Protestors enter Bear Stearns building in New York

[Tiberius]

Source: Reuters

NEW YORK (Reuters) - About 60 protesters opposed to the U.S. Federal Reserve's help in bailing out Bear Stearns entered the lobby of the investment bank's Manhattan headquarters on Wednesday, demanding assistance for struggling homeowners.

Demonstrators organized by the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America chanted "Help Main Street, not Wall Street" and entered the lobby without an invitation for around half an hour before being escorted out by police.

(snip)

Bear Stearns employees were amused and perplexed, some taking pictures. One man in the lobby applauded.

"Homeowners, that's more than $1 trillion (in mortgage debt), you're crazy," another man in a suit screamed at a protester on the street.

Read more: http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/080326/bearstearns_protest.html

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I'm not in favor of bailing out anybody, but I'm hopeful that the pitchforks and torches will come out anyway!

[angstlessk]

1. homeowners 1 trillion all at once...,bail out of wall street 250 billion 5 times

sorry wall street has 15 trillion in derivatives just waiting to default...

[Robbien]

2. Good move by the protesters.

They got a lot of air time on CNBC so were able to make sure everyone in the business elite and the Bush Admin aware that the "little" people are not happy with handing our cash over to Wall Street billionaires while we are erecting tent cities.

[Nutmegger]

3. R&K [n\t]

[darue]

4. bailout for 'mortgage-owners' my ass. they signed the contract, they can't read? tough shit

if you can't afford the rate reset, too damn bad they were stupid enough to sign up for that deal. If they're going to bail these dumb-shits out I DEMAND I be permitted to go back and get me one of these loans so I can get bailed out too! I KNEW what would happen with the rate resets and avoided, now my tax payments are supposed to go help people who took the risk and lost? madness.

You want to start a real welfare program with usefully sized monthly cash payments to the needy? FINE!

but don't for god's sake reward the stupid for buying houses they can't afford. forfucksake

bear sterns should be left to fail too

[Doctor Cynic]

5. They call them "liar loans" for good reason.

We had salesmen descending on poorer parts of town and trumpeting that you could live the American Dream with no down payment and low interest rates.

Don't have a decent job? Let's make one up for you! Let's pretend you're making $70K anyways!

Okay? Quick! Quick! Sign here and the house is yours!

So the brokers got rich by suckering people into taking out loans they know have a high chance of default, then they package those mortgages together, sneaks them past the credit agencies, and send them off to a bank vault somewhere.

I hope the SEC or whoever is responsible ensures those fraudulent brokers go straight to jail without collecting $200.

In the meantime the banks should be bailed out only if they hand over a large share to the government so taxpayers can benefit when they recover.

In Soviet Russia they had a joke that the factory workers pretend to work, and the factory boss pretends to pay them.

Here we have sleazy brokers pretending to sell suckers a house, and they pretend to pay the mortgage.