Ben Franklin said that, not me, but increasingly I find myself turning to the timeless wisdom of our forefathers. I encourage all of you as you struggle through this battle to go back and read the words of our leaders and consider just how similar the issues they were facing then are today. (Ben Franklin)

The Revolutionary Warriors that we are all descendants of (either by blood or by ethic and ideology or both) faced seemingly insurmountable obstacles and challenges by the most powerful forces in their universe.  The sovereign powers and the economic interests were one in the same and the two combined to enslave physically, emotionally and spiritually the people who came to this speck of dirt and who were willing to work for a better way.

The voices of our founding forefathers still speak clearly to all of us when we tap into our true American character.  I believe in American exceptional ism. (American exceptionalism refers to the opinion that the United States is qualitatively different from other nations. In this view, America’s exceptionalism stems from its emergence from a revolution, becoming “the first new nation”,^[1] and developing a uniquely American ideology, based on liberty, egalitarianism, individualism, populism and laissez-faire.)

I believe that we alone, together, have the power to heal the wounds that are inflicted upon our country.  I believe that together we can overcome these profound challenges that our  nation faces.  Doing so will require shared sacrifice, courage and a return the community values and revolutionary principles that lie at the heart and soul of this United States of America.  Remember we are the United STATES of America.

The solution to our challenges lies within our State, within your State, within each State.  In Florida, we will turn to Florida Statutes 69.021.  We will submit to the wisdom and discretion of our elected circuit court judges and our elected Sheriffs.  When mortgage payments and ownership are in dispute, our homesteaders will pay their payments each month to an elected circuit court judge.  Our elected Sheriffs will refuse to enforce judgments which are morally and legally repugnant, while at the same time our Sheriffs will require that homesteaders protect the property, support their community and make payments monthly to the court as a condition of maintaining their homestead.

Our corps of  90,469 attorneys who are licensed to practice law in the State of Florida will meet with judges, with banks, with elected and appointed officials and we will present for our stakeholders the solutions which will secure our state from the civil unrest that will surely come if the estimated 569,000 foreclosures that will be pending by 2011 are granted under current conditions.

We must all examine our United States Constitution.  There was a reason why the  First Amendment came first.  I want you all to click that link and consider the practical impact of our press and your right to talk, to write, to protest, to share your unique experience with the world, with Congress, with your President and with the world.  Consider the brilliance of our forefathers and the implication of our First Amendment right in today’s internet age.  Our Constitution lives in the sprawling, chaotic, belligerent, unrestrained forum that is the internet…today’s public square.  We must all fight to protect our public square.

The foreclosure crisis continues unabated and will only get worse as economic conditions continue to decline in the United States.  The foreclosure mediation programs starting across the state risk being dismal failures because the lender representative, who is supposed to have “full settlement authority”, really has only a very narrow range of options to offer the borrower.  Often these narrow few options are totally out of synch with the economic or practical realities such as when Indymac will refuses to allow an 84 year old sick and disabled woman to stay in her home under a reduced payment when they will lose at least half the balance of the loan if they take it back or when a servicer fails to accept a reasonable modification that is just a few dollars shy of their pre-programmed guidelines or when a servicer fails to accept a short sale because they’re holding out for an absurd sales price that they will never, ever receive.

INVESTOR/SERVICER LAWSUITS PILE UP

Later today I’m going to post an excellent lawsuit where a group of investors is suing a group of mortgage trusts alleging fraud in the sale of the deal to the investors.  Previously I’ve posted a lawsuit where other investors were suing the servicer for failing to act prudently in managing the mortgage payments and other obligations.  The point of all of this is that whole system is broken down very badly.  Individual attorneys like myself and others are reporting the absurd conduct of the attorneys and clients (how can attorneys pursue cases in circuit courts when they have no contact with their clients?), but increasingly these issues are going to have to be addressed at the much bigger levels of the investors and servicers…..the bottom line is the investors who bought these “shitty” mortgage deals are the ones holding the bag and their servicers and their attorneys are not acting in the investor’s best interests to proceed with these cases.

There are two avenues where these wrongs will start to be addressed:

1. Continued Institutional Litigation

(From the website subprime shakeout)

Heard on this Street this week: the super-secret Syndicate of MBS Investors discussed previously is gaining momentum.  A confidential source has informed me that some of the largest institutional investors in mortgage-backed securities have now joined the group, bringing the amount under management to ”hundreds of billions of dollars in MBS investments.”  The source further informed me that this number is expected to swell to a “jaw-dropping dollar figure.”

As discussed before, the Syndicate hopes to amass enough representation in enough securitizations throughout the country to take over those trusts pursuant to the terms of the respective Pooling and Servicing Agreements (PSAs).  These contracts often require 25% class ownership to petition the Trustee to take action and 50% ownership to fire the Trustee or Master Servicer.