Anarcissie—I dont know. History is filled with people who just decided that they could not , in good conscience, do what they were legally obligateed t o do. Sometimes the consequences, were dire, sometimes not.

What if a whole lot of people all agreed that this “just wasnt right”? Who could stop them? That is basically what happened with Vietnam Vets Against the WaR.

I’m sure you have done it—said, “I just cannot do this”. Civil disobedience is an example.

KDelphi—I don’t think people have much choice (as individuals), unless they’re lucky enough to be quite well off.  Most landlords, bankers, brokers and so forth are subject to the same economic rules as the rest of the people.  If they go easy on their tenants and customers, then they won’t be able to pay their mortgages, taxes, and other obligations.  And if someone is so well off they can defy the rules to some extent, you have to wonder how they got that well off, since acquiring significant wealth seems to involve practices most of us (as you note) find repugnant.

Anarcissie—good points. As long as people can say, “well, thats not ME, so they must have deserved their situation”.

Or, they will say, “If you were in the brokers’/bankers’/thieves’ position, you would have done the same!”. NO I wouldnt have. And I am willing to bet that most on this thread, although they might need/want more goods , would have serious limits to which they would not go to obtain them.

I find this whole situation riddled with inconsistencies. The banks call these homes toxic-assets. They don’t seem to even really want the properties.  The people who value the homes are being thrown in the street while the home sits empty and deteriorates.

These banks have done the unforgivable and the undefendable. They have created policies that obviously have destroyed and fooled people.  How is this not fraud?? It is fraud by any other name and these banks are establishments of theft and flim-flammery. Usury is a crime.

The squatters who have been exploited by the greedy lenders with unregulated loan packages, have no other way to be heard.
Its hardly the fault of the delinquent residents that our congress sold their jobs and shipped them out to China and India.

If you follow the link to the New York Times article, at least as of the moment, you’ll see it’s headed by a picture of a lot of fat cullud folks lying in a pile on a dirty mattress on the floor.  In short, a message to the White Folks not to get too interested in the practice.  It might be just the Times’s infallibly insufferable sense of upper-class privilege and entitlement, but I had the idea that some editor thought the implicit message of Leland’s article had to be undercut—that someone sensed the revolutionary potential in the situation.  Because real estate, in recent times, has been the primary nexus through which working and poor people have been kept under the control of the ruling class.  You can scavenge food and clothing, but you’ve got to either pay for a place to live or beg someone else to pay for it.  You have to attach yourself to an employer or the Welfare department.  You have to submit.

Spread the word.  We live in interesting times.

While not exactly legal, the idea of squatting in a foreclosed home, is one of the things that will make this administration stand up and take notice. The very idea of using a home that has been foreclosed is anathema to most Americans, but in most civilized countries is a concept that is not one that is abhorred.
When being foreclosed upon, a person or family, should in court, force the foreclosing entity to produce the deed, not the mortgage. The deed is the only proper form of ownership that entitles any entity to foreclose someones home.
Mr. Micheal Stoops, whom I have had the pleasure of meeting and working with, has the right idea, do the move-in of families out in the open, letting the neighbours know that the family that will be living in the house are not drug addicts and mentally ill.
This will prove to the government that families, most
of all need the help, not the Wall Street Thugs that caused this economic mess and are now trying to get away with murder by giving themselves bonuses for taking a sound economic system and ruining it with deregulation and shameful waste of taxpayer money.
All the while, the taxpayer, losing their home, is now living out on the street without help and without the governments assistance.
We live in a topsy-turvy, ‘Alice through the Looking Glass’ world, when the very people that caused the economic crisis are awarding themselves billions of dollars in bonuses, while the working class, and working poor cannot afford the basic necessities of life.
Power to the People, Peace Out. Do not fight, but use the system to gain control of the assets that you have and worked hard for all your life.

Re: KDelphi

Yes, in fact I have seen the doc.  Good Stuff.  You betcha!  The People see the writing on the wall, and they “read” better than is “formulated”.  Hang tough.

Outraged—I love that song, by the Dixie Chicks!! Did you see the doc they did about it?

Squatting is perfectly legal in most industrialized countries. I think that it is a good idea! Better than the govt using “our” (former) money to buy them up as parts of “toxic assets”!

Good for them.  This one goes out to all who persevere…..

“Forgive, sounds good
Forget, I’m not sure I could
They say time heals everything
But I’m still waiting

I’m not ready to make nice
I’m not ready to back down
I’m still mad as hell and
I don’t have time to go round and round and round”  ......The Dixie Chicks, most especially Natalie Maines.

Thank you Natalie.  A credit to humanity.