Obama Administration Will Spend Just $12 Billion Of The $50 Billion Promised To Help Homeowners

[laughingliberal]

The Obama administration will spend less than a quarter of the $50 billion it promised to help homeowners facing foreclosure, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said in a report Monday.

The CBO projection raises fresh questions about the success of the administration's foreclosure-prevention efforts and its commitment to helping homeowners, even as unemployment hovers near 10 percent. Corporations and large banks appear to be in full-fledged recovery -- last quarter, corporate profits reached an all-time high of $1.66 trillion on an annual basis -- but households and small businesses seem to have been left out.

Washington policymakers talk constantly about helping "Main Street" recover from the steepest downturn since the Great Depression. Spending less than a quarter of the money promised to help residents of "Main Street" keep their homes may not seem in line with that goal.

President Barack Obama and his top aides, including Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, have made numerous pledges to the ever-increasing number of homeowners faced with foreclosure, declines in home value and reductions in equity. The administration's programs, announced by Obama in a Mesa, Ariz. high school just four weeks after he took office, originally aimed to "enable as many as 3 to 4 million homeowners to modify the terms of their mortgages to avoid foreclosure."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/11/29/obama-foreclosure-hamp-cbo_n_789559.html

*sigh*

[Bluebear]

1. 'Corporations and large banks appear to be in full-fledged recovery' - well, that was the concern.

Obviously not to help struggling homeowners, most of which were shown the door from this scam of a program.

[MadHound]

2. No unemployment extension, no foreclosure help,

But the wealthy and corporate as well tended in this country.

[inna]

3. the only thing that will surprise me at this point will be any pro-working class policies.

i know, fat chance.

[neverforget]

4. We outnumber the monied interests but we have no voice and no power.

[dreamnightwind]

5. In large groups we still have power

Somewhat off-topic, but I'd like to see DU transform itself into a catalyst for real fundamental change.

It's great to have a forum that discusses so much of what's wrong with things. Until we know, we won't act. More and more, I think we know. It's not just about electing Democrats, not even close.

There are a lot of people on here, many of whom have had the wool removed from their eyes by the actions of this administration.

There are plenty of working models on this planet. Most of them are not based on military might and unfettered trans-national capitalism.

We really need to get together on this and use our collective might to escape the good cop bad cop facade of a two party system.

Personally I'd like to reclaim the Democratic Party for the people, but I'm open to other paths, whatever works. Social Democratic party?

Plenty of people here smarter than me, but time to get this party started!

[OnionPatch]

6. The only numbers that count are the numbers in our bank accounts.

Collectively, we add up to shit compared to them.

[neverforget]

7. Correct and they're looking to take as much of our money as they can

[dreamnightwind]

9. Not true at all

If you look at the history of humans bringing actual change to their circumstances, you will find many examples of large groups of otherwise powerless individuals bringing fundamental change once they unite for a cause.

I share your cynicism, some of it at least, but I'd like to see us get past this "nothing will help" mentality, it's self-defeating and keeps us from doing what we need to do.

We can and should complain all we want about the hopelessness of waiting for our current leaders to bring the change we need. The other side of it, though, is that change really can and does happen. We gotta do it ourselves, as many of us together as we can muster.

[OnionPatch]

11. Well, I should have said "the only numbers that matter to our politicians

and the powers that be" are the numbers in our bank accounts. But I do believe there is hope or I wouldn't be here (at DU). Sometimes the battle seems insurmountable, but I adhere to MLKs thoughts that the arc of the moral universe bends toward justice in the long run. Especially if we don't give up.

[dreamnightwind]

13. Yep

Sorry to preach to the choir. I see people giving up these days, understandable, I feel like that myself a lot of times, but we need to do the complete opposite, step up our game, so whenever I can I try to shift the momentum away from resignation and towards activism. I'm often surprised by all of the nay-saying on DU anytime action is proposed. If we could channel our angst into action we'd be quite a force.

[laughingliberal]

8. Indeed. nt

[Mimosa]

10. Reminds me of the aid which we didn't receive post-Katrina

There was aid which was authorised by Congress to help those who suffered through Katrina and whose lives were impacted forever. In my household we received $1700 of that FEMA aid which they demanded we pay pack a year later. We are still paying on a Katrina related SBA loan (very, very small). Supposedly a lot of no strings aid was authorised by Congress but most of us never received it.

[amborin]

12. K&R