Keep an eye on the widening foreclosure scandal

It's a dandy. Banks are selling houses from under people who own them free and clear. They're using forged foreclosure documents to kick people out of their homes. Or they're just foreclosing on homes without making sure they even possess the mortgage and promissory notes.

Here's a good explainer at Crooks & Liars.

You try to be cynical but you just can't keep up

There are actually people in this country who think it's good that our unemployment rate is at 9.7 percent (and that's a lowball figure; it's really higher than 16 percent when you count part-timers and discouraged job seekers). Susie Madrack at Crooks and Liars writes about the people who see a silver-lining in the jobs crisis thundercloud. She includes this lovely quote from an economist:

The secret to the amazing increases in productivity in the American economy is finally out. Companies in the US are not hiring full-time workers. They are gambling that they can keep their margins high by keeping a vast part of the workforce, perhaps millions of people, unemployed.

Unemployed people, it turns out to no one’s surprise, will work for very little. And, they will work without benefits, without job security, and without complaint.....

The development is a revelation, and a good one, (Emphasis added) for companies, municipalities, and states, all of which are tight on cash and unable to get credit at reasonable rates if at all.

Read the whole thing and feel your blood start to boil.