats. I’ll limit my examples to big banks, the worst offenders. That’s a logical outcome as Willie Sutton once famously mouthed, “Because that’s where the money is.” Researchers are convinced Sutton’s iconic quote was never uttered by the famed bank robber but it will do for our purposes. Bank of America has been accused of fraud, Goldman Sachs (banking and investment) and Citigroup have been in the soup as well. There’s also UBS’ Swiss competitor, Credit Suisse and many others. All have reached deep into their corporate pockets settling civil charges and other fiscal nastiness through fines and penalties.

Let’s face it, capitalism begets greed begets corruption. Needs a bit of tweaking, wouldn’t you agree?

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Dennis S

Raised rural & small town, then lived in N.Y., Chicago & LA. Widely traveled. Returned from world wandering to pursue media life of anchorman/reporter and major, medium and small market talk radio. Highly active in politics. Once worked as orderly & security in Mens Lock Ward for the Criminally Insane at a state institution. Much more rational population than current Teapublicans. Great concern for country run by and for the extreme wealthy. The inhumane current running through this country has no precedent in modern history.

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