What would you do for a million dollars?

I've been tagged by Lee Distad in a game of blog tag. The rules are:

1. When you're tagged, answer the question on your blog, with a trackback to the original post.

2. Ask an additional million dollar question — and tag 3 bloggers with answering.

The question Lee poses to me is:

Would you promote a product or service that you didn't believe in for $1 million?

With a hypothetical like this, the devil is in the details. Would I spend a few months selling NutriSystem door-to-door if some benefactor would give me a million dollars even if I sold far less than than that? Sure. I could use the fresh air. But that kind of fantasy scenario trivializes the question.

Would I build a career selling variable annuities or high-fee, high-expense mutual funds as a stockbroker? Nope. I had that chance. First, I'm not a salesman by nature. But more importantly, I really can't sell something I don't believe in. Devoting my life to doing something I believe is unethical is just a non-starter.

And now to the question I'll pose:

Would you accept $1 million if it meant the election of your least favorite Presidential candidate? To make it interesting, let's including the already departed like Huckleberry and the Breck Girl.

I'm going to tag Alarming News, Pillage Idiot, and Ang. If you have any thoughts, throw 'em in the comments.

Great moments in children's literature

Why are these dogs gazing so longingly at the leaves on that tree?



Wait a minute -- I recognize those leaves!

Congratulations to subversive photographer Brian Stanton who slipped this past publisher Simon & Schuster in the children's book Dog. Get it on Amazon for that little stoner in your life.

Greenspan's Body Count update

In the last episode of Greenspan's Body Count, we speculated that realtor Kashmir Billon might be alive today if his partner Raymond James Robinson had sought an honest career instead of trying to get rich quickly in real estate.

New details have emerged that confirm our suspicion:

Earlier Thursday, Supervising Deputy District Attorney Harold Jewett said that the murder appeared to stem from fraud involving a residential real estate development on Seventh Street in North Richmond.

Billon reportedly financed the purchase and construction of homes on property that Robinson owned. Although details of how the fraudulent transaction was supposed to work were not released by authorities, it appeared Robinson allegedly planned to sell those homes to a fictitious person through a bank.

The fraudulent purchase was reportedly scheduled to close escrow Monday, "leaving the bank holding the bag," Jewett said.

Investigators were still working to determine how much Billon knew about the alleged scheme.

"It's possible he was killed because he found out about the fraud," Jewett said.

Greenspan's Body Count remains at twenty-five:

Kashmir Billon
Bill McMurtry
Lisa McMurtry
James Hahn
Raymond Donaca
Deanna Donaca
[redacted]
[redacted]
Michel Veillette
Nadya Ferrari-Veillette
Marguerite Veillette
Vincent Veillette
Mia Veillette
Jacob Veillette
Maurice Pereira
Natasha Pereira
Mark Achilli
Raed Al-Farah
Andrew Kissel
Rufus Shaw Jr.
Lynn Flint Shaw
Mr. Pierce
Walter Buczynksi
Marci Buczynski
Jason Washington

And the winner is...

Looks like it will be Hope and Change vs. Less Jobs, More Wars.

May the least horrible man win.

In a New York minute

Bloomberg:

"If you had anything on the ball, you could make it happen in Vegas," said real estate agent Donna Marie Gold, 62, who built a $4.5 million fortune buying and selling properties over six years.

After failing to complete a single sale last year, Gold said she fell $22,000 short each month on payments needed to maintain 14 properties. Now two to four months behind on some mortgage payments, she's lost access to a $250,000 Wells Fargo & Co. equity credit line.

"The whole thing was upside down in a New York minute," Gold said. "There needs to be some forgiveness in this climate with regards to credit and rebuilding one's credit."

Gee, I can't imagine why nobody will extend her a quarter-million dollar loan.

UPDATE: I think I've found the problem. Donna is trying to rent a 2-bedroom condo for $5100 when there are 2-bedroom condos in the same building for $1200 and $1950 on craigslist. And look at the eloquent prose with which she describes her Palmilla rental:

What's the theme of this page? Do you have a list of customer testimonials or reference information that you'd like to share with your visitors? News or unique details about your business that don't seem quite right for your other pages? Click to add your page's main content here.

Fannie Mae

Today Fannie-tastic reported that they lost $2.19 billion dollars because they bought the fraudulent loans that folks at Countrywide created which are worth very little. They also stated that 2009 is going to be worse. So what does the government do?

“…the Office of Federal Housing Enterprise Oversight said it will lower requirements for surplus capital to 15 percent from 20 percent.”

And the experts chime in - ''With a weak housing market, for God's sake, we need Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac to work,'' said Andrew Parmentier, a managing director at Friedman Billings Ramsey & Co. in Arlington, Virginia.

What our socialist friend seems to be implying is that we created a situation that has caused our economy to be at risk of something bad and the only way to prevent it from really becoming badder is…. to do the same thing that got us to where we are today. The cliché of giving an alcoholic more alcohol to cure his alcoholism certainly applies.

An Open Letter to Barney Frank

Dear Mr. Frank:

I read recently about your proposed housing bailout bill.

Before the final bill is passed by both houses, there are a few things I'd like you to consider:

1) This is supposed to apply to "owner-occupied principal residences only." How do you plan to verify this? The bill summary refers only to the borrower "certifying" this. These are the same borrowers that "certified" lots of things that weren't true in the original loan application. If you are putting $300 million of taxpayer money at risk, enough to refinance more than a million homes, where do you expect the government to find hundreds of thousands of honest, competent loan officers to verify the facts? The loan industry doesn't have many honest, competent loan officers left.

2) The borrow must "certify" (again) that his debt-to-income ratio is at least 35%, and that he did not commit fraud on the original loan. Oh, what a tangled web we weave! "I certify that I wasn't lying when I said I made $100,000 a year, but now I make just $40,000 a year. I need a bailout!" Again, who do you expect to verify these suspicious claims on a million loans?

I have a modest proposal: when someone applies for the bailout, compare the stated income on the original loan to the income reported on the borrower's tax return for the prior and following year. If the numbers aren't close, the borrower should immediately be prosecuted for mortgage fraud and/or tax fraud.

Of course, that might cut down a bit on the number of applications you receive.

Best regards,

W.C. Varones