Rick Raw: Foreclosure Debacle Continues–Chaos Reigns

By Rick Grant Commentary rickgrant01@comcast.net

Since the economic apocalypse of 2008, foreclosure rates have continued to raise exponentially. Millions of homes in states like Florida and Nevada, specifically, Las Vegas, are sitting empty. Their former mortgage holders have just abandoned their homes because they owe much more than the house is worth.

Recently, a new scandal has log jammed the foreclosure process. Because the original mortgages were bought and sold so many times, documents have gone missing, and Federal investigators have discovered unauthorized signatures, and fraudulent loan applications. It’s a hurricane of worthless paper.

Consequently, the whole foreclosure system is overwhelmed by these problems that have exacerbated the resolution for millions of foreclosed homeowners. In other words, it may be years or never before these empty house are ready to be resold.

Meanwhile, the former owners have moved on to renting apartments or houses. Some or all of these missing mortgage documents may never be found. Some owners have just stayed in their home waiting for the ax to fall. In some case, these squatters have lived mortgage free since 2008.

Vast subdivisions are now suburban ghost towns with thousands of empty homes. They sit like abandoned movie sets. These houses could be renovated and offered to low income families to live in and maintain at reasonable rental rates.

Having people living in the houses would be preferable to letting the them decay or be targets for vandals. Yeah, but banks and financial institutions are not known for their logical thinking.
What’s worse, the banks blatant incompetence and fraudulent practices will go unpunished.

Furthermore, these chisseling, bumbling fools were rewarded with multibillion dollar bailouts at taxpayers expense. They caused the crisis and received a windfall. The middle class sank to the bottom.

Some courts have sent the banks packing, at least temporarily, and the banks themselves, such as JP Morgan Chase and Bank of America, have suspended foreclosures while they untangle the paperwork mess.

If the Federal agencies can prove that the banks that made these questionable loans can’t substantiate the signatures or find the documents, the banks face a financial tsunami of buying back tens of billions of dollars in missing or unauthorized loans.

Meanwhile, the whole culture of middle class suburban living has disappeared, scattered to the four winds as people lost their jobs and walked away from the upside down mortgages. These wastelands of empty houses stretch for hundreds of miles in Florida. Yes, and the home owners paid for this disaster with lost hopes and dreams.

The whole foreclosure debacle has continued to wreak havoc in the real estate markets, which are still severely depressed. If one thinks that the great recession of 2008 is waning, think again. It’s still raging.

Turning the millions of empty houses into immediate rental property would be a interim solution. However, the ghost subdivisions sit as a grim reminder of the lost culture of the middle class that were trampled by the greed addled banks selling bad mortgages, hastily put together with bogus signatures, then sold and resold, again and again, like commodities.

Rick Raw: Pot Goes Mainstream as Medicine–One Small Step to Pervasive Legalization

By Rick Grant Commentary rickgrant01@comcast.net

Just as the gangsters of the 1920s didn’t want Prohibition to end, the licenced medical marijuana growers of California didn’t want Proposition 19 to pass. It mandated legalizing pot for recreational use.

If Proposition 19 had passed, it would have brought in the agribusiness conglomerates to grow pot on a big scale. The mom and pop growers couldn’t compete with agribusiness’ capital.

So, ironically, the growers sided with law enforcement in the Proposition 19 initiative. Medical marijuana has become a multi-billion dollar business in California. Anyone with a prescription can buy marijuana legally in California and selected other states.

Florida (the penis state) is still the epicenter of the Bible belt and ultra-conservative philosophies to make even medical marijuana legal. Floridians would rather have a known crook–Rick Scott--as governor than legalize pot. Dumbasses!

Pot is such a hot topic, a marijuana joint was featured on this week’s "Time Magazine" cover.

The benefits of medical marijuana are well known to chemotherapy patients. It relieves the nausea and boosts the patient’s appetite. Hip women have always known that pot relieves the symptoms of premenstrual cramps and PMS.

More significantly, marijuana has been linked clinically to relieving the onset of depression, anxiety, and schizophrenia. Pot also relieves migraines, insomnia, back pain, and for what ever reason, lack of appetite–the well known muchie factor. And, of course, pot relieves the pressure on the optic nerve of glaucoma, from which I suffer.

Other symptoms of common maladies that marijuana relieves are irritable bowel syndrome, Tourette’s, muscular dystrophy, herpes, diabetes, gonorrhea, eczema, and weight loss for eating disorders. Presently, there is a study that THC (the active chemical in marijuana) slows down the progress of Alzheimer patients.

In California, it’s easy to get a prescription for pot. Just make an appointment with your primary care physician and complain of pain, and presto, go to a marijuana boutique and buy pot. There is a limit for each customer.

In contrast to pot’s wondrous medicinal properties is its high or buzz that regular smokers of the "evil" weed seek. The legal marijuana boutique owners of California tout the different types of high that each variety of buds (the most saturated with THC part of the plant) to give the customer. There is the spiritual high; the psychedelic high; the creative high; (musicians like that one) the sexual high, et al.

Medical marijuana patients use sophisticated methods to get the most out of their supply of weed. They use bongs or breathing bags that blow up with smoke then the smoker can hold the smoke in the bag until he or she wants another hit. This way, no smoke goes to waste, like in a burning joint.

Patient testimonials can be accessed at http://www.montanacargiversnetwork.com/Yes, this would imply that in legal medical marijuana states, there are legions of happy pot smokers. But what’s the downside? Nothing serious. As any pot smoker will tell you, loss of short term memory is no biggie. No one has ever ODed on marijuana–it’s impossible.

However, anything done in excess has negative effects. Serious pot-heads tend to be unmotivated couch potatoes. But not always.

Willy Nelson chain smokes joints all day and into the night. He’s a heavy user and he still functions normally, performs concerts, and remembers his lyrics. He told Larry King he had smoked pot right before going on his show.

In Willy’s case, his body has built up a tolerance and his sensitivity to getting high has stabilized at a certain level. If a non-pot smoker did that, he or she would be out-of-it for a couple of days.

So the nationwide legalization of marijuana debate rages. Yes, I’ve inhaled a lot of pot smoke in the past and enjoyed it. But in my book "The Mind further Out," I advocate a drugless high from meditation which is a more satisfying spiritual experience. But, if someone gave me a joint today, I’d smoke it.

As for marijuana’s medicinal properties, if I needed pot to relieve symptoms of a major illness, I wouldn’t hesitate to get it anyway possible. But the "killer" weed has come a long way from the documentary "Reefer Madness." In some states, like Florida, marijuana offenses carry heavy sentences. It just depends on what state in which you’re inhaling.

Rick Raw: Al Qaeda Gaining Strength as Date of American Pullout of Afghanistan Draws Near

By Rick Grant Commentary rickgrant01@comcast.net

As the date for the Afghanistan draw-down of U. S. Troops nears (July 11, 2011) al Qaeda is gaining strength and power in the Arabian Peninsula, Samolia, and other unstable countries, as well as Afghanistan and Pakistan.

The movement grew from its roots in the Afghan mountains to a global force of Jihadists seeking to destroy western civilization, returning the world to Medieval times.

When we invaded Afghanistan right after 9/11 with special forces and surgical bombing campaigns, it played into al Qaeda’s hands.

Suddenly, al Qaeda’s sworn enemy flooded into their backyard so they could conduct assaults on American positions, and melt back into the mountains.

Bin Laden was delighted that Americans had come to fight on his turf. It enabled him to recruit an steady flow of Jihadists from Pakistan into the no-man’s land of the border region between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

When the U.S. pulls out of Afghanistan, the Taliban will gain political power. In fact, the shaky government of Afghanistan is already negotiating with the Taliban to include them in the government and give them territory. As savvy observers know, the Taliban is in league with al Qaeda because the enemy of my enemy is my friend.

Our departure of both Iraq and Afghanistan will only broaden the Taliban and al Taeda’s recruiting drives and their political power. It’s well known that both the Taliban and al Qaeda are receiving sophisticated arms from Iran, which will be a greater ally of the Jihadist movement in the future.

With no attacks from the U.S. on al Qaeda’s bases of operation in Afghanistan, they’ll have plenty of time, resources, and arms to plan terrorist strikes inside the U.S., Britain, and the rest of Europe.

The recent interception of the UPS cargo mail bombs were mailed from Yemen to two Chicago synagogues. These were sophisticated explosive devices using high grade explosives packed in printer cartridges.

Here in the U.S., we can expect more attempted attacks from al Qaeda bases of operation. For every hundred attacks that are thwarted by U.S. intelligence, they only need one to get through.

It make take years or months, but al Qaeda is not going to stop. They’re in it for the next Millenium.

It’s inevitable that sooner or later we can expect large scale terrorist attacks on our subway systems and other soft targets like large malls or synagogues. All Westerners are targets, especially Americans and Israelis.

In Kuwait’s "Al Seyassah" newspaper, Ahmad Abdal Aziz Al-Jarallah said, "The Saudi’s have developed a unique way of dealing with Jihadists. The royal family knows that by targeting innocent civilians, al Qaeda damages orthodox Islam."

"They have implemented a multipronged strategy to stamp out extremism. Security measures are just one part. Equally important is psychological counseling of extremists to correct their religious behavior. "

They even mentor families of those who have been lured into extremism.
In other words, they deprogram these brain washed youth that throwing away their lives in a suicide bombings is a mortal sin against Islam.

So, how do we fight them when we pull out of Afghanistan? We must cut the head off the snake by finding al Qaeda’s central command bases, spread out over the globe.

More ground intelligence is needed using undercover Arab spies. When we find a central command, we take it out with a Predator drone. But we have to verify its authenticity as a legitimate target. That’s where ground intelligence is needed.

It will be difficult and will require the cooperation of other countries like Pakistan, which harbors al Qaeda/Taliban sympathizers who secretly support their operations with money and arms.

More importantly, we have to send regular Muslims into the extremist enclaves to counsel them to break the bonds of their extremist beliefs as evil not a religious crusade. Of course, we should kill bin Laden ASAP. He’s breathed our air long enough.

(Certain facts and a quote gleaned from "The Week." editorial "Is Al Qaida stronger than ever")

Rick Raw: Politics has Degenerated Into Bitter Acrimony That Paralyzes Progress

By Rick Grant Commentary rickgrant01@comcast.net

American politics has always been an underhanded ugly game. However, in recent years, anything goes in the Body Politic, from proven crooks running to stupid women winning primaries. People have lost faith that politicians have our best interest in mind and for good reason.

In reality, today’s swine on the Hill could care less about their constituents. All they care about is getting rich and being reelected. The divisions between parties have widened into an unbreachable chasm.

Recently, minority whip John Boehner said that "My whole focus in the next two years will be to defeat President Obama in 2012." He didn’t say that he would help to solve the nation’s many problems and help establish new jobs for Americans. The evil bastard is brandishing his sword. Boehner’s reason for being is all out warfare against the Obama administration.

So we send these clowns to Washington to supposedly represent us, and all they do is fight to get a majority in Congress to wield power, and get reelected. Is it any wonder that a third of all Americans describe themselves as independents.

However, voting independent is tantamount to throwing your vote away. Yes, we’d all like a third viable independent party. Yeah, and fools rush into the black hole. History proves that it’s not going to happen any time soon. So, these people who say they’re independent are expressing an idealistic dream.

The partisans of the Left and Right try to shape the national agenda through inflammatory cable TV shows, attack ads, the Internet, talk radio, (which is mostly conservative) and various advocacy groups. There is no middle ground any more.

The war between partisan sides makes compromise impossible. So, voters get pissed off and decide to throw out incumbents without realizing that they are voting in the same scoundrels as before.

In this election, it’s like throwing out the baby with the bath water. And, we end up with a bunch of bitter Republicans who want to dismantle all of Obama’s accomplishments. So, the end result is: The war on the Hill continues ad infinitum.

So the angry voters throw out the majority of Democrats. How long will it take before they feel betrayed? Not long. Then the cycle starts all over again. If there was some Jesus-like white knight who rode into town with all the answers, perhaps he could change things? Nope, he’d hit the gridlock like all the rest.

The sorry bunch of people running for office keeps declining in intelligence, morals, and ethics. We get women who don’t know that Africa is a continent and other candidates who don’t know the minimum wage in their state. Yet, voters like their looks.

It’s like the judge who sentenced Ted Bundy to die in the electric chair. He praised Bundy’s legal skills and said he would have been a great lawyer, but he had chosen the wrong path. The judge missed the point. Bundy was a ruthless serial killer who killed over 40 young women, and then had sex with their dead bodies. The judge should have said: "You’re an evil demon and you should go straight to hell."

Many voters are like the incredibly stupid women who fall in love with serial killers and even marry them. Some women actually carry on married lives with incarcerated men without conjugal visits.

Dumb voters vote for a certain candidate for the most trivial reasons. To wit: They’re good looking, they flirt with women voters, they seem to be very conservative, while they cheat on their wives with other women or men. Or, they just look convincing on television.

The whole process of our Body Politic is corrupted by stupidity and deception. So what if the Republicans get a majority in Congress, it won’t change a thing. It will be an impasse until 2012, when Obama faces his biggest crisis–getting reelected.