You didn't specify that. You said there were no options. Nice backpeddle.

There are options for VA, FHA, Freddie, Fannie and even USDA for refi. If you have a loan that falls outside of those options, then you're in the extreme minority. Even with private bank loans, there are internal programs for refinancing an underwater house even over 100% LTV.

90%+ of mortgages are backed by Freddie Mac/Fannie Mae.

I was also able to refi for about 3.2% with a poor LTV due to HARP. The original point you were trying to make was so dense and under-informed it's mind bottling.

It's pretty clear the decrease in refis year over year is due to interest rates being about 1% higher than they were last year.

There are issues with purchase money mortgages, particularly for non-Qualified Mortgages, a new term of art under Dodd-Frank, and banks being able to lend, but that's a whole different issue and one that will likely sort itself out in the coming year.

In fairness, I believe this is a new mortgage origination number rather than the percentage of the entire mortgage market.

Yeah, I know there is little to no strategic interest here but I'm good with us helping. Its good to see that Britain and China will help also. Waiting to hear the details.

310 killed in latest Boko Haram attack; kidnapped girls still missing - CNN.com

Send the SEALS in and Boko Haram will turn a Whiter Shade of Pale.

















(alright, it's the best I can do without my morning coffee)

Can I say that Boko Haram are thugs or is that racist?

Depends on whether or not they would talk trash after a football game.

By all means, let's get more involved in Syria.

My Way News - Rebels blow up historic Aleppo hotel in Syria

My reaction to this was "hmmm".

Nearly half of all home sales all-cash deals
http://money.cnn.com/2014/05/08/real...sh-home-sales/

Yeah ... hopefully that's roughly the same reaction that a variety of law enforcement agencies had as well.

Isn't there some big move by hedge funds to buy family homes and then rent them out(and presumably wait for the next big price bubble to sell)? I would assume those are mostly cash deals.

I've gotten a bunch of unsolicited offers to sell my house for cash - they want to tear it down and build a bigger house on the lot to sell. (My house is old, and tiny, but is on a big lot in a nice area). There's a lot of new construction in my neighborhood, I suppose from similar deals.

Not really. The move by hedge funds is to make higher interest rate loans to non-qualified mortgage buyers and then package those loans in bulk into securities. Hedge funds in general don't want to manage properties.

I wonder how Dennis Rodman is interpreting this?

Stay cool Obama.

U.S. criticizes racist North Korean screed against Obama - The Washington Post

I didn't know one of my uncles spoke Korean.

People are lining up to vote for that guy in the midwestern primaries

Keith Crisco dies at his home just days after primary | abc11.com

edit: Since the headline doesn't give the key detail, this is the guy who was locked in the primary battle with Clay Aiken in NC.

Hmmm....

Seventy-one year old man suffers a fall and dies at his home. Not sure I see much of a story there.

He's a congressional candidate, that's pretty much "a story" anywhere.

Hell, the jokes have already begun about Clay "I'm Not Finishing Second THIS Time" Aiken.

Unless he slipped on....cooking oil.

DUN DUN DUNNNNNNNN.

Well, some voters did think he was {wait for it} a slippery character.

GROAN

I think we need a new thread after that one.

Nah, I suspect no one wants to go back to the days of dozens of "POL" threads that we had from '06-'10....

I do

I'm not a fan of the superthread concept

+1

Besides, it's much easier for me to troll Jon if everything's neatly in one thread. :D

It's ok, we'll just have a new thread in 2017 for the next Prez ;).

Honestly, I doubt we'll have time given all the posting we'll be doing about the end of Game of Thrones.

So an Idaho federal judge declared the state's gay marriage ban unconstitutional. Pending a stay (which I guess is likely), the weddings start Friday. I've always kind of wanted to go to a rushed "beat the court stay" gay wedding and reception, maybe I'll get an invite. If only to convince my girlfriend that's the way to go (courthouse and party v. months of planning and tens of thousands of dollars - but also, a rushed gay wedding party would be fun.). I wonder what impact this will have on next week's primaries, which the media and candidates are playing up as a battle for the "soul of the Republican party" in Idaho. The tea party thing has kind of fizzled out nationally, but it seems to be growing a little here. Big business is supporting a couple of prominent tea partiers is elections against regular Republicans. And its a closed primary, so the far right has a real shot. I registered for a party for the first time in my life just to vote. The results could have some interesting ramifications for me career-wise.

I had no idea you lived in Idaho.

Moved here in 2006. (Edit: I'm a New England transplant with law school in between.....there are kind of surprisingly a TON of northeast transplants here.)

The job market must be picking up. The homeless guy that's been living in one of my sheds for the past three years found himself a job.

Couldn't get the embedded video to start at the right time, but it gets good at 34:16 for about 30 seconds.

The Idaho Governor GOP Nominee Debate

There's totally not enough spiritual warfare in politics.

And this debate lacked usual perennial candidate "Pro-life". That's his name, he's an organic strawberry farmer, and I believe he opposes abortion.

The general governor election in November will include a libertarian candidate who won a private contract to supply prosecution services to Idaho's second largest county. It was a big contract, supporting dozens of employees. The county paid him up front. He transferred the money to his private account, apparently just spent it all, ran out of money to run the prosecution office, and resigned. And then he was acquitted of the subsequent criminal charges. He was accused of falsifying evidence in that case, was charged with that, and was acquitted again. (There were also two hung juries in there somewhere) Then last week he got acquitted when the U.S. Attorney's office went after him for bankruptcy fraud.

Started it at 34:16, listened to the guy talk about spiritual warfare, thought it was amusing, starting laughing when they changed to a wider angle and saw the guy next to him....

Moderator: That question was about taxes.

That's where I lost it.

Barlow: Mayor Quimby, you're well-known, sir, for your lenient stance on crime. But suppose for a second that _your_ house was ransacked by thugs, _your_ family tied up in the basement with socks in their mouths, you try to open the door but there's too much _blood_ on the knob --
Quimby: What is your question?
Barlow: My question is about the budget, sir.

http://www.snpp.com/episodes/2F02.html

SI

33:50 ftw

I would love to vote for a guy named "Butch" Otter at least once.

Not bad, but he's still got a ways to go to match Donald Sterling here.

I didn't realize Joad Cressbeckler was based on a real person.

Old, Grizzled Third-Party Candidate Threatens McCain's Base - YouTube

what the fuck

Descent is the highest form of patriotic

Dola,

In that Idaho debate video, I kept waiting for a "Live, from New York, it's Saturday Night!" that never came.

Makes the GA primary seem normal. The one where there was a fight to see who was the most conservative culminating in a "you didn't even vote for Saxby Chambliss" barb that had the frontrunner speechless. These commercials are silly, they all just say that the person supports guns, wants to end Obamacare, and will value the sanctity of life and marriage...better than their conservative opponent.

I've done it. Our governor rides a horse and wears a cowboy hat. And he's the least goofy of the 4 candidates, and also the most liberal. And there's nothing at all of substance on the Democratic side. Which makes sense, because the November election is a formality. Even though Idaho did have exclusively Democratic governors all through the 70s and 80s and half the 90s. Weird state.

The saddest thing about this primary -- 7 candidates worth -- is that there really doesn't seem to be but one candidate worth a shit in the entire affair ... and he stepped on a third rail with me the other day & ended his chances of getting my vote. A motley collection of RINO's and frauds if there's ever been one. Even worse, these are the best options available in November.

Truly, this is quite possibly THE most depressing race of my voting life.

Nobody wants to run in our house district as a democrat. The only guy to make the primary ballot with enough signatures is 26 years old. Granted it's a losing proposition most likely. I think it went D 1 time in maybe the past 18 cycles or so.

That's nothing, my best friend's sister makes $67 /hr on the laptop . She has been out of work for seven months but last month her pay check was $12263 just working on the laptop for a few hours...

I think we need to know is what company and are they still hiring? :)

I got that email, too!

SI

That's one of those districts where the only way the challenging party wins is if it's late in the race and the other candidate gets caught with, what's the cliche again, a dead woman or a live boy.

SI

Going to need pics to validate the story

So some right wing terrorists want to overthrow the government today in what they're calling "Operation American Spring". Organizers expect 10-30 million "patriots" to show up.

Apparently their version of America is one that doesn't tolerate any viewpoints but their own.

Anyone doing a sweepstake on how many actually turn up? - I'll take 30,000 ....

30.

this, however I'm sure the organizer's will claim at least 30,000

I'm sure however many do show up, they will have the rage equal to 30 million people.

That's obviously what they meant originally.

Live stream of the revolution!
Operation American Spring on USTREAM: Operation American Spring Live Video by Uncle Sams Misguided Children. Political News

I think they may actually have about 50 people!

OH NO, THEY'VE BROKEN OUT THE BENGHAZI SIGNS!

Now someone they're calling Chaos is speaking, he has a bunch of flags.

There are DOZENS of us. Dozens!

There's also a video where one of them say they should begin by singing the national anthem and then starts to lead everyone with, "Oh beautiful..."

Now to current speaker is claiming to know Obama's true identity and says if Obama doesn't like what he has to say can go back to Kenya.

They need to make this into a reality show

Just remember everyone, this is not a protest

Has Obama resigned or fled the country yet?

I'm glad they are pressuring to get the truth about what happened at the Bengaza Strip

Ah, the classic Doobie Keebler tactic.

Judging by the comments on any article, there are plenty of companies and the labor force participation rate among the nation's best friend's sisters/aunts/cousins/former roommates is now at 100%.

Guys...guys...the fucking #OperationAmericanSpring hashtag is pure fucking gold.

Some gems

Asia ‏@Prescribed_Naps 36m
What do we want?
Less government in our lives.
When do we want it?
After our Social Security check clears
#OperationAmericanSpring #tcot

Tina Dupuy ‏@TinaDupuy 4h
The people waving the KKK flag on the mall are complaining that Obama is anti-Semitic? #OperationAmericanSpring

Gail Simone ‏@GailSimone 4h
Look, don't feel bad, #OperationAmericanSpring! Eight people is a fine turnout, considering the View is on!

Gen JC Xtian patriot ‏@JC_Christian 9h
It may look like there are less than a dozen of us, but that's because thev2 million others are wearing camo #operationamericanspring

John NoWayNRA™ ‏@azmoderate 13m
#OperationAmericanSpring were expecting 10 to 30 million. Problem was they told them to meet at the Capital & they ended up in Richmond

False flag operation by liberals to make conservatives look foolish.

I just threw up in my mouth a little.


Was that the guy who made the crack about the other candidate not having a college education?


Speaking as a member of the Liberal Assembling False Flag committee, I can tell you this isn't one of ours, though I can understand the confusion as we do have a large number of them going on.

Twitter looks for Operation American Spring: ‘Where is everybody? I’m confused’

Don't worry. They've gone to the classic "someone hacked my Twitter account" that works so well for celebrities

SI

Nah, the third rail guy was probably the most certain vote I'd ever had in my life -- Paul Broun -- who decided that he's more into simply hating everything the federal government does instead of staying the hell out of the way when they manage (granted, in spite of themselves) to get something right (enforcement of federal drug laws).

Several people have referenced, subtly or not so, the lack of college education possessed by Karen Handel.

Perdue is apparently too rich, Handel doesn't have a college degree, the rest are simply running on guns, marriage, and how much they hate everything the government does. They must have gotten the memo that the one who hates Obamacare and government the most will win. Oddly, I saw somewhere that the public does not support a full repeal, but I'm guessing that's heavily along partisan lines and the best way to win your primary is to walk around with an assault rifle threatening to harm anyone who is against traditional marriage and pro-Obamacare.

Hope overthrow gov't thing doesn't turn ugly at 5:00 when 30,000,000 "patriots" ready for dinner realize DC doesn't have a Cracker Barrel.

— Col. Morris Davis (@ColMorrisDavis) May 16, 2014

:lol:

Perdue is just too related to his cousin (the tax raising/flag-chaging ex-governor) for me to trust him an inch, Handel lost any chance with me after the poorly handled (no pun intended) revelation of her Log Cabin Republicans membership during her failed gubernatorial bid 4 years ago.

Regarding Michelle's speech in Kansas.

60 years after Brown v. Board, Michelle Obama tells Topeka students that are its ‘legacy’ – CNN Political Ticker - CNN.com Blogs

My son's high school was in the news (he wasn't part of it) ...

Students hang N-word banner at Georgia high school - CNN.com

Over Fri night dinner, I asked him if any of the African Americans were insulted by this prank. He said he didn't think so as Drake is part African American and everyone knew it was from the song.

The stats is what I thought was interesting as it aligns with Michelle's comments about population moving from "cities to suburbs". Having gone to my kids grade-middle-high school functions, there is a noticeable lack of African American presence ... definitely a higher number of Asian/Indian in the minority ranks.

I thought it was interesting how the GOP won against the TP candidates ... see the bolded text. Wonder if this will be a real shift in GOP or just something to win elections.

5 things we learned on Tuesday - CNN.com

I mostly agree with the article, and I'd say it's two things:

1. The GOP establishment candidates are running better primary campaigns, and a large part of that is taking the TP threat seriously. This was definitely not the case in previous years.

2. GOP establishment candidates have moved rightward to help fend off the TP candidates.

I suspect it was easier to get the big GOP money behind the establishment candidates after they saw how Akin, Murdock, etc torpedoed the chance at the Senate last time.

SI

One thing I think the article discounts, at least in the snippet you posted, is that in order to appeal to the broader electorate those candidates are going to have to come back to the center, but if they do that they risk

a) alienating the TP-base
b) having the democrats (and angry TPers) paint them as dishonest

Plus, by running off to the right to fend off the TP they've given the Democrats facing them in the general plenty of ammunition to go after them with.

It's an interesting development, but it's yet to be seen if it can actually be effective in a general election, let alone in multiple general elections.

Being that I know the area very well (grew up basically one county over, worked there for a couple of years) there isn't quite the "cities to suburbs" effect in this instance.

Here's a map of the state black population by percentage. That clear line of demarcation for most of the north? The current figures are often all-time highs for percentage of black population, at least in my lifetime (and I'm getting kinda old). Those are areas where there's never really been a minority presence, likely attributable to the fact that the area was largely poor & not farm rich back to the antebellum era. I mean, I can literally name every single black person I ever went to school with, that's how few there were/how small a percentage of the population we're talking about.

edit to add: The map isn't displaying as an image, if you're interested in what I'm referring to then you can see it here
http://www.indexmundi.com/facts/unit...percentage#map

I'm not sure any of that matters if the Dems continue to rely on a message of, "We're not as bad as them." There are so many things the Dems could run, but they are content to be as uninspiring as possible.

Realistically alienating the base won't do anything in this election. They'd cut off their own genitals before voting for a Democrat, and unlike the Democratic base, disaffection doesn't reduce turnout. It's largely old, white people in the TP base, and they're a voting metronome anyway.

I'm not sure independents are sympathetic enough to the TP to go "Oh, if THEY think this person is dishonest, I should probably vote for the Democrat instead," for one. For another, the polarization of politics between Democrats and Republicans is such that there's likely to be a fair bit of motivation questioning even if the Republican doesn't tack back to the center.

You ever notice that? Every Republican is the most extreme right-wing threat to the country in a generation and every Democrat is a left-wing extremist who wants your daughters to slut it up and abort the babies. I'm somehow on email lists for candidates from both parties, and I get 8-10 emails alleging the sins of one side or the other on a daily basis.

I've never seen "so-and-so is an honorable person who loves his/her country, but we can do better." Everybody's an extremist now.

Successive elections have shown that it's safe for Democrats to be uninspiring than to take concrete stances that open themselves to attack ads.

Well, it's Forsyth Freakin' County. ;) Of all of the places in metro Atlanta for black people to "migrate to the suburbs," just by reputation alone, I'm pretty sure that Forsyth County would be ranked roughly, oh, dead last. ;) (Note that in the line that Jon mentions, all of the counties due east and west of Forsyth have significantly higher population percentages of black people.) I strongly suspect that the reputation is no longer (for the most part) deserved, but it's there, so for many black people, Forsyth County is an option that would never even be considered. My personal experiences traveling there with majority-black Tucker football teams in the 2000s were always positive, and there was a very fun friendly band rivalry between Tucker's virtually-all-black band and North Forsyth's lily-white crew. They'd have an informal drumline battle of the bands on the track for a half hour or so every time we played them, either up there or at home, and it always ended with high fives and hugs.



I think you're forgetting that you grew up and live in a state where such a statement is unusual. ;)

Oh it's DEFINITELY something that's outside the state norm, I just wanted to point out that in that part of the state the low percentages are not anything remotely new.

For all the heat that Forsyth took during that very manufactured controversy back in the day, race was never anywhere near the issue there that it was in some other places I could name. Not that I would ever call out Fannin County (or even Dawson or Gilmer) as examples or anything ;)

But both historical and demographic trends point to a bad year. They might scrap by and hold the Senate, but they probably won't. I think they'd be in much better shape if they stood up for the ACA, a minimum wage increase and a Social Security increase. They could build it all around helping working families get ahead. There's also a bonus of two of the three being very popular.

I'm tired of a choice between bad ideas or no ideas.

Didn't know. I moved from Gwinett to Forsyth in 2001.

Race on The Oprah Show: A 25-Year Look Back

I do totally agree with you FWIW.

I think we should have blind-name, blind-party, issue-stance only voting.

No names on the ballot, no party identifiers, just "candidate a's stance on this issue is X, candidate b's stance on the issue is Y" for a number of defined issues, and make people actually vote that way.

Of course that would require some sort of arbitrator to define what the issues to be taking stances on were, so it's not a perfect solution, but it's what i'd like to see.

Then again, party identification largely covers the majority of those things ... and saves a whole lot of ink.

I noticed something interesting (to me anyhow) in the various bits & pieces from the latest Congressional dissatisfaction polls. I think it sort of fits with something I haven't quite been able to articulate as well as I'd like.

Americans' view of Congress: Throw 'em out - CBS News

Take this statement first:

And then this one


32% of R's say they're supporters of the Tea Party (or tea party, lowercase)
23% of R's say TP affiliation would make them more likely to back a candidate

Okay, so we could figure that somewhere between those two numbers are "tea partiers"

But then there's this


Go ahead, read that one again.

The "too little influence" number makes sense, right in between the two previous numbers. But what about the "right amount of influence" figure, which is a plurality in the demo?

Are those mostly people who just figure they really haven't had much impact?

Or is that the group where I tend to land but have never been able to articulate as well as I'd like? Something like "I like/appreciate the general idea behind their goals, I'm just not always thrilled with the organizational aspect / specific candidates/ something".

edit to add: At any rate, I just thought that was an interesting bit of potential paradox, figured I'd share it here.

Somewhere there's a village missing its idiot. Okay, there's lots of those but in this case I'm thinking of whomever put together this list.

White House outs CIA official by mistake - CNN.com