Government bailouts...

I'm tired of hearing the talk about "The government needs to help out these poor people with the adjustable rate mortgages". They knew what they were getting into. If they didn't know, they should have.

My brother is one of the people who got one of these loans because he and his wife's credit wasn't so hot and it was the only financing they could get. He knows they shouldn't have gotten it but he wanted to make his wife happy. They got divorced, he ended up getting the house after some bills hadn't been paid, and he busted his butt and got it caught up and, to the best of my knowledge, he refinanced. Was it my fault that he got that loan? Nope. Wasn't yours either? Should we have to bail him out? Nope. Good thing is, my brother is responsible and is taking care of his own house. There are apparently quite a few people who aren't.

CNN.com had a survey up this evening asking "Should the U.S. government step in and back up troubled mortgage loans?". 68% of the respondents said no. Now CNN usually has a more liberal lean to it and it's reader's responses usually lean more to the left also. If a CNN.com pole is showing that we shouldn't be paying for other people's mistakes, I think it's a safe bet that we could find a consensus saying not only no but hell no.

This morning on one of the morning talk shows they were having a round table about this and one of the panelists compared the victims of Katrina to the people in the "mortgage crisis".


Do you remember those "Katrina Victims" like this outstanding citizen on the left? Looting beer from a convenience store?
Maybe from the store on the right? This business owner went through the same disaster and you can see what the fine citizens of New Orleans did to him. Yes, I understand there were a LOT of true victims in the Katrina disaster. My wife spent time taking care of elderly people who were bussed out of New Orleans to our town. She was feeding them, changing their sheets, even had to change one poor little old lady's "diaper". The lady was so embarrassed. It was really sad. The yahoo in the picture with the beer, he's not a victim. He's an able bodied adult man who should have been smart enough to get his sorry butt out of town. Don't blame the government that you didn't listen to the radio and see the news on TV and hear your neighbors talking and still didn't act and get up and go. Ray Nagin did screw up by not using those school buses to help the elderly and the sick but there were plenty of parasites in New Orleans who just sat around waiting for the government to pick them up when they delivered their food stamps. Yes, I'm a former social worker. I've sat behind the desk and looked at FS receipients finances and heard their stories. Maybe a third of them really need the help. I didn't mind giving it to them. Over half of them I'd kick off right now and tell them get a job or starve.

Back to the main topic, so many of the people in New Orleans were victims only in they lost their homes, the places they worked were destroyed, maybe a family member who couldn't get out didn't make it. There should have been a lot smaller number if the people who were able would have just gotten up and left. We live 100 miles inland and we still took precautions for a hurricane that was supposed to roll over us. People up here were boarding windows, moving pets, and heading to relatives houses in other towns.

All it takes is a little common sense. So many in New Orleans didn't show it and so many with these stupid mortgages aren't showing it. I got tired of hearing about all the arrests in Houston of "Katrina Refugees" and I'm tired of hearing about victims of the mortgage crisis. Times are hard. Suck it up and figure out how to get by.