If so, what percentage of those who had foreclosures due to predatory lending practices, loss of jobs or illness?

Secondly, I don’t want to sound paranoid, but, on CNN there was this talk show host, Bill Bootz who accused “poor people” who were financially irresponsible for the economic situation we are witnessing today. Does statistical data support these accusations?

What about the Large Developers that OVER BUILT in many communities across this entire country, driving the housing prices and tax base to the ceiling in a slow-economy environment. There are more empty, ” never sold homes” populating my community. How does this factor into the housing crisis equation?

Construction Costs, the affects of gentrification on poor communities, shifts in the economy and how it impacts the general citizenry was also a factor to be considered. Greedy Developers are also never mentioned. What to this data?

It makes more sense that this housing crisis can be the result of NEW HOME DEVELOPMENT COSTS driving the banking industry to provide LARGE LOAN PACKAGES, and creating a situation where the supply of housing outpaced the demand for new housing. An increase in the housing stock in an inflationary environment and where there are busts in any particular industry providing employment is certainly a recipe for eventual failure.

The Saving and Loan Crisis is a recent example of this type of failure. Did we repeat this mistake and are now are using poor people and programs that assisted poor people with homeownership as the scapegoats for this disaster? The magnitude is too out of proportion. I feel that the truth is being denied or suppressed.

My paranoia come from my studies around the strategies of the Nazis and their initial justification for persecuting and eventually exterminating the poor living in the ghettos of Germany. The poor were convenient, powerless scapegoats who were blamed for the down-turn in Germany’s economy.

Scapegoating was a very affective tool for killing Sadam Hussein and thousands of Iraqi citizens. The American citizenry digested those lies and parroted the lies as if they were God’s truth and so history repeats itself again.

We are in danger of repeating this destructive behavior again. In America, the code word for non-white citizens is “the poor”. I am witnessing a growing and disturbing movement toward laying the blamed for this economic down-turn at the feet of loyal, hardworking citizens.

If you know Mr. Bill Bootz or those in the CNN agency who failed to challenge this man, please help by sharing these concerns if the facts do not support the accusations. Blaming the so-called “poor” should not be allowed to roll so easily off of the tongues of the accusers. The consequences are just too great.

SINCERELY,

MARY E. HARDEN

WTF?

RealtyTrac explains this by saying this percentage might not be totally accurate due to improvements in its collection systems. What does that mean? Were the 07 numbers wrong? Are the 08 numbers wrong? How do you have a 6000% difference and not explain it in a hell of a lot more detail? And why do the media just rely on RealtyTrace without any further digging?

If the City Paper wants to know what the DC numbers are, then send a staffer to the Recorder of Deeds office and check the stats.