Sixty Four

Sixty four, the number of notices of default under a deed of trust, listed just this Friday in the Elk Grove Citizen newspaper.

They, the banks trying to collect, are apparently required to post these defaults a minimum of three times in a legal notice section of any newspaper. The Sacramento Bee doesn't carry any, probably because at $5 a line times 85 lines...well, you get the idea.

Now, more interestingly, take a look at the names of my sixty four defaulting neighbors: Gilda Sajul, Angela Barta, Richard Reyes, Geneveive Barber, Robert Sankey, Garrey Lemonte, Carmen Frey, Mahjabeen Akhtar, Aileen Moun, Cristina Cobain, George Smith, Esperanza Johnson, Sanjani Singh, Kendall Simmons, Salvador Nieves, Tom Donaldson, Rommel Evangelista, Viola Hansen, Carlos Contreras-Gomez, Alberto Gotladera, Edgard Corea, Tarlok Singh, Gloria Sinlao, Rakeshwar Ram, Ariel Obisbo, Sanj Jung, Nikolay Kosachevich, Trina Thi Vina Nguyen, Pagette Aduna, Loanne Nguyen...well, you get the idea.

So that I'm not coined a "coward" by our Attorney General, let me openly discuss race here on the Monologues. Let me be frank...there aren't too many white people defaulting. Why would that be, huh?

Whites comprise 59% of the Elk Grovian population. Actually, a fairly low percentage, compared to, say, Omaha, Nebraska. But looking at these names...they ain't white. Not even close. Well, OK, George Smith is probably as white a name as you can possibly come up with, but you can see my point. My defaulting neighbors are predominately brown.

I can take two viewpoints on this. One, that brown people were taken advantage of, were duped by white bankers, forced into mortgages they knew they couldn't pay but the white underwriter made her commission and that's all that mattered. Or two, these brown people were themselves unscrupulous, flipping houses and buying Mercedes and vacationing in Las Vegas and gambling until sunrise and fucking their relatives out of their life savings and buying designer clothing and binging on Grey Goose and communicating via Blackberry and navigating via OnStar... and...and...and...

If I have no way to determine who's at "fault," how the fuck will the federal government know? Should I bail out each class of clowns? Apparently so. Remember, we need to do everything we can to stop the tide of foreclosures in this nation, and if it means taxing the prudent (me) to support the imprudent (you), well so be it.

I'll tell you, with full sincerity, that every group of arriving immigrants is just as enamored with unearned riches as is white America. While my white America might get away with a hell of a lot more, nonetheless, everyone is rotten to the core. I've got Georgian and Bangladeshi and Iranian and Lebanese co-workers who are every much as starry-eyed about hoarding wealth and owning four luxury cars and living in three houses and growing rich as any native white guy.

Unearned riches is a fundamental tenant of America, regardless of the color of your skin.