Ever notice this?
I only say this as full disclosure. You see, I am not unbiased. With that said, here are some tools I’m using to understand the foreclosure fraud settlement deal…
1. The administration’s MO
In keeping with my disclaimer above, here’s Scarecrow at Firedog lake articulating a cynical view on how the administration approaches these things, an approach that seems to lean always to the financial industry while couching things in misleading hopey/changey spin.
2. Yves Smith
Yves Smith at Naked Capitalism has long been one of the few voices pointing out the rampant fraud in the banking system and the back room accommodations that qualify as economic problem solving these days.
Here she is enumerating 12 specific reasons to doubt the legitimacy of the foreclosure deal.
3. Matt Taibbi
Then there’s Matt Taibbi, the unabashed caller-out of BS. His book, Griftopia, is a concrete introduction to just how complete the refashioning of the western political system has been. He doesn’t pull punches.
Here he is at Rolling Stone explaining why he is no longer optimistic about the deal and how he sees it mainly as a superficial, face-saving agreement that demonstrates the extent to which the financial industry has completely outgunned the American law enforcement system.
4. From a banker’s point of view
And lest you think that all I read is lefty blogs, consider this from American Banker in which they suggest that the complete absence of any public details is evidence that far from being a credible effort at law enforcement, the foreclosure deal amounts to putting the “press release cart in front of the settlement horse”.