Greed

The other night on TV I saw a preacher giving a highly emotional sermon about the financial troubles of today. If I heard it correctly, he said he asked God about the reasons for the financial crisis and then was reminded that greedy bankers had taken advantage of poor people by making them home loans. They had no ability to pay them back, causing the disaster. I of course had heard that version many times but I had not heard anyone claim that he got that information from God. At the same time that I asked God if he really told the man that, the camera panned the congregation and I saw that it was obviously a group that was hearing exactly what they wanted to hear. They were all nodding their approval as he shouted out his revelation.

I have been immersed in this specific issue for my entire career. Much of my younger career was spent defending my profession against the charge that these greedy bankers simply would not lend money to poor people who needed houses. I never understood that charge because lending is all about income and credit, not about politics and race.

But now we are being blamed for just the opposite and yes, our motivation is that we are still greedy.

Now I am not going to defend all banks and all their decisions on how they lent. But I am a firm believer in things coming full circle when it comes to real estate lending. Real estate is technically a commodity. It is what they call a "hard asset". When you lend to a business, you are lending based on many intangibles (the business's reputation, its management philosophy, its brand recognition, etc). But hard assets are always about simply supply and demand. Politics can mess with supply and demand for a while, but the value of hard assets tends to self-correct over time. It is now in the self-correcting mode.

What happened between the time that greedy bankers shamefully refused to lend to poor people and the time when greedy bankers shamefully lent to poor people? A lot of politics happened. Gaining votes happened. Votes used to be worth a chiken in every pot. Then the value went up to a car in every driveway. Finally it became the driveway, itself.

How that equates to banker greed, I have no idea.

Virgina Tech: An Assault of Reason

Senseless carnage. I guess all carnage is senseless, but the massacre at Virginia Tech today has really made people pause. I walked into a sandwich shop at noon. It is usually teeming with conversation and laughter. Today it was quiet. Everyone’s eyes were glued on the TV. There wasn’t even any conversation back and forth about what people were seeing. There was no, “We should have done this” or “If only we did that.” When you think about what we were seeing, it was a perfect example of something so absurdly wrong that it assaulted our sense of reason. There is no rational way to explain why this might have happened. It is even more ironic when the scene is a college campus; a place where reason supposedly prevails.

One of my first blog posts was about a scene on a college campus where this very thing happened before. I believe it was the first time this type of thing (a school shooting) had ever happened. I was visiting the campus 30 years later when I saw the place of the massacre. I instantly remembered the scenes that I saw as a 15 year old boy on our black and white TV set. It is interesting that a TV picture was indelibly etched into my young mind, only to come back with extreme clarity 30 years later. I believe that happens when you witness or you are a part of something that assaults your sense of reason.
The irony of the University of Texas massacre was the message carved on the face of the building. Read about it here.

Can you handle the truth?

I named my blog Truthseeker because that is its mission. I love to dig out the truth. In this present age that can be a challenge. I am posting a You-tube video of a recent speech given by a Mr. Evan Sayet at the Heritage Foundation. It is pretty long. However, please view it. I am picking it up off of the Little Green Footballs website, but it is one of those Internet phenomenons that has grown every day. Many remarks that I have seen say, "VIEW THIS VIDEO!!! You will come to a new understanding of something very important." Mr. Sayet is a brilliant communicator. It is easy to see why Bill Maher employed him as a writer. It is also easy to see why he doesn't employ him now. I am sure this is not the last we will hear from this man.

Evan Sayet

John 15:13

When I was a sophomore in college, I changed my major from Architecture to Political Science. Architecture was not me. And I was deeply interested in what was happening on the world scene. Part of the draw to Political Science was that in some ways, the Oregon campus provided a front row seat. Every so often, we would hear that Oregon’s Senator Wayne Morse was on campus. After dropping in virtually unannounced, he would let the word out that he was going to speak in the big PLC lecture hall. I always skipped class to hear him. Senator Wayne Morse, the Tiger of the Senate was the most electrifying speaker I has ever heard. They do not make orators like him any more.

It was a very unique time. The Vietnam War had escalated to 500,000 troops, President Nixon’s plan to get us out by escalating was not working, and campuses like Oregon were becoming very volatile.

It was reason enough to be excited when a U. S. Senator came to speak, but this was not any U. S. Senator. A little bit of history is in order here. President Johnson got us deeply committed to the war by passing through the Congress and Senate the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution. It was the “line in the sand” that Johnson drew to establish our presence there. It passed the Senate 98 – 2. The two “no’s”were Senator Wayne Morse and his sidekick Earnest Gruening of Alaska. Please note that when it came to the Vietnam conflict, 98 Senators were for it before they were against it. Senator Morse was a brilliant constitutional scholar. His reasons against it were not political. They were based on his firm belief that our presence there was unconstitutional. By the early ‘70’s, most everyone was against it too, and they all were now listening to him. After hearing him lecture for 90 minutes, everyone within ear shot was against the war, too.

My term project that year was to make sense out of the validity (or nonvalidity) of the war. So, my skipping class and listening to Senator Morse was “research.” Besides, most of the Political Science Professors were there, too. No Poli Sci prof wanted to be conspicuous by his absence at a Wayne Morse event.

Well, actually, there was one professor who was not there. His name was Joseph Fizman. Old Joe seemed to be barely tolerated by the younger Poli Sci profs. He was kind of a throw-back. He dressed “old world” and had an Eastern European accent that I couldn’t place. I had to take a course from him that quarter, because it was all that I could fit into my schedule. I remember very clearly, one day, when Professor Fizman glared at us through his thick glasses and said “You think that getting marijuana legalized is politics?” Then he shouted, “That is shitty politics! I will tell you politics.”

Then he proceeded to tell us over the next 90 minutes how thirty years before, he hid under the floorboards of an old house in Poland as Nazi’s searched the house above him. He described how he ran for his life, and how some in his family did not make it. It was then that I got the accent and the look. He was Jewish. Then he explained that he is alive today, and living in America because Americans came and fought and died to stop the slaughter of his people. He was not the orator that Senator Morse was, but with an emotional voice, sometimes booming, other times weeping, he helped us understand that to him, politics that matter are life sacrificing, life taking, and most importantly, life giving.

In that one class, my position on the Vietnam War was severely challenged. Senator Morse’s argument against the war was unshakable. It was not legal. But so what? Our world would not be the same unless there were people, countries, and armies that would stand between those who would commit genocide and those they wanted dead. I needed to come to grips with the reality of what Professor Fizman had told us. I tried to rewrite my paper to explain that even though the Vietnam War was illegal, it was, in some very crucial ways, right. I think I got a C. But I learned that politics is not just about what is legal. After all, what is legal is simply what the last judge or jury says it is. It is necessary to take the side of what is right. I ended up feeling that way about Vietnam.

I took some heat from my friends for thinking that way. The common feeling was that protecting the Vietnamese was not worth the lives of our people. I lost some friends in that war and I sometimes agreed with those feelings, but the friends I lost would not have. And there was the feeling that when we left Vietnam, things would settle down soon, anyway. I graduated from school and wasn’t around Professor Fizman when the last of our troops pulled out of Vietnam. My brother-in-law saw first-hand from the deck of his ship, the unreal chaos surrounding the final withdrawal. I often wondered what Professor Fizman told his new classes after up to 5 million Vietnamese and Cambodian people were then slaughtered by the Communists. I am sure he was angry, and I am sure he also wept as he told them. And . . . I am sure he remained unpopular with the other professors.

HAPPY FEET is destined to make you sad

Going to see the latest holiday movie at the box office with your family is a fun holiday tradition. This year's chosen movie for your enjoyment is Happy Feet. Have you seen the trailer on TV? Wow! The advertisement says that it will have you "dancing in the isles." What could be more lovable than a warm animated story about happy penguins? But before you pick up the grandchildren and head to the theatre for that wonderful quality-time experience, please read what Michael Medved is saying about the movie. He believes that Hollywood is at it again. He thinks that while they are promising a warm, happy, family friendly experience, they are really delivering a dark, politically correct, anti-religious, film guaranteed to give the kids nightmares. Here is what he says:

"This may be the darkest, most disturbing feature length animated film ever
offered by a major studio. At least 80% of the film’s running time shows its
penguin characters in pain or danger. Scenes of terrifying leopard seals and
killer whales trying to devour the protagonist and his friends are so intense as
to guarantee nightmares; the PG rating is a joke since the film is wildly
inappropriate for young viewers under seven (and their parents). Rather than
sending you out of the theatre with a song in your heart (there’s a big focus in
the script on “heart songs”) the movie produces feelings of fright, discomfort,
even guilt. The title “Happy Feet,” suggesting a feel-good frolic, could hardly
be more deceptive for a deeply ill-considered project that will make most
audience members feel gloomier and more depressed than they did when they
entered the theatre."

Read the rest of his review here

Now, is it a crime to put out a dark animated movie just in time for the holidays? Of course not. But when the promotion takes advantage of what we all want to see at Christmas time and then brings us into a theatre under that premise, only to deliver more Hollywood agenda propaganda, we need to rise up and take notice. Hollywood does not play fair anymore. They are all too willing to take advantage of our trust. They don't deserve our trust anymore.

Quest

The scene was 10 years ago. I was a 45 year old student for a month on the University of Texas campus. Campus activity looked the same as my own school (University of Oregon) 25 years earlier. I had changed though. As a 45 year old, I was aware of the spiritual atmosphere and confident of my place in it. At Oregon, when I was a young student, I was self focused and unsure of my world. Any confidence I projected, any resolve I espoused were merely generated out of the need of the moment to project and espouse confidence and resolve. Twenty-five years later I could see the same fragile masks on some of the young students as we walked through campus between classes.
On the Texas campus, there is a big lawn crisscrossed by sidewalks. Between classes it teems with a sea of students as they cross through it for the next class. At the far end is the tallest building on campus. It is at the same time famous and infamous. It is the “Clocktower Building”. If you are old enough, you might remember the first real sniper killing in our country that was covered live on television across the nation. A man had made his way up the Clocktower Building’s 23 stories with a rifle and started killing students as they crossed the lawn on their way to class. Many more would have died if it wasn’t for a couple of brave patrolmen who, armed with only a pistol and a shotgun, climbed up the 23 flights of stairs and put an end to the carnage. I was about 15 when it happened. I had not remembered or thought of it since, but when I walked on campus 30 years later and looked up to see that building, I instantly remembered. This was that building.
However as I approached it, remembering the black and white TV images, I saw something that I was not prepared for. Engraved in the marble across the face of the huge base of the building was the quote, “Know the truth and the truth will set you free.” Young students walked past, oblivious of the building’s infamy and unmoved by the huge message carved in stone before them. The scene was surreal. Oblivious students walking past a structure that had all the impact of Golgotha. A place made infamous by the mass murdering of innocent students. The same place had the message of ultimate freedom emblazoned on it.
I watched the scene before me and realized that the students represented all of us. We are all on a quest for truth. We all walk the path that represents the quest for truth, oblivious of the fact that death itself can scour the same path, seeking who it may devour. We all are somewhere between the realization of death and the revelation of the truth.
The irony of the scene was that the author of the building’s inscription was not a sponsor of academic pursuit at all. And his statement was not about the pursuit of knowledge. Nor was it a simple platitude. After all, what he was talking about is so powerful that it is the only certain and successful defense from the clocktower killer. I wanted to walk through the square, point to the inscription and ask the students, “Who do you think first said that? What do you think that means?” What was he talking about?” I didn’t stop anyone. They all had just minutes to get to their next class. They were all too focused to pay attention to some middle aged stranger.
But you’ve got time? What do you think it means?

Know the Truth

Engraved on the big clocktower building at the University of Texas campus are the words, "Know the truth and the truth will set you free." That is a great challenge for college students to have in front of them every day. I wondered when I read it if some students walk under this invitation for four years without knowing who said it or what he was saying.
We live in a time where knowledge is increasing exponentially, but truth is held hostage to the word "relative."
My purpose for this blog is to use it as a tool to find the essence of truth in issues that are important to me. Your comments are essential because "iron sharpens iron."
At this point I feel a desire to include the following topics in my discussions:

• The spiritual landscape
• The political landscape
• Marriage and family issues
• Investment comments (especially commodity technical analysis)
• Oregon Duck sports

My hope and my goal is to use the process of discussion and mutual discovery to arrive at truth that endures the circumstances of the moment and guides us as we encounter the future.