Farewell, Personal Responsibility. We Hardly Knew Ye.

This could be the most aggravating, frustrating, and saddening thing I have read in quite some time. Maybe ever. I haven't posted much about the "housing credit crisis", mainly because I believe it is rude to laugh at people. Well, my patience has officially worn out because of attitudes like this:

Sinclair: If they reduced our interest rate back to 4.25, we might be able to make the payments, but I don't think we're going to.
Vigeland: Now, why not?

Sinclair: We would do it if the equity was there, but in a case where we're already so behind... Imagine that for five years, say, we're gonna pay four grand a month and then we're just gonna be back up at what we bought the house for. We feel like we're throwing away money.

The Sinclairs say they want to take responsibility for their debts, but right now it makes more financial sense not to.

Sinclair: I mean, you ask a good question. Is it really the right thing to do to let the mortgage companies take up the difference? That's a really tough ethical question.

Dan says he experienced the various stages of grief, including denial and anger. Now he's just relieved.

Sinclair: We went through months of being skinflints, because we knew that we were going into the red, so we didn't buy anything. All the sudden, we had a bank full of money and we're living rent-free, but we know that's not really our money.

Vigeland: How does that feel?

Esmeralda Sinclair: Great! Like he said, we were so tight with money...

Dan: It does feel great, because all the sudden, we feel like we have a little margin now where we can go out to dinner, get a babysitter...

Vigeland: But you're not paying your mortgage. You're not paying the biggest obligation you have. How does that feel good?

Esmeralda: We already went through the guilt. This is really what we need to do, not what we wanted to do, but what we need to do.

You know, when historians look back at the collapse of America in the 21st century, this will be the reason. Historians may not be able to figure it out, but the fact is that attitudes like this are the reason that America will fail. America used to be the greatest country on earth because of our values and responsibility, but we have clearly lost our way. This is really really sad. How do these freaking people sleep at night? The people are walking piles of human debris, and they do not deserve to be sucking air. Hopefully there is a comet screaming toward Earth to bring us sweet relief. A person can hope.

One last question, what about those of us who have PAID our mortgages on time (with extra principle every time)? Where's our handout? Where's our ability to live rent (and apparently GUILT) free?

Die in a fire, farkwads.