In a panel discussion on Monday, John Dugan, head of the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency reported,

[R]ecent data showed that after three months, nearly 36 percent of borrowers who received restructured mortgages in the first quarter re-defaulted.

The rate of re-default jumped to about 53 percent after six months and 58 percent after eight months, Dugan said, without providing an explanation for the trend.

Regulators speaking at an OTS-housing forum did not provide any explanations for the causes behind the data.

Regulators speaking at an OTS-housing forum did not provide any explanations for the causes behind the data.

“We don’t know the answers yet, but these are the types of questions that we have begun asking our servicers in detail,” Dugan said.

Sheila Bair, chairman of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp, who has been pushing for fast and systematic loan modifications, said regulators need to examine re-default data more closely.

“I think it’s very important to look at this data carefully and know what it says and what it doesn’t say,” Bair said.

Homeowners re-defaulting after getting aid; by John Poirier and Karey Wutkowski, edited by Brian Moss; Reuters; Dec 8, 2008, 2:10pm EST.

They don’t know, and they don’t want to know. Somehow, they’ll finesse, obfuscate, and sidestep the truth; and if necessary, flat out lie.

We already knew the reason for the original mortgage meltdown—the handing out of mortgages with little or no money down, on the basis of race or ethnicity, to people who had previously proved themselves not creditworthy. Indeed, mortgage bankers had known under what conditions lending is successful or leads to defaults, respectively, for generations but had been coerced into ignoring that hard-won knowledge through the original and amended versions of the Community Reinvestment Act (CRA).

Indeed, we learn elsewhere that during the very same panel discussion, the participants had already ruled the truth out of bounds:

OTS director John Reich insisted [CRA] “had absolutely nothing to do with the mortgage crisis.” FDIC chief Sheila Bair said it was a “myth,” adding that “it’s really unfortunate that this is out there.” “It’s simply not true,” she asserted. Next up was Comptroller of the Currency John Dugan, who agreed the CRA “certainly was not the cause of the subprime crisis.”

Though they offered little evidence to support their assertions, a Fed governor released findings of a study the Fed did with the Brookings Institution to quash the idea the CRA encouraged high-risk subprime lending to uncreditworthy borrowers.

In a speech to the “Confronting Concentrated Poverty Policy Forum,” Randall Kroszner asserted that CRA-mandated loans are “nearly as profitable” as conventional loans. He cited a 2000 Fed study on CRA loan performance.

A careful reading of the 99-page report finds evidence that seems to undercut his conclusion that CRA loans are just as safe. For example, the study found that “nearly 90% of large banking institutions report higher 30-89 day delinquency rates for CRA-related home lending than for overall home lending.”

CRA Defenses Sound More Like CYA, Investor’s Business Daily, Posted December 9, 2008.

This forked-tongue routine reminds me of back in 1999, when the NAACP began its successful campaign to blackmail (pun intended) the TV networks into hiring even more talentless blacks to fill primetime shows that fewer and fewer Americans found entertaining. A few months later, New York Daily News TV critic David Bianculli criticized the baneful influence of “political correctness,” while emphasizing that his criticism did not apply to the NAACP campaign.[TV TONIGHT,  July 2, 2001,]

On Monday, the Wall Street Journal published a letter from the FDIC’s “Director Office of Public Affairs,” claiming that the re-defaults were only running at “15 percent.”

These folks really need to get their lies straight.

A market economy cannot run, and a free society cannot long endure, based on false information. For dictatorships, and for the racial socialist calling himself “Barack Obama,” however, deception works just fine, thank you.

A tip ‘o’ the hat to Bill Quick at the Daily Pundit.

As John Kass of the Chicago Tribune points out, the media in 2008 devoted far more attention to a Vice-Presidential candidate’s career in a small town in Alaska than to a Presidential candidate’s career in the transportation hub of the United States.

The best antidote for the media miasma about the next President of the United States is … my book, America’s Half-Blood Prince: Barack Obama’s “Story of Race and Inheritance,” which you can buy here. I get a really nice cut of out of each book sold, so I’d greatly appreciate it if you’d pick up a copy or two.

Remember Lewiston, Maine? The town of 36,000 became controversial in 2002 when it complained about the burden the sudden influx of a thousand tribal refugees made upon the post-industrial town, particularly on the welfare system and the schools. When Mayor Laurier Raymond asked Somalis to stop coming because Lewiston was overwhelmed, he was condemned as a racist by Somalis who had purposely come to Maine because of its generous welfare benefits.

Here’s an update referring mostly to the numbers…

Seven years after Somali immigrants began relocating to Lewiston, the city estimates there are 3,500 immigrant residents now, with the number expected to crest to more than 4,000 in 2009.

“The last few years we’ve averaged 25 to 30 arrivals a month,” according to Deputy City Administrator Phil  Nadeau, a number that is not reflected in the 2007 adjusted Census figures.
[Census count will be critical to Lewiston, Lewiston Sun Journal, December 10, 2008]

In other words, “They keep coming.”

As I wrote in my 2003 VDARE.com article, Banned In Lewiston? Female Genital Mutilation, the prevalence of FGM, a form of culturally accepted child torture, is practically universal among Somalis with a prevalence of 98 percent. It is a crime in this county and a human rights outrage, but Washington has been particularly generous in granting refugee slots to Somalis.

In other Somali news, dozens of young tribal fellows residing in America recently left for their homeland in order to pursue jihad. In fact one, Shirwa Ahmed, blew up himself along with 29 other people.

Is America diverse enough yet?

Below, colorful Somalis in Lewiston.

Politico.com has 7 Blago questions for Obama. Via Instapundit, who asks “Will he hear any of these at his next press conference?” Answer, given the press’s overwhelming devotion to Obama, “No.”

But the first question, “Did you communicate directly or indirectly with Blagojevich about picking your replacement in the U.S. Senate?” , misses the obvious follow-up, “And if not, why not?”

Obama is the Democratic Junior Senator from Illinois, Blagojevich is the Democratic Governor of Illinois, and unlike Hillary Clinton, whose appointment as Secretary of State was a big surprise, Obama knew when he first  announced he was running for President (May 2007) that his Senate seat would be vacant if he won, and that Blagojevich would be appointing his replacement. Why didn’t he deal with it then?

It reminds of something that W.S. Gilbert is said to have written  to a British  railway company in the nineteenth century:“Sir, Sunday morning, although recurring at regular and well foreseen intervals, always seems to take this railway by surprise.”

The fact that Obama would be leaving a Senate vacancy if he won  was as predictable as Sunday, and he should have been talking about it to Blagojevich.  If he wasn’t talking to him about it, it isn’t corruption, it’s incompetence,

When I wrote an item title Illegal Immigration Enthusiast Rod Blagojevich Arrested For Corruption you might think that it’s because we specialize in immigration issues that it would strike me that way.But it’s not just me, illegals and their friends feel the same way.
Illinois reader Dawn Mueller writes

Leaders of the illegal alien front group Illinois Coalition for Immigrant & Refugee Rights–an Illinois Democratic Party organization that aids & abets illegal aliens–are bemoaning Blagojevich’s political demise.

Here’s the story:

Public officials continue to rail against Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich after his arrest on federal corruption charges. But some Illinois residents say they’re feeling conflicted.

“He’s undertaken quite a number of initiatives designed to benefit immigrants in our state,” says Fred Tsao, [Email] policy director of the Illinois Coalition for Immigrant and Refugee Rights. “Being the son of a Serbian immigrant himself, he definitely understood immigration on a very deep and personal level.”

Governor’s Arrest Leaves Mixed Feelings
Chip Mitchell,WBEZ (Chicago Public Radio, December 10, 2008

Dave Gorak has been on to the ICIRR for a long time–see Illegal In Illinois—The Treason Lobby Does Chicago, among others.

So, back into the breach again in the war against Christmas, launched in fine style for us by Max Blumenthal at The Daily Beast. His essay is really reverberating around the left blogosphere.

Clearly, the primary stratagem of the anti-Christmas forces this year is to allege that objecting to the suppression of Christmas is anti semitic. That was obviously the purpose of the Blumenthal article. This is a serious mistake on their part, because it is a very two edged sword. Watch this space!.

At present most of the anti-anti War on Christmas writers, though, are still using the previous years’ tactical manual, screaming that there no such thing as a War on Christmas. I have dealt with this previously.

However, before the blood is really flowing, it is pleasant to remember those writers, not themselves Christians, who have written elegant and kindly pieces deploring this war. One is Burt Prelutsky, whose reward was to have his name mis spelled and his Jewishness impugned by Blumenthal. In 2006 I noted a particularly graceful article by Amity Shlaes:

Protestant Christians, with some notable exceptions, have been good hosts over the years to those of who don’t believe precisely the same things they do. In the U.S., the Christmas tree has earned a right to be a symbol of general tolerance.

And this year we have Merry Christmas, Merry Christmas, Merry Christmas by Jeffrey Goldberg The Atlantic 08 December 2008:

I’m perfectly happy living in a country that is populated mainly by Christians, particularly Christians who show nothing but acceptance for their fellow citizens who happen to follow other religions. So it doesn’t sit well with me that Christians now feel constrained to offer the anodyne “Happy Holidays” rather than a greeting that touches directly on the reason for our seasonal merriment.

So, my Christian sisters and brothers, feel absolutely free to greet me with “Merry Christmas,” and I’ll greet you right back…The important thing is to not be afraid.

Unfortunately, Jeffrey Goldberg has subsequently had to deal with reality. Rudolph the Jewish-American Reindeer 10 Dec 2008 reports

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” caused a stir at a New Hanover County (North Carolina) school. A parent complained about the song’s religious reference and got it pulled from her child’s kindergarten Christmas show at Murrayville Elementary School. The song was pulled “because it had the word Christmas in it,” said Rick Holliday, assistant school superintendent.

A Jewish mother, who didn’t want her name published, objected to what she called “religious overtones” in the song. So the principal agreed to pull it from the program.

Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reinder causes stir at school WRAL.com Dec 9 2008

Goldberg points out that there is a whole genre of Christmas songs written by Jews in the middle decades of the 20th Century of which Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer was one:

Why, you could almost say there’s a conspiracy by Jews to dominate the Christmas-jingle-writing industry!

New Hanover County is essentially Wilmington North Carolina, 80% White, 17% Black 2% Hispanic: Old America. Probably less than 1% is Jewish: no wonder the

Jewish mother…didn’t want her name published.

The VDARE.com reaction: The New Hanover School District bureaucrats are either despicable cowards or agents of evil. Complain to Dr. Rick Holliday, Assistant Superintendent, and Dr. Al Lerch, Superintendent.

I like visiting Angel Island in the San Francisco Bay very much. You can take a BART train to the Ferry Building, then catch a boat out to the island. When I visited last summer, I did the 5-mile hike of the perimeter where the views of the Bay are unique and keep changing as you walk.

One change I noticed at that time was the sturdy fencing around the old Immigration Station–it was protected like Fort Knox, because of the expensive refurbishing of the place to emphasize the suffering of the Chinese immigrant wanna-bes.

It was called the Ellis Island of the West, but there is a major difference. Ellis Island welcomed immigrants from Europe “yearning to be free,” as the inscription on the Statue of Liberty puts it. Angel Island’s immigrants were mostly from China. And they were clearly unwelcome.

There’s long been an exhibit on the island about its immigration station. Tuesday, State Park rangers showed off an expanded exhibit, which will open to the public Feb. 15. The centerpiece is a restored barracks.

The building has been repainted, bunk beds immigrants slept in have been set up, strewn with clothes they might have worn, luggage they might have carried and games they might have played.

The view out the windows to the north was glorious on a bright December day. But in those days, the doors were guarded, the windows were covered with escape-proof steel mesh, and the place has all the charm of a medium-security prison. [Bitter memories of Ellis Island of the West, By Carl Nolte, San Francisco Chronicle, December 11, 2008 ]

There’s no mention of the cost to the taxpayers of the deluxe new shrine to victimhood.

The reader has to pay close attention to how people’s experiences are described to understand that the “subterfuge” employed by the Chinese is outright fraud.

The immigrants had to resort to subterfuge to clear immigration. Wong’s parents, Gee Seow Hong, his father, and Gee Theo Quee, his mother, had to lie about their relationship to get into the United States. Wong’s father was the son of a citizen, but his wife was not a citizen herself. So she pretended to be Gee Seow Hong’s sister, and that her daughter, Li Keng, was her niece.

Later, when the family lived in Oakland and Gee Theo Quee became pregnant, there were further complications, since the Gees were not exactly who they said they were.

So they paid a man named Wong and assumed his name. The family, which ran a restaurant in Oakland’s Chinatown, had six daughters and a son, all of them named Wong.

Chinese were able to work this scam because the immigration records were destroyed in the San Francisco earthquake and fire in 1906–The Great Quake: Out of chaos came new Chinese America , [By Vanessa Hua, San Francisco Chronicle, April 13, 2006].

Yet when government buildings were destroyed a century ago, so were the birth and immigration records inside. Scores of Chinese recognized the serendipity, claiming citizenship and bringing in their children.

In many cases, for a fee, they also brought in people who weren’t their children. Hundreds of those friends and strangers, who came to be known as “paper sons,” arrived in the Bay Area in the following decades, changing Chinese America forever.

The attitude of many Chinese is that the Chinese Exclusion Act (1882-1943) was racist and therefore Chinese rationalize their lawbreaking as necessary, even though there is no right to immigrate. But the Chinese wanted to come to America to make money so they committed fraud, and now are complaining about being treated poorly on Angel Island.