Infuriated over the mortgage bailout

Apparently the only place we read about the negligence and unquenched greed of the bankers is in the letters to the editor section. The bankers and their mortgage broker accomplices have committed fraud upon the American people.

The commercial banks, the investment banks and the government conspired to line their own pockets at the expense of every American. Now that the banks can't find their way out of the mess without bankruptcy and financial ruin, the federal government is going to bail them out. And who bails out the federal government? Us. All of us. We are going to pay to clean up this mess.

Is this not stealing from those of us who saw through the fraud and refused to enter into such tenuous and fragile schemes? Not to mention those that bought into it and are now teetering on the brink. These are families and old people and those working poor who just wanted a better life.

The bankers and their cohorts took every advantage and used every trick to steal their money and leave them in the lurch, while they walked away with bulging wallets and no responsibility. The U.S. government allowed this to happen by failing to properly regulate the bankers.

What household of four, earning $36,000 per year, can afford to pay off a $300,000 interest-only mortgage for the first five years, with a $30,000 balloon payment and an adjustable rate?

No one, that's who. But the bankers got their "interest only" money, at least until the family went bust.

Where is the outrage of the silent majority? Where are the regulators that were supposed to oversee these offerings? Where are the criminal prosecutions?

And where, dear Mr. Editor, are the investigative reporters? Not "sexy" enough for you? Raymond P. Donahue Thousand Oaks