What, for goodness sake, is going on? What is all this business about helping homeowners (all of a sudden) by reducing the principle on their mortgages? It sounds too good to be true which, naturally, it is. You canny beast you! You’ve done it again! You've found yet another way to make a profit out of other people's pain! This time it is gift wrapped. I read the following in the NYT today:
Steven and Marisela Alva say they do not know who helped them with their mortgage. All they know is that they feel blessed.
Last December, the couple got a letter saying that a firm had purchased the mortgage on their home in Pico Rivera, Calif., from Chase Home Finance for less than its original value. “We want to share this discount with you,” the letter said.
“I couldn’t believe it,” said Mr. Alva, a 62-year-old janitor and father of three. “I kept thinking to myself, ‘Something is wrong, something is wrong. This sounds too good.’ ”
Now let me get this straight—you persuade homeowners to refinance, they do indeed end up having lower mortgages, and the government and, eventually the taxpayer, will end up paying the bill—right? This is all part of your belated realization that people do not like you very much. You are finally beginning to notice the rage out there. But, with a stroke of your pen you can calm the storm and reap a healthy profit. You win winners in your win win garb win yet again!
I read an amazing thing: Even as the CEO of Goldblock Box, or is it Goldbody Shine, sneered at the idea of going on the talk shows to polish up their image, he also offered, I can hardly believe this, an apology! Finally the Remorseful Banker Incarnate! This just in: His name is Blankfein, and the bank he works for is Goldman Sachs. My search for a remorseful banker has finally yielded results and as such I must name names. I admit to generally refraining from mentioning either those of of banks or bankers. I’m no populist, no wielder of pitchforks or clubs. I’m just trying to get my mind around all of this. I’m just trying to find the human being behind the profit motive, the heart behind the gold fob watch. It ain’t easy!
To quote: “We participated in things that were clearly wrong and have reason to regret....We apologize.”
My only problem with this apology is I cannot find the regret...anywhere! What is there to regret? they are reaping larger profits than ever before and certainly NEVER give money away. If they appear to do so it is only a mirage, smoke and mirrors. They fund large Art exhibits for the price of attaching their name to it. Banking, selling mortgages, getting rich, chasing money for money’s sake, seeking power...may all be very sexy but it doesn’t smack of taste or profundity, or altruism in any way and so these are the things they must have, attempt to buy and can never truly own.
The saddest part of all this is that the anger aimed at these fat cats (in forty letters to you I haven’t used this expression until now!) will always be muted by our need for them to fund, aid and abet our habits, our all to addictive habits like obsessive consumerism and the insistent wish to vote for a government not entirely in the pockets of the banks and corporations. I'd love to think, for once, the banks are actually reaching out to those who have lost their shirts during this whole mess. Sadly I don't believe it is so.
I feel like a spelunker caught in a massive ball of steel wire at the bottom of an old mine shaft.
Yours sincerely though clearly lost,
Kristian Witherkay
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