Write-Offs: 08.17.07

Posted by Bess Levin, Aug 17, 2007, 5:01pm

BREAKING: FTC loses request again to stop Whole Foods deal. [Reuters]

Statshot-Paying-Mortgage.jpg

[The Onion via Curbed]


$$$ Bernanke in Pictures [LoSC]

$$$ DealBreaker's John Carney goes On The Money tonight to discuss Wall Street layoffs.

$$$ The escape of the enablers [Fortune]

$$$ "From the desk of ima psycho, esq." [Gawker]

$$$ A WallStrip classic: The Blackberry Shootout. Word is they are preparing for Round 2. If you think you've got the right stuff, sign up now.

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Posted by JT, Aug 17, 2007 6:06PM

anyone else run into the crazies over by wall & broadway today handin out some nonsense from this Larouche guy? I decided to (for the purposes of mockery) to check it out and this guy its nuts, like a real-world version of that guy in Network ("I'm mad as hellll and I'm NOT going to take it anymore!")

Posted by CCS, Aug 17, 2007 8:15PM

The Fortune article pissed me off so much I had to send the author this email:

Nobody held a gun to people's heads to borrow too much money to buy homes they couldn't afford in products that don't make any sense. Nobody was forcibly sent to refinance with cash-out mortgages to go buy a bunch of junk they don't need. To what rational borrower does it make sense to borrow 100% of the purchase price of a home, anyway?

It was overreaching aspiration and greed that caused the mess we find ourselves in now.

Certainly, Wall Street enabled this. The ratings agencies are massively at fault and without the liquidity from China and others, none of it would have been possible to begin with. What about homebuilders who pimped their wares to the masses and helped arrange financing? Mortgage brokers who fraudulently completed applications for borrowers in order to qualify them for the home of their dreams? The root of the problem is really an American consumer that is not, generally, thrifty nor rational when it comes to their collective personal financial affairs.

I would say as fiscal examples go, the American consumer has a pretty poor one in their own government. The media doesn't help here, either. Just look at what is glorified in print and on TV. MTV Cribs, Flip This House, What You Get For The Money, are three examples of real estate shows that immediately spring to mind. What about the get-rich-quick real estate schemes sold on TV? Americans want the good life, even if they can't afford it, and the media serves it up on a silver platter.

So, why is Wall Street the proverbial fall guy here? Because a bunch of folks made silly amounts of money? Wall Street is simply a financial intermediary--a middle-man--and that is a fact. The Street's customers are those who have capital and those who are in need of capital. Hardly, the root of the problem, in my opinion. Sadly, Wall Street will bear the brunt of the lawsuits. After all, that's where the money is and that seems to be the point of your article.

Posted by narf, Aug 18, 2007 4:12PM

So why the charitable trust in the Caymans for the CDO's?

Posted by boy, Aug 18, 2007 8:07PM

(17%)(18%) is hilarious
(13%) are for brave souls

Posted by chris, Aug 20, 2007 7:30AM

Lyndon Larouche? I thought he was dead.

Posted by Shwilly, Aug 20, 2007 9:14AM

Who is the girl in the video? She's cute.

Posted by Plopfish, Aug 20, 2007 9:48AM

Shwilly, unless you were kidding, it is none other than Lindsay Campbell! from Wallstrip:

http://www.wallstrip.com/theshow/

Posted by Shwilly, Aug 20, 2007 12:09PM

not a joke. i'm in love.

Posted by KMan, Aug 20, 2007 1:55PM

I'd like to show her some 'pretty fierce thumbwork'.

DA DUM DUM

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