No.

Would I like to throw him down a flight of stairs, just for being a cowardly racist asshole ?

Yes.

Where do you get the idea that only YOU get to define “progress” ?

Can’t we at least all agree this shit needs to be shut down?

And what law says you have to buy what a sales person presents to you? Were the mortgage officers committing fraud? Did they have people sign documents stating they were receiving a fixed rate mortgage when they were really issuing them a variable rate one?

Yes and yes. The fixed/variable rate switch was (and is) quite common. A loan officer is a specialist in determining whether or not you can afford a loan and also a fiduciary (look it up if you don’t understand the legal implications of that). Loan officers have been widely caught fudging the numbers in calculations in order to sell a bigger loan. Legally, that’s equivalent to having your lawyer lie in court to your detriment.

Jason & Michael are great guys with a solid business, but they’re not Live Nation.

The band and promoter in this story all do what they do out of a deep and abiding love of music, not necessarily the (surprisingly small) monetary rewards.

Also applicable in a more focussed sense: within Scotland the Proddys hate the Fenians and the Catholics hate the Proddys. But when Scotland plays England at fitba, we are united.

We’d probably hate the Jews too, but we are too similar to Ireland in that respect, per Joyce.

Also, at least one of the mega-lenders was caught charging higher fees and rates to  minority borrowers. If you believe that they’re the only  ones, I’ve got a bridge etc. Eviction rates for minorities are probably higher too, though I don’t have a link at hand on that one.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/07/13/business/wells-fargo-to-settle-mortgage-discrimination-charges.html?_r=0

The difference between me putting my signature on a sub-prime balloon mortgage and then not being able to pay the new higher amount and loosing an investment to Mr. Madoff is very clear.  I caused the first thing to happen by knowingly entering into that contract, where as Bernie was lying to his investors and committing fraud.

Lots of people you deal with in life are suppose to have your best interest at heart, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t know what the hell is going on.  Like why did the doctor prescribe this medication over another, or what are my payments going to be every month for this loan.  I’m not disagreeing with you that people got pushed toward these loans and that claims were exaggerated, but the fine print on those mortgage documents states exactly what they were getting into.  (And yes I have and do read every single page of any document I sign.)

(I’m white for the record.)

Oh so that’s why he was doing it to others, so he could know it when it happened to him.
I get it.

Also, SF ain’t all that great.  It was a lot snobbier than anywhere else I’d ever been.

In parts of the US racism is just a specialized subset of general xenophobia.

Listening to some English people go on about the Scots, you’d think that there were five million Ripley’s aliens north of the border. But as with orcs in Mordor, they’ll rapidly side with them the moment that someone more ‘alien’ shows up.

I rode up and over the mountain without incident, and saw no such flags on my route, but it was a bit of an eye-opener about the nature of that stereotypical craziness.

Indians with surname Patel do not necessarilly belong to one clan, it is a surname shared by many families. Patels in the United States have roots in like, at least ten, give or take states in India. It is a very common name in India, crazy-common in London and is in the top 200 names in the United States. Most Patels I’ve made acquaintance were Hindu, but I also had a work-out pal whose parents came from Pakistan, his fam is Muslim. What did his parents do here (in U.S., Oregon)? They bought a small hotel, being CPAs by training I strongly suspect irony was involved, but maybe both irony and family tradition.

Anyway – Patels who do not even know about one-another own hotels all over the place. Several acquaintances and friends explained to me that the high freq of Patels with hotels is because, even though Patel ‘A’, Patel ‘M’ and Patel ‘Z’ who operate hotels in LA, CA, Deliverance, MS and Hoboken NJ respectively don’t know each-other, and are not even aware either, they have webs of distant and not so distant relatives who do, and over the years have emigrated, sponsored by family, extended family and etcetera. But my reckoning this isn’t really a clan. 

Now, about the racist thing  and let’s keep in mind individuals vary. All of these Patels though, likely being within, I dunno, I’ll arbitrarily say 2.2 degrees of separation, are nevertheless, individuals, families, and extended networks and there is likely no ‘Patel Central’ – just like there is no ‘Jew Central’ (believe me if there was a ‘Jew Central’ maybe I’d be wandering care-free in my very-own vineyard.)  

I don’t challenge what you write in your comment – I believe you about the Patels you know are, for whatever reason, are making this policy. It’s just not been my experience with acquaintances and friends surnamed Patel I have here in the US. 

However, there is the huge, huge, factor of the caste system. 

Laws of India do not  currently recognize the caste system, Pakistan is Islamic, so the caste system should not be an issue there. The caste system should not be relevant at all among Sikhs, but friends of mine who are Muslim and Sikh have told me how the system continues to be an influential stain, even with Muslims and Sikhs to whom caste should not be relevant. 

So….Ser  ApMardda, I don’t doubt what you wrote about your personal observation, it just hasn’t been mine, but maybe you’re older and/or more travelled than me.

Cheers!

That’s bullshit. I don’t care if every single person who ended up underwater and lost their home is a minority it’s not whiteys fault that they can’t ask questions, read the fine print, understand how a loan works (or find/bring along a friend that does).

No, sir. That is bullshit. Loan officers are fiduciaries. If they use deceptive practices, and that has been shown to be widespread, they committed a crime. What you’re doing is no different than blaming Bernie Madoff’s victims, except that they could more easily afford the loss than people on the edge who were suckered into loans that they couldn’t afford by people who are bound by law to use the highest standard of integrity in dealing with them.

That’s bullshit.  I don’t care if every single person who ended up underwater and lost their home is a minority it’s not whiteys fault that they can’t ask questions, read the fine print, understand how a loan works (or find/bring along a friend that does).

-obviously everyone’s situation is different, if said people lost their home due to other circumstances like job loss then I understand.  But if they simply lost it because their monthly payment jumped then that’s on them.

Anyway, I have never known East Indians or Pakistanis to discriminate against paying customers because of colour. Discriminate amongst themselves, you bet, the caste system comes to mind, but not due to race. With few exceptions they’re great business-people (in business families) – and are people-people. 

I can easily imagine however, certain nationalities (other than rednicks) doing this.

Talking as if POC don’t know already about all the glorious progress that’s been made.

SMDH

Well, as the saying goes, you can take the clown out of the circus, but ya’ can’t take the circus out of the clown.

big cities have plenty of racists but for the most part, exceptions like this incident notwithstanding i guess, even someone dumb enough to be hate racist or just stupid racist has the wherewithal to keep their stupid opinions hidden.

Just simply being an intolerant, closed-minded city should disqualify San Francisco. As if that’s not bad enough, have you ever tried quickly finding a parking space on the street there?