Analysts predict the Fed will trim its key rate, now at 4.5 %, by one-quarter of a percentage point at that time. A few even speculate about the possibility of a half-point cut.
What are Vegas oddsmakers saying about an interest rate cut?....
Former Vegas oddsmaker Wayne Allen Root says odds for a rate cut are as follows:
25% pt 1 to10
50% pt 3 to 2
1% pt 10 to 1
No Cut 100 to 1(CNN)
So based on the odds we will see something come from todays
Coinciding with President Bush's Rate Increase break, a recent poll showed that 51% of Americans think that homeowners facing Foreclosure should be given special treatment (CNN).
Jessie Jackson has even entered the frey and his Rainbow Coalition asked the business community to help out. Jackson argues that Bush's plan helps those that are current, but not people in the NOD process right now. I am not sure how the business community can help, but I do get nervous when our nations political brain trust start getting involved. Before long they are competing in an orgy of giveaways.
Which brings me to an interesting quote I recently read in Cigar Aficionado Magazine(Dec '07 pg 86) by Tom Selleck. This was not in the context of the SubPrime mess at all. But I think his take is interesting and is worth mentioning in light of today's mortgage mess.
"...when people move from convincing to mandates, it's not my deal. And I don't think that is what a free society is about. Government has a function in educating but not in propagandizing, and that is not a simple world. The world is messier. That world allows for human failure and that world allows for messy solutions, which we ought to get really comfortable with if we want to stay free. It's real simple to practically abolish speeding if you apply the death penalty to it......is what they should be most grateful for in a free society is the right to fail...and if you do not have the right to fail and you're protected from failure, you can't truly succeed. You're stuck in that great gray middle where you are giving up responsibilities for perceived benefits that come from a government, and that's a slipper slope. I think free society is supposed to be messier than that".
