BOMBSHELL: Mass. Supreme Court Rules That Most Foreclosure Sales From Previous 5 Years Are VOID

Originally posted by poet1b
reply to post by BadNinja68

 

The problem is the people that make the laws are vested financially with the institutions that break the laws.

Yeah, those would be the politicians preaching about the glories of the free market, and tax cuts for the super rich.

At what time do people wake up and realized they have been conned by the whole free market scam.

Markets don't self regulate, which is why we need government to do what it is supposed to do, protect individuals from corporate, and other institutional abuses.

Vote out the free market preaching politicians, and vote in politicians who support cracking down on white collar crime, and the politicians who help the corporations rob our country blind.

While I appreciate your anger, at the corruption that has brought down our nation, I also realise that we have not had free markets for at 50 years.

Just look up "community reinvestment act" to see what I'm talking about.

WOW there could be a mess the who's left to pay the taxes then?

I just read the first page.

What if i bought a house and it was siezed and sold to me illegally and the previous owners come around and say Get out of our house!, do i have to leave? Does the previous owner still have legal title to his home? It seems to me he should.

I can see tons of people who were forced to be homeless want to go take their houses back and kick out the unlawful occupiers.

reply to post by poet1b


Sorry Poet - We disagree because you've failed to really think on the issue.

The reason bad loans got sold as good loans is because of free market deregulation nonsense that weakens the laws and the enforcement of rules that prevent this type of con from being pulled.

Laws do not prevent an activity - merely punish it.

Market systems are not self policing and this free market nonsense that they are is just another form of communism.

You... obviously forgot to include a few critical concepts necessary for people other than yourself to find this sensible.

No they wouldn't, because without laws against corrupt business practices, corporate executives know they can steal the money through deceit, take the money and walk away from the corporation, and stick the low level investors with the losses.

A fool and his/her money are soon parted.

Any sensible investor does research into the company they plan to invest in.

Further - you simply make fraud and falsifying records illegal. People who lose money over nonsense then have a legal right to take institutions to court. You let the investors and share holders serve as your auditors and regulating agencies. When there is money to be lost - #'s real.

How many times do you have to see this con pulled before you recognize what is going on? You are barking up the wrong tree.

How do you propose regulating these markets?

An agency?

To effectively regulate against fraud - you need a "boots on ground" approach. You need to actually audit the files of those companies to be regulated. This cannot be done, effectively, by governments. Plain and simple.

Who audits the manufacturing industry for the accuracy of their description of their manufacturing process? A government agency? No - The ISO and their accompanying statutes. They arose from the free market as a way of certifying that a company is operating according to the process that it claims to be using for its customer.

The same with the IEEE.

If you wish to do be anyone who is anybody in the world of manufacturing and/or electronics, you comply with ISO and IEEE regulations/standards. Plain and simple. If you don't, you will lose a number of contract bids because businesses don't want to risk someone with a lack of standards considered to be good. Those organizations also do a pretty good job of regulating and performing certifications because it's their reputation on the line each time they certify a business or set a standard.

Any sensible investor does research into the company they plan to invest in. Further - you simply make fraud and falsifying records illegal. People who lose money over nonsense then have a legal right to take institutions to court. You let the investors and share holders serve as your auditors and regulating agencies. When there is money to be lost - #'s real.

reply to post by Aim64C


You can have terrific investments, and get burned. It's market manipulation, done usually by a consortium of crooked CEO's/CFO's, politicians and lobbyists concentrating in a market sector. They cause public panic and pick up the pieces cheap after the damage has been done. We ALL lose in this secenario.

Who audits the manufacturing industry for the accuracy of their description of their manufacturing process? A government agency? No - The ISO and their accompanying statutes. They arose from the free market as a way of certifying that a company is operating according to the process that it claims to be using for its customer.

While there are great ideas and values in the ISO, many companies use certification after the fact, usually when getting ready to sell or split up a company. If you see a sudden 'Quality' movement in your company, pay attention to see if the upper management is moving people in and out. They often use it as a way to clean house and make the company more attractive for a sale or take over. I have seen this 4 times in my career, and each time the company was sold within a year, or split up. The people that got hurt the worst were the experienced workers and lower management that just got handed a pink slip for all of thier "efforts" to bring a quality atmosphere into the company.

reply to post by JohnPhoenix


I myself own a home that was foreclosed in MA. If you have title insurance, you should be, again SHOULD be somewhat worry free. If you notice on your covered risks, one of which is "protection from a defective title" A defective title is an invalid title because a claimed prior holder of the title did not have title, or there is an inaccurate description of the property, or some other "cloud" over it, which may or may not be learned from reading the deed.
This is also not ALL foreclosures being void, simply the ones that were done via "robo-signing"
Which is still a large number of foreclosures, but nowhere close to being "all". Worst case scenario is that the property will go into reforclosure, and people will then have to re-bid on property. Again that is worst case scenario
If you notice in the Bevelaqua case, he did not have title. insurance and is now suffering dearly.
Bottom line, it is worth the few hundred $$ to have an attorney review the title and purchase title insurance. Also, if you dont see a quitclaim deed from the previous owner to the bank...something stinks!!

From Massachusetts Real Estate Law Blog FULL ARTICLE

Title insurance companies who have insured Ibanez afflicted titles have been steadily resolving these titles since the original Ibanez decision in 2009. I’m not sure how many defective foreclosure titles remain out there right now. There certainly could be a fair amount lurking in titles unknown to those purchasers who bought REO properties from U.S. Bank, Deutsche Bank, etc. If you bought such a property, I recommend you have an attorney check the back title and find your owner’s title insurance policy. Those without title insurance, of course, have and will continue to bear the brunt of this mess.

reply to post by Hendrix92TheUniverse


We have never had a free market, no such thing has ever existed, except on perhaps some tribal anarchist communistic level.

Regulation of business has been a standard in the U.S. from the beginning and before that. Regulation of business has always existed in market economies, and failure to regulate (prevent white collar crime) has always been closely associated with the numerous economic collapses of which the current is only the latest.

The concept of the free market is just another unrealistic idealism akin to communism. Once you realize this, you will understand how things have gotten so screwed up.

reply to post by Aim64C


If you had really thought about things you would never have posted this statement.

Laws do not prevent an activity - merely punish it.

What are you saying? That we should not bother with laws, because they do not prevent an activity? Gee, if we don't need to bother with laws against fraud, what about murder and rape, and all the other crimes?

Further - you simply make fraud and falsifying records illegal. People who lose money over nonsense then have a legal right to take institutions to court. You let the investors and share holders serve as your auditors and regulating agencies. When there is money to be lost - #'s real.

Broke people can't afford lawyers to get back their money, and laws created by free market preaching politicians have made taking on such cases extremely risky. Besides that, the people you are trying to sue will use the money they fraudulently stole from you to pay for their lawyers.

What you support is a system where only those who can afford justice get justice. Which in most cases is an individual fighting an army of lawyers. There is no justice in this.

What if we applied your principles to murderers and rapists?

To effectively regulate against fraud - you need a "boots on ground" approach. You need to actually audit the files of those companies to be regulated. This cannot be done, effectively, by governments. Plain and simple.

It was done in the past, and it can be done again. Yours is the slave mentality that believes we are slaves and we always have been slaves and we always will be slaves, and that there is no such thing as justice.

ISO and IEEE are a joke. Everyone knows this.

What you suggest is a system where Lawyers and Insurance companies make all the rules. You suggest rule by corporation. No thank you. That is stupidity, and only leads us to becoming subjects of the corporations, nameless faceless identities that will make rule by kings look kind in comparison.

I choose to stick with representative government. Rule by economics is communism.

Fraud is a crime, and it should be investigated, prosecuted, and punished by the government like any other crime.

Originally posted by Detergent
If there's a silver lining in this dark mess, it is that fewer people buying homes will risk buying a foreclosed-on home from a bank. That will drive up demand for new and existing homes with clear titles, which will help raise the prices of those homes. Not to the level of 5 years ago, but some improvement will be very welcome by most homeowners and certainly by the construction industry.

It depends on how deep this goes. If MERS transfers are declared illegal as I believe they should be than even new homes title status could be in limbo as it is still the primary way titles are being transferred.

For those of you who don't know what MERS (Mortgage Electronic Registration Service) is, it is basically a private database and service that records and processes transfer of title setup by banks in the 90's. It has been used on roughly half the existing mortgages in the United States - 60 million. The way it works is the loan is first assigned to MERS than they argue all future transfers can occur inside their system. The legal question is since MERS has no financial interest in these properties how do they have the ability to transfer something they do not own. So for properties registered with MERS they are actually the ones filing for foreclosure - not the bank who paid for the loan. The second problem with MERS is many states have laws on the books requiring transfers be registered with the state, but in most cases this is no longer done when transferring through MERS. Third the fact the transfer is electronic and private all kinds of fraud can occur within the system such as transfer of property multiple times, the deletion of records etc.

MERS was created for two main reasons - one it is much faster and easier to have a universal system for transfer nationwide, second it's cheaper as the financial institutions avoid having to pay the state transfer fees. So its convenient for the parties transferring the title. It has been so heavily used the last decade or so that somehow it has claimed legitimacy just from it's size. One of the great things about transfers registered with the state is they are a matter of public record, MERS is not and thus title can be transferred in secret. Although hard to prove I believe MERS has helped facilitate mortgage fraud by assigning property to more than one agency.

Again it is basically too big to fail - If all the transfers done only through MERS were found illegitimate the states would have huge claims on lost fees - and all such transfers would be declared void which would create a huge mess.

More info can be found in this article. MERS, It may have swalloed your loan

reply to post by LrBc1275


Not only will the lawyers be making out from this problem, looks like the insurance companies will get into the act.

That is a good buyer beware, if you can't get title insurance, stay away.

reply to post by proximo


Wow, that link is quite the bombshell. How many people know about this?

www.nytimes.com...

The heart of the scam.

Mortgage brokers hip deep in profits handed out no-doc mortgages to people with fictional incomes. Wall Street shopped bundles of those loans to investors, no matter how unappetizing the details. And federal regulators gave sleepy nods.

I'd say that last comment is far too kind to regulators under the GW admin. Aiding and abetting would be more accurate.

Oh, but all is well, trust in the free market.

the MERS Corporation, claims to hold title to roughly half of all the home mortgages in the nation — an astonishing 60 million loans.

Say What!

How can MERS claim title to those mortgages, and foreclose on homeowners, when it has not invested a dollar in a single loan?

Wow, such a deal.

Seems people are not buying this.

Last month in Utah, a local judge made the no-less-striking decision to let a homeowner rip up his mortgage and walk away debt-free. MERS had claimed ownership of the mortgage, but the judge did not recognize its legal standing.

That's what they should do with all of these mortgages.

With MERS under scrutiny, its chief executive, R. K. Arnold, who had been with the company since its founding in 1995, resigned earlier this year.

What do you want to bet he took his ill-begotten loot with him?

So it seems that if your title went through MERS, who knows how viable it is.

I have to wonder how much you can rely upon title insurance to pay out, and what you will really get back.

It is time to face the facts

Most mortgages have become invalid contracts.

The US government backs most every mortgage in existence. so taxpayers are already on the hook for all of them.

Thus the reality of the situation is that US taxpayers are already on the hook for all these losses. The taxpayers will make all the investors whole + the interest they collect until maturity. So our tax dollars are being used to pay investors profits on contracts that invalid. Doesn't make any sense at all.

Solution:

Have the government buy outright all the mortgages they currently back through the FHA, FNM, Etc. Rewrite every mortgage. Write down principal up to 30%. Charge 4 -4.5% interest. The interest collected over the years will easily cover the cost of the write downs and the workforce needed to run the program. Once instituted, all mortgage contracts will have been rewritten and will now be valid.

This will allow the investors, who should really get nothing at this point, to at least recoup their original investment. It will cost them future profits, a more than just outcome, considering all their assets are really invalid contracts. It also holds the homeowner to a large portion of their debt, but allows them some relief and a good possibility of keeping their homes. Also just as it's not fair for the homeowner to keep the house for nothing either. They did borrow the money and even under my plan will still be paying a whole bunch more than the original purchase price. (Owe $135,000 - goverment forks out 135k and refinances laon at $105K. Over term of loan repayments equal around $165k, giving the government enough to cover operating costs and the eventual bad loans that will still occur).

The economy will benefit as homeowners have a bit more suplus income to spend and save. Investor class will also be sitting on much cash that will likely end up being invested into more productive endeavors. Housing will benefit because the supply of housing will fall dramatically. Home builders will be able to build once again. Jobs will come back much faster than under any other plan to date.

This is really a win-win for everyone in the end. Only petty jealousy and a warped sense of corporate entitlement keeps something similar from happening. It's time to come together for our future and this is the plan that can make it happen. Pass it around.

reply to post by charlyv

You can have terrific investments, and get burned. It's market manipulation, done usually by a consortium of crooked CEO's/CFO's, politicians and lobbyists concentrating in a market sector. They cause public panic and pick up the pieces cheap after the damage has been done. We ALL lose in this secenario.

First, lobbyists will be substantially fewer and less powerful if you remove government's ability to interfere with the market and business practices.

Second, fraud (both deliberate and negligent) would still be a punishable crime in the courts.

It's not the government's job to secure the value of your stock or ethics of business. It is the responsibility of share holders to make aggregate decisions regarding the future of the company and keep an eye on the people appointed to the management positions within it.

The fact that people CAN lose money is reason for them to pay the hell attention to what is going on.

While there are great ideas and values in the ISO, many companies use certification after the fact, usually when getting ready to sell or split up a company.

This is true to some degree.

However, I say again, most -real- manufacturing will refuse to do business with you if you are not ISO compliant. Plain and simple. You have to come with an absolutely stellar reputation to get added to a list of exceptions.

Further - it is the decision of share holders, ultimately, to sell, merge, buy, etc with another company. If they go for ISO certs and then sell to another company - it is that company's responsibility to do a little research and to check for indicators of fraud or less-than-honest practices (not necessarily fraudulent or illegal - but just not honest).

As for employees losing their jobs under such mergers and the like - that really has nothing to do with the topic at hand. I understand why people would be frustrated - but it is a management level thing and internal to the company - and, quite bluntly, none of the government's business. The only time it would become a government issue involves the employment contract, itself, and what it establishes as the grounds for employment, termination, lay-off, etc.

reply to post by poet1b

What are you saying? That we should not bother with laws, because they do not prevent an activity? Gee, if we don't need to bother with laws against fraud, what about murder and rape, and all the other crimes?

The basis for your argument relies upon the idea that laws somehow prevent the activity. They do not. They punish it.

How much of what was going on for the past 20 years or so was illegal? (From a corporate level - likely a lot - though tagging individuals will be a bit more difficult). Certainly a lot of negligence involved that can be found to be illegal.

Yet - it being illegal, the billions we spend on the IRS, SEC, and other regulatory agencies - failed to protect us from the damaging effects of that illegal activity.

If you want to see an activity discontinue, you must increase the risks of engaging in it. When Texas allowed concealed carry of firearms - many forms of crime saw a steep decrease in frequency. Why? You may get your ass shot off when you try to car jack someone.

Similarly - if the government will simply look at your failing bank and hand you a subpena because share-holders have levied a charge of fraud against you; rather than back the value of your stock with the printing press... you might be a little less bold with crazy stock exchange schemes.

Broke people can't afford lawyers to get back their money, and laws created by free market preaching politicians have made taking on such cases extremely risky. Besides that, the people you are trying to sue will use the money they fraudulently stole from you to pay for their lawyers.

What world do you live in? Lawyers practically hunt you down to participate in class-action suits and chase down ambulances. You can bet they would be watching news from Wall Street for potential cases. It's even more likely that they would develop and fund their own intelligence network (particularly legal firms) - much like private security and private investigation - only aimed at quietly investigating companies to spring a lawsuit on them.

I don't blame you - you simply don't have a lawyer's mindset. They'll get creative.

What if we applied your principles to murderers and rapists?

... Where... if you get raped... you levy a charge against the accused and State Prosecuting Officials investigate the charge?

Sounds kind of like how it works, already.

The difference would be that legal firms are more likely to get involved in cases of stock fraud.

reply to post by poet1b

It was done in the past, and it can be done again. Yours is the slave mentality that believes we are slaves and we always have been slaves and we always will be slaves, and that there is no such thing as justice.

No, it was not.

So long as institutions like Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac are allowed to exist by government sponsoring and such a precedent is allowed to remain legal - there is no amount of regulation - government or private - that can keep it in check.

Plain and simple.

And since you have nothing left to stand on, you resort to ad-hominem.

ISO and IEEE are a joke. Everyone knows this.

I grew up in manufacturing. Please substantiate this ignorant claim.

Because, in real industry - the government is a joke. OSHA? File a complaint to them - see what happens.

What you suggest is a system where Lawyers and Insurance companies make all the rules. You suggest rule by corporation. No thank you. That is stupidity, and only leads us to becoming subjects of the corporations, nameless faceless identities that will make rule by kings look kind in comparison.

What book did you read that made you get the, humorous, idea that you were smart?

It's pretty simple, Snuffy. You have skills and knowledge you have acquired (or, should have). You contract those abilities to a company that pays you in exchange for those services. You can, also, freely practice your trades (or even develop new trades out of your knowledge and experience) and market that trade to the people of your community and beyond (maybe even contracting a few people to help out).

Or, you can sit around and hope someone appreciates your existence enough to give you what you want/need.

I choose to stick with representative government. Rule by economics is communism.

Seeing as any government is going to be inherently bound by the limits of economics... this statement seems somewhat self-ignorant.

But that should be expected, I suppose. I believe I've dejected your claim to sentience in the past.

Fraud is a crime, and it should be investigated, prosecuted, and punished by the government like any other crime.

You... don't really seem to understand the difference between regulation and prosecution.

reply to post by Aim64C

Yet - it being illegal, the billions we spend on the IRS, SEC, and other regulatory agencies - failed to protect us from the damaging effects of that illegal activity.

The same can be said of the police who fail to prevent rape and murder. Should we get rid of all the police departments for their failure to prevent crime? Can you see how ridiculous your argument is?

If you want to see an activity discontinue, you must increase the risks of engaging in it. When Texas allowed concealed carry of firearms - many forms of crime saw a steep decrease in frequency. Why? You may get your ass shot off when you try to car jack someone.

We could bring back the old practice of tar and feathering con artists. A good tar and feathering of these wall street crooks is just what is needed.

What world do you live in? Lawyers practically hunt you down to participate in class-action suits and chase down ambulances.

So the press makes things out to be, but in the real world, this is a bunch of hooey. Your best chance is to join a class action suit, but you will only get pennies back on the dollar.

No, prosecuting fraud works nothing like real crime. The police do not come out, they do not make a report, as in a rape case, or any other crime. You are completely out of touch with reality.

reply to post by Aim64C


I tend to agree with you for the most part, though I still support some degree of firm regulation. The problem is, most of the current laws and regulations in existance are either not enforced, impractical to enforce or follow, or really don't prevent or punish anything. In otherwords, lame duck laws. What the country really needs on all fronts is a deep internal audit of all regulations, policies, and laws on the books, throw out the completely useless rules, regs, and agencies associated with them. Cut the size of pointless govornment, or redistribute resources where they are more needed.

But in the meantime, new and more practical/enforcable regulations must be set in place to provide some degree of oversight. I do not trust the private sector enough to self regulate, even on the grounds of common sense and economic self preservation. They certainly can't be trusted to self regulate on ethical or quality grounds. If it was only the actual institutions and corporations who would suffer for their own stupidity, then I would not care at all if there was any regulations. Unfortunately, when Wall Street and the banks do anything stupid, the rest of us not involved and not being stupid are the ones who end up suffering and taking the brunt of the fail. I don't care about protecting people from themselves, what I'd like is some sort of protection from the idiots.

For starters, the lending practices of banks, with the sub prime mortgages and overlending to people who any idiot could see would not be able to pay it back, should have never been permitted or legal, and should be outlawed period. And punishment/enforcement of such practices should be hefty, severe, and painful for the offenders.

reply to post by Aim64C


Gee, how is it that the real estate market worked fine all those years until Newt got his deregulation plan passed, and massive levels of fraud followed.

The system worked, and then people like you bought into the free market scam and voted for the elimination of the laws that had kept the system honest for almost a century. Now you want to claim it can't be done, demonstrating your ignorance of history.

ISO is a joke, and those of us who did the work to meet ISO compliance laughed at how ridiculous the rules were.

At least OSHA does something, ISO does nothing.

I don't know how I earn a living has anything to do with this discussion, but I will say there are those of us who make things happen, and those who pretend to make things happen. You need to stop pretending.

Here is a clue to help you find reality again.

You claim "government is going to be inherently bound by the limits of economics" but the reality is just the opposite. Good governance creates strong economies, poor governance creates weak economies. That is the huge difference between the third world and the first world.

Third world countries fail because the rich control the county, and there is little or no justice.

Protect the property rights of the people from the abuses of the super rich, and the economy prospers. Allow the rich to rob and steal at will ( aristocrats and warlords of the past ) and the economy fails miserably. It is as if you don't get the whole concept behind representative government.

Thanks once again for making me look smart.

reply to post by poet1b

The same can be said of the police who fail to prevent rape and murder. Should we get rid of all the police departments for their failure to prevent crime? Can you see how ridiculous your argument is?

I don't think you truly grasp the mass of your own argument.

Do the police make it safe for you to wander through dark alleys? Do the police ensure your safe arrival to your destination or the security of your meeting?

Do they even ensure the safety of your flight? (Or, rather, does the TSA accomplish this?)

The police cannot and should not be expected to check every room before you enter, every road before you drive, etc.

The same with the stock market. You are ultimately responsible for your own investments and your own decisions. That does not change what activities are legal and illegal - but, as I said - a fool and his/her money are soon parted. If you act stupid and allow people to take advantage of you (in legal or illegal ways) - there's no amount of regulation on the face of the planet that -can- protect you.

We could bring back the old practice of tar and feathering con artists. A good tar and feathering of these wall street crooks is just what is needed.

I notice a distinct lack of identities. Who are we tar and feathering, again?

So the press makes things out to be, but in the real world, this is a bunch of hooey. Your best chance is to join a class action suit, but you will only get pennies back on the dollar.

So... you should get your full investment back?

Who is going to pay for that? With what money?

This mentality is what led to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac and the investments in them being backed by the government.

Sure - you get all of your money back, regardless. You just pay for it with inflation, instead.

It's cute when you think you're smart.

No, prosecuting fraud works nothing like real crime. The police do not come out, they do not make a report, as in a rape case, or any other crime. You are completely out of touch with reality.

I believe it is you who is out of touch with reality. Any report of a crime -is- a report. The difference is the method of investigating the crime. Law enforcement has special divisions for investigating such crimes - and that is where reports of those crimes will go to be investigated.

The other part of reality is that it's not instantaneous. In rape cases, you have DNA and physical evidence that is collected, analyzed, and acted upon - sometimes within hours. Fraud, depending upon the type, can take years to investigate and build a case to prosecute - even when using private firms.

reply to post by Skadi_the_Evil_Elf


The problem is that the people who are against regulation, enforcing laws against white collar crime, or any laws in general that don't let the rich do as they please, have done everything they can to muck up any laws they must pass to appease voters.

The free market priests, when they can't prevent laws against fraud from being passed they work to make them as confusing and therefore unenforceable as possible.

reply to post by poet1b

Gee, how is it that the real estate market worked fine all those years until Newt got his deregulation plan passed, and massive levels of fraud followed.

The system worked, and then people like you bought into the free market scam and voted for the elimination of the laws that had kept the system honest for almost a century. Now you want to claim it can't be done, demonstrating your ignorance of history.

The thing is - what happened had nothing to do with the regulations that were changed. Point out to me, please, what regulations were changed and how those led to the current issue at hand.

Since you won't be able to - I'll continue.

The problem is with Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. These two enterprises bought Mortgage Backed Securities and resold them as larger stock that was secured by the Federal Government.

This, however, wasn't the end of it. The FHA and many other government institutions and mandates came down in an attempt to push housing of the underprivileged. Sub-prime mortgage lending was -endorsed- by the government. These mortgages were then bound up in MBSs and sold to Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac.

Fannie and Freddie knew the percentage of these loans that would default and fail to generate a return - but their investors were secured against loss on the stock. So, no one really cared.

None of the regulations that were repealed would have prevented this abuse of the system that was enabled by the government, effectively, securing the monetary value of stock in a private company.

ISO is a joke, and those of us who did the work to meet ISO compliance laughed at how ridiculous the rules were.

Clearly, you don't understand the importance of documentation and adherence to it. Not that I expect anything more out of a drone.

At least OSHA does something, ISO does nothing.

Like what? File a report of unsafe working conditions to them and see what happens. Five dead people later, maybe they'll make a phone call.

You claim "government is going to be inherently bound by the limits of economics" but the reality is just the opposite. Good governance creates strong economies, poor governance creates weak economies. That is the huge difference between the third world and the first world.

A government cannot create an economy. A government can promote an economy or stifle it, true - but it is inherently bound by the economy it draws its taxes and industrial/technological capabilities/implements from. Further - a population is bound by its economic and industrial capability. Plain and simple. You can't work with what you don't have and can't make.

Protect the property rights of the people from the abuses of the super rich, and the economy prospers. Allow the rich to rob and steal at will ( aristocrats and warlords of the past ) and the economy fails miserably. It is as if you don't get the whole concept behind representative government.

No, you simply seem to want to live in a world where personal responsibility is supplanted by government regulations and protections.

Sorry - at the end of the day - I'm not really swayed by your silliness.

Your state can regulate things the way you and your fellow statesmen see fit. We'll do things our way, here. That's about the only way we'll come to an agreement.