In Soviet America, Contract Walks Away From You!

Shot:

MSNBC afternoon host Dylan Ratigan took to the ramparts of The Huffington Post on Thursday and urged home owners to stop paying their mortgages as a leftist protest against a government too cozy with the bankers. The title was “They Keep Stealing — Why Keep Paying?” The crisis was all Wall Street’s fault, and now they’re back to paying themselves bonuses after a federal bailout. So stop paying them. (Notice Ratigan doesn’t suggest you protest Washington and TARP by refusing to pay your taxes.) This piece sounds like a direct-mail letter:

You didn’t cause this mess. They did.

Now you are struggling to make the same payments on this mortgage on your now overpriced home even in light of a crashing economy and massive deflation, all while the government does everything in its power to help Wall St. keep the bonuses coming.

Well, it is becoming time to take matters into your own hands… I suggest that you call your lender and tell them if they don’t lower you mortgage by at least 20%, you are walking away. And if they don’t agree, you need to consider walking away.

It probably doesn’t feel right to you.

That is because you probably are a good person. But your mortgage is a business deal, and it is not immoral to walk away from a business deal unless you went in to the deal with the intention of defaulting.

— Transcription by Tim Graham of Newsbusters, which I linked to in June of 2010, under the headline of “GE Spokesman Says Don’t Pay Your Loan With GE!”, since General Electric, which at the time owned MSNBC, is also in the business of personal and commercial loans, and at least overseas, mortgages as well.

Chaser:

I’m sure Mr. Obama doesn’t consider himself immoral for walking away from his repeated promises (aka “effectual truth”) that Americans could keep their contracts with insurance companies, particularly since, as he is wont to say, sin is “Being out of alignment with my values,” and Mr. Obama’s highest value is advancing whatever forms of leftism Mr. Obama values at that current moment.

Or as Allahpundit writes, “Welcome to utopia, Dylan.”