joshs

One other lead combination I have seen is low from a (lowish) doubleton with Rusinow honor leads. The main problem with rusinow is that when partner leads the 9,T,J,Q you sometimes don't know if he has a doubleton (or a higher honor) and this can cause a big problem. Out of the blue Qx and Jx leads are fairly rare, but Tx and 9x are relatively common. The idea is to lead low from Tx and below (and occasionally even from Jx or Qx, although that risks a blockage).

Well let me present the bidding theory issues involving a. 2/1 auction with major suit agreement at the 3 level b. 2/1 auction with major suit agreement at the 2 level and while I am at it I will mention as another example c. 1M-3M(4 card limit raise) In a and b, what are your goals? Goals: 1. Reach the correct strain .Something like 90% of the time the correct strain is the agreed major, but roughly 10% of the time we belong in a different strain, usually NT 2. Reach the correct level Since, you usually belong in the major, 2 is much more important than 1, but getting 2 correct is still pretty important. What information can you share and what goals do these serve? a. General Strength. This is mostly useful only for level. (Although, Having extra strength does increase the liklihood that 3N is better than 4M) b. Shape. This is useful for both strain and level, since you can evaluate how well your honors are working. c. Locations of honor cards. This is also useful for both strain and level, but for it to help strain you need to know more than 1 card in C and 1 in spades. In general, cuebidding honors does not give you enough info below 3N to help determine if 3N is correct. In general, its secondary honors (K's Q's and J's) that are potentially wasted opposite a short suit, so a high concentration of them (say KQTx) opposite a stiff is an indicater that 3N might be right. d. control showing bids. If the control showing bids can be either length or shortness, and can be either the ace alone or a suit with honor concentration, it really does not help strain much, so this is about level. When the suit is agreed at the 3 level, you have no chance of working out if 3N was right. When you have a fit, and the 2/1 bid showed a 5 card suit, its really rare for 3N to be right unless one player has substantial wastage opposite there partner's short suit. Hence the tools that are about level are key. That is, Strength and Location of Controls become your priority (if you had to pick between these 2, strength is much more important). When the suit is agreed at the 2 level, you can serve both goals. Furthermore its not a choice between natural and cuebidding. Its a choice between 1 round of natural (either a shape style or an honor concentration style serves that end) and 1 round of cuebidding, vs 2 rounds of cuebidding. The natural information is as useful for slam as a second round of cuebidding (for instance showing 5431 also shows a control in the singleton suit), and since you can convey the natural info below 3N its helpful for strain as well. I have remarked elsewhere, that cuebidding auctions convey 2 pieces of information: a. strength b. location of controls (or key honors in partner's suit) and that a is much more important than b. The value you get from 2 levels of cuebidding is minimal in slam auctions. This is one of the reasons that its not that common for cuebidding auctions to extend to the 5 level. 80% of the value in cuebidding comes from the statement that someone is interested in slam. Let me ask this? Would you rather be in slam off an AK but with 12 tricks available, or in a slam where you have all suits controled but can't possibily take 12 tricks? Since I am tierd of this post, I will only mention 1M-3M in passing. Here the 3M bidder's range is already tightly defined, so that eliminates the main value of cuebidding. Furthermore, opener is rarely good enough to bid slam on power (opposite a 10 count, openers needs to hjave opened 1M on a good 21 or so). These auctions are all about the degree of fit, since finding out if responder has a stiff is very valuable, as is the ability for opener to show a 2 suiter. Cuebidding is just not effective here.

Perhaps it means, "JDown likes to play transfers here"?

I hinted at this in my original post - I'm now keen on using the same structure in 4th, as well as 3rd. Opposite a passed hand, your no-trump ladder should be based on how high you want to be opposite a balanced maximum pass with no fit. Expects 3NT to be marginal at best Clearly wants to be in 3NT opposite a maximum pass Clearly wants to be in game opposite a hand an ace shy of opening Opposite a partner who will open almost all flat 12s but pass most flat 11s, this means playing a 14-16 NT, or something thereabouts. If you open four-card majors on weakish balanced hands, this is even more important - you can't open 1M on a balanced 14, because partner has to be able to respond 1NT on his balanced 11, over which you couldn't possibly entertain taking another call. Of course, the exact range is a function of your aggressiveness and the conditions. Vulnerable at teams, some feel it's best to pass a fair proportion of flat 12-counts, but still want to be in a thin game with 12 opposite 12. This is somewhat problematic! Yes that is the crux of my argument. I don't think the difference between 14-16 and 15-17 matters that much for competative auctions (and the exact effect is pretty complicated since it depends on how likely the opps will enter over 1N as a passed hand, and what kind of hands they pass, since opening NT makes it harder for your side to find its own fits) but in constructive bidding it isn't even close. In standard ranges, you needlessly end up in 2N down much more often then you need to here... Having a good range for 1N means that a passed hand 1N response can truely be semi-forcing e.g. No game opposite a balanced hand less than a 1N opening. This means you do not have rediculous auctions like: Qxxxx Axx Kx AJx xx Kxx xxx KQxxx 1S-1N-2C-2S (or 3C) Instead it goes, 1N-All Pass If you don't have to worry about missing game with you 5332's you can then decide to bid or not to bid over 1N based on the nature of your values (how strong is the 5 card suit/ how likely is it that 1N is the best spot) instead of based on just your point count.

You think Dean is to the left of Obama??? thats hardly clear to me. I think the media really misportrayed Dean last time, since on economic issues he was "moderate to conservative" among the democrats assuming that left/right has meaning there. e.g. a. Very pro free trade b. fiscally conservative/anti deficit spending c. "pro-business" (Contrast these with Edwards, for instance)

Scetch of Claim A: First we ignore pre-emptive openings: Seat 1 :Let me assume that the Strong Club Pair opens all 10 counts, and 1/2 of the 9 count, but nothing lighter. Seat 2: Let me assume that the Standard Pair opens all 12 counts, half the 11 counts, and nothing lighter (Feel free to redo these caculations with your own distribution here, I am just trying to approximate things). The player in Seat 1 having passed, has on average 6.19 HCP The player in Seat 2 having passed has on averqage 7.35 HCP (take a standard table of probabilities of HCP holdings, and take conditional expectations given the above assumptions) Thus player 3 has on average (40-6.19-7.35)/2=26.46/3=13.23 HCP Now you need to compute the probability of 17+ given a mean of 13.23 and compare it with 15+ given a mean of 10. to do this for real, you need to calculate the standard deviation in the 3'rd seat case (which is less than in the 1st seat case) but this has to change by an aweful lot to make up for the fact that you are 1.23 HCP closer to your objective value. Now assume pre-empts: Claim A prime: At least with relatively normal pre-emption styles, the premeptive hands that are not good enough to open 1, are better than average for the range (so that we don't pre-empt on 0's and pass with 9 or 10's, but rather we pass 0's and preempt on 9 or 10). Thus removing the premepts from the passed hand actually decreases the average number of HCP given a pass (since the preempts were better than the average pass). Hence this further increases the expected HCP in hand 3 after 2 passes. Probably the correct value, given my assumptions, is almost 13.5. Claim B: Note that 13.5 is only 1.5 short of 15, while 10 is 2 short of 12. I leave the calculations of the standard deviations as an excercise to the reader....

Define "efficient". I am not disputing the claims or even trying to be pedantic. I'm just trying to clarify what you are getting at. Efficient-"performing or functioning in the best possible manner" Now to evaluate efficiency you need a metric for "best", which in the case of bridge could be to a. maximize your score per hand (in a given scoring method) b. maximize you chance of winning a match or event (could be very different then a if you are a big favorite or underdog) c. how much fun you have, in which case ignore my claims at efficiency, since clearly playing 0-12 NTs is more fun :) I.E. An efficient method is one that is good at achiving your goals...

This actually gets more extreme if you play light openers. Without simulation results to back me up, I make the following claims: Suppose you play a 15+ strong club in 1/2, with other openings being 10-14, and you open most 10's. Suppose the opps play a standard system (rule of 20ish openers). Let P=Probability of holding a 15+ hand in first seat Let Q=Probability of holding a 17+ hand in 3rd seat, after the first 2 players pass. Claim A: Q>P, and its not even that close Claim B: In this context, after only 2 passes, a strong NT (15-17) is more common than a weak NT (12-14) [unlike standard] What hands you open in 1/2 has a big effect on the distribution of hands you have to deal with in 3/4, and thus its pretty clear that playing the exact same methods (or at least ranges) is not efficient. For instance, Claim C: If you play standard methods, and a 15-17 NT in 1/2, its actually more efficient to play 14-16 in 3/4. I will let the simulators work this one out...

It is absolutely necessary to play pass and pull as 2 places to play in this sort of auction....

Well one can say that our politicians aren't being hired to sit in comittee meetings but are instead hired to give speaches about matters of public policy-- which is exactly what they are doing on the road while campaigning. I think the truth is somewhere in between...

I don't think there is absolutely universal agreement about this but let me outline a general 2/1 approach, and point out the issues: 1. The next bid is natural E.G. 1S-2D-2H-2S 2N Slow Club values, either 5422 or 5413. Usually the range on this is like 12-14 or 18+ 3C 5413 or maybe 5404 3D 5431 or maybe 5422 with Hx in Diamonds 3H 55xx 3S Some play this as 5422 but not right for 2N. Some as 6-4. Some as promising extras. Some as denying extras. 3N Natural, but 15-17ish 4C on Qbids, serious slam tries 4M Exactly 5422 with good suits but no controls in the other suits. As you can tell there is no universal agreement here on the exact shape or the exact range shown by these bids. In traditional 2/1, 2N was the "Slow Down bid". After this bid 3N is a possible final contract. This bid indicates that the hands don't fit that well, and its more of a quantatiative auction. One Set of Agreements: In Order of priority A. With Qx or better support responders 2/1 bid (assuming it promised 5 cards) at your 3rd bid. B. With 5413 and values in the 4'th suit OTHER than the ace, bid 2N or 3N depending on range C. With 5413 and no KQJ or 5404 bid the 4'th suit D. With 5-5 in Majors show that E. With 6412 or 6421 and a good 6 card suit, but a min hand and not Hx in partner's suit, splinter F. With 5422, a min, no control in either minor, but good trumps, bid 4S G. With other hands bid 3S and things proceed like in Gitelman 2/1 There are many alternatives here: For instance I usually allow more flexibility with what you do with Hx in partner's suit so its not totally obligatory to show that feature at your 3'rd bid but rather depends some on how much you like your hand. Hxx is obligatory to show. For instance with Axxxx Kxxx Qx KJ, I prefer a slow down 2N bid to an encouraging 3D bid at your 3rd turn. In general, after 2 level trump agreement, trumps have not been firmly set unless either player rebids trumps a 3'rd time or starts qbidding at the 4 level. Otherwise, NT is a possible final contract. After all the bids above, responder can bid 3M (Serious/non-serious depending on what you play), 3N natural, 4 level q bidding.

I always was fond of this song, even if the author confuses Judas and Trotsky... Stand Up For Judas (Leon Rosselson) The Romans were the masters When Jesus walked the land In Judea and in Galilee They ruled with an iron hand The poor were sick with hunger And the rich were clothed in splendour And the rebels, whipped and crucified Hung rotting as a warning And Jesus knew the answer - "Give unto Caesar what is Caesar's" Said, "Love your enemies" But Judas was a Zealot and he Wanted to be free "Resist", he said, "the Romans' tyranny" So stand up, stand up for Judas And the cause that Judas served It was Jesus who betrayed the poor with his word Now Jesus was a conjuror, Miracles were his game He fed the hungry thousands And they glorified his name He cured the lame and leper He calmed the wind and the weather And the wretched flocked to touch him So their troubles would be taken And Jesus knew the answer - "All you who labour, all you who suffer Only believe in me" But Judas sought a world where no-one Starved or begged for bread "The poor are always with us", Jesus said Now Jesus sowed division Where none had been before Not the slave against the master But the poor against the poor Caused son to rise up against father And brother to fight against brother For "He that is not with me Is against me" was his teaching Said Jesus, "I am the answer You unbelievers shall burn forever Shall die in your sins" "Not sheep or goats" said Judas but "Together we may dare Shake off the chains of tyranny we share" Jesus stood upon the mountain With a distance in his eyes "I am the Way, the Life" he cried "The Light that never dies So renounce all earthly treasures And pray to your heavenly father" And he pacified the hopeless With the hope of life eternal Said Jesus, "I am the answer And you who hunger only remember Your reward's in heaven" So Jesus preached the other world But Judas wanted this And he betrayed his master with a kiss By sword and gun and crucifix Christ's gospel has been spread And two thousand cruel years have shown The way that Jesus led The heretics burned and tortured And the butchering bloody Crusaders The bombs and rockets sanctified That rain down death from heaven They followed Jesus, they knew the answer All unbelievers must be believers Or else be broken "So place no trust in saviours" Judas said, "for everyone Must be to his or her own self a sun"

It's lonesome away from your kindred and all By the campfire at night where the wild dingos call But there's nothin' so lonesome, so dull or so drear Than to stand in the bar of a pub with no beer Now the publican's anxious for the quota to come There's a faraway look on the face of the bum The maid's gone all cranky and the cook's acting queer What a terrible place is a pub with no beer The stockman rides up with his dry, dusty throat He breasts up to the bar, pulls a wad from his coat But the smile on his face quickly turns to a sneer When the barman says suddenly: "The pub's got no beer!" There's a dog on the verandah, for his master he waits But the boss is inside drinking wine with his mates He hurries for cover and he cringes in fear It's no place for a dog round a pub with no beer Then in comes the swagman, all covered with flies He throws down his roll, wipes the sweat from his eyes But when he is told he says, "What's this I hear? I've trudged fifty flamin' miles to a pub with no beer!" Old Billy, the blacksmith, the first time in his life Has gone home cold sober to his darling wife He walks in the kitchen; she says: "You're early, me dear" Then he breaks down and he tells her that the pub's got no beer It's lonesome away from your kindred and all By the campfire at night where the wild dingos call But there's nothin' so lonesome, so dull or so drear Than to stand in the bar of a pub with no beer

Well my opinion, which is probably out of style these days is: a. The 3N overcall established a forcing pass. Yes it might be the opps hand, but we bid game to make. b. Since pass is forcing, you normally x as penalty, and pass to invite partner to rebid 4N (or rare cases 5m if he didn't really have a stopper) if his overcall was based on a long minor, but to x if based on a balanced hand c. So you now have the sequences: 4N direct, and P then 4N available. In my mind, I think 4N direct is 2 places to play and P then 4N is a slam invite (maximum passed hand with a source of tricks, say x Axx xxx KQxxxx). If you did not have a source of tricks you would be happy defending. If 3N did not establish a forcing pass then I think 4N is natural showing something like the x Axx xxx KQxxxx hand... (I would neither open 3C nor open 1C with this Vul). I do think there is a case for bidding your 1 suit with such a hand, and bidding 4N when you have 2 suits since you have no other way of showing that. Its just that without any agreements, I think if it can be natural, it is natural.... Actually, now that I think about it, I think 4N delayed as 2 places to play is much better then 4N direct as 2 places. When partner's 3N was based on a solid 7 bagger, and you bid 4N showing 2 places before partner can show that he was 1 suited, you can't play in partner's solid suit, and you can't play in 4N (except by partner breaking discipline). On the other hand, if you pass first and partner pulls to 5m, you are happy to play there with say 6520 shape and 2 card support. Hence I think 4N direct should be "natural", although unbalanced. While 4N delayed should be 2 places to play. Of course partner being a passed hand might change what hand types partner can have, depending on the partner....

I am starting with 2D. What happens now?

Well I think I have to pass, although I am not confident about this making....

But diamond cards and club cards are not of equal worth....

Kahil Gibran from The Prophet: And a woman who held a babe against her bosom said, "Speak to us of Children." And he said: Your children are not your children. They are the sons and daughters of Life's longing for itself. They come through you but not from you, And though they are with you, yet they belong not to you. You may give them your love but not your thoughts. For they have their own thoughts. You may house their bodies but not their souls, For their souls dwell in the house of tomorrow, which you cannot visit, not even in your dreams. You may strive to be like them, but seek not to make them like you. For life goes not backward nor tarries with yesterday. You are the bows from which your children as living arrows are sent forth. The archer sees the mark upon the path of the infinite, and He bends you with His might that His arrows may go swift and far. Let your bending in the archer's hand be for gladness; For even as he loves the arrow that flies, so He loves also the bow that is stable.

I hope I am not being offensive here, but I would like to know something, whilst I accept what you say is probally correct from your prospective, what do you teach your children as a balancing view on religion say "percentage wise" how much of other religious view points do you put into a positive light for that child to make a concious decision and where do you tell them that they need to make a decision about what religion they may want to follow of their own choice Yeah, this is hard. Especially since some religions/belief systems involve the idea that all others are very wrong. Hopefully, your belief system is more enlightened so you can teach your child the value of your religion while also teaching your child that there are other ways to live. This is a big difference between religions. Jews, for instance, believe that non Jews can be good people and can go to heaven. In fact, the main difference is that Jews have more rules thay have to follow. God told us how to live a good life, but it involes more work in order to get the rewards. Some religions fundamentally believe that people from other religions can't go to heaven. that creates a much larger obstical to teaching your children pluralistic ideas...

Yes granted, but it is a serious question I am a non believer and by that I mean, I do not beleive in the existance of God, any God for that matter and I accept that people are entitled to thier beliefs and I respect that, it is their belief, even though I actually believe that the same people, if their parents were Muslims or Quakers or Jehovahs witnesses, then that is what their belief would be you see what I am trying to get at is, that children will follow in their parents footsteps, how many Muslim kids brought up, suddenly change to Judism or Catholosism aged 18. is it not fair to say once brought up in a religion then that is what you bec ome and that main point I am making is that THere is no choice for these kids, their parents make them what they are the same applies to a lesser degree with politics and perhaps more so for racist views I also disagree with Dr Todd that it is an offensive question, it is a question he may feel uncomfortable with but it is a question and that is all it is as for a dangerous suggestion, why is it a dangerous suggestion (perhaps because you do not like the possible answers) ? Yeah, but my point is how many kids not brought up on anything become jewish later. In fact, there is a whole spectrum of beliefs and practices, but those that "choose judiasm" as an adult usually end up at one of the extremes, and I don't think thats an accident. Try going to a Conservative or Orthodox service and see if you have any idea what is going on. There is an extreme selection bias here becomes someone has to put many years of effort (as an adult) to be able to get much out of the experience and they have to decide to put this effort in before they see the value of the experience. Hence it hardly ever happens. In general, you can't choose to do something that you were never taught how to do. Christianity does not involve nearly that much work, but there still is stuff to learn. Someone can't choose between playing baseball and soccer without playing enough baseball and soccer to be able to value the experience. Religion is even more complex since religous behavior involves every second of your life. As my mother likes saying the fundamental goal of a religous life is to make every moment holy, to recognize the presence of the divine in every moment and in every action that we take. This is not just about where we go on the weekend and what prayers we say.

But if you immerse them in Jewish life you are depriving them of the chance to be immersed in, say, a Buddhist life. As to the OP, rather than not expose children to any religious or political beliefs, it would be better to expose them to as many religious and political beliefrs as possible. This is really the only way to allow them to make an enlightened choice. And as a bonus it will tend to steer them away from the more extrem viewpoints. That is correct. It is not possible to offer all possible lifes to your child. You can offer them: a Nothing b A Choice between Nothing and Judiasm c. A choice between Budism and Judiasm and Nothing (where Budism and Judiasm are tought less in depth, and you can't possibly be immersed since you are learning a competing set of practices and beliefs) Its of course possible that you can teach your child more then one thing. but you can't teach everything. This is like telling me that I should not teach my child to speak english because what if my child prefers french, and I am forcing english on him/her.... Teaching your child something usually gives them a choice, teaching them nothing usualy does not offer a choice.... As to your more the merrier. Its nice to say that, and I am all for exposing people to more things, but there is a big difference between the 30 second cartoon version of ideas/lifestyles and actually teaching them about these things. You certainly can't teach someone how to live a jewish life as part of a survey of religions, and I don't think budism is that much easier. Having said all that, I used to be a part of a weekly inter-religous discussion group back when I lived in DC (discussion once a week and visited one of the members house of worship once a month) and that was a very edjucational experience (although I can't say what its like to live my life immersed in a different religion). I have always thought that pluralism was a good thing. But I don't think you can ever escape Rousseau's Paradox of Freedom....

Boy thats a loaded question. Speaking as a jew, you can't very easily just one day say "I am interested in judiasm, let me decide to be a jew." In order for my child to have any idea if they like judiasm, they need an immersion in jewish life, which involves lots of work (and probably requires learning Hebrew). Fundamental to judiasm (as oppossed to chistianity) is the notion that "from actions come beliefs". there is an emphasis on what you do, not on what you beleive, just as there is much more of an emphesis on this world, as oppossed to the next... Anyway, lets temporarily ignore the ritualistic issues and the behavioral issues associated with "beliefs", although I fundamentally think you can't ignore those. How can you not teach values and ideas to your kids? If you tell you child to not hit your neighbor's kid you are imparting values. Everything you do or say carries moral content, and typically political content as well. Whether you say "I always vote for republicans because they believe in traditional family values" or just merely teach those values to your kids or merely act according to those values your actions will have a similar impact on your child. I you beat your child that will impart values. If you instead talk to your child that imparts values. This is not to say that your children's beliefs will be wholy determined by your "actions" but it does have influence...So I think the question is close to meaningless.

Gerben mentioned the mayor reason. And depending on the laws, the bank will get the house and sell it, but this does not mean (!), that you got rid of your complete loan, at least in Germany you still owe the bank the missing money, ... unless you declare your self bancrupt, which requires that you make your finnacial situation public, and you are under surveilance for a couple of years. With kind regards Marlowe PS: And of course you may not get your house back at a cheap price. Afterall an auction is open to all. It doesn't work this way in the US. There are two types of foreclosures: Judicial and Non-Judicial. A Non-Judicial foreclosure is used in 99% of the cases. The property is put on the auction block and the bank can bid up to the value of its loan + costs. It is a relatively quick process - 4-5 months, but the bank can't go back after the borrower for any shortage. The property is the only security for the loan, the bank can't go back and get a 'default judgment'. If after the property sells and the bank still hasn't collected its loan, its SOL. Rarely, the bank will have a huge shortfall, and the borrower will have a significant financial statement where it pays to go back and get a judgment for the balance. This assumes the loan documents allow it, and the borrower has something to go after. It is also a much slower process, since the 'judicial' foreclosure doesn't get any priority on the court calendar, so it can take 18 months or so. Actually there are two distinctions: Judicial vs Non-Judicial Forclosures is one The other is Recourse vs Non-Recourse loans You sort have combined the two into one idea The standard mortgage contract is a recourse contract. That is you have borrowed $X and have agreed to pay this money back. If you do not, the bank lays claim (holding a lien) to your property and sells it. Giving them your property does not eliminate there claim for $X. If you borrow 200K, and they foreclose, and sell the property for 150K you can still sue for a definciency settlement for the other 50K. Now having said that, this doesn't happen much for two reasons: 1. Most of the western states (including CA) passed laws back in the depression against definciency claims on home mortgages. These laws effectively convert to mortgage contract from a Recourse to a Non-Recourse loans. Note though that these laws really are mostly in the western US. 2. Most people who default don't have any money, so its a waste of time and money (legal costs) to go after them.... For Judicial vs Non-Judicial see: http://www.all-foreclosure.com/judicial.htm Its really mostly about the forclosure process (and property auction process) and disposition of the property and not about the debt. BTW, if you look at: http://www.all-foreclosure.com/procedures.htm It will tell you in which states its possible to get deficiency judgements.

I thought most people die immediately after their 40'th birthday??

I confess that this makes some sense to me. But, in practice, is this working as advertised? Lenders and borrowers have their self-interests, I have mine, different from theirs but common, I think, to many. Namely, I don't want to see a collapse of the system. My mortgage is paid off, my kids have fixed rate mortgages that will be paid off in the not so distant future. So my personal stake here is let's not sink the ship. Home ownership is good for the owners and good for the country. I favor it. Debt beyond what a person can handle is good for no one. I bought a townhouse in 1970. It cost around 28K but of course we have to scale this for inflation. What is important, or seems to me to be important, is that after I put up my 20% or so down payment I was left with a mortgage that was in the neighborhood of twice my annual salary. Banks expected something like that. As I built up equity and moved into a house I think the mortgage was maybe three times my annual salary. But banks didn't go much beyond that. Now it appears to me folks are, or were, getting mortgages with little or no down payment and in amounts that may be seven or eight or more times their salary and then they run up credit card debt that astounds me. Out with the old, in with the new, but I find it hard to believe that this is sustainable and, from what I am reading, we are about to find out that it isn't. In a phrase, this risk that they are so fond of spreading around seems to be spreading to me and to all of us. I don't wish anyone ill but I also do not wish to be dragged down by their wild speculations. I imagine the fact that people ran up debt they could not handle and banks made loans they should not have made is going to cost me some money. It's the breaks, I guess, but I don't like it. I doubt that anyone disagrees with you. But what has been going on recently is three things: a. housing prices have skyrocketed in recent years (particularly on the coasts). The ratio of home price to rent rose around 40% this decade to its peak 2 years ago. This is of course unsustainable (this ratio should be in equilibrium long term) but created a bubble effect: a1. some people saw prices going up and "speculated" hoping to make a profit a2. others saw prices going up, were afraid that they were going to be priced out of the market if it kept going up, so they bought even though they really could not afford the homes (its just they felt they really really could not affod it in a year or two) these behaviors kept price demand from reaching a natural equilibrium and let prices way overshoot there intrinsic value. b. While home ownership is clearly a good thing, too many people got lent money who couldn't really afford it. There is lots of blame to be spread around. Lets suffice it to say when there are many people involved in any enterprise, there interests will not be completely aligned, so borrowers, brokers, appraisers, loan originators, investors, mortgage servicers etc all have different interests... as does the president of any company and the folks who work for it, so the worker bees may want to sell mortgages that are not really in the company's best interest to sell. c. after the housing market began to soften, and mortgage defaults began to rise, there was an over-reaction in the investment community, which pulled a lot of money out of the mortgage market and made conditions even worse (its for isntance much harder to get a jumbo loan now, and the rates have gone up even for people with perfect credit).