For the first time since this Greatest Recession Since the Great Depression (GRSGD) began, bank delinquencies on the books of the more than 7800 banks that report to the FDIC are on the decline.  And Exhibit 1 shows the first point on what should continue to be a downward trend as loan delinquencies return to pre-GRSGD levels over the next few years.

Late in the fall of 1988 the accounting firm, Coopers & Lybrand (C&L), won a competitive award to construct a computer system that collected the monthly security and loan information relating to Ginnie Mae’s mortgage-backed security program. As a C&L consultant with a math major and a Wharton M.B.A., I was put in charge of testing the system as it was being developed.

Where is Howard Beale when we need him?  Two years into the Greatest Recession Since the Great Depression (GRSGD) and our financial leaders are still telling us that we need to be patient while waiting for our economic recovery.

Mortgage debt in the United States (currently more than $10 trillion) has grown to the point that it is nearly the same size as our national debt (in fact, a few years ago, U.S. mortgage debt actually successfully passed our national debt), and it has only been as a result of the new Administration’s debt spending that our national debt has regained the lead in the race to see which can account for the highest amount of our economic debt.

He knows nothing about economics whatsoever, but he’s entertaining to listen to. And he’s certainly right about one thing: it is an absolute joke that personal finance, basic accounting and basic economics are not part of the typical high school curriculum:

Peter Schiff just lost the Republican nod for US Senator in Connecticut. If someone ever embodied the antithesis to the nation’s current approach, it is Schiff.

A long Japanese-like malaise, very possibly a prolonged 70’s style stagflation and a slow downward spiral of a Britain-esque imperial demise is what I see on the horizon. Unfortunately, I almost hope for that since an all out Rome style collapse is within the realm of possibility.

So while Linda McMahon is a flip-flopping opportunist, Peter Schiff has always preached fiscal restraint and small government and his long career provides ample evidence he will follow through on his word. He will work to shrink government, stop the bailouts and endless debt-financed spending. He will work to protect the Constitution. He’ll help to get an audit of the Federal Reserve (something Linda knows little if anything about). He opposed the Iraq War at the time

Throughout much of our nation’s history, US federalism has moved toward centralizing power within the federal government. Since the post-bailout hysteria and most recent public sector expansion, the issue of states’ rights has had a renaissance. Some Americans long for a system where states have more control to govern. You know, the system our Founders seemed to envision, where each state is an experiment adopting best practices from one another.

As the foreclosures started to go through the courts later in the decade, we began to uncover why so many were able to get loans that they couldn’t afford. It all started with the mortgage brokers giving out loans to those who had no intention or didn’t have the funds to pay the loan off.