This is fraud, obviously, and there is no excuse for it, regardless of race, creed or color of skin.

That’s probably true. There are always people trying to scam others, not just in banking but doctors who perform unnecessary tests, lawyers who bill for 3 hours for every hour they actually worked, car mechanics who bill for replacing parts they merely fixed.

But this is a different story. Let’s not bring race into this.

My issue isn’t that some bank brokers are dishonest. My issue is the claim by the Al Sharptons of the world that there’s an organized effort by “the whitey” to give 10% interest rates to blacks who deserved 7% loans and the only reason for the mark-up is the white man’s racism.

Those who commit scams should be prosecuted. But turning every issue into an example of the evil of “The White Devil” is the true racism.

I’m sick and tired of innocent whites being accused of the worst thought crime (“racism”) for which they lose jobs and reputations just because of their skin color.

Sharpton and Jesse Jackson are out to destroy the white race in order to excuse everything blacks do. And whites go to their own personal destruction quietly while begging for forgiveness for crimes they never committed.

So it’s not that the government needs to come in and fix all these subprime loans; some were entered into legally and the borrower should have known better. However, there seems to be more and more evidence of brokers acting illegally to secure loans that had no reasonable chance of working out. It looks like using YSP’s and subjective, discretionary loan pricing have really hurt many people including non-borrowers who simply purchased securities including these crappy loans.

Since this is a blog about race…these shady brokers (I definitely do not want to accuse all or even a majority of brokers) have hurt people of all races. In general more minorities have been affected, but that really doesn’t change the issue.

As usual, liberals (I use that term imprecisely) are not happy unless they have the government come in and force people to do something. Behind the smiling facade of liberalism lies the jackboot state.

Pablo, if you feel so passionately about this sort of thing, perhaps you can go into banking and create what you consider to be more equitable loans.

The crisis isn’t confined to the US because these junk loans were repackaged and then sold to other financial institutions around the world. So now the sub-prime loan folly is an international problem.

Why were these junk loans bought and sold so avidly? The liberals can’t be blamed for the global mess, but the greed of the banks and mortgage brokers can.

As for your one-sided points, there is no real point to continuing the argument because neither of us are going to be convinced by the other. The only thing I do want to comment on is the part about disparate impact because I have done quite a bit of research on this. Disparate impact is a legal theory that can be used under certain statutes or laws, but definitely not all. It has been used in employment contexts most often and I believe it began with a sexism case. Traditionally it is used in Title VII cases and recently the Supreme Court adopted it for an ADEA case. It has not however been accepted for use under the FHA or ECOA which would be the two most on-point statutes used for a lending discrimination lawsuit.

I can’t wait to hear your thoughts on this.