yjacket

Personally, I think this "situation" stinks and could very well lead us into another unnecessary war. The first flaw that is committed by a huge portion of the individuals in studying international politics is in assuming the leader of the "opposing" side is an irrational actor and is "evil". Rest assured, they are extremely rational; they may be ruthless and "evil" but they are rational and in many instances have several specific objectives in mind. Just like this recent news story of the professor who had students "stomp on Jesus", there is always more to the story than what is reported. Bin Laden was exceptionally rational, as is Ahmadinejad and Kim Jong Un. Unfortunately, it is too easy to dismiss them as "evil" (because it is what we want to believe) without actually delving into the details of the reasons behind what they are trying to accomplish. In many instances, if we are forced to analyze the reasons behind why they are doing what they are doing it would lead us to rethink some of our own actions. And it is completely impossible that our country would have ever committed wrongful acts against another country. For over a year (way before NK started to be in the news), I heard of the US military's "pacific pivot". As a general strategy, the military is shifting focus away from the desert to the pacific. Now NK is coming into focus as Iran is sort of fading . . . We have too many useless, senseless wars; we have been conditioned to believe that is our God-given duty to fight every perceived injustice or perceived threat from any tiny bug that might land on our nose. NK a threat?? . . . . just like Iraq was a threat and Iran is a threat. Please, these guys may be ruthless and evil but they ain't dumb. All of them know that if they lobbed a nuke to the US their country would be obliterated. Countries like NK and Iran have way more to fear from the US than we have to fear from them. We pre-emptively attacked another country that had not attacked us! If I were NK, you are darn right I'd build a nuke. I'd want the US to know that if they attacked me, they'd get punched in the nose. For the most part the "intelligence" to go to war with Iraq was a farce, built up on lies and on what individuals wanted to see rather than what really was. I suppose now we are to blindly trust the current "intelligence" and news reports, regardless of the fact that Iraq, Iran and NK were labeled the "axis of evil" over 10 years ago. There is always more to the story than meets the eye. Whether we want to see it or not, there are individuals and interest groups within the US who want war; rather than be peacemakers they glory in war, they glory in strength, they glory in power. And so they convince others of the righteousness of their position. To enhance and grow the military, to be number 1, to be the most powerful . . . all as we go marching to war.

The really sad thing is that this typifies something that happens on a consistent basis. Individuals in general are way too trusting of their leaders and take on a different persona in large groups-the madness of crowds. I've been involved in many conventions where the people blindly trust their leaders and go along with what they've been told because their leaders told them. Afterwards, if one went up and asked them privately what they thought about the leaders actions they would be in disagreement with what happened, yet they went right along with the leaders decisions, never complained, and actually encouraged the bad behavior. They lacked the moral courage to stand up for what they believed in and to go against the crowd and their leaders.

I think it is actually relatively simple. The government should get out of the marriage business, as it was up until the relatively recent past. I include public schools in that too. The battle should then be in the convincing of the hearts and minds of individuals that homosexual marriage is incorrect. Personally for me, right now homosexual marriage does absolutely zip to destroy my marriage. If some homosexual couple moved in next door, I'd have a couple of options. 1) Use it as a learning lesson to my kids that it isn't right, God hates the sin but not the sinner. 2) Move. Personally I think marriage is way more under attack from other forces besides homosexuality; it is one very small piece. Take a look at the marriage-relationship-advice forum . . . most marriages are under attack from other things. Finances, communication issues, law of chastity, selfishness, maturity, or any other number of vices. The fact that as a society we have "starter marriages", or a high proportion of people live together before marriage. If one makes a claim that the "institution of marriage" is under attack by homosexual marriage, I'll probably agree to some extent, but I'd make the claim that the institution of marriage was under attack the minute the Government got involved and started determining what is & isn't marriage. And that happened in the US after polygamy was outlawed, so from that perspective the institution of marriage has been under attack for over 120 years. If the Government had never gotten involved in determining what constituted "proper" marriage, I'm pretty sure polygamy would have gone on quite a bit longer.

Yes we do, honor and sustain the laws in general, but there does come a point where to honor and sustain the law is to honor and sustain evil. The law is executed by individuals not some entity known as the Government, at some point to honor a law and put someone in jail for disobeying xyz law is evil. If you read the writings of the founders they were some of the most disloyal, non-law abiding individuals. It is up to every individual to determine where that line exists. I believe it is extremely disingenuous to make a blanket statement that we must obey all laws. Many examples in Scripture and in Modern Times exists where Men of God defy the laws of man. To say that we as Saints must obey any and all laws has got to be one of the worst Sacred Cows in the Church. Sacred Cow #1: Obey the law of the land… no matter what? | Mormon Chronicle I do find it interesting that you while you claim you don't have a problem with Hobby Lobby standing up for what they believe in, you also believe they should be punished for their beliefs. The logical inconsistency here is that if everyone were punished for standing up for their beliefs then no one would step outside the box and take a stand, everyone will eventually conform to the belief that is not punished. I never said civil disobedience makes you immune. That is where the trial comes into play. A judge and a jury can actually make the determination that the law was broken, but because it is a bad law the penality is drastically reduced or no penalty exists. In fact, the DA can even make the determination to NOT prosecute. So many laws exist today that it is impossible to live 100% within all laws, especially if one owns a business. That is one of the points about a jury of 12 individuals that are your peers. Not only pleading the case but that the law is unjust. While jury Nullification is not the norm it has been practiced in the US. Jury nullification in the United States - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia This is where IMO we have as a society become so focused on Justice and The Law, we forget Mercy or actually thinking through the problem, seeing it from another's point of view. We are so focused on the me and how everyone should give me whatever I need or that everyone should give Joe Blow what he needs, and by George we will MAKE you do it. Most laws today aren't to protect life, liberty, and property, they are there to make people conform to a certain world-view that may or may not be correct. 90% of the population believes x so a law is passed to force the 10% to comply to the demands of the 90. Or take ObamaCare a law is passed that makes the demands of the many (50, 60%, whatever) forced on the few. Tyranny of the majority basically. And yes I do mean force, you see it as consequence . . . but what else is force when you literally take away someone's land, money, business, life, if they do not comply. That same twisted logic is used by those who use a gun to rob someone. I (robber) told you to give me your money, you did not obey me so the consequence is that I shoot you. The only difference between Hobby Lobby and the robber is because we are "civilized" and we have gotten 535 wise men together to write down on a piece of paper and print it far and wide the edict: If you do not give Healthcare to your employees, we will fine you, if you do not pay us, we will jail you. That is legalized theft and is immoral, unjust and wrong. If you do not obey, we will take away what you own, that is the very definition of violence and force. I find it interesting that you bring up the Constitution to claim that Nullification did not exist and therefore has no place in our society. Yet many will use the same document to claim that a Right to Medical Care does exist or is at least within the purview of the government to force upon individuals. I would agree that I do not think Obamacare was intended to pick a fight with Religion, but that it infringes upon businesses and individual rights is of no question. Can you ever imagine Christ forcing others to obey a certain code. He was the very definition of non-violence.

An interesting sidenote that I've often thought about. When Jesus originally came, many of the Jews were looking for a political savior, someone to throw off the yoke of the Romans. They did not understand He came as a Spiritual Savior. When He comes again, He will then be the political Savior and institute a new order.

Au contraire. One of the greatest travesties in our modern society is the inability of us as a society to actually think about the laws that are passed and to determine for ourselves whether they are just laws or not. We have been brainwashed that regardless of the justness of the law we must obey because its the law. This country has a very long history of civil disobedience to laws. In fact, the original intent of the United States with its checks and balances was to have States check the power of the Federal Government. They would do this by State Nullification. The way that individuals would check State/Local power was through Jury Nullification. We have long gotten away from those principle to today where if the Federal Government mandates it, we shall obey. Where would we be without the Rosa Parks, Muhammad Ali's, Patrick Henry's etc of the world who felt that the law as written was unjust and decided to take a stand against it? As far as Hobby Lobby not being forced, I cannot understand how anyone can draw that conclusion. If Hobby Lobby continues doing business as they have always done they will be fined. If they don't pay the fine their business will have a lien against it, it will eventually be shut down and the head of the business could face the prospect of jail time. If that isn't force, I don't know what is. We have also as a society forgotten the difference between negative rights and so-called positive rights. Everything in the Constitution and Bill of Rights is about negative rights, i.e. what someone can not do to you. We have drifted so far away from that to now rights are what someone must do. By its very nature ObamaCare is one of the mothers of all Positive Right legislation. You will do x at the point of being deprived of your life, your liberty, and your property-the very things that the Founders fought for . . .

The US is in a huge mess, and its not a problem that will be solved easily and it will involve a lot of pain. The bottom line is that we have too much debt, on a National, State, Individual and Corporate level. Thankfully, individual debt has been declining a good bit since the Housing Bust as people thankfully defaulted on their debt obligations. Unfortunately, the same thing is not happening at corporate/state/national level. Nationally there are only a couple of ways out. 1)Inflate (soft default) 2) Pay it back/Grow out of it, 3) Hard default. Growing out of it is impossible, too much debt exists. Paying it back is Austerity. The problem with Austerity is the saying you can't get blood from a turnip. Simply balancing the current budget doesn't do much, we've still got over 16T in debt that rolls over every year. Eventually interest will rise . . . paying try paying 8-10% interest on 16T worth of debt. So we will get inflation. The solution we should take is to balance the budget by cutting spending. I think if we cut to something like 2007 levels of spending the budget would be balanced. And then default on the rest. But since everyone wants their piece of the pie and is unwilling to give up that slice, we will continue along the current path until the Bond market explodes. Then things will get real interesting. Either way what we will have is a lower standard of living. There is a really good reason why the Jew had a debt Jubilee every 49 years.

Kloud, I'm going to come in here half-time. And I'll say upfront, I hope you find what you are looking for in life. I hope you find the peace and joy in your life that you lack, however you get to that point, I truly hope you find a lasting peace in your life. IMO from your words, I don't necessarily see that you have a problem with the Church, I see a problem with God. For whatever reason, you are exuding a lot of anger, bitterness, resentment and while it appears directed at the Church, it is also directed at God. Why do I have a crappy job? Why do I have a crappy life? Why am I on this message board? For whatever reason you are exuding a lot of emotions that are indicative of a very unhappy individual. To be honest, leaving the Church is not a huge complicated ordeal, it is a very straight-forward process. It requires a letter, signature and not much else. A step below that is a do-not-contact list. Basically you tell the Church, don't bug me. There is only as much drama into the process as an individual makes into it. If there is a lot of drama in the process, it's because one is injecting drama into it. Bishops, Stake Presidents, etc. are human and as humans will screw up from time to time. So while it is not complicated it is also not a normal process that the ecclesiastical authorities will be intimately familiar with. Unlike what many sites might report, people are not "leaving in droves". As such, I'd ask a little compassion towards those leaders who you have talked to regarding this. In your journey, if I may offer a few bits of insight that might help you along the way. #1) Honesty is the best policy, even though it might seem more prudent to not be honest. If you don't feel like answering, just say so. If one is always honest with oneself and with those around, one will never feel like they are always being "talked into" doing something. Plus, one never has to remember the lies, or worry about getting caught. And the most important person to be honest with is yourself- "A Man's got to know his limitations" ;-). #2) Focus on others happiness vs. your own. Funny thing about life, the more one focuses on making other people close to you happy (spouse, kids, parents, etc) the happier one becomes. There is no use is trying to control what makes someone else happy. If roses make your wife happy but you hate them . . . get her roses. No use on raining on someones parade. #3) Life comes in waves/cycles, whatever your situation it won't be like this forever. Things get better, things get worse. It's just life. Does God plan all our actions and events? I'll let you answer that question. I personally believe we make thousands of choices everyday that determine to a very large extent where we go in life. And sometimes "crap happens". It just is, nothing you can do about it except take whatever lessons and move on. If you don't like your situation, then either do something to change it or learn to adapt. #4) The Atonement is more than just a repentance process, it's about us becoming whole, at-one with God and with ourselves. Whatever ails you in life, may you find the peace, joy, happiness that we all as sons and daughters of a loving God need and deserve.

Well # 3 is coming for us next year. The 1st one is exciting/scary/wondrous/nervous, etc. Not that the others aren't, but you kind of know what to expect. So for us it's now more about what kind of personality, focus, individuality that this one have vs. how we are going to raise 'em. I would say to just take it easy and relax. There is a reason God made pregnancies 9 months and why it takes years for infants to become children. Rome wasn't built in a day and neither are children raised in a day. IMO the best thing one can do is to use the time God gives us to prepare wisely. My personal belief is that raising children, while challenging, really isn't all that hard. The concepts are extremely simple. Because we are human and screw up, implementing those concepts can be difficult at times. I also believe that in many ways the art of parenting in today's US culture is for the most part completely lost. People have been raising kids for thousands of years and only in the past 50-60 years have we seen such a loss of parenting skills. So use this time wisely, go out and purchase some good parenting books (no they don't have to be LDS books). For us, the first 2 years with my son was really rough (we just had no clue on parenting, even though my parents are phenomenal). My dad saw the problems and bought us 3 or 4 parenting books by John Rosemond. It completely turned our entire life around. It took a while to implement, but I look back from then to now and think wow the change and the journey are amazing. ultimately IMO - understand your goal . . . the goal is to eventually emancipate your child so they can live a healthy, spiritual, wonderful, independent life. - communicate clearly, mean what you say - be consistent!! kids are smart they can find the holes in what you say and do - pick your battles . . . sometimes it just ain't worth it. - have fun

My 2 cents. SisterSarah, I feel for you. I have 2 main comments: 1) As others have noted, speak with your Bishop. Generally with these types of things it is either a lack of leadership that persuades (sometimes with a stick, if necessary) members to meet appropriate standards and/or it is a new a lack of strength in the ward -- maybe lots of new members, etc. It sounds like you have issues with 1 or 2 individuals in particular. If the Bishop doesn't work, you can always talk to them about how their actions offend you . . . something about when taking offense talk between thy brother and thee . . . 2) Roll with it! Unless they are in a leadership roll and just spouting off apostasy, just roll with it. For a time period, I was in a . . . very interesting ward . . . shall we say. I heard from the pulpit during Fast & Testimony meeting "I can only sustain the Mission President with my left hand, 'cuz he's not doing a good job", "All babies are evil except Mormon babies", and I was treated to a rendition of the Holy Ghost dance on stage among other things (with the Bishop kindly leading the dancer off the stage-exit stage left!!). It was very interesting. My wife and I always had something to talk about after church. It provided many hours of conversation :-). I guess we could have gone inactive b/c the Gospel wasn't being taught in its pure form. We could have gone to the Bishop and thrown a hissy-fit -- both of us are RMs and we had 1 small child at the time. But you know, I look back fondly at my time in that ward. While I wasn't being "taught" persay, I did learn more about the Gospel personally, how to be more forgiving, more kind, more charitable to those who didn't have as much knowledge as I did in the Gospel. In fact, my old Bishop from that ward became a Stake President . . . Ultimately you've got a few choices: Go to the Bishop and hope he solves the problem; go to the person and talk to them about it; or Roll with it and become a Rock in the Gospel that others can look to as an example; move to a different ward; or you could go inactive. While I completely understand how this can be extremely annoying, frustrating, disappointing, etc. I personally think it's a little much to go inactive over something like this. IMO, going inactive over something like this speaks to a bigger issue with your own testimony. But that's my 2 cents . . . and maybe I'm full of it.

My bad, I misunderstood. I agree. Economic ignorance is very high in this country, mostly because no one ever teaches it to them. It is one of those things that appears boring, yet will have the most impact on one's life. I agree that the correction to the bubble is a market adjustment. Bubbles themselves cannot and do not form without government intervention or banking intervention. Every single bubble I can think of in the last 100 years was caused by government intervention into the free market. Either by manipulating laws or by inflating the money supply. South Seas bubble - private/public partnership in government debt Stock market bubble 1929 - Federal Reserve inflated money supply for several years prior. Naz 1999 - free flowing Fed. Reserve money from the mid-90s. Housing 2005 - free flowing money from lowered interest rates after Naz bust. There will be markets that increase and decrease but were it not for the Fed. the massive bubbles we've had in the last 20 years would not occur. And inflation is a non-uniform event. The high-powered money gets injected into the locations that will return the highest rates (markets that are already increasing). It will power those markets into bubbles. Price Inflation is not tied to rates in the money market. The price of any good and all goods in general are tied to 4 factors. Supply/demand of the good and supply/demand of money. In fact, the Federal Reserve specifically sets market rates below price inflation. This is supposed to persuade people to put money into other things besides savings. If only it were that simple. Sure over the long-haul and over averages that might be the case. But we don't live averages. Most people thought real estate was a great inflation hedge and it was . . . until it wasn't and crashed. Like I mentioned I bought my house below mid 80s pricing. Inflation adjusted I bought at 50% what it was worth in 1985. So if someone used a similar house as an inflation hedge they would have lost 50% of the value of their money over 25 years. How's that for an inflation hedge? We live in a bubble economy, thanks Fed., if one does not learn to ride the bubble waves they will be crush when the wave crashes. It's how the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. The rich ride the waves, the middle class and poor continually jump in just before it crashes and get crushed.

I don't know about this last week, but I'd done fairly well over the past month. I'd prefer it not be that way though. For me, everything is relative. For example, the Dow is at 13.3k, great, but gas is close to $4. If you look at an oil/dow ratio the Dow looks very unimpressive: charles hugh smith-Reader's Journal and Dow-Oil Ratio I remember buying 68 cents/gallon gas in 1998, it's quadrupled since then while the Dow is ~30-40% higher. So I really try to look at value investing rather than price investing. What is over/under valued compared to everything else. I also look at big cycles, as everything goes in cycles. The major investments are Stocks, Bonds, Real Estate, Commodities. Stocks still suck-12 year bear market (although I'd say sometime in the next 5-10 years will prob. be a great time to be in stocks). I'll prob. buy some stocks the next crash that comes around. Bonds have been in a 30 year bull market, I wouldn't touch bonds with a 10 foot pole. That is an accident waiting to happen. I'd like to short bonds and at some point might do so. Real Estate in some areas is a steal. Las Vegas, Florida, etc. I'd seriously like to buy some more real estate/land where I live, I just don't want the hassle of being a landlord. I was the biggest of housing bubbleheads, but in many places it is now a steal of a lifetime. In many areas not so much, it really depends. I bought my house at below mid 80s pricing (not-inflation adjusted). Shoot, I read an article recently about a single mother buying a 2000+ sqft home built in the mid-2000s for ~45k. Ridiculous. Commodities are probably mid-way through their cycle. I'm waiting for a blow-off top here sometime in the next 5-10 years. Personally though, I'd rather just be able to save my money without having to worry about trying to beat inflation. The bubbles are caused by the Federal Reserve system and in order to not get squashed by inflation you've got to find a way to beat it. Everything comes back to our monetary system and the Federal Reserve, one of the most dishonest, corrupt, evil institutions ever created by man. Presidents and Congress can do a lot to influence our economy, but no one has more influence or control than the Federal Reserve. If you ever want to learn more about this corrupt private institution, just read The Creature from Jekyll Island : A Second Look at the Federal Reserve: G. Edward Griffin: 9780912986210: Amazon.com: Books

I would also add that comparing taxes to tithing is completely inappropriate as there is one big difference. I don't pay tithing and nothing happens to me (except I don't get to go to the temple, if I'm honest). I don't pay taxes and I go to jail, my property is seized and my life destroyed. We have 2 separate but related issues. 1) Debt, 2) Federal budget. As a society, we are seeing more and more people demand more from government. I personally subscribe to the saying "A government big enough to give you everything you want is a government big enough to take from you everything you have." My home county is a perfect example of the largess of government. We have massively failing schools, the superintendent has a 200k+ salary that he is receiving in full while he waits to go on trail for racketeering, bribery and embezzlement. The school board "surprisingly" found a 60M budget deficit the week their budget was to be passed. I could go on with the list of junk in my county. Yet, instead of reigning in the out-of-control system, the school board passed a 1 mil increase in property taxes. Stupidly enough, my county voted many of the same bums back into office. Because our children's education is "too important" everyone is willing to just throw more money at the problem instead of actually looking for the problems and solving them. We don't like the unemployment numbers, hey lets throw more money at the problem, we don't like housing numbers, throw more money at the problem. Spend, spend, spend. No one ever looks at the hard truth. Unemployment is labor mismatch. There are plenty of companies out there willing to hire, but not finding qualified labor or people willing to take the pay. A huge chunk of the jobs lost were in construction. Those jobs are not coming back, so those folks need to find a new line of work. Housing, well home prices were too high and were well out of wack with normal income/housing ratios. So we throw more money at both problems, lower interest rates to try and force some fix on the system. Let it adjust naturally . . . eventually people will realize they need to change their line of work, retrain, etc. Eventually homes will reach normal levels again. Extremely frustrating.

'll jump into the forray here as this is a topic that I love to study and is one that is fairly complex and mostly hidden from most people. Sorry for the long post ahead of time. To tackle this problem it is very important to understand the nature of the system that we have. First off, all of our current present day money is loaned into existence. By it's very nature, a US dollar is debt. If all loans were paid back there would be no US dollars in existence. The current monetary system we have has only existed since 1971. So while it is can be useful to compare our situation to situations prior to 1971, it doesn't really provide a guidemap since we are dealing with different monetary systems. For a quick and dirty: http://www.peakprosperity.com/crashcourse/chapter- 7-money-creation US dollars are created via two seperate but related processes. 1) US Government sell Treasury bills and via an indirect method-setting interest rates- (and recently not so indirectly, QE) the Federal Reserve buys Treasury Bills and sells US dollars (Federal Reserve Notes). Obviously not all the dollars used to buy Treasuries are newly created . . . but a lot of them are. 2) Fractional Reserve Lending: when commercial or local banks lend money they do not actually have those US dollars. When Joe Blow gets a loan for 200k, the bank is only legally required to have 20k of actual US dollars, a 10% reserve ratio. However over the past decade in practice this ends up being close to a 0% reserve ratio. So how does this all relate. Well, GDP isn't a measure of the amount of dollars but a measure of the turnover or productivity. I know it is GDP = C + I + G (X-M), but it is really trying to measure the activity of an economy. So there is a lot of talk of the National Debt. An important measurement is debt to GDP (currently national debt-GDP is ~100%) ,to break down debt to GDP what it is capturing is how much activity/productivity/etc. an economy is generating vs. how much debt there is. For a simple contrived example, a low debt/GDP ratio means that say in a localized economy Company A took out 100k in loans, yet produced 300k worth of goods in a year. i.e. even though they had 100k in loans the money turned over many times and they produced a vast amount product compared to the loans. A high debt/GDP ratio means the reverse. 100k in loans and only 100k of stuff. So it is absolutely pointless to compare any other country's debt/GDP to our debt/GDP. It's more a measure of how effective their economy is at using debt rather than a measure of how good their economy is. A low debt/GDP just means they are getting more bang for their buck. It is also important to distinguish between public debt (16T) and total debt. Total US debt is ~350% of GDP. Now for broader implications. I believe we have too much debt relative to what we produce. People can debate this . . . Do we now have too much debt, or is too much debt at 500%, 1000?? What that level is I'm not sure, but the implication is quite clear. At some point we have too much loans for what we produce, and we will need to get rid of the debt. There are only 3 ways to get rid of debt. 1) Inflate (soft default), 2) Default (hard default) 3) pay it off (austerity). I'll start with #3. This is what Greece is doing and failing miserably at. Money basically goes out of existence when loans are paid off. So you enter into a cunnundrum: you have to get more productive with the money you have and pay off loans. Paying off loans shrinks the money supply, which eventually will cause prices to fall, which makes paying off loans harder. #2) Hard default. Basically tell the banks to shove it. The money is already loaned into existence so by telling the banks you won't pay them back you ensure that the money supply won't shrink. But by defaulting you ensure immediately much higher interest rates so the rate that loans are created will probably drop drammatically. This can socially be really bad as really screwy things will end up happening with a hard default. See Argentina 2001. Greece initially was going to hard default last year (and did to some extent), but backed away from that ledge. #3) Inflate-soft default. The way this occurs is through monetization of debt. Basically the Federal Reserve buys up bad debt in exchange for printing more US dollars. This ends up lowering the amount of debt per actual US dollar available. This episode (the 2008 credit crisis and ongoing after effects) has been building since 1971 when we basically become a credit based monetary system. Big picture wise, the build-up of credit has lead to the massive stock market bubble of 2001 and the housing bubble of 2008. Given a stable (i.e. non-increasing) monetary supply the natural market reaction is for gentle downward sloping deflation in prices. Basically productivity increases as society grows causing things to be cheaper. We have seen massive amounts of productivity gains in the past 20 years, yet very little actual price deflation. This is because the monetary supply has increased many, many times relative to production. The natural reaction to our massive credit build-up would be massive price deflation. And we have seen that to some extent . . . especially in housing, no wage increases, etc. Unfortunately, the Federal Reserve is hell-bent on preventing actual deflation. Thus they are trying to counter-act the natural credit bubble busting by buying more assets and buying bad debt. The Federal Gov. is also acting somewhat to prevent actual deflation by running larger and larger deficiets. There are 3 ways to pay off debt, we are choosing #1. So where does that leave us. Well, I guess it really depends on your level of confidence in whether the Federal Reserve and the Fed. Gov. can do what they say they want to do to. Sure interest rates are 3% now, but the old saying goes "markets can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent". Me personally, I think the best case scenario is something along the lines of Japan. 20 year of no asset gains, no stock market gains, relatively stable prices. At some point Japan will blow up, but 20 years is pretty good. Average person in Japan, things are pretty good. Worst case scenario is the Fed. loses the handle, interest rates skyrocket and can't control inflation and we get huge inflation (a doubling of prices relatively quickly, but no hyperinflation) a la Argentina 2001. We will not get a Greece episode because our debt is in dollars, whereas Greece's debt is in Euros and they don't control the presses. This isn't an easy problem and no one really knows exactly what will happen. Added to the whole problem is that the US dollar is the reserve currency. Basically in order for any other country in the world to inflate their way out of their credit problems, they have to buy US dollars (this is one reason why we have and will always have, until we are not the reserve currency, a trade deficit). We sell our dollars to the world for their stuff so they can inflate. My guess is that what we are seeing is the beginning of the end of the dollar hegemoney (US reserve currency), what comes afterwards is a ??. I would say what people should buy are assets, hard assets. Great time to buy land, gold, silver, commodities, etc. I also believe we are on the cusp of a sea change in interest rates. Rates have fallen for 30 years, bonds have been in one of the longest bull markets in history. That will change, when is the big questions, but it will change. I have considered shorting 30 year bonds. Sure it might go from 3 to 1.5 but considering we are at the lowest point in the last 100 years, chances are pretty darn good that sometime in the next 30 years it will be a lot higher than 3.

100% agree. Dealing with contracts, foreclosures, defaults, money, etc. is an extremely complex, ever changing situation. No one, except the people who make those decision, have access to all the information available as to why they made a certain decision. There is a reason why bankruptcies, foreclosures, defaults, etc. are removed from the court of public opinion and have developed into laws. In the vast, vast majority of cases, when something is unethical . . . it is also against the law. Besides, it is entirely subjective as to what is "financial stress". Financial stress for someone making 20k/year is different than someone making 120k/year. Some people would feel naked having less than 50k in a bank account, others would be grateful to have 500 bucks. It's like people think someone who strategically defaults gets off without any penalties. Oh there are penalties and lots of them and unless you plan on moving to another country you are stuck with the penalties for many years. There ain't no free lunch.

This seems like a fallacious argument. Make a claim that X happens, when someone asks for an example of X happening then saying I'm not going to give specific examples of X happening . . . but trust me it does there are many ways to do X and you're better off not knowing. Sorry my BS o meter is spiking. The title of this thread is strategic foreclosures and short sells, I have been addressing those aspects. If the thread title were running ends around the financial system then that is a different topic. If you believe that you have specific evidence of such against a particular individual then I would suggest you bring such evidence to the persons Bishop and let them deal with the matter. I have no reason to doubt that such a case does exist, but if so it is probably a very limited scenario and if you feel it is a huge concern then go to the person's Bishop. If you are a part of something you feel is unethical then stop being a part of it. If it's b/c the state this is occurring in is non-recourse, the best thing to do is to change the laws to make it a recourse state. My sole point is that just because someone strategically defaults it does not necessarily make it unethical. Even if they buy a home afterwards it doesn't necessarily make it unethical. The more loops and twists and turns the more likely it is unethical, but you really need a case by case basis to make that determination.

Just-a-guy thanks! I'd like to see a specific instance of this happening, otherwise it is just conjunction: "Basically when a house goes down in value, a member will buy a much more expensive home using either their own funds or a money from a second loan on the first, then short-sell or foreclose the first. The same member is then happy to pocket the profits on the second home when the value goes up" The basic premise seems to be that the member is profiting during the strategic default. IMO the bank should be able to pursue the foreclosure loss. And in the vast majority of states this is true. There are 12 states were loans are non-recourse: Recourse v. Non-Recourse States Maybe that is where the confusion comes in. My state GA, the bank can sure has crap pursue you if you default on a loan (as they should be able to). The way you get out of that is through bankruptcy. That's why to me, the issue is a moot point. It can't happen. Of course lenders and creditors should be able to pursue losses in court. The counter-point should be that basically in states that are non-recourse loans should be a) harder to get and b) much higher interest rates to compensate for the banks inability to pursue losses. The only way to possibly make it happen is to buy the 2nd house using some sort of incorporation, etc. which gets into a whole other set of criteria that isn't germane to this discussion. I have no idea why a state would make mortgage loans non-recourse . . . that's just dumb. I would also argue that in those select cases of this happening the person is most likely not buying a more expensive house, they are probably downgrading. I personally find it extremely hard to believe (and I would like to actually see a specific instance) where someone who has strategically defaulted ended up in a bigger home, nicer neighborhood etc. As for the short sale that eowyn mentioned, we'll agree to disagree. I find it as a negotiating tactic, I don't see anything unethical this negotiation.

I would just add in the larger scheme total US debt is over 300% debt to GDP. http://www.zerohedge.com/sites/default/files/images/user5/imageroot/2012/01/World%20debt%20to%20GDP.jpg The issue of debt will become a major issue in future years. As I've said before there are only 3 ways out. Default, inflate, pay it off. Paying it off would entail decades of real pain, in fact there may be no real way to actually pay it off. Debt liquidation is the quickest and least painful way out. It sucks, but it reboots the system. How we approach housing debt liquidation is indicative of how we will approach things when grand scheme debt liquidation is necessary. Obviously, the people who lied and cheated are evil, but some people just need to liquidate debt. Debt = slavery. Debt IMO should only be used for things that will increase productivity, i.e. build a new factory invest in new machinery, etc. Debt for a house or a car is in general a losing proposition.

I have a huge problem with someone coming in with this type of a hypothetical (or maybe it's a real-life example) in this case and saying it's right or wrong. Not enough facts exists in order to make that determination. That's what courts, Bishops, lawyers, judges, etc. are for. Of course we have to judge righteously, but as we are internet jockies not courts it is not for us to judge. Yes some people are scumbags and just care about what's mine, some people are evil and just care about themselves regardless of who their actions affect, they will lie, cheat, steal, etc. to gain an advantage. But just because someone strategically defaults does not mean they are one of these types of people. I have an issue with this type of a hypothetical scenario because it becomes emotionally charged. It becomes worse if it is a real-life example. The facts presented are one-sided, presented in a manner that ensure the person telling the story is more likely to be in the right. One person believes b/c they perceive that someone is getting an unfair advantage that it's wrong. Rather than looking at the situation and analyzing the particulars, they come off with a blanket "it's unethical". They end up becoming hypocrites by looking at their neighbors and picking out the perceived mote in their brothers eye without looking at the beam in their own eye. That is why I believe I have consistently said it may or may not be ethical, and for that I get blasted. I have individuals claiming in some way that I cannot possible be a good Mormon because of this position.

A very well thought out and good reply. I think we are probably closer in thought than farther apart.

Haven't read the article, but yes going back to the Gold Standard we had prior 1930s would be a bad idea because it doesn't solve the problem. The root problem is fractional reserve banking/lending (which can still exists under a Gold Standard). On top of that is ability to inflate the money supply at will.

Which result? and to what higher standard? This isn't rocket science here. If they lie on an application that is wrong, Liar loans, stated income loans etc. are obviously wrong, but we aren't talking about that. The bank requires a crud load of documentation. Very, very few people can actually hold two mortgages at once, that requires financial reserves that very few people have. You can't just walk into a bank with a loan on one house, pick up another house with another loan and default on the 1st the next day. It just doesn't work that way. The bank will put that person through the ringer to verify assets, LTV ratios, etc. to ensure that in the event of a default the banks rear is covered. The bank who had a loan on the defaulted house will come after other assets, the second house, etc., which is why many times a strategic default situation requires bankruptcy or some sort of restructuring. You've built yourself a box by saying that defaulting when one can pay is unethical. There are tons of situations where that may not be the case. What about people who have vacation homes, that they want or need to unload, it's unethical for them to default b/c they can pay? Sometimes it is impossible to sell. If you have a 300k mortgage but can only sell the place for 200k that means in order to sell the house you have to bring 100k to the table when you sell. Many people who can afford to pay the monthly nut can't afford to bring 100k to the table to sell. So they default even though they can make the payments. Sometimes it is necessary to get rid of the debt, even when you can pay . . . unless you'd like us to go back to debtor's prison. That is why I have consistently said that it may be unethical to strategically default but that it may not be, a blanket statement is wrong. Unless you are their CPA then you have no moral grounds to make a claim that strategically defaulting is unethical.

Sure it is a breach, or breaking the contract (or whatever you like to call it). I'm saying that the contract spells out what happens in that event. And that whether or not it is ethical depends on the person and the situation and that it is not for us to judge whether it is ethical or not. We do not have all the facts of the situation. A strategic default in and of itself is a business transaction with no ethics attached. It is covered in the contract. One might be breaking the contract but one is not going outside the contract. The more likely a default the more the bank will put heavier penalties to that loan. Absolutely, they want to protect themselves. This is one reason why interest rates should be a lot higher (to compensate for the higher rates of defaults). I would say NINJA loans where people never made a single payment were probably in some degree unethical, but I do not know the situation of each and every person so I can not say for sure. But this conversation did not start with NINJA loans, it started with strategic defaults; that specifically people who defaulted when they could pay were being unethical. My point has been and continues to be that hardly anyone goes into getting a loan saying "I'm going to default", why get a loan if that is the case? But the situation changes and sometimes it becomes necessary to break a contract. LM was (maybe still is) trying to pin me down into saying that because I don't feel that I "must" pay a mortgage means that I "won't". I wouldn't get a 30 year mortgage unless I felt it was in my best interest to pay a 30 year mortgage. But I also recognize that at some point it is possible that my situation changes and it is no longer viable to continue to do so. If that situation occurred, I would carefully weigh my options, if defaulting ended up being the best outcome for me, my family, my long-term mental, emotional, financial health then I would default. Sometimes you just have to cut bait. I do not claim it is "good" to default, but that sometimes those things are necessary and it isn't my place to judge someone else.

I understand the concern. But everything is spelled out in your contract. Back in the old days (pre-1930s), banks did actually do something similar . . . they recalled loans. And in some instances today they can do the same, but again it is spelled out in the contract. In today's world to my knowledge there is nothing in the contract which stipulates that banks can renegotiate interest rates when it is fixed. The contract does spell out exactly what happens if you do not pay. That is my point, the contract you sign with the bank explicitly spells out what happens if you do not pay the mortgage. That why it pays to read all the fine print of the contract. Banks could be sneaky and put in a clause that allows them to reset the interest rates. My whole point is a lot of people claim that not paying the mortgage is going outside your contract. That is incorrect the contract and the law specifies exactly what happens when you do not pay, therefore non-payment is in the contract and is covered by law and therefore ethical as well as the ramifications of non-payment.

Yeap . . . you are right, forgot about that. (Sigh) The entire system is corrupt, corrupt to the core. It is really quite sad when you delve into the problem, research it and understand it. The entire banking/loan/monetary system needs to be completely burned down with a reboot. We'll get there, but it will be forced on us rather than done voluntarily. We will eventually have an event like Argentina 2001 or Greece, etc. It is really quite sad.