Obama Housing Fix: Live in Your Car

I’m seldom political-I’m a capitalist, not a ideologue- and while I like President Obama, I have to say that I am incredibly disappointed by the State of the Union speech this evening for one good reason: he barely touched on housing or what he’d do to fix the industry. It is among our biggest problems and he barely went there.  I could also do without the camera on the person Mr Obama was just about to mention, because it made the whole thing seem like a choreographed effort between journalists and politicians, but I guess that’s nothing new. 

It was a grand speech and he’s a marvelous rhetoritician. There were some inspiring things he said. I agree that the American worker is the best in the world. I love the commitment to freedom around the world, and agree that nation building should start in our own back yard. But where I feel let down is the very brief minutes discussing housing that followed his patting himself on the back for the recovery of the auto industry.

What good is importing cars to Korea when you can’t pay off your mortgage with the offer on your home? There was one promise to help people reduce their principle or be able to refinance withour red tape, and that was met with a heartbreakingly tepid response from the chamber. I shook my head. 

GM is the largest auto maker int he world. Swell. I guess we should just have millions of at risk homeowners who have no equity and no straight forward way out live in their cars instead. That might as well have been the solution. It was a 75 minute campaign speech with 90 seconds devoted to our most pressing issue, housing. 

We deserve better. They aren’t listening to us.